> ## Documentation Index
> Fetch the complete documentation index at: https://studies-guides.jaspari.com/llms.txt
> Use this file to discover all available pages before exploring further.

# Enrollment Goals and Lead Limits

> A study has an informational enrollment goal for tracking, plus two study-level settings, max leads and soft limit, that actually control the flow of volunteers.

A study has two separate things that sound similar but do different jobs: an enrollment goal, which is for your own tracking, and lead limits, which actually control the flow of volunteers. Both are set at the study level. Neither has a per-site version.

## Enrollment goals

Enter an enrollment goal and a target completion date on the study's Recruitment Goals tab. This is informational only. It doesn't route volunteers, doesn't pause anything, and doesn't change how volunteers are matched. It's there so you and your team have a number to measure progress against.

## Max leads and soft limit

These settings control how many volunteers a study receives.

<CardGroup cols={2}>
  <Card title="Max leads" icon="circle-stop">
    A hard cap on how many volunteers the study can receive. Once a study reaches its max leads, it stops receiving new volunteers entirely until you raise the cap. This is enforced at the moment a volunteer accepts an offer. Max leads is adjustable at any time; it isn't fixed once set.
  </Card>

  <Card title="Soft limit" icon="triangle-exclamation">
    An earlier checkpoint that triggers a notification when the study reaches it. Volunteers already mid-flow at the moment the soft limit is crossed are still let through, so a few more may land after the checkpoint, but the soft limit stops any new volunteer from starting after that point. Apply a soft limit below your max leads so that no one who starts is later turned away at the hard cap.
  </Card>
</CardGroup>

If you don't set a soft limit, it falls back to your max leads. Both are editable from the study's Recruitment Goals tab any time the study is active, paused, or in draft, and changes take effect immediately.

<Note>
  If soft limit equals max leads, only the "reached lead limit" notification is sent.
</Note>

## Adjusting limits mid-study

You can raise or lower max leads and soft limit at any time. Common reasons:

* Enrollment is going faster than expected and you want to stop new volunteers early.
* A sponsor or IRB amendment changes your target sample size.
* You want an earlier warning before you hit your cap, so you set a soft limit below it.

## Studies with more than one site

Max leads and soft limit apply to the whole study. Neither one applies to any single site. There is no per-site enrollment target and no automatic routing of volunteers toward under-enrolled sites. If you need enrollment concentrated at a particular site, manage that through which sites are assigned to the study and each site's own scheduling availability. See [Sites](/sharing/sites) for that setup.

## Virtual studies

The same two settings apply: an enrollment goal for tracking, and max leads/soft limit for actual control. A virtual study has no sites, so matching is based on recruitment area alone.


## Related topics

- [Studies Overview](/studies/overview.md)
- [Pipeline and Lead Statuses](/studies/pipeline-statuses.md)
- [Launch Your First Study](/getting-started/quickstart.md)
- [Setup and Launch](/studies/setup-and-launch.md)
- [Launch, Pause, and Edit a Study](/studies/launching-pausing.md)