# Rework Cost: 25% of Engineering Time Is $1M for a 20-Dev Team > Capers Jones: rework eats 20-40% of dev effort. DORA elite teams stay under 10%. Plug in headcount and loaded cost, get your number. IBM 1-10-100 rule built in ## Pages - [Home](https://reworkcost.com): Calculate annual rework cost in 30s. NIST + DORA data, IBM 1-10-100 rule, working formula. 25% rework = $1M+/yr for a 20-engineer... - [About ReworkCost.com: Independent Rework Cost Research](https://reworkcost.com/about): Who runs ReworkCost.com, why it exists, and what we hold to. An independent reference for software, manufacturing, and construction rework cost from... - [Accessibility-Failure Rework Cost 2026: WCAG Remediation Math](https://reworkcost.com/accessibility-failure-rework): Post-release accessibility remediation costs 6 to 15 times more than designing for WCAG conformance from the start. The page covers per-finding labour,... - [Agile vs Waterfall Rework: Does Agile Really Reduce Rework?](https://reworkcost.com/agile-vs-waterfall): Agile makes rework visible that Waterfall hides until UAT. Standish CHAOS + VersionOne State of Agile data on rework rates, with the... - [Rework Ratio Benchmarks 2026: Elite vs Average Teams](https://reworkcost.com/benchmarks): DORA 2024 + Capers Jones data. Elite teams under 10% rework, average 20-40%, struggling 50%+. Compare your engineering team across size, industry,... - [Boehm Cost of Change Curve: What the 1981 Data Actually Shows](https://reworkcost.com/boehm-cost-of-change-curve): Barry Boehm's cost-of-change curve is the source for the 1-10-100 rule. This page covers what the 1981 data actually shows, the 2001... - [Rework Cost Case Studies: NIST, IBM, Stripe, McKinsey 2026](https://reworkcost.com/case-studies): The canonical studies on rework cost: NIST 2002, IBM 1-10-100, Stripe Developer Coefficient, McKinsey Velocity, GitHub Octoverse. Sources, figures, and links - [Cost of Rework in Construction 2026: 5-15% of Project Cost](https://reworkcost.com/construction): Construction rework runs around 5% of project cost on average (CII), up to 21% with indirect and latent-defect costs (GIRI UK). Examples,... - [COPQ Calculator 2026: Cost of Poor Quality, PAF Method](https://reworkcost.com/copq-calculator): Cost of Poor Quality calculator with the four PAF cost categories (prevention, appraisal, internal failure, external failure). Juran 1951, Crosby 1979, ASQ... - [Cost of Quality (COQ) 2026: Juran, Crosby, Feigenbaum Framework](https://reworkcost.com/cost-of-quality): The Cost of Quality framework explained for software engineering teams. Juran 1951, Feigenbaum 1956, Crosby 1979, and the modern ASQ guidance applied... - [Cost of Rework in Construction 2026: 4-12% of Project Cost](https://reworkcost.com/cost-of-rework-in-construction): Construction rework eats 4-12% of project value per CII IR-153, NIST GCR 04-867 and the UK Get It Right Initiative. Causes, US... - [Defect Escape Rate: Formula, Benchmarks + How to Calculate (2026)](https://reworkcost.com/defect-escape-rate): Defect escape rate (defect leakage) is the share of defects that reach production. The formula, Capers Jones industry benchmarks (elite under 5%,... - [Design-Defect Rework Cost 2026: When Architecture Choices Bite](https://reworkcost.com/design-defect-rework): Design defects (wrong abstraction, missing seam, architectural coupling) drive 15-25% of total software rework cost. Causes, identification heuristics, and prevention - [Rework Cost Formula 2026: 3 Methods (Top-Down + Bottom-Up)](https://reworkcost.com/formula): Three rigorous methods to calculate rework cost: top-down sprint allocation, bottom-up ticket analysis, defect escape rate. Worked examples + Jira queries - [Integration-Defect Rework Cost: Conway's Law in the Build](https://reworkcost.com/integration-defect-rework): Integration defects (API contract mismatches, schema drift, async-event misuse) drive 10-20% of total rework. Conway's Law context, detection patterns, contract-testing ROI - [Cost of Rework in Manufacturing 2026: COPQ + Six Sigma](https://reworkcost.com/manufacturing): Manufacturing rework cost benchmarks: COPQ framework, Six Sigma rework data, ASQ Cost of Quality survey, and how manufacturing rework maps to software... - [How to Measure Rework: Jira JQL + Linear (DORA Metrics)](https://reworkcost.com/measure): Copy-paste Jira JQL queries and Linear views for rework ratio, defect escape rate, and DORA change failure rate. The 4 metrics that... - [Methodology: ReworkCost.com Sources, Formulas, and Refresh Cadence](https://reworkcost.com/methodology): How ReworkCost.com sources every figure: NIST, DORA, IBM SSI, Capers Jones, ASQ Cost of Quality, ISO 9001, Six Sigma, Lean, Boehm, Stripe,... - [PAF Model 2026: Prevention, Appraisal, Failure Cost Categories](https://reworkcost.com/paf-model): The PAF cost-of-quality model explained for software engineering teams. Crosby 1979, Juran 1951, modern ASQ guidance. How