MAU limits

This article explains how exceeding the Monthly Active Users (MAU) threshold for your subscription impacts your account so that you can continue to interpret your data with confidence as your MAU count increases.

Pendo uses the MAU metric to monitor the number of unique, active visitors within the last 30 calendar days. This metric indicates the size of your active user base and plays a key role in determining the Pendo plan that best accommodates your user base.

If you have multiple apps in your subscription, unique visitors are calculated individually for each app. For example, if your subscription has two apps and a single visitor engages with both of those apps in a 30-day period, it counts as 2 MAU.

Note: Depending on your subscription settings and Pendo plan, how we calculate anonymous and identified visitors and bill for your monthly active users (MAU) might vary. For more information, contact your Pendo account representative.

Impact of exceeding MAU threshold

After you exceed your MAU threshold, you lose access to certain functionalities until you upgrade to a subscription that supports your MAU count.

Since Pendo calculates MAU on a rolling 30-day basis, it's possible your access could fluctuate. For example, if you have a MAU threshold of 500 and reach 501 MAU on June 1 and then 499 MAU on June 2, you see generalized trends in your on June 1 and all of your data again on June 2.

If you encounter frequent fluctuations in access, we recommend upgrading to a higher plan to avoid disruptions in your Pendo experience. To get started with your upgrade, see our plan comparison page. When you upgrade, you retain all event data collected since installing Pendo on your application and maintain all subscription configurations.

Daily random sampling

If you exceed your plan's MAU threshold, Pendo checks your MAU count and selects a random sample of visitors once daily to help provide general insights and trends.

Aggregate data

Aggregate data is a summarized view of usage information, combining data from multiple visitors to show general patterns. Visitors who aren't part of the random sample that day won't have their data included in these aggregate summaries. This affects the data you see on pages that are specific to visitors, such as the Visitors page, Visitor Details page, visitor reports, poll responses, and any other instances where data is combined. The same applies for accounts.

While you won't see aggregate data for visitors outside of the random sample, you can still view detailed information for a specific visitor by searching the Visitors page to access the Visitor Details page. However, if a visitor isn't part of the random sample on a particular day, their aggregate data appears blank in the summaries.

This can also cause inconsistencies when comparing segments and reports. The list of eligible visitors always shows the full visitor list, regardless of your MAU threshold, to provide accuracy and clarity when targeting in-app guides. Meanwhile, all reports and analytics only show visitors included in that day's random sample.

Example

In this example, all nine visitors within the segment weren't included in that day's random sample. The segment list shows nine eligible visitors, and the visitor report shows zero visitors because this is considered aggregate data.

This daily random sampling helps ensure that you're always seeing the most reliable trends. To get the most reliable view of data, we recommend working with your full data set by upgrading to a plan that meets your MAU needs.

Total versus unique attempts

When you exceed your MAU threshold, data calculations might show numbers higher than this count. This is likely because the data measures total attempts or interactions instead of unique visitors. Total attempts count every interaction a visitor makes, whereas unique visitors only count the latest interaction per visitor.

For example, if three visitors interact with the same Feature in a specific timeframe where:

• Visitor A interacts with a specific Feature 5 times.
• Visitor B interacts with the same Feature 10 times.
• Visitor C interacts with that Feature 20 times.

These visits count as 35 total attempts by 3 unique visitors. However, if you've exceeded your MAU threshold and visitor C is excluded from the daily random sample, we show 15 total interactions by 2 unique visitors.

While our path reporting tool calculates total attempts, our Monthly Visitors chart on the Visitors page calculates unique visitors. You can configure funnels and many dashboard widgets to show either total attempts (typically "views" or "clicks") or unique visitors or accounts.

Note: You can also encounter data calculations for numbers higher than your MAU threshold if a previously inactive visitor becomes active after the random sample has been determined. In this case, the newly active visitor isn't considered for exclusion until the next sampling occurs.

Generalized trends

If your subscription exceeds the MAU threshold, aggregate data is presented as generalized trends based on a sampling of unique visitors equal to your MAU threshold. We randomize this sample daily to ensure the most accurate trendlines. The more you go over your MAU threshold, the less accurate your data is.

Exceeding your MAU threshold and only seeing aggregate data impacts the following:

• All behavioral reporting tools, including retention, funnels, paths, and Data Explorer
• Guide metrics
• NPS metrics
• Visitors and Accounts pages
• Visitor and account reports
• Visitor and Account Details pages
• Dashboard widgets, excluding Guide Overview, Page Overview, and Feature Overview

For example, if the threshold is 500 MAU and your subscription has a total of 10,000 MAU, only display data from 500 visitors. Below is what the difference could look like in the Daily Active Users chart.

• When you exceed your MAU threshold:
  
• When you're within your MAU threshold:
  

Unaffected data

Even when exceeding your MAU threshold, certain data and metrics remain unaffected to ensure crucial insights and functionalities continue to operate without interruption. The following data is considered functional, rather than aggregate, and is always correct, regardless of how much you exceeded your MAU threshold:

• List of eligible visitors when viewing segments. To ensure clarity when targeting guides, segments always show the correct number of visitors, regardless of whether they're included in that day's random sample.
• List of users applied to a guide.
• Visitor guide eligibility. All visitors are still able to view and interact with guides if you're over your MAU threshold. However, Guide Events from visitors excluded from that day's random sample are filtered out of the metrics.