Economic indicators calendar 2027: release dates and timing for the ISM PMI and seven more numbers manufacturers watch

Your sales team will tell you a quarter is soft about three weeks after it goes soft. Eight public releases can tell you sooner, and this economic indicators calendar lists when each one comes out in 2027, by date where the publisher has posted one and by recent pattern where it has not. The ISM manufacturing PMI is the broadest and the first out each month. The Federal Reserve’s industrial production report shows which industries are actually making more. AMT’s machine tool orders, Census housing starts, the NAHB builder index, the AIA billings index, the Dodge Momentum Index and ABC’s construction input prices fill in metals, machinery, building products and distribution.

You do not need an economist to use them. Put one date a month on your calendar, read the eight numbers in about half an hour, and tie each one to a decision you would actually make: where to aim outbound, when to spend on paid media, when to send a price notice. The calendar below has every 2027 date the publishers had posted as of Oct. 26, 2026, plus ISM’s expected dates.

Which numbers matter for which industries

Release	Publisher	What it measures	Leads which of our industries	Latest reading (as of Oct. 26, 2026)
Manufacturing PMI	ISM	Survey of purchasing managers; above 50 means expansion	All six	54.5 in September 2026; new orders 55.3, prices 77.9 (as reported by IndustryWeek)
Industrial production (G.17)	Federal Reserve	Actual output by industry	All six, by NAICS line	Manufacturing up 0.3% in September 2026 and 1.1% from a year earlier
US Manufacturing Technology Orders	AMT	Orders of metalworking machinery	Metals and machining; industrial machinery	$732.9 million in August 2026, up 36.3% from August 2025
New residential construction	Census Bureau and HUD	Housing permits and starts	Building products; industrial distribution	1,221,000 starts (annual rate) in September 2026; permits 1,400,000
Housing Market Index	NAHB/Wells Fargo	Home builder sentiment	Building products (residential)	29 in October 2026, tying June 2012 as the lowest in 14 years
Architecture Billings Index	AIA/Deltek	Architecture firm billings; under 50 means more firms reported declines	Building products (spec-driven, nonresidential)	44.7 in September 2026; commercial and industrial 50.9
Dodge Momentum Index	Dodge Construction Network	Nonresidential projects entering planning	Building products; automation and industrial tech; distribution	288.0 in September 2026, up 2.4%
Construction input prices	ABC, from BLS Producer Price Index data	Prices contractors pay for materials	Metals; plastics; building products; distribution	Read the next one Nov. 13, 2026, when BLS publishes October 2026 PPI

The 2027 economic indicators calendar

These are the release dates each publisher has posted for 2027, from the Fed’s G.17 schedule, the BLS PPI schedule, NAHB’s HMI release dates and the Census Bureau’s economic indicator calendar. ISM’s release calendar lists its 2026 dates, including Nov. 2, 2026 for the October report, but no 2027 dates as of Oct. 26, 2026. It and ISM’s PMI reports page say the Manufacturing PMI comes out on the first business day of the month at 10 a.m. Eastern, so the ISM column shows the date that rule produces, labeled expected. ISM does shift around holidays. Its calendar marks the December 2025 report as moved to Monday, Jan. 5, 2026, rather than Friday, Jan. 2, and Calculated Risk’s post that day confirms it, so check the January date.

Month (2027)	ISM PMI (expected)	Fed G.17	BLS PPI and ABC input prices	NAHB HMI	Census starts and permits
January	Jan. 4	Jan. 15	Jan. 14	Jan. 19	Jan. 20
February	Feb. 1	Feb. 17	Feb. 12	Feb. 17	Feb. 18
March	Mar. 1	Mar. 15	Mar. 12	Mar. 16	Mar. 17
April	Apr. 1	Apr. 15	Apr. 14	Apr. 19	Apr. 20
May	May 3	May 17	May 13	May 17	May 18
June	June 1	June 16	June 11	June 16	June 17
July	July 1	July 16	July 15	July 19	July 20
August	Aug. 2	Aug. 17	Aug. 10	Aug. 16	Aug. 17
September	Sept. 1	Sept. 16	Sept. 10	Sept. 20	Sept. 21
October	Oct. 1	Oct. 18	Oct. 15	Oct. 18	Oct. 19
November	Nov. 1	Nov. 17	Nov. 12	Nov. 16	Nov. 17
December	Dec. 1	Dec. 16	Dec. 15	Dec. 15	Dec. 16

Three releases have no posted 2027 schedule, so plan around their recent pattern:

• AIA Architecture Billings Index. AIA’s ABI page lists 2026 dates of Oct. 21, Nov. 18 and Dec. 16, all Wednesdays, and the August 2026 index came out Wednesday, Sept. 23. Expect a Wednesday in the second half of each month.
• Dodge Momentum Index. Dodge’s news listing shows the August 2026 index came out Sept. 8 and September’s on Oct. 7. Expect the first week or so of the month.
• AMT US Manufacturing Technology Orders. AMT’s August 2026 orders report was published Oct. 12, 2026, about six weeks after the month closed. Expect mid-month, covering the month before last.

