ARPA (Average revenue per account)
ARPA is the average a paying customer pays you each month: your monthly recurring revenue divided by the number of paying customers.
Worked example (made-up numbers)
Your MRR is $645 from 35 paying customers. ARPA is $645 ÷ 35 ≈ $18.43.
If you add a $49 plan and 5 customers move up to it, MRR rises to $795 and ARPA to about $22.71, with no new customers at all.
ARPA or ARPU?
ARPU (average revenue per user) divides by every user, free ones included. With 400 free users and 35 paying, ARPU is $645 ÷ 435 ≈ $1.48. Both are useful: ARPA says what a customer is worth each month; ARPU says what a signup is worth. Say which one you mean.
Why it matters when you’re starting out
ARPA is half of LTV: what a customer pays each month times how long they stay. Raising it (a higher plan, yearly billing, a paid add-on) is often easier than halving churn, and it changes what you can afford to spend to win a customer.
It also shows whether your pricing matches your audience. A low ARPA with many customers on the cheapest plan may mean your top plan offers nothing the audience needs, or that you’re attracting people who were never going to pay more.
How to measure it
- Work out MRR per currency.
- Count paying customers with an active subscription in that currency.
- Divide. Watch it monthly, next to new customers and churn.
Don’t count trials or free accounts in the denominator; that is ARPU. And compare like with like: a month with many new yearly customers can move ARPA without anyone paying more.
In Nordva Launch
Launch shows ARPA per currency next to monthly churn and 12-month LTV on the Insights page, from your Stripe subscriptions, read-only. It’s on every plan with Stripe connected.