What Is Cohort Retention?
Cohort retention tracks the percentage of users from a specific signup period (cohort) who remain active at each subsequent month. A retention curve that flattens above 30–40% indicates strong product-market fit. Steep early drop-offs signal onboarding problems.
Why it matters: this metric helps founders separate random variation from real business movement. Decisions improve when the metric is tracked in trend form, not one-off snapshots.
How to use it in practice: pair this metric with at least one upstream and one downstream signal. That way, you can explain why it changed and what action should come next.
In Assist Founder, this term appears in context with related indicators so you can move from definition to decision without switching tools.