How Much Is Your Existing Customer Base Worth a Year Later?
What this calculates
Net revenue retention is the revenue a cohort of customers is worth a year later, expansion included and churn deducted. This takes starting MRR with expansion, contraction and churn over the same twelve months, and reports net retention next to gross retention. Above one hundred percent the cohort grows without new customers.
A cohort starting at $100,000 MRR that adds $12,000 of expansion and loses $3,000 to contraction and $5,000 to churn has 104 percent net revenue retention, and 92 percent gross revenue retention before any expansion counts.
Your numbers
The cohort, measured across twelve months
What happened to it over those twelve months
Results update as you type. Nothing is sent anywhere, the calculation runs in your browser.
Net revenue retention
Live104.0%
on a $100,000 cohort over twelve months
- Gross revenue retention
- 92.0%
- Expansion rate
- 12.0%
- Contraction and churn
- 8.0%
- The cohort a year later
- $104,000
Solid
Net revenue retention of 104.0% means the cohort is worth more a year later than it was at the start, without a single new customer. Gross retention of 92.0% is the stronger half of the pair, because ChartMogul puts best-in-class gross retention above 86% at every stage, so the account base barely leaks. Expansion of 12.0% more than covers the 8.0% that left.
Pressure-test this against your real numbers
Thirty minutes on whether the expansion loop or the leak is the cheaper thing to fix.
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How is net revenue retention calculated?
Take the MRR a group of customers paid you twelve months ago. Add the expansion they bought since, subtract the contraction and the churn, then divide by where they started. Gross retention runs the same division with expansion left out, which is why it can never exceed one hundred percent and net retention can.
Formula
Net revenue retention = (start + expansion − contraction − churn) ÷ start Gross revenue retention = (start − contraction − churn) ÷ start Expansion rate = expansion ÷ start Contraction and churn = (contraction + churn) ÷ start New customers won during the year are excluded from every line. They belong to a different cohort and counting them here would measure sales rather than retention.
- The window is twelve months, and it is fixed rather than configurable. Both published sources measure retention across twelve months, so a single month entered here would be compared against a benchmark it has nothing in common with.
- The cohort is closed. Customers who joined during the year are excluded from all four figures, because including them measures new business and calls the result retention.
- Contraction and churn are entered separately because they are different problems. A downgrade keeps a relationship that a cancellation ends, and only one of the two is usually recoverable with a conversation.
- This is revenue retention, not customer retention. A company can lose a third of its customers and hold net revenue retention above 100 percent if the ones that stayed grew, which is common in a business moving upmarket.
- Currency movement, price rises applied at renewal and discounts falling away all land inside expansion or contraction here. If a meaningful share of your movement is a list-price change rather than a customer decision, this figure describes your pricing rather than your product, and how seat and usage pricing are combined moves this number more than most retention work does.
When this number misleads
One net revenue retention figure across every segment describes none of them. A company selling to both self-serve and enterprise usually has an enterprise cohort above 110 percent and a self-serve cohort well under 90, and the blended number sits in the middle looking unremarkable while both halves are telling you something specific. SaaS Capital’s own finding is that retention rises with contract value, so a blended figure is mostly a statement about your customer mix. Split it by ACV band before you compare it to anything, and split it again if one segment is growing faster than the other.
What is a good net revenue retention rate?
Anything above 100 percent means a cohort of customers is worth more a year later than it was at the start, before a single new customer is added. Below 100 percent it decays, and new sales have to replace the gap before they add anything. The bands below come from two published surveys of private SaaS companies.
| Net revenue retention | Reading | Source of the edge |
|---|---|---|
| Under 100% | Leaking | Definitional, the cohort decays year over year |
| 100% to 110% | Solid | SaaS Capital 2025: median 102% at $25k to $50k ACV |
| 110% to 120% | Strong | ChartMogul: best-in-class sits in the 110 to 120 range |
| Over 120% | Elite | ChartMogul: the 90th percentile reaches 118.7% and 126.4% |
SaaS Capital’s 2025 research reports a median net revenue retention of 102 percent for private SaaS companies with an average contract value between $25,000 and $50,000, with the top quartile at 111 percent and the bottom quartile at 97 percent. It also finds that retention rises with contract value, which is the single most useful thing to know before comparing yourself to anybody.
ChartMogul’s SaaS Retention Report, drawn from more than 2,100 SaaS businesses, puts the 90th percentile of net revenue retention at 118.7 percent for companies between $15 million and $30 million in ARR, and at 126.4 percent for companies selling at an ARPA above $500 a month. It describes best-in-class as the 110 to 120 range. Its figures are measured over twelve months, which is why this tool fixes the window at twelve months rather than leaving it to the reader.
Why gross retention belongs next to it
Net revenue retention nets expansion against churn, so a strong expansion loop can hide a leaking account base. Gross retention removes expansion and asks the simpler question: of the revenue you started with, how much survived. The two numbers move independently and a board reads them together.
ChartMogul puts best-in-class gross retention above 86 percent at every stage of company, and around 95 percent for businesses selling to mid-market and enterprise. At the default figures on this page gross retention is 92 percent while net retention is 104 percent, which describes a company whose customers stay and whose expansion is thin. That is a different problem from a company at the same 104 percent built on 75 percent gross retention and heavy expansion, and only the pair tells you which one you are. The Churn Rate Calculator works the same loss out per month if you have the customer counts rather than the revenue.
Questions founders ask about this
What is a good net revenue retention rate for SaaS?
Above 100 percent means a cohort grows on its own. SaaS Capital reports a median of 102 percent for private SaaS companies at $25,000 to $50,000 average contract value, with the top quartile at 111 percent. ChartMogul describes 110 to 120 percent as best-in-class. Where you should sit depends on your contract value more than on your stage.
What is the difference between net and gross revenue retention?
Net revenue retention counts expansion, gross retention does not. Gross asks how much of the revenue you started with survived, so it can never exceed 100 percent. Net can, which is why a strong expansion loop can hide a leaking account base. Read them together or you will miss which of the two is carrying the number.
Should new customers be included in NRR?
No. Net revenue retention measures a closed group of customers you already had. Adding the ones you won during the year turns it into a growth metric and stops it saying anything about retention. If the number moves when your sales team has a good quarter, something has gone wrong with how it is being calculated.
Can net revenue retention be over 100 percent while customers are leaving?
Yes, and it often is. If the customers who stay expand faster than the departing ones took with them, revenue retention stays above 100 while customer retention falls. That is the ordinary picture for a company moving upmarket, and it is the reason the customer count and the revenue figure both belong in a board pack.
Do you store what I enter?
No. The calculation runs in your browser and nothing is transmitted. Your last inputs are saved in your own browser so the page remembers them when you return. If you use the email field, only the result summary and your address are sent.
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