Route profile
DEN→IND
Flight reliability, delays and best times to fly from Denver to Indianapolis, 977 miles.
Right now
Aviation weather is not currently a factor.
Aviation weather is not currently a factor.
Route reliability
July 2023 – July 2026
Better than 49% of comparable major US routes (4,598 compared)
Calculated from 8,081 flights. How this is calculated · What counts as on time
DEN → IND arrives on time 75.5% of the time; the return trip, IND → DEN, arrives on time 80.3% of the time, a 4.8-point gap between the two directions of the same city pair.
DEN → IND spends 24.0 minutes on the ground on a 977-mile trip: 18.1 minutes from pushback to wheels-up at DEN and 5.9 minutes from touchdown to gate at IND.
Source: US DOT Bureau of Transportation Statistics · Data covering July 2023 – July 2026
What sets this route apart
Where DEN to IND differs most from similar routes by hour, weekday, month and airline, July 2023 – July 2026.
DEN to IND struggles most at 7 PM: 48.3% of its flights scheduled then arrive on time, 18.2 points behind the 66.5% on routes of similar length at the same hour. Against all other routes the gap is 19.5 points.
DEN to IND is at its best against routes of similar length for flights scheduled at 10 AM: 85.5% arrive on time, 3 points ahead of the 82.5% those routes manage at that hour. Against all other routes the gap is 2.8 points.
In September, DEN to IND runs 4.9 points below routes of similar length, 76.9% on time to 81.8%. Against all other routes the gap is 5.5 points.
Frontier Airlines does better on DEN to IND than on its routes of similar length: 81.7% on time here, 73.3% there, 8.4 points apart. Against all other routes the gap is 10.5 points.
Southwest Airlines’ flights on DEN to IND arrive on time 72.0% of the time, 3.8 points below the 75.8% it manages on its routes of similar length. Against all other routes the gap is 5.4 points.
DEN to IND against comparable routes
July 2023 – July 2026| Measure | This route | Compared with | Them | Gap | Flights behind it |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Hour: 7 PM departures | 48.3% | routes of similar length | 66.5% | −18.2 pts | 315 here, 200,932 there |
| Hour: 10 AM departures | 85.5% | routes of similar length | 82.5% | +3.0 pts | 1,092 here, 171,235 there |
| Month: September | 76.9% | routes of similar length | 81.8% | −4.9 pts | 659 here, 235,622 there |
| Airline: Frontier Airlines | 81.7% | routes of similar length | 73.3% | +8.4 pts | 851 here, 161,849 there |
| Airline: Southwest Airlines | 72.0% | routes of similar length | 75.8% | −3.8 pts | 4,502 here, 744,729 there |
Each comparison pools the flights of other routes, with this route’s own left out. Similar length means within 15% of this route’s 977 miles, with at least 5 such routes. A bucket is set against the most comparable group that has enough flights: similar length, then the same origin (at least 3 routes), then all other routes. Hours, weekdays and months appear only where both sides have 120 completed flights, and airlines where both have 600. The gap must be at least 2 points and 2 standard errors, and only the largest gap each way is kept per measure. These are differences in the flights counted, not causes.
Why DEN → IND flights are cancelled
July 2023 – July 2026
DEN → IND cancelled 50 of 8,081 scheduled flights — about 1 in every 162. The reason filed most often was extreme weather, 58.0% of the cancellations coded on this route — about 1 in every 279 scheduled flights.
Share of cancellations
Of 50 cancelled departures carrying a reason code.
What each reason means
Conditions the carrier judged severe enough to stop the flight: a blizzard, a hurricane, a line of thunderstorms.
29 cancellations, 58.0% of the total.
Crew, maintenance, aircraft cleaning, baggage or fueling: what BTS counts as within the carrier’s own control.
19 cancellations, 38.0% of the total.
Airport capacity, air traffic control flow programs, heavy traffic and ordinary bad weather. A system decision, not the airline’s.
2 cancellations, 4.0% of the total.
A terminal evacuation, a security breach, screening equipment failure, or screening queues over 29 minutes.
0 cancellations, 0.0% of the total.
Reason codes are the operating airline’s own filing with US DOT, not an independent finding of fault. Ordinary bad weather is filed under air traffic, so weather’s full share is larger than its bar.
50 coded cancellations were recorded on DEN → IND; the section appears from 50.
When it goes wrong
July 2023 – July 2026
47 min late
against a median of 2 min early
Percentiles over 8,081 operations; cancelled and diverted flights are counted separately.
Will your connection be tight enough?
Layovers at IND after arriving from DEN.
| Connection time | Chance of missing | Reads as |
|---|---|---|
| 30 min | 44% | Likely to miss |
| 45 min | 24% | High risk |
| 60 min | 15% | High risk |
| 90 min | 7.3% | Some risk |
| 120 min | 4.3% | Low risk |
This is one leg of a connection. Gate changes and the next flight's own schedule matter too. And a connection can fail before delay is even the question — this route cancels 0.62% of the time and diverts 0.12% of the time, which a late arrival never shows up in.
Chance of missing is the share of 8,021 arrivals on this route that landed later than the connection time less 30 minutes to reach the next gate.
The worst tenth of arrivals on this route land at least 47 minutes late (90th-percentile gate arrival delay), over 8,081 operations.
Any other layover length: connection checker.
