August 2025 Shareholder Update

Hi there,

August was another strong month for Buffer and our second month in which our net profit was more than our total profit for the whole of 2024 (and in fact, any year since 2020). We finished August with $296K in net income, which brings year-to-date profit to $1.3M. I can wholeheartedly say we achieved this by getting hyper-focused on serving customers, and we have a lot of great stuff planned for creators, entrepreneurs, and small businesses in the next few months.

Alongside these results, you may notice our reported MRR and ARR are lower than in recent months. These new numbers reflect an intentional change to how we recognize churn. From now on, we’ll count cancellations the moment they happen, rather than waiting until the end of a customer’s paid period. This shift makes our numbers appear smaller, but they provide a much clearer and more accurate picture of the business today. I’ll share more on this adjustment below.

Read on for the August results and my reflections on our continued growth.

Notes:

• Revenue rose $31K to $1.94M. Monthly and yearly revenue increased $14K, mobile revenue added $13K, and refunds decreased by $4K. These results keep us on track to surpass $4M in cash before year-end.
• Cash balance rose nearly $400K to $3.59M, our second straight month of $300K+ growth.
• We have a few larger cash outflows on the horizon, including ~$160K in retreat deposits and a possible Q3 tax payment. Even with these, we expect steady cash growth in the months ahead.

Noteworthy Updates & Reflections

A Change to How We Report MRR and ARR

In July, we cancelled more than 1,300 inactive legacy annual subscriptions and expected to see an immediate $14K drop in MRR. When the numbers barely moved, we realized our SaaS metrics platform was stretching the loss across 12 months instead of reflecting it right away. That didn’t sit right with me. By definition, recurring revenue should show what we can expect going forward, and when a customer cancels, that revenue isn’t recurring anymore.

We decided to intentionally change how we calculate MRR and ARR. Instead of continuing to count a customer’s revenue until the end of their paid period after they’ve cancelled, we’ll recognize churn immediately at the exact point of cancellation. That means if an annual customer cancels after six months, under our previous system we would have included them for another six months, going forward, we won’t count their revenue after they cancel.

This change means our numbers appear smaller in the short term, but they’re also more accurate and responsive. As of the end of August, our MRR is $1,854,462 ($22.3M ARR). That’s lower than some milestones we’ve celebrated recently, like $23M ARR and 70,000 paying subscribers, but it’s a truer reflection of the business today.

This change in calculation is a deliberate choice. Many companies prefer to maximize their headline numbers. We’ve chosen the opposite, because we believe smaller, more responsive numbers give us better insight, a faster feedback loop, and a closer tie to the real experiences of our customers.

If you’d like a deeper look at this change in MRR and ARR calculation, you can read more in this blog post.

Releasing One of Our Most-Requested Features: Bulk Upload

In August, we launched Bulk Upload, one of our top feature requests from Buffer customers. With Bulk Upload, Buffer users can upload up to 100 posts to Buffer in one go, straight from a CSV. No more copy-paste-repeat.

Our goal with Bulk Upload was to help users go from planning to publishing without the busywork. This feature has already been helpful for users managing content from multiple brands and preparing seasonal campaigns.

Read more on the blog

Buffer for iOS 26

The team recently released Buffer for iOS 26, the biggest update we’ve ever shipped to our mobile app. More than 1,000 commits went into this release, bringing a fresh design, a brand-new Apple Watch app, and dozens of improvements that make Buffer smoother and more flexible for creators on the go.

Read more about this update.

What’s Coming Up

Upcoming Conference

I’ll be speaking at Business of Software in early October. My talk, “Navigating a Multi-Year Decline to New All-Time-Highs,” is the story of how Buffer went from our largest decline in company history, where ARR dropped 20% over four years, to reaching new all-time highs at $22.3M.

I’ll be sharing what it was like to lead through this period: spotting early warning signs of a plateau, the experience of being in free fall, rediscovering purpose, strengthening culture during tough times, and ultimately finding a new path to sustainable growth.

It’s a story five years in the making, and I’m looking forward to sharing the lessons and reflections with the BoS community.

More From the Buffer Team

Earlier this year, I defined one of our strategic themes as building Buffer into a Team of Creators. This is more than dogfooding, it means the whole team is on their own creator journey. It’s been inspiring to see how much energy this has brought to our culture, and I believe it’s already helping us create a better Buffer for customers.

Here are a few posts from teammates that stood out in August:

• Sabreen Haziq, our Senior Brand and Community Manager, posted about Buffer’s time-off policy.
• Diego Sanchez, a Senior Product Manager at Buffer, posted about cancelling recurring meetings.
• Simon Heaton, our Director of Growth Marketing, shared a few remote work reflections.
• Melilyna Poh, a Senior Customer Advocate at Buffer, shared reflections from her recent time off.

This theme will continue to guide us, and I’m eager to continue learning from the creativity of our own team as much as from our customers.

Thank you for being a part of our journey and for your continued support. Feel free to reply if you have any thoughts or questions.

– Joel, Founder CEO