Project Management Statistics 2026: Failure and Overruns
Most organizations believe they have a track record of project success. The delivery data rarely agrees with them. Here are the project management statistics worth knowing in 2026, each sourced inline with the year noted.
How often projects land on time, on budget, and on benefits
36% of organizations mostly or always complete projects on time, and 49% mostly or always complete them on budget (Wellingtone State of Project Management 2026, fielded through Q4 2025 across more than 150 organizations).
42% of organizations mostly or always deliver the full benefits of their projects (Wellingtone, 2026). Benefits realization is named as one of the three hardest processes to embed.
52% say their organization has a track record of project success (Wellingtone, 2026). The report’s own verdict: the performance data suggests that is optimistic.
A third of projects are not baselined at all, leaving no agreed starting point to measure schedule or cost performance against (Wellingtone, 2026).
What overruns look like at the large end
One in six IT projects is a black swan, carrying a cost overrun of 200% on average and a schedule overrun of almost 70% (Harvard Business Review, 2011, from a study of 1,471 IT change initiatives with an average cost of $167 million).
27% was the average cost overrun across those same 1,471 projects (HBR, 2011). The distribution has a fat tail, so the average hides the real risk.
Nine out of ten megaprojects have cost overruns, and overruns above 50% in real terms are not uncommon (Bent Flyvbjerg, Project Management Journal, 2014). He calls the pattern the iron law of megaprojects: over budget, over time, over and over again.
44.7% is the average cost overrun on rail projects, and it combines with an average demand shortfall of 51.4% (Flyvbjerg, 2014). Costs come in high and benefits come in low on the same project, so the business case misses from both directions.
Complexity is what practitioners say breaks projects
31% of complex projects fail to achieve the full scope of their originally intended benefits, more than twice the 12% rate in PMI’s own 2024 research (PMI Pulse of the Profession 2026, 2026).
81% of project professionals say projects have become more complex in recent years, with 37% calling the increase significant, and 97% managed at least one complex project last year (PMI, 2026).
34% report delays in stakeholder decision-making as a consequence of poorly managed complexity, alongside missed delivery deadlines (35%) and exceeding budget (28%). The average project carries 2.1 complexity-related issues (PMI, 2026).
88% of projects were rated extremely or very successful when teams were highly effective at managing complexity, against just 14% when teams were slightly effective or ineffective (PMI, 2026). Applying a structured framework lifted the success rate to 72% from 61%, yet 35% of professionals used no framework at all on their most recent complex project.
The money that leaks through communication
US$135 million is at risk for every US$1 billion spent on a project, and 56% of that sum, US$75 million, is at risk because of ineffective communications (PMI, The Essential Role of Communications, 2013).
73% versus 68%: project professionals with high business acumen adhere to budget more often than their peers, adhere to schedule more often (63% versus 59%), and experience project failure less often (8% versus 11%) (PMI Pulse of the Profession 2025, 2025, from a survey of 2,841 project professionals). Only 18% of project professionals qualify as high business acumen.
The status reporting tax
72% of project professionals spend half a day or more every single month manually collating project reports (Wellingtone, 2026), a number the report itself calls disappointing.
50% of respondents had no access to real-time project KPIs yet still spent a day or more each month generating reports (Wellingtone State of Project Management, 2024).
22% of organizations are still planning projects in Microsoft Excel, and a further 11% have no project management solution at all (Wellingtone, 2026).
PMO coverage is near universal, PMO maturity is not
86% of organizations have at least one PMO, but nearly half of those PMOs are less than four years old (Wellingtone, 2026).
44% of respondents are somewhat or very dissatisfied with the level of project management maturity in their organization, and only 22% believe their organization reaches maturity level 4 or 5 (Wellingtone, 2026).
42% of PMOs agree they have a clear remit and objectives, up from a third in 2017 (Wellingtone, 2026).
Where AI is landing in project work
70% of project professionals say their organization currently uses AI, up from 36% in 2023, with a further 29% planning to adopt it and just 1% doing neither (Association for Project Management, 2025, from a Censuswide survey of 1,000 project professionals).
50% of those using AI name task and schedule automation as the function that has benefited most, level with resource allocation and risk forecasting, and just ahead of reporting and dashboarding at 49% (APM, 2025).
27% say AI is fully embedded in their workflows rather than trialled at the edges, and 82% use it more often than they expected to five years ago (APM, 2025).
Where the coordination work actually goes
Half a day a month collating reports, decisions stalled waiting on stakeholders, benefits nobody tracked after handover: none of that needs a project manager’s judgement. Carly is not a project tool, it is the assistant around one, chasing the status update by email, booking the decision meeting with the people holding it up, and filing the follow-up where the team will see it. Carly connects to thousands of apps, so Thursday’s review notes reach the tracker without anyone retyping them.
FAQ
What percentage of projects fail? It depends on the bar. Only 36% of organizations mostly or always deliver projects on time and 42% deliver the full benefits (Wellingtone, 2026), while 31% of complex projects miss the full scope of their intended benefits, more than double the 12% in 2024 research (PMI, 2026).
How many projects go over budget? Around half: 49% of organizations mostly or always complete projects on budget (Wellingtone, 2026). At the large end it is far worse, with nine out of ten megaprojects running over cost (Flyvbjerg, 2014), and one in six IT projects overrunning by 200% on average (HBR, 2011).
Why do projects fail? Practitioners point at complexity and coordination rather than technical execution: missed deadlines (35%) and delays in stakeholder decision-making (34%) top the list of consequences (PMI, 2026), and US$75 million is at risk per US$1 billion spent through ineffective communications (PMI, 2013).
How much time do project managers spend on status reporting? 72% spend half a day or more every month manually collating project reports (Wellingtone, 2026), and half were doing it without any access to real-time project KPIs (Wellingtone, 2024).
Related: Productivity Statistics · Workplace Automation Statistics · Time Management Statistics · AI in the Workplace Statistics
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