LAX → EWR Flight Reliability

Right now

Origin · LAXNo disruption reported

Aviation weather is not currently a factor.

Updated 08:53 UTC

Los Angeles airport profile →

Destination · EWRNo disruption reported

Aviation weather is not currently a factor.

Updated 08:51 UTC

Newark airport profile →

Route reliability

July 2023 – July 2026

Route Reliability Score

62/ 100Good

Better than 39% of comparable major US routes (4,598 compared)

Calculated from 16,286 flights. How this is calculated

On-time arrivals

79.6%

12,616 of 15,846

Cancellation rate

1.90%

309 cancelled

Median arrival delay

-10 min

Average 3.6 min

Severe delays

8.5%

60+ minutes late

Delay when late

78 min

Average, when 15+ min late

Flights analyzed

16,286

4 carriers

LAX → EWR arrives on time 79.6% of the time; the return trip, EWR → LAX, arrives on time 74.5% of the time, a 5.1-point gap between the two directions of the same city pair.

LAX → EWR spends 30.7 minutes on the ground on a 2,454-mile trip: 19.7 minutes from pushback to wheels-up at LAX and 11.0 minutes from touchdown to gate at EWR.

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

Why LAX → EWR flights are cancelled

July 2023 – July 2026

LAX → EWR cancelled 309 of 16,286 scheduled flights — about 1 in every 53. The reason filed most often was the airline, 52.4% of the cancellations coded on this route — about 1 in every 101 scheduled flights.

Share of cancellations

Airline52.4%

Weather35.9%

Air traffic11.7%

Security0.0%

Of 309 cancelled departures carrying a reason code.

What each reason means

The airline1 in 101

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

162 cancellations, 52.4% of the total.

Extreme weather1 in 147

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

111 cancellations, 35.9% of the total.

The air traffic system1 in 452

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

36 cancellations, 11.7% 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.

309 coded cancellations were recorded on LAX → EWR; the section appears from 50.

When it goes wrong

July 2023 – July 2026

One arrival in ten is worse than

48 min late

against a median of 10 min early

Arrived an hour or more late8.5%

Typical delay when late78 min

Cancelled1.90%

Landed somewhere else0.80%

Percentiles over 16,286 operations; cancelled and diverted flights are counted separately.

Will your connection be tight enough?

Layovers at EWR after arriving from LAX.

Connection buffer and chance of missing by layover length, LAX → EWR arrivals
Connection time	Chance of missing	Reads as
30 min	33%	Likely to miss
45 min	20%	High risk
60 min	14%	Some risk
90 min	8.3%	Some risk
120 min	5.5%	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 1.90% of the time and diverts 0.80% of the time, which a late arrival never shows up in.

Chance of missing is the share of 15,846 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 48 minutes late (90th-percentile gate arrival delay), over 16,286 operations.

Any other layover length: connection checker.

Best time to fly

LAX → EWR flights departing 5–9 AM arrived on time 86.7% of the time, against 69.3% for 12–3 PM departures, a gap of 17.4 percentage points.

By day and hour

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

Hour of departure matters more than day of the week: hourly averages sit a typical 7.7 points from the route-wide rate, weekday averages 2.5 points.

