Route reliability record
XNA→LGA
Bentonville to New York
- Flights
- 875
- Period
- July 2025 to June 2026
- Distance
- 1,147 mi
- Carriers
- 1
This route carries a cancellation problem, not just a delay problem: 4.2% of scheduled flights never operate, against 1.8% nationally. Of the ones that do fly, close to three flights in four arrive on time, worth a B− overall. The punctuality figure counts only flights that actually departed, so it flatters an operation that cancels this often. That rests on 875 XNA to LGA flights, with a median arrival 7 minutes early.
Best time to fly XNA to LGA: a 5am–8am departure, ideally on a Wednesday. Flights in that window arrived on time 85.0% of the time and Wednesday flights 84.2%, against 76.9% for the route overall.
The US average over the same twelve months is 77.6%, 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
76.9%
Arrivals under 15 minutes late, of 832 completed flights
Avg delay
88 min
Across delayed arrivals only, not all flights
Cancelled
4.23%
National rate is 1.81%
Best carrier
Republic
76.9% on time across 875 flights
These figures cover 875 flights between July 2025 and June 2026. Beyond the headline rate, 11.8% of arrivals land a full hour or more behind schedule. That is the number that wrecks a connection, and it is not visible in an on-time percentage alone.
Carrier by carrier
Which airline is most reliable on XNA to LGA
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 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Republic Airways | 875 | 76.9% | 88 min | 4.23% | B− |
Flight by flight
Flights on XNA to LGA
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.
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 half a point between the best and worst carrier. Each bar is the on-time rate for flights scheduled inside that window.
- 5am–8am280 flights85.0%
- 8am–11am91 flights83.3%
- 11am–2pm191 flights75.7%
- 2pm–5pm219 flights69.1%
- 5pm–8pm94 flights66.7%
- 8pm–5am—
Scale runs 60% to 90%. Rows with fewer than 30 flights show a dash.
Book the early departure. Flights leaving between 5am–8am arrive on time 85.0% of the time, against 66.7% 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 5am–8am window is the busiest, with 280 flights scheduled in it.
Across the year
When delays peak on this route
This route's year swings by 33 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.
April is the best month on the calendar at 89.7% on time. Shoulder season thins the schedule and takes the summer weather with it, and the operation gets its margin back. October was the busiest month here, with 81 flights.
Across the week, Wednesday is the strongest day at 84.2% on time and Sunday the weakest at 66.7%. 18 points is a smaller lever than departure hour, but it is free.
Delay causes
Why this route gets delayed
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 17,000 reported delay minutes.
- 39%Late-arriving aircraft
- 37%National Airspace System
- 17%Carrier
- 7%Extreme weather
- 0%Security
39% 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 17,000 reported delay minutes here, that single category outweighs weather by 5 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 16,792 reported delay minutes.
37% 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 6,129 minutes out of 17,000, against a national NAS share of 21%.
Cancellations run at 4.23%, against 1.81% nationally. That is about one flight in 25 cancelled outright. A cancelled flight is invisible in every on-time figure on this page, so the punctuality numbers above describe only the flights that actually operated.
Connections and stage length
What a delay here actually costs
For anyone connecting, the number to weigh is not the on-time rate but the tail behind it. 11.8% of arrivals land a full hour or more behind schedule, against 8.1% nationally. A 45-minute layover does not survive that, and no amount of walking quickly changes it. Ninety minutes is the honest minimum here, and two hours if the onward flight is on a separate ticket.
The 1,147 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. It is also long enough that the aircraft usually flies three or four legs a day rather than six, which slows how fast delay compounds.
The return leg runs 74.8% on time across 875 flights, within 2 points 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. 875 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 LGA after this flight
What to do with this
Booking this route
Put together: the delay figures matter less here than the 4.23% cancellation rate. A late arrival costs you an hour and a half; a cancelled flight costs you the day. Book the 5am–8am departure so there is still a schedule behind you if it goes wrong, and treat a same-day connection as optimistic. 832 completed flights over 12 months sit behind that.
Common questions
XNA to LGA questions
How often is XNA to LGA delayed?
Roughly one flight in four arrives at least 15 minutes late, which is the Department of Transportation's definition of a delayed arrival. That works out to 23.1% of the 875 flights in this analysis, against 22.4% nationally. Delayed flights are late by an hour and a half on average.
How reliable is XNA to LGA compared with the rest of the country?
76.9% of flights arrive on time here against a national 77.6%, a difference of half a point against it. That is worth a B− on this site's grading scale.
What time of day has the fewest delays on XNA to LGA?
The 5am–8am departure window is the strongest at 85.0% on time. The 5pm–8pm window is the weakest at 66.7%, 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 March delays on XNA to LGA?
March is the weakest month at 56.9% on time, compared with 89.7% in April. Across the year that is 33 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
- LGA to XNA — the return legseparate record
- LaGuardia (LGA) delay statistics
- XNA to DFW, a related route78.7%
- ORD to LGA, a related route67.3%
- XNA to ORD, a related route75.9%
- Republic Airways on-time record76.9%
- The US routes with the most cancellations
- Why the first flight of the morning is statistically safest
Direction matters. XNA to LGA and LGA to XNA are scored separately because they are separate operations, with different departure banks and different aircraft. Compare the return leg.
Embed XNA to LGA’s on-time badge on your site
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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.