PlainFlights

DCA vs LGA - 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
LGA

New York, NY

New York, New York

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Key Performance Metrics

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

Metric DCA LGA
On-Time Rate (higher is better) 80.8% 81.2%
Avg Delay (lower is better) 79.6 min 80.6 min
Delay Rate (lower is better) 19.2% 18.8%
Cancellation Rate (lower is better) 1.52% 1.80%
Total Flights 1,425,060 1,574,867
Delayed Flights 274,313 295,934
Cancelled Flights 21,697 28,401
Top Delay Cause Late Aircraft Late Aircraft

✓ / ▲ 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%

LGA - New York, NY

Late Aircraft 41.0%
Carrier 30.2%
NAS 23.9%
Weather 4.7%
Security 0.1%

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 LGA

Route Flights On-Time
ORD → LGA
New York
56,539 78.2%
LGA → ORD
Chicago
56,521 80.8%
ATL → LGA
New York
42,079 80.8%
LGA → ATL
Atlanta
42,078 82.2%
LGA → BOS
Boston
39,006 82.4%
BOS → LGA
New York
38,931 83.4%

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.