SMF → SAN Flight Reliability

Right now

Origin · SMFNo disruption reported

Aviation weather is not currently a factor.

Updated 08:53 UTC

Sacramento airport profile →

Destination · SANNo disruption reported

Aviation weather is not currently a factor.

Updated 08:51 UTC

San Diego airport profile →

Route reliability

July 2023 – July 2026

Route Reliability Score

69/ 100Good

Better than 59% of comparable major US routes (4,598 compared)

Calculated from 16,310 flights. How this is calculated

On-time arrivals

76.3%

12,312 of 16,136

Cancellation rate

0.85%

139 cancelled

Median arrival delay

-1 min

Average 8.5 min

Severe delays

5.5%

60+ minutes late

Delay when late

50 min

Average, when 15+ min late

Flights analyzed

16,310

4 carriers

SMF → SAN arrives on time 76.3% of the time; the return trip, SAN → SMF, arrives on time 77.1% of the time.

SMF → SAN spends 20.1 minutes on the ground on a 480-mile trip: 14.9 minutes from pushback to wheels-up at SMF and 5.2 minutes from touchdown to gate at SAN.

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

What stands out

Which day you fly matters unusually much here, a wider weekday spread than 95% of 4,467 comparable routes.

84.6% on time on a typical Tuesday, against 69.2% on a Friday.

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 4,467 in the comparison.

Why SMF → SAN flights are cancelled

July 2023 – July 2026

SMF → SAN cancelled 139 of 16,310 scheduled flights — about 1 in every 117. The reason filed most often was extreme weather, 47.5% of the cancellations coded on this route — about 1 in every 247 scheduled flights.

Share of cancellations

Weather47.5%

Airline28.8%

Air traffic23.7%

Security0.0%

Of 139 cancelled departures carrying a reason code.

What each reason means

Extreme weather1 in 247

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

66 cancellations, 47.5% of the total.

The airline1 in 408

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

40 cancellations, 28.8% of the total.

The air traffic system1 in 494

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

33 cancellations, 23.7% 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.

139 coded cancellations were recorded on SMF → SAN; the section appears from 50.

When it goes wrong

July 2023 – July 2026

One arrival in ten is worse than

39 min late

against a median of 1 min early

Arrived an hour or more late5.5%

Typical delay when late50 min

Cancelled0.85%

Landed somewhere else0.21%

Percentiles over 16,310 operations; cancelled and diverted flights are counted separately.

Will your connection be tight enough?

Layovers at SAN after arriving from SMF.

Connection buffer and chance of missing by layover length, SMF → SAN arrivals
Connection time	Chance of missing	Reads as
30 min	45%	Likely to miss
45 min	23%	High risk
60 min	13%	Some risk
90 min	5.4%	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 0.85% of the time and diverts 0.21% of the time, which a late arrival never shows up in.

Chance of missing is the share of 16,136 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 39 minutes late (90th-percentile gate arrival delay), over 16,310 operations.

Any other layover length: connection checker.

Best time to fly

SMF → SAN flights departing 5–9 AM arrived on time 88.5% of the time, against 62.2% for 9 PM–5 AM departures, a gap of 26.3 percentage points.

By day and hour

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

Hour of departure matters more than day of the week: hourly averages sit a typical 8.8 points from the route-wide rate, weekday averages 5.8 points.

On-time arrival rate for SMF to SAN by weekday and scheduled departure hour, local time. Each button reads out one slot.
Hour	Monday	Tuesday	Wednesday	Thursday	Friday	Saturday	Sunday
6 AM–7 AM
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

On-time rate, % · stronger color, fewer on time

40–49
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 6 AM and after 9 PM (469 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 SMF to SAN. A dash means fewer than 120 flights, which are not scored.
Hour	Monday	Tuesday	Wednesday	Thursday	Friday	Saturday	Sunday
6 AM–7 AM	92.5% on time231 flights	87.7% on time188 flights	92.9% on time185 flights	90.4% on time230 flights	89.2% on time230 flights	89.5% on time204 flights	91.8% on time221 flights
7 AM–8 AM	87.5% on time221 flights	89.8% on time188 flights	95.1% on time188 flights	80.5% on time222 flights	86.0% on time226 flights	86.8% on time139 flights	87.9% on time218 flights
8 AM–9 AM	61 flights, too few to score	85 flights, too few to score	84 flights, too few to score	62 flights, too few to score	58 flights, too few to score	88 flights, too few to score	81.0% on time121 flights
9 AM–10 AM	85.2% on time158 flights	88.4% on time141 flights	86.5% on time141 flights	81.0% on time157 flights	81.4% on time158 flights	108 flights, too few to score	89.5% on time145 flights
10 AM–11 AM	80.5% on time256 flights	88.4% on time199 flights	89.9% on time202 flights	77.1% on time251 flights	71.7% on time257 flights	85.1% on time169 flights	74.4% on time236 flights
11 AM–12 PM	76.0% on time146 flights	88 flights, too few to score	96 flights, too few to score	62.3% on time159 flights	71.8% on time150 flights	98 flights, too few to score	75.3% on time167 flights
12 PM–1 PM	114 flights, too few to score	85.4% on time172 flights	83.6% on time171 flights	113 flights, too few to score	109 flights, too few to score	85.1% on time123 flights	78.7% on time151 flights
1 PM–2 PM	80.1% on time146 flights	109 flights, too few to score	105 flights, too few to score	72.7% on time150 flights	68.7% on time149 flights	98 flights, too few to score	75.4% on time124 flights
2 PM–3 PM	67.6% on time185 flights	80.4% on time148 flights	80.7% on time141 flights	71.0% on time185 flights	61.1% on time186 flights	105 flights, too few to score	70.3% on time139 flights
3 PM–4 PM	70.9% on time198 flights	79.2% on time168 flights	79.1% on time159 flights	66.7% on time186 flights	61.9% on time194 flights	97 flights, too few to score	71.4% on time179 flights
4 PM–5 PM	69.4% on time124 flights	85 flights, too few to score	89 flights, too few to score	59.0% on time122 flights	53.5% on time127 flights	98 flights, too few to score	62.4% on time127 flights
5 PM–6 PM	73.5% on time156 flights	83.2% on time168 flights	74.4% on time174 flights	62.9% on time154 flights	63.6% on time153 flights	76 flights, too few to score	53.2% on time173 flights
6 PM–7 PM	66.5% on time167 flights	78.5% on time144 flights	74.3% on time146 flights	61.6% on time167 flights	50.9% on time172 flights	105 flights, too few to score	46.8% on time160 flights
7 PM–8 PM	65.6% on time191 flights	81.5% on time129 flights	72.4% on time126 flights	58.0% on time185 flights	52.4% on time190 flights	73.0% on time126 flights	52.0% on time199 flights
8 PM–9 PM	63.4% on time124 flights	84.7% on time124 flights	79.5% on time124 flights	63.6% on time121 flights	66.4% on time122 flights	60 flights, too few to score	97 flights, too few to score

