Where Our Growth Benchmark Numbers Come From

In our work we meet many leaders who cannot name their own growth numbers. Retention, K-factor, LTV:CAC and CAC payback are the leading indicators inside the product. They show where the business is going before the revenue line does. Find out yours before any other number.

The growth benchmark tool is the reference for that. Enter your numbers and see where each sits against its range.

Every range traces to a named publisher: Amplitude, Adjust, AppsFlyer, Benchmarkit and Pavilion, High Alpha (the former OpenView), KeyBanc, a16z, Reforge, Andrew Chen. Where no publisher has a matching number, the range is an estimate and the tool says so.

A monthly scan re-checks every source. A range changes only when a publisher with a disclosed methodology prints something newer.

Why the source matters more than the number

“Retention” alone is published two ways that sit about ten times apart. A page that quotes one next to the other looks authoritative while comparing two different things.

Cohort retention is the share of everyone who signed up (or installed) who is still active N days later. Amplitude, Mixpanel, AppsFlyer and Adjust publish this. It is what the tool asks you for.

Returning-user rate is the share of users active in one period who are active again in a later period. Most of that population survived the early drop, so the numbers read far higher. Pendo’s B2B figures (50 to 70% at Day 1, 25 to 35% at 90 days) are the ones that circulate.

Until July 2026 the tool graded your cohort number against Pendo’s returning-user ranges. A B2B product with an ordinary 10% Day-7 cohort retention got told it was failing.

We re-sourced every B2B retention range to cohort data. We rewrote the articles on this site that had repeated the mix-up. If you have seen “B2B Day-1 retention is 50 to 70%” somewhere, that is Pendo’s returning-user rate.

The ranges and their sources

B2B SaaS, cohort retention

Day 90 is the only B2B point with a published, population-matched figure, so it anchors the curve. The earlier points are built to be consistent with it: each must sit at or above the next.

We cross-checked them against Amplitude’s cross-industry data. There the 90th-percentile Day-1 cohort return is 21% and Day 7 about 12%. Those cross-checks are pooled across industries, so they cannot source a B2B range. They do say our ceilings are generous rather than strict.

Consumer apps, cohort retention

Consumer publishers measure cohort retention natively, so these ranges needed no re-sourcing.

Unit economics and virality

K-factor is our least-sourced metric. Reforge and Andrew Chen give the reasoning and the ranges. Every scan since June 2026 has looked for a Tier 1 empirical study with a disclosed sample and found none. The aggregators it found all trace back to one blog compilation. We keep the range because the reasoning holds.

Marketplaces

Two-sided marketplaces get their own ranges. They are graded monthly rather than daily, because that is how the source material benchmarks them.

• Buyer retention: 50 to 70% at month 1, 30 to 50% at month 6 and 20 to 50% at month 12 (a16z, Reach Capital, Lenny Rachitsky, Casey Winters).
• GMV growth: 3.4 to 5.9% a month (converted from Bowery Capital’s and a16z’s yearly ranges).
• Take rate: 10 to 20%, with a large spread by subtype (Wall Street Prep, Sharetribe).
• Fill rate: 30 to 60% (Lenny Rachitsky, Simon Rothman at Greylock).

Why some ranges are estimates, and why we say so

Nobody publishes B2B Day-1 cohort retention for a population that matches Amplitude’s Day-90 set. The tool marks the range as an estimate and shows how it was built.

An estimate labelled as an estimate tells you the order of magnitude and how much to trust it. An estimate dressed as a sourced fact invites you to set a target on a number nobody measured.

The tool used to grade activation and onboarding completion. An audit in June 2026 looked for the sources behind those ranges. The only published onboarding-completion figures (Userpilot’s 2024 report, a vendor sample of 188 companies) sat two to four times below our range. Activation rates depend so much on each company’s own definition that no published range matched ours. Those ranges are gone from the tool.

How the numbers change

A researcher agent runs a scan every month across the publishers above. It also covers the ones we would want to hear from (Mixpanel, RevenueCat, Bessemer, ICONIQ, ChartMogul, SaaS Capital, Point Nine). Every finding is logged in a version-controlled file with its source, date, sample size and a tier:

• Tier 1: an established benchmark publisher with a stated methodology and sample size.
• Tier 2: a credible analyst or vendor with partial disclosure.
• Tier 3: blogs, aggregators and unsourced posts.

A range changes only when a Tier 1 or Tier 2 source with a disclosed methodology has published something newer than the source we cite. Tier 3 material is logged and never acted on. When credible sources conflict, the log lists all of them rather than averaging. A person reads each run and decides what to port into the tool.

The July 2026 consumer Day-30 range came out of that process. AppsFlyer’s median and Adjust’s aggregate landed in the same month, and the range was built to bracket both.

Numbers we read and did not adopt

SaaS Capital’s 22% median growth rate. SaaS Capital’s 2026 reports put the median growth rate of private SaaS companies at 22%, down from 25% in 2024.

Those are Tier 1 numbers, and they answer a different question from the one the tool asks. The tool grades the mechanics underneath growth: cohort retention, unit economics and virality. If we ever add a revenue-growth range, SaaS Capital is where it would come from.

Adjust’s global retention averages. Adjust’s user retention guide puts global retention at 26% on day 1, 13% by day 7 and 7% at day 30, across all platforms and verticals. All three sit inside our consumer ranges (20 to 30%, 8 to 15%, 3 to 7%), so the ranges stand.

The averages are single numbers, and a range is more honest about the spread between apps. Adjust’s own vertical cuts run from 20% on day 1 for e-commerce to 29% for gaming.

Mixpanel’s 5.0% one-week B2B retention. Mixpanel’s 2026 State of Digital Analytics puts North American one-week B2B retention at 5.0%. Against Pendo’s 40 to 60% returning-user rate, it sits far below. Against our Day-7 cohort range of 4 to 20%, it sits inside.

Pendo’s returning-user rates. We keep them, labelled, and do not grade against them. If you measure returning users rather than cohorts, Pendo’s ranges are the right comparison for you.

How to read a range

First, find out which metric your own dashboard reports. A “retention” tile built on active users is a returning-user rate, not cohort retention.

Second, place your number inside the range for your product type and read the status next to it. A sourced range is a reference class; an estimate is an order of magnitude.

Third, look at the shape of your curve rather than any single point. A cohort curve that flattens at 3% has found a durable core. One still sliding at Day 60 has not.

See where your own numbers land against these ranges. The free benchmark tool charts your retention, K-factor, LTV:CAC and CAC payback against the B2B, consumer or marketplace ranges above. Each source is one click away, and it takes six minutes.