FBA Planning Overview
Purpose
Turn your sales history and supplier lead times into a concrete answer to "what do I need to reorder, and by when."
Who this page is for
Sellers managing purchasing decisions, especially anyone currently doing this in a spreadsheet.
The core concepts
| Term | What it means |
|---|---|
| Sales velocity | Average units sold per day, calculated from recent order history |
| Lead time | Days between placing a purchase order and stock arriving at Amazon, ready to sell |
| Safety stock | Extra buffer stock held to absorb demand spikes or supplier delays |
| Reorder point | The stock level at which a new order should be placed |
See How Planning Works for the full explanation of how these combine, and Reorder Calculations for the actual formula.
Reading a planning row
Open FBA Planning and each product shows: current stock, forecasted sales velocity, lead time, safety stock, reorder point, and — when stock is projected to cross the reorder point — a suggested reorder quantity and target order date.
:::info Screenshot placeholder [FBA Planning table showing a product with reorder point crossed and a suggested reorder quantity] :::
Planning figures depend on lead time being set correctly — either at the workspace default level (Initial Configuration) or per supplier (Lead Times). An unset or wrong lead time is the most common cause of a reorder suggestion that looks off.
Why forecasts change over time
Sales velocity is recalculated on a rolling basis, so forecasts for the same product will shift week to week as new sales history comes in — particularly for newer products with limited history, or seasonal products. This is expected behaviour, not a bug.
Refreshing your plan
Planning figures recalculate automatically on a schedule. To force an immediate refresh after a major change (a new supplier, a bulk stock adjustment), see Refresh Planning.