DEN → LGA Flight Reliability

Right now

Origin · DENNo disruption reported

Aviation weather is not currently a factor.

Updated 07:53 UTC

Denver airport profile →

Destination · LGANo disruption reported

Aviation weather is not currently a factor.

Updated 07:51 UTC

New York airport profile →

Route reliability

July 2023 – July 2026

Route Reliability Score

54/ 100Fair

Better than 22% of comparable major US routes (4,598 compared)

Calculated from 14,617 flights. How this is calculated

On-time arrivals

74.2%

10,529 of 14,181

Cancellation rate

1.83%

267 cancelled

Median arrival delay

-4 min

Average 10.3 min

Severe delays

9.5%

60+ minutes late

Delay when late

69 min

Average, when 15+ min late

Flights analyzed

14,617

5 carriers

DEN → LGA arrives on time 74.2% of the time; the return trip, LGA → DEN, arrives on time 76.6% of the time, a 2.3-point gap between the two directions of the same city pair.

DEN → LGA spends 27.0 minutes on the ground on a 1,620-mile trip: 19.0 minutes from pushback to wheels-up at DEN and 8.1 minutes from touchdown to gate at LGA.

Source: US DOT Bureau of Transportation Statistics · Data covering July 2023 – July 2026

What stands out

The airline matters unusually much on this route, a wider carrier-to-carrier gap than 91% of 2,692 comparable routes.

Delta Air Lines arrived on time 79.9% of the time, against 61.4% for Frontier Airlines, flying the exact same route.

Source: FlyerIntel analysis of US DOT BTS data · July 2023 – July 2026 · Ranked against every other route with the same kind of figure and at least 2,692 in the comparison.

Why DEN → LGA flights are cancelled

July 2023 – July 2026

DEN → LGA cancelled 267 of 14,617 scheduled flights — about 1 in every 55. The reason filed most often was extreme weather, 60.7% of the cancellations coded on this route — about 1 in every 90 scheduled flights.

Share of cancellations

Weather60.7%

Airline22.5%

Air traffic16.9%

Security0.0%

Of 267 cancelled departures carrying a reason code.

What each reason means

Extreme weather1 in 90

Conditions the carrier judged severe enough to stop the flight: a blizzard, a hurricane, a line of thunderstorms.

162 cancellations, 60.7% of the total.

The airline1 in 244

Crew, maintenance, aircraft cleaning, baggage or fueling: what BTS counts as within the carrier’s own control.

60 cancellations, 22.5% of the total.

The air traffic system1 in 325

Airport capacity, air traffic control flow programs, heavy traffic and ordinary bad weather. A system decision, not the airline’s.

45 cancellations, 16.9% of the total.

Security—

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.

267 coded cancellations were recorded on DEN → LGA; the section appears from 50.

When it goes wrong

July 2023 – July 2026

One arrival in ten is worse than

57 min late

against a median of 4 min early

Arrived an hour or more late9.5%

Typical delay when late69 min

Cancelled1.83%

Landed somewhere else1.16%

DEN → LGA has an average that understates its risk: a typical arrival is 4 min early, but the worst tenth are 61 minutes worse than that. If the trip has something unmissable at the end of it, the median is the wrong number to plan against.

Percentiles over 14,617 operations; cancelled and diverted flights are counted separately.

Will your connection be tight enough?

Layovers at LGA after arriving from DEN.

Connection buffer and chance of missing by layover length, DEN → LGA arrivals
Connection time	Chance of missing	Reads as
30 min	42%	Likely to miss
45 min	25%	High risk
60 min	17%	High risk
90 min	9.4%	Some risk
120 min	5.6%	Some 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 1.83% of the time and diverts 1.16% of the time, which a late arrival never shows up in.

Chance of missing is the share of 14,181 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 57 minutes late (90th-percentile gate arrival delay), over 14,617 operations.

Any other layover length: connection checker.

Best time to fly

DEN → LGA flights departing 5–9 AM arrived on time 89.1% of the time, against 65.4% for 3–6 PM departures, a gap of 23.7 percentage points.

By day and hour

On-time arrival rate for each weekday and scheduled departure hour, in local time at the departure airport (DEN).

Hour of departure matters more than day of the week: hourly averages sit a typical 9.3 points from the route-wide rate, weekday averages 2.3 points.

