Tracking Important Recruitment Metrics You Should Know

Recruiting the right people is not just about filling positions. It’s about finding the right fit for your team. There are numerous advanced hiring methods and technologies to help you get the best recruits. 

But how do you know if your hiring process is working?

That’s where recruitment metrics come in. These numbers tell you what’s working and what’s not. They help you improve hiring speed, cost, and quality. 

Without tracking key metrics, you’re making decisions in the dark. The right data helps you attract top talent and avoid costly mistakes. Let’s understand the most important recruitment metrics you need to know.

What are Recruitment Metrics?

Recruitment metrics are numbers that help you understand how well your hiring process is working. They show where things are smooth and where they need fixing. Think of them as a scorecard for your recruitment efforts.

For example, imagine you’re hiring a software developer. You post the job online, and after three weeks, you find the right candidate. But what if you realize most of your best hires actually come from employee referrals, not job boards? That’s how recruitment metrics work—they help you focus on what works best.

By tracking the right metrics, you can hire faster, save money, and find top talent without the guesswork. 

Here’s why recruitment metrics are so important:

• Improve hiring efficiency: Recruitment metrics help identify delays and speed up the recruitment process.
• Reduce hiring costs: These metrics highlight expensive recruitment channels and optimize your budget.
• Measure recruiter performance: These metrics help understand how well the hiring strategies are working.
• Improve quality of hire: These metrics help you focus on sources and processes that bring in the best employees.

To learn more about the importance of using metrics in HRM, check out our blog, “Understanding HR Analytics: Importance, Key Metrics, and Best Practices”

Now that we have discussed what recruitment metrics are, let’s understand the top 10 recruitment metrics that you must track to improve your hiring.

Key Recruitment Metrics to Track

Recruitment metrics provide clear insights to help refine your strategy, reduce hiring time, and attract top talent. Some metrics focus on speed, like how long it takes to fill a position. Others help you measure quality, such as how well new hires perform in their first year. 

Tracking these key metrics gives you the insights needed to build a strong, efficient hiring process. Let’s take a closer look at the most important ones.

1. Time to Fill

Time-to-Fill tracks how many days pass from opening a job requisition to accepting an offer. It covers sourcing, screening, interviewing, and hiring steps. A shorter Time-to-Fill means a faster hiring process, while a longer one may signal delays or inefficiencies.

What Does it Reflect?

This metric helps measure how quickly your team can move a candidate through the hiring process. A long Time to Fill may indicate bottlenecks in sourcing, slow decision-making, or a lack of qualified candidates.

For Example

If a company opens a job position on March 1 and fills it on March 20, the Time to Fill is 20 days. Tracking this over multiple roles shows hiring trends and problem areas.

Benefits of Tracking this Metric

Here are some benefits of tracking Time to Fill:

• This metric helps identify bottlenecks in the recruitment process.
• It ensures roles are filled quickly to maintain productivity.
• It improves workforce planning and forecasting.

How to Improve this Metric

Here’s how you can improve Time to Fill:

• Automate screening processes to speed up selection.
• Build a talent pipeline for faster hiring.
• Streamline interview scheduling with digital tools.

2. Time to Hire

Time to Hire counts the days from when a candidate enters the pipeline (applies or is sourced) until they accept an offer. Unlike Time-to-Fill, which covers the entire hiring process from requisition to acceptance, Time-to-Hire starts when recruiters engage a candidate.

What Does it Reflect?

A shorter Time to Hire means a more responsive recruitment process. A longer duration can suggest delays in interviews, decision-making, or communication with candidates.

For Example

If a candidate applies on April 5, is interviewed on April 10, and accepts an offer on April 15, the Time to Hire is 10 days.

Benefits of Tracking Time-to-Hire

Here are some benefits of tracking this metric:

• Helps assess recruiter efficiency.
• Improves the candidate experience by reducing waiting times.
• Reduces the risk of losing high-quality candidates to faster competitors.

How to Improve this Metric 

Here’s how you can improve time-to-hire:

• Use structured interviews to make faster decisions.
• Reduce approval delays in the hiring process.

3. Cost per Hire

Cost-per-hire or CPH measures the average cost of hiring a new employee. These include the expenses like, advertising costs, onboarding cost, referral bonus programs. Basically it involves summation of all internal and external recruitment expenses and dividing the same by total hires in a given period of time. 

What Does it Reflect?

This metric shows whether a company is hiring cost-effectively. High costs can signal inefficiencies, while very low costs may lead to lower hiring quality.

For Example

If a company spends $10,000 on recruitment and hires 5 employees, the Cost per Hire is $2,000 per employee.

