What Is a Chargeback Win Rate and How Do You Calculate It?

Your win rate tells you how well your evidence works. The catch: there are two ways to compute it, and three moments where a dispute can be "won."

What is a chargeback win rate?

A chargeback win rate is the share of chargebacks that end in your favor over a period, usually a month. Two formulas are in common use:

• Won ÷ contested. Disputes won divided by disputes you answered with evidence. This measures the quality of your responses.
• Won ÷ received. Disputes won divided by every dispute received, including the ones you accepted. Chargebacks911 argues for this one and calls the contested-only figure inflated.4Chargebacks911, Win Rate KPIs, May 11, 2020 It measures how much of the problem you recover.

Same store, same month: 40% or 24%. Leave open cases out of both until they are decided.

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What counts as a win?

It depends on when you stop counting. Visa runs two dispute cycles (Visa Core Rules, sections 11.2.2 and 11.2.3):1Visa Core Rules and Visa Product and Service Rules, April 18, 2026

So a consumer dispute "won" at Dispute Response can come back when the issuer makes a pre-Arbitration attempt. At Arbitration, Visa decides, and the result can be split: Visa allows split decisions, for example when a partial credit was processed (section 1.10.2.2).1Visa Core Rules and Visa Product and Service Rules, April 18, 2026 The stages and deadlines are covered in dispute management.

Processors simplify this. Stripe sets a dispute to won or lost when the issuer decides, says the outcome is final, and doesn't support arbitration. In rare cases a lost dispute later becomes a "late win."2Stripe Docs, How disputes work (read October 14, 2026) Two statuses are not wins: prevented (stopped before a formal chargeback) and warning_closed (an inquiry that never escalated).3Stripe API reference, The Dispute object (read October 14, 2026) Disputes that can't be challenged, which Stripe closes as lost on arrival, belong in "received," never in "contested."2Stripe Docs, How disputes work (read October 14, 2026)

Why "average win rate" figures mislead

Visa and Mastercard don't publish an average win rate. Vendor figures mix formulas, stages and merchant samples, so they can't be compared with your own number.

Segment instead:

• By reason code. Fraud codes and "not received" codes need different evidence. Stripe gives each dispute a reason field you can group by.3Stripe API reference, The Dispute object (read October 14, 2026)
• By CE 3.0 eligibility. Stripe flags disputes eligible for Visa Compelling Evidence 3.0 in enhanced_eligibility_types.3Stripe API reference, The Dispute object (read October 14, 2026) No public source gives a CE 3.0 win rate, so measure yours separately.

For writing the response itself, see our chargeback rebuttal letter guide.