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Something has to vary, proper?
Instagram, Snapchat, and TikTookay have dominated the social media panorama for years. As AI infiltrates each platform — and lots of corners of our lives — new social media founders, apps, and web behaviors are rising.
From vibe coding to cultural shifts shaping how individuals wish to join, it is an ideal storm for founders to experiment with social media.
AI has “essentially brought down the cost of making anything,” Amy Wu Martin, a companion at Menlo Ventures, informed Business Insider.
Menlo is an investor in Anthropic, whose product Claude Code has radically modified the product-building pipeline for startups.
“If you want to build a consumer AI company, you may not need a lot of engineers, but you still need cash for Anthropic credits,” mentioned Vanessa Larco, who cofounded Premise, a brand new VC agency backing AI-native startups.
While it is simpler than ever to make an app out of skinny air, it is troublesome to boost enterprise capital for a consumer-facing social media upstart.
PitchBook knowledge on social startup investments exhibits that after a peak in 2021 (239 offers totaling $2.2 billion), the variety of offers has declined every year. In 2025, PitchBook counted 97 offers totaling $330 million.
Still, there is a cohort of traders with hungry eyes looking for what is going to stick.
Business Insider is highlighting traders at 22 VC companies which can be actively funding or scouting out modern social startups. Our third annual listing is sourced from nominations by startup founders and enterprise friends, in addition to our personal reporting.
These traders, throughout the board, are excited by what AI has unlocked for the class, and lots of are bullish on shopper investments even because the broader VC area shies away from it. Our listing consists of big-shot companies that backed most of the mobile-era giants, in addition to AI-era funds based by VCs who wished to take issues into their very own fingers.
They’re backing startups constructing agentic options for our private relationships, firms targeted on getting us off our telephones and into actual life, and vibe-coding startups turning software program into content material.
As Nicole Quinn — a former investor at Lightspeed Venture Partners who left in 2025 to cofound Connect Ventures — put it, funding this subsequent wave of web startups will largely be investing within the “future of joy.”
Kimberly White/Getty Images for TechCrunch
Investors: Andrew Chen, normal companion; Olivia Moore, companion; Justine Moore, companion
Andreessen Horowitz backed most of the greatest hits of the cellular period, together with Instagram, Pinterest, Reddit, and Roblox. It’s additionally backed a slew of social firms from the 2020s, like BeReal, Clubhouse, Partiful, and Substack.
The agency has been actively backing shopper functions of AI, with traders together with the twin-investor duo Olivia and Justine Moore.
A16z additionally runs a aggressive accelerator, Speedrun, which invests as much as $1 million in early-stage shopper startups. The accelerator is spearheaded by normal companion Andrew Chen.
Recent investments:
Courtesy of Abstract Ventures
Investors: Ramtin Naimi, founder and normal companion; Alex Davidov, normal companion
From occasions app Partiful to the social-map startup Corner, Abstract’s traders have their fingers on the heart beat of recent web firms.
Founded by Naimi in 2016 when he was 25, the San Francisco-based agency sometimes invests in seed and early-stage firms. The agency has $1.8 billion in property underneath administration, per its web site. Outside the patron umbrella, the agency has additionally made bets in crypto, AI, and enterprise.
Before becoming a member of Abstract in 2018, Davidov was a fintech investor at Core Innovation Capital.
Recent investments:
Courtesy of Hugo Amsellem
Investor: Hugo Amsellem, cofounder and normal companion
Amsellem is a French investor who not too long ago moved to San Francisco. He rebranded the agency from Intuition VC to Babylon in 2026, focusing the fund on startups that “move culture.”
Before changing into a VC, he labored at creator financial system startup Jellysmack, overseeing M&A technique. Babylon has backed a string of early-stage shopper social startups, together with music social app Airbuds, meme and GIF platform Klipy, and AI social startup Eigen.
He’s eyeing startups constructing new takes on social networking powered by AI, similar to Eigen. The social startup is constructing a “mutual friend” layer for AI, that means a method to join you with individuals and share bits of knowledge, like a pal may in actual life.
“That’s the type of thing that AI will enable,” Amsellem mentioned, supercharging “those existing human behaviors without actual humans in the middle.”
Babylon sometimes writes checks as much as $250,000 for pre-seed rounds.
Recent investments:
Jay Kim
Investor: Jay Kim, affiliate
Kim began his profession in fairness analysis earlier than becoming a member of Dig. He is an investor at Black Jays — an early-stage shopper fund primarily based in New York. He focuses on startups throughout shopper, healthcare, fintech, edtech, and AI.
