Project - How % Complete is Calculated

Last Modified On: October 8, 2024

The Project % Complete tells you how much of the project is done. How this is calculated is different between waterfall, agile, and task list projects. This help article explains how we calculate % complete for each project type.

Waterfall Projects

Waterfall (or schedule-based) projects consider duration and the % complete for tasks in the project.

There are five (5) fields on the project that are used to determine the % complete for Waterfall projects. They are as follows:

• Duration Complete - Day Unit Tasks - this is the total duration of completed project tasks in days. This excludes parent tasks, time tracking only tasks, and tasks with a duration unit in hours.
  
  If the project task % complete is greater than 0 but less than 100%, then it takes the project task % complete * task duration as the completed duration for the task. For example, if Task A is at 75% complete and it has a duration of 1 week (5 days), then the completed duration is calculated as (0.75 * 5) which is 3.75. This is what rolls up to the Duration Complete - Day Unit Tasks.
   
• Duration Complete - Hour Unit Tasks - this is the total duration of completed project tasks in hours. This excludes parent tasks, time tracking only tasks, and tasks with a duration unit not in hours.
  
  If the project task % complete is greater than 0 but less than 100%, then it takes the project task % complete * task duration as the completed duration for the task. For example, if Task A is at 75% complete and it has a duration of 3 hours, then the completed duration is calculated as (0.75 * 3) which is 2.25. This is what rolls up to the Duration Complete - Hour Unit Tasks.
   
• Total Duration in Days - this is the total duration of project tasks in days. This excludes parent tasks, time tracking only tasks, and tasks with a duration unit of hours.
   
• Total Duration - Hour Unit Tasks - this is the total duration of project tasks in hours. This excludes parent tasks, time tracking only tasks, and tasks with a duration unit not in hours.
   
• Total Hours for Workday - this defaults to 8 hours.

The project % complete is calculated as follows:

((Duration Complete - Day Unit Tasks + (Duration Complete - Hour Unit Tasks / Total Hours for Workday)) / (Total Duration in Days + (Total Duration - Hour Unit Tasks /Total Hours for Workday))) *100

For example, if we have a waterfall project with the following values:

Duration Complete - Day Unit Tasks = 10

Duration Complete - Hour Unit Tasks = 2.25

Total Duration in Days = 112

Total Duration - Hour Unit Tasks = 3

Total Hours for Workday = 8

Then, the project % complete would be calculated as follows:

((10 + (2.25 / 8)) / (112 + (3 / 8)) * 100 which would give us 9.15% complete rounded to 2 decimal places.

Please note:

Milestone tasks (tasks with a duration of "0" days) do not impact the project's % complete calculation. This means that if all non-milestone tasks are complete and there are still milestone tasks that are open, the project's % complete will be at 100%.

Agile Projects

Agile projects being included in the project % complete calculation is available with Inspire Planner's OCT 2024 (1.366) Major Release.

Agile projects calculate % complete based on the story points of completed tasks against the total story points for all user stories (tasks) in the project.

There are two (2) fields on the project that are used to determine the % complete for Agile projects. They are as follows:

• Total Story Points - this is the sum of story points for all tasks in the Agile project. This includes all task types (user stories, bug, epic, and task), regardless of whether the task is in a sprint or in the backlog.
   
• Completed Story Points - this is the sum of story points for all completed tasks (where task % complete is 100%). This includes all task types (user stories, bug, epic, and task), regardless of whether the task is in a sprint or in the backlog.

The project % complete for Agile project is calculated as:

(Completed Story Points / Total Story Points) * 100. 

For example, if you have 20 Completed Story Points and 93 Total Story Points, then it would be calculated as (20/93) * 100 which would be 21.51% (rounded to 2 decimal places).

Please note the following:

• Deferred Tasks are excluded from Total Story Points and Completed Story Points.
   
• Tasks where story points is NULL (blank) are excluded from Total Story Points and Completed Story Points. 

Task List Projects

Task List projects being included in the project % complete calculation is available with Inspire Planner's OCT 2024 (1.366) Major Release.

Task List projects calculate % complete based on the number of completed tasks against the total tasks in the project.

There are two (2) fields on the project that are used to determine the % complete for Task List projects. They are as follows:

• Total Tasks - this is the total number of tasks in the project, excluding parent tasks. 
   
• Tasks Completed - this is the total number of completed tasks in the project, excluding parent tasks.

The project % complete for Task List project is calculated as:

(Tasks Completed / Total Tasks) * 100. 

For example, if you have 10 Tasks Completed and 25 Total Tasks, then it would be calculated as (10/25) * 100 which would be 40%.