Monthly subscription churn

Formula

Cancels in month / active subs at month start

Unit

%

Models

Subscription

What it is

Monthly subscription churn is the percentage of active subscribers who cancel or lapse in a given month relative to the subscriber count at the start of that month. It is the foundational retention metric for consumer subscription businesses.

How to calculate it

Divide the number of cancellations (or non-renewals) in a month by the number of active subscribers at the start of that month. To annualise, compound monthly: annual churn ≈ 1 − (1 − monthly churn)^12.

Why it matters

For B2C subscription products, monthly churn determines payback period and LTV. Even seemingly modest differences — say 5% vs. 8% monthly — produce dramatically different LTV curves over 12–24 months. Monthly churn also surfaces the impact of billing-plan mix: weekly plans, which offer a low entry price, suffer catastrophically higher churn than monthly or annual plans.

Benchmarks & pitfalls

RevenueCat 2026 data shows mid-life monthly subscription churn typically falls in the 3–10% range. Weekly plans churn extremely fast: fewer than 5% of weekly-plan subscribers survive to month 6. When benchmarking, always segment by billing cadence — blending weekly, monthly, and annual plans into a single churn rate produces a meaningless average. Also distinguish between voluntary (cancellation) and involuntary (payment failure) churn; involuntary churn can represent 20–40% of total attrition and is addressable with dunning and retry logic.