Delayed and cancelled flight statistics from 2024
The proprietary data analysed in this article includes flights that have departed between March 1st, 2024 and September 30th, 2024. Approximately 18.6 million flights are included here. That’s around 3.01 million flights per month! These flights run along 275,500 different routes. The countries with the greatest number of departing flights are the USA, China, India, Spain, and the UK. The delays mentioned in this analysis are based on arrival time, not departure or take-off time.
Among the top ten countries with the highest flight volumes during the observed period, China and Canada had the highest cancellation rates in the rankings, at around 5% and 3.4% respectively. In contrast, Spain and India had the lowest cancellation rates, at around 0.8% and 1.1% respectively.Out of over 500,000 flights in the UK, just under 8000 were cancelled during the observed period. This leaves the UK flight cancellation rate for 2024 at 1.51%. The UK had the fourth-lowest cancellation rate among the ten countries considered. Only Italy, India, and Spain had lower rates of flight cancellations.
The percentage of cancelled flights across all included countries ranged from 1.5% to 3.2% over the observed months (March to September 2024).Flight cancellation percentages started high at around 3%, peaking at 3.2% in June. There was then a sharp decrease to 2.2% in July, followed by a further decrease to 1.5% in August, and then a plateau.
Approximately 63% of all flights experienced no delay during the period studied. The majority of delays were minor, with most (around 18-22% across all months) lasting from five to 30 minutes. An additional 10-11% of flights experienced a very short delay of up to five minutes. Major delays from 30 minutes to three hours ranged between 4-10% across months, with the highest number occurring in July. Delays of more than three hours remained low, at less than 0.15% across all months.This year performed relatively on par with last year in terms of the rate of flights with no delays and an on-time arrival. However, there was an increase in the percentage of flights with significant delays. This was mainly due to July’s poor flight punctuality: in 2024, July had the lowest percentage of no-delay flights (around 57%), and by far the highest percentage of majorly delayed flights (10.3%).
On July 19th, 2024, a failed software update from cybersecurity company CrowdStrike affected 8.5 million computers running Windows around the world, causing them to crash and show a critical system error. While the meltdown lasted only a few days, the repercussions were severe, with insurers estimating that it would cost Fortune 500 companies around $5.4 billion in damages. This incident caused increased delays and other flight interruptions in July 2024. Other aviation industry factors, including planned strike action at London Gatwick airport, strikes at Italian airports, and more may have had some role to play in the increased average delays seen in July. As one of the busiest periods for air traffic during the summer holiday season, this caused significant disruption.
Of the top 10 countries with the highest flight volumes during the observed period, the US and Brazil stand out with the highest rates of on-time flights. Around 70% of US flights and 72% of Brazilian flights were on time during this period. In contrast, just 42% of German flights and 49% of Italian flights were on time. Brazil and Japan had the lowest rates of major flight delays, at 2.6% and 3.5% respectively. On the other hand, flights departing from Germany (9.7%) and Italy (10.3%) had the highest rates of major delays. The UK also experienced significant delays this year, with only around 51% of UK flights departing on time. 40% of UK flights experienced a minor delay, while just over 9% experienced a major delay.
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From IT outages to strikes and weather delays, 2024 has seen plenty of incidents disrupting flights and leaving travellers stranded. Some countries, like America and China, experienced a high number of cancellations. Countries in Europe, like Germany and Italy, were more impacted by delays. Regardless of the type of disruption, travel disruptions can be a big source of stress—especially if you happen to be travelling for a business trip. Fortunately, if you’re a business traveller or travel manager, there are several steps you can take to make sure delays and cancellations don’t ruin your plans.
Delays happen, but if there’s a problem you’ll want to know where your business travellers are. TravelPerk’s interactive travel map lets travel managers keep track of travellers in real time, so they can act immediately and fulfill their duty of care obligations.
If flights are delayed or cancelled, travellers may need to update plans quickly while on the go. When rebooking through TravelPerk, you’ll have access to a 24/7 customer support team via phone and chat, with a target response time of 15 seconds. With FlexiPerk, you can also make your trips refundable and get 80% of your money back if you need to cancel any time up to two hours before travel.
Is there likely to be an issue with your flight? With TravelPerk’s TravelCare solution, you’ll be the first to know about developing situations like public health emergencies, airstrikes, and more that may affect your air travel plans.
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