Route profile
STL→CLT
Flight reliability, delays and best times to fly from St. Louis to Charlotte, 575 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 48% of comparable major US routes (4,598 compared)
Calculated from 6,028 flights. How this is calculated · What counts as on time
STL → CLT arrives on time 80.7% of the time; the return trip, CLT → STL, arrives on time 75.7% of the time, a 4.9-point gap between the two directions of the same city pair.
STL → CLT spends 26.6 minutes on the ground on a 575-mile trip: 12.5 minutes from pushback to wheels-up at STL and 14.1 minutes from touchdown to gate at CLT.
Source: US DOT Bureau of Transportation Statistics · Data covering July 2023 – July 2026
What sets this route apart
Where STL to CLT differs most from similar routes by hour, weekday, month and airline, July 2023 – July 2026.
STL to CLT struggles most at 5 PM: 61.6% of its flights scheduled then arrive on time, 9 points behind the 70.6% on routes of similar length at the same hour. Against all other routes the gap is 8.2 points.
STL to CLT is at its best against routes of similar length for flights scheduled at 9 AM: 88.6% arrive on time, 2.7 points ahead of the 85.9% those routes manage at that hour. Against all other routes the gap is 4.3 points.
February is kinder to STL to CLT than to routes of similar length: 87.5% on time against 81.7%, 5.8 points better. Against all other routes the gap is 6.1 points.
American Airlines does better on STL to CLT than on its routes of similar length: 82.3% on time here, 74.8% there, 7.5 points apart. Against all other routes the gap is 7.2 points.
Southwest Airlines’ flights on STL to CLT arrive on time 72.5% of the time, 5.4 points below the 77.9% it manages on its routes of similar length. Against all other routes the gap is 4.9 points.
STL to CLT against comparable routes
July 2023 – July 2026| Measure | This route | Compared with | Them | Gap | Flights behind it |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Hour: 5 PM departures | 61.6% | routes of similar length | 70.6% | −9.0 pts | 198 here, 125,241 there |
| Hour: 9 AM departures | 88.6% | routes of similar length | 85.9% | +2.7 pts | 806 here, 108,908 there |
| Month: February | 87.5% | routes of similar length | 81.7% | +5.8 pts | 425 here, 133,527 there |
| Airline: American Airlines | 82.3% | routes of similar length | 74.8% | +7.5 pts | 4,857 here, 323,238 there |
| Airline: Southwest Airlines | 72.5% | routes of similar length | 77.9% | −5.4 pts | 989 here, 425,318 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 575 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 STL → CLT flights are cancelled
July 2023 – July 2026
STL → CLT cancelled 69 of 6,028 scheduled flights — about 1 in every 87. The reason filed most often was extreme weather, 87.0% of the cancellations coded on this route — about 1 in every 100 scheduled flights.
Share of cancellations
Of 69 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.
60 cancellations, 87.0% of the total.
Crew, maintenance, aircraft cleaning, baggage or fueling: what BTS counts as within the carrier’s own control.
6 cancellations, 8.7% of the total.
Airport capacity, air traffic control flow programs, heavy traffic and ordinary bad weather. A system decision, not the airline’s.
3 cancellations, 4.3% 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.
69 coded cancellations were recorded on STL → CLT; the section appears from 50.
When it goes wrong
July 2023 – July 2026
41 min late
against a median of 7 min early
Percentiles over 6,028 operations; cancelled and diverted flights are counted separately.
Will your connection be tight enough?
Layovers at CLT after arriving from STL.
| Connection time | Chance of missing | Reads as |
|---|---|---|
| 30 min | 34% | Likely to miss |
| 45 min | 19% | High risk |
| 60 min | 12% | Some risk |
| 90 min | 7.2% | Some risk |
| 120 min | 4.7% | 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 1.14% of the time and diverts 0.13% of the time, which a late arrival never shows up in.
Chance of missing is the share of 5,951 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 41 minutes late (90th-percentile gate arrival delay), over 6,028 operations.
Any other layover length: connection checker.
Best time to fly
STL → CLT flights departing 5–9 AM arrived on time 89.0% of the time, against 67.5% for 3–6 PM departures, a gap of 21.5 percentage points.
