What is Net Revenue Retention?

Definition

Net Revenue Retention (NRR) - sometimes called Net Dollar Retention (NDR) - measures the percentage of recurring revenue you retain from your existing customer base over a period, including expansion, contraction, and churn. It excludes new customer revenue.

NRR is the single most-cited metric in B2B SaaS investor decks because it captures three things in one number: how well you keep customers, how well you grow them, and how well your product compounds value.

Formula

NRR = (Starting ARR + Expansion - Contraction - Churn) / Starting ARR

See the full methodology and worked examples →

Benchmarks at a glance

• < 90% - Severe retention problem. Fix before scaling.
• 90-100% - Below typical SaaS range.
• 100-110% - Median public SaaS.
• 110-130% - Strong. Top half of public SaaS.
• 130%+ - Elite. Snowflake at IPO posted 158%.

See benchmarks broken down by vertical, stage, and ACV band →

Why NRR matters

A company with 130% NRR doubles revenue every ~2.5 years from existing customers alone, before counting any new sales. A company below 100% has a leaky bucket - new sales are filling a hole left by departing accounts.

NRR is also the single best predictor of long-term gross margin, because it captures retention quality without being polluted by go-to-market spend.