# Launch500

> Launch500 is an annual list of the startups building software worth paying for, chosen on evidence and published every February, plus a directory where any company can list its product. A place on the list cannot be bought: a product is considered only after it passes a Crash Test (a fixed set of scenarios for its category, run by a named tester on a dated version), and passing makes it eligible, not selected. The editorial weighs the Crash Test, reviews, customer feedback and our engineers' view of how useful the product is. No product has been tested yet.

## The list and the directory

- **Launch500 list** (https://launch500.com/launch500): published each February. Entry barrier: a passed Crash Test. Not for sale.
- **Listings** (https://launch500.com/submit): free, or £49 to be featured for 14 days (labelled Sponsored). A listing puts a product on the platform, never on the list.

## How we are funded

Run by 99 Developers Ltd. Listings and Crash Tests pay for it. Money never buys a score, a review removal, a place on the Launch500 list, or a ranking position. The code that computes scores cannot read payment or vendor records, and a build check enforces it.

What money can and cannot buy: https://launch500.com/trust/how-we-make-money

## Two scores, never blended

- **Crash Test score** (0–100): our own hands-on test. One team, one week, one named version.
- **Community score** (0–5, once reviews open): verified user reviews, weighted by verification tier, recency decay and sampling correction.

They measure different things on different scales and are never averaged. Where they disagree, the disagreement is the useful part.

## Machine-readable access

Every category, product and test report has a markdown mirror at the same path with `.md` appended. Example: https://launch500.com/best/ai-agent-builders.md