By departure window
By departure hour
- 12 AM to 4 AM: too few flights to score
- 5 AM: 92.5% on time from 861 flights
- 6 AM: too few flights to score
- 7 AM: 86.4% on time from 1,000 flights
- 8 AM: 86.7% on time from 184 flights
- 9 AM: 88.6% on time from 811 flights
- 10 AM: 78.7% on time from 190 flights
- 11 AM: too few flights to score
- 12 PM: 76.9% on time from 248 flights
- 1 PM: 78.4% on time from 293 flights
- 2 PM: 76.2% on time from 493 flights
- 3 PM: 74.5% on time from 392 flights
- 4 PM: 64.7% on time from 557 flights
- 5 PM: 61.6% on time from 204 flights
- 6 PM: 70.9% on time from 489 flights
- 7 PM to 11 PM: too few flights to score
Why STL → CLT 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 STL → CLT. Only delays of 15 minutes or more are attributed. What the five causes mean
Late-arriving aircraft is the largest cause on STL → CLT, at 46.2%: flights here mostly leave late because the plane came in late, and the day shows it: 5–9 AM departures arrived on time 89.0% of the time and 3–6 PM departures 67.5%.
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 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| American Airlines | 4,925 | 82.3% | 1.24% | -9 min | 7.4% |
| Southwest Airlines | 993 | 72.5% | 0.30% | 1 min | 6.9% |
American Airlines flew 83.2% of the 5,918 flights listed.
American Airlines arrived on time 9.8 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.
| Flight | Scheduled | Operations | On time |
|---|---|---|---|
| AA858 American Airlines | 7:00 AM | 639 | 88.0% |
Weekly and seasonal patterns
By day of week
Tuesday is historically the most reliable day and Sunday the least, a gap of 5.9 percentage points.
By month
- Jan: 84.2%
- Feb: 87.5%
- Mar: 81.6%
- Apr: 85.2%
- May: 76.7%
- Jun: 75.1%
- Jul: 71.3%
- Aug: 79.2%
- Sep: 85.4%
- Oct: 85.0%
- Nov: 84.6%
- Dec: 78.1%
July is historically the weakest month and February the strongest, a spread of 16.2 percentage points.
Reliability over time
July 2023 – July 2026
- July 2023: 73.3% from 178 flights
- August 2023: 74.9% from 168 flights
- September 2023: 82.1% from 153 flights
- October 2023: 81.4% from 177 flights
- November 2023: 87.3% from 173 flights
- December 2023: 75.3% from 146 flights
- January 2024: 78.5% from 147 flights
- February 2024: 89.5% from 143 flights
- March 2024: 79.4% from 155 flights
- April 2024: 82.3% from 176 flights
- May 2024: 61.7% from 184 flights
- June 2024: 75.8% from 179 flights
- July 2024: 59.8% from 182 flights
- August 2024: 79.6% from 157 flights
- September 2024: 85.1% from 179 flights
- October 2024: 89.1% from 174 flights
- November 2024: 85.0% from 147 flights
- December 2024: 80.1% from 176 flights
- January 2025: 84.7% from 169 flights
- February 2025: 85.3% from 152 flights
- March 2025: 81.8% from 182 flights
- April 2025: 83.4% from 177 flights
- May 2025: 84.3% from 180 flights
- June 2025: 73.1% from 169 flights
- July 2025: 74.1% from 170 flights
- August 2025: 83.2% from 162 flights
- September 2025: 89.0% from 155 flights
- October 2025: 84.5% from 162 flights
- November 2025: 81.4% from 162 flights
- December 2025: 78.3% from 166 flights
- January 2026: 89.4% from 155 flights
- February 2026: 87.9% from 136 flights
- March 2026: 84.1% from 128 flights
- April 2026: 91.9% from 123 flights
- May 2026: 86.3% from 139 flights
- June 2026: 76.5% from 169 flights
- July 2026: 78.3% from 178 flights
Over the most recent 12 months (2025-08 to 2026-07), on-time arrivals averaged 83.9% against 82.1% in the 12 months before — improving by 1.8 percentage points.
Data and methodology
Calculated by FlyerIntel from 6,028 STL → CLT 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