Gross revenue retention (GRR) is the percentage of recurring revenue a company keeps from its existing customers over a period, after churn and downgrades and before any expansion.
The GRR formula and the 100% ceiling
The formula is starting recurring revenue, minus revenue lost to churn and downgrades, divided by starting recurring revenue. Expansion is left out, so GRR tops out at 100%. Where net revenue retention shows whether the existing base grew, GRR shows how much of it held. A team needs both, because strong upsells in a few accounts can push NRR past 100% while many accounts quietly shrink.
GRR moves on the renewal call, in the downgrade request an account manager does not see coming, and in the QBR where value is confirmed or left vague. Our account expansion guide covers how a manager coaches those conversations on live accounts; the starting point for most of them is a customer QBR run on the customer's measures.
Example
Stripe's example: a business starts the month with $100,000 of MRR and loses $5,000 to downgrades and cancellations, so GRR is 95%. Add an illustrative $8,000 of upgrades in the same month and NRR is 103%. The team grew its base and still lost one dollar in twenty. On a renewal forecast, that $5,000 is the line to coach: which accounts it came from, and what the account manager heard, or missed, before it happened.
The question a manager asks in the 1:1
When GRR slips, ask the account manager: "For the accounts that downgraded, what did the customer say about value in the last conversation before the notice, and did we write it down?" A good answer names the account, the date and the buyer's words: "At the March QBR their ops lead said the second warehouse team had gone back to spreadsheets, and we never followed it up." A weak answer is "they cut budget", with no conversation behind it. The weak answer is the one to coach, because it usually means the downgrade was decided in a meeting nobody on the team was in.
Related terms
- What is net revenue retention?: GRR plus expansion
- What is expansion revenue?: the line GRR leaves out
- What is a customer health score?: the early warning teams use for churn
- How to run a renewal call: the conversation that decides most of GRR
FAQ
Can gross revenue retention be over 100%? No. GRR subtracts churn and downgrades from starting revenue and adds nothing back, so the result cannot go above 100%. A figure above 100% means expansion revenue has slipped into the calculation, which makes it net revenue retention.
What is the difference between GRR and NRR? GRR leaves out expansion and NRR includes it. GRR shows how much starting revenue the team kept; NRR shows whether the existing base grew overall. Read together, they show whether growth came from healthy accounts or from a few large upsells covering losses.
What is a good gross revenue retention rate? Stripe calls 85% or above healthy and 90% or higher ideal for most SaaS businesses, with some enterprise companies reaching 95%. The right target depends on segment and contract length, so compare against your own trend by segment first.