On-time arrival rate for DEN to LGA by weekday and scheduled departure hour, local time. Each button reads out one slot.
Hour	Monday	Tuesday	Wednesday	Thursday	Friday	Saturday	Sunday
6 AM–7 AM
7 AM–8 AM
8 AM–9 AM
9 AM–10 AM
10 AM–11 AM
11 AM–12 PM
12 PM–1 PM
1 PM–2 PM
2 PM–3 PM
3 PM–4 PM
4 PM–5 PM
5 PM–6 PM

On-time rate, % · stronger color, fewer on time

50–59
60–69
70–79
80–89
90–99

Fewer than 120 flights, not scored

Source: FlyerIntel analysis of US DOT BTS data · July 2023 – July 2026 · On time is arrival within 15 minutes of schedule. Cells round to whole percentages; the table shows one decimal.

No slot is named best or worst: too few reach 500 flights. Departures before 6 AM and after 6 PM (32 flights) are not drawn: no slot in those hours has enough flights to score.

View as tableHide table

On-time arrival rate (%) with flights beneath, by scheduled departure hour and weekday for DEN to LGA. A dash means fewer than 120 flights, which are not scored.
Hour	Monday	Tuesday	Wednesday	Thursday	Friday	Saturday	Sunday
6 AM–7 AM	95.1% on time210 flights	96.5% on time204 flights	95.0% on time201 flights	92.6% on time206 flights	87.7% on time212 flights	77 flights, too few to score	88.7% on time154 flights
7 AM–8 AM	81.1% on time170 flights	89.8% on time163 flights	86.9% on time163 flights	89.6% on time174 flights	85.6% on time172 flights	89.4% on time183 flights	86.0% on time220 flights
8 AM–9 AM	102 flights, too few to score	108 flights, too few to score	110 flights, too few to score	102 flights, too few to score	95 flights, too few to score	102 flights, too few to score	102 flights, too few to score
9 AM–10 AM	76.4% on time151 flights	75.0% on time165 flights	77.4% on time167 flights	78.8% on time156 flights	70.0% on time153 flights	92 flights, too few to score	82.4% on time127 flights
10 AM–11 AM	78.9% on time194 flights	81.6% on time184 flights	81.0% on time183 flights	70.7% on time188 flights	74.9% on time192 flights	109 flights, too few to score	76.6% on time195 flights
11 AM–12 PM	74.9% on time326 flights	74.3% on time318 flights	75.1% on time317 flights	75.4% on time321 flights	72.3% on time323 flights	81.3% on time130 flights	75.4% on time325 flights
12 PM–1 PM	31 flights, too few to score	67 flights, too few to score	70 flights, too few to score	31 flights, too few to score	27 flights, too few to score	31 flights, too few to score	32 flights, too few to score
1 PM–2 PM	66.7% on time130 flights	72.1% on time128 flights	69.3% on time128 flights	68.9% on time128 flights	63.7% on time129 flights	62 flights, too few to score	74 flights, too few to score
2 PM–3 PM	61.4% on time181 flights	68.4% on time155 flights	74.5% on time149 flights	65.7% on time180 flights	65.2% on time183 flights	75.7% on time146 flights	56.6% on time196 flights
3 PM–4 PM	65.7% on time146 flights	75.7% on time140 flights	71.7% on time140 flights	65.7% on time146 flights	70.5% on time150 flights	59 flights, too few to score	64.8% on time130 flights
4 PM–5 PM	63.0% on time221 flights	69.4% on time189 flights	67.2% on time193 flights	58.5% on time208 flights	67.3% on time217 flights	116 flights, too few to score	55.7% on time213 flights
5 PM–6 PM	60.1% on time388 flights	68.0% on time398 flights	65.3% on time398 flights	65.0% on time384 flights	67.2% on time287 flights	67.1% on time257 flights	62.1% on time401 flights

By departure window

5–9 AM89.1%

9 AM–12 PM76.3%

12–3 PM67.5%

3–6 PM65.4%

9 PM–5 AM—

By departure hour

12 AM

3 AM

6 AM

9 AM

12 PM

3 PM

6 PM

9 PM

Departure windows with fewer than 120 flights are not scored.

Why DEN → LGA runs late

July 2023 – July 2026

Air traffic control34.3%

airspace and airport capacity, including weather-driven flow control

The airline33.0%

crew, maintenance, boarding and fueling, all within the carrier’s control

Late-arriving aircraft29.9%

the inbound aircraft was late, so this flight started late

Weather2.7%

weather severe enough to stop this flight specifically

Security0.1%

screening or terminal security incidents

Share of the delay minutes US DOT attributed to each cause for DEN → LGA. Only delays of 15 minutes or more are attributed.

How this route holds up in bad weather

July 2023 – July 2026

Bad weather raises cancellations by a similar amount at both ends of DEN to LGA: 4.0 times the normal rate at DEN and 4.1 times at LGA. Cancelled in bad weather against normal hours: DEN 2.8% against 0.7%, LGA 9.0% against 2.2%. Flights that did leave DEN in bad weather arrived on time 51.5% of the time, against 78.8% in normal hours.