Best time to fly
DEN → IND flights departing 5–9 AM arrived on time 90.6% of the time, against 60.7% for 6–9 PM departures, a gap of 29.9 percentage points.
By departure window
By departure hour
- 12 AM to 4 AM: too few flights to score
- 5 AM: 94.4% on time from 362 flights
- 6 AM: 92.8% on time from 209 flights
- 7 AM: 88.9% on time from 354 flights
- 8 AM: 87.9% on time from 472 flights
- 9 AM: 83.6% on time from 509 flights
- 10 AM: 85.5% on time from 1,096 flights
- 11 AM: 77.3% on time from 195 flights
- 12 PM: 75.7% on time from 364 flights
- 1 PM: 78.8% on time from 808 flights
- 2 PM: 71.0% on time from 405 flights
- 3 PM: 73.9% on time from 469 flights
- 4 PM: 62.9% on time from 246 flights
- 5 PM: 65.8% on time from 1,236 flights
- 6 PM: 69.1% on time from 552 flights
- 7 PM: 48.3% on time from 319 flights
- 8 PM: 59.1% on time from 389 flights
- 9 PM to 11 PM: too few flights to score
Departure windows with fewer than 120 flights are not scored.
Why DEN → IND runs late
July 2023 – July 2026
the inbound aircraft was late, so this flight started late
crew, maintenance, boarding and fueling, all within the carrier’s control
airspace and airport capacity, including weather-driven flow control
weather severe enough to stop this flight specifically
screening or terminal security incidents
Share of the delay minutes US DOT attributed to each cause for DEN → IND. Only delays of 15 minutes or more are attributed. What the five causes mean
Late-arriving aircraft is the largest cause on DEN → IND, at 51.4%: flights here mostly leave late because the plane came in late, and the day shows it: 5–9 AM departures arrived on time 90.6% of the time and 6–9 PM departures 60.7%.
Airlines on this route
Carriers with at least 200 flights, by the airline that operated each one.
| Carrier | Flights | On time | Cancelled | Median delay | Severe |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Southwest Airlines | 4,532 | 72.0% | 0.57% | 1 min | 8.5% |
| United Airlines | 2,690 | 79.6% | 0.67% | -4 min | 6.4% |
| Frontier Airlines | 857 | 81.7% | 0.70% | -10 min | 6.6% |
Southwest Airlines flew 56.1% of the 8,079 flights listed.
Frontier Airlines arrived on time 9.7 percentage points more often than Southwest Airlines on this route.
Flights on this route
Flight numbers with at least 600 operations here and still on the schedule.
Weekly and seasonal patterns
By day of week
Wednesday is historically the most reliable day and Friday the least, a gap of 6.5 percentage points.
By month
- Jan: 78.1%
- Feb: 78.5%
- Mar: 77.1%
- Apr: 79.1%
- May: 75.2%
- Jun: 69.6%
- Jul: 66.4%
- Aug: 71.8%
- Sep: 76.9%
- Oct: 80.9%
- Nov: 81.8%
- Dec: 78.6%
July is historically the weakest month and November the strongest, a spread of 15.4 percentage points.
Reliability over time
July 2023 – July 2026
- July 2023: 59.6% from 228 flights
- August 2023: 73.0% from 240 flights
- September 2023: 73.1% from 228 flights
- October 2023: 79.1% from 259 flights
- November 2023: 82.7% from 243 flights
- December 2023: 76.0% from 221 flights
- January 2024: 71.8% from 201 flights
- February 2024: 74.6% from 181 flights
- March 2024: 75.1% from 210 flights
- April 2024: 74.4% from 215 flights
- May 2024: 72.7% from 247 flights
- June 2024: 76.2% from 258 flights
- July 2024: 74.4% from 264 flights
- August 2024: 79.7% from 232 flights
- September 2024: 82.7% from 221 flights
- October 2024: 82.7% from 231 flights
- November 2024: 77.8% from 208 flights
- December 2024: 83.3% from 192 flights
- January 2025: 77.8% from 173 flights
- February 2025: 77.7% from 158 flights
- March 2025: 79.6% from 201 flights
- April 2025: 79.8% from 200 flights
- May 2025: 76.5% from 230 flights
- June 2025: 62.1% from 254 flights
- July 2025: 61.0% from 289 flights
- August 2025: 62.9% from 240 flights
- September 2025: 75.0% from 213 flights
- October 2025: 81.1% from 228 flights
- November 2025: 85.2% from 190 flights
- December 2025: 76.8% from 192 flights
- January 2026: 85.5% from 174 flights
- February 2026: 83.6% from 159 flights
- March 2026: 76.6% from 211 flights
- April 2026: 83.5% from 195 flights
- May 2026: 76.7% from 216 flights
- June 2026: 70.5% from 237 flights
- July 2026: 70.4% from 242 flights
Over the most recent 12 months (2025-08 to 2026-07), on-time arrivals averaged 76.7% against 76.0% in the 12 months before — broadly unchanged.
Data and methodology
Calculated by FlyerIntel from 8,081 DEN → IND flight records from the US DOT Bureau of Transportation Statistics, covering July 2023 – July 2026. Late means 15 or more minutes past scheduled arrival; cancelled and diverted flights are left out of on-time rates.
Full methodology · Data sources · Report a problem
Related research: How Long a Layover Needs to Be · Two Airlines on One Route · Best Time of Day to Fly From Major US Airports
Analysis last recomputed