How many cohort users are still active at month N?
№ 104 · Active wallets cohort
Definition
MetricShare of a signup cohort still transacting at month N
Unit% of original cohort still active
Triangular grid of % of cohort still active (any transaction in trailing 30 days). Newer cohorts retain better in modern fintech. Build by counting users with any transaction per month per cohort. Example: Oct 25 cohort 64% active at M5; Mar 26 cohort 100% at M0 (early days).
Benchmarks
| Bottom 30% | Median | Top 30% |
|---|---|---|
| Day 1 below 20% and day 30 at or below 4%, the pattern in investment and crypto apps acquired on paid traffic | Day 1 about 25 to 30%, day 7 about 12 to 18%, day 30 about 5 to 12% | Day 30 retention of 15% or better and a month-6 curve that flattens above 10%, the pattern seen in banking apps anchored to direct deposit or bill payment |
Consumer finance and fintech apps, install-based cohorts, Europe and Tier-1 Western markets, 2022 to 2026. Retention measured as an app open, which is a weaker event than a transaction, so a transaction-based active wallet curve will sit below these numbers. · The published benchmarks measure app opens, not funded transactions, and the gap matters. A wallet that counts only users with at least one transaction in the month will run materially below the AppsFlyer and Adjust figures for the same cohort. Sources disagree on fintech day 30: Business of Apps reports 4.2% across finance apps, the Adjust-derived figure is 11.6%, and UXCam puts strong performers at 10 to 15%. The spread is category composition rather than measurement error, since payments and crypto sit at the bottom and banking sits at the top of the same aggregate. Also note that nearly one in two Western European investment app installs was flagged as fraudulent, which means an uncleaned cohort chart in that category is measuring bots for its first few weeks.
| Category | Bottom 30% | Median | Top 30% |
|---|---|---|---|
| Traditional bank apps | roughly 12% at day 30 | roughly 15 to 20% at day 30 | day 30 at 1.5x to 2x the neobank level |
| Neobanks and digital wallets | below 6% at day 30 | roughly 8 to 12% at day 30 | roughly 12 to 15% at day 30 |
| Investment, trading and crypto apps | below 3% at day 30 | about 4% at day 30, 19% at day 1 | roughly 8% at day 30 |
| Payments and money transfer apps | below 3% at day 30 | about 4 to 6% at day 30 | retargeting driving 25 to 40% of conversions, day 30 near the finance median |
When it looks bad
The cohort curves never flatten, so instead of a decay that levels into a stable plateau after month 3 the lines keep sloping toward zero, which means the product has no habitual core and every month of growth has to be bought again.
Month 1 at 34%, month 3 at 11%, month 6 at 4%, month 12 at 1.4%, with the month-12 point falling for each successive cohort. There is no plateau, so cohort lifetime is finite and short.
What to do about it
- Filter install fraud before reading the chart at all. Nearly one in two Western European investment app installs was flagged as fraudulent, and iOS fraud rates in the finance vertical ran higher than Android despite the platform's quality premium, so an unfiltered curve overstates month 0 and understates every retention rate derived from it (AppsFlyer with Sensor Tower, 2026).
- Build a retargeting programme rather than treating retention as a product-only problem. Retargeting drove up to 85% of conversions for traditional banks against 3 to 4% for neobanks, and that gap is the single clearest correlate of the 1.5x to 2x day 30 retention difference between the two groups (AppsFlyer, 2025).
- Shift the activation event from install to first funded transaction and rebuild the cohort chart on that basis. About 14% of finance app users complete all activation steps by day 30, so a curve anchored on install is measuring a population that is mostly never going to transact (Business of Apps, 2026).
- Add a scheduled recurring reason to open the app, such as a bill reminder or a payday balance summary. Banking apps recorded about 12.5 hours per download in early 2026 against 8.8 for investment and money management apps, and the difference is scheduled utility rather than discretionary interest (AppsFlyer with Sensor Tower, 2026).
Sources
- AppsFlyer Investment apps retained 19% of users at day 1 and only 4% at day 30; traditional banks achieved day 30 retention 1.5 to 2x that of neobanks, with retargeting driving up to 85% of bank conversions versus 3 to 4% for neobanks. appsflyer.com ↗
- AppsFlyer, with Sensor Tower and Google Ads European finance installs reached 960m in 2025 with 0.4% growth; banking app users spent about 12.5 hours per download in early 2026 against 8.8 hours for investment and money management apps; web-to-app drove 41.8% of owned media conversions; nearly one in two Western European investment app installs was flagged as fraudulent. appsflyer.com ↗
- Business of Apps Finance apps average 4.2% day 30 retention with stock trading highest and payments lowest; about 14% of finance app users complete all activation steps by day 30. businessofapps.com ↗
- UXCam Day 30 retention of 10 to 15% for strong fintech performers against an all-category median near 4%. uxcam.com ↗
- CORE MBA Research, citing Adjust Mobile App Trends 2026 and AppsFlyer State of App Marketing Cross-industry 2026 medians of D1 25 to 26%, D7 11 to 13% and D30 5 to 7%, with fintech at D1 30%, D7 17.6% and D30 11.6%. core-mba.pro ↗
- Nu Holdings (Nubank) Monthly ARPAC reached USD 15.0 in Q4 2025, up from USD 11.1 a year earlier; monthly activity rate held at 83% and cost to serve at USD 0.80. international.nubank.com.br ↗
- Block, Inc. (SEC Form 8-K, Q3 2025 shareholder letter) Cash App gross profit per monthly transacting active reached USD 94.16 annualised in Q3 2025, up 25% year on year, with 8.3m primary banking actives. sec.gov ↗
- Chime Financial (SEC Form S-1/A) Defines a primary account relationship as 15 or more card purchases in a calendar month or one qualifying direct deposit of USD 200 or more, and defines payback as the point at which cumulative cohort transaction profit meets that cohort's acquisition cost. sec.gov ↗