Bad weather and normal hours at the airports

Scheduled departures, July 2023 – July 2026

Departures from DEN and LGA in hours of bad weather and in normal hours
Departures from	DEN	LGA
Cancelled in bad weather	2.8%	9.0%
Cancelled in normal hours	0.7%	2.2%
Arrived on time, bad weather	51.5%	63.6%
Arrived on time, normal hours	78.8%	80.9%
Departures in bad weather	92,610	56,339

United Airlines (1.5% cancelled against 3.5% for the other carriers at DEN), Delta Air Lines (1.1% cancelled against 2.9% for the other carriers at DEN) and Southwest Airlines (2.4% cancelled against 3.1% for the other carriers at DEN) cancelled fewer departures from DEN in bad weather than the other carriers there did in the same months. None of the route’s other carriers was clearly worse. One more carrier flies this route but has too few bad-weather departures from DEN to compare.

This route’s airlines in bad weather at DEN

All departures from DEN

Cancellation rates in bad weather at DEN for the airlines that fly DEN to LGA, against the other carriers at DEN in the same months
Airline	Bad-weather departures	Cancelled	Other carriers
United Airlines	30,853	1.5%below the others	3.5%
Delta Air Lines	3,460	1.1%below the others	2.9%
Southwest Airlines	28,467	2.4%below the others	3.1%
Frontier Airlines	6,740	3.1%about level	2.8%

These are airport figures, not route figures: every scheduled departure from DEN and LGA, to any destination, in hours the weather report called bad. The airline rows count each carrier’s departures from DEN on every route.

Weather source and limits. In full: DEN (airlines), LGA, What Weather Costs Each Airport, Who Cancels More When the Weather Turns, Airports That Change Places When Weather Turns.

Airlines on this route

Carriers with at least 200 flights, by the airline that operated each one.

Airlines on this route
Carrier	Flights	On time	Cancelled	Median delay	Severe
United Airlines	6,264	75.8%	1.28%	-5 min	9.3%
Southwest Airlines	4,281	69.5%	1.75%	0 min	10.2%
Delta Air Lines	3,174	79.9%	2.68%	-9 min	7.9%
JetBlue	486	70.1%	2.88%	-4 min	12.6%
Frontier Airlines	412	61.4%	3.16%	6 min	15.7%

United Airlines flew 42.9% of the 14,617 flights listed. Frontier Airlines cancelled 3.16% of its flights here against 1.28% for United Airlines.

Delta Air Lines arrived on time 18.5 percentage points more often than Frontier Airlines on this route.

Flights on this route

Flight numbers with at least 600 operations here and still on the schedule.

Flights on this route
Flight	Scheduled	Operations	On time
DL398 Delta Air Lines	7:10 AM	788	85.9%
UA1442 United Airlines	7:45 AM	762	89.0%
UA2446 United Airlines	9:49 AM	627	82.3%

UA1442 (7:45 AM) arrived on time 89.0% of the time, 6.7 points more often than UA2446 (9:49 AM) at 82.3%.

Weekly and seasonal patterns

By day of week

Mon72.2%

Tue76.4%

Wed75.8%

Thu73.0%

Fri73.3%

Sat79.1%

Sun71.7%

Saturday is historically the most reliable day and Sunday the least, a gap of 7.4 percentage points.

By month

Jan

Feb

Mar

Apr

May

Jun

Jul

Aug

Sep

Oct

Nov

Dec

July is historically the weakest month and April the strongest, a spread of 19.0 percentage points.

Reliability over time

July 2023 – July 2026

24

25

26

Over the most recent 12 months (2025-08 to 2026-07), on-time arrivals averaged 71.8% against 74.9% in the 12 months before — declining by 3.1 percentage points.

Data and methodology

Calculated by FlyerIntel from 14,617 DEN → LGA 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

Analysis last recomputed September 26, 2026

DEN airport LGA airport Return direction LGA → DEN

DEN→LGA

Right now

Route reliability

What stands out

Why DEN → LGA flights are cancelled

Share of cancellations

What each reason means

When it goes wrong

Will your connection be tight enough?

Best time to fly

By day and hour

By departure window

By departure hour

Why DEN → LGA runs late

How this route holds up in bad weather

Bad weather and normal hours at the airports

This route’s airlines in bad weather at DEN

Airlines on this route

Flights on this route

Weekly and seasonal patterns

By day of week

By month

Reliability over time

Data and methodology