OCRA High-Precision Checklist: score, risk bands and the 2026 update

The OCRA Checklist scores the risk of repetitive work of the upper limbs over a shift, separately for the right and left side, and places the result in one of five risk bands. Its High-Precision version (HP Checklist) keeps the same scale and bands but builds the score from measured times in seconds instead of estimated fractions of the cycle. It is the version this guide follows, and the one Postura computes from video.

It is also easy to misread. A score that looks precise can rest on a wrong cycle time, a recovery break counted twice or a yellow band read as “fine”. This guide explains how the score is actually built, so you can check it, defend it and act on it.

What the guide covers

• What the Checklist measures, what the High-Precision version changes, and what neither covers.
• The five factors that make up the score: frequency, posture, stereotypy, complementary factors and force.
• The two multipliers for recovery and for the duration of repetitive work.
• How to read the result: the five bands, the yellow zone and a worked example.
• The 2026 update: the new boundary at 16, the link between score and expected disorders, and the second edition of ISO 11228-3.
• When to use the OCRA Index or a multitask model instead.

Sources

The content follows the method as published by its authors, Enrico Occhipinti and Daniela Colombini: the original paper (Ergonomics, 1998), the 2007 update of reference values, the 2011 paper introducing the High-Precision Checklist (La Medicina del Lavoro), the 2021 validation of the Checklist and the 2026 OCRA 30th-anniversary dossier (Dossier Ambiente no. 153). Where Postura applies an internal convention, the guide says so.

The OCRA Checklist measures the biomechanical overload of the upper limbs caused by repetitive work over a shift. It applies only to repetitive tasks, and it scores each side of the body on its own.

What counts as a repetitive task

A task is repetitive when the upper limbs perform the same pattern of technical actions again and again during the shift. Under the authors’ definition, that means at least one of:

• the work is organised in cycles, a sequence of actions performed the same way and repeated, whatever their length;
• the same gesture is repeated for more than half of the working time.

Repetitive does not mean machine-paced. An operator preparing orders of 3 to 20 items, with no fixed cycle time, is still doing repetitive work if the actions are always the same: pick, place, close the box, move it on. In that case the observed video, typically one to four minutes of typical actions, stands in for the cycle.

Acyclic phases inside a repetitive task, such as restocking, unpacking, machine time and waiting, are part of the task. Treating them as non-repetitive time leaves only the dense part of the work and overestimates the risk.

The technical action

The technical action is the elementary unit of OCRA: one task-oriented action of one upper limb, such as take, position, screw or insert. Actions can be dynamic or static (a sustained hold, such as gripping a tool throughout the cycle). Counting them reliably normally needs a video review.

Some actions do not happen in every cycle, for example a refill every ten pieces. These technical actions in frequency must be included when they are standard and recurring, pro-rated in the count or handled as a separate phase.

The base of the OCRA Checklist is the Partial score, the sum of five factors scored for each side: frequency, posture, stereotypy, complementary factors and force.

Partial = Frequency + Posture + Stereotypy + Complementary factors + Force

The Partial score describes the task itself, before recovery and duration are taken into account. In the High-Precision Checklist, posture, force and complementary factors are scored from the percentage of the cycle they actually occupy, measured in seconds.

Frequency

Frequency scores how many technical actions the limb performs per minute. Dynamic and static actions are scored as separate components, and the frequency score is the higher of the two. Technical actions in frequency, the ones that recur once every few cycles, are included in the count.

Posture

Posture scores how long each joint spends outside a neutral position: shoulder, elbow, wrist and hand grip. The posture factor takes only the highest of the joint contributions, not their sum.

For the hand, only a grip on an object about 3 to 5 cm across counts as congruent. Pinch, palmar and hook grips are awkward. Ill-fitting gloves effectively turn every grip into an awkward one.

Postura measures joint angles from the video frame by frame and applies angle thresholds for each joint.

Stereotypy

Stereotypy scores the repetition of the same movements. It is scored as the maximum of two contributions, a very short cycle or the same actions repeated for most of the cycle, not their sum, and it is added only once. As an internal convention, Postura scores a cycle of up to 8 seconds as 3 points and a cycle of more than 8 and up to 15 seconds as 1.5 points.

Two multipliers turn the Partial score into the result: the recovery multiplier for the distribution of breaks and the duration multiplier for how long the repetitive work lasts in the shift.

Intrinsic score = Partial × Recovery multiplier

Final score = Intrinsic score × Duration multiplier

The recovery multiplier

The recovery multiplier is looked up from the number of hours without adequate recovery in the shift, counted analytically from the real distribution of breaks, half hours included.

• The last hour of the shift and the hour before the meal break count as recovered.
• For what remains unrecovered in each hour: under 20 minutes scores 0, 20 to 40 minutes scores half an hour, more than 40 minutes scores one hour.

