What is Gross Churn?
Definition
The total revenue lost from cancellations and downgrades in a period, before accounting for expansion revenue from existing customers.
Understanding Gross Churn
Gross churn measures the raw revenue loss from your subscriber base — how much money walked out the door. It includes both voluntary cancellations and involuntary churn from payment failures. Gross churn is always negative and does not include expansion revenue.
The distinction from net churn matters: a company might have 10% gross churn but only 5% net churn because expansion revenue offsets half the losses. For consumers, gross churn rates of services you subscribe to indicate overall satisfaction levels — high gross churn may signal a service in decline.
Related Terms
Churn Rate
The percentage of subscribers who cancel their subscription during a given time period, typically measured monthly or annually.
Net Revenue Retention
A metric measuring the percentage of recurring revenue retained from existing customers, including expansions, contractions, and churn.
Voluntary Churn
Subscriber cancellations that occur by the customer's deliberate choice, as opposed to involuntary churn from payment failures.
Involuntary Churn
Subscriber loss that occurs due to payment failures rather than the customer's deliberate choice to cancel.