Demand forecasting
Demand forecasting takes the messy guesswork out of “how much stock do I need?”. It builds a forecast from your historical sales, factors in your vendor lead times and current stock levels, and tells you what to reorder, in what quantity, by what date.
In this guide:
- Open the forecast view
- Read a forecast for one SKU
- Override velocity settings
- Create a purchase order
Prerequisites
- At least 30 days of sales history (60+ recommended).
- Vendor lead times configured for the SKUs you want to forecast. See Lead times.
- Professional+ plan or feature-enabled. Forecasting is not available on Free plans.
Step 1: Open the forecast view
Go to Forecasting in the sidebar (under the Inventory section).
The list shows every active SKU with these columns:
| Column | Meaning |
|---|---|
| Product | Product name. Click to view the forecast detail. |
| ASIN | Amazon Standard Identification Number. |
| SKU | Your stock keeping unit. |
| Velocity | Smoothed average daily units sold. |
| FBA Qty | Current quantity in Amazon FBA. |
| Warehouse Qty | Current quantity in your warehouse. |
| Days Stock | Available stock divided by velocity. |
| Reorder By | Date by which a PO must be raised to avoid stockout, given the lead time. |
| Forecast | Projected units needed over the reorder window. |
| Reorder Cost | Estimated cost of the reorder. |
| Reorder Qty | The recommended PO quantity. |
| Scenario | The active forecast scenario. |
Sort by Reorder by ascending to see what’s most urgent.
The forecast view has three tabs:
- Overview — summary of all active SKUs and their reorder status.
- Forecasting — detailed forecast view with per-SKU analytics.
- AI Forecasting — AI-driven forecast scenarios and recommendations.
Step 2: Read a forecast for one SKU
Click a product name to open the per-SKU forecast detail.
The detail page shows:
- History chart — actual daily sales, smoothed.
- Projection chart — the forecast over the next 90 days.
- Stock-out date — when, given current stock and run-rate, you’ll run out.
- Reorder window — the window during which a PO needs to be raised.
Step 3: Override velocity settings
On the forecast detail page, you’ll see collapsible panels for Velocity Settings, FBA, and other configuration. If you know something the forecast doesn’t (a Prime Day promo coming up, a supplier issue dropping a competitor’s stock), expand the relevant panel to override defaults:
Velocity Settings panel:
- Use Manual Velocity — toggle to override calculated velocity.
- Manual Velocity (units/day) — enter a fixed daily run-rate to use instead of the calculated average.
Calculation Variables and Coverage & Supplier Constraints:
- Default Lead Time — how long from PO to receipt (in days).
- Transfer Time — days to transfer from warehouse to FBA.
- Safety Stock — days of buffer stock to maintain.
- MOQ / MTQ — minimum order quantity and maximum transfer quantity constraints.
- Forecast Period (days) — the time window for the forecast.
- Round up orders to nearest carton — align orders to case-pack multiples.
Save the overrides on the SKU; they persist until you remove them. Hilal pre-fills these with calculated defaults from your vendor and product data.
Step 4: Create a purchase order
When you’re ready to reorder, use the Reorder by date and Reorder Qty from the forecast as your guide. Go to Purchase orders to create a new order with your preferred supplier.
Tips
- Forecasts get noticeably more accurate after 60+ days of sales history.
- Review the history chart for outliers that may skew the forecast.
Troubleshooting
- Reorder date is in the past. You’re already late. Raise the PO immediately — Hilal still suggests a quantity.
- Forecast disagrees with my gut. Check the history chart for outliers (a one-off bulk sale skewing the run-rate). The detail view lets you exclude specific dates.