In many organizations, maintenance teams face constant pressure to reduce downtime, control costs, and improve asset performance. Yet, despite best efforts, leaders often struggle to know if their strategies are truly driving results.
Are the right maintenance metrics in place to measure performance effectively? Which maintenance KPIs actually reflect progress toward operational excellence, and which ones are just adding noise? How can a certified maintenance and reliability professional ensure the data being tracked aligns with both short-term goals and long-term business outcomes?
These questions highlight a core challenge: without clarity on what to measure and why, even the most skilled teams risk falling short of world-class maintenance standards. That’s where metrics make the difference. The ability to define, track, and act on the right numbers is what separates reactive organizations from those achieving consistent reliability, efficiency, and value.
This article explores the top 10 maintenance metrics that define world-class maintenance performance.
What is a Maintenance Metric?
A maintenance metric is a numerical measurement, or Key Performance Indicator (KPI), used to track the effectiveness and efficiency of maintenance activities, such as the reliability of equipment, the performance of the maintenance team, and the management of resources like costs and inventory.
By analyzing these metrics, organizations gain data-driven insights to identify areas for improvement, optimize maintenance strategies, reduce downtime, and align maintenance efforts with broader business goals.
Purpose of Maintenance Metrics
Before a company can achieve world-class maintenance, it must first understand why maintenance metrics matter. Many organizations struggle with high downtime, unexpected equipment failures, and a growing maintenance backlog.
Without the right measurements, these problems spiral, leading to increased maintenance costs, lost production, and frustrated teams. Maintenance metrics exist to fight these pain points head-on by making performance visible and actionable.
The Top 10 Most Important Maintenance Metrics
In the realm of maintenance, understanding and harnessing key performance indicators (KPIs) is important. These metrics play a pivotal role in evaluating the performance of people, assets, projects, and overall maintenance quality. The effective use of maintenance metrics is crucial for organizations striving to attain their goals and enhance operational efficiency.
Metrics in the maintenance world encompass various aspects such as machine failures, repair times, maintenance backlogs, and costs, all measured against company objectives. Maintenance KPIs can be categorized into leading and lagging indicators, each serving a distinct purpose. Learn how web-based CMMS enables real-time tracking and streamlined communication.
Leading indicators, foreseeing changes or trends for future success, include metrics like Preventive Maintenance (PM) compliance and estimated vs. actual performance.
Lagging indicators, measuring past performance against goals, encompass metrics like Mean Time Between Failure (MTBF) and Mean Time to Repair (MTTR).
1. Equipment Downtime
Equipment downtime refers to the period when machinery or production assets are not operational. This can occur due to equipment failures that cause unplanned stoppages or as a result of planned maintenance activities such as inspections, adjustments, or replacements.
World-Class Maintenance Standard
A widely accepted world-class maintenance benchmark is to keep unplanned downtime at 10% or less. That means equipment should ideally run with at least 90% availability. Achieving this level requires a strong maintenance strategy, consistent schedule compliance, and the development of a proactive maintenance culture within the organization.
Why It’s Crucial
Tracking downtime reveals where a facility stands in terms of maintenance effectiveness and productivity. It acts as one of the most critical key performance indicators in maintenance operations, because:
- High downtime suggests weak preventive maintenance practices or poor maintenance processes, signaling the need to reassess maintenance tasks and workflows.
- Low downtime reflects strong maintenance metrics, showing effective maintenance team performance and optimized maintenance schedule compliance.
- When tracked by area or production stage, downtime highlights where the most critical maintenance backlog exists, allowing managers to allocate resources more effectively.
How to Calculate
Downtime can be calculated using the following formula: (Hours of downtime ÷ Total period measured) × 100
2. Mean Time to Repair (MTTR)
Mean Time to Repair (MTTR) measures the average time it takes for equipment to be diagnosed, repaired, and restored after a failure. It’s one of the most critical maintenance performance metrics because long repair times lead to higher equipment downtime, higher maintenance costs, and lower overall equipment effectiveness (OEE).
- Extended MTTR reduces equipment availability, undermining operational efficiency.
- Unclear maintenance processes and a lack of proactive maintenance culture increase unplanned downtime.
