Key takeaways
- Across 9 subscription brands RetainUP audited in 2026, a median 45.6% of new subscribers reached their third order.
- The median brand kept 73.6% to order 2, level with Recharge's 75.2% supplement benchmark, then fell behind it by order 3.
- Every brand in the sample that kept fewer than 70% of subscribers to order 2 finished under 37% at order 3.
Most subscription retention benchmarks come from the apps. Recharge publishes one. YOCTO publishes one. Skio quotes a third. They disagree, and none of them show you one brand at a time.
This post does. It covers 9 subscription brands we audited in 2026, measured before we changed anything, each counted the same way: by order, from the first paid order. Every brand is anonymised. The numbers are as we found them. For what counts as good, see what a good subscription retention rate is. This post is the brand-level data: where subscribers leave, order by order.
How many subscribers reach order 3?
Across the 9 brands, a median 45.6% of new subscribers placed a third order, with a range of 30.1% to 61.2%. That puts the middle of our sample 3.5 points under Recharge's supplement benchmark and 6.4 points under YOCTO's median store.
| Brand | Category | App | Order 1 to 2 | Reached order 3 | Order 2 to 3 step |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Brand A | Supplements | Loop | 57.8% | 30.1% | 52.1% |
| Brand B | Personal care | Recharge | 57.4% | ~31% | 54% |
| Brand C | Supplements | Stay AI | 68.6% | 36% | 52.5% |
| Brand D | Pet care | Loop | 67.3% | 36.3% | 53.9% |
| Brand E | Coffee | Recharge | 78.1% | 45.6% | 58.4% |
| Brand F | Home fragrance | Recharge | 73.6% | 50.4% | 68.5% |
| Brand G | Personal care | Recharge | 80.4% | 52.7% | 65.5% |
| Brand H | Supplements | Skio | 90.9% | ~53.6% | 59% |
| Brand I | Supplements | Recharge | 80.1% | 61.2% | 76.4% |
| Median, 9 brands | 73.6% | 45.6% | 58.4% | ||
| Recharge, ~1,750 supplement brands | Supplements | Recharge | 75.2% | 49.1% | about 65% |
| YOCTO, median store | Mixed | Mixed | 72% | 52% | about 72% |
Recharge's figure comes from its supplement retention report, about 1,750 brands, updated October 2026. YOCTO's comes from its subscription statistics, stores it runs or audited from November 2025 to October 2026. Four of our nine brands sit at 36% or below. Half the cohort was gone before order 3 at five of them.
Where do subscribers drop: before order 2 or after?
The losses split almost evenly: the median brand lost about 26 of every 100 new subscribers before order 2, and about 28 more between order 2 and order 3. The split at each brand is anything but even.
Brand A lost 42 of every 100 before the second order. Brand H lost 9, then lost 37 before the third. Same problem on paper, two different fixes. "Fix order 2" is right for one and wrong for the other, so read your own split before you pick a project.
How does order 2 retention compare with the benchmarks?
At order 2 the sample matched the benchmarks: a median 73.6%, against 75.2% in Recharge's supplement data and 72% at YOCTO's median store.
The gap opens after. Of the subscribers who placed order 2, the median brand kept 58.4% to order 3. Divide Recharge's order 3 figure by its order 2 figure and you get about 65% for the same step. YOCTO's medians give about 72%. The brands we audited get a second order about as often as everyone else. They lose the third.
Does order 2 retention predict order 3?
In this sample, yes: every brand that kept under 70% to order 2 finished between 30% and 36% at order 3, and every brand above 70% finished between 46% and 61%.
Order 2 sets the ceiling. A brand that loses 4 in 10 before the second box can't make it up later. Above the line, the order 2 to 3 step decides the rank. Brand H kept 90.9% to order 2, the best in the sample, and still finished below Brand I, which kept 80.1% but held 76% of them to order 3.
Nine brands is a small sample. Read this as a pattern worth checking in your own data.
What drives the drop before order 2?
Most of the loss before order 2 comes from people who did not mean to subscribe, did not feel a result in the first weeks, or were surprised by the first charge. At Brand C, 24.4% of cancellations came from people who never meant to subscribe. At Brand B, 37.6% of all cancellations came in the first 30 days.
