The 20 Worst US Airports for Delayed Flights

If you've been stuck on the tarmac or stranded at the gate for what seems like an eternity, you're not alone. A new study by travel website Places to Travel reveals which U.S. airports are the biggest culprits when it comes to lengthy flight delays. Places to Travel analyzed data from the Bureau of Transportation Statistics for nearly 2 million delayed domestic flights from January 2023 through February 2024 to find the airports with the longest average delay times.

If you want to avoid a long flight delay, don’t book a flight through Provo Airport in Utah. Late flights at this small airport were delayed an average of 1 hour and 42 minutes. According to the study, of the 2,194 flights that landed at Provo, 39.74 percent (872) were delayed.

The second worst offender for delayed flights was a much bigger airport, Orlando Sanford International Airport in Florida, with average delays of 1 hour and 34 minutes.

While large hubs like Chicago O'Hare International Airport, New York’s John F. Kennedy International Airport, and Philadelphia International Airoprt made the top 20 for longest delays, the findings show that delay times don't necessarily correlate with an airport's size and volume of flights.

"The data doesn't show a clear trend with regard to the size of airports," said Jason Wilson, CEO of Places to Travel. “However, the findings do still show that a massive number of flights are delayed, resulting in traveler stress and potential missed connections, among other consequences, and the air travel infrastructure needs to urgently adapt to handle the massive volumes of passengers to rectify this.”

On the opposite end of the spectrum, if you want the best chance of an on-time flight, travel through Hilo International Airport in Hawaii, where the average delay was just 40 minutes.