Route reliability record
SBN→ATL
South Bend to Atlanta
- Flights
- 1,030
- Period
- September 2025 to August 2026
- Distance
- 566 mi
- Carriers
- 2
This route lands a B, about a point worse than the national rate of 77.3%. About one flight in four arrives 15 minutes late or worse, and those flights are late by close to two hours on average. That rests on 1,030 SBN to ATL flights, with a median arrival 9 minutes early.
Best time to fly SBN to ATL: a 5am–8am departure, ideally on a Thursday. Flights in that window arrived on time 82.3% of the time and Thursday flights 85.2%, against 76.5% for the route overall.
The US average over the same twelve months is 77.3%, so there is little to separate this route from the country as a whole. The variation that matters here is internal: which carrier, and what time of day.
Key figures
On time
76.5%
Arrivals under 15 minutes late, of 1,001 completed flights
Avg delay
122 min
Across delayed arrivals only, not all flights
Cancelled
2.23%
National rate is 1.89%
Best carrier
SkyWest
76.5% on time across 1,029 flights
These figures cover 1,030 flights between September 2025 and August 2026. Beyond the headline rate, 11.0% 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 SBN to ATL
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 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Delta Air Linesthin sample | 1 | 100.0% | — | 0.00% | A+ |
| SkyWest Airlines | 1,029 | 76.5% | 122 min | 2.24% | B |
Flight by flight
Flights on SBN to ATL
The flight numbers below flew this route at least 250 times in the period, busiest first. Each has its own record, with its schedule and delay causes.
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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.
- 5am–8am365 flights82.3%
- 8am–11am—
- 11am–2pm352 flights77.2%
- 2pm–5pm14 flights—
- 5pm–8pm299 flights68.5%
- 8pm–5am—
Scale runs 60% to 90%. Rows with fewer than 30 flights show a dash.
Book the early departure. Flights leaving between 5am–8am arrive on time 82.3% of the time, against 68.5% 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 365 flights scheduled in it.
Explore
Filter SBN to ATL 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 SBN to ATL, the best departure window is 5am–8am at 82.3% on time and the worst is 5pm–8pm at 68.5%, a wide gap of 13.8 points. All US flights leaving 5am–8am ran 89.3%.
- 5–8am82.3%
- 8–11am—
- 11am–2pm77.2%
- 2–5pm—
- 5–8pm68.5%
- 8pm–5am—
best all US flightsScale 60% to 95%. Cells under 30 flights show a dash.
Across the year
When delays peak on this route
This route's year swings by 36 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.
January is the weak month at 52.5% on time, against 88.9% in September. Winter delays cluster: a single storm system can account for most of a month's shortfall, so an average December hides both very good weeks and genuinely unflyable days. March was the busiest month here, with 89 flights.
Across the week, Thursday is the strongest day at 85.2% on time and Monday the weakest at 70.3%, a spread of 15 points.
Delay causes
Why this route gets delayed
Carrier accounts for 63% of the 29,000 delay minutes carriers reported here, and the remaining four split what is left.
- 63%Carrier
- 28%Extreme weather
- 9%National Airspace System
- 0%Security
Extreme weather accounts for 28% of delay minutes, well above the single-digit share typical across the system. Weather delays are lumpy: they arrive as whole bad days rather than as a steady drag, so the monthly strip above is the more useful view of the risk. The national share is 6%, so this operation carries roughly 4.7 times the usual weather exposure. The split is drawn from 28,604 reported delay minutes.
The largest share of delay minutes, 63%, falls under carrier control: crew scheduling, maintenance, fuelling, baggage. It accounts for 18,000 of the 29,000 delay minutes reported here.
Cancellations sit at 2.23% against a national 1.89%, which is ordinary. Diversions add another 0.58%.
Connections and stage length
What a delay here actually costs
11.0% 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.
The 566 miles between these two airports put this in the middle of the US network, around two and a half to three hours of block time. That is enough cruise to absorb a ten-minute late pushback and not enough to absorb thirty.
The return leg runs 74.5% on time across 1,030 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.
One caution: this is a thin sample. 1,030 flights over twelve months is enough to clear this site's floor but not enough to pin the rate down tightly, and a single bad week moves it by more than a point. Treat the grade as a rough reading.
Work out the risk of missing a connection in ATL after this flight
What to do with this
Booking this route
Put together: treat all of this as provisional. 1,030 flights over twelve months is enough to clear this site's floor and not enough to be confident to better than a couple of points. The 76.5% headline is the most reliable number on the page; the hour and month splits below it are built on a few dozen flights each. 1,001 completed flights over 12 months sit behind that.
Common questions
SBN to ATL questions
How often is SBN to ATL delayed?
About one flight in four arrives at least 15 minutes late, which is the Department of Transportation's definition of a delayed arrival. That works out to 23.5% of the 1,030 flights in this analysis, against 22.7% nationally. Delayed flights are late by close to two hours on average.
How reliable is SBN to ATL compared with the rest of the country?
76.5% of flights arrive on time here against a national 77.3%, a difference of about a point against it. That is worth a B on this site's grading scale.
What time of day has the fewest delays on SBN to ATL?
The 5am–8am departure window is the strongest at 82.3% on time. The 5pm–8pm window is the weakest at 68.5%, 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 January delays on SBN to ATL?
January is the weakest month at 52.5% on time, compared with 88.9% in September. Across the year that is 36 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
- ATL to SBN — the return legseparate record
- Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International (ATL) delay statistics
- SBN to ORD, a related route65.5%
- LGA to ATL, a related route75.5%
- SBN to CLT, a related route78.2%
- Delta Air Lines on-time record100.0%
- SkyWest Airlines on-time record76.5%
- How often a connection fails at the major US hubs
- The best time of day to fly, according to 7.05 million flight records
Direction matters. SBN to ATL and ATL to SBN 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.