10 Maintenance KPIs Every Planner Should Track (With Examples)

If you are responsible for a maintenance plan, your job is simple to describe but hard to execute: reduce unplanned downtime, control costs, and keep production happy.

The fastest way to do that is to track a focused set of maintenance KPIs that show whether your schedule, backlog and team are actually under control. The problem? Most lists of maintenance metrics are written for consultants, not planners. They either dump 30+ abstract KPIs on you, or explain MTBF in isolation without showing how it links to your day-to-day planning.

This guide fixes that.

You'll get 10 practical maintenance KPIs, each with:

• A plain-English definition.
• The formula.
• A simple numeric example.
• "So what?" – how a planner uses it in weekly planning.

These are designed for real plants using CMMS data, not textbook examples.

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The 10 core maintenance KPIs for planners

Here are the KPIs we will cover:

1. PM Compliance (%)
2. Planned Maintenance Percentage (PMP)
3. Schedule Compliance (%)
4. Maintenance Backlog (weeks of work)
5. Reactive Work Percentage (%)
6. Mean Time To Repair (MTTR)
7. Mean Time Between Failures (MTBF)
8. Overall Equipment Effectiveness (OEE)
9. Wrench Time (%)
10. Maintenance Cost per Unit of Output

These pull from the KPIs most commonly recommended by leading CMMS vendors and reliability consultancies, but reshaped around the questions a planner actually asks: "What should the team work on next week, and how do I prove we're improving?"

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1. PM Compliance (%)

What it is The percentage of preventive maintenance (PM) tasks completed on or before their planned due date.

Why it matters for planners

• Low PM compliance = more unexpected breakdowns later.
• High PM compliance tells operations that the plan is being executed and the risk of surprise failures is going down.

Formula

PM Compliance (%) = (Number of PM tasks completed on time ÷ Total PM tasks due) × 100

Example

• 120 PMs were due last month.
• 96 were completed on or before their due date.

PM Compliance = (96 ÷ 120) × 100 = 80%

How a planner uses it

• Set a minimum target (e.g. 85–90%).
• When compliance drops:
  • Check if the schedule is overloaded.
  • See which trades or asset groups are consistently late.
  • Re-balance the plan or move non-critical work out.

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2. Planned Maintenance Percentage (PMP)

What it is The share of maintenance labour hours spent on planned work vs unplanned/reactive work.

Why it matters

• A plant living in "firefighting mode" will show a high percentage of hours on emergency jobs.
• Increasing PMP over time is one of the clearest signs that planning and scheduling are working.

Formula

PMP (%) = (Planned maintenance hours ÷ Total maintenance hours) × 100

Example

• Total hours last week: 400
• Hours on planned work orders: 280

PMP = (280 ÷ 400) × 100 = 70%

How a planner uses it

• Track PMP week-by-week.
• Use it in your Monday meeting: "Last week we hit 70% planned hours; our 90-day target is 80%."
• When PMP is low:
  • Identify the biggest sources of urgent work.
  • Use root cause or work-order comments to eliminate those failure modes.

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3. Schedule Compliance (%)

What it is The percentage of work that was scheduled for a given period and actually completed in that period.

Why it matters

• This KPI measures the quality of your weekly schedule, not just your PM plan.
• Low schedule compliance tells you either:
  • The schedule is unrealistic, or
  • Emergencies are constantly displacing planned work.

Formula

Schedule Compliance (%) = (Scheduled jobs completed in period ÷ Total jobs scheduled for period) × 100

Example

• 150 work orders scheduled this week.
• 120 of those completed this week.

Schedule Compliance = (120 ÷ 150) × 100 = 80%

How a planner uses it

• Pair this with PMP:
  • PMP high + Schedule compliance high = planning working well.
  • PMP low + Schedule compliance low = constant firefighting.
• Use it to negotiate with operations:
  • "If we want 85% schedule compliance, we must protect these PM windows."

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4. Maintenance Backlog (weeks of work)

What it is The amount of approved work sitting in the CMMS, expressed in labour weeks (or days) at current staffing.

