West Palm Beach/Palm Beach, FL

What the Data Says About PBI

West Palm Beach/Palm Beach, FL in West Palm Beach/Palm Beach, Florida handled 302,058 flights in the Bureau of Transportation Statistics dataset between 2020 and 2025, posting a 76.9% on-time departure rate. Of those flights, 69,881 experienced delays, 3,995 were cancelled, and 491 were diverted. The cancellation rate works out to 1.32%, the diversion rate to 0.16%, and the average delay when departures run late is 78.7 minutes. These figures are the baseline for comparing PBI against other airports in the same state and nationally.

Breaking down what drives delays at PBI, Late Aircraft leads the pack. Late Aircraft accounts for 47.4% of total delay minutes, followed by Carrier at 28.4% and NAS (National Aviation System) at 20.9%. Weather contributes 3.2% of delay minutes at this airport, while security holds the smallest share at 0.1%. Travelers often overestimate the weather share; the BTS categorization shows late-arriving aircraft and carrier operations as the larger contributors.

Seasonally, October runs the cleanest at PBI with a 92.1% on-time rate, while July is the roughest at 87.2% — a 5-point swing between best and worst month. Volume peaks in March, when average flights hit 5,793. The busiest route from PBI is to PBI (West Palm Beach/Palm Beach), with 21,790 flights at a 79.6% on-time rate. Combine these numbers — 76.9% on-time, 78.7-minute average delay, 1.32% cancellation rate — and you have a concrete picture of departure reliability at West Palm Beach/Palm Beach, FL.