Carrier route record

ASSFO→DCA

Alaska Airlines · San Francisco to Washington

Flights: 364
Period: July 2025 to June 2026
Share of route: 33%
Carriers: 2

Historical statistics for July 2025 to June 2026, not live status. For today’s flights, check with Alaska Airlines.

Alaska on SFO to DCA lands a B, level with the national rate of 77.6%. Roughly one flight in four arrives 15 minutes late or worse, and those flights are late by about an hour on average. That is a workable record, not a spotless one. That rests on 364 flights, with a median arrival 10 minutes early.

The US average over the same twelve months is 77.6%, so there is little to separate Alaska on SFO to DCA from the country as a whole. The variation that matters here is internal: which carrier, and what time of day.

On time

77.6%

Arrivals under 15 minutes late, of 357 completed flights

Avg delay

55 min

Across delayed arrivals only, not all flights

Cancelled

1.10%

National rate is 1.81%

Whole route

78.9%

Every carrier on SFO to DCA, 1,093 flights

These figures cover 364 flights between July 2025 and June 2026. The median arrival is 10 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

Alaska against every carrier on SFO to DCA

Alaska flew 364 of the 1,093 flights on SFO to DCA, about 33% of it. Its 77.6% on time is about level with the route as a whole at 78.9%. Ranked by on-time rate it is last of two carriers on the route, where the range runs from United at 79.6% to Alaska at 77.6%.

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.

On-time performance by carrier on SFO to DCA
Airline	Flights	On time	Avg delay	Cancelled	Grade
United Airlines	729	79.6%	60 min	0.96%	B+
Alaska Airlines (this page)thin sample	364	77.6%	55 min	1.10%	B

Flight by flight

Alaska flight numbers on SFO to DCA

AS 809:4577.6% · 364 flights

Departure window

When Alaska runs best on this route

Departure time is the single lever a traveller controls, and it moves the odds more than most people expect. Each bar below is the on-time rate for flights scheduled to leave inside that window, across 364 flights.

There are not enough flights in each departure window to split Alaska's SFO to DCA record by time of day without the percentages moving on noise. The headline rate of 77.6% is the reliable figure here.

Across the year

Alaska on SFO to DCA through the year

Jul–Sep 202592 flights71.9%
Oct–Dec 202591 flights80.2%
Jan–Mar 202690 flights79.3%
Apr–Jun 202691 flights78.9%

Scale runs 65% to 85%. Rows with fewer than 30 flights show a dash.

Monthly volumes are too low here to break the year into twelve reliable readings. What the twelve-month total says is 77.6% on time across 364 flights.

Quarter by quarter Alaska on SFO to DCA held fairly steady: 71.9% in Jul–Sep 2025, 80.2% in Oct–Dec 2025, 79.3% in Jan–Mar 2026 and 78.9% in Apr–Jun 2026. A spread of 8 points is about what a sample of this size moves on its own, so the annual figure is a fair summary.

Across the week, Saturday is the strongest day at 90.2% on time and Monday the weakest at 68.0%. 22 points is a smaller lever than departure hour, but it is free.

Delay causes

Why Alaska runs late on this route

Carriers report a reason for every delay minute they cause, in five DOT categories. The split below is by minutes, not by number of flights, so a handful of very long weather delays weighs as much as many short ones. It covers 4,396 reported delay minutes.

Late-arriving aircraft
41%
National Airspace System
34%
Carrier
23%
Security
1%

41% of delay minutes trace back to a late-arriving aircraft, meaning the plane was already behind before it got here. That is a cascade, and cascades start small and grow through the day. Across 4,396 reported delay minutes here, that single category outweighs weather by 41 to one. It is the strongest argument for booking the first departure of the morning, when the aircraft has been sitting at the gate overnight with nothing to inherit. The split is drawn from 4,396 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 1,514 minutes out of 4,396, against a national NAS share of 21%.

Cancellations sit at 1.10% against a national 1.81%, which is ordinary. Diversions add another 0.82%.

Connections and stage length

What a delay here costs

5.6% 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 about an hour, which a normal layover absorbs.

At 2,442 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 68.1% on time across 364 flights, 10 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 10 points of difference.

One caution: this is a thin sample. 364 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 SFO to DCA

Put together: treat all of this as provisional. 364 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 77.6% headline is the most reliable number on the page; the hour and month splits below it are built on a few dozen flights each. 357 completed flights over 12 months sit behind that.

Where to go next

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.

Key figures