How much is a subscriber worth to your store over their lifetime?
What is a subscriber worth to your store?
Enter your own numbers. The calculator starts on the worked example further down this page. Leave the acquisition cost empty if you don’t track it.
All results are estimates from your inputs, not figures from your store.
How does the LTV calculator work?
- Average lifetime (months) = 1 ÷ monthly churn rate. With the same churn rate every month, this is how long a subscription lasts on average: at 5%, 1 ÷ 0.05 = 20 months.
- Orders per subscriber = average lifetime × orders per month. Orders per month come from the delivery interval: every week = 52 ÷ 12, every 2 weeks = 26 ÷ 12, every 4 weeks = 13 ÷ 12, every month = 1, every 2 months = ½, every 3 months = ⅓.
- Lifetime revenue per subscriber = orders per subscriber × average order value.
- Lifetime gross profit per subscriber (LTV) = lifetime revenue × gross margin. The gross margin is what’s left of an order after the cost of the goods; take off shipping and payment fees too if that’s how you calculate.
- LTV:CAC = lifetime gross profit ÷ what you spend to win one subscriber (customer acquisition cost). Above 1, a subscriber earns back what it cost to win them.
- Extra gross profit at 1 point less churn = the LTV at your churn rate minus 1 point, minus the LTV today.
What is a subscriber worth at 5% monthly churn?
Example (made-up numbers): an average order value of €30, monthly delivery, a gross margin of 60%, a monthly churn rate of 5% and an acquisition cost of €90 per subscriber.
| Result | Calculation | Value |
|---|---|---|
| Average subscription lifetime | 1 ÷ 5% | 20 months |
| Orders per subscriber | 20 × 1 | 20 |
| Lifetime revenue per subscriber | 20 × €30 | €600 |
| Lifetime gross profit per subscriber (LTV) | €600 × 60% | €360 |
| LTV:CAC | €360 ÷ €90 | 4 |
| Extra gross profit at 4% churn | 25 × €30 × 60% − €360 | €90 |
The lower churn already is, the more each point is worth: in the same example, going from 3% to 2% churn adds €300 of gross profit per subscriber.
Treat the LTV as a ceiling on what you spend to win a subscriber, and check it early: compare what your newest subscribers bring in their first months with what they cost to win. As ad spend grows, new subscribers often cancel sooner.
What does the estimate leave out?
- Changing churn. New subscribers often cancel earlier than long-standing ones, so a single rate is an average.
- Skips and pauses. They lower the orders a subscriber places compared with the delivery interval.
- Discounts. Enter the order value after the subscription discount.
- Timing. A euro in two years counts the same as one today; there is no discount rate.
How does Zubs raise a subscriber’s lifetime value?
Churn sits in the denominator, so halving it doubles the lifetime and the LTV with it. Zubs works on churn with a cancellation flow that answers each reason with an offer, a customer portal where subscribers skip or change orders themselves, payment retries and Sequential Flows that reward subscribers at set orders. If many cancel in their first months, start with the early-churn playbook.
Bottom line
A subscriber’s lifetime value is order value × orders per month ÷ monthly churn rate, and at gross margin it tells you how much you can spend to win one. Churn moves it most, and every point less adds more than the one before.
Frequently asked questions
- Should I look at lifetime revenue or lifetime gross profit?
- At gross profit when you compare it with what you spend to win a subscriber. Revenue includes the cost of the goods you ship, so comparing it with acquisition cost makes a subscriber look more valuable than they are.
- Why does the calculator need a churn rate above 0%?
- The average lifetime is 1 ÷ churn rate, which has no end at 0%. If you had no cancellations last month, take the churn rate over a longer period, such as the average of the last 12 months.
- Should I use a monthly or a yearly churn rate?
- Monthly. The lifetime comes out in months, and the delivery interval turns it into orders.
- Is my data stored or sent anywhere?
- No. The calculation runs in your browser, and nothing you enter leaves the page.