Route profile
DTW→RDU
Flight reliability, delays and best times to fly from Detroit to Raleigh–Durham, 501 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 80% of comparable major US routes (4,598 compared)
Calculated from 4,664 flights. How this is calculated · What counts as on time
DTW → RDU arrives on time 84.0% of the time; the return trip, RDU → DTW, arrives on time 86.6% of the time, a 2.6-point gap between the two directions of the same city pair.
DTW → RDU spends 24.0 minutes on the ground on a 501-mile trip: 16.8 minutes from pushback to wheels-up at DTW and 7.2 minutes from touchdown to gate at RDU.
Source: US DOT Bureau of Transportation Statistics · Data covering July 2023 – July 2026
What stands out
This route has stayed remarkably steady year over year, a smaller swing than 100% of 5,368 comparable routes.
84.0% on time over the most recent 12 months (2025-08 to 2026-07), against 84.0% in the 12 months before (2024-08 to 2025-07), virtually unchanged.
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 5,368 in the comparison.
What sets this route apart
Where DTW to RDU differs most from similar routes by hour, weekday, month and airline, July 2023 – July 2026.
DTW to RDU is at its best against routes of similar length for flights scheduled at 4 PM: 85.4% arrive on time, 13.5 points ahead of the 71.9% those routes manage at that hour. Against all other routes the gap is 14.7 points.
DTW to RDU holds up on Mondays better than routes of similar length do: 86.0% on time to their 78.1%, a 7.9 points lead. Against all other routes the gap is 8.8 points.
June is kinder to DTW to RDU than to routes of similar length: 84.1% on time against 73.9%, 10.2 points better. Against all other routes the gap is 11.4 points.
DTW to RDU against comparable routes
July 2023 – July 2026| Measure | This route | Compared with | Them | Gap | Flights behind it |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Hour: 4 PM departures | 85.4% | routes of similar length | 71.9% | +13.5 pts | 164 here, 78,593 there |
| Weekday: Monday | 86.0% | routes of similar length | 78.1% | +7.9 pts | 699 here, 214,889 there |
| Month: June | 84.1% | routes of similar length | 73.9% | +10.2 pts | 410 here, 117,820 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 501 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 DTW → RDU flights are cancelled
July 2023 – July 2026
DTW → RDU cancelled 56 of 4,664 scheduled flights — about 1 in every 83. The reason filed most often was the airline, 60.7% of the cancellations coded on this route — about 1 in every 137 scheduled flights.
Share of cancellations
Of 56 cancelled departures carrying a reason code.
What each reason means
Crew, maintenance, aircraft cleaning, baggage or fueling: what BTS counts as within the carrier’s own control.
34 cancellations, 60.7% of the total.
Conditions the carrier judged severe enough to stop the flight: a blizzard, a hurricane, a line of thunderstorms.
22 cancellations, 39.3% of the total.
Airport capacity, air traffic control flow programs, heavy traffic and ordinary bad weather. A system decision, not the airline’s.
0 cancellations, 0.0% 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. With only one or two carriers on the route, the split mostly reflects how they file. Ordinary bad weather is filed under air traffic, so weather’s full share is larger than its bar.
56 coded cancellations were recorded on DTW → RDU; the section appears from 50.
When it goes wrong
July 2023 – July 2026
30 min late
against a median of 9 min early
Percentiles over 4,664 operations; cancelled and diverted flights are counted separately.
Will your connection be tight enough?
Layovers at RDU after arriving from DTW.
| Connection time | Chance of missing | Reads as |
|---|---|---|
| 30 min | 28% | High risk |
| 45 min | 16% | High risk |
| 60 min | 9.9% | Some risk |
| 90 min | 5.1% | Some risk |
| 120 min | 2.9% | 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 1.20% of the time and diverts 0.09% of the time, which a late arrival never shows up in.
Chance of missing is the share of 4,604 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 30 minutes late (90th-percentile gate arrival delay), over 4,664 operations.
Any other layover length: connection checker.
