Churn Rate

Churn rate is the percentage of customers or subscribers who stop using a product or cancel within a given time period. It matters because high churn can erase acquisition gains and reduce long-term profitability even when top-of-funnel metrics look healthy. Teams should analyze churn by cohort, acquisition source, and lifecycle stage to identify where retention breaks down. Practical improvements include onboarding optimization, value communication, and proactive support for at-risk users. A common mistake is treating churn as a single aggregate number without segment context, which hides specific causes and delays corrective action.