Takt Time: How Fast You Need to Work to Meet Demand

Takt time is the pace you need to work at to meet customer demand. It is the available working time divided by the number of units customers want in that time. Takt is German for the beat or pulse in music, and the idea is the same: one unit should be finished on every beat.

Takt time is different from cycle time. Cycle time is how long your process actually takes per unit. Takt time is how long it is allowed to take. When cycle time is longer than takt time, you fall behind; when it is much shorter, you have more capacity than demand.

The formula

Available working time is the time people are actually able to work: shift length minus breaks, meetings and planned maintenance. Do not subtract unplanned breakdowns. Takt time is a target, and breakdowns are a loss against it.

Worked example

A small food producer runs one shift a day:

• Shift length: 7.5 hours, or 450 minutes.
• Breaks: two 15-minute breaks, so 30 minutes.
• Available time: 450 − 30 = 420 minutes.
• Demand: retailers order an average of 120 packs a day.
• Takt time: 420 ÷ 120 = 3.5 minutes per pack.

Making a pack takes 12 minutes of hands-on work across all its steps. At a takt of 3.5 minutes, that needs 12 ÷ 3.5 = 3.43 people working steadily, so four people. With four, there is slack for stoppages and training. With three, the line would fall behind every day.

Calculate your takt time

Use an average day's demand, not your busiest. The calculator shows takt time and how many people that pace requires.

Using takt time to balance the work

Once you know takt time, time each step of the process and compare it:

• A step slower than takt is a bottleneck. Every unit queues in front of it. Split the work, add a person at that step or remove waste from it.
• A step much faster than takt has spare capacity. That person can take on part of the bottleneck's work.
• The goal is for each person's share of the work to be close to, but below, takt time.

The time and motion study guide shows how to time each step properly.

Where takt time does not fit

Takt time works best when the work is repeated and demand is fairly steady. It fits a bakery, a print room or an assembly bench. It fits a one-off building project less well. Even there, though, the idea helps: if you need to complete 40 kitchen fits a quarter, that sets the pace each fitting team must work at.

When demand is seasonal, calculate a takt time for each season rather than one for the whole year.