Daily Active Users
DAU (Daily Active Users)
The count of unique users who perform at least one qualifying action in an app or platform within a given day. DAU is a primary engagement metric for consumer apps and is divided by MAU to produce the DAU/MAU ratio (stickiness). For products targeting daily usage habits, a DAU/MAU ratio above 20% is generally considered healthy.
How Daily Active Users works in practice
Defining "active" precisely is critical — an app open with no meaningful action should not count as DAU, as it inflates the metric without reflecting genuine engagement. The "qualifying action" definition depends on the product: for a trading app, executing a trade or checking a position; for a productivity tool, completing a task or creating a document. DAU trends provide the earliest signal of product health changes — a 5-day trailing DAU decline often precedes visible changes in MAU or churn rate by 3–4 weeks, giving early warning to diagnose issues. DAU/MAU ratio (stickiness) is the cleanest normalised engagement metric for comparing products: a ratio above 50% indicates near-daily habitual usage; below 20% suggests the product is used occasionally rather than habitually.
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If installs are up but activation is flat, the onboarding funnel is where I'd start.
Let's talk →This term sits in the Mobile & App category, which means it is most useful when evaluating app acquisition, onboarding, retention, and in-app activation. The goal is not to memorize the label. The goal is to know when it should change a decision, a page, a campaign, or a measurement setup.
Related terms
The count of unique users who perform at least one qualifying action within a calendar month. MAU growth rate is a primary KPI for consumer apps, reported alongside the DAU/MAU ratio and cohort retention curves. "Active" must be defined as a meaningful action (not just an app open) to prevent inflated counts from low-intent sessions.
The percentage of users who are still active in an app 7 days after their initial install or sign-up. D7 retention is a leading indicator of product-market fit — apps with D7 retention above 20% typically sustain significantly stronger 30-day and 90-day retention. Comparing D7 by acquisition channel and cohort identifies which channels bring the most genuinely engaged users.
The percentage of customers who cancel or do not renew within a given period. High churn erodes MRR growth and increases CAC payback period, making retention optimisation as important as acquisition for sustainable growth.
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