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At what age do chickens molt (lose feathers/natural process)? Chickens will molt at about 18 months of age. Molting is where they lose all or some of their feathers and stop producing eggs. This is a natural shedding of feathers. Molting may take 2 to 4 months. Laying will resume when molt is over, but may not be as good as before molt process.
Factor #1 - Breed. Chicken breeds that are generally considered to be layers tend to lay sooner than those considered meat or dual purpose breeds. The hybrid laying breeds start laying as early as 16 weeks. Heritage laying breeds tend to lay about 4 weeks later (20 weeks) and all other breeds will begin laying between 20-32 weeks of age. I have no hard evidence to prove this, but I suspect that the breeds that lay the most eggs each year are also ones that are likely to lay the soonest.