Building a startup is hard enough without operating in an information vacuum. Reddit has become one of the most valuable platforms for founders because it offers something you cannot find anywhere else: raw, unfiltered conversations between potential customers, fellow founders, and industry experts. No PR spin, no marketing polish -- just people sharing what actually works, what fails, and what they need.
Whether you are validating an idea, searching for your first users, or trying to understand why people choose your competitor, these subreddits are where the real conversations happen. Each community listed below has been selected because it consistently provides the kind of insights that help founders make better decisions: honest feedback, real-world experience, and pattern-matching opportunities you cannot get from reading blog posts or industry reports alone.
Core Startup Communities
These are the communities where founders spend the most time. They cover the full lifecycle of building a startup, from initial idea validation to scaling and fundraising. If you only have time to follow a few subreddits, start here.
r/startups
1.2M+ membersThe primary Reddit community for startup founders. Discussions cover idea validation, MVPs, product-market fit, hiring, fundraising, and growth strategies. The community has weekly threads for sharing what you are working on and getting feedback from other founders.
r/Entrepreneur
1.5M+ membersA broader entrepreneurship community that covers everything from side hustles to venture-backed startups. Members share business ideas, revenue reports, growth tactics, and honest post-mortems of businesses that did not work out.
r/SideProject
100K+ membersA community for indie makers and developers building projects outside of their day jobs. Members share launches, progress updates, and technical decisions. The vibe is supportive and practical, with a focus on shipping products and learning from feedback.
r/indiehackers
60K+ membersFocused on bootstrapped founders building profitable businesses without venture capital. Discussions center on revenue milestones, growth strategies, pricing experiments, and the reality of building a business independently.
r/SaaS
100K+ membersDedicated to Software-as-a-Service businesses. Founders discuss pricing strategies, churn reduction, onboarding flows, feature prioritization, and B2B sales tactics. Product launches and milestone posts are common and well-received.
r/growmybusiness
30K+ membersA smaller, focused community dedicated specifically to business growth strategies. Members share their growth challenges and get tactical advice on marketing, sales, partnerships, and customer acquisition.
Try Reddily Free
Analyze any Reddit thread and extract actionable insights in seconds. 5 free credits, no credit card required.
Start Free TrialOperations, Fundraising, and Skills
Beyond the core startup communities, these subreddits help founders with specific aspects of building a company: raising capital, managing operations, building products, and developing the technical skills needed to execute on their vision.
r/smallbusiness
600K+ membersPractical, operations-focused discussions about running a business day to day. Covers hiring, accounting, legal structures, vendor selection, customer management, and the unglamorous realities of keeping a business running.
r/venturecapital
80K+ membersDiscussions about fundraising, investor relations, term sheets, and the venture capital ecosystem. Both founders and investors participate, providing perspectives from both sides of the table.
r/ProductManagement
100K+ membersProduct managers discuss user research, prioritization frameworks, roadmapping, stakeholder management, and product strategy. The community covers both early-stage product development and scaling established products.
r/webdev
2M+ membersA massive community for web developers covering frontend, backend, DevOps, and full-stack development. Members discuss technology choices, framework comparisons, deployment strategies, and best practices for building web applications.
r/digitalnomad
2M+ membersA community for people building location-independent businesses and careers. Discussions cover remote work tools, international business operations, visa strategies, and building businesses that can be run from anywhere.
r/juststart
60K+ membersDedicated to building online businesses from scratch, with a strong focus on content sites, affiliate marketing, and digital products. Members share detailed case studies with real revenue numbers and traffic data.
Getting the Most Value from Reddit as a Founder
These subreddits are most valuable when you approach them with specific questions rather than passively scrolling. Here are a few ways to make your Reddit time productive:
- Search for your problem space. Before posting, search each subreddit for threads related to the problem your startup solves. You will often find that people have already discussed exactly what you need to know.
- Look for "I switched from X to Y" stories. These switching narratives reveal the specific triggers that cause people to change products -- information that is crucial for positioning your startup against established competitors.
- Pay attention to what gets upvoted. High upvote counts on comments signal that a sentiment is widely shared. When a complaint about a product gets hundreds of upvotes, that tells you something significant about market demand.
- Use tools to analyze at scale. Reading individual threads is useful, but analyzing patterns across dozens of threads reveals trends that no single discussion can show. Reddily helps you extract themes and insights from multiple Reddit discussions simultaneously.
Reddit is not a replacement for talking directly to customers, but it is an excellent complement. The communities listed above will help you understand your market, validate your ideas, and learn from the experiences of founders who are a few steps ahead of you on the same journey.