Your mobile app’s success depends on how well you can get users to adopt your product and stick around.
User adoption refers to the process a mobile app user goes through to become accustomed to an app and start using it repeatedly. According to angel investor Andrew Chen: “The single most telling metric for a great product is how many of them become dedicated, repeat users.” Why? By improving your user adoption, you can increase retention and revenue while minimizing your mobile app’s churn.
However, that’s often easier said than done. Research shows that 25% of mobile users quit using an app after only one use. Another study from Simform also discovered that while the average user has 40 apps installed on their phone, they’re only active on about half of them.
You need to track these five adoption metrics to improve adoption because they measure your user activity and behavior. Based on these insights, you can determine whether users are sticking around and getting the most out of your app.
1. Daily and Monthly Active Users (DAU/MAU)
As the name suggests, Daily Active Users (DAU) is the number of users who log into your app at least once each day. Monthly Active Users (MAU) refers to the number of users who’ve logged in at least once in the past 30 days.
Your DAU and MAU are the most basic adoption metrics to track because they give you an idea of the general health of your app’s usage. However, while having a high DAU/MAU indicates that users are using your app, it doesn’t on its own indicate how users are adopting your app. You need to consider your DAU/MAU metric alongside other metrics — like average user time, which we’ll see soon — to get a full picture of your app usage.
How to Calculate DAU/MAU:
Measuring your daily and monthly active users is pretty straightforward:
DAU = The total number of unique daily users in the past 30 days
MAU = The total number of users who were active at least once in the past 30 days
2. User “Stickiness”
Your stickiness is the measure of how frequently users return to your app over 30 days. Getting users to "stick" to your app is important because loyal users drive revenue and lifetime value.
You don’t want users to sign up to your app and never log back in again.
How to Calculate It:
DAU / MAU = User Stickiness
Let’s say your food-delivery app has 300 Daily Active Users (DAU) and 1,000 Monthly Active Users (MAU). By calculating our stickiness with our formula, we get the following result:
300 / 1000 = 0.30
In other words, you have a user stickiness of 30%, which means your user comes back to your app every 10 - 11 days to order food.
3. Average User Session
The Average User Session metric tells you how long a user is on your app each time they log in. There is no one number that makes for a “good” average user session. You have to identify what makes a good Average User Session based on your own app.
A food-delivery app, for example, wants users to spend little time on their app. Users should be able to log in, quickly order the food they want, and wait until they get a notification that their food has arrived. On the other hand, a mobile game wants users to spend as much time as possible on their app.
How to Calculate It:
To calculate the average user session, use the formula below:
Average User Session = Sum of all users’ individual sessions / total number of sessions in a day
So, for ease, let’s say you had three users in one day. They each used your app for 10, 15, and 23 minutes, respectively. Your formula would look like this:
(10+15+23 minutes)/3 sessions = 16 minute average user session
4. Feature Adoption Rate
Your Feature Adoption Rate measures how many users are using a specific feature compared to your total number of app users. The metric helps you determine if users are actually adopting a feature you released and identify which features users are ignoring along with which ones are the most popular among users.
Suppose you notice users aren’t adopting a particular feature (maybe they don’t find it vital to their product experience). In that case, you can decide to remove it from your app and use the space for other features.
On the other hand, if you notice that certain features are quite popular among users, you might want to showcase them during your onboarding process to hook more new users.
How to Calculate It:
First, identify which feature you want to measure. For your food-delivery app, maybe you want to monitor how many users are using your delivery tracking feature. Use the formula below to track how many users are adopting the feature:
Feature Adoption Rate = Number of feature users / number of total app users
5. Time To Value (TTV)
Your Time To Value (TTV) refers to the amount of time it takes for your user to take a pivotal action, like signing up for a membership or making a purchase. A low TTV allows you to drive revenue from your app as quickly as possible and increases the chances of the user sticking to your product.
How to Calculate It:
First, you need to define what TTV means to you (whether it’s a product upgrade, when the user reaches their “aha” moment, or when they finish their onboarding). In the case of our food-delivery app, your TTV could be when the user makes their first order with your app.
Then, you need to calculate the time it takes the user to get to their TTV after they signed up for the first time.
Measuring Engagement Starts With the Right Adoption Metrics
For your app to succeed, you need to do more than just acquire new users. Keeping track of your adoption metrics helps you monitor your app’s engagement and determine whether you need to step up your retention efforts.
For example, to improve engagement, you might decide to include chat and in-app messaging as one of your app features to make users feel more connected. Or integrate an activity feed to build a sense of community.