Best time to fly
DTW → RDU flights departing 5–9 AM arrived on time 90.8% of the time, against 72.4% for 6–9 PM departures, a gap of 18.4 percentage points.
By departure window
By departure hour
- 12 AM to 6 AM: too few flights to score
- 7 AM: 91.8% on time from 763 flights
- 8 AM to 9 AM: too few flights to score
- 10 AM: 88.6% on time from 1,076 flights
- 11 AM to 1 PM: too few flights to score
- 2 PM: 83.4% on time from 428 flights
- 3 PM: 81.6% on time from 636 flights
- 4 PM: 85.4% on time from 165 flights
- 5 PM to 8 PM: too few flights to score
- 9 PM: 77.3% on time from 1,106 flights
- 10 PM to 11 PM: too few flights to score
Why DTW → RDU runs late
July 2023 – July 2026
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
screening or terminal security incidents
Share of the delay minutes US DOT attributed to each cause for DTW → RDU. Only delays of 15 minutes or more are attributed. What the five causes mean
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 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Delta Air Lines | 4,090 | 84.8% | 0.83% | -9 min | 5.0% |
| Frontier Airlines | 401 | 76.5% | 5.49% | -5 min | 7.9% |
Delta Air Lines flew 91.1% of the 4,491 flights listed. Frontier Airlines cancelled 5.49% of its flights here against 0.83% for Delta Air Lines.
Delta Air Lines arrived on time 8.3 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.
DL2164 (10:25 AM) arrived on time 88.8% of the time, 11.5 points more often than DL2839 (9:45 PM) at 77.3%.
Weekly and seasonal patterns
By day of week
Tuesday is historically the most reliable day and Sunday the least, a gap of 8.5 percentage points.
By month
- Jan: 78.0%
- Feb: 87.7%
- Mar: 84.5%
- Apr: 86.8%
- May: 83.7%
- Jun: 84.1%
- Jul: 78.0%
- Aug: 81.8%
- Sep: 88.2%
- Oct: 89.0%
- Nov: 89.2%
- Dec: 78.7%
January is historically the weakest month and November the strongest, a spread of 11.2 percentage points.
Reliability over time
July 2023 – July 2026
- July 2023: 75.7% from 137 flights
- August 2023: 81.6% from 140 flights
- September 2023: 87.9% from 124 flights
- October 2023: 91.5% from 129 flights
- November 2023: too few flights to score (113)
- December 2023: too few flights to score (101)
- January 2024: too few flights to score (105)
- February 2024: too few flights to score (92)
- March 2024: too few flights to score (119)
- April 2024: too few flights to score (116)
- May 2024: 81.5% from 135 flights
- June 2024: 83.4% from 149 flights
- July 2024: 78.9% from 153 flights
- August 2024: 77.2% from 142 flights
- September 2024: 86.6% from 129 flights
- October 2024: 86.2% from 132 flights
- November 2024: 90.6% from 127 flights
- December 2024: too few flights to score (115)
- January 2025: too few flights to score (104)
- February 2025: too few flights to score (102)
- March 2025: 90.0% from 130 flights
- April 2025: 89.9% from 129 flights
- May 2025: 87.5% from 144 flights
- June 2025: 80.4% from 155 flights
- July 2025: 78.2% from 143 flights
- August 2025: 86.0% from 151 flights
- September 2025: 90.0% from 130 flights
- October 2025: 89.4% from 141 flights
- November 2025: 85.2% from 150 flights
- December 2025: 72.1% from 124 flights
- January 2026: too few flights to score (103)
- February 2026: too few flights to score (99)
- March 2026: 78.8% from 122 flights
- April 2026: 86.5% from 128 flights
- May 2026: 81.5% from 121 flights
- June 2026: too few flights to score (113)
- July 2026: too few flights to score (117)
Over the most recent 12 months (2025-08 to 2026-07), on-time arrivals averaged 84.0% against 84.0% in the 12 months before — broadly unchanged.
Data and methodology
Calculated by FlyerIntel from 4,664 DTW → RDU 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