How to Increase Active Users on Mobile App? 10 Best Practices for 2026

So, you’ve overcome all the challenges and finally launched your app. What now? Chasing downloads may sound like a logical next step, but here lies a pitfall that destroyed many promising applications. Sure, there’s nothing wrong with trying to get some attention from your target audience, yet getting them to download your product is just the first step. While an average user has over 80 apps installed on their smartphone, they regularly use only about 9 of them. What’s more, nearly 25% of users abandon an app after a single use.

In a digital environment that abounds with options, staying on top of the market is not easy, and turning casual downloads into loyal, genuine customers is even harder. Still, it is achievable if you have the right strategy at hand.

In this guide, we’ll describe how to increase active users for your mobile app. The 10 practices we’re going to discuss will serve you well, whether you strive to re-engage dormant users or reach new audiences. 

What Are Active Users (DAU, MAU)?

Active users are the people who regularly interact with your app. They explore features, consume content, make purchases, or take any other meaningful actions appropriate for your niche. Your app’s success and profitability largely depend on this user category.

To get a clear picture of their performance and user behavior trends, brands divide active users into three groups: 

•  Daily active users (DAU)
•  Weekly active users (WAU)
•  Monthly active users (MAU)

MAU is your overall audience size and long-term engagement, while DAU is the part of your audience that has developed a habit of using your app. 

DAU/MAU Ratio

DAU and MAU are among the most important metrics in mobile app marketing analytics. By combining the two, you can determine how effective your current strategy is. The daily active users to monthly active users ratio, or so-called “stickiness,” is used to determine how many of your monthly active users return to your app every day. It’s calculated using the following formula:

Along with session frequency, this metric indicates how important your app is in your users’ daily lives. The higher the ratio, the more involved and loyal your user base is. As for DAU/MAU benchmarks, they vary by industry and niche. Generally, 20-25% stickiness is a good rate to aim for. 

How to measure active users

Measuring your app’s performance goes beyond counting daily active users and monthly active users. If you want to succeed, you need to know how users come aboard, what makes them come back, and what activities you can use to increase retention.

• Set clear activity parameters for your niche. You should decide what “active” means for your app, like money transfers for a finance app, purchases/product browsing for an e-commerce app, completed workouts for a fitness app, or calorie tracking for a nutrition app. 
• Track unique users. One person is one user, no matter how many times they open your app per day and how many devices they log into. It’s still one person who should be counted only once to keep the data reliable. 
• Get the right analytics tools. With tools like Firebase, Amplitude, or Mixpanel, you can track in-app events to get precise behavioral segmentation (event-based), perform user trend analysis, and better visualize your retention curve.
• Track cohorts. To better understand what kind of users stay active or leave soon, group them into cohorts by acquisition channel, device type, country, campaign source, etc. 

Why Are Active Users So Important?

Daily and monthly active users determine whether your app will thrive or become yet another random icon hidden forever inside a folder.

• Measuring engagement and value: A growing volume of daily active users and monthly active users equals strong customer fit, while a decrease in these metrics indicates poor user experience and low satisfaction. 
• Impacting revenue: Whatever it is your app offers, its profitability depends on the number of active users. For example, subscription apps with solid MAU tend to have lower churn rates and higher stable profits. 
• Strengthening brand reputation: Active users are your best advertisers. When they leave positive reviews, refer friends, and share content, they provide organic reach and visibility. 
• Identifying user trends: By tracking active user metrics and behavior, you can better understand what users want and whether you’re currently delivering that. This data will also help you get efficient churn prediction and avoid stagnation. 
• Guiding product decisions: To get users to come back regularly, your app should continuously come up with new features, functions, and perks. Active user data analysis will help you decide which features are worth investing in and which should be replaced. 

How to Increase Active Users on Mobile App: 10 Best Practices

If you want to carve a place for your app, a well-thought-out approach is a must. Whether you seek to improve engagement or increase the frequency of purchases, these 10 practices will make a real impact.

Effective user onboarding

After downloading an app, users decide to quit or stay within the first few minutes. The ones who complete onboarding are 3x more likely to become regular users. So, to win more daily active users and monthly active users, you should try to make the right first impression with a smooth, simple, and welcoming onboarding flow.

Make sure the process is quick and intuitive, taking no more than 2–3 screens. Provide convenient signup options, such as single sign-on (SSO), social logins, and Apple/Google sign-in. Avoid adding unnecessary steps and let users set their own preferences. 

Personalized experiences

Personalization is one of the most powerful mobile app marketing strategies for increasing user engagement and app conversions. 89% of brands state that in-app personalization helps drive revenue, while 71% of users expect brands to deliver real-time personalization.

Everyone likes to feel special. A good app offers personalized experiences that seem like an extension of the users’ needs, ideas, and desires. Analyze user data to learn what they like and what might push them to return. The content and products users are genuinely interested in will keep them scrolling longer, stay active, and come back more often. This will impact not only the count of your daily active users and monthly active users but also sales and revenue.

Tactical push notifications

Push notifications containing new content alerts, limited-time deals, special offers, saved items, and incomplete tasks can remind users about your app and why they need it. However, this method only works when used wisely, as being too pushy with notifications is a sure way to lose your audience. Messages can drive retention by over 75% when personalized and properly integrated into your lifecycle marketing, while an excessive flow of generic notifications can cause up to 69% of users to delete the app. 

