Startup Credits in 2026: The Complete List

Startup credits are free usage, discounts or plan upgrades that software companies give early-stage startups so they build on their platform. As of October 2026, the biggest programs are Google for Startups Cloud (up to $350,000), Cloudflare for Startups (up to $350,000), AWS Activate (up to $200,000), Microsoft for Startups (up to $150,000) and Datadog for Startups (up to $100,000). Most of the largest amounts require investor backing or a referral from an accelerator or VC, but several programs, including Cloudflare's $10,000 tier, AWS Activate Founders and TinyFish for Startups Tier 1, are open to bootstrapped teams.

Building a product that needs live web data? Apply to TinyFish for Startups: free TinySearch and TinyFetch at 4x rate limits, plus up to $12,000 in value.

We're TinyFish, and we run one of the programs on this list. We've included it where it honestly fits (web data), and checked every other figure against the provider's own startup page in October 2026. Programs change often, so each entry links to the official page.

Startup credits at a glance

How we grouped these: by what you'd spend the credits on (cloud, data and hosting, observability, go-to-market and operations, web data), because that's how you'll actually stack them. Within each group, the biggest program comes first.

Cloud infrastructure credits

These are the big ones. You can usually only hold one hyperscaler's credits at a meaningful level at a time, so pick the cloud you'd choose anyway.

Google for Startups Cloud Program

What it is: Google Cloud credits plus credits for Google's own models (Gemini and Gemma), technical support and monthly Google Maps Platform credits.

What you get: up to $350,000 in Cloud credits over two years. For AI startups, that's 100% of usage up to $250,000 in year one, then 20% up to another $100,000 in year two. Other startups get up to $100,000 in year one plus 20% up to $100,000 in year two. There's also a smaller Start tier worth $2,000.

Who qualifies: the funded tiers (Scale and Scale AI, $200,000 to $350,000) need verifiable Pre-Seed to Series A funding from a known investor, and a company founded within the last 3 to 5 years depending on tier. The $2,000 Start tier is for startups founded in the past 2 years with a working MVP, a clear business model and plans to raise venture funding. Your email domain must match your company website.

Where it falls short: grants, bank loans, crowdfunding and friends-and-family money don't count as funding for the Scale tier. Credits can't be used on third-party models from Model Garden or the Cloud Marketplace, and Workspace, Maps and Ads are separate. Stealth, unfunded founders are asked to wait until they have a working website.

Apply: cloud.google.com/startup

Cloudflare for Startups

What it is: credits for Cloudflare's usage-based developer platform: Workers, Workers AI, R2, D1, KV, Queues, Vectorize and more.

What you get: three tiers. $10,000 for bootstrapped or self-funded startups with under $1M raised. $100,000 for startups with under $5M raised and funded by an affiliated partner, plus technical sessions. $350,000 for startups with $5M+ raised and an affiliated partner, plus priority support and bi-weekly Solutions Architect office hours. Credits last one year.

Who qualifies: startups funded up to Series B. The $10,000 tier needs no minimum funding.

Where it falls short: caps apply inside the total. R2 is covered up to $10,000, and Workers AI up to $2,500, $10,000 or $50,000 depending on tier. AI Gateway and domain registration aren't covered. It's a one-time program per startup.

Apply: cloudflare.com/forstartups

AWS Activate

What it is: AWS promotional credits for any AWS service, including Amazon Bedrock for AI models.

What you get: Activate Founders gives self-funded startups $1,000 to start, with select participants qualifying for up to $5,000. Activate Portfolio gives up to $200,000 to startups with an Organization ID from an Activate Provider (an accelerator, angel group or VC firm in AWS's network). Invite-only AWS Credits for AI Startups go above $200,000 for companies ready to scale.

Who qualifies: pre-Series B, founded in the last 10 years, with an AWS account on the paid tier, and either new to Activate or requesting more than you've had before.

Where it falls short: the large amounts depend entirely on whether your investor is an Activate Provider. Many are (AWS names Andreessen Horowitz, Sequoia and Y Combinator among them), but check before assuming.

Apply: aws.amazon.com/startups/credits

Microsoft for Startups

What it is: Azure credits that apply across eligible Azure services, plus access to Microsoft's AI models and developer tools.

What you get: up to $150,000 in credits, according to Microsoft's startups page as of October 2026.

Who qualifies: smaller amounts are available to early-stage founders, and the largest amounts go to startups referred through Microsoft's Investor Network.

