Instinct raises $1B Series C at $10B valuation, a month after a $250M Series B

SAN FRANCISCO, 28 September 2026. Instinct, a startup building a personal AI agent, announced it raised an additional $1 billion from Sequoia Capital, Benchmark Capital and Coatue. The release headline puts the valuation at $10 billion, and TechCrunch reports that the company confirmed it as a Series C.

The valuation is roughly four times the $2.5 billion set by a $250 million Series B only a month earlier. The company has not disclosed revenue or user numbers.

How much did Instinct raise and who invested?

Instinct raised $1 billion, according to its own press release, from Sequoia Capital, Benchmark Capital and Coatue. The release text says "an additional $1 billion in its latest round". The words Series C and $10 Billion appear in the headline.

Tech Funding News notes that the release names no lead investor and carries no comment from any of the three firms. The company did not state whether the $10 billion figure is pre-money or post-money.

How did the valuation go from $2.5 billion to $10 billion in a month?

The company announced no new product or revenue milestone to explain the jump. The two rounds are 33 days apart, according to Tech Funding News, and the second is four times the first by valuation.

The Series C was previewed before it was announced. The Information reported in September that Instinct was in talks to raise $1 billion at a valuation of about $10 billion. TechCrunch notes that Instinct confirmed the round in a press release on Monday, 28 September, after that report.

Dealroom, in its news item, says the deal sits in the 99th percentile of Series C rounds in the US enterprise software sector, a sample of 1,750 deals. That is Dealroom's own comparison, not a figure from the company.

What does Instinct do?

Instinct is a personal AI agent. Users text or call it, and the company says it uses its own phone and computer to finish tasks such as planning a cross-country road trip, ordering weekly groceries or cancelling forgotten subscriptions.

It is still in early access. TechCrunch reports that Instinct has no mobile app yet and communicates with users by text. The company's release lists four recent updates, all described here as company claims:

• Instinct Concierge: a service for high-touch cases such as phone calls and booking a restaurant that does not take online reservations.
• Trusted Person Network: lets one user's Instinct talk to other users' Instincts to coordinate plans and share files such as PDFs, images and spreadsheets.
• Location Sharing: on iMessage, Instinct can recognise when a user arrives somewhere and make suggestions.
• Privacy advancements: isolated sandboxes, short-lived local credentials and identity-signed tool execution, plus a system the company says catches hallucinations before a response is generated or executed.

The product is offered by Spear Street Technology, according to TechCrunch's August report.

Who founded Instinct?

Noah Shinn founded Instinct. Tech Funding News describes him as 23 and a former research scientist at Sierra, and says Reuters reports he founded the company in 2025.

Shinn is the only named executive in the announcement. The release carries a statement attributed to him: "We're building Instinct to be the best personal agent that can handle the deeply personal nuances of everyday life." TechCrunch says Instinct declined interviews with Shinn alongside the funding news and shared only the written statement.

How much has Instinct raised in total?

About $1.35 billion, by simple addition. TechCrunch reported total funding of $350 million after the Series B, and the new round adds $1 billion. Tech Funding News arrives at the same count. This is a cumulative figure, not the size of one round. For the distinction, see our explainer on round size versus cumulative funding.

Benchmark is the one investor named in both the Series B and the Series C. Index Ventures is named only for the Series B, and Sequoia and Coatue are named only for the Series C.

Who are Instinct's competitors?

The closest named rival is Meta's Muse agent. TechCrunch says Muse offers many similar features plus integration with Meta's social products, and that it reached the top of the US app stores with millions of downloads. Instinct has no mobile app.

Tech Funding News adds two more comparisons, both attributed to that outlet:

• Manus: an agent startup that Meta agreed to buy for $2 billion in December 2025, a deal Beijing ordered cancelled.
• Perplexity: valued at about $23 billion after a January round, and reportedly in talks with Nvidia at more than $30 billion, per Tech Funding News.

What will the money be used for?

The company's stated aim is to "bring useful AI to everyone" and, in Shinn's words, to "bring Instinct to more people". That is the full extent of what the release says. AI Weekly notes the release does not disclose revenue, active-user counts or how the $1 billion will be spent.

What's still unclear?

Several points are open, and the sources do not fully agree.

• Lead investor. The company release names none. Some outlets headline the round as led by Sequoia, Benchmark and Coatue, but Tech Funding News says the release names no lead. The Information had reported that Sequoia and Benchmark were in talks to lead, which is not a confirmed outcome.
• Valuation basis. Pre-money versus post-money is not stated.
• Cumulative total. Tech Funding News counts about $1.35 billion. Dealroom's news item lists $1.4 billion raised. Dealroom's company profile shows ranges instead of exact values: $1 billion to $2.5 billion in total funding and a $10 billion to $50 billion valuation. Its news item and the company headline use $10 billion.
• Earlier rounds. Dealroom's profile dates an earlier $100 million round to January 2025 at a $400 million valuation. Tech Funding News says Reuters reports the company was founded in 2025, so the exact timing and terms of the earlier funding are not settled here.
• Traction. TechCrunch notes the startup has not shared user numbers or growth metrics.
• Privacy and trust. Instinct's initial privacy policy drew criticism for overreach, and TechCrunch reports the policy has since been updated. Tech Funding News adds that the original terms included a "perpetual and irrevocable" data license. An agent that books, buys and cancels needs broad access to a user's accounts, so the safeguards listed in the release are company claims, not independently tested.
• Business model. No pricing is published on Instinct's site.

The weakest point of the headline is simple: a $10 billion valuation rests on investor conviction about the category, not on disclosed customers or revenue. Readers who want to check round claims against filings can see how in our guide to reading a Form D.

Last checked: 15 October 2026.