- Delays in repair inflate maintenance overtime and create a maintenance backlog.
World-Class Maintenance Standard
There is no universal benchmark for MTTR in the maintenance world. Achieving world-class maintenance requires organizations to define their own maintenance strategy, measurement methods, and leading indicators. This clarity drives continuous improvement and ensures schedule compliance across maintenance operations.
How to Calculate MTTR
MTTR = Total Downtime ÷ Number of Stoppages
This formula focuses purely on recovery time per stoppage, independent of uptime.
How to Improve MTTR
- Use a CMMS to track maintenance data and flag issues early.
- Strengthen preventive maintenance schedules to reduce breakdowns.
- Plan for failures in advance so the maintenance team can respond quickly.
3. Mean Time Between Failures (MTBF)
Mean Time Between Failures (MTBF) is the average time that equipment operates without experiencing a failure. It is a critical metric used to evaluate asset reliability and the overall maintenance effectiveness of an organization’s operations.
Just like MTTR impacts equipment availability, MTBF plays a direct role in determining overall equipment effectiveness (OEE). The longer a machine can run without interruption, the higher its contribution to equipment effectiveness and productivity.
World-Class Maintenance Standard
Although MTBF is widely used in industry, there is no single global standard for its measurement. To achieve consistency, each organization should clearly define the way maintenance data is collected and reported. This transparency allows for better internal tracking and benchmarking against world-class maintenance practices.
How to Calculate MTBF
MTBF is calculated as the total uptime divided by the number of equipment failures during a defined period. Expressed as:
MTBF = Total Operating Time ÷ Number of Failures
How to Improve MTBF
Improving MTBF requires building a proactive maintenance culture. Implementing a strong preventive maintenance schedule ensures that inspections, lubrication, calibrations, and other planned maintenance tasks are completed on time.
4. Planned Maintenance Percentage (PMP)
Planned maintenance percentage (PMP) is a maintenance performance metric that measures the proportion of total maintenance hours spent on scheduled maintenance tasks compared to overall maintenance hours in a given period.
It serves as one of the key performance indicators for maintenance effectiveness, showing how much time is dedicated to proactive maintenance activities versus reactive responses to equipment failures and unplanned downtime.
World-Class Maintenance Standard
In world-class maintenance practices, organizations target high PMP values to ensure operational efficiency and overall equipment effectiveness (OEE). Clear definitions of maintenance schedules, activities, and reporting methods are essential for consistent benchmarking of PMP as a leading indicator of future performance.
How to Calculate PMP
PMP is calculated by dividing the total planned maintenance hours by the total maintenance hours within a specific time frame, then multiplying by 100.
Formula: PMP = (Planned Maintenance Hours ÷ Total Maintenance Hours) × 100
A high PMP reflects strong schedule compliance and a proactive maintenance culture. It means the maintenance department is allocating most of its resources to preventive maintenance schedules, predictive maintenance strategies, and other planned activities that strengthen asset reliability and reduce maintenance costs.
On the other hand, a low PMP can indicate excessive maintenance backlog, overtime, or frequent equipment downtime that pulls the maintenance team into reactive work
5. Overall Equipment Effectiveness (OEE)
Overall Equipment Effectiveness (OEE) is a key performance indicator that measures how effectively equipment is utilized in alignment with business objectives. It is considered one of the most important maintenance metrics for assessing maintenance effectiveness and achieving world-class maintenance standards.
OEE highlights the impact of equipment downtime, performance gaps, and quality losses on overall productivity.
World-Class Maintenance Standard
World-class OEE performance is often cited as 85% or higher. However, just like with other maintenance KPIs, standards can vary depending on industry, equipment, and operational efficiency.
To ensure transparency, it is critical to define how OEE and other maintenance performance metrics are measured within the maintenance department. Clear methodologies allow data-driven decision-making based on both leading and lagging indicators.
How to Calculate OEE
The OEE calculation is based on three factors:
- Availability = Run Time ÷ Planned Production Time
- Performance = (Ideal Cycle Time × Total Count) ÷ Run Time
- Quality = Good Count ÷ Total Count
OEE is expressed as: OEE = Availability × Performance × Quality
How to Improve OEE
Improving OEE requires a proactive maintenance culture supported by CMMS tools. Preventive maintenance schedules, predictive maintenance techniques, and effective planned maintenance tasks reduce unplanned downtime and equipment failures.