Benefits of Tracking CPH

Here are some benefits of tracking CPH:

• Identifies costly inefficiencies in recruitment.
• Helps with budget planning and cost control.
• Improves ROI on recruitment strategies.

How to Improve CPH?

 Here’s how you can improve CPH in your organization:

• Reduce agency dependency with in-house sourcing.
• Use employee referrals to lower costs.
• Use technology to automate manual hiring processes.

4. Quality of Hire 

Quality of Hire (QoH) basically indicates the value that new hires bring to the organization. It is a complex metric and is difficult to be measured numerically. It’s often evaluated through job performance, retention rates, and manager satisfaction.

What Does it Reflect?

A high-quality hire contributes positively to the company, while a low-quality hire may struggle to meet expectations. It helps assess whether recruitment strategies are bringing in the right talent and contributing to the company’s growth. 

For Example

If a company hires 10 employees, and after one year, 8 have good performance ratings, the Quality of Hire score is 80%. However, the indicators used to measure quality may vary from one company to another.

Benefits of Tracking Quality of Hire

Here are some of the benefits of tracking quality of hire:

• Helps measure if new hires meet or exceed expectations.
• Highlights which sources bring in the best talent.
• Aligns hiring decisions with company goals and productivity.

How to Improve Quality of Hire

Here’s how you can improve quality of hire:

• Improve interview and assessment processes.
• Align hiring criteria with business goals.
• Gather feedback from managers on new hires.

5. Source of Hire 

Source-of-Hire is a metric that highlights the percentage of your total hires that entered the pipeline from each of the recruiting sources. Source of Hire identifies which recruitment channels bring in the most successful hires. It helps employers understand where top candidates come from. 

Did you know that 67% of employers use social media to recruit? Similarly, tracking Source of Hire metric helps identify the most effective hiring channels.

What Does it Reflect?

This metric shows which channels are delivering quality hires and which ones need improvement. It helps in optimizing recruitment marketing strategies and resource allocation.

For Example

If a company hired 50 employees last year and 20 came from employee referrals, referrals contributed 40% of total hires. If 15 hires came from job boards and 10 from social media, the data shows referrals were the most effective hiring source. 

Benefits of Tracking Source of Hire

Here are some of the benefits of tracking source of hire:

• Allows better allocation of recruiting budgets.
• Helps focus efforts on the most effective channels.
• Improves targeting of job postings.

How to Improve this Metric

Here’s how you can better track and use Source-of-Hire as a recruitment metric:

• Experiment with different job boards and track results.
• Invest more in high-performing sources.
• Use data-driven insights to refine sourcing strategies.

Explore the hrtech marketplace to find best recruitment software that connects you with numerous job boards and helps properly track Source of Hire!

6. Application Completion Rate

Application completion rate is an important metric highlighting the percentage of candidates who start and finish an application. A low rate suggests the process is too long or complicated. 

Conversely another metric is “applicant drop-off rate” that reflects the number of candidates that started but did not complete the application.

What Does it Reflect?

A high application completion rate signifies a smooth application process and less complexities. This metric essentially reflects a candidate’s experience while applying for a position. 

For Example

If 500 candidates start an application but only 300 finish, the completion rate is 60%.

Benefits of Tracking Application Completion Rate

By tracking application completion rate you can:

• Help reduce candidate drop-off.
• Ensure a smooth application process.
• Increase applicant volume for better talent selection.

7. Offer Acceptance Rate

Offer acceptance rate is the percentage of candidates who accepted a formal job offer. A high rate suggests competitive job offers, while a low rate may indicate issues with salary, benefits, or company reputation. This is measured by dividing the number of accepted offers by the number of job offers made. 

What Does it Reflect?

This metric helps determine whether your offers align with candidate expectations. A low rate may suggest that potential candidates are finding job offers by competitors to be more attractive.

For Example:

If a company extends 20 job offers and 15 are accepted, the Offer Acceptance Rate is 75%.

Benefits of Tracking Offer Acceptance Rate

Here are some benefits of tracking offer acceptance rates:

• Ensures competitiveness of job offers.
• Highlights areas for improvement in recruitment strategy.
• Reduces wasted time on rejected offers.

How to Improve Offer Acceptance Rate

You can improve offer acceptance rate by:

• Conducting market research to offer competitive salaries.
• Improving employer branding and company reputation.
• Providing clear career growth opportunities

8. Interview to Hire Ratio

Interview-to-Hire-Ratio measures how many interviews recruiters conduct before making a hire. A lower ratio suggests an efficient screening process, while a higher ratio may indicate poor candidate quality or ineffective interviews.

What Does it Reflect?

