Founder Triage

Free tool

Free-to-paid conversion calculator

For freemium products: free accounts in the period, and how many of them paid. One rate. Then the reasons that rate is not a diagnosis.

Accounts that could have paid. Include people who later upgraded.

How many of those free users paid in the period you care about.

What the rate is

Free-to-paid conversion is paying customers divided by free users, for one cohort or one window. A 2% rate on 2,000 free users is a different fact from 2% on 50. The first can be planned around. The second is a coin flip wearing a percentage.

Sample size

Under about 100 free users, do not compare yourself to a benchmark you read somewhere. One extra upgrade moves the rate by a full point or more. Wait for a larger cohort, or look at the step above: are people even reaching the moment where paying is a sensible question?

Why the rate does not identify the cause

The same 2% can come from any of these, and the fixes conflict:

  • People never reached value, so “upgrade” was a guess.
  • They reached value, and the free plan already included it.
  • The pain is real and occasional. They will not pay monthly for a rare job.
  • The price is the wrong shape: too much commitment, not too many dollars.
  • The free users are not buyers. Students, tire-kickers, or your own peers.

Cutting the price, adding a feature, and rewriting the landing page cannot all be the first experiment. Pick the step that is actually thin — activation, or the upgrade moment — before you touch the other one.

Limitations

  • It ignores churn. A high conversion into a plan people cancel in week two is not a win.
  • It ignores which free users were active. Dividing by every signup, including abandoned ones, mixes activation into the price question.
  • It is not a forecast. Last month’s rate is not next month’s revenue.

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