Structured exports: https://launch500.com/data

## Categories (31)

- [Customer engagement and lifecycle messaging platforms](https://launch500.com/best/customer-engagement): Platforms that hold behavioural customer data and send messages across several channels off the back of it, branching on what somebody did rather than on a list they sit in. The heavier end of messaging, where the product is the segmentation as much as the sending. Markdown: https://launch500.com/best/customer-engagement.md
- [Customer support and help desk software](https://launch500.com/best/customer-support): Tools that take inbound customer contact, route it to somebody who can answer, and keep the history. Spans shared inboxes through to full help desks with knowledge bases and automated first-line handling. Markdown: https://launch500.com/best/customer-support.md
- [Email marketing and lifecycle messaging software](https://launch500.com/best/email-marketing): Tools that hold a subscriber list, send broadcast and automated email against it, and report what happened. The category spans simple newsletter senders through to lifecycle platforms that branch on behaviour. Markdown: https://launch500.com/best/email-marketing.md
- [CRM software and sales pipeline tools](https://launch500.com/best/crm): Systems that store customer and deal records, track a pipeline through stages, and give a sales team a shared view of who said what and what happens next. Markdown: https://launch500.com/best/crm.md
- [Helpdesk and customer support ticketing software](https://launch500.com/best/helpdesk-software): Shared inbox and ticketing systems where a support team receives, assigns, tracks and answers customer conversations across email, chat and other channels. Markdown: https://launch500.com/best/helpdesk-software.md
- [Accounting and invoicing software for small business](https://launch500.com/best/accounting-software): Software that records income and expenses, issues invoices, reconciles against a bank feed and produces the reports an accountant or a tax authority expects. Markdown: https://launch500.com/best/accounting-software.md
- [Project management and team task tracking software](https://launch500.com/best/project-management): Tools where a team plans work, assigns it, tracks status across boards or timelines, and sees what is blocked or late. Markdown: https://launch500.com/best/project-management.md
- [HR software and employee onboarding systems](https://launch500.com/best/hr-software): Systems of record for employees, contracts, personal data, leave, onboarding and offboarding checklists, and the reporting an HR team and a regulator need. Markdown: https://launch500.com/best/hr-software.md
- [Product analytics and business intelligence software](https://launch500.com/best/analytics-software): Tools that collect events or connect to a warehouse, and let a non-engineer answer questions about usage, funnels, retention and revenue without writing SQL. Markdown: https://launch500.com/best/analytics-software.md
- [Workflow automation and integration software](https://launch500.com/best/workflow-automation): Tools that connect applications and run multi-step processes automatically, triggered by an event or a schedule, without an engineer writing and hosting the glue code. Markdown: https://launch500.com/best/workflow-automation.md
- [AI agent builders and no-code agent platforms](https://launch500.com/best/ai-agent-builders): Platforms for building software agents that use a language model to decide what to do next, call tools or APIs, and carry out multi-step tasks with limited human supervision. Markdown: https://launch500.com/best/ai-agent-builders.md
- [AI customer support agents and helpdesk automation](https://launch500.com/best/ai-customer-support-agents): Agents that read incoming support conversations, answer from a company's own documentation and ticket history, and either resolve the conversation or hand it to a human with context attached. Markdown: https://launch500.com/best/ai-customer-support-agents.md
- [AI SDR and sales outreach agents](https://launch500.com/best/ai-sdr-agents): Agents that research prospects, write and send outbound sequences, and book meetings with limited human involvement. The automated end of the sales development function. Markdown: https://launch500.com/best/ai-sdr-agents.md
- [RAG platforms and AI knowledge base software](https://launch500.com/best/rag-knowledge-platforms): Systems that index a company's documents and data so a language model can answer from them with citations, covering ingestion, chunking, retrieval, permissions and evaluation. Markdown: https://launch500.com/best/rag-knowledge-platforms.md
- [Browser automation and web agent software](https://launch500.com/best/browser-automation-agents): Agents that drive a real browser to complete tasks on websites, logging in, navigating, filling forms and extracting data, where no API is available. Markdown: https://launch500.com/best/browser-automation-agents.md
