Route profile
EWR→MKE
Flight reliability, delays and best times to fly from Newark to Milwaukee, 725 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 43% of comparable major US routes (4,598 compared)
Calculated from 2,586 flights. How this is calculated · What counts as on time
EWR → MKE arrives on time 84.1% of the time; the return trip, MKE → EWR, arrives on time 82.0% of the time, a 2.0-point gap between the two directions of the same city pair.
EWR → MKE spends 36.0 minutes on the ground on a 725-mile trip: 24.9 minutes from pushback to wheels-up at EWR and 11.1 minutes from touchdown to gate at MKE.
Source: US DOT Bureau of Transportation Statistics · Data covering July 2023 – July 2026
What stands out
Reliability here swings unusually widely by season, a wider month-to-month spread than 94% of 3,357 comparable routes.
92.5% on time in a typical March, against 67.1% in July.
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 3,357 in the comparison.
What sets this route apart
Where EWR to MKE differs most from similar routes by hour, weekday, month and airline, July 2023 – July 2026.
EWR to MKE is at its best against routes of similar length for flights scheduled at 4 PM: 84.0% arrive on time, 14.7 points ahead of the 69.3% those routes manage at that hour. Against all other routes the gap is 13.3 points.
EWR to MKE holds up on Sundays better than routes of similar length do: 83.2% on time to their 74.6%, a 8.6 points lead. Against all other routes the gap is 8.4 points.
March is kinder to EWR to MKE than to routes of similar length: 92.5% on time against 78.2%, 14.3 points better. Against all other routes the gap is 14.6 points.
Republic Airways does better on EWR to MKE than on its routes of similar length: 85.4% on time here, 82.3% there, 3.1 points apart. Against all other routes the gap is 3.3 points.
EWR to MKE against comparable routes
July 2023 – July 2026| Measure | This route | Compared with | Them | Gap | Flights behind it |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Hour: 4 PM departures | 84.0% | routes of similar length | 69.3% | +14.7 pts | 601 here, 121,097 there |
| Weekday: Sunday | 83.2% | routes of similar length | 74.6% | +8.6 pts | 345 here, 307,310 there |
| Month: March | 92.5% | routes of similar length | 78.2% | +14.3 pts | 161 here, 170,398 there |
| Airline: Republic Airways | 85.4% | routes of similar length | 82.3% | +3.1 pts | 2,339 here, 124,302 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 725 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 EWR → MKE flights are cancelled
July 2023 – July 2026
EWR → MKE cancelled 136 of 2,586 scheduled flights — about 1 in every 19. The reason filed most often was extreme weather, 58.8% of the cancellations coded on this route — about 1 in every 32 scheduled flights.
Share of cancellations
Of 136 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.
80 cancellations, 58.8% of the total.
Airport capacity, air traffic control flow programs, heavy traffic and ordinary bad weather. A system decision, not the airline’s.
55 cancellations, 40.4% of the total.
Crew, maintenance, aircraft cleaning, baggage or fueling: what BTS counts as within the carrier’s own control.
1 cancellation, 0.7% 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.
136 coded cancellations were recorded on EWR → MKE; the section appears from 50.
When it goes wrong
July 2023 – July 2026
31 min late
against a median of 13 min early
Percentiles over 2,586 operations; cancelled and diverted flights are counted separately.
Will your connection be tight enough?
Layovers at MKE after arriving from EWR.
| Connection time | Chance of missing | Reads as |
|---|---|---|
| 30 min | 27% | High risk |
| 45 min | 15% | High risk |
| 60 min | 10% | Some risk |
| 90 min | 5.3% | Some risk |
| 120 min | 3.6% | 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 5.26% of the time and diverts 0.23% of the time, which a late arrival never shows up in.
Chance of missing is the share of 2,444 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 31 minutes late (90th-percentile gate arrival delay), over 2,586 operations.
Any other layover length: connection checker.
Best time to fly
EWR → MKE flights departing 5–9 AM arrived on time 92.9% of the time, against 73.9% for 9 PM–5 AM departures, a gap of 19.0 percentage points.
By departure window
By departure hour
- 12 AM to 6 AM: too few flights to score
- 7 AM: 96.3% on time from 195 flights
- 8 AM: 92.8% on time from 370 flights
- 9 AM: 87.3% on time from 409 flights
- 10 AM to 2 PM: too few flights to score
- 3 PM: 83.2% on time from 318 flights
- 4 PM: 84.0% on time from 638 flights
- 5 PM to 8 PM: too few flights to score
- 9 PM: 75.4% on time from 378 flights
- 10 PM to 11 PM: too few flights to score
Departure windows with fewer than 120 flights are not scored.
Why EWR → MKE 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 EWR → MKE. Only delays of 15 minutes or more are attributed. What the five causes mean
Late-arriving aircraft is the largest cause on EWR → MKE, at 40.2%: flights here mostly leave late because the plane came in late, and the day shows it: 5–9 AM departures arrived on time 92.9% of the time and 9 PM–5 AM departures 73.9%.
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 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Republic Airways | 2,479 | 85.4% | 5.41% | -13 min | 4.4% |
Weekly and seasonal patterns
By day of week
Tuesday is historically the most reliable day and Thursday the least, a gap of 6.0 percentage points.
By month
- Jan: 89.4%
- Feb: 91.7%
- Mar: 92.5%
- Apr: 89.8%
- May: 83.2%
- Jun: 78.4%
- Jul: 67.1%
- Aug: 81.2%
- Sep: 84.5%
- Oct: 86.6%
- Nov: 91.1%
- Dec: 90.5%
July is historically the weakest month and March the strongest, a spread of 25.4 percentage points.
Reliability over time
July 2023 – July 2026
Over the most recent 12 months (2025-08 to 2026-07), on-time arrivals averaged 83.4% against 84.0% in the 12 months before — broadly unchanged.
Data and methodology
Calculated by FlyerIntel from 2,586 EWR → MKE 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