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By Lenny Rachitsky · lennysnewsletter.com · @lennysan on X · YouTube · LinkedIn
Lenny Rachitsky offers a five-point checklist for deciding when to sunset a product or feature, drawing on his Airbnb experience. The core argument is that a feature failing at least three of the criteria (low usage, high maintenance cost, degraded user experience, strategic misalignment, few vocal users) is likely ready to be shut down.
Subscriber post — summary only01Key takeaways
- If a feature fails three of five tests (usage, maintenance cost, UX harm, strategy fit, user backlash), consider sunsetting it.
- Treat under 5% active usage as a warning sign, benchmarked against what you'd call a successful launch.
- A feature consuming around 10% of team resources just to maintain is a strong sunset candidate.
- Features that add complexity and block core tasks often hurt more than they help, even when well liked.
- Teams usually wait too long to sunset; generally push through blowback once the decision is confident.
“Looking back, not once do I recall that anyone regretted a product or feature being sunset.”Lenny Rachitsky · Lenny’s Newsletter
“Folks love to build stuff. From time to time, though, you need to prune your product.”Gibson Biddle · Lenny’s Newsletter
02Frameworks mentioned
Summary and takeaways written by PM Atlas; quotes are short excerpts. © the original author.