33 Legendary Startup Pitch Decks and What You Can Learn From Them [+10 Free Templates]

A startup pitch deck is a brief presentation that provides investors with an overview of your new business and/or startup idea through presentation slides.

It usually focuses on showcasing your product, sharing your business model, giving a look into your monetization strategy, and introducing your team.

A startup pitch deck is an essential fundraising tool for successful startups, whether you’re looking to raise funding from $50,000, $500,000, or $50 million. However, an investor pitch deck is just one of the best pitch decks and examples we will share below.

Despite the brevity of the successful startup pitch decks, which usually run for 10 slides or less, creating a pitch deck that wins investment is not an easy task.

A great pitch deck covers key points through visuals and bullet points and usually has a competition slide, a problem slide, and a solution slide to explain your offering and the market.

Additionally, a business model slide and a team slide (if your business is developed enough to present these) can turn a good deck into a great startup pitch deck.

Don’t forget, a simple pitch deck is a good pitch deck—and you’re about to learn how to nail it.

• Examples of 33 successful pitch decks
• Takeaways that you can apply when creating your own startup pitch deck
• Editable templates of 10 pitch decks that you can use for free

Looking for a winning pitch deck template ASAP to present in front of potential investors?  Try our free template created in collaboration with HighSpark – an agency that has helped more than 500 startups raise cumulatively over $80 million in funding. 

Here is the list of 33 of the best startup pitch deck examples that we will go through:

1. Facebook
2. Airbnb
3. Buffer
4. Square
5. LinkedIn
6. Mint
7. MapMe
8. LaunchRock
9. MixPanel
10. Moz
11. Buzzfeed
12. YouTube
13. Manpacks
14. Foursquare
15. Flowtab
16. Dwolla
17. ZenPayRoll (Now Gusto)
18. Bliss
19. Adpushup
20. Wealthsimple
21. AppVirality
22. Shape Integrated Software
23. Podozi
24. Fittr
25. Swipes
26. Canvas
27. Ooomf (now Crew)
28. Cubeit
29. Castle
30. Sequoia Capital
31. Uber
32. WeWork
33. MatterMark

These startup pitch deck examples were created by top brands in tech. At the time, they were all small startups (seed stage companies) looking to raise money or venture capital through potential investors and grow their businesses. Sound familiar?!

We hope that their business idea and investor pitch decks will inspire you (and of course, potential investors).

If you are more of a visual learner than a reader type, you can watch a video summary of the first 10 startup pitch deck examples mentioned in this blog post:

Alternatively, if you’re ready to create your own pitch deck, we’ve added some startup pitch deck examples and pitch deck templates to the bottom of this article. You can go straight to them by clicking here. Or get access to Piktochart’s online design tool by signing up for a free account and choosing a presentation template to get started easily.

From behemoths like Facebook and YouTube to superstars like Buffer, together these startups have raised millions of dollars and are now worth billions!

It’s time to see how they did it.

Here’s a fun fact: Peter Thiel, the billionaire venture capitalist, and entrepreneur, was the first outside investor in Facebook back in 2004. That’s when Mark Zuckerberg first set out to turn his dorm room project into a lasting business. Zuckerberg received $500,000 from Peter Thiel.

Facebook’s pitch deck was more of a media kit of sorts. It was containing the company’s value proposition, key metrics, and marketing services that were used to sell ads to potential clients.

Favorite takeaway: The focus of the startup pitch deck was based on solid numbers such as user engagement, traffic, and growth trajectory.

Airbnb is a platform that allows people to list, find, and rent lodging.

This company is one of the greatest startup success stories of our time.

The now famous Airbnb pitch deck has become one of the best pitch decks for inspiring entrepreneurs around the world.

Favorite takeaway: The intro. It’s all about hooking your audience. You need to describe your business using as few words as possible. Imagine telling a 5-year-old what your business is about. If you can’t do that, it’s time to put some time into nailing it down.

Buffer is a social media scheduling platform that helps you schedule content for Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, and Pinterest.

