Calculating the Critical Path

The critical path application calculates the path through your tasks that represents those whose durations or dates cannot be increased without having a negative impact on the eventual end date of your project.

The simplest way to see this in action is to add a few tasks to a project without linking any of them, but give one of the tasks a 2 day duration and the rest 1 day. When you show the critical path you’ll see it’s the task with the 2 day duration that shows as critical, because it is controlling the end date of your project.

In calculating which route through your project is the critical one MindGenius takes into account any links and constraints that you might have set against your tasks. It’s also constantly being re-evaluated, so any changes you make in your project schedule could cause the critical path to change.

Whilst most projects have a single critical path, it is possible to have more than one depending on how your schedule works out, and in those circumstances MindGenius will show you each critical path that exists.