6. Maintenance Backlog
The maintenance backlog is the total volume of maintenance tasks that are still pending and waiting to be completed by the maintenance team. It is usually measured in workdays or weeks and reflects the amount of time required for available workers to finish both preventive maintenance and corrective tasks. This metric is a key indicator of maintenance effectiveness and helps track how well maintenance schedules are being followed.
World-Class Maintenance Standard
In world-class maintenance, the recommended standard is to maintain about six weeks of backlog per technician. Having zero backlog may indicate overstaffing, while excessive backlog points to poor schedule compliance or unplanned downtime disrupting planned maintenance.
How to Measure Maintenance Backlog
Backlog should be clearly defined to avoid inconsistencies in reporting. Maintenance data must distinguish between planned maintenance tasks, preventive maintenance, and corrective maintenance. This allows maintenance KPIs and performance metrics to reflect true maintenance effectiveness and predict future performance more accurately.
How to Manage and Improve Maintenance Backlog
An effective maintenance strategy is built on a proactive maintenance culture, preventive maintenance schedule compliance, and data-driven decision making.
Using a CMMS helps organize maintenance operations, prioritize urgent activities, and support continuous improvement of maintenance performance metrics.
7. Overall Equipment Effectiveness (OEE)
Overall equipment effectiveness (OEE) is a key performance indicator used to measure the true productivity of a plant. By calculating OEE, manufacturers can identify inefficiencies, optimize maintenance operations, and align with business objectives through continuous improvement.
Since OEE reflects the combined impact of availability, performance efficiency, and product quality, it is one of the most critical maintenance performance metrics for guiding a proactive maintenance culture.
World-Class Standard
OEE was first conceptualized by Seiichi Nakajima, who introduced the idea of measuring effectiveness through three main factors: availability, performance efficiency, and rate of quality products.
How to Calculate OEE
OEE is determined by multiplying its three core components:
- Availability = (Available Time – Planned Downtime) / Available Time
- Performance Efficiency = (Processed Units × Ideal Cycle Time) / Actual Operation Time
- Rate of Quality Products = (Acceptable Units / Units Produced)
Overall Equipment Effectiveness:
OEE = Availability × Performance Efficiency × Rate of Quality Products
How to Improve OEE
Improving OEE requires reducing inefficiencies across maintenance processes and eliminating the six big losses: equipment failures, setup and adjustment delays, idling and stoppages, reduced speed, process defects, and reduced yield.
8. Preventive Maintenance (PM) Compliance
Preventive maintenance (PM) is the scheduled work performed on equipment to reduce the risk of unexpected breakdowns and equipment failures and evaluate the consistency of a PM program. Unlike reactive repairs, PM is carried out while equipment is still operational, ensuring minimal equipment downtime.
PM compliance measures how effectively the maintenance department completes planned maintenance tasks within the designated timeframe, making it one of the most critical maintenance performance metrics for achieving world-class maintenance.
World-Class Maintenance Standard
A commonly accepted benchmark for schedule compliance is the “10% rule.” This means that PM tasks should be completed within 10% of their planned maintenance interval. For example, monthly maintenance activities should be completed within three days of their due date.
How to Calculate PM Compliance
PM compliance is typically calculated as:
PM Compliance = (Completed PM Work Orders ÷ Scheduled PM Work Orders) × 100
This formula gives maintenance teams a clear view of maintenance effectiveness and helps predict future performance.
How to Improve PM Compliance
Improving PM compliance requires a strong maintenance strategy supported by CMMS. These tools streamline maintenance operations, track schedule compliance, and provide maintenance data for data-driven decision making.
9. Inventory Turnover
Inventory turnover is a key performance metric that represents how efficiently a business converts its stock into sales. It compares the cost of purchased stock with the cost of items currently on hand.
An optimized inventory turnover ratio directly supports business objectives such as reducing equipment downtime, minimizing unplanned downtime, and aligning with overall equipment effectiveness (OEE) by ensuring resources are available when needed.