The almighty startup pitch deck that helped Buffer to raise half a million dollars gained popularity by becoming one of the first pitch decks openly shared online. The founder decided to put it up to help other startups to raise funds.

Favorite takeaway: Similar to Facebook, the deck was based on solid numbers from Buffer’s users (e.g., 800 users, $150,000 annual revenue run rate, etc.)

Square is a company that allows merchants to accept mobile credit card payments via a dongle.

Favorite takeaway: Social proof! It doesn’t hurt to promote the management team if they’ve been with Twitter, Google, LinkedIn, PayPal, and more. It shows that your management team’s experience is an armor to the company. This detailed startup pitch deck outlines Square’s business model and a simple financial model that portrays its annual revenue and five-year growth rate.

Founded in 2002, LinkedIn is the top business-oriented social networking platform.

The company’s pitch talks a great deal about company values, the power of networking, and how it’s different from other social networks out there.

Favorite takeaway: The deck also provides an extensive analogy to showcase to investors what LinkedIn is. For example, it talks about “Web 1.0” vs. “Web 2.0”: Alta Vista was “Search 1.0”, and Google was “Search 2.0”. The deck talks about how LinkedIn is “Networking for Businesses 2.0”.

Mint is a personal financial services tool that helps people track their spending and find ways to save money.

This startup pitch deck example was used in a competition and was never used for raising money, but it’s still a powerful deck that startups can learn from.

Favorite takeaway: This simple deck provides a clear value proposition to customers and investors. The creators of this deck also understood that one of the key concerns of an investor is the exit mechanism of his or her investments. I love how the deck highlights a number of exit strategy options.

MapMe allows users to create universally accessible (i.e., on smartphones, tablets, and computers) maps of anywhere they want with no coding required.

This startup deck was used to raise $1 million in seed funding.

Social proof almost always works. The deck showed that the startup had over 20,000 unique visitors, 18,000 monthly alerts, and12 minutes average sessions on the site.

Favorite takeaway: The pitch deck has fewer than 13 slides but provides investors with knowledge of the traction the site got going viral on social media and its go-to-market strategy.

LaunchRock allows users to create landing pages and quickly get their startups known through social media, even before the launch of their full site.

Favorite takeaway: As a more creatively designed pitch deck example, this pitch deck had only 15 slides but showed how the product works and the different ways it can be used. They also utilize an analogy similar to what LinkedIn had in their decks.

Mixpanel is an advanced analytics platform for mobile and the web. They not only measure page views but also analyze the actions people take. This is the series-B startup pitch deck for Mixpanel that helped them raise over $65 million.

Favorite takeaway: This pitch deck example started off with a problem: people guessing their analytics. It followed up by providing its solution to that problem and, ultimately, its competitive advantage. One of the best pitch decks, this is a great example of showing the problem and solution.

Moz started out as an SEO company but has pivoted to support marketers across all inbound marketing strategies.

This is the series-B startup pitch deck for Moz which they used to raise over $18 million. If you’re an established startup, this is a great example of an investor pitch deck, and you can follow this guide. The pitch deck is packed with information about the company since it was founded five years prior to this pitch.

Favorite takeaway: Because the company had already been in operation for five years, they were able to present an accurate estimated revenue, revenue run rate, average customer lifetime value, cost of paid acquisition, etc.

We all have a love-and-hate relationship with Buzzfeed, don’t we? I’m sure you’ve stumbled on their pages or watched their videos before. As of today, BuzzFeed has managed to raise over $240 million in investor capital (another great example of an investor pitch deck).

Favorite takeaway: SOCIAL PROOF! It doesn’t hurt to start a pitch deck with big numbers the company has, like the millions of users visiting the website on a monthly basis and quotations from large organizations such as CNN.

YouTube was acquired by Google in 2006 for $1.6 billion. Like Facebook, this company doesn’t require any introduction. Unfortunately, this is not the original deck. This is YouTube’s pitch deck to Sequoia Capital (one of the most established VC investors who’s often regarded as one of the industry’s best), which was released through a legal proceeding.

