Route reliability record
PVD→DCA
Providence to Washington
- Flights
- 2,426
- Period
- September 2025 to August 2026
- Distance
- 356 mi
- Carriers
- 5
This route carries a cancellation problem, not just a delay problem: 5.5% of scheduled flights never operate, against 1.9% nationally. Of the ones that do fly, about seven flights in ten arrive on time, worth a C− overall. The punctuality figure counts only flights that actually departed, so it flatters an operation that cancels this often. That rests on 2,426 PVD to DCA flights, of which Southwest Airlines flew 670 at 76.8% on time.
Best time to fly PVD to DCA: a 5am–8am departure, ideally on a Saturday. Flights in that window arrived on time 87.9% of the time and Saturday flights 81.7%, against 71.0% for the route overall.
Southwest Airlines is the most reliable of the three carriers covered here at 76.8% on time across 670 flights.
Key figures
On time
71.0%
Arrivals under 15 minutes late, of 2,278 completed flights
Avg delay
77 min
Across delayed arrivals only, not all flights
Cancelled
5.52%
National rate is 1.89%
Best carrier
Southwest
76.8% on time across 670 flights
These figures cover 2,426 flights between September 2025 and August 2026. Beyond the headline rate, 9.7% of arrivals land a full hour or more behind schedule, against 8.3% nationally.
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Carrier by carrier
Which airline is most reliable on PVD to DCA
The choice of carrier is not cosmetic here. Southwest Airlines arrives on time 76.8% of the time; PSA Airlines manages 66.1%. Sample sizes sit next to every figure, because a two-point gap across 1,062 flights means less than a ten-point one.
| Airline | Flights | On time | Avg delay | Cancelled | Grade |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Envoy Airthin sample | 42 | 85.7% | 23 min | 0.00% | A+ |
| Southwest Airlines | 670 | 76.8% | 61 min | 2.09% | B |
| Republic Airwaysthin sample | 202 | 73.9% | 60 min | 8.42% | C− |
| American Airlines | 450 | 70.8% | 59 min | 3.33% | C− |
| PSA Airlines | 1,062 | 66.1% | 95 min | 8.29% | C− |
PSA Airlines cancels 8.3% of what it schedules here, the highest in the table. A cancelled flight never appears in an on-time rate, so read that column alongside the punctuality one rather than after it.
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Best ways to make this trip
The most reliable ways to fly Providence to Washington
Every airline on this route and on the routes between nearby airports, ranked by how often a scheduled flight actually operated and arrived on time. 4 of the top 5 use a different airport at one end.
| Option | Airline | Success | On time | Cancelled | Best departure | Most punctual flight |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1. PVD → BWIProvidence to Baltimore | Southwest Airlines | 85.2% | 86.9% | 1.95% | 5am–8am, Wed | — |
| 2. BOS → IADBoston to Washington | United Airlines | 81.4% | 83.3% | 2.28% | 5am–8am, Sat (route) | UA 1734 05:45 |
| 3. BOS → BWIBoston to Baltimore | Republic Airways | 78.3% | 81.8% | 4.28% | 5am–8am, Thu | YX 5644 17:25 |
| 4. PVD → DCAProvidence to Washington | Southwest Airlines | 75.2% | 76.8% | 2.09% | 5am–8am, Wed | — |
| 5. BOS → BWIBoston to Baltimore | Southwest Airlines | 75.0% | 76.8% | 2.32% | 5am–8am, Tue | — |
Success is the share of scheduled flights that operated and arrived less than 15 minutes late, so a cancelled flight counts against it. “(route)” means the best time comes from every carrier on the route rather than this airline alone.
Departure window
The best time of day to leave
Departure time matters more here than the choice of carrier. The gap between the best and worst window is 30 points, against 11 points between the best and worst carrier.
- 5am–8am457 flights87.9%
- 8am–11am446 flights85.4%
- 11am–2pm365 flights64.6%
- 2pm–5pm460 flights63.9%
- 5pm–8pm562 flights58.0%
- 8pm–5am136 flights58.9%
Scale runs 50% to 95%.
The 5pm–8pm window is where this operation falls apart: 58.0% on time, against 87.9% for the 5am–8am slot. By evening the aircraft flying these rotations have absorbed a full day of small delays and there is no slack left to recover in. The 5pm–8pm window is the busiest, with 562 flights scheduled in it.
Explore
Filter PVD to DCA by airline, time, month and day
Pick a breakdown and a carrier. The dashed mark on each row is the same slice for every US flight.
On PVD to DCA, the best departure window is 5am–8am at 87.9% on time and the worst is 5pm–8pm at 58.0%, a wide gap of 29.9 points. All US flights leaving 5am–8am ran 89.3%.
- 5–8am87.9%
- 8–11am85.4%
- 11am–2pm64.6%
- 2–5pm63.9%
- 5–8pm58.0%
- 8pm–5am58.9%
best all US flightsScale 50% to 95%.
