Overview
Features
Industry solutions
By: Tanya Goncalves
Reviewed by: Nitin Joseph
Fact-checked by: Jason Afara
Published on: January 14, 2022
Last revised on: October 29, 2026
Maintenance performance KPIs are a way to understand whether maintenance is helping an organization improve asset reliability, reduce downtime, control costs, and support production. But not every maintenance metric is a KPI, and not every KPI matters equally to every organization.
The most effective maintenance KPI strategy starts with the outcome you want to improve and then works backward to identify the measurements that explain it. That means looking at KPIs as a connected system:
A manufacturing plant trying to increase production capacity will focus on availability, MTBF (opens in new tab), MTTR (opens in new tab), and production downtime (opens in new tab). A maintenance planner (opens in new tab) may care more about schedule compliance, backlog, and planned maintenance percentage. A reliability team is going to prioritize failure rate, repeat failures, and condition-monitoring compliance.
The goal isn't to track the largest possible number of maintenance performance metrics. It is to identify the relatively small set of indicators that tell you what is happening, why it is happening, and what you can do about it. Your maintenance KPI set should reflect your maintenance objectives, asset criticality, production requirements, data quality, and organizational maturity.
*Note: Benchmark figures are placeholders — verify against SMRP Best Practices 6th Edition where it publishes targets, and source/attribute elsewhere where SMRP omits them (it deliberately gives no target values for several metrics). Pillars follow the SMRP five-pillar framework.
Pick a KPI from the dropdown below or click any circle in the graph. The map then highlights just that metric and everything connected to it (i.e., what drives it and what it drives).
How to read the arrows:
Use the pillar buttons to focus on one SMRP area at a time or click Clear to see the whole picture again. You can drag any node to untangle a busy area and look more in-depth.
Table of contents
A maintenance key performance indicator, or KPI, is a measurable indicator used to evaluate performance against a maintenance or business objective. The distinction between a measure, metric, KPI, target, and benchmark is useful.
Term: Measure
Meaning: A raw observation
Example: 12 hours of downtime
Term: Metric
Meaning: A calculated measurement
Example: MTTR = 2.4 hours
Term: KPI
Meaning: A metric connected to an objective
Example: Reduce MTTR by 15%
Term: Target
Meaning: Desired level of performance
Example: MTTR < 2 hours
Term: Benchmark
Meaning: A comparison point
Example: Industry benchmark
Not every number collected by a CMMS should become a KPI. If a maintenance team can measure something but does not know why it matters, what decision it informs, or what outcome it should influence, it may be better treated as a diagnostic metric rather than a KPI.
A useful test is: If changing this number does not contribute to better maintenance or business outcome, why is it a KPI?
This is especially important because maintenance teams can easily end up tracking dozens of measures without gaining a clearer understanding of performance. The objective should be a useful measurement, not maximum data collection.
Maintenance KPIs and maintenance metrics are often used interchangeably. However, there’s a difference between the two.
Maintenance KPIs are numbers that tie organizational progress to maintenance performance, while maintenance metrics connect maintenance performance to maintenance actions. In other words, maintenance KPIs are a target your business is aiming at, and maintenance metrics are the arrows you’re shooting at that target.
For example, your ultimate business goal may be to increase revenue by 20%. In a capacity-constrained manufacturing environment, unplanned downtime has a direct impact on revenue because production capacity is already fully utilized. When a critical asset unexpectedly goes offline, lost production time often cannot be recovered, resulting in fewer products available to sell. As a result, reducing unplanned downtime becomes a key maintenance KPI.
“Reduction of downtime is about maintenance maturity of the asset. Are you auditing your PM program, are changing the way you do PMs from time to condition based? The how you reduce unplanned downtime that you can control in maintenance is what makes the major difference. The right vendor, repair and plan are paths to do so,” says Jason Afara, a former maintenance manager in manufacturing, now a Director at Fiix.
“Reduction of downtime is about maintenance maturity of the asset. Are you auditing your PM program, are changing the way you do PMs from time to condition based? The how you reduce unplanned downtime that you can control in maintenance is what makes the major difference. The right vendor, repair and plan are paths to do so,”
Several measurable maintenance metrics can influence unplanned downtime, including mean time to repair (MTTR), mean time between failures (MTBF), scheduled compliance, and planned maintenance percentage. By improving these leading indicators, maintenance teams can increase equipment availability and protect revenue-generating production capacity.
These are your maintenance metrics.
There is no universal list of the best or top maintenance KPIs. The right selection depends on what the organization is trying to accomplish. However, the following KPIs cover the major dimensions of maintenance performance.
What it measures: The average operating time between failures of a repairable asset.
For example, if an asset operates for 1,000 hours and experiences five failures:
MTBF = 1,000 ÷ 5 = 200 hours
A higher MTBF generally indicates fewer failures over a given operating period. But MTBF is the most useful when failure definitions are consistent. If one team records every minor stoppage as a failure while another only records major breakdowns, comparing their MTBF values can produce misleading conclusions.
