Key takeaways
Short answer: Takt time is the drumbeat of demand: available production time divided by units required. Cycle time is how long your process actually takes per unit. If cycle time is longer than takt time, you physically cannot keep up — you will run overtime, add shifts or miss orders. Comparing the two sizes the line against reality. See also oee for manufacturing.
Takt time is set by the customer, not the machine. It is the pace you must hit to meet demand: the available production time in a period divided by the number of units the customer needs in that period. It is a target rhythm, not a measured speed.
Cycle time is what the process actually delivers: the real time to produce one unit, including its real-world slowdowns. It is a measured fact about your line, not a target.
A cell has 27,000 seconds of available time per shift and must make 600 units, so takt time is 45 seconds — a unit must leave every 45 seconds to meet demand. The measured cycle time is 51 seconds. That six-second gap is not a rounding error: across 600 units it is an hour of shortfall per shift, which the plant currently covers with daily overtime. Comparing takt and cycle made an invisible overtime habit into a visible, fixable six-second problem.
Cycle below takt: you can meet demand with room to spare. Cycle above takt: you are structurally short and will rely on overtime or extra shifts. Cycle near takt: you are meeting demand but have almost no buffer for any disruption. The relationship, not either number alone, tells you whether the line is sized right.
If cycle exceeds takt, attack cycle time before adding shifts — balance the line, cut micro-stops, speed the bottleneck. Much of the gap is usually Performance loss, not true capacity, so it is recoverable without capital. Adding a shift to cover a six-second avoidable loss is the expensive way to solve a cheap problem.
1. Setting takt from the machine. Takt comes from demand, not equipment capability.
2. Adding shifts before reducing cycle time. You pay for capacity to cover recoverable loss.
3. Running cycle equal to takt. No buffer for disruption means constant firefighting.
4. Ignoring variation. An average cycle near takt can still miss demand when it varies.
Cycle-time inflation is largely Performance loss — micro-stops and reduced speed. Improving OEE pulls cycle time back under takt without new equipment, which is why takt-versus-cycle is one of the clearest lenses on whether your OEE Performance gap is costing you demand.
Fabrico measures real cycle time and the Performance losses inflating it, so you can close the gap to takt before resorting to overtime. Book a demo to see cycle time against takt on your lines.
No — it is set by customer demand and available time.
You cannot meet demand without overtime or added capacity — close the gap by reducing cycle time first.
It recovers the Performance loss inflating cycle time, often closing the takt gap without capital.
Slightly below, to leave a buffer for disruption — running exactly at takt means no resilience.
An average cycle near takt can still miss demand on its bad days, so account for variation, not just the mean.
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