Carrier route record
ASSEA→BNA
Alaska Airlines · Seattle to Nashville
- Flights
- 845
- Period
- September 2025 to August 2026
- Share of route
- 57%
- Carriers
- 3
Historical statistics for September 2025 to August 2026, not live status. For today’s flights, check with Alaska Airlines.
Alaska on SEA to BNA lands a B+, 5 points better than the national rate of 77.3%. About one flight in six arrives 15 minutes late or worse, and those flights are late by about 45 minutes on average. That rests on 845 flights, with a median arrival 8 minutes early.
Set against the rest of the country, Alaska's SEA to BNA record is 5 points better than the US average of 77.3%. That gap is worth roughly 48 fewer late arrivals for every thousand flights.
Key figures
On time
82.1%
Arrivals under 15 minutes late, of 836 completed flights
Avg delay
44 min
Across delayed arrivals only, not all flights
Cancelled
0.95%
National rate is 1.89%
Whole route
80.6%
Every carrier on SEA to BNA, 1,481 flights
These figures cover 845 flights between September 2025 and August 2026. The median arrival is 8 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
Alaska against every carrier on SEA to BNA
Alaska flew 845 of the 1,481 flights on SEA to BNA, most of the route. Its 82.1% on time is 2 points better than the route as a whole, which runs 80.6%. Ranked by on-time rate it is number two of three carriers on the route, where the range runs from Delta at 83.0% to Southwest at 60.0%. One of those carriers flew fewer than 365 flights here, so treat their positions as rough.
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 Lines | 516 | 83.0% | 61 min | 0.97% | B+ |
| Alaska Airlines (this page) | 845 | 82.1% | 44 min | 0.95% | B+ |
| Southwest Airlinesthin sample | 120 | 60.0% | 39 min | 0.00% | D+ |
Flight by flight
Alaska flight numbers on SEA to BNA
Timetable by Aviasales, a Travelpayouts partner. Booking through it may earn this site a commission at no cost to you; it changes no figure here.
Departure window
When Alaska runs best on this route
Departure time matters more here than the choice of carrier. The gap between the best and worst window is 27 points, against half a point between the best and worst carrier.
- 5am–8am—
- 8am–11am329 flights84.7%
- 11am–2pm31 flights58.1%
- 2pm–5pm—
- 5pm–8pm280 flights80.4%
- 8pm–5am205 flights83.7%
Scale runs 50% to 90%. Rows with fewer than 30 flights show a dash.
The weak window here is the middle of the day, not the evening: 11am–2pm runs 58.1% on time against 84.7% for 8am–11am. That shape usually means a departure bank rather than an accumulating delay, so the recovery later in the afternoon is real rather than noise. The 8am–11am window is the busiest, with 329 flights scheduled in it.
Across the year
Alaska on SEA to BNA through the year
July is the worst month at 73.9% on time, 16 points below March, the best at 89.8%. 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. July was the busiest month here, with 92 flights.
Across the week, Wednesday is the strongest day at 86.7% on time and Thursday the weakest at 77.4%, a spread of 9 points.
Arrival by arrival
How late Alaska on SEA to BNA runs when it is late
Alaska on SEA to BNA often beats the schedule: 286 of 836 completed flights, 34%, arrived 15 minutes or more early. The 150 late arrivals split 61 under half an hour, 61 between 30 and 60 minutes, and 28 an hour or more.
- 15+ min early286 flights34.2%
- Within 15 min400 flights47.8%
- 15–29 min late61 flights7.3%
- 30–59 min late61 flights7.3%
- 1–2 hours late22 flights2.6%
- 2+ hours late6 flights0.7%
Scale runs 0% to 100%.
Share of 836 completed flights by arrival against schedule.
A late pushback is often recovered here: of 173 departures that left 15 minutes late or more, 57 still arrived on time. 34 flights left on time and still arrived late.
The worst days
Worst days for Alaska on SEA to BNA
The latest arrival of the period was on 3 September 2025, 3 hours 44 minutes behind schedule; most of its delay minutes were filed as national airspace system delay. The five worst days are spread across September, March, July and August, with no single month standing out.
| Date | Arrived late by | Largest filed cause |
|---|---|---|
| 3 September 2025 | 3 hours 44 minutes | National Airspace System |
| 13 March 2026 | 3 hours 30 minutes | Extreme weather |
| 24 July 2026 | 3 hours 28 minutes | Carrier |
| 2 August 2026 | 2 hours 58 minutes | Carrier |
| 16 July 2026 | 2 hours 49 minutes | Late-arriving aircraft |
Delay causes
Why Alaska runs late on this route
Carrier accounts for 46% of the 6,628 delay minutes carriers reported here, and the remaining four split what is left.
- 46%Carrier
- 27%National Airspace System
- 24%Late-arriving aircraft
- 4%Extreme weather
The largest share of delay minutes, 46%, falls under carrier control: crew scheduling, maintenance, fuelling, baggage. It accounts for 3,037 of the 6,628 delay minutes reported here. The split is drawn from 6,628 reported delay minutes.
Cancellations sit at 0.95% against a national 1.89%, which is ordinary. Diversions add another 0.12%.
Connections and stage length
What a delay here costs
Badly late arrivals are rare here: only 3.3% land an hour or more behind schedule, against 8.3% nationally. Connections built on this flight are about as safe as US domestic connections get, though a cancelled flight still ignores every layover you give it.
At 1,978 miles this is transcontinental flying, and long routes get a quiet structural advantage. Scheduled block time on a flight this length carries more padding in absolute minutes, so a twenty-minute late departure often still becomes an on-time arrival. Read the on-time rate here as slightly flattering next to a short-haul route with the same operational quality.
The return leg is a different operation and performs like one: it runs 72.7% on time across 845 flights, 9 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 9 points of difference.
One caution: this is a thin sample. 845 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.
What to do with this
Booking Alaska on SEA to BNA
Put together: treat all of this as provisional. 845 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 82.1% headline is the most reliable number on the page; the hour and month splits below it are built on a few dozen flights each. 836 completed flights over 12 months sit behind that.
Related
Where to go next
- SEA to BNA, every carrier
- Alaska on BNA to SEA, the return leg
- Delta Air Lines on SEA to BNA83.0%
- Southwest Airlines on SEA to BNA60.0%
- Alaska Airlines network-wide record
- Seattle-Tacoma International (SEA) delay statistics
- Nashville International (BNA) delay statistics
- The best time of day to fly, according to 7.05 million flight records
- Worst months to fly in the US, ranked by the data
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.