Route profile
ORD→CLE
Flight reliability, delays and best times to fly from Chicago to Cleveland, 316 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 17% of comparable major US routes (4,598 compared)
Calculated from 11,752 flights. How this is calculated
ORD → CLE arrives on time 74.5% of the time; the return trip, CLE → ORD, arrives on time 80.0% of the time, a 5.5-point gap between the two directions of the same city pair.
ORD → CLE spends 32.5 minutes on the ground on a 316-mile trip: 25.1 minutes from pushback to wheels-up at ORD and 7.4 minutes from touchdown to gate at CLE.
Source: US DOT Bureau of Transportation Statistics · Data covering July 2023 – July 2026
Why ORD → CLE flights are cancelled
July 2023 – July 2026
ORD → CLE cancelled 244 of 11,752 scheduled flights — about 1 in every 48. The reason filed most often was extreme weather, 63.5% of the cancellations coded on this route — about 1 in every 76 scheduled flights.
Share of cancellations
Of 244 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.
155 cancellations, 63.5% of the total.
Airport capacity, air traffic control flow programs, heavy traffic and ordinary bad weather. A system decision, not the airline’s.
49 cancellations, 20.1% of the total.
Crew, maintenance, aircraft cleaning, baggage or fueling: what BTS counts as within the carrier’s own control.
40 cancellations, 16.4% 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.
244 coded cancellations were recorded on ORD → CLE; the section appears from 50.
When it goes wrong
July 2023 – July 2026
59 min late
against a median of 4 min early
ORD → CLE has an average that understates its risk: a typical arrival is 4 min early, but the worst tenth are 63 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 11,752 operations; cancelled and diverted flights are counted separately.
Will your connection be tight enough?
Layovers at CLE after arriving from ORD.
| 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 | 9.8% | Some risk |
| 120 min | 6.1% | 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 2.08% of the time and diverts 0.14% of the time, which a late arrival never shows up in.
Chance of missing is the share of 11,492 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 59 minutes late (90th-percentile gate arrival delay), over 11,752 operations.
Any other layover length: connection checker.
Best time to fly
ORD → CLE flights departing 5–9 AM arrived on time 86.5% of the time, against 65.6% for 6–9 PM departures, a gap of 20.9 percentage points.
By departure window
By departure hour
- 12 AM to 5 AM: too few flights to score
- 6 AM: 82.9% on time from 218 flights
- 7 AM: 88.7% on time from 1,217 flights
- 8 AM: 80.3% on time from 309 flights
- 9 AM: 90.9% on time from 245 flights
- 10 AM: 83.9% on time from 1,101 flights
- 11 AM: 73.6% on time from 422 flights
- 12 PM: 79.7% on time from 696 flights
- 1 PM: 80.2% on time from 411 flights
- 2 PM: 77.8% on time from 1,341 flights
- 3 PM: 68.9% on time from 527 flights
- 4 PM: 71.2% on time from 533 flights
- 5 PM: 61.4% on time from 453 flights
- 6 PM: 67.2% on time from 1,127 flights
- 7 PM: 62.8% on time from 1,056 flights
- 8 PM: 67.3% on time from 619 flights
- 9 PM: 69.2% on time from 1,277 flights
- 10 PM: 52.9% on time from 195 flights
- 11 PM: too few flights to score
Why ORD → CLE 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
Share of the delay minutes US DOT attributed to each cause for ORD → CLE. Only delays of 15 minutes or more are attributed.
Late-arriving aircraft is the largest cause on ORD → CLE, at 45.2%: flights here mostly leave late because the plane came in late, and the day shows it: 5–9 AM departures arrived on time 86.5% of the time and 6–9 PM departures 65.6%.
How this route holds up in bad weather
July 2023 – July 2026
The harder-hit end is the one the flight leaves from, where a cancellation keeps it from departing at all. Bad weather cancels 5.5 times the normal rate at ORD against 2.3 times at CLE. Cancelled in bad weather against normal hours: ORD 6.5% against 1.2%, CLE 3.8% against 1.6%. Flights that did leave ORD in bad weather arrived on time 55.7% of the time, against 77.1% in normal hours.
Bad weather and normal hours at the airports
Scheduled departures, July 2023 – July 2026| Departures from | ORD | CLE |
|---|---|---|
| Cancelled in bad weather | 6.5% | 3.8% |
| Cancelled in normal hours | 1.2% | 1.6% |
| Arrived on time, bad weather | 55.7% | 69.9% |
| Arrived on time, normal hours | 77.1% | 82.6% |
| Departures in bad weather | 104,455 | 17,314 |
Of the carriers on this route, United Airlines (3.5% cancelled against 7.4% for the other carriers at ORD) cancelled the fewest departures from ORD in bad weather and SkyWest Airlines (10.7% cancelled against 5.8% for the other carriers at ORD) the most.
