Acceptable quality limit
worst tolerable process average in percentage or ratio that is still considered acceptable
The acceptable quality limit (AQL) is the worst tolerable process average (mean) in percentage or ratio that is still considered acceptable; that is, it is at an acceptable quality level. Closely related terms are the rejectable quality limit and rejectable quality level (RQL).
In a quality control procedure, a process is said to be at an acceptable quality level if the appropriate statistic used to construct a control chart does not fall outside the bounds of the acceptable quality limits. Otherwise, the process is said to be at a rejectable control level.
In 2008 the usage of the abbreviation AQL for the term "acceptable quality limit" was changed in the standards issued by at least one national standards organization (ANSI/ASQ) to relate to the term "acceptance quality level". It is unclear whether this interpretation will be brought into general usage, but the underlying meaning remains the same.
An acceptable quality level is a test and/or inspection standard that prescribes the range of the number of defective components that is considered acceptable when random sampling those components during an inspection. The defects found during an electronic or electrical test, or during a physical (mechanical) inspection, are sometimes classified into three levels: critical, major and minor. Critical defects are those that render the product unsafe or hazardous for the end user or that contravene mandatory regulations. Major defects can result in the product's failure, reducing its marketability, usability or saleability.
This brief starts where responsible research should: with the source description of “Acceptable quality limit” as worst tolerable process average in percentage or ratio that is still considered acceptable. Everything that follows is an evidence route, not borrowed authority.
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The citation trail is more important than the brevity of the summary: it shows where individual claims can be examined in context. The source revision retrieved here is dated Jun 20, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q4672371. None of the 0 selected statements returned an explicit reference. The first chronological checks are 2008.
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This entry incorporates text from “Acceptable quality limit” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.