Across the year
When delays peak on this route
This route's year swings by 21 points from best month to worst, which is wide. An annual average tells you very little about the week you are actually flying, so read the strip rather than the headline if your dates are fixed.
July is the worst month at 60.6% on time, 21 points below October, the best at 81.6%. Summer afternoon convection and peak-season schedules land on the same weeks every year, so this is a pattern you can book around rather than a run of bad luck. September was the busiest month here, with 222 flights.
Across the week, Saturday is the strongest day at 81.7% on time and Friday the weakest at 66.3%, a spread of 15 points.
Delay causes
Why this route gets delayed
Late-arriving aircraft accounts for 52% of the 51,000 delay minutes carriers reported here, and the remaining four split what is left.
- 52%Late-arriving aircraft
- 34%National Airspace System
- 13%Carrier
- 1%Extreme weather
- 0%Security
52% of delay minutes trace back to a late-arriving aircraft, meaning the plane was already behind before it got here. Across 51,000 reported delay minutes here, that single category outweighs weather by 52 to one. The split is drawn from 50,880 reported delay minutes.
34% of delay minutes are charged to the National Airspace System: air traffic volume, runway configuration, ground stops. No carrier can price its way out of that, which is why airport choice moves the number here more than carrier choice does. That is 17,000 minutes out of 51,000, against a national NAS share of 21%.
Cancellations run at 5.52%, against 1.89% nationally. That is roughly one flight in twenty cancelled outright. A cancelled flight is invisible in every on-time figure on this page, so the punctuality numbers above describe only the flights that actually operated.
Connections and stage length
What a delay here actually costs
9.7% of arrivals land a full hour or more behind schedule, against 8.3% nationally. Ninety minutes is the honest minimum for a connection here, and two hours if the onward flight is on a separate ticket.
At 356 miles this is a short hop, and stage length matters more than it looks. A flight this short spends under two hours in the air, which leaves almost nothing to claw back a late pushback with. Delay here is decided on the ground, in the turn, which is why the 5am–8am window matters as much as it does.
The return leg runs 72.5% on time across 2,426 flights, within 2 points of this direction. The two legs are scored separately because they usually differ; on this city pair they happen not to.
The sample behind these figures is 2,426 flights, enough that the headline rate is stable to within roughly a point. The hour-block and month splits divide that further, so read the thinner bars with more caution than the headline.
Work out the risk of missing a connection in DCA after this flight
What to do with this
Booking this route
Put together: the delay figures matter less here than the 5.52% cancellation rate. A late arrival costs you a little over an hour; a cancelled flight costs you the day. Book the 5am–8am departure so there is still a schedule behind you if it goes wrong, and treat a same-day connection as optimistic. 2,278 completed flights over 12 months sit behind that.
Common questions
PVD to DCA questions
How often is PVD to DCA delayed?
Roughly one flight in three arrives at least 15 minutes late, which is the Department of Transportation's definition of a delayed arrival. That works out to 29.0% of the 2,426 flights in this analysis, against 22.7% nationally. Delayed flights are late by a little over an hour on average.
Which airline is most reliable on PVD to DCA?
Southwest Airlines leads at 76.8% on time across 670 flights. PSA Airlines is at the other end on 66.1%, a gap of 11 points. Sample size matters as much as the percentage: a rate built from a few hundred flights moves around far more than one built from ten thousand.
What time of day has the fewest delays on PVD to DCA?
The 5am–8am departure window is the strongest at 87.9% on time. The 5pm–8pm window is the weakest at 58.0%, 30 points behind. Later departures inherit delays from earlier flights the same aircraft has already flown, which is why the curve slopes the way it does.
How bad are July delays on PVD to DCA?
July is the weakest month at 60.6% on time, compared with 81.6% in October. Across the year that is 21 points between the best and worst months. Moving flexible dates out of that month is one of the few things that reliably helps.
Related
Where to go next
- DCA to PVD — the return legseparate record
- Ronald Reagan Washington National (DCA) delay statistics
- Southwest Airlines on PVD to DCA76.8%
- Republic Airways on PVD to DCA73.9%
- American Airlines on PVD to DCA70.8%
- PSA Airlines on PVD to DCA66.1%
- PVD to BWI, a related route86.9%
- BOS to DCA, a related route72.6%
- PVD to ORD, a related route74.5%
- Envoy Air on-time record85.7%
- Southwest Airlines on-time record76.8%
- Republic Airways on-time record73.9%
- The US routes with the most cancellations
- Same route, different airline: where the carrier you pick matters most
Direction matters. PVD to DCA and DCA to PVD are scored separately because they are separate operations, with different departure banks and different aircraft. Compare the return leg.
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Source: US DOT Bureau of Transportation Statistics, on-time performance data, September 2025 to August 2026. Last updated ; recomputed monthly. How this data is collected.