Why it matters

• A small backlog = risk of missing improvement work or underutilising the crew.
• A huge backlog = risk that critical work is buried and never done.

Formula

1. Sum estimated labour hours on all approved, not-yet-started work orders.
2. Divide by available labour hours per week.

Backlog (weeks) = Total labour hours in backlog ÷ (Number of technicians × Hours per tech per week)

Example

• Backlog labour: 1,200 hours
• Technicians: 5
• Hours/tech/week: 40

Weekly capacity = 5 × 40 = 200 hours Backlog = 1,200 ÷ 200 = 6 weeks

How a planner uses it

• Track backlog by:
  • Asset criticality.
  • Trade (mechanical, electrical, instrumentation).
• Agree a healthy range:
  • Many plants aim for 2–6 weeks depending on industry.
• If backlog > upper limit:
  • Prioritise by risk.
  • Defer low-risk cosmetic work.
  • Consider overtime or contractors.

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5. Reactive Work Percentage (%)

What it is The percentage of total maintenance hours spent on unplanned, reactive work.

Why it matters

• Reactive work is more expensive, less safe and causes the most disruption to production.
• Planners want a trend line where reactive work falls as PMs and planning improve.

Formula

Reactive Work (%) = (Reactive maintenance hours ÷ Total maintenance hours) × 100

Example

• Total maintenance hours: 400
• Reactive hours: 140

Reactive Work = (140 ÷ 400) × 100 = 35%

How a planner uses it

• Break down by:
  • Area/line (e.g. filler vs packaging).
  • Shift.
  • Asset criticality.
• When this number is stubbornly high:
  • Look at failure codes.
  • Identify the top 10 recurring failures and build specific PMs or redesigns for them.

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6. Mean Time To Repair (MTTR)

What it is The average time it takes to repair an asset and return it to operation after a failure.

Why it matters

• High MTTR means long disruptions to production when something breaks.
• MTTR reveals:
  • How well you plan spare parts.
  • How clearly work orders are written.
  • How easy the asset is to access and diagnose.

Formula

MTTR = Total downtime due to repairs ÷ Number of repair events

(Use consistent units – typically hours.)

Example

• 10 breakdowns in a month.
• Total repair time: 50 hours.

MTTR = 50 ÷ 10 = 5 hours

How a planner uses it

• Use MTTR to:
  • Identify assets where better job plans, spare kits or training can dramatically shorten downtime.
  • Justify improvement work: "If we invest 20 hours to redesign guarding, we expect MTTR to drop from 5 hours to 2 hours."

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7. Mean Time Between Failures (MTBF)

What it is The average operating time between failures for a repairable asset.

Why it matters

• MTBF is a core reliability metric that shows whether your PM strategy is actually increasing reliability.
• For planners, it's a reality check:
  • Are we doing too little PM?
  • Or doing PMs that do not actually affect failure patterns?

Formula

MTBF = Total operating time ÷ Number of failures

Example

• Asset runs 24/7.
• Over 6 months (≈ 4,380 hours) it failed 12 times.

MTBF = 4,380 ÷ 12 ≈ 365 hours

How a planner uses it

• Track MTBF for your top 10 critical assets.
• When MTBF falls:
  • Review PMs – are they condition-based or just calendar-based?
  • Look at failure modes – are we addressing the true causes?
• Use MTBF trends in your monthly report to show improvement or risk.

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8. Overall Equipment Effectiveness (OEE)

What it is A composite metric that shows how effectively a line or asset converts planned production time into good product. It combines:

• Availability (runtime vs planned time)
• Performance (speed vs design rate)
• Quality (good vs total units)

While OEE usually sits with operations, maintenance has a huge influence through downtime and minor stops.

Formula

OEE (%) = Availability × Performance × Quality

(Each component expressed as a decimal, then multiply and convert to %.)