- [AI meeting notetakers and call recording software](https://launch500.com/best/ai-meeting-notetakers): Tools that join calls, transcribe them, and produce summaries, action items and searchable records, usually syncing the result into a CRM or workspace. Markdown: https://launch500.com/best/ai-meeting-notetakers.md
- [AI document processing and data extraction software](https://launch500.com/best/document-data-extraction): Software that reads unstructured documents, invoices, contracts, forms, statements, and outputs structured fields with a confidence score and a path for human review. Markdown: https://launch500.com/best/document-data-extraction.md
- [Voice AI agents and automated phone answering](https://launch500.com/best/voice-ai-agents): Agents that hold a real-time spoken conversation over the phone or in an app, answering, qualifying, booking and escalating, using speech recognition, a language model and synthesised speech. Markdown: https://launch500.com/best/voice-ai-agents.md
- [AI coding agents and automated pull request tools](https://launch500.com/best/ai-coding-agents): Agents that take a written task or an issue, change code across a repository, run tests, and open a pull request for human review. Markdown: https://launch500.com/best/ai-coding-agents.md
- [LLM observability and agent evaluation tools](https://launch500.com/best/agent-observability): Tooling that records what an agent or language-model application did, prompts, tool calls, costs, latencies, and scores output quality against test sets so regressions are caught before users find them. Markdown: https://launch500.com/best/agent-observability.md
- [Productivity and document collaboration software](https://launch500.com/best/productivity-and-docs): Tools for writing, organising and sharing the documents, notes and wikis a team works from, usually combining a text editor with some structure such as databases, tasks or search. Markdown: https://launch500.com/best/productivity-and-docs.md
- [Finance, payments and banking software for business](https://launch500.com/best/finance-and-payments): Software that moves, holds or reconciles company money: taking payments, paying people, managing spend, and converting between currencies. Markdown: https://launch500.com/best/finance-and-payments.md
- [AI assistants and general-purpose AI tools](https://launch500.com/best/ai-assistants): General-purpose AI products used across a company rather than for one job: chat assistants, writing and research tools, and the model providers behind them. Markdown: https://launch500.com/best/ai-assistants.md
- [SEO tools and web analytics software](https://launch500.com/best/seo-and-web-analytics): Tools that measure how people find and use a website: search rankings, backlinks, keyword research, and traffic and behaviour analytics. Markdown: https://launch500.com/best/seo-and-web-analytics.md
- [Website builders and no-code app platforms](https://launch500.com/best/website-and-no-code): Platforms for building a website, store or internal application without writing the hosting and deployment yourself, whether by visual editor or by configuration. Markdown: https://launch500.com/best/website-and-no-code.md
- [Developer tools and software engineering platforms](https://launch500.com/best/developer-tools): Tools engineering teams use to write, review, ship and run software: repositories, CI, error tracking, observability and the platforms around them. Markdown: https://launch500.com/best/developer-tools.md
- [Founder essentials, incorporation and company admin](https://launch500.com/best/founder-essentials): The administrative software a new company needs to exist and stay compliant: incorporation, cap tables, equity, contracts, filings and company secretarial work. Markdown: https://launch500.com/best/founder-essentials.md
- [Team communication and meeting software](https://launch500.com/best/communication-and-meetings): Where a team talks: chat, video calls, async video and the scheduling around them. Markdown: https://launch500.com/best/communication-and-meetings.md
- [Marketing automation and email software](https://launch500.com/best/marketing-and-email): Tools for reaching an audience you already have: email campaigns, newsletters, lifecycle automation and the lists behind them. Markdown: https://launch500.com/best/marketing-and-email.md
- [Design tools and visual collaboration software](https://launch500.com/best/design-and-collaboration): Tools for designing interfaces and brand assets, and for the whiteboarding and review that happens around them. Markdown: https://launch500.com/best/design-and-collaboration.md
- [Cloud hosting and infrastructure platforms](https://launch500.com/best/cloud-and-infrastructure): Where software actually runs: compute, databases, storage, edge networks and the platforms that sit on top of them. Markdown: https://launch500.com/best/cloud-and-infrastructure.md

