Monthly Active Users

A key performance metric measuring the number of unique users who interact with a website or application within a 30-day period.

Monthly Active Users (MAU) is a key performance indicator that measures the total number of unique, registered users who perform a qualifying action on a digital platform within a given 30-day window. It is widely used by social media networks, software-as-a-service (SaaS) providers, mobile gaming studios, and digital publishers to assess the scale and health of their user base. To calculate MAU, a company must define what constitutes an "active" user. While some platforms count any login or app launch, others require a specific action, such as sending a message, streaming content, or making a transaction. Because the metric tracks unique individuals, a single user who logs in fifty times during the month is counted only once. Investors monitor this metric quarter-over-quarter and year-over-year to evaluate user acquisition, retention, and overall platform traction. For investors, MAU is a foundational metric because it dictates a company's monetization potential. A growing MAU base expands the inventory available for digital advertising and increases the pool of potential paying subscribers. However, a common pitfall is relying on MAU in isolation. A company can artificially inflate MAU through expensive marketing campaigns, even if those users never return. Therefore, analysts often pair MAU with engagement ratios, such as Daily Active Users divided by Monthly Active Users (DAU/MAU), to determine how sticky the platform actually is.

A streaming service defines an active user as any account that plays at least one video during a calendar month. In October, the platform records 50,000,000 total logins, but these logins came from only 12,000,000 unique accounts. The Monthly Active Users (MAU) for October is 12,000,000.