Churn Rate Calculator
Calculate customer churn and revenue churn for your SaaS or subscription business. Understand retention, customer lifetime, and impact on unit economics.
Calculator
Customer Metrics
Customers at start of period
Customers who churned this month
Revenue Metrics
Monthly recurring revenue at start
MRR lost from churned customers
Click "Calculate Churn" to see your results
Strong metrics attract better investors.
Low churn demonstrates product-market fit and sustainable growth potential.
Discover Investors for Your StageMethodology & Assumptions
Understanding Churn
Churn rate measures the percentage of customers or revenue lost over a period. It's one of the most critical metrics for subscription businesses, directly impacting growth, LTV, and valuation.
Calculation Method
- Customer Churn Rate: (Customers Lost ÷ Starting Customers) × 100
- Revenue Churn Rate: (Churned MRR ÷ Starting MRR) × 100
- Customer Lifetime: 1 ÷ Monthly Churn Rate
- Retention Rate: 100% - Churn Rate
Churn Benchmarks (SaaS)
- Excellent: Under 2% monthly (SMB), under 1% (Enterprise)
- Good: 2-5% monthly
- Acceptable: 5-7% monthly
- Concerning: Over 7% monthly
Customer vs Revenue Churn
Customer churn tracks the number of customers lost, while revenue churn tracks the dollar amount lost. Revenue churn can be negative if expansion revenue from existing customers exceeds churned revenue—a sign of strong product-market fit.
Impact on Business
- High churn limits growth potential and increases CAC burden
- Low churn enables compounding growth and higher LTV
- Churn directly affects valuation multiples
- Reducing churn is often more impactful than increasing acquisition
Frequently Asked Questions
What is a good churn rate for SaaS startups?
For SMB SaaS, monthly churn under 5% is good, under 2% is excellent. Enterprise SaaS should target under 1% monthly churn. Early-stage startups often have higher churn (5-10%) as they refine product-market fit. The key is showing improvement over time and understanding why customers leave.
What's the difference between customer churn and revenue churn?
Customer churn measures the percentage of customers lost, while revenue churn measures the percentage of revenue lost. They can differ significantly—losing 10 small customers might be 5% customer churn but only 1% revenue churn. Revenue churn is typically more important for business health.
How does churn affect LTV?
Churn directly determines customer lifetime, which is a key component of LTV. If monthly churn is 5%, average customer lifetime is 20 months (1 ÷ 0.05). Lower churn means longer customer lifetime and higher LTV, which improves unit economics and allows for higher CAC spending.
How can founders reduce churn?
Focus on customer success and onboarding, ensure strong product-market fit, provide excellent support, regularly engage with customers, identify at-risk customers early, gather and act on feedback, and continuously improve product value. Sometimes raising prices to attract better-fit customers can reduce churn.