Kim informed Business Insider that not too long ago the agency has been spending much less time on AI and extra time on firms constructing within the bodily world. He mentioned he is drawn to utilities “that can’t be learned in a few days or weeks or answered through an AI chat.”
While Black Jays hasn’t made many current bets within the social class, it is “actively looking,” although Kim mentioned it has been “difficult.”
Recent investments:
Courtesy of Nicole Quinn
Investor: Nicole Quinn, cofounder and managing companion
After 10 years at Lightspeed Venture Partners, Quinn joined Connect Ventures in 2025. The agency got here collectively in 2020 as a partnership between Hollywood expertise company CAA and enterprise capital agency New Enterprise Associates. Michael Blank, beforehand head of shopper investments at CAA, is Connect’s different managing companion and cofounder.
Connect describes itself as “consumer-obsessed” and invests in early-stage firms, sometimes on the seed and Series A phases.
“We always invest where there’s a technology overlay on an existing human behavior,” Quinn mentioned. Retention and engagement are by far crucial metrics Connect considers when evaluating whether or not a startup’s product is “sticky” and has the potential to turn out to be a “generational company.”
While at Lightspeed, Quinn led the agency’s investments in a number of creator financial system startups, together with publication platform Beehiiv and video platform Cameo.
Recent investments:
Lukas Schulze/Sportsfile for Web Summit by way of Getty Images
Investor: Sasha Kaletsky, cofounder and managing companion
Kaletsky cofounded Creator Ventures with YouTuber Caspar Lee within the UK and is now primarily based in New York. Focused on early-stage shopper web startups, the agency closed Fund II at $45 million in 2025.
Creator Ventures has invested in startups trying to disrupt numerous points of the web.
For occasion, it backed ElevenLabs, which many different startups use to combine voice AI instruments. It’s additionally backed newer functions, similar to Status, an AI gaming platform that lets individuals role-play as characters operating a social media account.
Recent investments:
FirstMark Capital
Investor: Rick Heitzmann, cofounder and companion
Heitzmann is not any stranger to shopper social. Since founding the agency in 2008, Heitzmann has led investments in social media firms like Pinterest and Discord.
FirstMark not too long ago made its first funding in a relationship app, backing ex-Hinge CEO Justin McLeod’s new AI relationship startup Overtone. The nascent relationship app introduced it raised $18 million in July.
“Probably a year ago, someone would’ve said ‘dating,’ I would’ve been like, ‘Ugh, it’s a horrible category,'” Heitzmann mentioned. “But then you meet somebody who’s thought about the world completely differently, more originally, and better than you have, and it changes your mind.”
Overtone is one among many new shopper functions of AI that contain audio.
“We think that’s definitely going to be, in the medium term, the primary way that people interface with AI and with applications,” Heitzmann mentioned.
Recent investments:
Courtesy of Forerunner Ventures
Investors: Kirsten Green, founding companion; Eurie Kim, managing companion; Fawzi Itani, principal
Before Kirsten Green based Forerunner Ventures in 2012, she had by no means labored for a startup or VC agency.
Green began as an accountant and an fairness analysis analyst. Forerunner Ventures has grown into an early-stage powerhouse, investing in firms like Glossier and Warby Parker. Green was featured on Business Insider’s Seed 40 listing for 2026, which highlights ladies early-stage traders.
Green continues to guide shopper investments, alongside Eurie Kim — who led Forerunner’s Oura funding — and Fawzi Itani.
Recent investments:
Goodwater
Investors: Chi-Hua Chien, cofounder and managing companion; Eric Kim, cofounder and managing companion; Ed Robinson, enterprise companion
Several years in the past, Goodwater made a vital early guess on Musical.ly — earlier than it was acquired by ByteDance and merged with TikTookay.
Goodwater has since made a number of investments in up-and-coming social startups, such because the occasions app Posh, the close-friends social community Yope, and the social calendar app Howbout. Per its web site, Goodwater is on the lookout for “the most promising consumer tech entrepreneurs.”
The agency, primarily based within the Bay Area, sometimes invests $5 million to $50 million into startups on the Series A and development phases.
Recent investments:
GV
Investor: Sangeen Zeb, normal companion
Zeb is a normal companion at GV (FKA Google Ventures) targeted on early- and late-stage AI, enterprise, and shopper firms, together with Harvey, Sierra, and OpenEvidence.
Before becoming a member of GV in 2021, Zeb was an investor with Founders Circle Capital, Centerview Capital, and Summit Partners.