Favorite takeaway: The company wanted to be the primary outlet for video content, and it succeeded in doing just that. It goes to show that if you know what your product can do, are able to show its potential, and build on the momentum gained through early investments to create that, then you can achieve its potential. If you’re aiming to build an investor pitch deck to land a VC like Sequoia Capital, this presentation slide deck is a great template for you!

Manpacks is a platform that delivers men’s essentials such as underwear, razors, grooming, and other products.

The company raised $500,000 with this pitch deck.

Favorite takeaway: This deck stands out! They clearly understand who they are, and they stayed that way throughout the entire presentation. The startup pitch deck is filled with a fun tone that helps explain the product well.

Foursquare is a mobile platform that helps you find the best places to go in your area.

Favorite takeaway: This pitch deck does a great job using screenshots of social proof that the app already has from its users sharing tweets of them being the ‘mayor’ of a particular area.

Flowtab was an app that allowed people to order drinks quickly at a crowded bar. Despite shutting down, the founders still made an effort to help other startups.

Favorite takeaway: Simplicity. This pitch deck example does well explaining critical information like the problem, the solution, their business model, and traction. You can’t really go wrong with this pitch deck.

Dwolla is a payment solution that allows users to send, receive, and request funds from other users. This 18-slide startup pitch deck landed the company $16.5 million.

Favorite takeaway: Most startups are founded because of a problem they faced, but not many people tell their story well through their pitch decks. In their slide deck, Dwolla shared a great story of how the founder paid $50,000 a year in credit card fees and then created a solution for never doing it again.

Gusto (previously ZenPayroll) is a cloud-based solution tool for small businesses to pay employees.

The company raised $6 million with this pitch deck.

Favorite takeaway: This isn’t just a startup pitch deck. It is a template that you can use and replicate easily by filling in the blanks.

Bliss provides metrics for coders and allows them to collaborate easily.

The company raised over $400,000 using Angel List.

Favorite takeaway: The pitch deck was well composed with a clear understanding of the product and the investors they were pitching to. This is one of the best pitch decks to use if you know your target market.

Adpushup allows companies to maximize ad revenues through advanced A/B testing. They raised more than $632,000 in investments.

Favorite takeaway: This slide deck proves that going back to the basics works. This pitch deck has basic principles like a great introduction, an outline of problems, potential solutions, market opportunities, products, case studies, milestones, traction, and a future plan.

Wealthsimple is Canada’s first online investment manager. They raised more than $2 million in seed funding with this slide deck.

Favorite takeaway: The startup pitch deck is sweet and short but effective. Our favorite part is the transformation of the industry, which is laid out in a table format.

AppVirality allows app developers to grow their platforms using growth method techniques proven by other startups.

Favorite takeaway: Our favorite takeaway is how the flow of the pitch deck goes through the problem, the proven solution, and how it works within their app to their target market in multiple slides.

Shape Integrated Software is budget management software that helps PPC analysts manage various budgets across different channels.

Favorite takeaway: When you have the traction to back your startup, use it. Shape clearly took advantage of it and presented it clearly in their pitch deck.

Podozi is an online e-commerce platform based in Nigeria.

Favorite takeaway: Most startup pitch decks work well when they’re short and sweet, in multiple slides, like Podozi’s. The best takeaway is the working partnership with large brands that this platform already has.

Fittr is a platform that designs custom workouts tailored to equipment, access, time management, and goals.

Favorite takeaway: As a user of this platform, we love the investment goals and the purpose of what the company is planning to use it for.

Swipes is a task manager app to help its users increase their productivity.

Favorite takeaway: One of their pages used social proof of quotations from The Next Web and Lifehacker. You can’t go wrong with that.

Canvas replaces paper-based processes with affordable and easy-to-use mobile apps and forms. They raised $9 million with these decks.

Favorite takeaway:  Instead of saying what they do, the second slide in their pitch deck shows how their startup helps businesses. No words are needed.

Crew (formerly Ooomf & then PickCrew) is a freelancer marketplace that connects mobile and web developers with projects or work. This deck was used to raise over $2 million dollars.

Favorite takeaway: Well-designed with an easy-to-understand flow.

