Throughput Calculator
Check whether your handling equipment can move the pallets your operation receives and ships each day. Enter inbound and outbound volumes, the number of moves each pallet takes, the moves per hour a truck achieves and the hours you operate, and the calculator returns equipment utilization, the trucks required and the spare capacity left.
Daily volumes
Unload, put-away, replenish, retrieve, load.
Handling resources
Forklifts, reach trucks or pallet trucks.
Equipment utilization
82.9%
1,750 moves needed against 2,112 moves of capacity
Pallets handled per day
700
Required truck hours
79.5h
Available truck hours
96.0h
Handling units required
5
Pallets per operating hour
43.8
Spare capacity
144pallets
How the Throughput Calculator Works
Throughput planning is a comparison between the moves the workload demands and the moves the equipment can supply. Pallets handled per day are inbound plus outbound. Multiplying by moves per pallet gives required moves, and dividing by moves per hour gives the truck hours needed. Available hours are the number of trucks multiplied by operating hours.
The formulas
- Required moves = (inbound + outbound) × moves per pallet
- Required truck hours = required moves ÷ moves per hour
- Utilization = required truck hours ÷ (trucks × operating hours)
- Trucks required = required truck hours ÷ operating hours, rounded up
Worked example
320 pallets in and 380 out is 700 pallets a day. At 2.5 moves per pallet that is 1,750 moves. At 22 moves per hour the work needs 79.5 truck hours. Six trucks over 16 operating hours give 96 available hours, so utilization is about 83% and five trucks would technically cover the volume — leaving the sixth as peak and breakdown cover.
Moves per pallet is the input to get right
Utilization scales directly with moves per pallet, and this is where most plans go wrong. Double handling at receiving, staging before put-away, replenishment trips and re-slotting all add touches that never appear in a simple in-out count. Walk the process and count them.
Results are planning estimates. Real throughput also depends on dock capacity, aisle congestion, battery or fuelling downtime, driver availability and the arrival profile across the day.
Related Pages
- Pick Rate Calculator — the picking side of the same workload
- Warehouse Labor Cost Calculator
- Storage Capacity Calculator
- Container Loading Calculator — pallets arriving per container
Frequently Asked Questions
- How do you calculate warehouse throughput?
- Add inbound and outbound pallets to get pallets handled per day, multiply by handling moves per pallet to get total moves, then divide by moves per hour per truck to get the truck hours required. Compare that against trucks multiplied by operating hours.
- How many moves per pallet should I assume?
- A pallet that is unloaded, put away, retrieved and loaded takes four touches; cross-docked pallets take two. Averages of 2 to 3 moves per pallet are common in mixed operations. Count your own process steps rather than using a default.
- How many pallet moves can a forklift do per hour?
- A counterbalance truck working short distances typically manages 20–25 moves per hour, a reach truck in narrow aisles 18–23, and long travel distances or high lifts push it lower. Measure moves per hour in your own building, since travel distance dominates.
- What utilization should I plan for?
- Plan around 75–85% average utilization. Equipment planned at 100% has no capacity for peaks, breakdowns, driver breaks or seasonal spikes, and queues at the dock build quickly once utilization passes about 90%.
- Why is my dock congested when utilization looks fine?
- Because volume is rarely spread evenly across the day. If most receipts arrive in a three-hour morning window, the peak-hour requirement can be double the daily average. Run the calculation again for the peak window with the hours it actually covers.
Related Warehouse Tools
Pick Rate Calculator
Calculate picking rate, picking capacity, labour requirements and estimated completion time.
Warehouse Labor Cost Calculator
Calculate fully loaded labour cost per order line, per day and per year for your picking operation.
Storage Capacity Calculator
Estimate pallet positions and storage capacity from warehouse floor area, storage share and levels.
Container Loading Calculator
Estimate how many cartons or pallets fit into a 20 ft, 40 ft or high cube container and the resulting utilization.