Those cancels cluster on three days: the signup day, the day the pre-charge reminder lands, and the charge day. We mapped them across 30,275 cancellations in when subscribers cancel. The fixes sit before the cancel page: a plain plan name and first charge date at checkout, onboarding that builds the habit, and gift value moved from order 1 to order 2. One brand lifted order 2 conversion 85% with a free gift on order 2.
What drives the drop between order 2 and order 3?
Between order 2 and order 3, subscribers leave over results, routine and price: the benefit has not shown up, the second box arrives before the first is used, or the first-order discount ends. Too much product is the quiet one. We call it consumption mismatch, and a skip offered at the right moment fixes much of it.
Order 3 is often the payback order for supplement brands. A brand that keeps 61 of 100 to order 3 earns its CAC back on far more subscribers than one that keeps 30. Run your own numbers in the subscription LTV calculator.
How we measured it
Every number comes from a baseline audit we ran in 2026 on each brand's own subscription data, before RetainUP changed anything.
- Sample: 9 Shopify subscription brands audited in 2026. Four supplement brands, plus coffee, pet care, home fragrance and two personal care brands. Apps: Recharge (5), Loop (2), Skio (1), Stay AI (1).
- Period: cohorts that started between early 2025 and mid 2026, read only once every subscriber in them had passed their order 3 date.
- Order 1 to 2: new subscribers who placed a second order, divided by new subscribers who placed a first paid order.
- Reached order 3: the same new subscribers who placed a third order. Counted by order, not by month, so monthly and quarterly plans compare fairly.
- Order 2 to 3 step: reached order 3 divided by order 1 to 2. Our calculation.
- Two estimates: Brands B and H are order 1 to 2 times order 2 to 3 from their audits. Drop both and the median stays at 45.6%.
- Caveats: nine brands is small. Brands that hire a retention consultant often have a problem, so the sample may run low. Cohort sizes range from under 200 subscribers (Brand G) to several thousand. The benchmarks use their own definitions and samples.
- RetainUP has worked with 80+ subscription brands. This dataset is narrower on purpose: only the brands we audited in 2026 with full data, measured the same way.
FAQ
What percentage of subscribers make it to the third order?
In 9 subscription brands we audited in 2026, a median 45.6%, ranging from 30.1% to 61.2%. Recharge's data on about 1,750 supplement brands puts it at 49.1%, and YOCTO's median store at 52%.
When do most subscribers cancel?
Before order 3. The median brand in our sample lost about 26 of every 100 new subscribers before order 2 and about 28 more before order 3. By the third order, more than half were gone.
Which drop is bigger, order 1 to 2 or order 2 to 3?
It depends on the brand. At the median the two are close, but Brand A lost 42 per 100 before order 2 and Brand H lost 9. Pull your own split before you choose a fix.
What is a good order 2 retention rate?
Above 70% is the line in our data. The median was 73.6%, and every brand under 70% finished under 37% at order 3. Recharge reports 75.2% for supplements and YOCTO 72% at its median store.
How do I calculate churn by order number?
Take one cohort, everyone whose first paid order fell in the same month. Count how many placed order 2 and order 3, and divide each by the number who placed order 1. Wait until the whole cohort has passed its order 3 date.
Why does my subscription app show a different number?
Apps count subscriptions or subscribers, count paused subscribers as retained or not, and count by month or by order. Read the definition before you compare. More in subscription numbers that lie.
More from our 2026 audit data
Three posts from the same 2026 audit set, plus the retention bands we use.
- Cancel flow save rate benchmark: what 8 subscription brands actually save
- Failed payment recovery rate benchmark: data from 8 subscription brands
- What's a good subscription retention rate?
Want your own order 2 and order 3 split next to these? The Subscription LTV Roadmap™ runs the same cuts on your data, cohort by cohort, and gives you every fix in order, for $1,000. Or start with the free subscription audit.
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Rahi Jain
Rahi Jain is a subscription LTV specialist who helps $1M to $10M DTC brands reduce subscription churn and maximize LTV on Recharge, Skio, Stay AI and Loop.
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