PlainFlights

SMF vs IAD - 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
SMF

Sacramento, CA

Sacramento, California

View full profile →
Airport B
IAD

Washington, DC

Washington, Virginia

View full profile →

Key Performance Metrics

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

Metric SMF IAD
On-Time Rate (higher is better) 82.7% 84.1%
Avg Delay (lower is better) 62.4 min 81.3 min
Delay Rate (lower is better) 17.3% 15.9%
Cancellation Rate (lower is better) 0.85% 1.05%
Total Flights 592,833 618,145
Delayed Flights 102,838 98,139
Cancelled Flights 5,050 6,473
Top Delay Cause Late Aircraft Carrier

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

Delay Cause Breakdown

SMF - Sacramento, CA

Late Aircraft 45.4%
Carrier 36.5%
NAS 15.4%
Weather 2.5%
Security 0.2%

IAD - Washington, DC

Carrier 37.9%
Late Aircraft 30.2%
NAS 22.4%
Weather 9.5%
Security 0.1%

Top Routes

Top routes from SMF

Route Flights On-Time
SAN → SMF
Sacramento
30,295 81.6%
SMF → SAN
San Diego
30,193 81.7%
SMF → LAX
Los Angeles
27,971 87.8%
LAX → SMF
Sacramento
27,970 87.2%
SMF → LAS
Las Vegas
26,989 80.6%
LAS → SMF
Sacramento
26,850 78.9%

Top routes from IAD

Route Flights On-Time
IAD → ATL
Atlanta
20,387 84.2%
ATL → IAD
Washington
20,375 84%
DEN → IAD
Washington
17,394 79.1%
IAD → DEN
Denver
17,372 83.1%
CLT → IAD
Washington
13,324 83.6%
IAD → CLT
Charlotte
13,287 83.5%

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.