How to Tell the Difference Between Time-to-Hire vs Time-to-Fill
It’s easy to mix up time-to-hire and time-to-fill. They both measure the pace with which you hire, but they focus on different parts of the process. And if you’re looking to improve your hiring speed, knowing the difference is an obligatory step before defining your strategy.
So, which one should you pay more attention to? That depends on what you’re trying to fix. Time-to-hire tells you how quickly you move a candidate through the pipeline once they’ve applied, while time-to-fill looks at the entire recruitment process from job requisition or job posting to offer acceptance. Both matter, but the right one to focus on depends on your hiring challenges.
What is Time-to-Hire?
Time-to-hire measures the number of days between when a candidate enters the hiring pipeline and when they accept a job offer. It’s a great way to gauge how efficient your team is at moving candidates through the process. The faster the time-to-hire, the better your chances of securing top talent before they accept another offer.
How to Calculate Time-to-Hire
To calculate it, use this formula:
Time-to-Hire = Date Candidate Accepts Offer – Date Candidate Enters the Pipeline
Let’s say a tech company is hiring a software engineer. A recruiter finds a promising candidate on LinkedIn and reaches out on April 5. The candidate moves through the interview process quickly, receives an offer on April 15, and accepts it the same day. In this case, the company’s time-to-hire is 10 days.
If this number starts creeping up, it could mean there are slowdowns in the interview process, delays in decision-making, or gaps in recruiter-candidate communication. Keep an eye on it so that your company can pinpoint areas where they can speed things up and avoid losing strong candidates to faster-moving competitors.
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What is Time-to-Fill?
Time-to-fill measures the total number of days it takes to fill a job opening, from the moment the position is posted to when a candidate accepts the offer. Unlike time-to-hire, which focuses on how fast a candidate moves through the pipeline, time-to-fill reflects the average effectiveness of the entire hiring process. This metric helps companies understand how long it typically takes to fill roles and whether there are bottlenecks in sourcing, approvals, or decision-making.
How to Calculate Time-to-Fill
To calculate time-to-fill, use this formula:
Time-to-Fill = Date Candidate Accepts Offer – Date Job is Posted
Consider the case of a retail company that needs to hire a store manager and posts the job on June 1. It takes a couple of weeks to gather applications, review resumes, and conduct interviews. The company extends an offer to a candidate on June 20, and they accept on June 22. In this case, the time-to-fill is 21 days.
If time-to-fill starts increasing, it could signal delays in sourcing candidates, a lengthy approval process, or an overall lack of efficiency in filling open positions. Monitoring this metric helps companies improve their hiring strategies and help them make sure they don’t leave positions vacant for too long, which can impact productivity and business operations.
Key Differences: Time-to-Fill vs. Time-to-Hire
You can easily distinguish between time-to-fill and time-to-hire by thinking of a Careers page that an ATS can help you set up. If you post a role in your Careers page, that's when time-to-fill starts counting. If a promising candidate clicks on that Careers link and uploads their resume, that's when time-to-hire starts kicking in.
Time-to-hire focuses on the candidate’s progression throughout the hiring pipeline. It tracks how quickly a company moves the same candidate from initial contact—or application—to offer acceptance. A long time-to-hire often signals flaws in the interview process, delays in communication, or slow decision-making by hiring managers.
Time-to-fill, on the other hand, takes a broader view. It measures the total number of days a position remains open, starting from the job posting date. This metric includes every aspect, like sourcing and even screening candidates, to finalizing the offer. A high time-to-fill might indicate problems with attracting applicants, a slow approval process for job openings, or difficulty finding qualified candidates.
To make the distinction clearer, here’s a breakdown of the key differences:
If your biggest concern is losing strong candidates to competitors, tracking time-to-hire can help you identify and fix delays in your process. If open roles are staying vacant for too long, monitoring time-to-fill can reveal where your hiring funnel is slowing down.
Balancing both is the key to building a more effective hiring strategy. If your business keeps time-to-hire low, you can improve candidate experience and increase your chances of securing top talent. If you manage to reduce time-to-fill, you make sure critical positions don’t stay open longer than necessary, preventing disruptions to your team and overall productivity.
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Industry Benchmarks: What’s a Good Time-to-Hire and Time-to-Fill?
The time it takes to hire and fill positions varies widely across industries. Some sectors, like hospitality and retail, move quickly due to high turnover, while others, such as government and finance, have lengthier hiring processes due to extensive background checks and regulatory requirements.
Tracking these benchmarks allows companies to gauge whether their hiring process is keeping pace with industry standards and uncover specific bottlenecks that slow down recruitment.
To verify these figures, we focused on findings by a talent acquisition firm.
What is the Current Time-to-Hire?
In 2025, it will take an average of 44 days to appoint people, according to research from a talent acquisition company.
