PlainFlights

DCA vs LAX - Airport Comparison

Select two airports to compare on-time performance, delays, cancellations, and top routes using U.S. Department of Transportation Bureau of Transportation Statistics (BTS) data (2020–2025) across all 50 states. See our methodology for how metrics are computed.

Airport A
DCA

Washington, DC

Washington, Virginia

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Airport B
LAX

Los Angeles, CA

Los Angeles, California

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Key Performance Metrics

BTS on-time performance data, 2020–2025 cumulative.

Metric DCA LAX
On-Time Rate (higher is better) 80.8% 82.8%
Avg Delay (lower is better) 79.6 min 72.9 min
Delay Rate (lower is better) 19.2% 17.2%
Cancellation Rate (lower is better) 1.52% 0.74%
Total Flights 1,425,060 2,137,032
Delayed Flights 274,313 366,815
Cancelled Flights 21,697 15,795
Top Delay Cause Late Aircraft Carrier

✓ / ▲ indicates the more favorable value. Data: BTS On-Time Performance, 2020–2025.

Delay Cause Breakdown

DCA - Washington, DC

Late Aircraft 46.4%
Carrier 28.7%
NAS 19.7%
Weather 5.0%
Security 0.2%

LAX - Los Angeles, CA

Carrier 41.7%
Late Aircraft 36.3%
NAS 18.5%
Weather 3.3%
Security 0.2%

Top Routes

Top routes from DCA

Route Flights On-Time
BOS → DCA
Washington
49,205 81.6%
DCA → BOS
Boston
49,133 80.5%
ATL → DCA
Washington
35,757 79.9%
DCA → ATL
Atlanta
35,728 83.9%
ORD → DCA
Washington
33,643 79%
DCA → ORD
Chicago
33,634 83.8%

Top routes from LAX

Route Flights On-Time
LAX → SFO
San Francisco
63,553 78.7%
SFO → LAX
Los Angeles
63,540 82.9%
LAX → LAS
Las Vegas
55,240 78.9%
LAS → LAX
Los Angeles
55,149 79.4%
JFK → LAX
Los Angeles
53,628 81.3%
LAX → JFK
New York
53,619 81.8%

Source: Bureau of Transportation Statistics (BTS), On-Time Performance Data (2020–2025) Bureau of Transportation Statistics (BTS), On-Time Performance Data (2020–2025) On-time rates exclude cancelled and diverted flights. PlainFlights is not affiliated with BTS or the DOT

Every figure on PlainFlights is rendered directly from BTS On-Time Performance data, no number is typed in by an editor. This tool queries live on-time, delay, and cancellation figures for the two selected airports from the dataset. See our editorial standards & corrections policy, the methodology behind these numbers, or report a data error.