Cubeit is a mobile application that allows users to aggregate content from anywhere. Cubeit used this 13-slide deck to raise seed funding before they even had a finished product.

Favorite takeaway: A strong introduction will get investors to pay attention. Their deck starts out with a clear message, which was that “owning more devices doesn’t make your life easier”. I can’t help but pay attention to how this company will help.

Castle was a startup that let rental owners put their properties on autopilot. This was the deck Castle used to raise $270,000 for their startup.

Favorite takeaway: Great design and easy to digest.

Sequoia Capital is one of the leading investment firms in Silicon Valley. This deck is a template they recommend following.

Favorite takeaway: It’s like having the keys to the kingdom. You don’t have to guess what this investment giant is looking for. They tell you straight away.

When Uber hit the scene, they fundamentally reimagined urban transportation. Their pitch deck tells this audacious story perfectly. Simple yet impactful, it illustrates the problem of expensive taxis and car services, then introduces Uber as the affordable, tech-driven solution.

They use stark data points to highlight the financial opportunity, a vital touch for potential investors.

As you create your pitch, remember Uber’s two key strengths: painting a clear problem-solution scenario and using compelling data to underscore their market potential. This strategy not only shows understanding of their market but also communicates their transformative vision effectively.

Favorite takeaway: The deck is clean and minimalist. The flow is easy to follow, and you get a clear idea of what’s the problem they’re trying to solve, and how they solve it.

WeWork’s pitch deck beautifully encapsulates its community-driven approach to shared workspaces.

They use visually appealing slides that mirror their innovative, modern brand. Their pitch deck deftly articulates the benefits of shared workspaces in today’s economy, setting the stage for their unique value proposition.

Favorite takeaway: what we do, who we do it for, why we do it; the deck walks you through their company vision with smart visuals and copy. We loved how they generated urgency by highlighting how co-working spaces were a fast-growing trend and investors could miss out on a profitable investment if they didn’t act quickly.

MatterMark’s pitch deck is a testament to the power of storytelling. utilizing clean visuals to aid comprehension and coupled with succinct copy to keep the narrative engaging. The 30-slide deck earned the platform $6.5 million in seed A funding.

Favorite takeaway: Strong visual storytelling through the use of charts and graphs. In just a few moments, you can see where the majority of their revenue comes from compared to their other revenue streams.

To sum up, a strong startup pitch deck not only serves to reinforce your brand to the target audience or investors, but shows your business plan and unique offering through the slides presented; using a problem slide, a solution slide, and a traction slide including concise bullet points. 

The best startup pitch deck also shows off your company’s personality, through the inclusion of a team slide or similar in the next few slides, to be presented after your business plan is clearly outlined.

As your company grows, you’ll probably start thinking about the next stage of growth. You can use these successful pitch decks can as the foundation to make an investor deck for your next round of financing.

Look at the takeaways from these startup pitch decks as a guide to help you in your quest to raise funds and venture capital for your own startup for an investment round.

Here are some of the key takeaways from our pitch deck examples:

• Pitch decks don’t have to be formal or beautiful.
• A great pitch deck will provide an impactful intro or slogan.
• Keep your deck short (less than 20 pages).
• Use analogies to back up the points that you’re making.

After going through so many startup pitch deck examples, we recommend that to make your pitch presentation stand out you should:

• Start with a strong intro/vision.
• Show problems and offer solutions.
• Identify market opportunities.
• Showcase products/services clearly.
• Digest your business model
• Highlight financials
• Add social proof/case studies.
• Differentiate from competition.
• Show an experienced management team.

Designing a strong pitch deck could turn your business idea into a reality after convincing investors to provide support financial support to your project.

If you’re looking for additional information, DocSend shared lessons they got learning from 200 startups who raised $360 million from their first pitch deck.

The following pitch decks are free templates available in Piktochart that you can use. This makes it easy to work on your slides without having to worry about design. We took care of that for you.

If you don’t have an account yet, just sign up for a free Piktochart account here and then click on one of the templates below.

To learn how the online pitch deck creator works, watch this on-demand demo.