Churn Rate Calculator
Find your customer churn rate in seconds. Enter how many customers you started with and how many you lost — get your churn percentage plus the average customer lifetime it implies.
Customer Acquisition Cost (CAC)
How much you spend, on average, to win one new customer.
Customer Lifetime Value (LTV)
The total gross profit you earn from an average customer before they churn.
LTV : CAC Ratio
The single most-watched SaaS efficiency number. 3:1 is the healthy benchmark.
MRR & ARR
Monthly and annual recurring revenue from your customer base.
Churn Rate
The percentage of customers you lose in a period — and the lifetime it implies.
Customer Retention Rate
The percentage of customers you kept, excluding new ones you added.
SaaS Valuation
A revenue-multiple estimate. Faster growth earns a higher multiple.
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What Is Churn Rate?
Churn rate is the percentage of customers who stop paying you over a set period. It is the most important retention metric in any subscription or SaaS business, because it works against every dollar of growth: high churn means new customers are just backfilling the ones walking out the door. Watch your churn rate closely and you are watching whether the business compounds or leaks.
Churn comes in two flavours. Customer churn (also called logo churn) counts the number of customers lost. Revenue churn counts the recurring revenue lost. They usually move together, but they can diverge sharply — which is why serious operators track both.
How to Calculate Churn Rate
The churn rate formula divides the number of customers lost by the number of customers you started the period with, expressed as a percentage.
Start a month with 500 customers, lose 15, and your monthly churn rate is 3%. Keep the window consistent — mixing monthly and annual figures is the most common churn-math mistake.
Converting monthly churn to annual churn
Monthly and annual churn rates are not interchangeable, and the gap is bigger than most founders expect because churn compounds. A 3% monthly churn rate does not mean 36% a year — it compounds to roughly a 31% annual churn rate once you account for the shrinking base each month. A 2% monthly churn rate annualises to about 21.5%. Always label whether a churn figure is monthly or annual before you compare it to a benchmark.
What Is a Good Churn Rate?
| Monthly churn rate | Read | Avg lifetime |
|---|---|---|
| Under 1% | Best-in-class / enterprise | 100+ months |
| 1% – 3% | Healthy SMB SaaS | 33–100 months |
| 3% – 7% | Watch closely | 14–33 months |
| Above 7% | Growth-capping | Under 14 months |
A good churn rate depends on your segment: enterprise SaaS should run well under 1% monthly, while self-serve SMB tools live higher up the table. Judge yourself against your own segment, not a universal target.
Churn Rate vs Retention Rate
Retention rate is simply the mirror of churn: retention rate = 100% − churn rate. A 3% monthly churn rate is a 97% monthly customer retention rate. They describe the same reality from opposite ends — churn counts who you lost, retention counts who you kept. Pick whichever frames the discussion, but never add them together as if they were separate levers.
Why Churn Caps Your Growth
Every new customer first has to replace one who left before it adds to growth. At 7% monthly churn you lose over half your base in a year, so acquisition spends much of its energy just standing still. Lowering churn does double duty: it raises lifetime value and frees acquisition to drive real net growth.
The highest-leverage churn fixes
- Onboarding & activation. Most churn is decided in the first 14 days. Get users to their first win fast.
- Annual plans. They remove eleven monthly cancel decisions and lift retention structurally.
- Proactive save flows. Catch at-risk accounts before renewal, not after they've left.
- Fix the reason, not the symptom. Exit surveys tell you whether it's price, product gaps, or onboarding.
Built and tested by Alston Antony — 500+ SaaS tools reviewed, 15,000-member founder community. Napkin math for founders, free and private.
Frequently Asked Questions
How do you calculate churn rate?
Customer (logo) churn = customers lost during a period ÷ customers at the start of that period × 100. If you began the month with 500 customers and lost 15, churn is 15 ÷ 500 = 3%. Keep the period consistent (monthly or annual) so the number is comparable over time.
What is a good churn rate for SaaS?
For SMB / self-serve SaaS, under 3% monthly customer churn is healthy and under 1% is best-in-class. Enterprise SaaS runs much lower, often well under 1% monthly. Annualised, 3% monthly compounds to roughly 30% a year, so small monthly differences matter enormously over 12 months.
Is 5% an acceptable monthly churn rate?
5% monthly is on the high side for SaaS. It implies an average customer lifetime of just 20 months and annualises to roughly 46% — nearly half your customer base gone in a year. It can be workable very early on while you find product-market fit, but if 5% persists as you scale, reducing churn should be your top priority before spending more on acquisition.
What does a 20% churn rate mean?
A 20% churn rate means one in five customers leaves during the period measured. If that is annual churn, you lose 20% of customers a year and keep 80%. If it is monthly, it is severe — a 20% monthly churn rate implies an average customer lifetime of only five months. Always confirm whether a churn figure is monthly or annual before reacting to it.
What is the difference between customer churn and revenue churn?
Customer (logo) churn counts accounts lost. Revenue churn counts dollars lost, which can differ sharply if your biggest accounts leave or downgrade. Revenue churn can even go negative (net negative churn) when expansion from remaining customers outweighs what you lost — the strongest signal in SaaS.
What is the difference between churn rate and retention rate?
They are two sides of the same coin: retention rate = 100% − churn rate. A 3% monthly churn rate is a 97% monthly retention rate. Churn measures the customers you lose; retention measures the ones you keep. Track whichever frames the conversation you are having, but do not double-count them.
How does churn affect customer lifetime?
Average customer lifetime is 1 ÷ churn rate. At 5% monthly churn, the average customer stays 20 months; at 2%, they stay 50 months. Because lifetime drives lifetime value directly, cutting churn is usually the highest-leverage way to improve your unit economics.
How can I reduce churn rate?
Fix activation first — most churn is decided in the first two weeks, so get new customers to their first real win fast. Then add annual plans to remove monthly cancel decisions, build proactive save flows for at-risk accounts, and use exit surveys to fix the actual cause (price, product gaps, or onboarding) rather than the symptom.
Is this churn calculator free?
Yes. No signup, no limits, and every calculation runs locally in your browser — your numbers are never stored or sent anywhere.