OnTimeStats

Historical on-time performance

Sacramento to Dallas-Fort Worth

1,431 miData through May 2026Source: US DOT · BTS

Flights on SMF–DFW arrive on time 77% of the time over the last 12 months.

On-time rate77%arrived within 15 min
p90 delay40 min1 in 10 flights is worse (tail risk)
Cancelled2.4%of scheduled flights

based on 1,671 flights over the last 12 months. On-time means arriving within 15 minutes (BTS standard).

By airline

How each carrier compares

  • American Airlines
    On-time77%
    Medianon time
    p9040 min
    Cancel2.4%
    Flights1,671

Why flights run late

Delay causes

  • Airline37%
  • Weather4%
  • Air traffic (NAS)15%
  • Late aircraft44%
  • Security0%

Most delay minutes here are attributed to Late aircraft.

When flights don't go

Why flights were cancelled

  • Airline8%
  • Weather93%
  • Air traffic (NAS)0%
  • Security0%

Most cancellations here are attributed to Weather. Shares are among 40 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 SMF → DFW

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 — 85% on time.

  • Mornings85% on time · p90 20 min · 2,189 flights
  • Overnights75% on time · p90 60 min · 737 flights
  • Middays75% on time · p90 50 min · 1,114 flights
  • Afternoons67% on time · p90 60 min · 1,049 flights

Best day of week

On-time rates are fairly even by day on this route — ranging from 75% to 79% on time.

  • Wednesdays79% on time · p90 35 min · 703 flights
  • Tuesdays79% on time · p90 35 min · 693 flights
  • Thursdays78% on time · p90 50 min · 768 flights
  • Fridays76% on time · p90 50 min · 752 flights
  • Mondays76% on time · p90 40 min · 747 flights
  • Saturdays76% on time · p90 45 min · 726 flights
  • Sundays75% on time · p90 60 min · 783 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.