US airlines achieved their third best ever month for punctuality in October since the Transportation Department began collating data more than 20 years ago.
Airlines reported an average 87% of flights arrived within 15 minutes of their schedules in October.
This is up 7% year over year and a slight improvement of 0.5% compared to September 2015.
The usual suspects led the way again with Delta flights on time 92.1% of the time, Hawaiian at 90.7% and Alaska at 88.2%, the DOT report said.
Low-cost carrier Spirit Airlines had the worst rate with 78% arriving on time.
While performance is improving, helped help by mild weather in October, US airlines have been accused of gaming the system by padding out advertised journey times according to a study by OAG Aviation Worldwide.
Customer complaints were also lower in October, the DOT said, at 1,527 complaints, down from 1,857 recorded the previous month.
