DFW to RDU flight delays
Dallas/Fort Worth, TX (DFW) Raleigh/Durham, NC (RDU) · 1,061 miles
2,281 flights · January 2025 – August 2026 · US Bureau of Transportation Statistics
69.68%
Arrived on time
Within 15 minutes of schedule
2.85%
Cancelled
Share of scheduled flights
68 min
When late, late by
Average across delayed arrivals
22 min
Delay per flight
Averaged over every flight flown
What the record says about this route
Which airline you fly changes the odds here. Frontier Airlines arrived on time 17.2 points more often than American Airlines over the same period on the same route — same airports, same weather, same air traffic control. A gap that survives all of that is about how the two airlines are run.
The season swings this route hard. In September it ran 31.4 points more punctual than in July — a difference bigger than the one between the best and worst airlines on most routes. If the date is flexible, it is worth more than the carrier.
Cancellation, not delay, is the risk worth pricing here: 2.85% of scheduled flights never operated. A late flight still gets you there. A cancelled one leaves you rebooking, and on a route with few daily departures that can mean losing a day.
The two directions do not behave alike. RDU to DFW arrives on time 8 points more often than the outbound. Delay accumulates through the flying day, so whichever direction is scheduled later tends to carry the worse record — which is an argument for booking the morning departure if the choice exists.
Which airline should you fly on this route?
Over January 2025 – August 2026, Frontier Airlines arrived on time most often on DFW to RDU. American Airlines was late most often. Flights ran closest to schedule in September and worst in July.
Every airline on DFW to RDU
Ranked by how many flights each one operated. A carrier with fewer than 100 flights in the period is listed but not graded.
| Airline | Flights | On time | Cancelled | Avg delay | Grade |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| American Airlines | 2,012 | 68.17% | 2.83% | 68 min | F |
| Frontier Airlines | 210 | 85.37% | 1.43% | 73 min | B |
| Spirit Airlines | 34 | 61.76% | 0% | 71 min | — |
| PSA Airlines | 18 | 69.23% | 27.78% | 140 min | — |
| Envoy Air | 7 | 71.43% | 0% | 20 min | — |
Month by month
Share of flights that arrived within 15 minutes of schedule, by month flown.
Other routes from Dallas/Fort Worth
Common questions
Are flights from Dallas/Fort Worth to Raleigh/Durham usually delayed?
69.68% of flights on the DFW to RDU route arrived within 15 minutes of schedule, so roughly 3 in every ten arrived late. That is worse than the average route in this record.
Which airline is most on time from Dallas/Fort Worth to Raleigh/Durham?
Frontier Airlines, at 85.37% on time across 210 flights. The least punctual on the route was American Airlines at 68.17%.
How often are DFW to RDU flights cancelled?
2.85% of scheduled flights did not operate — about 29 in every thousand. That is high enough that cancellation, not delay, is the risk worth planning around.
What is the best month to fly Dallas/Fort Worth to Raleigh/Durham?
September, when 84.5% of flights arrived on time. The worst was July at 53.1%.
When DFW to RDU flights are late, how late are they?
About 68 minutes on average across the flights that arrived more than 15 minutes behind schedule.
What these figures do and do not tell you
Everything on this page is counted from the flights that actually operated on DFW to RDU during January 2025 – August 2026, as reported by the airlines to the US Bureau of Transportation Statistics. "On time" is the federal definition: arriving at the gate within 15 minutes of the scheduled time.
A route's record is a description of the past, not a forecast. Weather, air traffic control and the aircraft's earlier flights that day drive most delays, and none of them are predictable from a historical rate. What the record does tell you is whether this route runs late more often than others, and which carrier on it has the better history — which is the part you can actually act on when you book.
Cancellations are counted separately from delays because they are a different problem for a traveller: a late flight still gets you there. How the grade is calculated →