This Linear company profile covers the company's valuation, revenue, funding rounds, investors and history. Linear works in software, with a focus on product development and issue tracking. It was founded in 2019 and is headquartered in San Francisco, California, United States. Its latest valuation on record is US$2.5 billion (employee tender offer) (August 2026). Every figure links to a public source, and anything the company hasn't disclosed is marked as such.
Revenue
| Metric | Value | As of | Source |
|---|---|---|---|
| Customers | More than 15,000 customers, including OpenAI, Scale AI and Perplexity | June 2025 | AOL (Reuters) |
Funding history
| Date | Round | Amount | Valuation | Investors | Source |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Aug 2026 | Employee tender offer | US$99M | US$2.5B | Accel, 01A, Salesforce Ventures, S32 | Pulse 2.0 |
| Jun 2025 | Series C | US$82M | US$1.25B | Accel (lead); 01 Advisors, Sequoia Capital, Seven Seven Six, Designer Fund | Built In SF |
| 2023 | Series B | US$35M | About US$400M | Accel (lead) | Verdict |
Linear timeline
Key dates from the sources on this page, oldest first. Metric snapshots are listed after the funding events.
- 2019 — Linear is founded in San Francisco by Karri Saarinen (CEO), Tuomas Artman and Jori Lallo.
- 2023 — Series B: US$35M, valuing the company at About US$400M. Investors: Accel (lead).
- Jun 2025 — Series C: US$82M, valuing the company at US$1.25B. Investors: Accel (lead); 01 Advisors, Sequoia Capital, Seven Seven Six, Designer Fund.
- Aug 2026 — Employee tender offer: US$99M, valuing the company at US$2.5B. Investors: Accel, 01A, Salesforce Ventures, S32.
- June 2025 — Customers: More than 15,000 customers, including OpenAI, Scale AI and Perplexity.
Investors
Overview
Linear makes software that product and engineering teams use to plan and track their work: issues, bugs, projects, roadmaps and development cycles. It's known for being extremely fast, keyboard-driven and carefully designed, which made it popular with startups and engineering teams frustrated by slower, more complex tools. Over time it has expanded from issue tracking into a broader product development system, including planning, customer feedback, documentation and AI agents that can take on engineering tasks. Many fast-growing AI companies use it.
Karri Saarinen, the CEO, Tuomas Artman and Jori Lallo founded Linear in 2019. All three are from Finland and previously worked at leading US technology companies: Saarinen led design systems at Airbnb, Artman worked on mobile engineering at Uber, and Lallo was an engineer at Coinbase. They built Linear because they felt existing tools slowed teams down. The company operates as a remote-first business with a base in San Francisco.
Products
- Issues and cycles: fast issue tracking with sprints, called cycles, and triage workflows.
- Projects and initiatives: planning and tracking larger pieces of work and company goals.
- Customer requests: collecting feedback from tools such as Slack, Intercom and Zendesk and linking it to product work.
- Docs: project documents and specifications connected to issues.
- Integrations: deep links with GitHub, GitLab, Slack, Figma and other tools.
- AI and agents: AI features that triage issues and summarise work, plus integrations that let AI coding agents pick up and complete issues.
Funding
Linear raised relatively little money compared with many startups and reported being profitable. It raised a Series A led by Sequoia Capital and a Series B led by Accel. In June 2025 it raised an US$82 million Series C at a US$1.25 billion valuation, led by Accel, with existing investors 01 Advisors and Sequoia and new investors Seven Seven Six and Designer Fund. The round included both new money and secondary sales. Linear said its profits grew 280% the previous year and that it had more than 15,000 customers, including OpenAI, Scale AI and Perplexity. One data provider later listed a higher secondary valuation, which we haven't verified, so we use the Series C figure.
Business model
Linear charges per user per month, with a free plan for small teams and paid plans that add features for larger organisations, such as advanced security, admin controls and analytics. Enterprise contracts cover larger companies. The company doesn't publish revenue, so we show it as not disclosed.
Competition
Linear's main competitor is Atlassian's Jira, the long-time standard for software issue tracking. Others include Asana, Monday.com, ClickUp, GitHub Issues and Projects, Shortcut and Notion. Linear's advantages are speed, design quality and a focused product philosophy that appeals to engineering-led companies; its challenge is winning large enterprises with complex requirements and entrenched Jira deployments.
