Cycle time is the total amount of time a story or bug spends in the steps in the 'In progress' category of a team's workflow. In the default workflow, these steps are Design, Development, Test, and Review, but cycle time works the same way for customized workflows.

Atono uses your team's cycle time history to understand how long different types and sizes of work typically take and to support estimated completion dates.

You can view cycle time on individual stories and bugs and use the team's Analytics reports to explore where time is being spent and how cycle time changes over time.

How cycle time works

An item starts accumulating cycle time when it moves from a 'To do' step to an 'In progress' step and stops when it moves to a 'Done' step.

Items don't need to follow a linear path through In progress. They can move back and forth between steps, skip steps, or even leave 'In progress' temporarily before returning. Cycle time is the cumulative time an item spends in 'In progress' steps for a specific team. Time spent outside 'In progress', such as in 'To do' or 'Done' steps, doesn't count.

If an item leaves 'In progress', cycle time pauses. When the item re-enters, tracking resumes.

For teams with customized workflows, cycle time depends on how steps are categorized as 'To do', 'In progress', or 'Done'. If the steps in these categories change, cycle time tracking adapts for future activity but doesn't retroactively adjust previously tracked times.

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Cycle time is team-specific
Cycle time is tracked separately for each team. If a story or bug moves from one team to another, its cycle time for the new team starts at zero.
The cycle time displayed on the item reflects the team it's currently assigned to. If the item is reassigned to a previous team, the cycle time shown reverts to the time accumulated when the item was last assigned to that team, and the team resumes tracking from that point forward.

What's cycle time for?

Cycle time isn't designed to track exact working hours for each item. Instead, it helps calculate the average cycle time for different types and sizes of work, supporting long-term planning and estimated completion dates.

By factoring in non-working hours and weekends, average cycle time gives a realistic picture of how long work typically takes to complete.

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Cycle time isn't editable
Cycle time reflects how work naturally progresses, even if it includes time beyond active working hours. This helps product owners and managers make more accurate plans and estimates. You can exclude outliers from average cycle time calculations if needed.

Cycle time reports

Atono provides two cycle time reports:

Cycle time by workflow step shows where stories and bugs typically spend their time while in progress.
Cycle time over time shows how your team's average cycle time changes from one period to the next.

To view cycle time reports for a team:

In the side menu, click the team.
Click the View team overview icon next to the team name.
Select the Analytics tab.
From the report selector, select Cycle time by workflow step or Cycle time over time.

Cycle time by workflow step

The Cycle time by workflow step report shows the average cycle time for each story size and for bugs, broken down by the steps in your team's workflow.

Each row represents a story size or bugs. The bar is divided into the team's 'In progress' workflow steps, so you can see how much each step contributes to the total average cycle time.

The total average cycle time and number of completed stories or bugs are shown for each row.

Hover over a bar to see a pop-up with:

The number of completed stories or bugs.
The total average cycle time.
The average time spent in each visible workflow step.
The percentage of the total cycle time spent in each visible workflow step.

Use the legend below the chart to show or hide workflow steps. Hiding a step removes it from all bars and their pop-up breakdowns.

Cycle time over time

The Cycle time over time report shows how your team's average cycle time changes from one period to the next.

Each bar represents a period within the selected timeframe and combines stories and bugs in a single view. The bar is divided by story size and bugs, so you can compare the average cycle time of different types and sizes of work over time.

The period represented by each bar changes automatically based on the selected timeframe:

1 month: Bars represent daily averages.
2-7 months: Bars represent weekly averages.
8-31 months: Bars represent monthly averages.
32-60 months: Bars represent quarterly averages.

Hover over a bar to see a pop-up with the average cycle time and number of completed items for each story size and for bugs represented in that period.

Use the legend below the chart to show or hide individual story sizes or bugs.

Interpret cycle time reports

The cycle time reports share several behaviors that help you understand and investigate the data.

Use Show last to choose how much historical data is displayed. Your selection is shared between the cycle time reports and remembered when you return.

Cycle time data is grouped based on the team's time zone. When you open work from a chart in the Everything page, the completed date range reflects the same team time zone.

View the work behind the data

Select a bar or segment in a cycle time chart to see the stories or bugs contributing to that result.

Atono opens the Everything page with filters applied for the relevant team, story size or bugs, timeframe or period, and completed work.

Outliers are excluded from the results.

Understand the calculation range

If your team has configured a custom averaging window, either a rolling number of months or a specific start date, the reports indicate which historical data is being used to calculate average cycle time.

The visual cues help you distinguish the data included in cycle time calculations from historical data shown only for context.

Greyed-out data

Data outside the configured calculation range appears dimmed. It's shown for reference but isn't included when calculating estimated completion dates or staleness indicators.

Dashed lines

Dashed lines mark the start and end of the data being used for cycle time calculations.

Configure the cycle time averaging window

You can configure how Atono calculates average cycle time for each team. This affects estimated completion dates and staleness indicators.

Only Workspace Owners, Workspace Administrators, Backlog Owners, and Team Administrators can change this setting for a team.

By default, Atono uses items completed in the past six months. You can choose from:

Default — includes items completed in the past six months, or as far back as records are available if less than six months.
Recent months — includes items completed within a rolling window of 1 to 12 recent months.
From selected date — includes items completed on or after a specific date.

To configure the averaging window:

In the side menu, click the team.
Click the View team overview icon next to the team name.
Open the ellipsis (...) menu.
Select Cycle time window.
Configure the window and save your changes.

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Show last vs. the cycle time window
Show last controls how much historical data is displayed in the reports. The cycle time window controls which completed items Atono uses to calculate a team's average cycle time. Atono uses this average to calculate projected completion dates and determine when in-progress work is considered stale.

Unavailable cycle time

An item's cycle time may appear as Unavailable or be hidden entirely for these reasons:

The item hasn't entered any In progress steps yet and is still in To do.
The item moved back into To do after being In progress and hasn't returned yet. Previously accumulated cycle time reappears once it re-enters In progress.
Items in Won't do don't display cycle time.

The item was marked as an outlier and excluded from cycle time reporting.

Outliers

If an item's cycle time is unusually long, you can mark it as an outlier to exclude it from average cycle time calculations, cycle time reports, and staleness indicators.

Only Workspace Owners, Workspace Administrators, Backlog Owners, and Team Administrators can mark an item as an outlier.

Mark an item as an outlier

On a story or bug, click the ellipsis (...) icon in the header.
Select Mark as an outlier.

Remove outlier status

If you accidentally mark an item as an outlier or change your mind, you can remove the outlier status to re-include it in calculations, reports, and staleness indicators.

On a story or bug, click the ellipsis (...) icon in the header.
Select Unmark as an outlier.