OnTimeStats

Historical on-time performance

San Diego to Sacramento

480 miData through May 2026Source: US DOT · BTS

Flights on SAN–SMF arrive on time 76% of the time over the last 12 months.

On-time rate76%arrived within 15 min
p90 delay35 min1 in 10 flights is worse (tail risk)
Cancelled0.9%of scheduled flights

based on 5,134 flights over the last 12 months. On-time means arriving within 15 minutes (BTS standard).

By airline

How each carrier compares

Too close to call — no single carrier is clearly more on-time here.

  • SkyWest Airlines
    On-time77%
    Medianon time
    p9035 min
    Cancel1.4%
    Flights1,194
  • Southwest Airlines
    On-time76%
    Medianon time
    p9035 min
    Cancel0.6%
    Flights3,818
  • Alaska Airlines
    On-time75%
    Medianon time
    p9030 min
    Cancel3.3%
    Flights122

Why flights run late

Delay causes

  • Airline20%
  • Weather1%
  • Air traffic (NAS)9%
  • Late aircraft69%
  • Security1%

Most delay minutes here are attributed to Late aircraft.

When flights don't go

Why flights were cancelled

  • Airline25%
  • Weather39%
  • Air traffic (NAS)36%
  • Security0%

Most cancellations here are attributed to Weather. Shares are among 44 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 SAN → SMF

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

Best time of day

Mornings are the most reliable time of day to fly this route — 89% on time.

  • Mornings89% on time · p90 15 min · 4,317 flights
  • Middays78% on time · p90 35 min · 3,790 flights
  • Afternoons73% on time · p90 40 min · 2,795 flights
  • Evenings71% on time · p90 45 min · 3,106 flights
  • Overnights65% on time · p90 50 min · 1,945 flights

Best day of week

On-time rates are fairly even by day on this route — ranging from 72% to 85% on time.

  • Tuesdays85% on time · p90 20 min · 2,110 flights
  • Wednesdays83% on time · p90 25 min · 2,096 flights
  • Saturdays80% on time · p90 30 min · 1,682 flights
  • Mondays75% on time · p90 40 min · 2,507 flights
  • Thursdays75% on time · p90 40 min · 2,509 flights
  • Sundays73% on time · p90 40 min · 2,516 flights
  • Fridays72% on time · p90 45 min · 2,533 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.