to allocate the four buckets... - [Performance-Regression Rework Cost 2026: When the Build Slows Down](https://reworkcost.com/performance-regression-rework): Performance regressions discovered late cost 10-50x more than caught early. The page covers per-regression labour, the Akamai/Amazon revenue-per-100ms math, and continuous performance... - [Prevention](https://reworkcost.com/prevention) - [How to Reduce Rework: 6-Lever Playbook Ranked by ROI (2026)](https://reworkcost.com/reduce): Six evidence-backed interventions ranked by ROI: specification quality, shift-left testing, code review, tech debt paydown, observability, communication rituals - [Regulatory-Compliance Rework Cost 2026: GDPR, SOC 2, HIPAA Math](https://reworkcost.com/regulatory-compliance-rework): GDPR, SOC 2, HIPAA, PCI-DSS changes drive a recurring rework tax. Compliance Week + Thomson Reuters data on annual compliance cost, per-control... - [Requirements-Change Rework Cost 2026: The Single Biggest Driver](https://reworkcost.com/requirements-change-rework): Late requirements changes are the single biggest rework driver in software per Capers Jones. Cost data, the cause behind the cause, and... - [Rework vs Maintenance Cost: The Distinction That Saves Budget Fights](https://reworkcost.com/rework-vs-maintenance-cost): Maintenance is keeping shipped software working; rework is fixing what should have worked. The categories overlap, but treating them as one number... - [Rework vs Technical Debt: The Difference and Why It Costs](https://reworkcost.com/rework-vs-technical-debt): Rework is doing work again; tech debt is the accumulated state that makes future work expensive. They compound. Cunningham 1992, Fowler quadrant,... - [Say-Do Ratio in Jira 2026: Formula, Target Range, How to Calculate](https://reworkcost.com/say-do-ratio): The say-do ratio measures committed work delivered against work promised. The formula, how to calculate it in Jira from the sprint report,... - [Security-Vulnerability Rework Cost 2026: CVE Remediation Math](https://reworkcost.com/security-vulnerability-rework): CVE-driven rework is the most expensive defect class per fix-hour. IBM Cost of a Data Breach 2026 puts the global breach average at a record $4.99M and the US average at $11.5M... - [Cost of Rework in Software Development: 25-40% of Effort](https://reworkcost.com/software): Capers Jones data shows 20-40% of software effort goes to rework. DORA 2024 research, Stripe's 17.3 hr/wk maintenance finding, and the IBM... - [4 Root Causes of Software Rework: Capers Jones Framework](https://reworkcost.com/sources): The four main sources of software rework: unclear requirements, poor testing, technical debt, miscommunication. Capers Jones research + per-cause prevention playbooks - [Rework from Miscommunication: The Cause Nobody Measures (2026)](https://reworkcost.com/sources/miscommunication): Conway's Law, async-sync mismatches, ticket handoff rework, and the prevention playbook: ADRs, runbooks, and async-first communication norms - [Rework from Poor Testing: The Escape-Rate Problem (2026)](https://reworkcost.com/sources/poor-testing): Why bugs that escape to production cost 5-100x more. The test pyramid, shift-left evidence from DORA 2024, and the prevention playbook for... - [Technical Debt as a Rework Multiplier (2026)](https://reworkcost.com/sources/technical-debt): How technical debt increases rework cost: the Stripe 17.3h/week figure, Carnegie Mellon SEI data, and the paydown strategies that break the compounding... - [Rework from Unclear Requirements: The Single Most Expensive Source (2026)](https://reworkcost.com/sources/unclear-requirements): Why unclear requirements cause the most expensive rework. Capers Jones data, six specific failure modes, and a prevention playbook with spec templates... - [Sprint Rework Percentage 2026: Calculate and Track the Metric](https://reworkcost.com/sprint-rework-percentage): How to calculate sprint rework percentage with Jira JQL queries and Linear filter views. Targets by team type, common measurement pitfalls, and... - [Testing & Defect-Removal Effort: What % of Software Cost (Capers Jones)](https://reworkcost.com/testing-defect-removal-effort): Capers Jones data: finding and fixing bugs is the single largest software cost, roughly 50 cents of every development-and-maintenance dollar. Why no... - [Tools That Reduce Rework 2026: Spec, Test, Review, Deploy](https://reworkcost.com/tools): Independent review of tools that measurably reduce software rework: spec hygiene, shift-left testing, code review, observability, deployment safety, AI pair tools - [What Is Rework? Definition + Examples (2026)](https://reworkcost.com/what-is-rework): A precise definition of rework in software development. Rework vs revision vs iteration vs refactor. Why the distinction matters for measurement and... --- *Generated 2026-07-28 from Rework Cost: 25% of Engineering Time Is $1M for a 20-Dev Team site source.*