User experience gamification

Apps with gamified features benefit from 30% higher user engagement. Gamification elements, such as badges, rewards, points, progress bars, and leaderboards, bring some character to in-app interactions, while also rewarding the users’ efforts and celebrating their achievements. This way, you can make users return to the app without making it feel forced. It’s an efficient, non-manipulative method of attracting more daily active users that encourages habit.

Building community around the app

In-app chats, interest-based groups, comment sections, forums, thematic channels, or social sharing help build a community and foster a sense of connection to your app that goes beyond its main features. Your app can become a platform that people value not only for its functionality but also for the community they get to enjoy. Needless to say, users interacting with the app and each other naturally grow your DAU/MAU.

Regular feature updates

Nothing reduces the number of daily active users faster than stagnation. Once your app stops meeting user needs, their interest will quickly vanish. That’s where regular updates, consistent UX/UI improvements, new functions and technologies, and even minor visual enhancements can work wonders.

Use customer feedback loops (NPS, micro-surveys, and short polls) to address user needs and expectations (this also helps with user involvement). With any luck, you’ll get enough data about user pain points and preferences to guide your product updates in the right direction. 

Re-engagement campaigns

Yet another way to expand your base of daily active users and monthly active users is to bring back those who had used your app in the past but have since drifted away. Personalized incentives, exclusive discounts, and specialized perks can remind dormant users about your app and rekindle their interest.

Omnichannel orchestration (push, email, SMS) will expand your reach and make your re-engagement efforts even more effective. You can also implement deep links to guide users directly to the app sections they’ve visited before. 

Activity incentives

How to increase daily active users if all else fails? Incentives, incentives, incentives. Loyalty points, cashback, milestone rewards, and referral bonuses will gently yet firmly motivate users to regularly interact with the app. Incentives attract new customers and motivate existing users, thus maintaining and growing a loyal base of daily and monthly active users. 

Optimized app design

To get more daily active users and monthly active users, your app should not only offer decent functionality and consistent value, but also be easy to use. Unsurprisingly, people prefer apps with fluid and natural interactions. So, make your app design simple. Use intuitive UI, streamlined navigation, readable typography, fast-loading pages, and responsive layouts to create a smooth UX. And don’t forget about app store optimization (ASO) so that your app's in-store presentation aligns with its current design. 

Data analytics for continuous improvement

Your strategy should be driven by reliable data. Analyze in-app behaviors and use tools like A/B testing and uninstall tracking to detect engagement drop-off points and UX bottlenecks. This same information will also help you locate the features that work. Continuously refine your engagement strategies and focus on practices that have the greatest impact on the number of daily and monthly active users.

How The Industry Leaders Increase Daily Active Users and Boost App Engagement

Let’s see how leading apps across different niches combine all these methods to skyrocket their number of daily and monthly active users and achieve long-term retention. 

Spotify

The popular music platform has over 678 million active users globally and boasts a 40%+ DAU/MAU ratio, meaning that most of its monthly active users interact with the app daily. That’s an impressive result. How did they get there? The answer is smart hyper-personalization. AI-enabled personalized playlists like “Discover weekly”, “Daily mixes,” and “Release radar” maintain engagement through habit, increasing the number of monthly, weekly, and daily active users. Meanwhile, custom push notifications about new releases don’t let the users lose interest in the app. 

Starbucks

One of the biggest global coffee chains has hit new heights in app promotion. Their top-notch rewards program allows users to earn points redeemable only through the app. Now, in-app orders and payments account for over 30% of the company’s total revenue, while an average program member spends three times as much as a typical non-member. These loyalty incentives create a surge of daily active users and repeat mobile visits. 

Nike Runner Club

This fitness app boasts an extensive active user base, with over 160 million users. Their secret is strong community features combined with motivation. The app offers challenges, achievement rewards, community leaderboards, and provides smooth integration with Strava and Apple Watch. These perks make users regularly check the app to track their progress, set new goals, and share their achievements with other community members. This approach not only drives retention but also increases revenue, since club members spend 3x more than guest visitors. 

Revolut

An average user of this popular fintech app makes about 30 transactions per month, implying a high level of engagement and loyalty. The app quickly becomes a habit by using gamified savings tools and real-time alerts, while referral rewards ensure a consistent inflow of monthly active users.

How to Increase Active Users with Reteno

Not sure how to increase DAU or how to increase MAU for your app? Reteno is here to help! We blend personalization, omnichannel engagement, and automated retention into one powerful strategy.

With our platform, you can use a balanced mix of mobile push notifications, web push, and messenger campaigns to reach and engage users throughout their entire journey. Relying on detailed user segmentation, Reteno tailors messages to resonate with user needs, habits, and motivations. With our automation tools, you can create win-back sequences, churn-prevention triggers, milestone in-app messages, and dynamic product recommendations to bring users back and make them stay. Finally, our real-time analytics will let you see the effects of your new strategy for yourself!

Let’s boost your user activity together and keep it high. Contact us and create a custom strategy your app deserves. 

Final Thoughts

How to increase active users on a mobile app? It all comes down to creating experiences that make users want to return and stay. Successful apps understand their audiences and constantly evolve to stay valuable, interesting, and engaging. You can use the strategies we’ve discussed to keep your users focused on your brand, and Reteno can help you with that.