This metric reflects the effectiveness of candidate selection. A high ratio could mean recruiters are interviewing too many unqualified candidates. A low ratio may indicate strong pre-screening and targeted hiring.

For Example

If a company interviews 10 candidates for a role and hires 1 person, the Interview to Hire Ratio is 10:1. If another position requires 5 interviews per hire, that suggests a more efficient hiring process.

Benefits of Tracking Interview-to-hire ratio

Here are some benefits of tracking interview-to-hire ratio:

• Helps recruiters refine screening methods to improve candidate quality.
• Reduces wasted time by ensuring better interview-to-hire conversions.
• Improves hiring efficiency and decision-making.

How to Improve Interview-to-hire

You can improve interview-to-hire by:

• Strengthening resume screening to shortlist only the best candidates.
• Using pre-employment assessments to filter out unqualified applicants.
• Training interviewers to ask better questions and make faster hiring decisions.

9. Candidate Net Promoter Score

Candidate Net Promoter Score (CNPS) measures how likely candidates are to recommend your hiring process to others. CNPS is a very useful metric when it comes to measuring candidate experience. A high CNPS indicates a smooth, positive process, while a low score indicates need for improvement. 

What Does it Reflect?

CNPS helps gauge how candidates perceive your company’s recruitment process. A low score may signal poor communication, long hiring timelines, or negative interview experiences. A high score suggests a well-structured process and positive candidate experience.

For Example

Candidates typically answer a simple question: “On a scale of 0-10, how likely are you to recommend our hiring process to others?”. The responses are divided into following categories:

• Promoters (9-10): Highly satisfied candidates.
• Passives (7-8): Neutral candidates.
• Detractors (0-6): Unhappy candidates.

You can calculate CNPS easily by subtracting the percentage of detractors from the percentage of promoters. 

So, if 50% of candidates are Promoters, 30% are Passives, and 20% are Detractors, CNPS would be 30 (50 – 20).

Benefits of Tracking CNPS

Here are some key benefits of tracking CNPS:

• This metric directly reflects candidate experience.
• Helps improve employer branding and reputation.
• Identifies pain points in the recruitment process.

How to improve CNPS

Here’s how you can improve CNPS:

• Communicate clearly and provide timely updates throughout hiring.
• Offer constructive feedback to all candidates, even those not selected.
• Streamline application and interview processes to reduce candidate frustration.

Learn more about how to improve the candidate experience from our blog.

10. Hiring Manager Satisfaction 

Hiring Manager Satisfaction measures how happy hiring managers are with the recruitment process and the candidates they receive. It highlights the effectiveness of hiring in meeting business needs. 

What Does it Reflect?

A high satisfaction score indicates that recruiters are sourcing and selecting strong candidates. A low score may suggest issues like poor candidate quality, long hiring timelines, or misaligned job requirements.

For Example

Hiring managers rate their satisfaction on a scale of 1 to 10 after each hire. If 7 out of 10 managers give a score of 8 or higher, overall satisfaction is strong. Companies can also gather qualitative feedback to understand specific concerns.

Benefits of Tracking Hiring Manager Satisfaction 

Here are some of the key benefits:

• Provides insights to refine sourcing, screening, and interviewing.
• It directly reflects the effectiveness of the recruitment process as hiring managers are most involved in the recruitment process
• It also helps understand any issues with the existing recruitment process 

How to Improve Hiring Manager Satisfaction

You can improve hiring manager satisfaction by:

• Streamlining the hiring process and removing unnecessary complexities
• Understanding the needs and expectations of hiring managers for better recruitment
• Providing proper tools and training to hiring managers

Tracking recruitment metrics gives you a clear view of your hiring efficiency. But human resource management is not just about recruitment. It is an all-inclusive process consisting of many steps. 

To learn more about metrics that can help you track other HR processes check out our blog, “Essential HR Metrics To Track In 2025”. 

The hrtech marketplace provides top HR solutions to track key recruitment metrics, optimize hiring decisions, and build a stronger workforce. Contact hrtech today to get personalized recommendations!

Conclusion 

Tracking recruitment metrics helps you measure efficiency, improve hiring decisions, and attract top talent. By analyzing key metrics like Time to Hire, Quality of Hire, and Cost per Hire, you can easily identify issues in the recruitment process. Consistently monitoring these metrics can help you make the hiring process faster and more effective.

The hrtech marketplace connects you with top HR software designed to track and improve recruitment metrics. Whether you need software to track key metrics, or improve overall recruitment efficiency, hrtech marketplace offers best software solutions. 

Explore hrtech today and find the right tools to track, analyze, and improve your recruitment metrics!