---
title: Virgin is the Fastest Airline in the Skies
description: Spirit, on the other hand, is struggling
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published: '2015-11-24T20:15:16.000Z'
modified: '2015-11-24T20:15:16.000Z'
section: Business
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![US-SKOREA-ACCIDENT-AIR](https://img.money.com/2015/11/173089715.jpg)
*A Virgin America flight takes off while a crashed Asiana Airlines Boeing 777 is seen on the runway at San Francisco International Airport.*

Virgin Airlines saved its passengers the more time gate to gate than any other airline in America, making it the [fastest](http://fivethirtyeight.com/features/will-your-holiday-flight-be-on-time/) airline in the country.

Using flight data from the federal Bureau of Transportation Statistics, [FiveThirtyEight](http://fivethirtyeight.com/features/will-your-holiday-flight-be-on-time/) dubbed Virgin “the Michael Jordan of airlines” for shaving an average of seven minutes off of its gate to gate travel time compared to the competition. Alaska Airlines came in a close second, saving its passengers an average of six minutes, while Delta, the only one of the big four to make it into the top three, cuts four minutes off the average trip.

At the other end of the scale is American Airlines, the 8th slowest, adding, on average, three minutes to every trip, followed by Frontier (four minutes), United (four minutes) and Spirit, the slowest of them all with a whopping nine minutes tacked on to the average flight.

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