Route reliability record
SNA→IAH
Santa Ana to Houston
- Flights
- 1,092
- Period
- September 2025 to August 2026
- Distance
- 1,346 mi
- Carriers
- 1
This route earns an A+. Close to nine flights in ten arrive inside the 15-minute window the DOT uses to define an on-time arrival, which puts it 11 points better than the national rate of 77.3%. When something does go wrong the average delay runs about an hour. That rests on 1,092 SNA to IAH flights, with a median arrival 7 minutes early.
Best time to fly SNA to IAH: a 8am–11am departure, ideally on a Thursday. Flights in that window arrived on time 96.8% of the time and Thursday flights 91.0%, against 88.4% for the route overall.
Set against the rest of the country, this route's record is 11 points better than the US average of 77.3%. That gap is worth roughly 111 fewer late arrivals for every thousand flights.
Key figures
On time
88.4%
Arrivals under 15 minutes late, of 1,088 completed flights
Avg delay
66 min
Across delayed arrivals only, not all flights
Cancelled
0.00%
National rate is 1.89%
Best carrier
United
88.4% on time across 1,092 flights
These figures cover 1,092 flights between September 2025 and August 2026. The median arrival is 7 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 SNA to IAH
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 Airlines | 1,092 | 88.4% | 66 min | 0.00% | A+ |
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Best ways to make this trip
The most reliable ways to fly Santa Ana to Houston
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. 4 of the top 5 use a different airport at one end.
| Option | Airline | Success | On time | Cancelled | Best departure | Most punctual flight |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1. SNA → IAHSanta Ana to Houston | United Airlines | 88.4% | 88.4% | 0.00% | 8am–11am, Thu | — |
| 2. LAX → IAHLos Angeles to Houston | United Airlines | 87.2% | 87.4% | 0.18% | 5am–8am, Wed | UA 654 05:45 |
| 3. LAX → IAHLos Angeles to Houston | Delta Air Lines | 84.0% | 84.8% | 0.93% | 8am–11am, Mon | DL 1143 09:40 |
| 4. LAX → IAHLos Angeles to Houston | SkyWest Airlines | 80.8% | 81.2% | 0.49% | 8am–11am, Tue | — |
| 5. LAX → HOULos Angeles to Houston | Southwest Airlines | 69.3% | 69.4% | 0.17% | 5am–8am, Sat | — |
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 12 points, against half a point between the best and worst carrier.
- 5am–8am82 flights91.5%
- 8am–11am283 flights96.8%
- 11am–2pm364 flights85.0%
- 2pm–5pm363 flights84.6%
- 5pm–8pm—
- 8pm–5am—
Scale runs 75% to 100%. Rows with fewer than 30 flights show a dash.
Book the morning departure. Flights leaving between 8am–11am arrive on time 96.8% of the time, against 84.6% for the afternoon window. That is 12 points of difference for no extra money, and it comes from the same aircraft having had no earlier flight to fall behind on. The 11am–2pm window is the busiest, with 364 flights scheduled in it.
Explore
Filter SNA to IAH 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 SNA to IAH, the best departure window is 8am–11am at 96.8% on time and the worst is 2pm–5pm at 84.6%, a wide gap of 12.2 points. All US flights leaving 8am–11am ran 83.9%.
- 5–8am91.5%
- 8–11am96.8%
- 11am–2pm85.0%
- 2–5pm84.6%
- 5–8pm—
- 8pm–5am—
best all US flightsScale 60% to 100%. Cells under 30 flights show a dash.
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 October, the best at 96.7%. 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. January was the busiest month here, with 93 flights.
Across the week, Thursday is the strongest day at 91.0% on time and Saturday the weakest at 85.0%, a spread of 6 points.
Delay causes
Why this route gets delayed
National Airspace System accounts for 48% of the 8,296 delay minutes carriers reported here, and the remaining four split what is left.
- 48%National Airspace System
- 25%Late-arriving aircraft
- 24%Carrier
- 2%Extreme weather
48% 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 3,993 minutes out of 8,296, against a national NAS share of 21%. The split is drawn from 8,296 reported delay minutes.
Cancellations are rare at 0.00%, below the national 1.89% and low enough to earn the plus on the grade. Almost no flights are called off; the risk here is arriving late, not not arriving.
Connections and stage length
What a delay here actually costs
Badly late arrivals are rare here: only 4.2% 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.
The 1,346 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 88.5% on time across 1,092 flights, within half a point 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. 1,092 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 IAH after this flight
What to do with this
Booking this route
Put together: treat all of this as provisional. 1,092 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 88.4% headline is the most reliable number on the page; the hour and month splits below it are built on a few dozen flights each. 1,088 completed flights over 12 months sit behind that.
Common questions
SNA to IAH questions
How often is SNA to IAH delayed?
About one flight in nine arrives at least 15 minutes late, which is the Department of Transportation's definition of a delayed arrival. That works out to 11.6% of the 1,092 flights in this analysis, against 22.7% nationally. Delayed flights are late by about an hour on average.
How reliable is SNA to IAH compared with the rest of the country?
88.4% of flights arrive on time here against a national 77.3%, a difference of 11 points in its favour. That is worth a A+ on this site's grading scale.
What time of day has the fewest delays on SNA to IAH?
The 8am–11am departure window is the strongest at 96.8% on time. The 2pm–5pm window is the weakest at 84.6%, 12 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 SNA to IAH?
July is the weakest month at 76.9% on time, compared with 96.7% in October. 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
- IAH to SNA — the return legseparate record
- John Wayne Airport (SNA) delay statistics
- George Bush Intercontinental (IAH) delay statistics
- SNA to SFO, a related route65.5%
- ORD to IAH, a related route76.0%
- SNA to PHX, a related route82.3%
- United Airlines on-time record88.4%
- The most punctual routes in the US, and the least
- The best time of day to fly, according to 7.05 million flight records
Direction matters. SNA to IAH and IAH to SNA 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.