one-line definition
Stickiness measures how frequently your monthly users return to your product on a daily basis, indicating how essential it is to their workflow.
formula: Stickiness = DAU ÷ MAU × 100 (same as DAU/MAU ratio). Above 20% = good, above 50% = exceptional.
tl;dr
High stickiness means users need your product regularly — it's a proxy for product-market fit. If users sign up but only visit 2-3 times per month, look for ways to create daily triggers: notifications, integrations, or workflow hooks.
Simple definition
Stickiness is the DAU/MAU ratio expressed as a percentage. It answers a simple question: of the people who use your product this month, how many come back every day? A stickiness of 25% means one in four monthly users opens your product on any given day. For solo founders, stickiness is the clearest signal of habit formation — high stickiness means your product is embedded in someone's routine, not just bookmarked.
How to calculate it
Divide your Daily Active Users by your Monthly Active Users and multiply by 100.
Formula: Stickiness = DAU ÷ MAU × 100
If you have 200 DAU and 1,000 MAU, your stickiness is 20%. Measure DAU as an average over the month (sum of daily DAUs divided by days in month) for a more stable number.
Example
You build a habit-tracking app. Your MAU is 3,000. On an average day, 450 users open the app. Stickiness = 450 ÷ 3,000 × 100 = 15%. That's below the 20% threshold. You add a morning push notification with yesterday's streak count. Over the next month, average DAU climbs to 690 while MAU stays roughly the same. New stickiness: 23%. The notification created a daily trigger that turned occasional users into regulars — and regular users are far more likely to upgrade to paid.
Related reading
Related terms
- DAU/MAU Ratio
- Retention Cohort
- Session Duration
FAQ
What is a good stickiness ratio for a SaaS product?+
Above 20% is solid for most B2B tools. Above 50% means your product is part of the daily workflow — think Slack or email. Below 13% suggests a tool people use occasionally but don't depend on.
How do I improve stickiness without annoying users?+
Build features that create natural daily triggers — dashboards that update overnight, digest emails, or integrations with tools people already open daily like Slack or their calendar.