By departure window

5–9 AM88.5%

9 AM–12 PM80.1%

12–3 PM76.8%

3–6 PM69.8%

6–9 PM65.4%

9 PM–5 AM62.2%

By departure hour

12 AM

3 AM

6 AM

9 AM

12 PM

3 PM

6 PM

9 PM

Why SMF → SAN runs late

July 2023 – July 2026

Late-arriving aircraft47.4%

the inbound aircraft was late, so this flight started late

Air traffic control26.6%

airspace and airport capacity, including weather-driven flow control

The airline23.9%

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

Weather2.0%

weather severe enough to stop this flight specifically

Security0.1%

screening or terminal security incidents

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

Late-arriving aircraft is the largest cause on SMF → SAN, at 47.4%: flights here mostly leave late because the plane came in late, and the day shows it: 5–9 AM departures arrived on time 88.5% of the time and 9 PM–5 AM departures 62.2%.

How this route holds up in bad weather

July 2023 – July 2026

The harder-hit end is SAN, where the flight lands. Its figure counts departures from SAN, so it says more about how that airport copes than about this route. Bad weather cancels 3.5 times the normal rate at SAN against 1.6 times at SMF. Cancelled in bad weather against normal hours: SMF 1.0% against 0.6%, SAN 3.5% against 1.0%. Flights that did leave SAN in bad weather arrived on time 66.7% of the time, against 78.4% in normal hours.

Bad weather and normal hours at the airports

Scheduled departures, July 2023 – July 2026

Departures from SMF and SAN in hours of bad weather and in normal hours
Departures from	SMF	SAN
Cancelled in bad weather	1.0%	3.5%
Cancelled in normal hours	0.6%	1.0%
Arrived on time, bad weather	83.0%	66.7%
Arrived on time, normal hours	83.2%	78.4%
Departures in bad weather	12,018	19,707

SkyWest Airlines (1.6% cancelled against 1.0% for the other carriers at SMF) cancelled more departures from SMF in bad weather than the other carriers there did in the same months. None of the route’s other carriers was clearly better. 2 more carriers fly this route but has too few bad-weather departures from SMF to compare.

This route’s airlines in bad weather at SMF

All departures from SMF

Cancellation rates in bad weather at SMF for the airlines that fly SMF to SAN, against the other carriers at SMF in the same months
Airline	Bad-weather departures	Cancelled	Other carriers
Southwest Airlines	6,823	1.0%about level	1.2%
SkyWest Airlines	1,842	1.6%above the others	1.0%

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

Weather source and limits. In full: SMF (airlines), SAN, 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
Southwest Airlines	12,087	75.4%	0.71%	-1 min	5.4%
SkyWest Airlines	3,653	78.8%	1.09%	-3 min	5.4%
Spirit Airlines	240	77.1%	1.67%	-5 min	10.2%
Alaska Airlines	216	83.8%	2.78%	-4 min	2.4%

Southwest Airlines flew 74.6% of the 16,196 flights listed. Alaska Airlines cancelled 2.78% of its flights here against 0.71% for Southwest Airlines.

Alaska Airlines arrived on time 8.4 percentage points more often than Southwest Airlines on this route.

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
OO3398 SkyWest Airlines	6:00 AM	746	89.5%

Weekly and seasonal patterns

By day of week

Mon76.7%

Tue84.6%

Wed83.2%

Thu71.3%

Fri69.2%

Sat81.7%

Sun71.5%

Tuesday is historically the most reliable day and Friday the least, a gap of 15.4 percentage points.

By month

Jan

Feb

Mar

Apr

May

Jun

Jul

Aug

Sep

Oct

Nov

Dec

June is historically the weakest month and January the strongest, a spread of 12.9 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 72.0% against 76.0% in the 12 months before — declining by 4.0 percentage points.

Data and methodology

Calculated by FlyerIntel from 16,310 SMF → SAN 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

SMF airport SAN airport Return direction SAN → SMF

SMF→SAN

Right now

Route reliability

What stands out

Why SMF → SAN 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 SMF → SAN 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 SMF

Airlines on this route

Flights on this route

Weekly and seasonal patterns

By day of week

By month

Reliability over time

Data and methodology