What is ARPU (average revenue per user)?

ARPU is an app's revenue in a period divided by all its active users in that period — paying or not.

If an app earns $3,000 in a month and had 10,000 active users, its monthly ARPU is $0.30. Because it counts free users too, ARPU shows what the whole audience is worth, which is the number that matters when you buy users or compare an ad-funded app with a paid one.

ARPU rises when more users pay, when they pay more, or when free users bring ad revenue.