World-Class Maintenance Standard
Much like other maintenance metrics, there is no single universal benchmark for inventory turnover. However, achieving world-class maintenance standards requires organizations to define consistent methodologies for data collection.
How to Calculate Inventory Turnover
Inventory turnover is calculated using the formula:
Inventory Turnover = Cost of Goods Sold / Average Inventory
This ratio shows how often inventory is sold and replaced within a period. A higher ratio indicates strong sales and efficient resource management, while a lower ratio may point to excess stock, delays in maintenance operations, or poor forecasting.
How to Improve Inventory Turnover
Improvement begins with data-driven decision-making. Monitoring maintenance data, forecasting demand, and aligning planned maintenance tasks with supply chain strategies help reduce bottlenecks.
Companies can further enhance turnover by aligning their maintenance strategy with predictive maintenance and real-time insights from the industrial internet.
10. Planned vs. Unplanned Maintenance
Planned vs. unplanned maintenance is a critical maintenance performance metric that measures the balance between scheduled planned maintenance tasks and unexpected unplanned downtime. It shows how effectively a maintenance department is executing its maintenance strategy and directly impacts operational efficiency and maintenance costs.
World-Class Maintenance Standard
The goal of measuring these metrics is to achieve a high planned maintenance percentage. This means that most maintenance activities are completed according to a maintenance schedule rather than in response to sudden equipment failures.
Evaluating the success of a maintenance program, this metric distinguishes between scheduled (planned) and unexpected (unplanned) maintenance tasks. Efficient tracking helps measure the program’s effectiveness..
How to Calculate Planned vs. Unplanned Maintenance
This metric is calculated by dividing the hours of planned maintenance by the total maintenance hours (planned + unplanned) within a defined period.
Formula: Planned Maintenance % = (Planned Maintenance Hours ÷ Total Maintenance Hours) × 100
How to Improve Planned vs. Unplanned Maintenance
Improving this metric requires building a proactive maintenance culture. A strong preventive maintenance schedule compliance rate reduces the risk of surprise failures.
Tips for Achieving World-Class Maintenance
Achieving world-class maintenance requires more than fixing equipment failures as they arise. The following practices are essential for attaining world-class maintenance and ensuring long-term asset reliability.
Strong Planning and Scheduling
Strong planning and scheduling are the foundation of maintenance effectiveness. A structured process ensures that maintenance tasks are properly resourced with the right labor, spare parts, and tools, reducing maintenance backlog and avoiding unnecessary equipment downtime.
By establishing a robust maintenance schedule compliance framework, the maintenance team can increase planned maintenance percentage, improve operational efficiency, and minimize maintenance overtime.
Effective planning also enhances schedule compliance and helps the maintenance department align maintenance activities with business objectives.
Proactive Approach
Shifting from reactive repairs to a proactive maintenance culture is a key step toward achieving world-class maintenance. Preventive maintenance and predictive maintenance strategies not only reduce unplanned downtime but also optimize overall equipment effectiveness (OEE).
When organizations leverage predictive analytics, maintenance data, and leading indicators, they can predict future performance and avoid costly failures. Proactive maintenance culture ensures that planned maintenance tasks are executed on time, enabling continuous improvement and stronger alignment with maintenance performance metrics.
Data-Driven Decisions
Modern maintenance strategy depends heavily on data-driven decision-making. Utilizing a CMMS enables real-time tracking of maintenance metrics, schedule compliance, and asset health.
When maintenance teams analyse leading and lagging indicators, the maintenance department can better evaluate past performance, identify trends, and optimize future performance.
Incorporating maintenance tools allows accurate monitoring of maintenance activities and equipment effectiveness, helping organizations boost maintenance effectiveness while lowering replacement asset value costs.
Skilled Workforce
World-class maintenance is impossible without a skilled workforce. The maintenance team must be equipped with the technical training and knowledge needed to execute the preventive maintenance schedule compliance effectively.
Skilled craftspeople reduce maintenance overtime, improve the quality of maintenance tasks, and enhance overall maintenance operations.