Zeb mentioned the perfect shopper founders have been examined early and are sometimes “a study in contradictions.” This consists of unlikely profession backgrounds — similar to Dollhouse’s Divanny Lamas, who labored in enterprise infrastructure earlier than founding the AI video creation app — that enable them to see openings others miss.
Recent investments:
Khosla Ventures
Investor: Adina Tecklu, companion
Tecklu joined Khosla in 2019 and is concentrated on early-stage software program, AI, and fintech firms. Previously, she labored in seed investing at Canaan and was an early worker at Zenefits.
Tecklu mentioned that probably the most compelling merchandise “don’t just help consumers accomplish tasks, they actively collaborate, create, entertain, or build relationships with them.”
“They use conversational or multimodal interfaces, compress expertise into intuitive experiences, grow more personalized as they learn each person’s preferences, and often unlock entirely new consumer behaviors,” she mentioned.
Recent investments:
Menlo Ventures
Investors: Shawn Carolan, companion; Amy Wu Martin, companion
In June, Menlo introduced that the 50-year-old enterprise agency had raised $3 billion in capital to again the subsequent technology of AI firms. The agency made a giant guess on Anthropic and, with its recent funding, is on the hunt for standout firms constructing one thing “net new,” Carolan mentioned.
Carolan joined the agency in 2002 and led its investments in Uber and Siri (pre-Apple acquisition). Martin joined Menlo in 2023 and was beforehand at Lightspeed Venture Partners and FTX Ventures. She’s led Menlo’s investments in AI firms like music startup Suno and social commerce instruments like ShopMy and Alta.
One space Martin is eyeing is how startups are cracking multiplayer, multi-agent applied sciences that might assist individuals higher deal with duties or socialize. Carolan echoed this, including that they are involved in seeing how AI might deliver again actually social networks (which have largely turn out to be leisure platforms), beginning with the “reinvention of the contacts book.”
Recent investments:
Brandi Rollins
Investor: Allison Stern, founder and normal companion
Stern says Mother Ventures is the primary VC agency to deal with moms because the hero shopper. It invests in pre-seed to Series A startups.
“We believe moms are the signal consumer in the AI era,” she mentioned. “Moms don’t want software; they want problems solved.” That mentioned, she famous that AI has made it doable to ship options at scale.
Before founding Mother Ventures, Stern was an working companion at The Chernin Group and the cofounder of Tubular Labs, a social media analytics platform.
Recent investments:
Courtesy of Patron
Investors: Amber Atherton, companion; Jason Yeh, cofounder and normal companion; Brian Cho, cofounder and normal companion
Patron’s group is captivated with gaming and the ways in which individuals join — on-line and offline.
Atherton mentioned the agency’s method to recognizing promising shopper bets stems from retaining a detailed eye on “subcultures,” particularly within the AI period.
“Things that are starting to change on the edges could be a predictor around where mainstream consumer behavior is going to go,” Atherton mentioned. Wellness tradition is a type of alternatives.
The early-stage agency has backed social startups like Arya, an AI relationship wellness platform, and Sweatpals, an app for locating IRL health and wellness lessons and communities.
Recent investments:
Courtesy of Precursor
Investors: Charles Hudson, managing companion; Marina Girgis, principal
Hudson, primarily based in San Francisco, based Precursor greater than a decade in the past and has a knack for backing founders early on.
Girgis, primarily based in New York, joined Precursor in 2021 after spending a number of years as an analyst at Bloomberg.
“We think a lot about the longer-term staying power of an app when we first invest,” Girgis mentioned. “What’s the goal behind the app? How can you use the habits that you’re creating or the data that you’re collecting to create something really long-lasting?”
Last yr, Precursor closed a $66 million fund (the generalist agency’s fifth fund) to again early-stage startups. Precursor sometimes invests as much as $500,000 in pre-seed or seed-stage startups.
Recent investments:
Courtesy of Premise
Investors: Vanessa Larco, cofounder and companion; Mercedes Bent, cofounder and companion
Larco and Bent teamed up final yr to discovered Premise and are betting their careers on the potential for shopper web startups on this AI period. The two traders beforehand held posts at NEA and Lightspeed, respectively.
Gaming — notably Roblox — is one space Larco sees as a chance.
“Snapchat was for young millennials,” she mentioned. “Something like Roblox might be the next social network for Gen Alpha.”
When it involves AI, Larco mentioned multiplayer, actually social, agentic instruments have an extended method to go earlier than they’re helpful.
“The biggest problem right now in agent world is an agent has a really hard time knowing anyone exists beyond the person or the context it lives in,” Larco mentioned.
