The Recovery Time Objective (RTO) is the duration of time and a service level within which a business process must be restored after a disaster (or disruption) in order to avoid unacceptable consequences associated with a break in business continuity. The business continuity timeline usually runs parallel with an incident management timeline and may start at the same, or different, points.

In accepted business continuity planning methodology the RTO is established during the Business Impact Analysis (BIA) by the owner of a process (usually in conjunction with the Business Continuity planner). The RTOs are then presented to senior management for acceptance.

It should be noted that the RTO attaches to the business process and not the resources required to support the process.

The RTO and the results of the BIA in its entirety provide the basis for identifying and analyzing viable strategies for inclusion in the business continuity plan. Viable strategy options would include any which would enable resumption of a business process in a time frame at or near the RTO. This would include alternate or manual workaround procedures and would not necessarily require computer systems to meet the RTOs

It is important to remember that the "O" in RTO stands for objective, not mandate. In reality, strategy is often selected that will not meet the RTO. In this instance the RTO will not be met but should still remain an objective of future strategy revision.