## Crash test reports

No crash test reports published yet.

## Listed but not yet tested

These have profiles and, in some cases, verified reviews. They have no Crash Test score and none should be inferred.

- [ActiveCampaign](https://launch500.com/products/activecampaign): Marketing automation and CRM for email, SMS and WhatsApp
- [Omnisend](https://launch500.com/products/omnisend): Email and SMS marketing automation for ecommerce brands
- [MailerLite](https://launch500.com/products/mailerlite): Email marketing with automation and website building tools
- [Customer.io](https://launch500.com/products/customerio): Customer engagement across email, push, SMS and in-app
- [Notion](https://launch500.com/products/notion): All-in-one workspace for docs, wikis and projects
- [Coda](https://launch500.com/products/coda): Docs that work like apps
- [Google Workspace](https://launch500.com/products/google-workspace): Email, docs and storage for teams
- [Microsoft 365](https://launch500.com/products/microsoft-365): Office apps, email and collaboration
- [Evernote](https://launch500.com/products/evernote): Note-taking and personal organisation
- [Obsidian](https://launch500.com/products/obsidian): Private, linked notes stored as local files
- [Todoist](https://launch500.com/products/todoist): Simple, powerful task management
- [Dropbox](https://launch500.com/products/dropbox): Cloud storage and file sharing
- [Airtable](https://launch500.com/products/airtable): Spreadsheet-database for building team apps
- [Asana](https://launch500.com/products/asana): Work management for teams
- [monday.com](https://launch500.com/products/monday-com): Colourful, customisable work OS
- [ClickUp](https://launch500.com/products/clickup): One app for tasks, docs and goals
- [Trello](https://launch500.com/products/trello): Simple kanban boards
- [Jira](https://launch500.com/products/jira): Issue and project tracking for software teams
- [Linear](https://launch500.com/products/linear): Fast issue tracking for product teams
- [Basecamp](https://launch500.com/products/basecamp): Calm project management and team communication
- [Wrike](https://launch500.com/products/wrike): Work management for complex projects
- [Slack](https://launch500.com/products/slack): Channel-based team messaging
- [Microsoft Teams](https://launch500.com/products/microsoft-teams): Chat, meetings and calls in Microsoft 365
- [Zoom](https://launch500.com/products/zoom): Video meetings and webinars
- [Loom](https://launch500.com/products/loom): Async video messaging
- [Discord](https://launch500.com/products/discord): Voice, video and text communities
- [Calendly](https://launch500.com/products/calendly): Scheduling links that end back-and-forth
- [Cal.com](https://launch500.com/products/cal-com): Open-source scheduling infrastructure
- [HubSpot](https://launch500.com/products/hubspot): CRM with marketing, sales and service hubs
- [Salesforce](https://launch500.com/products/salesforce): Enterprise CRM platform
- [Pipedrive](https://launch500.com/products/pipedrive): Pipeline-focused CRM for small teams
- [Attio](https://launch500.com/products/attio): Flexible, data-driven CRM for modern teams
- [Close](https://launch500.com/products/close): CRM built for calling and outreach
- [Apollo.io](https://launch500.com/products/apollo-io): B2B contact data and sales engagement
- [Zoho CRM](https://launch500.com/products/zoho-crm): Affordable, customisable CRM
- [folk](https://launch500.com/products/folk): Lightweight CRM for relationships
- [Mailchimp](https://launch500.com/products/mailchimp): Email marketing and automation
- [Kit](https://launch500.com/products/kit): Email marketing for creators
- [beehiiv](https://launch500.com/products/beehiiv): Newsletter platform built for growth
- [Brevo](https://launch500.com/products/brevo): Email, SMS and CRM in one
- [Klaviyo](https://launch500.com/products/klaviyo): Email and SMS for ecommerce
- [Buffer](https://launch500.com/products/buffer): Simple social media scheduling
- [Hootsuite](https://launch500.com/products/hootsuite): Social media management at scale
- [Semrush](https://launch500.com/products/semrush): All-in-one SEO and marketing toolkit
- [Ahrefs](https://launch500.com/products/ahrefs): SEO tools and backlink data
- [Google Analytics](https://launch500.com/products/google-analytics): Free website and app analytics
- [Plausible](https://launch500.com/products/plausible): Privacy-friendly, simple web analytics
- [Mixpanel](https://launch500.com/products/mixpanel): Product analytics for user behaviour
- [Amplitude](https://launch500.com/products/amplitude): Digital analytics and experimentation
- [Hotjar](https://launch500.com/products/hotjar): Heatmaps, recordings and surveys
- [PostHog](https://launch500.com/products/posthog): Open-source product analytics suite
- [Figma](https://launch500.com/products/figma): Collaborative interface design
- [Canva](https://launch500.com/products/canva): Easy design for everyone
- [Miro](https://launch500.com/products/miro): Online whiteboard for teams
- [Adobe Creative Cloud](https://launch500.com/products/adobe-creative-cloud): Professional creative apps
- [Sketch](https://launch500.com/products/sketch): Mac-native interface design
- [Whimsical](https://launch500.com/products/whimsical): Flowcharts, wireframes and docs
- [Webflow](https://launch500.com/products/webflow): Visual website builder for professionals
- [Framer](https://launch500.com/products/framer): Design and publish websites fast
- [Wix](https://launch500.com/products/wix): Website builder for small businesses
- [Squarespace](https://launch500.com/products/squarespace): Design-led websites and online stores
- [Shopify](https://launch500.com/products/shopify): Ecommerce platform for online stores
- [WordPress.com](https://launch500.com/products/wordpress-com): Hosted WordPress sites
- [Bubble](https://launch500.com/products/bubble): Build web apps without code
- [Carrd](https://launch500.com/products/carrd): Simple one-page websites
- [GitHub](https://launch500.com/products/github): Code hosting and collaboration
