CSAT vs NPS

Customer experience isn’t just about what you deliver - it’s about how your customers feel. Measuring that feeling accurately can transform how you design products, services, and marketing strategies.

Among the many metrics available, CSAT and NPS are two of the most recognized and widely used. Both give you a window into customer perception, but they focus on different moments in the customer journey.

Understanding CSAT vs NPS - and how to combine them - helps you capture both the immediate reaction and the long-term relationship. Let’s explore what sets them apart, when to use each, and how tools like SurveyNinja make measuring them effortless.

Read also: How to Use Quantitative Research Effectively in Surveys

What Is CSAT (Customer Satisfaction Score)?

Customer Satisfaction Score (CSAT) measures how satisfied customers are with a specific experience, transaction, or service. It’s the most direct way to gauge short-term satisfaction.

A typical CSAT survey asks:

“How satisfied were you with your recent purchase (or interaction)?”

Respondents answer on a numeric scale - often 1–5 or 1–7 - where the higher end represents higher satisfaction. It’s simple, quick, and easily comparable across time.

The CSAT formula is straightforward:

CSAT (%) = (Number of satisfied customers ÷ Total responses) × 100

If 80 out of 100 respondents select “satisfied” or “very satisfied,” your CSAT score is 80%.

CSAT often uses a Likert scale, which helps measure the intensity of opinions. For example, instead of a simple yes/no, customers can express degrees of satisfaction - an important detail for identifying trends in sentiment.

It’s best used immediately after an event, such as completing an order, interacting with customer support or attending a training session.

When to Use CSAT

Use CSAT when you want to understand how customers feel immediately after an interaction.

Examples include:

• After a customer support chat or email resolution.
• Following an online purchase or delivery.
• After a training session, demo or class.

CSAT works best for operational teams that want to monitor and improve specific processes. Because it’s short and context-specific, customers are more likely to respond right after their experience.

SurveyNinja allows you to automate CSAT surveys at critical touchpoints - for example, sending a satisfaction question immediately after a ticket closes or a service concludes. The feedback arrives in real time, helping you act before issues escalate.

CSAT Advantages and Limitations

Pros	Cons
Quick to create and deploy. High response rates due to short length. Ideal for tracking service performance and short-term trends.	Measures only recent experiences. Doesn’t reflect long-term loyalty or brand image. Can fluctuate with temporary service issues.

What Is NPS (Net Promoter Score)?

While CSAT focuses on short-term satisfaction, NPS (Net Promoter Score) measures long-term loyalty and advocacy - how likely customers are to recommend your brand to others.

The NPS survey uses one simple question:

“How likely are you to recommend our company to a friend or colleague?”

Respondents choose a number from 0 to 10. Their answers fall into three categories:

• Promoters (9–10): Loyal fans who actively promote your brand.
• Passives (7–8): Satisfied but not enthusiastic - vulnerable to competitors.
• Detractors (0–6): Unhappy customers who may damage your reputation through negative feedback.

The NPS formula is:

NPS = % Promoters – % Detractors

For example, if 60% are promoters and 10% detractors, your NPS is +50, a strong indicator of customer loyalty.

As discussed in our detailed NPS guide, this metric is ideal for tracking how customers perceive your brand over time. It’s not about one transaction - it’s about the emotional connection that drives long-term growth.

When to Use NPS

NPS is designed for the big picture. It measures how your audience feels about your brand overall, not a single transaction.

You should use NPS:

• Quarterly or bi-annually to assess brand perception trends.
• When launching new products or entering new markets.
• After major service or pricing changes.

NPS helps marketing and leadership teams understand how actions affect loyalty. It’s also an early warning signal - a drop in NPS often predicts churn.

By monitoring NPS in SurveyNinja, you can automatically identify promoters for referral programs or engage detractors with follow-up surveys and personalized retention strategies.

NPS Advantages and Limitations

Pros	Cons
Strong predictor of growth and retention. Easy to benchmark over time and against competitors. Identifies brand promoters for advocacy programs.	Can be influenced by timing or mood. Doesn’t explain why customers feel a certain way without follow-up questions. Requires consistent measurement intervals for meaningful comparison.

Read also: AI in Marketing: How Artificial Intelligence Transforms Digital Strategies

CSAT vs NPS: Key Differences

Both metrics measure customer sentiment, but they answer very different questions. CSAT captures the moment, while NPS captures the relationship.

Factor	CSAT	NPS
Focus	Satisfaction with a specific interaction	Loyalty and long-term advocacy
Question Type	“How satisfied are you with…?”	“How likely are you to recommend…?”
Scale	1–5 or 1–7	0–10
Timeframe	Short-term, event-based	Long-term, relational
Metric Type	Descriptive satisfaction	Predictive loyalty
Best For	Evaluating service or product quality	Measuring brand health and retention

While CSAT provides tactical feedback, NPS offers strategic insight. A company might have a high CSAT (customers happy with service) but a low NPS (customers wouldn’t recommend the brand) - a signal that something deeper needs attention.

When designing surveys, it’s best to use a mix of questions so respondents can share context behind their ratings. Open-ended follow-ups like “What influenced your score?” add qualitative depth and help you identify actionable improvements.

Combining CSAT and NPS

For the best results, use both metrics together. Each one provides insights that the other can’t.

• CSAT reveals how happy customers are right now.
• NPS shows whether they’ll stay and recommend you later.

Let’s look at a real-world scenario.

A subscription-based SaaS company uses CSAT surveys immediately after onboarding to measure user satisfaction with the setup process. Results show an average CSAT of 90%. However, their NPS, measured monthly, stagnates at +12.

After reviewing open comments, the team discovers that while onboarding is smooth, customers struggle with long-term product updates. They improve communication and add feature tutorials. Three months later, CSAT remains high, and NPS rises to +35.

The takeaway? Short-term satisfaction drives long-term loyalty - but only if you actively connect both metrics. SurveyNinja’s integrated dashboards make this connection visible, turning numbers into actionable insight.

Conclusion

When comparing CSAT vs NPS, the key difference is focus.

• CSAT measures satisfaction with specific experiences - it’s immediate, operational, and direct.
• NPS measures loyalty and advocacy - it’s strategic, predictive and long-term.

You need both to truly understand your customer journey. CSAT helps you react fast; NPS helps you plan ahead.

With SurveyNinja, you can design both in minutes, automate timing and analyze correlations between short-term happiness and long-term loyalty.