Route reliability record
SYR→CLT
Syracuse to Charlotte
- Flights
- 1,088
- Period
- September 2025 to August 2026
- Distance
- 603 mi
- Carriers
- 2
This route lands a B, 2 points better than the national rate of 77.3%. About one flight in five arrives 15 minutes late or worse, and those flights are late by an hour and a half on average. That rests on 1,088 SYR to CLT flights, with a median arrival 7 minutes early.
Best time to fly SYR to CLT: a 8am–11am departure, ideally on a Wednesday. Flights in that window arrived on time 83.8% of the time and Wednesday flights 90.0%, against 78.9% 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
78.9%
Arrivals under 15 minutes late, of 1,071 completed flights
Avg delay
86 min
Across delayed arrivals only, not all flights
Cancelled
1.38%
National rate is 1.89%
Best carrier
American
79.0% on time across 1,074 flights
These figures cover 1,088 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 SYR to CLT
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 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| American Airlines | 1,074 | 79.0% | 87 min | 1.30% | B |
| PSA Airlinesthin sample | 14 | 69.2% | 37 min | 7.14% | C− |
Flight by flight
Flights on SYR to CLT
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 12 points, against half a point between the best and worst carrier.
- 5am–8am288 flights81.0%
- 8am–11am75 flights83.8%
- 11am–2pm225 flights81.2%
- 2pm–5pm172 flights83.3%
- 5pm–8pm328 flights72.0%
- 8pm–5am—
Scale runs 65% to 90%. Rows with fewer than 30 flights show a dash.
Book the morning departure. Flights leaving between 8am–11am arrive on time 83.8% of the time, against 72.0% for the evening 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 5pm–8pm window is the busiest, with 328 flights scheduled in it.
Explore
Filter SYR to CLT 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 SYR to CLT, the best departure window is 8am–11am at 83.8% on time and the worst is 5pm–8pm at 72.0%, a wide gap of 11.8 points. All US flights leaving 8am–11am ran 83.9%.
- 5–8am81.0%
- 8–11am83.8%
- 11am–2pm81.2%
- 2–5pm83.3%
- 5–8pm72.0%
- 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 26 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.
August is the worst month at 65.6% on time, 26 points below September, the best at 91.8%. 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. October was the busiest month here, with 110 flights.
Across the week, Wednesday is the strongest day at 90.0% on time and Sunday the weakest at 70.1%, a spread of 20 points.
Delay causes
Why this route gets delayed
Late-arriving aircraft accounts for 46% of the 19,000 delay minutes carriers reported here, and the remaining four split what is left.
- 46%Late-arriving aircraft
- 39%Carrier
- 9%National Airspace System
- 6%Extreme weather
46% of delay minutes trace back to a late-arriving aircraft, meaning the plane was already behind before it got here. Across 19,000 reported delay minutes here, that single category outweighs weather by 7 to one. The split is drawn from 19,378 reported delay minutes.
The largest share of delay minutes, 39%, falls under carrier control: crew scheduling, maintenance, fuelling, baggage. It accounts for 7,480 of the 19,000 delay minutes reported here.
Cancellations sit at 1.38% against a national 1.89%, which is ordinary. Diversions add another 0.18%.
Connections and stage length
What a delay here actually costs
7.7% 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 an hour and a half, which a normal layover absorbs.
The 603 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 73.0% on time across 1,089 flights, 6 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 6 points of difference.
One caution: this is a thin sample. 1,088 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 CLT after this flight
What to do with this
Booking this route
Put together: treat all of this as provisional. 1,088 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 78.9% headline is the most reliable number on the page; the hour and month splits below it are built on a few dozen flights each. 1,071 completed flights over 12 months sit behind that.
Common questions
SYR to CLT questions
How often is SYR to CLT delayed?
About one flight in five arrives at least 15 minutes late, which is the Department of Transportation's definition of a delayed arrival. That works out to 21.1% of the 1,088 flights in this analysis, against 22.7% nationally. Delayed flights are late by an hour and a half on average.
How reliable is SYR to CLT compared with the rest of the country?
78.9% of flights arrive on time here against a national 77.3%, a difference of 2 points in its favour. That is worth a B on this site's grading scale.
What time of day has the fewest delays on SYR to CLT?
The 8am–11am departure window is the strongest at 83.8% on time. The 5pm–8pm window is the weakest at 72.0%, 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 August delays on SYR to CLT?
August is the weakest month at 65.6% on time, compared with 91.8% in September. Across the year that is 26 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
- CLT to SYR — the return legseparate record
- Charlotte Douglas International (CLT) delay statistics
- SYR to ORD, a related route73.6%
- MCO to CLT, a related route78.6%
- SYR to ATL, a related route83.3%
- American Airlines on-time record79.0%
- PSA Airlines on-time record69.2%
- Why the first flight of the morning is statistically safest
- The best time of day to fly, according to 7.05 million flight records
Direction matters. SYR to CLT and CLT to SYR 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.