Metric Definition
MAU
Monthly active users
Monthly active users counts the number of unique users who engage with your product within a 30-day rolling window. MAU is the broadest measure of your engaged user base and a key metric for growth, monetisation, and investor reporting.
6 min read
What is MAU?
Monthly active users (MAU) is the count of unique users who perform at least one qualifying action within a 30-day rolling period. It represents the total size of your actively engaged user base and is one of the most-reported metrics in product companies, investor decks, and public filings.
MAU matters because it captures the total addressable engaged audience: the full pool of users who interact with your product at any frequency. While DAU measures the daily core, MAU includes weekly users, bi-weekly users, and those who engage just once a month. This makes MAU a more inclusive metric that better represents total reach.
For products where daily use is not the natural pattern (expense tools, reporting platforms, seasonal products), MAU is often more relevant than DAU. A project management tool might have strong MAU even with moderate DAU, because many users check in weekly rather than daily. That does not mean engagement is weak; it means the product's usage rhythm is weekly.
MAU growth is one of the primary metrics investors evaluate because it indicates market adoption velocity. Rapidly growing MAU suggests product-market fit and successful user acquisition. Plateauing MAU suggests the product has saturated its initial market or is losing users as fast as it acquires them. Declining MAU is a clear danger signal indicating churn is exceeding acquisition.
How to measure MAU
Count the number of unique users who performed at least one qualifying action in the trailing 30-day window. The qualifying action should be the same meaningful core action used for DAU to maintain consistency. The DAU/MAU ratio then reveals how sticky the product is within that active base.
MAU is a rolling metric: each day, new users enter the 30-day window and users whose last activity was 31 days ago exit. This means MAU can change daily even without new sign-ups, based purely on user return behaviour.
For SaaS products with team or organisational accounts, track both user-level MAU and account-level MAU. User-level MAU shows individual engagement breadth. Account-level MAU shows how many organisations are actively using the product, which is more directly tied to revenue for seat-based or account-based pricing models.
| MAU variant | Definition | Use case |
|---|---|---|
| Standard MAU | Unique users active in past 30 days | General engagement and growth tracking |
| Paid MAU | MAU among paying customers only | Revenue-relevant engagement; excludes free tier |
| Account-level MAU | Unique accounts with at least one active user | B2B engagement; tied to account retention |
| Feature-level MAU | Unique users who used a specific feature in 30 days | Feature adoption and product development priorities |
MAU in a metric tree
MAU decomposes into the flows that add and remove users from the active base each month.
The tree shows that MAU growth comes from three positive flows (new users, retained users, resurrected users) minus one negative flow (churned users). Sustainable MAU growth requires that the sum of new plus resurrected users exceeds churned users, while the retained base remains stable or grows.
The most common MAU growth pattern for healthy products is: retained users form the large, stable base; new users provide growth on top; and churned users are a small fraction. If churned users begin to approach or exceed new users, MAU growth stalls regardless of acquisition efforts. Monitoring feature adoption rate helps explain what keeps retained users engaged month after month.
MAU benchmarks
| Metric | Benchmark | Context |
|---|---|---|
| MAU month-over-month growth | 5% to 15% | Strong growth for early-to-mid-stage products. |
| MAU retention (month-to-month) | 80% to 90%+ | Percentage of last month's MAU who are active again this month. |
| New user contribution to MAU | 10% to 30% | Healthy mix of new and returning. If >50%, retention may be weak. |
| Resurrection rate | 2% to 10% | Previously inactive users who return. Product updates and campaigns drive this. |
How to grow MAU
- 1
Improve retention before scaling acquisition
A strong retention rate is the foundation of sustainable MAU growth. If month-to-month retention is below 80%, investing in acquisition is like filling a leaky bucket. Fix the retention problem first, then scale acquisition.
- 2
Optimise activation for new sign-ups
A new user who never activates (performs a core action) will never become an MAU. Improving your activation rate through better onboarding flows, reduced time to first value, and guided walkthroughs ensures new users experience the product's core value.
- 3
Build features that create monthly return triggers
Monthly reports, renewal reminders, periodic check-ins, and collaborative features give users a reason to return at least monthly. The goal is to build at least one monthly usage habit.
- 4
Re-engage lapsed users systematically
Users who were active two to three months ago but have lapsed are the easiest to re-engage. Targeted campaigns highlighting new features or showing what they have missed can resurrect a meaningful portion.
- 5
Expand use cases within existing accounts
For B2B products, expanding from one team to multiple teams within the same organisation grows account-level MAU without any new acquisition cost.
Common mistakes with MAU
Counting MAU without defining "active"
If "active" means any server-side event, MAU includes automated syncs and background processes. Define active as a meaningful user-initiated action to ensure MAU reflects genuine engagement.
Celebrating MAU growth while retention declines
If MAU is growing only because new user sign-ups exceed churn, the growth is fragile. Track retention rate alongside MAU to ensure growth is sustainable.
Not distinguishing free and paid MAU
For freemium products, total MAU includes users who generate no revenue. Track paid MAU separately to understand the health of the monetised user base.
Using MAU for daily-use products
If your product is designed for daily use, MAU is too blunt a metric. Use DAU and the DAU/MAU ratio to understand engagement depth. MAU alone does not distinguish between a user who engages daily and one who logs in once a month.
Related metrics
Daily Active Users
DAU
Product MetricsMetric Definition
DAU = Unique Users Who Performed a Qualifying Action in a Single Day
Daily active users measures the number of unique users who engage with your product on a given day. It is the primary engagement metric for consumer and SaaS products, indicating whether your product has become a daily habit for its users.
DAU/MAU Ratio
Stickiness ratio
Product MetricsMetric Definition
DAU/MAU Ratio = DAU / MAU
The DAU/MAU ratio measures what proportion of monthly active users engage with your product every day. It is the most widely used indicator of product stickiness, revealing how deeply embedded your product is in users' daily routines.
Retention Rate
Product MetricsMetric Definition
Retention Rate = (Users Active at End of Period / Users Active at Start of Period) × 100
Retention rate measures the percentage of users or customers who continue to use your product over a given period. It is the most important growth metric because sustainable growth is impossible when users leave faster than they arrive.
Feature Adoption Rate
Product MetricsMetric Definition
Feature Adoption Rate = (Users Who Used the Feature / Total Active Users) × 100
Feature adoption rate measures the percentage of users who use a specific feature within a given period. It tells product teams whether new features are resonating with users and which existing features are underutilised, guiding investment decisions and roadmap priorities.
Understand what drives your MAU
Build a metric tree that decomposes MAU into new users, retained users, resurrected users, and churn so you can see which flows to optimise for sustainable growth.
