MRR and churn: the two numbers that show if you're really growing

If you sell a subscription or a monthly service, two numbers sum up the health of your business. You don't need any complicated tool to track them.

MRR: your monthly recurring revenue

MRR is the sum of what your active customers pay you each month.

• An annual customer at €480 counts as €40 a month.
• One-off sales (a single project) don't count.
• Active discounts are deducted.

Example: 12 customers at €49 and 3 customers at €119 give 588 + 357 = €945 MRR.

The MRR calculator does the maths for you.

Churn: the share of customers who leave

Monthly churn is the number of customers lost during the month divided by the number of customers at the start of the month.

Example: 40 customers on the 1st, 2 leave, that's 5% churn.

It sounds small. But at 5% a month, you lose roughly half your customers in a year, and you have to sign as many just to stay level. The churn simulator shows the effect over twelve months.

Read them together

• MRR going up, low churn: healthy growth.
• MRR going up, high churn: you're filling a leaky bucket, each month takes more effort.
• Flat MRR despite new sales: churn is eating your growth. Fix it first.

The monthly ritual

On the first day of the month, write down three numbers: MRR, customer count, departures. Ten minutes. After three months, you know exactly whether your problem is attracting or keeping customers.