This route’s airlines in bad weather at ORD
All departures from ORD| Airline | Bad-weather departures | Cancelled | Other carriers |
|---|---|---|---|
| United Airlines | 31,269 | 3.5%below the others | 7.4% |
| American Airlines | 17,789 | 5.4%below the others | 6.7% |
| Republic Airways | 9,471 | 8.1%above the others | 6.5% |
| Envoy Air | 14,228 | 8.6%above the others | 6.9% |
| SkyWest Airlines | 21,044 | 10.7%above the others | 5.8% |
These are airport figures, not route figures: every scheduled departure from ORD and CLE, to any destination, in hours the weather report called bad. The airline rows count each carrier’s departures from ORD on every route.
Weather source and limits. In full: ORD (airlines), CLE, 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.
| Carrier | Flights | On time | Cancelled | Median delay | Severe |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| United Airlines | 6,058 | 77.2% | 1.11% | -5 min | 8.9% |
| Envoy Air | 1,973 | 75.7% | 2.79% | -4 min | 8.4% |
| SkyWest Airlines | 1,411 | 67.4% | 3.26% | 1 min | 14.3% |
| American Airlines | 1,201 | 61.9% | 3.41% | 4 min | 16.5% |
| Republic Airways | 1,109 | 79.7% | 3.16% | -8 min | 6.7% |
United Airlines flew 51.5% of the 11,752 flights listed. American Airlines cancelled 3.41% of its flights here against 1.11% for United Airlines.
Republic Airways arrived on time 17.8 percentage points more often than American Airlines on this route.
Flights on this route
Flight numbers with at least 600 operations here and still on the schedule.
| Flight | Scheduled | Operations | On time |
|---|---|---|---|
| UA2652 United Airlines | 6:10 PM | 804 | 68.6% |
Weekly and seasonal patterns
By day of week
Tuesday is historically the most reliable day and Friday the least, a gap of 7.7 percentage points.
By month
- Jan: 71.0%
- Feb: 79.8%
- Mar: 74.6%
- Apr: 78.4%
- May: 76.7%
- Jun: 66.2%
- Jul: 66.1%
- Aug: 72.6%
- Sep: 78.6%
- Oct: 80.2%
- Nov: 78.4%
- Dec: 73.6%
July is historically the weakest month and October the strongest, a spread of 14.1 percentage points.
Reliability over time
July 2023 – July 2026
- July 2023: 65.4% from 224 flights
- August 2023: 77.6% from 273 flights
- September 2023: 74.8% from 234 flights
- October 2023: 82.9% from 234 flights
- November 2023: 88.7% from 231 flights
- December 2023: 88.1% from 244 flights
- January 2024: 64.4% from 215 flights
- February 2024: 85.3% from 192 flights
- March 2024: 84.0% from 181 flights
- April 2024: 80.4% from 225 flights
- May 2024: 70.8% from 260 flights
- June 2024: 64.9% from 267 flights
- July 2024: 65.5% from 211 flights
- August 2024: 69.7% from 244 flights
- September 2024: 83.3% from 311 flights
- October 2024: 84.7% from 321 flights
- November 2024: 83.8% from 247 flights
- December 2024: 79.6% from 245 flights
- January 2025: 80.5% from 259 flights
- February 2025: 82.6% from 259 flights
- March 2025: 77.8% from 338 flights
- April 2025: 85.2% from 398 flights
- May 2025: 79.8% from 414 flights
- June 2025: 65.1% from 427 flights
- July 2025: 60.0% from 431 flights
- August 2025: 71.0% from 421 flights
- September 2025: 77.1% from 403 flights
- October 2025: 75.5% from 441 flights
- November 2025: 68.4% from 403 flights
- December 2025: 59.0% from 361 flights
- January 2026: 67.4% from 320 flights
- February 2026: 74.6% from 346 flights
- March 2026: 68.0% from 445 flights
- April 2026: 71.6% from 478 flights
- May 2026: 77.1% from 467 flights
- June 2026: 68.3% from 383 flights
- July 2026: 73.6% from 399 flights
Over the most recent 12 months (2025-08 to 2026-07), on-time arrivals averaged 71.2% against 76.9% in the 12 months before — declining by 5.7 percentage points.
Data and methodology
Calculated by FlyerIntel from 11,752 ORD → CLE 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