Customer Retention Rate (CRR)
What Is Customer Retention Rate?
Customer Retention Rate (CRR) is a core CX metric that shows how many existing customers your company retains over a defined period—excluding any new customers acquired during that time. It gives a clear view of whether customers are choosing to stay and continue using your product, which is often a stronger indicator of value than any single satisfaction score.
While many CX metrics focus on sentiment or transactional moments, CRR tracks actual behavior. It’s outcome-driven: are customers sticking with you long enough to grow, expand, and realize the full value of your platform?
In SaaS, retention is everything. A company with high retention can grow faster, spend less on acquisition, and build a more predictable revenue engine. CRR is often monitored alongside churn rate, Net Revenue Retention (NRR), and Customer Lifetime Value (CLTV) to paint a holistic picture of customer health.
What makes CRR unique is its simplicity—it’s not skewed by upsells, expansion revenue, or logo additions. It tells you if customers who signed up are still here. And that makes it one of the most honest KPIs in customer experience.
Why Customer Retention Rate Matters in SaaS CX
Retention is the output of everything you deliver—product, support, onboarding, value. CRR tells you how many customers actually stay. Here’s why it matters:
Growth Foundation: High retention drives compounding revenue. Without it, acquisition spend leaks value before it pays off.
Experience Validation: If customers are leaving, something isn’t working—regardless of satisfaction scores. CRR shows whether your experience earns long-term trust.
Benchmark for Success: CRR offers a clear, quantifiable target for CX and Success teams to align around, quarter after quarter.
Cohort-Level Clarity: Measured over time, CRR helps identify which segments stay longer—and why—guiding product and go-to-market strategy.
How to Measure CRR
To calculate Customer Retention Rate, use this formula:
CRR = ((E − N) / S) × 100
Where:
- E = Number of customers at the end of the period
- N = Number of new customers acquired during the period
- S = Number of customers at the start of the period
Example:
If you started with 200 customers, ended with 220, and acquired 40 new ones in that period:
CRR = ((220 − 40) / 200) × 100 = 90%
This means 90% of your existing customers stayed with you—an indicator of CX strength.
Customer Retention Rate is a critical pulse check on how well your company delivers value over time. Improving CRR doesn't just protect your recurring revenue—it strengthens every part of your business, from onboarding to renewals. For CX, product, and revenue leaders, it’s a foundational KPI that ties customer happiness to business health. The more customers you keep, the more sustainable your growth becomes.