Investment in workforce development fosters a culture of continuous improvement and accountability, ensuring that maintenance processes are executed efficiently and effectively. A capable workforce is a key performance indicator of strong maintenance performance.
Focus on Life-Cycle Cost (LCC)
A world-class maintenance strategy emphasizes life-cycle cost (LCC) rather than focusing solely on upfront purchase prices. Maintenance performance metrics must account for total expenses, including preventive maintenance schedules, planned maintenance hours, and potential equipment failures over an asset’s life.
By considering life-cycle cost, organizations can make smarter decisions regarding asset reliability and replacement asset value. This approach improves maintenance effectiveness, reduces long-term maintenance costs, and aligns maintenance operations with both operational efficiency and business objectives.
Leveraging eWorkOrders CMMS to Achieve World-Class Maintenance
At eWorkOrders, we believe world-class maintenance starts with visibility and control over your assets. That’s why our CMMS gives organizations the ability to track, analyze, and improve performance with real-time data. With customizable dashboards and detailed reporting, we transform raw numbers into actionable insights that drive results.
When we talk about performance, we’re not just looking at numbers—we’re helping teams see the bigger picture. For example, by monitoring Maintenance Metrics, companies gain clear visibility into KPIs that directly impact efficiency, costs, and reliability.
Our CMMS helps reduce unplanned downtime, cut mean time to repair (MTTR), and increase mean time between failures (MTBF), which translates into stronger asset reliability and more predictable operations. This customizable solution empowers organizations to set and measure a range of KPIs, transforming performance data into meaningful reports and dashboards. eWorkOrders enhances both quantitative and qualitative insights into maintenance strategy, ensuring visible improvements in various areas.
We’ve also seen organizations strengthen their preventive maintenance programs and improve work order completion rates. These improvements drive down inventory costs, raise overall equipment effectiveness (OEE), and push inspection compliance higher. To better understand how to measure and act on these results, we encourage teams to explore our guide on mastering maintenance KPIs.
As part of our commitment to industry best practices, we align with standards from SMRP. Understanding why SMRP matters in maintenance and reliability helps organizations adopt proven frameworks that ensure long-term success.
Every improvement brings cost savings, higher production uptime, and better delivery performance. With eWorkOrders CMMS, you don’t just maintain assets—you build a smarter, more efficient operation.
Ready to see how this works in practice? Book a live demo with our team today and take the first step toward achieving world-class maintenance.
Conclusion
Achieving world-class maintenance performance is not about chasing every number; it’s about focusing on the right ones. The ten metrics outlined here provide a framework for measuring effectiveness, guiding proactive strategies, and driving real business value. With the right balance of planning, skilled execution, and data-driven insights, maintenance teams can cut downtime, control costs, and extend asset life. Most importantly, they can prove their impact on overall operational success. Don’t let guesswork guide your strategy; equip your team with the tools they need to track, manage, and improve performance.
Take the next step toward world-class maintenance with eWorkOrders CMMS. Contact us today.
Frequently Asked Questions
What are the criteria for world-class maintenance?
World-class maintenance is defined by minimal unplanned downtime, high preventive maintenance compliance, optimized costs, skilled workforce capability, and continuous improvement through data-driven decision-making. It ensures asset reliability, operational efficiency, and alignment of maintenance activities with overall business objectives.
What are KPIs for maintenance?
Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) for maintenance measure performance, efficiency, and reliability of assets and teams. Examples include equipment downtime, Mean Time to Repair (MTTR), Mean Time Between Failures (MTBF), Preventive Maintenance compliance, maintenance backlog, and Overall Equipment Effectiveness (OEE).
What are the 4 P’s of maintenance?
The 4 P’s of maintenance are: Preventive (planned inspections and servicing), Predictive (data-driven forecasting of failures), Proactive (eliminating root causes), and Productive (integrating maintenance with operations). Together, they establish a balanced strategy to reduce downtime and optimize asset performance.
What are the 5 pillars of maintenance and reliability?
The five pillars of maintenance and reliability are: Work Identification, Planning, Scheduling, Execution, and Follow-up/Analysis. These pillars create a structured framework that ensures tasks are prioritized, resources are allocated efficiently, and continuous improvement is embedded into maintenance processes.
