Longer onboarding with more questions: trial starts up double digits
Commentary byLiftArchiveOur analysis, not theirsLose It!, a calorie tracking app, made its onboarding longer by adding more questions, and trial start rate went up by double digits.
The team kept adding questions until the gains tapered off.
Paul Apollo of Lose It! shared the result on the Sub Club podcast, and it was published on the RevenueCat blog.
- Trial start rate: up by double digits as onboarding got longer. The exact figure was not shared.
- Gains flattened at some length, so there is a ceiling. The final number of questions was not shared.
- Trial-to-paid and long-term revenue were not reported.
The change
The variant adds more question screens before the paywall.
Simplified mockup drawn by LiftArchive from the shared screenshots.
Control
The shorter onboarding Lose It! had before the tests.
Variant
Onboarding with extra questions, added in rounds and tested each time, until more length stopped helping.
Why it likely won
Our reading of the result, not the practitioner's claim.
- The team's view is that more questions signal the app will be tailored to the user, which raises the value of paying.
- Some answers were used to set up premium features during onboarding, so users had something to lose by not subscribing.
- Health and fitness users may expect a detailed setup, so a longer flow reads as care, not friction.
Caveats: Sample size, duration and the exact lift were not shared. The result comes from a podcast remark written up on the RevenueCat blog.
Who ran it
Lose It! ran this test. Source: RevenueCat blog (Sub Club podcast write-up). The numbers are theirs; the summary and commentary on this page are ours.
How to run this test on your app
- Hypothesis
- If we add relevant personal questions to onboarding, then trial start rate will rise because users expect a plan built for them and start to invest in the setup.
- Primary metric
- Trial start rate
- Guardrails
- Onboarding completion rate
- Trial-to-paid conversion
- Realized LTV per customer
- Who should test it
- Apps that personalize a plan, such as health, fitness, diet or learning apps. It probably won't help utility apps where users want to do one task right away.
Questions
Doesn't a longer onboarding cause drop-off?
Some users will drop off, but Lose It! still saw more trial starts overall.
They kept adding questions until gains stopped, which shows there is a limit.
Do the questions have to be used?
Lose It! used some answers to tailor the app and set up premium features.
Asking questions you never use may hurt trust if users notice.
What should I measure?
Trial start rate is a fine first metric, but also track trial-to-paid and LTV per customer, since longer flows may change who starts a trial.