Project burn rate in a conventional project is the pace at which a project consumes its allocated budget over a specific timeframe.

In Agile project burn is a metric used to measure the productivity of an Agile team. It shows how quickly Agile team members are completing their tasks and the metrics used can be sprints or user stories completed or products delivered. This can be shown using either a Burndown chart that shows how quickly a team is working through a customer’s user stories or products delivered or a Burnup chart to see how much work has been done and how much work is left. As with many Agile techniques it is a simple visual aid to assist communication or Information Radiator in the jargon.