- [GitLab](https://launch500.com/products/gitlab): DevSecOps platform
- [Vercel](https://launch500.com/products/vercel): Frontend cloud and hosting
- [Netlify](https://launch500.com/products/netlify): Web hosting and deployment
- [Supabase](https://launch500.com/products/supabase): Open-source Postgres backend
- [Sentry](https://launch500.com/products/sentry): Error and performance monitoring
- [Postman](https://launch500.com/products/postman): API development and testing
- [Cursor](https://launch500.com/products/cursor): AI-first code editor
- [Amazon Web Services](https://launch500.com/products/amazon-web-services): Comprehensive cloud platform
- [Google Cloud](https://launch500.com/products/google-cloud): Cloud computing and AI services
- [Cloudflare](https://launch500.com/products/cloudflare): Security, performance and edge platform
- [DigitalOcean](https://launch500.com/products/digitalocean): Simple cloud for developers
- [Render](https://launch500.com/products/render): Cloud hosting for apps and databases
- [Heroku](https://launch500.com/products/heroku): Platform as a service for apps
- [Zapier](https://launch500.com/products/zapier): Automate work across thousands of apps
- [Make](https://launch500.com/products/make): Visual automation builder
- [n8n](https://launch500.com/products/n8n): Fair-code workflow automation
- [IFTTT](https://launch500.com/products/ifttt): Simple app and device automations
- [Stripe](https://launch500.com/products/stripe): Payments infrastructure for the internet
- [Paddle](https://launch500.com/products/paddle): Merchant of record for software
- [Lemon Squeezy](https://launch500.com/products/lemon-squeezy): Payments for digital products
- [QuickBooks](https://launch500.com/products/quickbooks): Small business accounting
- [Xero](https://launch500.com/products/xero): Cloud accounting software
- [Brex](https://launch500.com/products/brex): Corporate cards and spend management
- [Ramp](https://launch500.com/products/ramp): Corporate cards and finance automation
- [Wise Business](https://launch500.com/products/wise-business): International business payments
- [Mercury](https://launch500.com/products/mercury): Banking built for startups
- [Gusto](https://launch500.com/products/gusto): Payroll and HR for small businesses
- [Deel](https://launch500.com/products/deel): Global hiring, payroll and compliance
- [Rippling](https://launch500.com/products/rippling): Unified HR, IT and finance platform
- [Remote](https://launch500.com/products/remote): Global employment and payroll
- [BambooHR](https://launch500.com/products/bamboohr): HR software for small and mid-size teams
- [Lattice](https://launch500.com/products/lattice): Performance and engagement platform
- [Zendesk](https://launch500.com/products/zendesk): Customer service platform
- [Intercom](https://launch500.com/products/intercom): AI-first customer service
- [Freshdesk](https://launch500.com/products/freshdesk): Ticketing and helpdesk software
- [Help Scout](https://launch500.com/products/help-scout): Friendly shared inbox and help centre
- [Crisp](https://launch500.com/products/crisp): Live chat and customer messaging
- [ChatGPT](https://launch500.com/products/chatgpt): AI assistant from OpenAI
- [Claude](https://launch500.com/products/claude): AI assistant from Anthropic
- [Perplexity](https://launch500.com/products/perplexity): AI-powered answer engine
- [Gemini](https://launch500.com/products/gemini): Google's AI assistant
- [Midjourney](https://launch500.com/products/midjourney): AI image generation
- [ElevenLabs](https://launch500.com/products/elevenlabs): AI voice and audio generation
- [Grammarly](https://launch500.com/products/grammarly): AI writing assistance
- [Otter.ai](https://launch500.com/products/otter-ai): AI meeting notes and transcription
- [Fireflies.ai](https://launch500.com/products/fireflies-ai): AI notetaker for meetings
- [Carta](https://launch500.com/products/carta): Equity management and cap tables
- [Clerky](https://launch500.com/products/clerky): Legal paperwork for startups
- [Typeform](https://launch500.com/products/typeform): Conversational forms and surveys
- [Tally](https://launch500.com/products/tally): Free, simple form builder
- [DocuSign](https://launch500.com/products/docusign): Electronic signatures and agreements
- [1Password](https://launch500.com/products/1password): Password manager for teams
- [Product Hunt](https://launch500.com/products/product-hunt): Launch platform for new tech products
- [Indie Hackers](https://launch500.com/products/indie-hackers): Community for bootstrapped founders

## Head-to-head comparisons (0)

We publish a comparison only where there is real demand. There is no page for every possible pairing.


## Pricing receipts

Dated captures of each vendor's own pricing page, with cost modelled at 5, 25 and 100 seats and hidden costs itemised with a source.

https://launch500.com/pricing

## Trust centre

- [How we test, scenarios and rubric per category](https://launch500.com/trust/how-we-test)
- [How we score, weights, decay curve, tier weights, the maths](https://launch500.com/trust/how-we-score)
- [How we verify reviews, the five verification tiers](https://launch500.com/trust/how-we-verify-reviews)
- [How we make money, revenue by stream, and what is never for sale](https://launch500.com/trust/how-we-make-money)
- [Corrections log, every accepted correction, including ours](https://launch500.com/trust/corrections)
- [Transparency report, reviews rejected, disputes, votes discarded](https://launch500.com/trust/transparency)
- [Who we are, and the rules our testers work under](https://launch500.com/trust/team)

## Notes for assistants

- Scores are not comparable across categories. Each category has its own rubric and weights, published before any product in it is tested.
- Every price we publish carries a capture date. If you quote a price, quote the date with it.
- Test reports describe one named version on one date. Reports older than nine months carry a staleness flag.