Simple example

• Availability = 0.90 (10% downtime)
• Performance = 0.95 (running at 95% of design speed)
• Quality = 0.98 (2% scrap)

OEE = 0.90 × 0.95 × 0.98 ≈ 0.838 OEE ≈ 83.8%

How a planner uses it

• Focus on the Availability portion:
  • Link asset downtime records in the CMMS to OEE losses.
  • Prioritise work that reduces chronic small stops and repeat failures.
• Use OEE to speak the language of production:
  • "Fixing this chronic stop is worth +3 percentage points of OEE on Line 2."

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9. Wrench Time (%)

What it is The percentage of technicians' paid time actually spent working on tools at the job, not walking, waiting for permits, chasing parts, or sitting in meetings.

Why it matters

• Low wrench time often means poor planning:
  • Missing parts.
  • Poor job instructions.
  • Work orders raised without a clear scope.

Formula (simplified)

Wrench Time (%) = (Time spent physically working on assets ÷ Paid maintenance time) × 100

Example

• Paid hours for techs today: 80
• Time recorded actually fixing or inspecting equipment: 44

Wrench Time = (44 ÷ 80) × 100 = 55%

How a planner uses it

• Run periodic time studies or sample observations.
• Use findings to:
  • Pre-kit jobs with parts.
  • Improve job plans so techs do not keep returning to the planning office.
  • Reduce administrative tasks during peak maintenance windows.

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10. Maintenance Cost per Unit of Output

What it is Total maintenance cost divided by a meaningful production measure (e.g. cases, tonnes, metres, hours of operation).

Why it matters

• Links maintenance performance directly to business performance.
• Helps you justify investment in better PM, spares and tools.

Formula

Maintenance Cost per Unit = Total maintenance cost ÷ Units of output

Example

• Monthly maintenance cost: $120,000
• Monthly output: 3,000,000 bottles

Cost per unit = 120,000 ÷ 3,000,000 = $0.04 per bottle

How a planner uses it

• Track by line or area where possible.
• Use it in your quarterly review:
  • "We've increased PM compliance and reduced breakdowns. Cost per bottle is flat, but OEE has improved. Maintenance spend is paying off."

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How to implement these KPIs without drowning in spreadsheets

You do not need 40 KPIs. You need a simple hierarchy:

Tier 1 – Executive / business view (monthly)

• OEE
• Maintenance Cost per Unit
• Reactive Work %

Tier 2 – Planner / reliability view (weekly)

• PM Compliance
• Planned Maintenance Percentage
• Schedule Compliance
• Backlog (weeks)
• MTTR / MTBF (for critical assets)

Tier 3 – Continuous improvement view (as needed)

• Wrench Time
• Detailed breakdown of reactive work, failure modes and root causes.

Start by setting realistic targets, not "world-class" numbers copied from a slide deck. Use historical data to understand where you are today, then improve step by step.

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Practical example: a simple weekly planner KPI board

For a single site, your weekly board could show:

• PM Compliance: 88% (target 90%)
• Planned Maintenance Percentage: 74% (target 80%)
• Schedule Compliance: 82% (target 85%)
• Reactive Work: 31% (target <25%)
• Backlog: 4.5 weeks (target 3–5 weeks)
• MTTR – Top 5 assets: 3.2 hours (down from 4.0)
• MTBF – Filler: 290 hours (up from 220)

Use the same layout every week. Trend it. Let the numbers tell you where to focus planning time next.

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How LeanReport Can Help

Most planners know what they should track. The real problem is getting the numbers out of Excel and the CMMS without losing half a day.

That is where LeanReport comes in.

You can:

• Upload raw CMMS exports (from SAP, Maximo, Maintenance Connection, MEX, etc.).
• Automatically calculate key maintenance KPIs like PM Compliance, PMP, backlog weeks, MTTR and reactive work.
• Visualise trends without building complex spreadsheets.
• Generate ready-to-send weekly and monthly reports in minutes rather than hours.

Instead of arguing with pivot tables, you spend your time prioritising work and improving the plan.

👉 Want to see how this works in practice? Visit our How it works page or start by reading more implementation guides on the LeanReport blog. When you are ready to roll this into your plant, you can check our pricing for simple, fixed plans.