Flight profile · United Airlines
UA500
Indianapolis (IND) to San Francisco (SFO) · scheduled 6:00 AM – 7:50 AM
How UA500 performs
851 operations, July 2023 – July 2026.
UA500 arrived on time 85.1% of the time, against 79.5% for all IND → SFO flights, so this departure is 5.6 percentage points better than the route as a whole. Against United Airlines’ own flights on this route it is 5.6 points better.
UA500’s scheduled departure has moved during the period FlyerIntel has on file: it typically left around 7:45 AM earlier on, and around 6:00 AM more recently — a 105-minute shift, not the few minutes of day-to-day rounding every published schedule carries. Confirm the current departure time before booking around an older listing.
Source: US DOT Bureau of Transportation Statistics · 851 operations, July 2023 – July 2026 · If UA500 is cancelled or significantly changed, DOT’s automatic refund rule may entitle you to your money back. The refund checker walks through eligibility.
Where UA500 is right now
A live reading, only if you ask for it. It is not part of the reliability record above.
Ask for the position of UA500 right now, if receivers on the ground are hearing it. Nothing is requested until you press the button.
Against the rest of the route
| Flight or route | On time | Cancelled | Median delay | Severe | Flights |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| UA500 | 85.1% | 1.41% | -8 min | 4.5% | 851 |
| United Airlines on IND → SFO | 79.5% | 1.12% | -6 min | 6.8% | 1,434 |
| All IND → SFO flights | 79.5% | 1.12% | -6 min | 6.8% | 1,434 |
Source: FlyerIntel analysis of US DOT BTS data · July 2023 – July 2026
Why UA500 runs late
Where US DOT attributed the delay minutes on this flight.
crew, maintenance, boarding and fueling, all within the carrier’s control
the inbound aircraft was late, so this flight started late
airspace and airport capacity, including weather-driven flow control
weather severe enough to stop this flight specifically
Share of the delay minutes US DOT attributed to each cause for UA500 on IND → SFO. Only delays of 15 minutes or more are attributed.
Source: US DOT Bureau of Transportation Statistics · Data covering July 2023 – July 2026
Does a late aircraft delay this flight?
How often the plane that flies UA500 comes in late, and what that does to the departure.
When the aircraft came in 15 or more minutes late, UA500 pushed back an average of 30 minutes late; when it came in on time or early, an average of 3 minutes late.
Each departure is matched to the flight the same aircraft flew into IND just before it, using the tail number in the DOT file, 731 of 840 departures in all. A departure is left out when that flight is unknown, was cancelled or diverted, or the aircraft had sat for more than 12 hours. A flight the airline cancelled never left and is not in the count, and one flown by a substitute aircraft is matched to the aircraft that flew it, not to the one first planned.
Against the network at the same turn length
| Share of departures | Inbound landed 15+ late | Left 15+ late after a late inbound | Left 15+ late after an on-time inbound |
|---|---|---|---|
| UA500 | 22% | 47% | 9% |
| Network, same turn | 17% | 68% | 9% |
The schedule leaves a normal turn: enough time to clean and board if the aircraft is on time, little to spare if it is not.
The network row is every flight with a scheduled turn of 60 to 89 minutes. How often UA500’s aircraft landed 15 or more minutes late is higher than the network’s and, once the aircraft was late, how often UA500 left 15 or more minutes late is lower than the network’s.
More: Which Flight Numbers Pay for a Late Aircraft lists the flight numbers that pass a late aircraft on.
Source: US DOT Bureau of Transportation Statistics · Data covering July 2023 – July 2026
From pushback to gate
When it leaves IND late, does that still matter by the time it reaches SFO?
UA500 pushes back an average of 9.1 minutes late and reaches the gate at SFO an average of 0.1 minutes late. The 9.0 minutes between those two figures are slack the published schedule already carries, which is why a late pushback on this flight does not reliably become a late arrival. Its 15.6 minutes on the taxiways at IND is about what any departure from the airport in that hour spends.
On arrival at SFO, UA500 spends 8.1 min taxiing from touchdown to the gate — ground time a connecting passenger sits through before they can even leave the aircraft, on top of however late the flight itself ran. That is about what any arrival at SFO spends on the ground before reaching the gate.
