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Takt time is the rate at which you must produce one unit to meet customer demand within available production time. It is the metronome of the production floor — everything in lean scheduling is calibrated to it.
| Term | Definition | How It's Used |
|---|---|---|
| Takt Time | The required production rate to meet customer demand | Sets the target — what you need to achieve |
| Cycle Time | The actual time to complete one unit or subprocess | Measures reality — what you're actually achieving |
| Lead Time | Total elapsed time from order to delivery | Customer-facing metric — what they experience |
Lean improvement reduces cycle time toward takt time. When cycle time consistently exceeds takt time, you have a capacity problem. When it is consistently below takt time, you have an opportunity to rebalance the line and potentially increase capacity.
Most facilities calculate their takt time. Very few use it as a live operational signal. The takt time is posted on a whiteboard, entered into a spreadsheet, and then the shift happens. Whether the floor is on pace is only known after the fact.
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30 minutes. Real product. We'll show TaktClock implementing these principles live against your production configuration.