What’s on the Capacity poster
A 6-row table: Measure · Means.
Three capacity measures and the ratios they produce.
- Design capacity — Maximum theoretical output
- Effective capacity — Realistic maximum, allowing for changeovers and maintenance
- Actual output — What was produced
- Utilisation — Actual ÷ design
- Efficiency — Actual ÷ effective
- Bottleneck capacity — The system's real ceiling
Running above about 85% utilisation makes queues grow sharply. High utilisation and short lead times are incompatible.
Questions about the Capacity poster
- What’s on the Capacity poster?
- A 6-row table: Measure · Means. Three capacity measures and the ratios they produce. Design capacity — Maximum theoretical output; Effective capacity — Realistic maximum, allowing for changeovers and maintenance; Actual output — What was produced; Utilisation — Actual ÷ design; Efficiency — Actual ÷ effective; Bottleneck capacity — The system's real ceiling. Running above about 85% utilisation makes queues grow sharply. High utilisation and short lead times are incompatible.
- Who is the Capacity poster for?
- Capacity belongs to the Business & Management section rather than to a school year, because business is not something one grade owns. Anyone learning operations can pin it up — a beginner, a student mid-course, or someone revising years later.
- When should you use the Capacity poster?
- Utilisation and efficiency measure different gaps. Confusing them hides the real problem. A wall chart earns its place by being glanceable from where the work is happening, so Capacity belongs on the wall where that business work actually happens, within glancing distance, rather than filed away.
- What other posters go with Capacity?
- Agile & Waterfall, Critical Path and Inventory Models sit alongside Capacity in the Business & Management section. Printed together they make a wall rather than a single sheet, which is how a reference set actually gets used.Agile & WaterfallCritical PathInventory Models
- Is the Capacity poster free to download and print?
- Yes. Capacity downloads as a free PDF with no account, no email and no watermark, like everything else in the Business & Management section. Print as many copies as you like for a home, a classroom, a library or a tutoring group; reselling the file is the only thing the licence rules out.Read the licence
- What size does the Capacity poster print at?
- Capacity is a vector PDF laid out for US Letter, and prints on A4 with Fit to page — the same file, no separate download. Because every mark on it is drawn rather than photographed, it stays sharp enlarged to A3, A2 or A1 at a copy shop. Colour carries emphasis only, so a greyscale print of Capacity loses nothing.Printing guide
Related posters
Charts that sit alongside Capacity on the same wall.
Browse every Business & Management poster, or start from the full catalogue.