Carrier route record
WNTPA→FLL
Southwest Airlines · Tampa to Fort Lauderdale
- Flights
- 364
- Period
- September 2025 to August 2026
- Share of route
- 26%
- Carriers
- 3
Historical statistics for September 2025 to August 2026, not live status. For today’s flights, check with Southwest Airlines.
Southwest on TPA to FLL sits in the middle of the pack with a C. About seven flights in ten arrive on time by the DOT's definition, 9 points worse than the national rate of 77.3%. The late ones land about 55 minutes behind schedule. That rests on 364 flights, with a median arrival 3 minutes late.
The national on-time rate over the same period is 77.3%, so Southwest on TPA to FLL runs 9 points behind the country as a whole. Across a thousand flights that is about 90 extra late arrivals.
Key figures
On time
68.3%
Arrivals under 15 minutes late, of 356 completed flights
Avg delay
54 min
Across delayed arrivals only, not all flights
Cancelled
2.20%
National rate is 1.89%
Whole route
72.3%
Every carrier on TPA to FLL, 1,410 flights
These figures cover 364 flights between September 2025 and August 2026. On-time means an arrival less than 15 minutes after the scheduled gate time, the same threshold the Department of Transportation uses in its own reports. Cancelled and diverted flights are excluded from the on-time rate and counted separately, which is why the cancellation column matters on its own.
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Carrier by carrier
Southwest against every carrier on TPA to FLL
Southwest flew 364 of the 1,410 flights on TPA to FLL, about 26% of it. Its 68.3% on time is 4 points worse than the route as a whole, which runs 72.3%. Ranked by on-time rate it is number two of three carriers on the route, where the range runs from JetBlue at 85.4% to Spirit at 67.8%. 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 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| JetBlue Airwaysthin sample | 355 | 85.4% | 119 min | 2.82% | A |
| Southwest Airlines (this page)thin sample | 364 | 68.3% | 54 min | 2.20% | C |
| Spirit Airlines | 691 | 67.8% | 65 min | 3.91% | C− |
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Departure window
When Southwest runs best on this route
Departure time matters more here than the choice of carrier. The gap between the best and worst window is 47 points, against half a point between the best and worst carrier.
- 5am–8am—
- 8am–11am35 flights100.0%
- 11am–2pm26 flights—
- 2pm–5pm178 flights69.7%
- 5pm–8pm112 flights53.3%
- 8pm–5am13 flights—
Scale runs 45% to 100%. Rows with fewer than 30 flights show a dash.
The 5pm–8pm window is where this operation falls apart: 53.3% on time, against 100.0% for the 8am–11am slot. By evening the aircraft flying these rotations have absorbed a full day of small delays and there is no slack left to recover in. The 2pm–5pm window is the busiest, with 178 flights scheduled in it.
Across the year
Southwest on TPA to FLL through the year
September is the best month on the calendar at 90.0% on time. Shoulder season thins the schedule and takes the summer weather with it, and the operation gets its margin back. January was the busiest month here, with 31 flights.
Across the week, Saturday is the strongest day at 76.5% on time and Thursday the weakest at 59.2%, a spread of 17 points.
Arrival by arrival
How late Southwest on TPA to FLL runs when it is late
The 113 late arrivals split 47 under half an hour, 39 between 30 and 60 minutes, and 27 an hour or more.
- 15+ min early56 flights15.7%
- Within 15 min187 flights52.5%
- 15–29 min late47 flights13.2%
- 30–59 min late39 flights11.0%
- 1–2 hours late14 flights3.9%
- 2+ hours late13 flights3.7%
Scale runs 0% to 100%.
Share of 356 completed flights by arrival against schedule.
A late pushback is often recovered here: of 152 departures that left 15 minutes late or more, 49 still arrived on time. 10 flights left on time and still arrived late.
The worst days
Worst days for Southwest on TPA to FLL
The latest arrival of the period was on 15 March 2026, 5 hours 9 minutes behind schedule; most of its delay minutes were filed as national airspace system delay. On three of the five worst days the largest share was filed as a late-arriving aircraft.
| Date | Arrived late by | Largest filed cause |
|---|---|---|
| 15 March 2026 | 5 hours 9 minutes | National Airspace System |
| 7 December 2025 | 4 hours 9 minutes | Carrier |
| 31 March 2026 | 3 hours 38 minutes | Late-arriving aircraft |
| 17 May 2026 | 3 hours 24 minutes | Late-arriving aircraft |
| 5 October 2025 | 3 hours 13 minutes | Late-arriving aircraft |
Delay causes
Why Southwest runs late on this route
Late-arriving aircraft accounts for 58% of the 6,125 delay minutes carriers reported here, and the remaining four split what is left.
- 58%Late-arriving aircraft
- 25%Carrier
- 15%National Airspace System
- 3%Extreme weather
58% of delay minutes trace back to a late-arriving aircraft, meaning the plane was already behind before it got here. Across 6,125 reported delay minutes here, that single category outweighs weather by 18 to one. The split is drawn from 6,125 reported delay minutes.
The practical consequence: the 8am–11am departure is the one that starts clean. Its aircraft has no earlier leg to be late from, which is exactly why that window shows 100.0% on time here.
Cancellations sit at 2.20% against a national 1.89%, which is ordinary. Diversions add another 0.00%.
Connections and stage length
What a delay here costs
7.6% 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 about 55 minutes, which a normal layover absorbs.
At 197 miles this is a short hop, and stage length matters more than it looks. A flight this short spends under two hours in the air, which leaves almost nothing to claw back a late pushback with. Delay here is decided on the ground, in the turn, which is why the 8am–11am window matters as much as it does.
The return leg is a different operation and performs like one: it runs 86.8% on time across 364 flights, 19 points above 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 19 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 Southwest on TPA to FLL
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 68.3% headline is the most reliable number on the page; the hour and month splits below it are built on a few dozen flights each. 356 completed flights over 12 months sit behind that.
Related
Where to go next
- TPA to FLL, every carrier
- Southwest on FLL to TPA, the return leg
- JetBlue Airways on TPA to FLL85.4%
- Spirit Airlines on TPA to FLL67.8%
- Southwest Airlines network-wide record
- Tampa International (TPA) delay statistics
- Fort Lauderdale-Hollywood International (FLL) delay statistics
- Why the first flight of the morning is statistically safest
- The best time of day to fly, according to 7.05 million flight records
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.