What Is OEE? Overall Equipment Effectiveness
OEE (overall equipment effectiveness) shows how much of planned time a machine really produces good parts. Learn the formula, an example and levers.
Definition
OEE, or overall equipment effectiveness, measures how much of planned production time is truly productive. It multiplies availability, performance and quality. A low OEE points to stops, slow cycles or scrap. Actarion improves the human side of OEE with guided changeovers, standard work and faster fault handling.
Why does it matter on the shop floor?
- Machines are 'running' but output is far below plan.
- Nobody agrees on why the line lost an hour.
What is OEE?
OEE is a KPI that shows which share of planned production time results in good output at full speed. OEE = availability x performance x quality.
Availability captures stops such as breakdowns and changeovers. Performance captures slow cycles and micro-stops. Quality captures scrap and rework. Each factor points to a different improvement lever.
Key elements
- 1Availability: run time divided by planned time.
- 2Performance: actual output divided by ideal output.
- 3Quality: good parts divided by total parts.
Example from the shop floor
A line runs 80% of planned time, at 90% of ideal speed, with 98% good parts. OEE is 0.80 x 0.90 x 0.98, about 71%.
How does Actarion help?
- Actarion reduces changeover time and human error, two drivers of lost OEE, and logs the data per step.
- Digital, step-by-step work instructions generated from your SOPs with AI.
- AR guidance on tablets and AR glasses, with an audit trail per execution.
Frequently asked questions
It depends on the process. Benchmarks vary; compare against your own baseline first.
Mainly availability (changeovers, faults) and quality (errors, scrap).
No. Uptime is only part of availability; OEE also counts speed and quality.