How to read them without an economist

ISM PMI

Look at new orders before the headline. New orders move first, and in September 2026 they were 55.3, above the 54.5 headline. Also check the list of industries reporting growth; in September, 12 of 18 grew, including fabricated metals, plastics and rubber, machinery, primary metals and nonmetallic minerals, according to First Trust’s and IndustryWeek’s reports. Watch the prices index too. At 77.9 in September, far more purchasing managers paid higher prices than lower ones. ISM’s full report sits behind a member login, so free coverage from trade publications is the practical route. For what the September reading did and did not say about where new orders are landing, see our analysis of the September 2026 PMI.

Fed industrial production

The G.17 measures what factories actually produced, so it checks the PMI’s survey answers against output. Skip the headline and read the industry lines for your customers. In the September 2026 G.17, machinery output rose 1.4% for the month and 6.9% from a year earlier, fabricated metals rose 3.3% over the year, plastics and rubber rose only 0.7%, and motor vehicles and parts fell 3.0% for the month. For the calendar, note that the Fed issues its annual revision on Nov. 24, 2026, with 2022 as the new base year, so year-ago comparisons will shift.

AMT orders

Machine tool orders show which shops and OEMs are adding capacity. AMT said growth in orders from contract machine shops exceeded overall market growth in August 2026, and that aerospace has taken a growing share of orders. If you sell to job shops, tooling or automation, this is your earliest signal.

Census starts and permits

Permits come before starts, and starts come before most building product orders. Use the seasonally adjusted rate for trend, but use the not seasonally adjusted counts to time paid media, because spring is when houses actually get started. Check the confidence interval Census prints next to every monthly change. In Census’s September 2026 release, the 5.2% drop in starts came with a margin of plus or minus 11.8 percentage points, so the month alone did not prove a decline.

NAHB HMI

The headline is builder sentiment, and the useful detail sits inside NAHB’s release, in the share of builders cutting prices (43% in October 2026) and using incentives (65%). When those climb, builders are buying on cost. Our analysis of the October reading of 29 covers what that means for building products marketing in early 2027.

AIA ABI

AIA’s ABI page says the index predicts nonresidential construction activity 9 to 12 months ahead. The sector lines matter more than the headline. In AIA’s September 2026 release, the national index was 44.7, but commercial and industrial firms were at 50.9.

Dodge Momentum Index

Dodge’s September release says the index leads nonresidential construction spending by a full year to 18 months. The release names the largest projects entering planning. In September 2026, the three largest commercial projects were data centers, one at $480 million and two at $473 million, and institutional planning rose 9.4% for the month. If those names matter to your plan, start with who buys in the data center supply chain.

ABC construction input prices

ABC publishes its analysis of the BLS Producer Price Index on the day the PPI comes out, so use the BLS dates in the calendar. If you sell metals, plastics or building materials, your customers read it before they read your price notice. Our guide to the price increase letter and tariff surcharge notice covers what to put in that notice.

Turn each number into a pipeline decision

A number is only worth checking if it can change something you do. The table below holds the rules we would write into a 2027 plan, one trigger per release. Each decision maps to a box in our one-page 2027 marketing plan for manufacturers, so the monthly check feeds the plan instead of sitting beside it.

Release	Trigger	Decision
ISM PMI	New orders under 50 for two straight months	Cut the forecast for new logos and move outbound effort toward existing accounts, parts and service
Fed G.17	A customer industry falling three months running	Pull that industry out of new paid campaigns and shift its budget to the industries the G.17 shows growing
AMT orders	Orders rising with contract shops leading	Job shops should update capabilities pages and equipment lists now, before the next round of RFQs
Census starts and permits	Not seasonally adjusted starts show the spring ramp	Weight building products paid media to the spring ramp instead of spending evenly, and more heavily in the Midwest and Northeast, where winter starts are lowest
NAHB HMI	Price-cut share above 40%	Lead builder messages with installed cost and labor saved
AIA ABI	A sector under 50 for a quarter	Move spec and AIA course effort to the sectors above 50
Dodge Momentum Index	Planning up in a project type	Build an account list of the owners, contractors and engineers on those projects now; they buy a year or more out
ABC construction input prices	Input prices up three months running	Draft the price increase or surcharge notice before your customers ask

Our rules, not the publishers'. Source: Our position.

In your industry

In metals and machining and industrial machinery, lead with AMT orders and the G.17 lines for fabricated metals and machinery, because they track what your customers are buying. Use the PMI, a broad survey, for a read on general conditions.

In plastics and rubber, watch the ISM prices index and the G.17 plastics and rubber line together. Plastics output rose only 0.7% over the year to September 2026 while the prices index sat at 77.9.

For building products, starts, permits, NAHB and the ABI are the core four. Residential and nonresidential can move in opposite directions, as they did in fall 2026.

In automation and industrial tech, watch Dodge, which names the largest projects entering planning, data centers included, a year or more before construction spending follows.

Industrial distributors sell into all of the above, so track the PMI and G.17 for your top three customer industries.

Pick one day a month

Most of these releases cluster between the first and the third week of the month. If you check once, check on the last Thursday of the month. By then the latest reading of each release is out, and AMT’s runs about six weeks behind anyway. In 2027 that is Jan. 28, Feb. 25, Mar. 25, Apr. 29, May 27, June 24, July 29, Aug. 26, Sept. 30, Oct. 28, Nov. 23 (a Tuesday, since Nov. 25 is Thanksgiving) and Dec. 30.

Put the eight numbers in one row of a spreadsheet each month, add a column for the decision each one changed, and bring that sheet to the monthly sales meeting. After three months you will know which of the eight actually moved your pipeline and which you can stop checking.