Route profile
ORD→MKE
Flight reliability, delays and best times to fly from Chicago to Milwaukee, 67 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 1% of comparable major US routes (4,598 compared)
Calculated from 11,099 flights. How this is calculated
ORD → MKE arrives on time 68.6% of the time; the return trip, MKE → ORD, arrives on time 72.4% of the time, a 3.8-point gap between the two directions of the same city pair.
ORD → MKE spends 37.3 minutes on the ground on a 67-mile trip: 29.5 minutes from pushback to wheels-up at ORD and 7.7 minutes from touchdown to gate at MKE.
Source: US DOT Bureau of Transportation Statistics · Data covering July 2023 – July 2026
What stands out
This route's worst arrivals run unusually far past its typical one, a bigger gap than 97% of 4,598 comparable routes.
A typical arrival is 1 min early, but the worst tenth run 83 minutes worse than that.
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 4,598 in the comparison.
Why ORD → MKE flights are cancelled
July 2023 – July 2026
ORD → MKE cancelled 330 of 11,099 scheduled flights — about 1 in every 34. The reason filed most often was extreme weather, 84.2% of the cancellations coded on this route — about 1 in every 40 scheduled flights.
Share of cancellations
Of 330 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.
278 cancellations, 84.2% of the total.
Airport capacity, air traffic control flow programs, heavy traffic and ordinary bad weather. A system decision, not the airline’s.
45 cancellations, 13.6% of the total.
Crew, maintenance, aircraft cleaning, baggage or fueling: what BTS counts as within the carrier’s own control.
7 cancellations, 2.1% 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.
330 coded cancellations were recorded on ORD → MKE; the section appears from 50.
When it goes wrong
July 2023 – July 2026
82 min late
against a median of 1 min early
ORD → MKE has an average that understates its risk: a typical arrival is 1 min early, but the worst tenth are 83 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 11,099 operations; cancelled and diverted flights are counted separately.
Will your connection be tight enough?
Layovers at MKE after arriving from ORD.
| Connection time | Chance of missing | Reads as |
|---|---|---|
| 30 min | 48% | Likely to miss |
| 45 min | 31% | Likely to miss |
| 60 min | 23% | High risk |
| 90 min | 14% | Some risk |
| 120 min | 9.0% | 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 2.97% of the time and diverts 0.10% of the time, which a late arrival never shows up in.
Chance of missing is the share of 10,758 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 82 minutes late (90th-percentile gate arrival delay), over 11,099 operations.
Any other layover length: connection checker.
Best time to fly
ORD → MKE flights departing 5–9 AM arrived on time 74.1% of the time, against 62.4% for 3–6 PM departures, a gap of 11.7 percentage points.
By departure window
By departure hour
- 12 AM to 5 AM: too few flights to score
- 6 AM: 74.8% on time from 165 flights
- 7 AM: too few flights to score
- 8 AM: 73.4% on time from 373 flights
- 9 AM: 75.5% on time from 657 flights
- 10 AM: 74.1% on time from 965 flights
- 11 AM: 67.0% on time from 317 flights
- 12 PM: 74.4% on time from 531 flights
- 1 PM: 68.7% on time from 303 flights
- 2 PM: 73.4% on time from 957 flights
- 3 PM: 68.8% on time from 806 flights
- 4 PM: 60.4% on time from 770 flights
- 5 PM: 57.3% on time from 723 flights
- 6 PM: 65.0% on time from 940 flights
- 7 PM: 66.9% on time from 1,077 flights
- 8 PM: 67.9% on time from 937 flights
- 9 PM: 70.6% on time from 1,242 flights
- 10 PM: 54.8% on time from 228 flights
- 11 PM: too few flights to score
Why ORD → MKE 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
