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Definition

Monthly Tracked Users (MTU)

Monthly tracked users (MTU) counts every unique user an analytics platform records in a calendar month - including anonymous visitors who never sign in. It matters chiefly as a billing unit: analytics vendors have priced by MTUs, and the count is always higher than your MAU, because 'tracked' includes everyone the SDK saw, not just engaged users.

Why the tracked-user count is always bigger than your MAUMTU = MAU + three inflators (all historically billable)illustrative proportions - audits typically find double-digit percentage waste in mature instancesMAU - engaged usersanonymous bouncesfragmented identitiesbotswhat an MTU-billed contract countswhat you meant to buyCost control order: identity hygiene first (fragmentation is pure waste), bot filtering second, then taxonomy pruning.Amplitude’s public plans meter events now, but the same inflators bloat event volume too - the discipline transfers.

Interactive diagram - hover the elements. Plotted values are illustrative examples, not measurements.

Why is MTU always bigger than MAU?

Three inflators: anonymous traffic (every landing-page bounce is a tracked user), identity fragmentation (one human counted as several IDs across devices or before merge), and bot traffic that slips filters. On MTU-billed contracts these inflators are billable - which made identity hygiene a literal cost control.

Does Amplitude still bill by MTU?

Amplitude's public self-serve plans are event-based at the time of writing (checked against amplitude.com/pricing): tiers are sized by events per month, not tracked users. But MTU billing is not extinct - Amplitude's billing documentation still maintains an MTU guide for MTU-priced plans, and its startup program quotes MTU caps - so check which unit your own agreement uses before comparing quotes, and see our pricing guide for the current structure.

In practice: The pricing guide covers the current event-based math and how to forecast your volume.

Monthly Tracked Users (MTU): common questions

How do I reduce a tracked-user or event bill without losing data?+

Identity hygiene first (merge fragmentation is pure waste), bot filtering second, then taxonomy pruning - unqueried events and never-identified bounce traffic are the classic cuts. An audit typically finds double-digit percentage waste in mature instances.

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