Which US Airports Have the Most Flight Cancellations?

LGA (New York LaGuardia) cancels more flights than any other major US airport — a 3.4% cancellation rate, more than double the 1.6% national average. DCA, EWR, DFW, and PHL round out the top five, and the pattern is telling: capacity-constrained hubs cancel more often than airports with room to absorb a delay.

• LGA has the highest cancellation rate among major US airports, at 3.4% — more than double the 1.6% national average across the 24-month window.
• DCA (3.3%) and EWR (2.8%) also rank near the top — all three are slot-constrained Northeast airports with little schedule slack to absorb a bad day.
• PHX, PDX, SLC, and SMF each cancel just 0.7% of flights — the lowest cancellation rates among major US airports, less than half the national average.
• A high cancellation rate isn't the same as a low on-time rate — EWR cancels more often than DFW (2.8% vs. 2.5%) yet still lands a higher share of its completed flights on time (78.5% vs. 72.3%).

Which airports cancel the most flights?

LGA, Washington Reagan National (DCA), and Newark Liberty (EWR) cancel flights more often than any other major US airport. Among the 37 major airports with at least 50,000 annual departures, all five of the highest-cancellation airports sit above 2.4% — well past the 1.6% national average across the 14.1 million US flights FlightRecord tracked from June 2024 through May 2026.

• LGA — New York LaGuardia: 3.4% cancelled, 78.9% on-time, 17.4 min average delay
• DCA — Washington Reagan National: 3.3% cancelled, 75.9% on-time, 19.7 min average delay
• EWR — Newark Liberty: 2.8% cancelled, 78.5% on-time, 18.2 min average delay
• DFW — Dallas/Fort Worth: 2.5% cancelled, 72.3% on-time, 21.0 min average delay
• PHL — Philadelphia: 2.4% cancelled, 77.1% on-time, 19.7 min average delay

Which airports cancel the fewest flights?

At the other end of the list, five major airports keep cancellations under 1%: Phoenix (PHX), Portland (PDX), Salt Lake City (SLC), Sacramento (SMF), and Denver (DEN) — each cancelling well under half the national rate, and several of them among the most punctual airports in the country besides.

• PHX — Phoenix Sky Harbor: 0.7% cancelled, 79.2% on-time, 14.1 min average delay
• PDX — Portland: 0.7% cancelled, 84.3% on-time, 11.0 min average delay
• SLC — Salt Lake City: 0.7% cancelled, 84.3% on-time, 11.6 min average delay
• SMF — Sacramento: 0.7% cancelled, 82.0% on-time, 11.8 min average delay
• DEN — Denver: 0.8% cancelled, 76.3% on-time, 16.7 min average delay

See the full ranked list of all 37 major US airports on the most reliable airports ranking.

Why do LGA, DCA, and EWR cancel so many flights?

All three are slot-constrained — the FAA caps how many takeoffs and landings each airport can handle per hour, so there is little unused runway capacity to absorb a bad-weather day or an air-traffic slowdown elsewhere in the system. When a storm or ground stop backs up the schedule, airlines running these tightly packed slots more often cancel a flight outright rather than let one late departure cascade delays through the rest of the day.

A cancelled flight and a delayed flight are tracked as separate outcomes in DOT data — see cancelled vs. delayed flight for how the distinction works and why it matters for a passenger's rights.

DFW tells a related but different version of the same story. It isn't slot-restricted the way LGA and DCA are, but its sheer scale as one of the country's busiest hubs means a single disrupted bank of connections can strand enough downstream aircraft and crews that cancellations follow anyway — on top of its already-low 72.3% on-time rate.

Cancellation rate isn't the same as on-time rate

Not necessarily. EWR cancels 2.8% of flights — well above the 1.6% national average — yet it still lands 78.5% of completed flights on time, a better on-time rate than DFW's 72.3% despite DFW cancelling slightly less. The two figures measure different failure modes: on-time rate describes how often a flight that operates arrives close to schedule, while cancellation rate describes how often the flight never happens at all. PDX and SLC score well on both counts — 84.3% on-time and only 0.7% cancelled — which points to genuinely resilient day-to-day operations rather than a schedule simply padded to hide delays.

What this means when you're booking a flight

If your itinerary routes through LGA, DCA, EWR, DFW, or PHL — especially during winter storms or summer thunderstorm season — budget for a real chance of an outright cancellation, not just a delay, and keep a backup flight or same-day alternate in mind before you're stuck rebooking mid-storm. Checking the specific airport's own on-time and cancellation numbers before you book a tight connection through any of them is worth the extra minute.

Frequently asked questions

What's a normal flight cancellation rate?

Nationally, about 1.6% of US flights are cancelled, based on FlightRecord's analysis of 14.1 million flights from June 2024 through May 2026. Airports above roughly 2% — including LGA, DCA, EWR, DFW, and PHL — cancel meaningfully more often than a typical major airport.

Which US airport cancels the most flights?

LGA (New York LaGuardia), at a 3.4% cancellation rate — more than double the 1.6% national average — followed by DCA at 3.3% and EWR at 2.8%.

Why do New York and Washington, DC airports cancel so many flights?

LGA, DCA, and EWR are slot-constrained, meaning the FAA limits how many takeoffs and landings each can handle per hour. That leaves little slack to absorb weather or air-traffic disruptions, so airlines are more likely to cancel a flight outright rather than let a delay cascade through the rest of the day's schedule.

Does a high cancellation rate mean an airport is unreliable overall?

Not by itself. Cancellation rate and on-time rate measure different things — EWR cancels more often than DFW but still gets a higher share of its completed flights in on time. Check both figures before judging an airport's overall reliability.

Are flight cancellations counted the same way as flight delays?

No. A cancelled flight never departs and has no arrival time, so it's excluded from delay averages and reported separately — see cancelled vs. delayed flight for the full definitional difference between the two.