Where it falls short: Microsoft has changed the structure of this program several times, and third-party guides quote anywhere from $5,000 to $200,000. Check the current tiers in the application before planning around a number.

Apply: microsoft.com/startups

DigitalOcean Startups (formerly Hatch)

What it is: 12 months of DigitalOcean credits, plus a marketplace of partner perks.

What you get: the credit amount varies and is set by the DigitalOcean Startups partner that refers you. There's a $10,000 monthly usage limit while you're in the program. GPU credits are a separate application, offered to select startups.

Who qualifies: startups that have raised $10M or less, with a company website, a matching company email and a new DigitalOcean team account. Service businesses (agencies, consultancies, dev shops) aren't eligible.

Where it falls short: core credits don't cover GPU Droplets, and unused credits are forfeited.

Apply: digitalocean.com/hatch

Database and hosting credits

MongoDB for Startups

What it is: MongoDB Atlas credits, Voyage AI tokens and technical support, in four tiers that grow with your stage.

What you get: baseline credits at the first tier, rising to "maximum credits" with priority support at the top tier. MongoDB doesn't publish the dollar amounts. Credits last 12 months, and extensions are considered case by case.

Who qualifies: less than 7 years old, Series A or earlier, focused on a single software product (agencies and dev shops are excluded), with an active website and LinkedIn page, and not previously in the program. You don't need to be new to MongoDB.

Apply: mongodb.com/startups

Vercel for Startups

What it is: credits and Enterprise-tier access for teams hosting on Vercel.

What you get: up to $30,000 in Flexible Commitment Amount, Enterprise-tier access and startup-focused support.

Who qualifies: "eligible teams", with criteria checked during the application.

Where it falls short: Vercel doesn't publish its eligibility criteria on the startups page, so you'll find out when you apply.

Apply: vercel.com/startups

Observability and analytics credits

Datadog for Startups

What it is: up to a year of the full Datadog platform: infrastructure monitoring, APM, logs, LLM observability and security.

What you get: up to $100,000 in credits for your first year, with no cut-down product tiers.

Who qualifies: Series A or earlier, new to Datadog (no current or past customers), and referred by one of Datadog's official partners. There's no direct route without a referral.

Where it falls short: you must confirm activation within 30 days of acceptance, and accounts inactive for three months can be removed.

Apply: datadoghq.com/partner/datadog-for-startups

PostHog for Startups

What it is: credits for PostHog's product analytics, session replay, feature flags, experiments and more.

What you get: $50,000 in PostHog credits for 12 months. Partner-backed startups also get $12,000+ in partner perks, plus merch.

Who qualifies: the default route is a company less than 2 years old, with less than $5M raised and a company email domain. Partner routes have their own limits (for example, under $8M raised and under 5 years old).

Where it falls short: since September 14, 2026, credits no longer cover PostHog's AI tools (PostHog AI, Desktop, the Slack app, Replay Vision and Inbox). Startup plan members get normal-priority support, not high-priority.

Apply: posthog.com/startups

Sentry for Startups

What it is: credits for Sentry's error monitoring and performance tracing.

What you get: up to $5,000 in credits and priority support.

Apply: sentry.io/for/startups

Go-to-market and operations credits

These aren't credits in the cloud sense, but the discounts are large enough to matter for a seed-stage budget.

HubSpot for Startups

What it is: discounted HubSpot Professional and Enterprise products: CRM, marketing, sales and service.

What you get: 90% off year one, 50% off year two and 25% off year three for eligible funded startups. Startups linked to approved entrepreneurial organizations get 30% off year one and 15% off year two.

Who qualifies: for 90% off, Pre-Seed, Seed or Series A funding (not Series B or later), and either an approved partner affiliation or venture funding HubSpot can verify on Crunchbase or Harmonic.

Where it falls short: applies to net-new Professional or Enterprise products only, and needs an annual commitment.

Apply: hubspot.com/startups

Intercom Early Stage

What it is: Intercom's helpdesk plus Fin, its AI support agent, at startup pricing.

What you get: 93% off in year one (from $65 a month), with 300 Fin outcomes and 15 Fin qualifications a month included. 50% off in year two and 25% off in year three.

Who qualifies: up to $10M in funding, fewer than 15 employees and not currently an Intercom customer.

Where it falls short: phone, SMS, WhatsApp and extra Fin outcomes are charged at list price.

Apply: intercom.com/early-stage

Notion for Startups

What it is: free months of Notion's Business plan with Notion AI.