Recent investments:
Note: Larco and Bent invested as angels
Eamonn M. McCormack/Getty Images for SXSW London
Investor: Alexis Ohanian
After cofounding Reddit, one among social media’s greatest firms, Alexis Ohanian is trying smaller.
One yr after leaving Reddit’s board, Ohanian launched Seven Seven Six (776), his enterprise capital agency. 776 has persistently invested in shopper platforms, from music sharing to micro dramas and restaurant discovery. Ohanian backed a relationship app, Left Field, when he starred as an investor on “Shark Tank.”
In November, Ohanian informed Business Insider that he was trying to replicate the efficiency of the group chat.
“This generation coming up has learned, and has a preference for, a less gamified version of life,” he mentioned. “They’re choosing a healthier type of paradigm for social.”
Recent investments:
Brian Dorsey Studios
Investor: Ethan Daly, normal companion
Six years in the past, Daly was Shine Capital’s first rent. Now, he is made companion and leads investments.
Daly informed Business Insider that development in shopper AI has been relegated primarily to productiveness instruments and NSFW functions. Meanwhile, “legacy social networks” are extra targeted on engagement than connecting individuals, he added.
“We believe this creates a massive opportunity,” Daly mentioned. “We’re backing the next generation of human and social experiences.”
He additionally cofounded Earshot, a studio internet hosting DJ units, dinners, and artwork exhibitions.
Recent investments:
Dilpreet Shah
Investor: Maya Bakhai, founder and managing companion
Spice Capital launched in 2021 and focuses on early-stage firms that serve internet-native shoppers throughout AI, blockchain, shopper, and deep tech. In current months, the agency employed its first AI chief expertise officer to automate inside operations and function a tech companion for its portfolio firms.
Consumers have gotten extra “rational,” Bakhai mentioned, more and more turning to AI assistants to assist make buying choices as a substitute of counting on emotion or advertising. Over time, she expects startups will more and more promote to not individuals, however to the AI brokers making choices on their behalf.
“The end state of that is that agents are the next consumer,” she mentioned.
Prior to Spice, Bakhai labored at Kevin Durant’s VC agency Thirty Five Ventures.
Recent investments:
Courtesy of Stellation Capital
Investors: Peter Boyce II, founder and managing companion; Rhian Horton, principal
A New York-based agency backing early-stage startups, Stellation was based by Boyce II after he left General Catalyst.
It’s a generalist fund, however Stellation has made a number of bets on shopper startups.
It backed Software Applications Incorporated, a desktop device for LLMs, which OpenAI acquired. It has additionally backed firms like Koodos, which makes the social app Shelf, and Swsh, a social platform for sharing content material from giant occasions like music festivals.
Horton joined Stellation Capital in 2023.
Recent investments:
Kimberly White/Getty Images for TechCrunch
Investor: Niko Bonatsos, cofounder and managing director
Bonatsos left his publish at General Catalyst after 15 years to launch a brand new agency, referred to as Verdict Capital, in 2026. The agency’s mandate? To lead early-stage investments in “founders who are freaks in a good way” and “building in categories that don’t have a name yet,” Bonatsos mentioned.
Bonatsos has a historical past in shopper. At GC, he invested in firms like Snap, Discord, and Triumph Arcade, in addition to newer social startups, together with Status and IRL-social startup 222.
Verdict has already invested in 15 firms, and 30% of these investments are within the shopper class, Bonatsos mentioned.
He sees ample alternative as an investor proper now due to how AI is permitting some founders to “reimagine entire categories” and construct “much faster.”
Recent investments:
Illustration by Michael M. Santiago/Getty Images
Investors: Patrick Mandia, Eddie Koai, Ceci Mourkogiannis, Chad DePue, Antoine Martin
Uncommon Projects has backed a number of up-and-coming social startups, together with close-friends social apps Locket and Retro, vibe-coding social app Gizmo, {and professional} networking startup Series. It additionally backed BeReal, in addition to AI firms like Mirage (previously Captions) and AI notetaker firm Granola.
“We’re a group of friends that met while working on product at Snapchat — we look for companies with an uncommon perspective on how people communicate and grow together,” the agency’s web site says.
Per DePue’s LinkedIn, Uncommon invests checks of $100,000 or extra.
Some of the traders are additionally constructing startups within the area. Martin is the cofounder of Amo, the corporate behind Bump. DePue cofounded AI relationship app Sitch.
Recent investments:
• Eigen: An AI social startup constructing a “mutual friend” to attach individuals
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