Route reliability record
PWM→EWR
Portland to Newark
- Flights
- 1,095
- Period
- July 2025 to June 2026
- Distance
- 284 mi
- Carriers
- 2
This route carries a cancellation problem, not just a delay problem: 3.8% of scheduled flights never operate, against 1.8% nationally. Of the ones that do fly, more than four flights in five arrive on time, worth a B− overall. The punctuality figure counts only flights that actually departed, so it flatters an operation that cancels this often. That rests on 1,095 PWM to EWR flights, with a median arrival 12 minutes early.
Best time to fly PWM to EWR: a 5am–8am departure, ideally on a Friday. Flights in that window arrived on time 86.3% of the time and Friday flights 86.6%, against 83.1% for the route overall.
Set against the rest of the country, this route's record is 6 points better than the US average of 77.6%. That gap is worth roughly 55 fewer late arrivals for every thousand flights.
Key figures
On time
83.1%
Arrivals under 15 minutes late, of 1,052 completed flights
Avg delay
96 min
Across delayed arrivals only, not all flights
Cancelled
3.84%
National rate is 1.81%
Best carrier
Republic
82.4% on time across 944 flights
These figures cover 1,095 flights between July 2025 and June 2026. The median arrival is 12 minutes early, which is the part an average hides: most flights here are fine, and the on-time rate is decided by a tail of badly late ones. On-time means under 15 minutes late, the DOT's own threshold.
Carrier by carrier
Which airline is most reliable on PWM to EWR
Only one carrier clears this site's 365-flight floor here, so there is no comparison to draw. The table below is the full picture.
| Airline | Flights | On time | Avg delay | Cancelled | Grade |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| United Airlinesthin sample | 151 | 87.4% | 112 min | 5.30% | A− |
| Republic Airways | 944 | 82.4% | 95 min | 3.60% | B− |
Best ways to make this trip
The most reliable ways to fly Portland to Newark
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. 1 of the top 2 use a different airport at one end.
| Option | Airline | Success | On time | Cancelled | Best departure | Most punctual flight |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1. PWM → EWRPortland to Newark | Republic Airways | 79.4% | 82.4% | 3.60% | 5am–8am, Wed | — |
| 2. PWM → LGAPortland to New York | Republic Airways | 77.8% | 81.4% | 4.43% | 8am–11am, Sat (route) | — |
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 14 points, against half a point between the best and worst carrier. Each bar is the on-time rate for flights scheduled inside that window.
- 5am–8am387 flights86.3%
- 8am–11am226 flights85.6%
- 11am–2pm90 flights85.6%
- 2pm–5pm265 flights77.8%
- 5pm–8pm68 flights72.1%
- 8pm–5am59 flights84.2%
Scale runs 65% to 90%. Rows with fewer than 30 flights show a dash.
Book the early departure. Flights leaving between 5am–8am arrive on time 86.3% of the time, against 72.1% for the evening window. That is 14 points of difference for no extra money, and it comes from the same aircraft having had no earlier flight to fall behind on. The 5am–8am window is the busiest, with 387 flights scheduled in it.
Across the year
When delays peak on this route
This route's year swings by 20 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 76.9% on time, 20 points below February, the best at 96.4%. 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. October was the busiest month here, with 135 flights.
Across the week, Friday is the strongest day at 86.6% on time and Monday the weakest at 78.2%. 8 points is a smaller lever than departure hour, but it is free.
Delay causes
Why this route gets delayed
One category carries most of the weight here. National Airspace System accounts for 50% of the 17,000 delay minutes carriers reported, and the remaining four split what is left. The split is by minutes rather than by flights, so a few very long delays count for as much as many short ones.
- 50%National Airspace System
- 24%Carrier
- 21%Late-arriving aircraft
- 5%Extreme weather
50% 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 8,495 minutes out of 17,000, against a national NAS share of 21%. The split is drawn from 17,128 reported delay minutes.
Cancellations run at 3.84%, against 1.81% nationally. That is about one flight in 25 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
7.3% of arrivals land an hour or more late, close to the national 8.1%. That is the figure that decides a connection, and it says a 60 to 75 minute layover is reasonable here while anything under 45 minutes is a bet. Most delays on this route last an hour and a half, which a normal layover absorbs.
At 284 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 81.9% on time across 984 flights, within about a point 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 1,095 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 EWR after this flight
What to do with this
Booking this route
Put together: the delay figures matter less here than the 3.84% cancellation rate. A late arrival costs you an hour and a half; 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. 1,052 completed flights over 12 months sit behind that.
Common questions
PWM to EWR questions
How often is PWM to EWR delayed?
About one flight in six arrives at least 15 minutes late, which is the Department of Transportation's definition of a delayed arrival. That works out to 16.9% of the 1,095 flights in this analysis, against 22.4% nationally. Delayed flights are late by an hour and a half on average.
How reliable is PWM to EWR compared with the rest of the country?
83.1% of flights arrive on time here against a national 77.6%, a difference of 6 points in its favour. That is worth a B− on this site's grading scale.
What time of day has the fewest delays on PWM to EWR?
The 5am–8am departure window is the strongest at 86.3% on time. The 5pm–8pm window is the weakest at 72.1%, 14 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 PWM to EWR?
July is the weakest month at 76.9% on time, compared with 96.4% in February. Across the year that is 20 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
- EWR to PWM — the return legseparate record
- Newark Liberty International (EWR) delay statistics
- United Airlines on PWM to EWR87.4%
- Republic Airways on PWM to EWR82.4%
- PWM to ORD, a related route77.2%
- MCO to EWR, a related route73.8%
- PWM to BWI, a related route81.8%
- United Airlines on-time record87.4%
- Republic Airways on-time record82.4%
- The US routes with the most cancellations
- What a cancellation rate actually tells you (and what it hides)
Direction matters. PWM to EWR and EWR to PWM 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, July 2025 to June 2026. Last updated 15 September 2026; recomputed monthly. How this data is collected.