How Has Postpaid Churn Of The Major U.S. Wireless Carriers Trended In Recent Years?

Subscriber churn is one of the most closely watched metrics in the wireless industry, as it is a measure of a carrier’s customer retention and loyalty. It has become even more important in recent years, given that the scope for new customer additions is fairly limited in the saturating U.S. market. Below we take a look at how the postpaid churn figures of the four major U.S. carriers have trended over the last five years.

Verizon and AT&T have the lowest postpaid subscriber churn in the industry, driven by their high quality subscriber bases and strong network performance. While T-Mobile had the highest churn in 2011, the carrier has made significant progress in reducing churn in recent years with the introduction of its “Un-carrier” marketing campaign and its economical Simple Choice plans. Sprint currently has the highest churn figures in the industry, but things could get better going forward if the carrier successfully executes on its planned network upgrade.

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