How long does it take for an analyst price target to be reached?
By Mathew Auto, AnaChart research desk. Updated 24 October 2026.
How long does it take for an analyst price target to be reached? By convention, a target looks twelve months ahead. We timed it instead, across 408,490 price targets that the stock went on to reach, set by 3,332 working analysts on 5,510 stocks.
Counting only the targets that were reached, the average was 335 days, against 365 for a twelve month label. Targets the stock hasn’t reached aren’t in that figure.
Around the average, 35.1% of reached targets sit in analyst and stock records averaging six months or less, and 31.4% in records averaging more than a year.
Of 575,976 price targets from analysts still publishing, the stock reached 408,490, or 70.9%. Counting reached targets only, they took 335 days on average. 35.1% came from records averaging six months or less and 31.4% from records averaging more than a year. Targets set far above the price also took longer, and stocks reached fewer of them: 450 days and 44.8% for records whose targets averaged 60% or more above the price, against 281 days and 75.1% for records under 10% above it.
In this post
Key findings
- 335 daysthe average wait for 408,490 reached targets
- 281 vs 450days for targets under 10% above the price, against 60% or more
- 277 daysBernstein’s average, the fastest of 44 firms
- 97 of 111Vivek Arya’s Nvidia targets reached, after 196 days on average
- 29.1%of targets not reached so far
Reached targets averaged 335 days
We started from every analyst with a live AnaChart page who has set at least one price target since 1 October 2024. That is 3,332 analysts.
Between them they hold 64,867 analyst and stock records, one for each stock an analyst has covered, with 575,976 price targets.
A target counts as reached on the first day the share price touches it after the analyst publishes it. By that test, stocks reached 408,490 of the 575,976 targets. That’s 70.9%.
For the reached ones, the clock runs from the target date to the day the price got there. Averaged across all 408,490, it comes to 335 days, about eleven months.
The 167,486 targets not reached so far have no end date, so they can’t enter this average.
The spread around the average
An average of 335 days can come from targets that all take about a year, or from a mix of fast and slow ones. The bands below show a mix.
To see the spread, we sorted every analyst’s record on every stock by its average time to target and counted the reached targets in each band. 2.4% of reached targets sit in records that average 30 days or less.
Another 10.8% sit in records averaging one to three months and 21.8% in three to six months. The largest band, 33.5%, is six months to a year.
The long tail holds the rest. 22.7% of reached targets sit in records averaging one to two years, and 8.7% in records averaging more than two years.
In total, 68.6% of reached targets come from records that average a year or less and 31.4% from records that average longer.
These bands sort records, not single targets. A record that averages 200 days can hold targets reached in a week and targets reached after two years.
So the bands can’t give target-level quartiles, and they can’t say what share of targets is reached within a fixed window such as twelve months. Answering that needs every target’s own date and outcome, which this summary data doesn’t hold.
Bigger targets take longer
The distance between the target and the share price on the day it’s set lines up with both measures. We grouped analyst and stock records by their average implied upside and compared them.
| Average target above the price | Price targets | Reached | Average days |
|---|---|---|---|
| Under 10% | 169,911 | 75.1% | 281 |
| 10% to 20% | 134,297 | 78.3% | 326 |
| 20% to 35% | 128,267 | 73.8% | 355 |
| 35% to 60% | 77,597 | 66.3% | 386 |
| 60% or more | 65,904 | 44.8% | 450 |
We grouped each analyst and stock record by the average distance between target and share price on the day the analyst set it. Average days counts reached targets only.
The time to target rises with every step, from 281 days for records under 10% above the price to 450 days for records 60% or more above it.
The share reached is 75.1% in the first group and 78.3% in the second, then falls at each step to 44.8% in the top group.
Key takeaway: the size of a target tells you roughly how long to wait.
The same stock, different clocks
Groups hide people, and analysts on the same stock can differ by months. Nvidia is one example.
Vivek Arya at BofA has set 111 Nvidia price targets and the stock reached 97 of them, after 196 days on average. Atif Malik at Citi has 88 reached out of 92, after 137 days. Joseph Moore at Morgan Stanley has 70 out of 84, after 101 days.
Same stock, and the average wait runs from 101 to 196 days. Arya’s Nvidia targets have averaged 55.6% above the price on the day.
Every analyst page on AnaChart shows this record stock by stock, so the time to target for the person behind a new call is a click away. Our post on why the analyst’s name matters goes further into how much the individual explains.