Share of the delay minutes US DOT attributed to each cause for ORD → MKE. 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 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 2.8 times at MKE. Cancelled in bad weather against normal hours: ORD 6.5% against 1.2%, MKE 3.8% against 1.3%. 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 | MKE |
|---|---|---|
| Cancelled in bad weather | 6.5% | 3.8% |
| Cancelled in normal hours | 1.2% | 1.3% |
| Arrived on time, bad weather | 55.7% | 70.7% |
| Arrived on time, normal hours | 77.1% | 82.3% |
| Departures in bad weather | 104,455 | 11,113 |
Republic Airways (8.1% cancelled against 6.5% for the other carriers at ORD), Envoy Air (8.6% cancelled against 6.9% for the other carriers at ORD) and SkyWest Airlines (10.7% cancelled against 5.8% for the other carriers at ORD) cancelled more departures from ORD 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 ORD
All departures from ORD| Airline | Bad-weather departures | Cancelled | Other carriers |
|---|---|---|---|
| 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 MKE, 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), MKE, 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 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| SkyWest Airlines | 10,532 | 68.1% | 2.91% | -1 min | 14.3% |
| Republic Airways | 323 | 84.0% | 3.10% | -5 min | 5.8% |
| Envoy Air | 213 | 71.4% | 4.69% | -4 min | 10.3% |
SkyWest Airlines flew 95.2% of the 11,068 flights listed. Envoy Air cancelled 4.69% of its flights here against 2.91% for SkyWest Airlines.
Republic Airways arrived on time 15.9 percentage points more often than SkyWest 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 |
|---|---|---|---|
| OO5555 SkyWest Airlines | 5:50 PM | 1,003 | 62.2% |
Weekly and seasonal patterns
By day of week
Tuesday is historically the most reliable day and Sunday the least, a gap of 9.3 percentage points.
By month
- Jan: 61.7%
- Feb: 66.9%
- Mar: 67.0%
- Apr: 72.1%
- May: 71.7%
- Jun: 64.5%
- Jul: 65.6%
- Aug: 69.0%
- Sep: 74.4%
- Oct: 74.3%
- Nov: 72.9%
- Dec: 61.5%
December is historically the weakest month and September the strongest, a spread of 12.9 percentage points.
Reliability over time
July 2023 – July 2026
- July 2023: 73.6% from 199 flights
- August 2023: 74.9% from 199 flights
- September 2023: 73.3% from 187 flights
- October 2023: 82.4% from 177 flights
- November 2023: 76.6% from 175 flights
- December 2023: 77.6% from 170 flights
- January 2024: 65.0% from 155 flights
- February 2024: 83.8% from 167 flights
- March 2024: 83.2% from 203 flights
- April 2024: 79.3% from 208 flights
- May 2024: 64.7% from 206 flights
- June 2024: 69.1% from 178 flights
- July 2024: 66.4% from 233 flights
- August 2024: 65.5% from 228 flights
- September 2024: 77.1% from 240 flights
- October 2024: 80.5% from 251 flights
- November 2024: 73.6% from 260 flights
- December 2024: 63.7% from 234 flights
- January 2025: 71.0% from 217 flights
- February 2025: 66.8% from 196 flights
- March 2025: 65.0% from 243 flights
- April 2025: 80.5% from 368 flights
- May 2025: 76.1% from 361 flights
- June 2025: 61.2% from 382 flights
- July 2025: 58.4% from 394 flights
- August 2025: 68.1% from 399 flights
- September 2025: 73.3% from 394 flights
- October 2025: 67.8% from 463 flights
- November 2025: 70.9% from 464 flights
- December 2025: 53.1% from 405 flights
- January 2026: 54.8% from 373 flights
- February 2026: 60.0% from 410 flights
- March 2026: 59.9% from 450 flights
- April 2026: 62.2% from 516 flights
- May 2026: 71.3% from 517 flights
- June 2026: 65.5% from 416 flights
- July 2026: 68.0% from 461 flights
Over the most recent 12 months (2025-08 to 2026-07), on-time arrivals averaged 64.8% against 69.8% in the 12 months before — declining by 5.0 percentage points.
Data and methodology
Calculated by FlyerIntel from 11,099 ORD → 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