What is time to fill?

Talent Acquisition

Time to fill is the number of days it takes to fill an open position, usually counted from the day a requisition is approved to the day a candidate accepts the job offer. Talent teams average it across the roles filled in a period to see how long seats stay empty and where hiring slows down.

How time to fill is defined

The international standard for recruitment metrics, ISO/TS 30430:2021, defines time to fill for each position as the total number of days between the delivery of an approved requisition to staffing and the date on which an applicant accepts the job offer. For a reporting period, the metric is the average number of days across all filled positions. The standard describes a separate version for critical positions, meaning roles with a direct and significant impact on organizational outcomes.

The calculation has two parts:

Time to fill for one role: The offer accepted date minus the requisition approval date.
Average time to fill: The total days across all roles filled in the period, divided by the number of roles filled.

Definitions vary in practice. Some teams start the clock when the job is posted, and some stop it on the new hire's start date. US federal agencies use a related measure that the Office of Personnel Management (OPM) calls time-to-hire. It starts on the date the hiring manager validates the need, and agencies report it to two end points: acceptance of the tentative offer and the new employee's entrance on duty (OPM time-to-hire reporting instructions). Whichever version a team picks, it should write the definition down and apply it the same way in every report.

Why time to fill matters for talent teams

Teams use time to fill in several ways:

Planning: It tells hiring managers and finance how long a seat is likely to stay empty, which headcount plans depend on.
Diagnosis: Read next to time to hire, it shows where a search loses time. If time to fill is long but time to hire is short, the delay is in finding the right candidates. If both are long, the process itself is slow.
Targets: In its September 30, 2026 guidance on time-to-hire, OPM requires federal agencies to manage hiring actions within 80 calendar days: 66 days from validated hiring need to tentative offer, 2 days to accept, and 14 days to entry on duty. It also asks agencies to set data-informed targets, review them at least quarterly, and pay particular attention to mission-critical occupations, high-volume hiring, and hard-to-fill positions.

How Findem approaches time to fill

Findem's guide to recruiting metrics recommends choosing one time-to-fill definition, writing it down, and reporting the metric by role family rather than as one company-wide average. The recruiting KPI dashboard template uses the same formula, offer accepted date minus requisition open date, with the ATS as the source system.

On the platform, Findem works on the parts of a search that come before the offer. Findem for talent acquisition brings every channel a team sources from, including the ATS, past applicants, referrals, and the broader market, into one place, with warm paths surfacing first. Sourcing analytics compare inbound, ATS rediscovery, referrals, employee connections, alumni, and external search, so leaders can see which channels generate engagement, interest, and applications. Market intelligence shows where talent is concentrated, so teams can evaluate role feasibility before a search starts.

Related terms

Sources

ISO/TS 30430:2021, Human resource management: Recruitment metrics clusterISO, April 2021. Definition text read from the published standard sample
Updated instructions for reporting annual time-to-hireUS Office of Personnel Management, December 2019
Guidance on time-to-hire under the Merit Hiring PlanUS Office of Personnel Management, September 30, 2026
Recruiting metrics: 15 KPIs to track, with formulas
Findem for talent acquisition
Talent analytics
Market intelligence

Frequently asked questions.

Time to fill measures how long a role stays open, from requisition approval to offer acceptance. Time to hire, as most private-sector teams use it, measures how long the hired candidate spent in the process, from the day they applied or were sourced to offer acceptance. US federal agencies use time-to-hire differently: OPM starts it when the hiring manager validates the need, which makes it closer to time to fill.

For each filled role, subtract the requisition approval date from the date the candidate accepted the offer. Then add up the days for all roles filled in the period and divide by the number of roles. Count days the same way every time. OPM, for example, counts calendar days, including weekends and holidays.

ISO/TS 30430 starts the clock when an approved requisition is delivered to staffing and stops it when an applicant accepts the job offer. Some teams start at the posting date or stop at the start date instead. Those versions produce different numbers, so pick one and document it.

No single figure applies to every employer, because roles, levels, locations, and markets differ. For US federal hiring, OPM's September 2026 guidance requires agencies to manage hiring actions within 80 calendar days, from validated hiring need to entry on duty.

Findem brings a team's sourcing channels into one place with warm paths surfacing first, compares how each channel performs, and shows where talent is concentrated before a search starts. Teams keep their own time-to-fill definition and targets, and people review results before they influence hiring decisions.