Key takeaway: two analysts on the same stock can run on very different clocks.
Firm by firm
Firm averages differ as well. Among the 44 firms, including Credit Suisse, with at least 3,000 price targets and 10 analysts in our sample, reached targets took between 277 and 497 days on average.
The shortest averages belong to Bernstein at 277 days, Wedbush at 282, Needham at 297 and Truist at 298. Goldman Sachs and Susquehanna follow at 299 and 300.
The longest are Credit Suisse at 497 days, a firm whose research UBS has since absorbed, then Wolfe Research at 460, Raymond James at 441 and Deutsche Bank at 417.
At firm level, the correlation between share reached and average days is 0.09. Wolfe’s analysts have the highest share of targets reached among the 44 firms, 80.0%, with one of the longest waits.
Our companion study ranks which Wall Street firms have the most accurate analysts on several measures at once.
Targets not reached so far
Stocks have not reached 167,486 of the 575,976 targets so far, or 29.1%. That number mixes two kinds of target.
Some are old targets the stock didn’t get to. Others are still pending: set recently, with time left. Since our data runs to October 2026, a target set in August 2026 has had weeks, against an average of 335 days for the ones that made it.
The summary records don’t say how many of the 167,486 are pending, so 29.1% shouldn’t be read as a miss rate.
The upside table above shows where unreached targets concentrate. In records with average targets 60% or more above the price, stocks haven’t reached 55.2% of targets. In records under 20% above the price, 23.5% haven’t.
Using time to target when you read a call
Three questions help when a new target comes out. How far is it from today’s price? On the numbers above, a record averaging 60% upside has a different history from one averaging under 10%.
How long has this analyst taken on this stock before? That’s on their AnaChart page. And has the target had time yet? A target published last month has had a fraction of the 335 day average.
For a closer look at hit rates in general, our explainer on how accurate analyst price targets are covers the same data from the other side, and our speed study compares newer and veteran analysts on the same clock.
How we measured this
Analysts. Every analyst with a live AnaChart page and at least one price target since 1 October 2024: 3,332 analysts, 5,510 stocks, 64,867 analyst and stock records, 575,976 price targets. We left out analysts who stopped publishing before October 2024.
Reached. A target counts as reached on the first day the share price touches it after publication, using split-adjusted prices. For a target set below the price, that means the price falling to it.
Data. Analyst records read from live AnaChart pages on 4 October 2026, covering price targets through 1 October 2026.
Days. From the target date to the day the price got there. The 335 day average weights each analyst and stock record by its number of reached targets.
Bands. We built the time bands and upside groups from each analyst and stock record’s averages, not from single targets, so a band holds every reached target in the records whose average falls inside it.
We also capped implied upside averages at 300% to limit the effect of data errors.
Firms. Firms with at least 3,000 price targets and 10 analysts in the sample. Firm figures combine every analyst at that firm in the sample.
Every analyst on an AnaChart stock page shows their reached ratio and average days to target on that stock. Try AAPL or MSFT. The full target by target history is on anachart.store.
Mathew Auto is the byline of AnaChart’s research desk. Articles under this name are written by the AnaChart team from AnaChart’s record of 660K+ analyst price targets and 750K+ ratings, and every figure is checked against that record before it’s published.
Frequently asked questions
How long does it take for an analyst price target to be reached?
Counting reached targets only, the average across 408,490 reached price targets from 3,332 analysts still publishing was 335 days.
68.6% of reached targets came from analyst and stock records averaging a year or less and 31.4% from records averaging longer. On Nvidia, Joseph Moore of Morgan Stanley averages 101 days and Vivek Arya of BofA 196 days.
What share of analyst price targets are reached?
70.9%: 408,490 of 575,976 targets from analysts with a live AnaChart page who have published since October 2024.
The other 29.1% includes recent targets that haven’t had time yet, so it isn’t a final miss rate. Atif Malik of Citi has 88 of 92 Nvidia targets reached.
Do higher price targets take longer to be reached?
Yes. Records whose targets averaged under 10% above the price took 281 days on average, against 450 days for records averaging 60% or more above.
The share reached also falls, from 78.3% in the 10% to 20% group to 44.8% in the 60% and over group.
Which firms’ price targets are reached fastest?
Among 44 firms with at least 3,000 targets and 10 analysts, Bernstein averages 277 days, Wedbush 282, Needham 297 and Truist 298. Wolfe Research averages 460 days with 80.0% of targets reached, the highest share of the 44.