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

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 7 AM (831 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 LAX to EWR. A dash means fewer than 120 flights, which are not scored.
Hour	Monday	Tuesday	Wednesday	Thursday	Friday	Saturday	Sunday
7 AM–8 AM	91.0% on time298 flights	89.7% on time300 flights	90.0% on time295 flights	88.1% on time298 flights	92.0% on time298 flights	87.3% on time280 flights	87.6% on time295 flights
8 AM–9 AM	79.4% on time262 flights	86.0% on time266 flights	81.5% on time262 flights	78.9% on time264 flights	83.3% on time262 flights	79.9% on time252 flights	80.3% on time261 flights
9 AM–10 AM	18 flights, too few to score	12 flights, too few to score	13 flights, too few to score	18 flights, too few to score	18 flights, too few to score	23 flights, too few to score	18 flights, too few to score
10 AM–11 AM	75.5% on time280 flights	77.3% on time276 flights	74.7% on time274 flights	70.5% on time281 flights	74.6% on time279 flights	72.5% on time205 flights	65.1% on time277 flights
11 AM–12 PM	72.1% on time208 flights	76.4% on time198 flights	73.1% on time200 flights	68.8% on time210 flights	74.8% on time209 flights	63.1% on time174 flights	61.2% on time227 flights
12 PM–1 PM	70.6% on time122 flights	72.1% on time126 flights	71.5% on time125 flights	62.1% on time127 flights	67.5% on time125 flights	107 flights, too few to score	112 flights, too few to score
1 PM–2 PM	72.4% on time155 flights	77.8% on time155 flights	69.1% on time156 flights	64.3% on time156 flights	62.6% on time157 flights	60.8% on time132 flights	59.1% on time156 flights
2 PM–3 PM	110 flights, too few to score	103 flights, too few to score	105 flights, too few to score	107 flights, too few to score	111 flights, too few to score	105 flights, too few to score	109 flights, too few to score
3 PM–4 PM	13 flights, too few to score	14 flights, too few to score	14 flights, too few to score	14 flights, too few to score	13 flights, too few to score	5 flights, too few to score	13 flights, too few to score
4 PM–5 PM	84.8% on time142 flights	85.4% on time128 flights	78.8% on time138 flights	77.8% on time138 flights	81.2% on time141 flights	51 flights, too few to score	72.3% on time135 flights
5 PM–6 PM	0 flights, too few to score	0 flights, too few to score	1 flight, too few to score	0 flights, too few to score	0 flights, too few to score	0 flights, too few to score	0 flights, too few to score
6 PM–7 PM	0 flights, too few to score	0 flights, too few to score	0 flights, too few to score	0 flights, too few to score	0 flights, too few to score	0 flights, too few to score	0 flights, too few to score
7 PM–8 PM	0 flights, too few to score	0 flights, too few to score	0 flights, too few to score	0 flights, too few to score	0 flights, too few to score	0 flights, too few to score	0 flights, too few to score
8 PM–9 PM	89 flights, too few to score	86 flights, too few to score	86 flights, too few to score	90 flights, too few to score	95 flights, too few to score	81 flights, too few to score	93 flights, too few to score
9 PM–10 PM	84.1% on time305 flights	89.2% on time304 flights	87.4% on time304 flights	82.9% on time304 flights	89.4% on time308 flights	87.5% on time295 flights	83.9% on time306 flights
10 PM–11 PM	70 flights, too few to score	69 flights, too few to score	78 flights, too few to score	73 flights, too few to score	69 flights, too few to score	75 flights, too few to score	79 flights, too few to score
11 PM–12 AM	78.3% on time184 flights	85.3% on time178 flights	85.2% on time179 flights	80.6% on time181 flights	80.8% on time181 flights	79.9% on time180 flights	80.1% on time181 flights

By departure window

5–9 AM86.7%

9 AM–12 PM71.6%

12–3 PM69.3%

3–6 PM79.8%

6–9 PM85.5%

9 PM–5 AM84.2%

By departure hour

12 AM

3 AM

6 AM

9 AM

12 PM

3 PM

6 PM

9 PM

Why LAX → EWR runs late

July 2023 – July 2026

Air traffic control39.8%

airspace and airport capacity, including weather-driven flow control

Late-arriving aircraft30.3%

the inbound aircraft was late, so this flight started late

The airline27.0%

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

Weather2.9%

weather severe enough to stop this flight specifically

Security<0.1%

screening or terminal security incidents

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

How this route holds up in bad weather

July 2023 – July 2026

The harder-hit end is EWR, where the flight lands. Its figure counts departures from EWR, so it says more about how that airport copes than about this route. Bad weather cancels 3.3 times the normal rate at EWR against 1.3 times at LAX. Cancelled in bad weather against normal hours: LAX 1.0% against 0.8%, EWR 6.9% against 2.1%. Flights that did leave EWR in bad weather arrived on time 65.8% of the time, against 80.0% in normal hours.

