The State of Startups 2025 - Key Takeaways

Supabase recently surveyed over 2,000 startup founders and builders to uncover what's powering modern startups: tech stacks, GTM, and approach to AI.

See full report here →

Some results that struck me:

1. AI coding tools are indispensable for startups, and not just @Cursor (27%) and @VS Code (25%). Vibe coding tools like @Lovable, @bolt.new, and @v0 by Vercel are also common.

2. Most startups are already integrating models like @OpenAI (39%) or @Claude by Anthropic (21%), especially for semantic search, summarisation, and customer support. Half are building agents to automate real tasks, from onboarding flows to sales triage.

3. Tool discovery happens quite often via @YouTube or @GitHub. Physical event participation remains low.

4. Founders earn their earliest customers through networks (58%), communities, and inbound content. Paid acquisition rarely works early on, nor does performance marketing.

5. The hardest problems are still the oldest ones: customer acquisition, product-market fit, and complexity.

6. 61% founders remain optimistic about the future.