Recovery inside the cycle

Some cycles contain their own recovery, a period in which the limb is completely inactive. As Postura applies it, this counts as internal recovery only when it lasts at least 10 consecutive seconds, appears in every cycle and keeps the ratio between active time and recovery no higher than about 5 to 1 (Postura tolerates up to 6.5 to 1). When valid internal recovery is present, the recovery multiplier is 1.

This is why waiting time for a machine must stay in the video: cut it, and the recovery disappears from the analysis.

The duration multiplier

The duration multiplier depends on the net duration of repetitive work in minutes. Net means excluding breaks, the meal, non-repetitive work and valid internal recovery, without subtracting the same recovery twice. If a task fills only part of the repetitive time, use its actual duration, not the whole shift. The multiplier is read from the table in ISO 11228-3.

An OCRA Checklist score up to 7.5 is green and acceptable; above 22.5 it is purple, high risk. In between are three bands, yellow, orange and red, each with its upper limit included.

OCRA Checklist score	Band	Risk level
Up to 7.5	Green	Acceptable
Above 7.5, up to 11.0	Yellow	Borderline
Above 11.0, up to 16.0	Orange	Low
Above 16.0, up to 22.5	Red	Medium
Above 22.5	Purple	High

The bands follow the 2026 OCRA dossier (Dossier Ambiente no. 153). Every upper limit belongs to its own band: a score of exactly 16.0 is still low risk, and medium risk starts above it.

The yellow band is not “safe”

The yellow band is a borderline zone. There is no scientific evidence that upper-limb disorders will develop at that exposure, and no evidence that they will not. Only green is evidence-based as acceptable. Read a yellow result as uncertainty: monitor the station and improve it when you can.

How Postura rounds the score

Postura rounds each score up to one decimal before showing it and classifying it, so the number and the colour always agree. A score of 7.50 stays 7.5 and is green; 7.501 becomes 7.6 and is yellow. Because all band limits are expressed to one decimal, the band is the same as for the unrounded score. This is a Postura convention, not a rule of the method.

Following the 2021 validation, the OCRA Checklist boundary between low and medium risk moved from 14 to 16; the 2026 OCRA dossier consolidates the change and ties the score directly to the expected prevalence of upper-limb disorders.

The boundary moved from 14 to 16

The change comes from the validation of the OCRA Checklist presented by Occhipinti and Colombini at the IEA 2021 Congress, on a population of 11,734 exposed workers. It is consolidated in the method’s 30th-anniversary publication, OCRA 30° anniversario (Dossier Ambiente no. 153, 2026), which also gives the mathematical rationale for the new value.

If your risk assessment still uses 14, stations scored above 14.0 and up to 16.0 change from medium to low risk. Re-read them before you re-plan the corrective actions.

From score to expected disorders

The same validation produced a direct predictive model between the Checklist score and the expected prevalence of upper-limb disorders (PA, the percentage of affected workers):

PA = 0.742 × Checklist score (R² = 0.86, 11,734 workers)

It turns a score into a figure management can understand: the expected prevalence of upper-limb disorders in a group of workers exposed at that score. For the OCRA Index, the 2007 update of reference values gives a similar model, with about 5% of workers affected at an Index of 2.2, 11% at 4.5 and 21% at 9.0.

Use the OCRA Checklist to map and prioritise many workstations, the OCRA Index when you need an analytical result for a job redesign, a return to work or a medico-legal case, and a multitask model whenever the operator rotates between tasks.

Criterion	OCRA Checklist	OCRA Index
Output	One score per side, five bands	Actual / recommended technical actions (ATA/RTA), per limb and shift
Speed	Fast	More detailed, takes longer
Built for	Mapping many workstations, setting priorities	Job redesign, return to work, medico-legal cases

Both instruments assess the same risk and both are validated, so the choice depends on what the output is used for. Where the result has to support a decision about an individual worker, such as a return to work, the more analytical Index is the usual choice.

Rotations need a multitask model

When an operator rotates between several repetitive tasks in the shift, the score of each task is an intermediate result. The overall exposure comes from the OCRA multitask procedure, with a weighted-average or a more complex method depending on the rotation. Never report a single-task score as the exposure of a worker who rotates.

Take the OCRA Checklist scores you already have and check two things: the boundary between low and medium risk is 16, not 14, and every station in the yellow band has a monitoring plan. Then pick the station with the highest score and look at which factor drives it.

With Postura

Postura computes the OCRA High-Precision Checklist from the videos of a station, because measured seconds are what video analysis produces: the AI counts the dynamic technical actions and measures postures frame by frame. You enter cadence, static actions, stereotypy, perceived force (Borg), complementary factors, breaks and shift length, and Postura applies the formulas with the 2026 bands, for each side, with every factor visible.

• See it on your own footage: book a demo.
• Recording the video: read How to film a workstation for an ergonomic assessment.
• Choosing the method: read OCRA vs NIOSH vs REBA.