The founder’s guide to TechCrunch Disrupt 2026: Everything you need to know
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- TechCrunch Disrupt 2026 runs October 13-15 at San Francisco's Moscone West, with programming built around the question of how to build enduring companies in the AI era.
- Startup Battlefield selected 200 startups on August 20 to pitch for a $100,000 prize, with prior participants citing 3x oversubscription rates and more than 100 investor inbounds after their confirmation.
- The event features 200+ expert sessions across six editorially curated stages — Disrupt, Builders, AI, Real World AI, Smart Money, and Smart Systems — covering fundraising, GTM, infrastructure, and AI deployment.
- Confirmed speakers include RJ Scaringe (Rivian), Panos Panay (Amazon), Paolo Ardoino (Tether), Toni Schneider and Rose Wang (Bluesky), Amjad Masad (Replit), and Andrew Feldman (Cerebras), with more to be announced.
- Founder tickets are $300 off until August 21, with an additional $100 discount for purchases before 11:59 p.m. PT on August 7 and a 10% discount on a second co-founder ticket.
- Startup Battlefield will expand to more international markets in the 2027 cycle, building on this year's selection process.
Why it matters: With AI reshaping every startup layer — product, infrastructure, fundraising — Disrupt 2026's cross-stack speaker lineup (Amazon's Panos Panay, Tether's Paolo Ardoino, Cerebras's Andrew Feldman) gives founders a rare full-stack view of who's building what. For early-stage founders specifically, Startup Battlefield's track record of 100+ investor inbounds and 3x oversubscription for prior participants offers concrete ROI in a tighter funding market.
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