What Is CSAT Score (Customer Satisfaction Score)?
A rating question that measures how satisfied a respondent was with one specific interaction — a purchase, a support ticket, an onboarding step — expressed as a percentage satisfied.
CSAT asks a direct question — “How satisfied were you with [interaction]?” — usually on a 1–5 scale from Very Dissatisfied to Very Satisfied. It’s calculated as the percentage of respondents who chose a “satisfied” rating (typically the top box or top two boxes) out of everyone who answered.
The key difference from NPS: CSAT measures satisfaction with one specific moment, while NPS measures overall loyalty to the relationship. A customer can be highly satisfied with a single support interaction (high CSAT) while still being unlikely to recommend the company overall (low NPS) — the two metrics answer different questions and are often tracked together, not as substitutes for each other.
Because CSAT is tied to a specific interaction, it works best sent immediately after that interaction happens — right after a support ticket closes, right after checkout — while the experience is still fresh.
Example
CSAT = 380 / 500 = 76%.
How to Use CSAT in SurveyRock
Trigger a short CSAT survey right after a support interaction closes or a purchase completes. SurveyRock's response dashboard tracks the satisfied-percentage automatically, and workflow automation can route low-CSAT responses straight to Slack or a follow-up email so nothing slips through.
See how workflows work