Departure delay is averaged over every pushback and arrival delay over every completed arrival, so the two counts differ by the flights that never reached SFO. Taxi-out is gate to wheels up and sits inside the scheduled block rather than on top of it; the comparison is 16,451 departures from IND scheduled in the clock hour UA500 most often leaves in. Taxi-in is landing to gate, compared against every arrival FlyerIntel has on file at SFO (436,060 flights), not just UA500’s own. More on taxi time.
Source: FlyerIntel analysis of US DOT BTS data · July 2023 – July 2026
The hour it leaves IND
Part of any flight’s record belongs to the clock rather than to the flight. UA500 has one departure time, so this is what that time is worth.
On-time arrival rate. 16,451 departures from IND are scheduled in the 6 AM–7 AM hour over the period, against 147,128 across the whole day.
UA500 is scheduled out of IND at 6:00 AM, in the 6 AM–7 AM bank. Departures from IND in that hour arrive on time 90.9% of the time against 81.9% across the airport’s whole day — the slot alone is worth 9.0 points better before anything about this particular flight is considered.
The two airport figures cover every departure from IND to every destination, so they describe the slot rather than this journey — the like-for-like comparison against the route is above. Hours are scheduled local, and a number whose schedule moved between banks inside the period has no single hour and is not described here at all. Why the hour matters.
Source: FlyerIntel analysis of US DOT BTS data · July 2023 – July 2026 · Hours below 120 departures are not scored.
By day of week
Does UA500 run worse on particular days?
Wednesday is historically the most reliable day and Friday the least, a gap of 7.2 percentage points.
Source: FlyerIntel analysis of US DOT BTS data · July 2023 – July 2026 · Days with fewer than 120 operations are not scored.
Other routes UA500 has flown
A flight number is a slot in a schedule, and carriers reassign it. These are the other city pairs this number served in the analysis period.
| Route | Operated | Flights | On time |
|---|---|---|---|
| SFO→PHX San Francisco to Phoenix | March 29, 2026 – July 31, 2026 | 74 | — |
| DEN→IDA Denver to Idaho Falls | January 6, 2026 – February 11, 2026 | 36 | — |
| MFR→DEN Medford to Denver | February 4, 2026 | 1 | — |
| SFO→BUR San Francisco to Burbank | August 19, 2025 – December 17, 2025 | 84 | — |
| SFO→SNA San Francisco to Santa Ana | August 19, 2024 – August 18, 2025 | 344 | 84.3% |
| SNA→IAH Santa Ana to Houston | May 22, 2025 – August 18, 2025 | 89 | — |
| GRR→DEN Grand Rapids to Denver | June 27–30, 2024 | 4 | — |
| EWR→BOS Newark to Boston | May 23, 2024 – June 26, 2024 | 33 | — |
| RDU→EWR Raleigh–Durham to Newark | May 23, 2024 – June 26, 2024 | 33 | — |
| DEN→SDF Denver to Louisville | February 15, 2024 – May 22, 2024 | 74 | — |
| LAS→SFO Las Vegas to San Francisco | January 8, 2024 | 1 | — |
| BOI→SFO Boise to San Francisco | October 29, 2023 – January 5, 2024 | 63 | — |
Because the same number has served different journeys, the statistics above describe only the route UA500 currently operates. Blending them would produce an average of two different flights.
When it goes wrong
The average describes a usual day. This is the day that ruins a connection.
26 min late
against a median of 8 min early
Percentiles over 851 operations; cancelled and diverted flights are counted separately.
Source: US DOT Bureau of Transportation Statistics · Data covering July 2023 – July 2026
Data and methodology
Calculated by FlyerIntel from 851 records of UA500 operating IND → SFO, published by the US DOT Bureau of Transportation Statistics. A flight counts as delayed when it arrives 15 or more minutes after schedule. Cancelled and diverted flights are excluded from the on-time rate and reported separately. Flight numbers are resolved as carrier plus number plus route, because the same number serves different routes over time.
Full methodology · Data sources · Report a problem
Related research: Most and Least Reliable Flight Numbers · The Delay You Inherit · Making Up Time in the Air
Analysis last recomputed