What influences MTBF? It can be affected by:
MTBF should therefore be treated as an outcome, not necessarily as a direct explanation of why reliability changed.
Relationship: If MTBF has decreased, failures are happening more frequently. That suggests the availability problem may be related to reliability.
What it measures: The average time required to restore an asset after a failure.
For example, if five repairs take a combined 15 hours:
MTTR = 15 ÷ 5 = 3 hours
Lower MTTR generally means assets are being restored more quickly.
What influences MTTR? It can be affected by:
Relationship: Reducing MTTR should not automatically be treated as a success if repairs become less effective and repeat failures increase. A fast repair that fails again shortly afterward may improve MTTR while negatively impacting reliability.
Now suppose MTBF has stayed relatively stable, but MTTR has increased. That tells a different story. The equipment isn't necessarily failing more often. Instead, each failure is taking longer to resolve. This distinction is important because the corrective action is completely different.
If MTBF is the problem, you might investigate:
If MTTR is the problem, you might investigate:
The availability of KPI tells you that there is a problem. MTBF and MTTR help you investigate what kind of problem it is.
What it measures: How much of the relevant time an asset is available to perform its intended function.
Availability is particularly useful because it connects reliability and maintainability. Two assets can have the same number of failures but dramatically different availability if one takes much longer to repair.
How do we calculate availability?
Availability Calculator
Availability = Uptime / (Uptime + Downtime)
Your overall availability is 95%
In the pre-set example, your availability is 95%. To understand what is driving it, examine MTBF and MTTR.
What it measures: PM compliance measures how much scheduled preventive maintenance is completed according to the defined requirements and timing.
A high PM compliance rate indicates that scheduled maintenance is being executed. But there is a crucial distinction: PM compliance measures execution. It does not automatically measure effectiveness.
An organization could achieve excellent PM compliance while continuing to experience frequent failures if:
So, for example, if PM compliance increases from 85% to 98%, you have evidence that the organization is executing more of its scheduled PM work. But you don't yet know whether the PM program is effective. To determine that, you need to look at the downstream outcomes.
So, PM compliance increases, but MTBF stays flat and failures stay flat. That suggests that simply completing more PM tasks has not yet produced a measurable reliability improvement.
Relationship: PM compliance tells you whether the planned activity happened. Reliability KPIs help tell you whether that activity appears to be having the desired effect.
What it measures: How much maintenance work is planned compared with total maintenance workload.
A higher planned percentage generally indicates a more proactive maintenance operation. But planned work is not necessarily effective work. A team can plan large volumes of ineffective work.
Therefore, planned maintenance percentage should be considered alongside:
What it measures: Scheduled preventive maintenance that has not been completed within the required time frame.
A growing overdue PM population can indicate:
What it measures: How much scheduled maintenance work is completed according to the maintenance schedule.
A high schedule compliance rate generally indicates that planned work is being executed as intended. Low schedule compliance can have many causes:
What it measures: Outstanding maintenance work that has not yet been completed. Backlog can be measured in work orders, labor hours, or another standardized unit.
A growing backlog may indicate that maintenance demand is exceeding available capacity. But backlog size alone does not tell you whether the situation is critical. A useful relationship analysis considers:
A 1,000-hour backlog consisting mostly of low-priority work is fundamentally different from a 200-hour backlog containing critical safety or production risks.
What it measures: How reactive the maintenance organization has become.
A high emergency-work percentage can be associated with:
Relationship: As reactive maintenance increases, so does emergency work and the need for overtime work and spare parts availability, ultimately these all drive the maintenance cost to increase.
What it measures: The total of all direct and indirect expenses required to maintain equipment, assets, staff and facilities running.
Total maintenance cost can include:
A lower maintenance cost is not automatically better. Cutting maintenance spending can reduce short-term costs while increasing failures, downtime, production losses, or asset risk.
Relationship: As maintenance speed decreases, preventive work can be deferred, leading to an increase in failures, downtime, and production loss.
What it measures: The percentage of manufacturing time that is truly productive.
Maintenance has a direct relationship with availability and can influence performance and quality, but operations, process design, materials, staffing, and other factors can also affect OEE. If OEE declines, the maintenance team should not automatically assume that maintenance caused the problem.
Think of leading indicators as the metal filings showing up in an oil sample and lagging indicators as the seized gearbox they were warning you about. One gives you an early warning while there's still time to intervene; the other confirms the consequences after the damage is done.
Leading indicators tell you about activities or conditions that can influence future performance. Examples include PM compliance, inspection completion rates, schedule compliance, and planning maintenance percentage. Like the metal filing in an oil sample, these indicators appear while you still have an opportunity to take corrective action and prevent a failure.
Lagging indicators tell you about outcomes that have already occurred. Examples include unplanned downtime, asset availability, OEE, maintenance costs, and equipment failures. Like the seized gearbox, they only confirm the problem after it has disrupted operations and incurred costs.
Diagnostic indicators help explain what happened and why. Continuing the example, if the gearbox seizes, diagnostic indicators are the evidence that helps you determine the root cause: Was lubrication inadequate? Was contamination present? Was the bearing at the end of its useful life? Diagnostic indicators include metrics such as MTTR, MTBF, failure modes, work order history, and asset condition data. These indicators provide the context needed to understand performance results and identify the corrective actions required to improve future outcomes.