Average Time-to-Hire by Industry
Time-to-hire refers to how long it takes to hire a candidate once they enter the recruitment pipeline. Here’s how different industries compare:
- Cleaning Services – 14 days
- Hospitality – 14 days
- Automotive – 16 days
- Education & Child Care – 18 days
- Healthcare – 18 days
- Retail – 18 days
- Tech & Media – 20 days
- Fitness – 22 days
- IT – 41 days
- Professional Services – 47 days
- Investment Banking – 60 days
- Engineering – 62 days
Average Time-to-Fill by Industry
As we’ve been saying, time-to-fill measures the total duration from when a job is posted to when it is filled. This metric accounts for hiring speed but also reflects job market conditions, candidate availability, and company processes. According to U.S. labor data, which Dice, the mean vacancy duration—time-to-fill—for different industries is:
- Construction – 13 days
- Leisure & Hospitality – 21 days
- Retail & Wholesale – 25 days
- Professional & Business Services – 25 days
- Manufacturing – 31 days
- Information Technology – 33 days
- Government – 41 days
- Financial Services – 45 days
- Healthcare – 49 days
What These Numbers Mean for Your Hiring Process
Hiring takes longer or shorter depending on the job, the skills needed, and the rules in the industry. If your company’s hiring process significantly exceeds these benchmarks, it may signal bottlenecks that could lead to losing top candidates. On the other hand, if your hiring process takes much less time than average, you may need to make sure you’re conducting thorough assessments to secure the right talent.
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How to Improve Both Metrics
Improving your company’s average time-to-hire and time-to-fill metrics goes beyond just shortening hiring timelines. You must refine the entire recruitment strategy. For companies, the pressure to hire quickly can sometimes lead to rushed decisions, but focusing on these metrics strategically allows for better quality hires without sacrificing efficiency. If you address both time-to-hire and time-to-fill, you can not only increase speed and upgrade the quality and experience for job seekers and recruiters.
Strategies to Reduce Time-to-Hire
If you want to reduce your time-to-hire numbers, consider these tips:
- Automate resume screening and candidate outreach
Automation can be a game-changer when it comes to reducing time-to-hire. With AI tools that help you screen resumes and reach out to candidates automatically—such as TalentHR’s Applicant Tracking Systema , you can quickly identify the best applicants without spending hours sorting through applications.
- Implement structured interview processes
Having a structured interview process is key to moving candidates through faster. If you set up a consistent group of questions and assessment criteria, you cut down on the back-and-forth and make the process more straightforward. It also helps you vet candidates more efficiently, which means you’ll have a better idea of who’s right for the role—and you can make decisions quicker.
- Improve recruiter-candidate communication
When recruiters keep candidates in the loop with timely updates, they remain engaged and less likely to lose interest or accept other offers. A quick email or a chat about where they are in the process can go a long way in keeping everything on track so that there are no delays due to a lack of communication.
Strategies to Reduce Time-to-Fill
For reducing time-to-fill, try these:
- Build a strong talent pipeline in advance
One of the most effective ways to reduce time-to-fill is to have a ready pool of candidates before a position even becomes available. Building a talent pipeline through networking, internship programs, and strategic partnerships can guarantee that companies have a list of qualified candidates they can tap into when job openings come along.
- Use proactive sourcing instead of reactive hiring
Don’t wait until a job opens up to start looking for candidates. Proactive sourcing—reaching out to potential hires before the need arises—lets you create a list of strong candidates ready to go when positions do become available. Tools like LinkedIn, industry events, and social media can help you connect with passive candidates who may not be actively looking but could be a perfect fit when the time comes. And you should combine these more proactive strategies with the reliable Careers page.
- Streamline internal approval processes for job openings
Internal approval processes can sometimes cause unnecessary delays. If you manage to reduce the number of approval layers or establish a more efficient system for signing off on new hires, you can speed up the process. Having things like budget approvals and job descriptions pre-approved ahead of time means you can move forward with candidates more quickly and get them into your company without long waiting periods.
Work on your Time-To-Hire and Fill with HR Tools
Time-to-hire zooms in on how quickly you can move a candidate from their application until they accept the job offer, while time-to-fill takes a broader view, tracking how long it takes to fill a role from the moment the job is posted.
By tracking both, companies can point out shortcomings and refine their strategies for a simpler, faster hiring process. The right Applicant Tracking System, like the one bundled with TalentHR, might be the first step to acting on these indicators. When you track these metrics and use the tools at your disposal, have everything at hand to upgrade your hiring process, improve the candidate experience, and make sure your team doesn’t miss out on top talent.
So, keep an eye on both metrics, fine-tune your strategy, and register on TalentHR for free. It's an all-around HR software that takes seconds to set up.
