Braintrust for Startups
AI Platform Credits
6–12 months of Braintrust Pro free (up to ~$2,988 value at $249/mo)
Who qualifies
Every condition below is taken from the vendor’s own published criteria. Read them before you spend an afternoon on the application.
Raised under $15M
Total funding must be below $15M at the time you apply. Vendors verify this against public funding records, so an unannounced round usually still counts.
Partner referral needed
There is no self-serve application. You need a referral from an approved VC, accelerator or incubator — start with your lead investor’s portfolio-benefits page.
Startups
The programme is aimed at startups. Vendors read this loosely, but expect to describe the company and what you are building on the application.
About Braintrust for Startups
Quick answer
6–12 months of Braintrust Pro free — evals, tracing, and LLM observability for AI teams that have raised at least $100k. Partner-VC startups get a full year.
Braintrust is one of the most-used eval and observability platforms for teams shipping LLM products, and its startup program gives you 6 to 12 months of the Pro plan free — a plan that normally runs $249/month, so the full-year tier is worth roughly $2,988. Any new customer with at least $100k raised gets six months; startups at Series A or earlier backed by a partner VC (a16z, Accel, Greylock, ICONIQ, Kleiner Perkins) get twelve.
What you get
- 6 months of Braintrust Pro free for any eligible startup with $100k+ in funding
- 12 months of Pro free if you're Series A or earlier and funded by a partner VC (a16z, Accel, Greylock, ICONIQ, Kleiner Perkins)
- Pro includes $249/month in usage credits, 5 GB of processed data per month, and 50k scores per month
- Exclusive office hours with the Braintrust team
- Invites to Braintrust executive events and customer sessions
How to apply
5 steps. The last one is the part most people skip.
- 1
Get the referral before anything else
Braintrust for Startups has no self-serve application for this programme. Ask your lead investor, accelerator or incubator for their partner link — most Tier 1 funds keep a portfolio-benefits page listing exactly this. Without it the rest of the process is closed to you.
- 2
Open Braintrust for Startups through the link on this page
It carries our referral tag. The terms you get are identical either way, and it never changes what this page says about the programme.
- 3
Have the eligibility evidence ready
Applications are checked against 3 conditions — raised under $15m, partner referral needed, startups. Incorporation date, cap table and a one-line description of what you are building cover most of it.
- 4
Size the migration against the 12 months window
Credits start burning from activation, not from when you get round to using them. Work out what you will genuinely consume in that window before you move production workloads across.
- 5
Know the rate you land on when it runs out
The point of a credit is a runway extension, not a permanent discount. Check standard list pricing for the usage you will have by then, so the first real invoice is a decision rather than a surprise.
Braintrust for Startups FAQ
The questions we actually get asked about this programme.
Ask us something elseBraintrust Pro is $249/month, so six free months is worth about $1,494 and the twelve-month partner-VC tier is worth roughly $2,988 — plus each Pro month includes $249 in usage credits, 5 GB of processed data, and 50k scores.
Yes. Any new customer with at least $100k in verifiable funding qualifies for six months of Pro. The partner-VC list (a16z, Accel, Greylock, ICONIQ, Kleiner Perkins) only determines whether you get the extended twelve-month tier.
You roll onto standard Pro pricing at $249/month, or you can downgrade to Braintrust's free tier. Use the free window to wire evals into CI and quantify the value before the line item starts.