Bad weather and normal hours at the airports

Scheduled departures, July 2023 – July 2026

Departures from LAX and EWR in hours of bad weather and in normal hours
Departures from	LAX	EWR
Cancelled in bad weather	1.0%	6.9%
Cancelled in normal hours	0.8%	2.1%
Arrived on time, bad weather	78.9%	65.8%
Arrived on time, normal hours	81.4%	80.0%
Departures in bad weather	60,639	51,613

Spirit Airlines (1.8% cancelled against 1.0% for the other carriers at LAX) cancelled more departures from LAX in bad weather than the other carriers there did in the same months. None of the route’s other carriers was clearly better.

This route’s airlines in bad weather at LAX

All departures from LAX

Cancellation rates in bad weather at LAX for the airlines that fly LAX to EWR, against the other carriers at LAX in the same months
Airline	Bad-weather departures	Cancelled	Other carriers
JetBlue	2,801	1.0%about level	1.0%
Alaska Airlines	2,917	1.1%about level	1.0%
United Airlines	8,785	1.2%about level	1.0%
Spirit Airlines	2,995	1.8%above the others	1.0%

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

Weather source and limits. In full: LAX (airlines), EWR, 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	10,224	79.0%	1.96%	-10 min	9.0%
Alaska Airlines	2,385	81.7%	1.93%	-10 min	7.0%
JetBlue	2,313	78.2%	1.43%	-10 min	8.9%
Spirit Airlines	1,364	83.2%	2.20%	-13 min	5.8%

United Airlines flew 62.8% of the 16,286 flights listed.

Spirit Airlines arrived on time 5.0 percentage points more often than JetBlue on this route.

Other ways to fly Los Angeles to New York

Airport pairs in the same two city markets, as the DOT defines them.

Other ways to fly Los Angeles to New York
Route	Flights	On time	Cancelled	Median delay	Score
LAX→JFK Los Angeles to New York	31,153	79.8%	1.27%	-10 min	63
LAX→EWR this route Los Angeles to Newark	16,286	79.6%	1.90%	-10 min	62

Flying to EWR from the Los Angeles area? Compare LAX, SNA, BUR, ONT for EWR, with the same test for what counts as a real difference.

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
UA1700 United Airlines	4:30 PM	893	79.8%
UA2096 United Airlines	8:20 AM	811	80.5%
UA1855 United Airlines	1:30 PM	606	64.8%

UA2096 (8:20 AM) arrived on time 80.5% of the time, 15.7 points more often than UA1855 (1:30 PM) at 64.8%.

Weekly and seasonal patterns

By day of week

Mon80.4%

Tue83.7%

Wed81.0%

Thu76.7%

Fri81.0%

Sat78.3%

Sun76.2%

Tuesday is historically the most reliable day and Sunday the least, a gap of 7.5 percentage points.

By month

Jan

Feb

Mar

Apr

May

Jun

Jul

Aug

Sep

Oct

Nov

Dec

July is historically the weakest month and October the strongest, a spread of 13.7 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 79.7% against 80.3% in the 12 months before — broadly unchanged.

Data and methodology

Calculated by FlyerIntel from 16,286 LAX → EWR 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

LAX airport EWR airport Return direction EWR → LAX

LAX→EWR

Right now

Route reliability

Why LAX → EWR 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 LAX → EWR 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 LAX

Airlines on this route

Other ways to fly Los Angeles to New York

Flights on this route

Weekly and seasonal patterns

By day of week

By month

Reliability over time

Data and methodology