What you get: 6 months free if you're affiliated with one of Notion's startup partners, 3 months free with a business website and company email, or 1 month for very small teams. Notion values the top offer at up to $12,000 for a 100-person team.

Who qualifies: non-paying Notion customers with a work email, fewer than 100 employees and no previous Notion promotions.

Apply: notion.com/startups

Linear for Startups

What it is: free access to Linear's Business plan for issue tracking and product planning.

What you get: up to 6 months free.

Who qualifies: non-paying Linear users with fewer than 50 employees, affiliated with an official Linear partner (a long list of VCs and accelerators, plus Stripe Atlas, Mercury, Brex and Ramp).

Apply: through your partner's link; see linear.app/startups

Stripe Atlas

What it is: Stripe's company formation service, which doubles as a perks bundle.

What you get: over $200,000 in partner offers (Stripe names AWS, Google and Xero among them) and $2,500 in Stripe product credits. Stripe refunds the Atlas fee if you deposit $5,000 into a Stripe Treasury account within 90 days of incorporating.

Who it's for: founders who haven't incorporated yet. If you're already incorporated, look at banking perks from Brex or Mercury instead.

Apply: stripe.com/atlas

Web data credits

TinyFish for Startups

What it is: our program. TinyFish is one API for the live web: Search, Fetch, Agent, Browser and Monitor behind one key and one wallet.

What you get: Tier 1 (up to $7,000): free TinySearch and TinyFetch at 4x rate limits for 6 months, $100 in your wallet every month for 6 months and 50 concurrent TinyAgent and TinyBrowser runs. Tier 2 (up to $12,000): free TinySearch and TinyFetch at 4x limits for a year, 50% off TinyAgent and TinyBrowser for 24 months and $500 to start. Both tiers get blog and social features, founder events and a direct line to engineers.

Who qualifies: Tier 1 is for independent, pre-production teams (no accelerator or investors). Tier 2 is for startups backed by an accelerator, VC or angels, with proof. A verified business email domain is required.

Where it falls short: it only helps if your product reads or acts on websites. If it doesn't, skip it. The headline values assume full use of the 4x limits.

Apply: tinyfish.ai/startups. Full details in TinyFish for Startups: tiers, credits and how to apply.

How to choose (and stack) startup credits

1. Start with the cloud you'd pick anyway. Don't move your stack to chase a bigger number. Credits expire in 12 to 24 months; migration pain lasts longer.
2. Check your investors first. AWS Portfolio, Cloudflare's upper tiers, Datadog, Linear and the biggest Microsoft amounts all depend on a partner referral. Ask your accelerator or lead investor for their perks list before applying anywhere directly.
3. Apply when you'll use them. Most credits start the clock at approval. A $100,000 grant that expires before launch is worth nothing.
4. Stack across categories, not within them. One hyperscaler, one observability tool, one analytics tool, one CRM, plus specialist APIs like TinyFish or AI model credits.
5. Use your company email everywhere. Google, DigitalOcean, PostHog, Notion and TinyFish all reject or downgrade personal email addresses.

Mistakes to avoid

• Applying from a Gmail address. It's the most common reason for instant rejection.
• Assuming "up to" means you'll get it. Most programs hand out the maximum only to funded, partner-referred companies.
• Forgetting the cliff. Set a calendar reminder two months before each program ends and check what your bill will be at list price.
• Letting credits lapse unused. DigitalOcean, Cloudflare and TinyFish Tier 1 credits don't roll over.
• Reselling or sharing credits. Every program on this list bans it, and most will revoke everything if they catch it.

What's changed recently

• Cloudflare raised its tiers in a recent update: the entry tier went from $5,000 to $10,000 and the top tier from $250,000 to $350,000.
• Google split AI and non-AI startups: AI startups can get up to $250,000 in year one, versus $100,000 for others.
• PostHog stopped covering its AI tools with startup credits from September 14, 2026.
• AI model credits moved behind VCs: OpenAI and Anthropic now route their largest credits through partner investors. We cover those in AI credits for startups.
• Web data got its own program: TinyFish for Startups launched in October 2026.

Need web data in your product? Apply to TinyFish for Startups: Tier 1 needs no funding, Tier 2 is worth up to $12,000.

Keep reading

• TinyFish for Startups: Up to $12,000 in Credits, Tiers and How to Apply
• AI Credits for Startups in 2026: Every Program Worth Applying To
• Best Startup Programs and Perks in 2026
• AI Accelerators in 2026: Programs, Terms and How to Get In
• Best AI Tools for Startups in 2026

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