Route reliability record
TPA→DTW
Tampa to Detroit
- Flights
- 2,292
- Period
- September 2025 to August 2026
- Distance
- 983 mi
- Carriers
- 4
This route lands a B, 4 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 a little over an hour on average. That rests on 2,292 TPA to DTW flights, of which Delta Air Lines flew 1,715 at 82.4% on time.
Best time to fly TPA to DTW: a 5am–8am departure, ideally on a Wednesday. Flights in that window arrived on time 90.7% of the time and Wednesday flights 85.5%, against 81.2% 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
81.2%
Arrivals under 15 minutes late, of 2,246 completed flights
Avg delay
74 min
Across delayed arrivals only, not all flights
Cancelled
1.83%
National rate is 1.89%
Best carrier
Delta
82.4% on time across 1,715 flights
These figures cover 2,292 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 TPA to DTW
The two carriers here are closely matched: 4 points separate the best from the worst. At that spread, schedule and price are better tie-breakers than reliability. Sample sizes are shown so you can see which rows are worth weighing.
| Airline | Flights | On time | Avg delay | Cancelled | Grade |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Delta Air Lines | 1,715 | 82.4% | 77 min | 1.17% | B |
| Spirit Airlines | 407 | 78.2% | 63 min | 5.16% | B− |
| Frontier Airlinesthin sample | 165 | 76.5% | 81 min | 0.61% | B+ |
| Southwest Airlinesthin sample | 5 | 40.0% | 34 min | 0.00% | F+ |
Spirit Airlines cancels 5.2% of what it schedules here, the highest in the table. A cancelled flight never appears in an on-time rate, so read that column alongside the punctuality one rather than after it.
Flight by flight
Flights on TPA to DTW
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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Best ways to make this trip
The most reliable ways to fly Tampa to Detroit
Every airline on this route, ranked by how often a scheduled flight actually operated and arrived on time, with its best departure time and most punctual flight number. No nearby airport pair beat these.
| Option | Airline | Success | On time | Cancelled | Best departure | Most punctual flight |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1. TPA → DTWTampa to Detroit | Delta Air Lines | 81.4% | 82.4% | 1.17% | 5am–8am, Wed | DL 808 08:30 |
| 2. TPA → DTWTampa to Detroit | Spirit Airlines | 74.2% | 78.2% | 5.16% | 5am–8am, Fri | — |
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 18 points, against 4 points between the best and worst carrier.
- 5am–8am432 flights90.7%
- 8am–11am510 flights88.0%
- 11am–2pm271 flights77.4%
- 2pm–5pm616 flights76.9%
- 5pm–8pm333 flights72.8%
- 8pm–5am130 flights73.0%
Scale runs 65% to 95%.
Book the early departure. Flights leaving between 5am–8am arrive on time 90.7% of the time, against 72.8% for the evening window. That is 18 points of difference for no extra money, and it comes from the same aircraft having had no earlier flight to fall behind on. The 2pm–5pm window is the busiest, with 616 flights scheduled in it.
Explore
Filter TPA to DTW 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 TPA to DTW, the best departure window is 5am–8am at 90.7% on time and the worst is 5pm–8pm at 72.8%, a wide gap of 17.9 points. All US flights leaving 5am–8am ran 89.3%.
- 5–8am90.7%
- 8–11am88.0%
- 11am–2pm77.4%
- 2–5pm76.9%
- 5–8pm72.8%
- 8pm–5am73.0%
best all US flightsScale 60% to 95%.
Across the year
When delays peak on this route
This route's year swings by 23 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 70.6% on time, against 93.3% 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. March was the busiest month here, with 321 flights.
Across the week, Wednesday is the strongest day at 85.5% on time and Monday the weakest at 77.2%, a spread of 8 points.
Delay causes
Why this route gets delayed
Late-arriving aircraft accounts for 49% of the 31,000 delay minutes carriers reported here, and the remaining four split what is left.
- 49%Late-arriving aircraft
- 29%Carrier
- 20%National Airspace System
- 3%Extreme weather
49% of delay minutes trace back to a late-arriving aircraft, meaning the plane was already behind before it got here. Across 31,000 reported delay minutes here, that single category outweighs weather by 17 to one. The split is drawn from 31,386 reported delay minutes.
The practical consequence: the 5am–8am departure is the one that starts clean. Its aircraft has no earlier leg to be late from, which is exactly why that window shows 90.7% on time here.
Cancellations sit at 1.83% against a national 1.89%, which is ordinary. Diversions add another 0.17%.
Connections and stage length
What a delay here actually costs
6.9% 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 a little over an hour, which a normal layover absorbs.
The 983 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 78.7% on time across 2,290 flights, within 3 points of this direction. The two legs are scored separately because they usually differ; on this city pair they happen not to.
The sample behind these figures is 2,292 flights, enough that the headline rate is stable to within roughly a point. The hour-block and month splits divide that further, so read the thinner bars with more caution than the headline.
Work out the risk of missing a connection in DTW after this flight
What to do with this
Booking this route
Put together: the calendar is the biggest lever here, not the carrier or the hour. September runs 93.3% on time and December 70.6%, a swing of 23 points. If the dates move at all, move them out of December before you think about anything else. 2,246 completed flights over 12 months sit behind that.
Common questions
TPA to DTW questions
How often is TPA to DTW 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 18.8% of the 2,292 flights in this analysis, against 22.7% nationally. Delayed flights are late by a little over an hour on average.
Which airline is most reliable on TPA to DTW?
Delta Air Lines leads at 82.4% on time across 1,715 flights. Spirit Airlines is at the other end on 78.2%, a gap of 4 points. Sample size matters as much as the percentage: a rate built from a few hundred flights moves around far more than one built from ten thousand.
What time of day has the fewest delays on TPA to DTW?
The 5am–8am departure window is the strongest at 90.7% on time. The 5pm–8pm window is the weakest at 72.8%, 18 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 TPA to DTW?
December is the weakest month at 70.6% on time, compared with 93.3% in September. Across the year that is 23 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
- DTW to TPA — the return legseparate record
- Tampa International (TPA) delay statistics
- Detroit Metropolitan Wayne County (DTW) delay statistics
- Delta Air Lines on TPA to DTW82.4%
- Spirit Airlines on TPA to DTW78.2%
- Frontier Airlines on TPA to DTW76.5%
- TPA to ATL, a related route79.6%
- ORD to DTW, a related route71.1%
- TPA to ORD, a related route72.9%
- Delta Air Lines on-time record82.4%
- Spirit Airlines on-time record78.2%
- Frontier Airlines on-time record76.5%
- 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. TPA to DTW and DTW to TPA 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.