Technical Debt Ratio
Estimated remediation time for all code issues as a proportion of total development time
What is Technical Debt Ratio?
Technical debt ratio compares the estimated time needed to fix shortcuts and poor design in the code with the total time spent developing it. It shows how much accumulated code problems are slowing a team down.
Like financial debt, a small amount can be sensible, but a large amount makes every change slower and riskier.
How this KPI is measured
- Function
- Product & Engineering
- Sub-function
- Product Delivery
- Industry
- All Industries
- Type
- Leading
- Impact
- Quality
- Unit
- %
- Measurement frequency
- Monthly / Quarterly
- Formula
- (Estimated remediation time / Total development time) × 100
How to calculate it
Divide estimated remediation time by total development time, and multiply by 100.
For example, if fixing known problems would take 200 days and building the code took 2,000 days, the ratio is 10%.
Many code analysis tools estimate remediation time, but the numbers are approximate. Use the trend and the worst areas, not the exact figure.
Where it is used
Deciding when to refactor
Justify time for cleanup.
Tracking code health
See the trend.
Prioritising fixes
Focus on the worst areas.
How to improve it
Tips and common mistakes
- The numbers are estimates. Use trends.
- Not all debt needs paying down.
- Link to delivery speed to make the case.
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