Broiler FCR chart by age: week-by-week cumulative targets

What is a broiler FCR chart?

A broiler FCR chart lists the feed conversion ratio you should expect at each age of a batch — total feed eaten divided by total live weight gained. A broiler FCR of 1.70 at day 42 means the flock ate 1.70 kg of feed for every 1 kg of body weight it put on. The chart matters because FCR is not one number: it rises with age. A bird converts feed very efficiently in week one and less efficiently every week after, so a figure like "1.6" means nothing until it is matched to a day.

Almost every chart you will see is a cumulative FCR chart. Cumulative means all the feed fed from day one up to that day, divided by all the weight gained up to that day. That is the number your integrator, feed dealer and your own books use, and it is the one to compare against the table below. Weekly (or "period") FCR, which looks at only that week's feed and gain, is a sharper warning signal and is covered further down.

Below: the week-by-week cumulative targets, how to read them, worked rupee math, what a bad week looks like, and how to stop FCR drifting without noticing. If you only need to calculate your own batch, use our broiler FCR calculator.

Broiler FCR by age: cumulative targets, day 7 to day 42

These are practical planning ranges for standard commercial broiler breeds in Indian sheds, with the body weight that normally goes with them. Breed guides publish tighter, lower numbers achieved in controlled environments; most Indian farms land somewhat above those, so read a figure at the top of the range as acceptable, not as a failure.

• Day 7: cumulative FCR about 0.90-1.10 at a body weight of 150-180 g.
• Day 14: about 1.10-1.30 at 400-480 g.
• Day 21: about 1.25-1.45 at 750-900 g.
• Day 28: about 1.40-1.60 at 1,200-1,450 g.
• Day 35: about 1.55-1.75 at 1,700-2,050 g.
• Day 42: about 1.65-1.85 at 2,200-2,600 g, the usual Indian market weight.

How to read the broiler FCR chart without fooling yourself

Always read FCR together with body weight, never alone. A flock showing a "good" 1.55 at day 35 but weighing only 1,500 g is not doing well: it ate little and grew little, and the pretty ratio hides a slow batch. Compare both columns to the age. Our broiler weight chart by age gives the weight side of the pair.

Cumulative FCR also hides recent trouble. By day 35 you have five weeks of good early numbers dragging the average down, so a bad week 5 moves the cumulative figure only a little. That is why a farmer who watches only the cumulative line is always the last to know. Calculate the weekly FCR too: feed eaten this week divided by weight gained this week. In week 5 a healthy weekly FCR is roughly 1.9-2.2; if it jumps to 2.6, something went wrong this week, even if the cumulative line still looks fine.

Finally, correct for mortality. Feed eaten by birds that later died is still counted, but the weight they would have added is not. A shed with 6% mortality will show a worse FCR than the same shed with 3% mortality even if every surviving bird behaved perfectly. When comparing batches, note the mortality next to the FCR; our mortality rate guide explains how to calculate it.

Worked example: what 0.1 of FCR costs

Take a shed of 10,000 birds sold at 2.4 kg average live weight, so 24,000 kg of live weight in total (ignoring the chick's 40 g start weight to keep the maths simple). At an FCR of 1.70 the flock eats about 40,800 kg of feed. At an FCR of 1.80 it eats 43,200 kg. The difference is 2,400 kg of feed for the same birds and the same sale weight.

At an illustrative feed price of ₹30 per kg, that is ₹72,000 on one batch, from a gap of just 0.1 on the chart. Your feed price will differ, so put your own rate in, but the shape of the result does not change: one tenth of FCR on a 10,000-bird shed is a five-figure rupee number every cycle, and across five or six cycles a year it is bigger than most farm owners expect. Feed is the largest single cost in broiler farming, so the FCR line is where money is most often lost without anyone seeing it.

What a bad FCR week looks like

A bad week rarely announces itself as one dramatic event. It usually shows up as a quiet pattern in the numbers, and the cause is almost always upstream of the feeder:

• Weekly FCR 0.3 or more above the chart while body weight is on target: feed is being wasted, through spillage, rats, leaking feeders set too high, or poor-quality pellets crumbling to dust.
• Weekly FCR high and body weight also behind: the birds are under stress. Heat is the most common Indian cause, because panting birds burn energy on cooling instead of growth; see how to cool a poultry shed in summer.
• Feed intake normal but gain flat: look for subclinical disease such as coccidiosis or a gut infection, where birds eat but do not absorb.
• Wet, caked litter and a sharp ammonia smell: irritated, uncomfortable birds eat and convert worse. Check wet litter and ammonia readings.
• Early weeks behind: a weak or chilled brooding start (week 1 below about 32 °C at chick level) leaves a gap in weight that pushes the whole FCR line up for the rest of the cycle.

Common mistakes when using a broiler FCR chart

Most FCR "problems" on paper are measurement problems. Fix these before blaming the feed:

• Estimating feed from bag counts without weighing or reconciling leftover bags in the bin at the end.
• Using a guessed average weight instead of a proper sample of at least 1-2% of the flock, drawn from several spots in the shed.
• Comparing a day-38 batch to the day-42 target. Always compare at the same age.
• Ignoring the starting weight and mortality, which makes batches impossible to compare fairly.
• Treating the integrator's published standard as a promise. It is a target set under good conditions, not a guarantee for your shed.

Why continuous data keeps FCR on the chart

FCR is the final answer to a long list of daily inputs: brooding temperature, shed heat, feed intake, drinker flow, litter moisture and ammonia. A farmer who sees all of those only once a week sees the damage after it is done. The point of monitoring is to see the cause early, while the weekly FCR can still be rescued.

A poultry IoT system is designed to log shed temperature, humidity and ammonia continuously and to alert when a reading leaves the safe band for the flock's age, and to pair that with daily feed and weight records so weekly FCR is calculated automatically instead of on a notebook at month-end. For the bigger picture of how these pieces connect, see our guide to IoT for poultry farms and the poultry farm monitoring page.

Keep your next batch on the FCR line

If you want to see how temperature, ammonia, feed and weight records could fit your shed size, book a meeting with the MD and walk through it in plain language.