The biggest mistake organizations make is asking: “What maintenance KPIs should we track?” A better question is, “What outcome are we trying to change?”
Before selecting any KPI, put it through a simple three-question test:
This step is important because business metrics are not necessarily a good maintenance KPI. For example, revenue may be a key organizational objective, but maintenance often has limited direct control over market demand, pricing, or sales performance. Effective maintenance KPIs should be clearly linked to business outcomes while remaining measurable, actionable, and within the maintenance team's sphere of influence.
Use the following seven-step process to identify the KPIs that matter most to your operation.
What are you trying to improve?
Which maintenance outcome is most directly connected?
Not every asset carries the same consequence of failure. A failed lift station pump can disrupt operations, create compliance risks, and lead to significant losses. On the same machine, a broken light has little to no impact, but both still require maintenance. The priority in which both fixes happen, depends on their impact. Asset criticality should therefore influence which maintenance KPIs receive the greatest attention.
When reviewing performance, maintenance teams should focus most closely on the indicators tied to their most critical assets. For example, PM compliance, condition monitoring completion, backlog, and unplanned downtime may warrant greater scrutiny for assets whose failure would have the highest impact on safety, environmental compliance, production, or service delivery. By viewing KPIs through a criticality lens, organizations can ensure that their maintenance efforts and improvement initiatives are directed where they will reduce risk and create the greatest business value.
Criticality does not determine which KPIs you can measure; it determines which KPIs deserve the most attention.
Select the lagging KPI that tells you whether the objective is improving. For example:
Choose the measurements that can influence the outcome. For example, if you're looking at availability, you're going to measure indicators like: PM compliance, emergency work %, MTTR, and MTBF.
Diagnostic metrics help explain why the KPI moved. For example, as it relates to availability, diagnose the problem using:
A baseline represents your current level of performance. It is the starting point from which improvement is measured. For example, your current PM compliance may be 82% or your current schedule compliance may be 65%.
A target is the level of performance you are aiming to achieve within a specific time frame. Targets should be realistic, aligned with business objectives, and challenging enough to drive improvement. If PM compliance is currently 82%, a target might be 90% by year-end.
A benchmark is a reference point based on industry standards, peer organizations, or best-in-class performance. Benchmarks can provide valuable context and highlight improvement opportunities, but they should not automatically become your target.
A common mistake is assuming that a benchmark and a target are the same thing. An industry benchmark may indicate that top-performing organizations achieve 95% PM compliance, but that does not mean 95% is the right target for your organization today. The appropriate target depends on your current baseline, available resources, asset criticality, and business priorities. Benchmarks should inform goal-setting, not replace it.
A KPI without an owner and an action process is simply a number. Someone should know:
Different people need different levels of information. A technician does not need the same dashboard as an executive.
Focus on execution:
Focus on workflow:
Focus on maintenance performance:
Focus on operational outcomes:
Focus on business impact:
A KPI strategy is only as reliable as the data behind it. A CMMS can provide many of the inputs needed to calculate maintenance KPIs, but the exact requirements depend on how the organization defines each metric.
1. KPI selection mistakes
2. Measurement mistakes
3. Interpretation mistakes
4. Behavioral management mistakes
The purpose of maintenance KPIs is not to produce a dashboard full of numbers. It is to create a reliable connection between maintenance activity, asset performance, and business outcomes. The most useful KPI systems make those relationships explicit.
A KPI tells you where to look; related metrics help you determine why the number changed. That is why the best maintenance KPI strategy combines: Leading indicators to influence performance, lagging indicators to measure outcomes, diagnostic metrics to explain changes, and business KPIs to show why the maintenance work matters.
The most important KPI depends on the organization's objective. Common core KPIs include MTBF, MTTR, availability, PM compliance, schedule compliance, maintenance backlog, emergency work, maintenance cost, and OEE.
There is no universal target that applies to every organization or asset. PM compliance should be interpreted alongside asset criticality, maintenance strategy, failure performance, and the effectiveness of the PM tasks themselves.
OEE is better understood as a production or business KPI that maintenance contributes to. OEE combines availability, performance, and quality, so changes in OEE can have causes outside maintenance.
There is no universal number. The goal should be to track the smallest set that provides enough information to understand outcomes, identify causes, take action, and measure whether those actions worked.
Leading maintenance KPIs include PM compliance, inspection completion, planned maintenance percentage, schedule compliance, training, and condition-monitoring compliance. They measure activities or conditions that can influence future maintenance outcomes.
Society for Maintenance & Reliability Professionals. (2020). SMRP best practices (6th ed.). SMRP.
Wireman, T. (2015). Benchmarking best practices in maintenance, reliability and asset management (3rd ed.). Industrial Press.
Gulati, R. (2013). Maintenance and reliability best practices (2nd ed.). Industrial Press.
Leverage the cloud to work together, better in the new connected age of maintenance and asset management.