Post-Newtonian phase accuracy requirements for stellar black hole binaries with LISA

The Laser Interferometer Space Antenna (LISA) will observe black hole binaries of stellar origin during their gravitational wave inspiral, months to years before coalescence. Due to the long duration of the signal in the LISA band, a faithful waveform is necessary in order to keep track of the binary phase. This is crucial to extract the signal from the data and to perform an unbiased estimation of the source parameters. We consider post-Newtonian (PN) waveforms and analyze the PN order needed to keep the bias caused by the PN approximation negligible relative to the statistical parameter estimation error, as a function of the source parameters. By considering realistic population models, we conclude that for ∼90 % of the stellar black hole binaries detectable by LISA, waveforms at low post-Newtonian (PN) order (PN ≤2 ) are sufficiently accurate for an unbiased recovery of the source parameters. Our results provide a first estimate of the trade-off between waveform accuracy and information recovery for this class of LISA sources.