Route reliability record
SDF→LGA
Louisville to New York
- Flights
- 1,034
- Period
- September 2025 to August 2026
- Distance
- 659 mi
- Carriers
- 2
This route carries a cancellation problem, not just a delay problem: 4.5% of scheduled flights never operate, against 1.9% 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 1,034 SDF to LGA flights, with a median arrival 13 minutes early.
Best time to fly SDF to LGA: a 5am–8am departure, ideally on a Friday. Flights in that window arrived on time 91.0% of the time and Friday flights 87.5%, 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 77.3%. That gap is worth roughly 58 fewer late arrivals for every thousand flights.
Key figures
On time
83.1%
Arrivals under 15 minutes late, of 982 completed flights
Avg delay
58 min
Across delayed arrivals only, not all flights
Cancelled
4.55%
National rate is 1.89%
Best carrier
Republic
83.2% on time across 1,033 flights
These figures cover 1,034 flights between September 2025 and August 2026. The median arrival is 13 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.
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Carrier by carrier
Which airline is most reliable on SDF to LGA
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 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Republic Airways | 1,033 | 83.2% | 58 min | 4.55% | B− |
| American Airlinesthin sample | 1 | 0.0% | 137 min | 0.00% | F+ |
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Best ways to make this trip
The most reliable ways to fly Louisville to New York
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. SDF → EWRLouisville to Newark | Republic Airways | 83.4% | 87.5% | 4.73% | 8am–11am, Wed (route) | YX 3594 06:15 |
| 2. SDF → LGALouisville to New York | Republic Airways | 79.4% | 83.2% | 4.55% | 5am–8am, Fri (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 15 points, against half a point between the best and worst carrier.
- 5am–8am310 flights91.0%
- 8am–11am56 flights87.0%
- 11am–2pm216 flights80.7%
- 2pm–5pm255 flights79.5%
- 5pm–8pm197 flights76.5%
- 8pm–5am—
Scale runs 70% to 95%. Rows with fewer than 30 flights show a dash.
Book the early departure. Flights leaving between 5am–8am arrive on time 91.0% of the time, against 76.5% for the evening window. That is 15 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 310 flights scheduled in it.
Explore
Filter SDF to LGA 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 SDF to LGA, the best departure window is 5am–8am at 91.0% on time and the worst is 5pm–8pm at 76.5%, a wide gap of 14.5 points. All US flights leaving 5am–8am ran 89.3%.
- 5–8am91.0%
- 8–11am87.0%
- 11am–2pm80.7%
- 2–5pm79.5%
- 5–8pm76.5%
- 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 22 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.
December is the weak month at 70.8% on time, against 92.8% 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. May was the busiest month here, with 116 flights.
Across the week, Friday is the strongest day at 87.5% on time and Thursday the weakest at 77.0%, a spread of 11 points.
Delay causes
Why this route gets delayed
National Airspace System accounts for 46% of the 9,628 delay minutes carriers reported here, and the remaining four split what is left.
- 46%National Airspace System
- 32%Carrier
- 20%Late-arriving aircraft
- 2%Extreme weather
46% 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 4,453 minutes out of 9,628, against a national NAS share of 21%. The split is drawn from 9,628 reported delay minutes.
Cancellations run at 4.55%, 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
6.3% of arrivals land an hour or more late, close to the national 8.3%, so a 60 to 75 minute layover is reasonable here while anything under 45 minutes is a bet. Most delays on this route last about an hour, which a normal layover absorbs.
The 659 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 is a different operation and performs like one: it runs 79.9% on time across 1,033 flights, 3 points below this direction. Departure banks, aircraft rotations and the congestion at each end all differ, so scoring the two directions together would average away a real 3 points of difference.
One caution: this is a thin sample. 1,034 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 LGA after this flight
What to do with this
Booking this route
Put together: the delay figures matter less here than the 4.55% cancellation rate. A late arrival costs you about 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. 982 completed flights over 12 months sit behind that.
Common questions
SDF to LGA questions
How often is SDF to LGA 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 1,034 flights in this analysis, against 22.7% nationally. Delayed flights are late by about an hour on average.
How reliable is SDF to LGA compared with the rest of the country?
83.1% of flights arrive on time here against a national 77.3%, 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 SDF to LGA?
The 5am–8am departure window is the strongest at 91.0% on time. The 5pm–8pm window is the weakest at 76.5%, 15 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 December delays on SDF to LGA?
December is the weakest month at 70.8% on time, compared with 92.8% in September. Across the year that is 22 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
- LGA to SDF — the return legseparate record
- LaGuardia (LGA) delay statistics
- SDF to ORD, a related route79.3%
- ORD to LGA, a related route66.6%
- SDF to ATL, a related route89.6%
- Republic Airways on-time record83.2%
- American Airlines on-time record0.0%
- The US routes with the most cancellations
- The best time of day to fly, according to 7.05 million flight records
Direction matters. SDF to LGA and LGA to SDF 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.