Linear at a glance
Linear is a San Francisco-based, remote-first software company founded in 2019 by Karri Saarinen, Tuomas Artman and Jori Lallo. It makes fast issue tracking and product development software used by more than 15,000 companies. It raised an US$82 million Series C at a US$1.25 billion valuation in June 2025, led by Accel, and reports being profitable.
Timeline
- 2019: founded by three Finnish engineers and designers.
- 2020: launches publicly after a waitlisted beta; raises a Series A led by Sequoia.
- 2023: raises a Series B led by Accel.
- 2024–2025: adds customer requests, docs and AI features.
- June 2025: raises US$82 million at US$1.25 billion.
Craft as a strategy
Linear is often cited as an example of how product quality and design can be a competitive advantage in crowded software categories. Rather than adding every feature customers request, it focuses on speed, consistency and opinionated workflows. That approach built strong word-of-mouth among engineers and designers, keeping marketing costs low and supporting profitability. The challenge is scaling the product for large enterprises without losing what made it distinctive.
AI agents and software planning
As AI coding agents begin to complete engineering tasks, issue trackers become the place where work is assigned to both humans and agents. Linear has integrated with agents so that an issue can be delegated to an AI, which then writes code and reports back. This could make issue tracking more central to software development, and Linear's popularity with AI companies positions it well for that shift.
Who uses Linear
Linear's users are mainly product managers, engineers and designers at startups and growth-stage technology companies, increasingly joined by larger organisations moving away from older tools.
Risks
- Atlassian's scale: Jira's installed base and ecosystem are hard to displace in large enterprises.
- Feature pressure: enterprise demands may complicate the product.
- AI disruption: new AI-native tools could reshape how teams plan work.
Questions for product teams
- How do your workflows map to the tool's opinionated structure?
- Which integrations do you need with code, design and support tools?
- How will AI agents fit into your planning process?
Linear versus Jira
Jira has been the default for software teams for many years, with deep customisation, a vast marketplace of add-ons and integration across Atlassian's products. That flexibility can also make it slow and complex. Linear takes the opposite approach, with fewer configuration options, opinionated workflows and a focus on speed. Startups often choose Linear from the beginning, while larger companies weigh migration costs, reporting needs and integration with existing processes. Atlassian has responded by improving Jira's performance and design and adding AI features.
Valuation context
A US$1.25 billion valuation is modest compared with some AI-era software companies, reflecting Linear's capital efficiency: it raised relatively little and focused on profitability. Its growth among AI companies could support a higher valuation in future rounds.
Latest developments (October 2026)
Linear completed a US$99 million tender offer in 2026 that let current and former employees sell shares at a US$2.5 billion valuation, double its 2025 level, with Accel, 01A, Salesforce Ventures and S32 buying, according to Pulse 2.0. The company said it passed US$100 million in annual recurring revenue, has more than 40,000 paying business customers, is cash-flow positive and chose not to raise new primary capital. This supersedes the 2025 valuation described earlier on this page.
What to watch
Watch enterprise adoption, AI agent integrations, any new funding round and competition from Atlassian. Our guide to the largest private SaaS companies covers related companies.
Takeaways
Product and engineering teams get a fast, focused planning tool. Founders can learn from Linear's capital-efficient, design-led growth. Investors should watch whether it can win large enterprises.
Sources
Every figure on this page comes from the public sources below. Where sources disagreed, we used the company's own announcement or a primary news report. Private-company data changes; check the date beside each figure.
Frequently asked questions
What does Linear do?
Linear is a software / product development and issue tracking company headquartered in San Francisco, California, United States. It was founded in 2019.
What is Linear's valuation?
Linear was valued at US$2.5 billion (employee tender offer) as of August 2026, according to Pulse 2.0. Private company valuations are set at funding rounds or share sales and can change significantly between them.
How much revenue does Linear make?
Linear is a private company and has not publicly disclosed its revenue. Figures on third-party sites are usually modelled estimates rather than numbers reported by the company.
What was Linear's latest funding round?
The most recent financing we have verified is a employee tender offer in Aug 2026: US$99M, at a valuation of US$2.5B. Source: Pulse 2.0.
Who are Linear's investors?
Investors named in public announcements include Accel, Sequoia Capital, 01 Advisors, Seven Seven Six and Designer Fund.
Who founded Linear?
Linear was founded in 2019 by Karri Saarinen (CEO), Tuomas Artman and Jori Lallo.
Is Linear a public company?
No. Linear is a private company (private, venture backed), so its shares are not traded on a stock exchange and it isn't required to publish its financial results.
Where is Linear headquartered?
Linear is headquartered in San Francisco, California, United States.