Retention Rate
The share of customers who are still active or paying at the end of a period compared with the start.
Core MetricsTerm 31 / 81
Formula
Retention = (Customers at end − New customers acquired in period) ÷ Customers at start × 100
In practice
Read retention from the cohort curve, not the average: if the curve flattens somewhere, the product has a loyal core. A curve that keeps falling means fixing the product, not spending more on acquisition.
Strategies that use this term
34 resultsArticles that use this term
6 results- 04The Great Illusion of Retention: You Don't Have to Retain the User, but Their Critical Behavior in the Product
- 03The First Spark of Value: Which Exact Behavior Must a User Perform for Real Value to Have Begun?
- 07The Value Layer of Time: The Longer a User Stays in the Product, Why Should the Value They Receive Grow Exponentially?
- 13The Value Debt Danger: What Is the Hidden Enemy of Products That Grow Fast but Rot from Within, and How Do You Prevent It?
- 01The Real Growth of AI: Why Perceived and Measured Speedup Diverge, and How That Shapes Growth Decisions
- 01Which Growth Work Goes to an Agent? Choosing Between a Prompt, a Workflow and an Agent, Stage by Stage