OnTimeStats

Historical on-time performance

Chicago to Cleveland

307 miData through May 2026Source: US DOT · BTS

Flights on MDW–CLE arrive on time 78% of the time over the last 12 months.

On-time rate78%arrived within 15 min
p90 delay40 min1 in 10 flights is worse (tail risk)
Cancelled1.1%of scheduled flights

based on 1,107 flights over the last 12 months. On-time means arriving within 15 minutes (BTS standard).

By airline

How each carrier compares

  • Southwest Airlines
    On-time78%
    Medianon time
    p9040 min
    Cancel1.1%
    Flights1,107

Why flights run late

Delay causes

  • Airline36%
  • Weather3%
  • Air traffic (NAS)11%
  • Late aircraft49%
  • Security1%

Most delay minutes here are attributed to Late aircraft.

When flights don't go

Why flights were cancelled

  • Airline8%
  • Weather83%
  • Air traffic (NAS)8%
  • Security0%

Most cancellations here are attributed to Weather. Shares are among 12 cancellations with a reported cause (BTS reports causes from June 2003).

Over time

On-time trend

By season

On-time rate by month

When to fly

Best time to fly MDW → CLE

All airlines · rolling 36 months (2023-06 .. 2026-05).

Best time of day

On-time rates are fairly even by time of day on this route — ranging from 64% to 89% on time.

  • Mornings89% on time · p90 15 min · 820 flights
  • Middays87% on time · p90 15 min · 776 flights
  • Afternoons76% on time · p90 35 min · 732 flights
  • Evenings71% on time · p90 45 min · 654 flights
  • Overnights64% on time · p90 70 min · 606 flights

Best day of week

On-time rates are fairly even by day on this route — ranging from 73% to 84% on time.

  • Wednesdays84% on time · p90 20 min · 529 flights
  • Tuesdays84% on time · p90 30 min · 529 flights
  • Fridays78% on time · p90 30 min · 565 flights
  • Thursdays77% on time · p90 40 min · 561 flights
  • Mondays76% on time · p90 40 min · 561 flights
  • Saturdays76% on time · p90 35 min · 357 flights
  • Sundays73% on time · p90 50 min · 486 flights

Keep exploring

Related pages

Methodology

A flight is on time when it arrives within 15 minutes of schedule — the US DOT / BTS standard. Median and p90(the “1-in-10 bad day”) are read from the full arrival-delay distribution, never averaged across periods.

Figures cover a carrier’s own BTS-coded flights. Cells below ~200 flights are flagged as limited data. All numbers are pre-computed from public BTS On-Time Performance data.