saas · ai · dev · indie
Startup Vessel: requirements, how to submit, and what you actually get
Software for founders building their first thing, behind the same badge wall.
startupvessel.com
Eligibility
Who Startup Vessel accepts
You need
An account, by Google or email
Their badge on your site, checked live before the form appears
A screenshot and a square icon, both uploaded
A short description of 150 characters or fewer
You'll be rejected if
Anyone who cannot put a badge on their own site, since the third step does not exist until their checker finds it
Anyone whose site their crawler cannot reach, because the check is a live fetch of the page you nominate
SaaS productsAI toolsDeveloper toolsIndie products
What you actually get
A page at /product/<slug> whose Visit link carries only rel=noopener noreferrer, so the link is followed. The audience is founders assembling a first stack, which is narrower than the operator’s AI indexes.
How to submit to Startup Vessel
- Sign inGoogle, or an email account you create with them.
- Add your websiteYour product homepage. They generate the badge and your listing slug from it.
- Badge and verifyA light and a dark snippet, both pointing at your listing URL, and a field naming the page they will fetch. Verify Badge is what opens the third step.
- DetailsSite name, screenshot, icon, up to four categories, a pricing model, a short description of 150 characters and an overview of 1500, then a terms checkbox and Submit for Review.
Startup Vessel requirements
An account on the site
Their badge on your site
200x54 PNG, light or dark, verified live
Site name
as it appears on your own site
Screenshot
PNG or JPG up to 10MB
Icon
square, PNG or JPG up to 5MB
Categories
up to 4 of about fifty
Pricing model
free, free trial, freemium or paid
Short description
150 characters
Overview
1500 characters
Gotchas
The whole listing form is behind the badge check. Step 3 does not exist until their crawler has found the badge, so there is no way to see what will be asked before the badge is live on your site.
Their snippet asks for a do-follow link to your listing URL, which is stricter than the usual badge and means a site that nofollows its footer links has to make an exception.
They publish no review window at all: the success page says only that the tool is under review, so a listing can sit unreviewed with nothing to check against.
The success page offers the same product to a grid of sister directories run by the same operator, which is a fast way to spend an evening filling the same form over and over.
Let your agent submit to Startup Vessel
Connect SubmitMap to your AI over MCP and this page stops being something you read and copy. Your agent asks for the Startup Vessel playbook and gets the brief for this exact form, with the values already taken from your submission pack instead of placeholders you fill in by hand.
What it does for this platform
Checks your product against the 6 Startup Vessel rules above, so you find out you would be rejected before you open a tab.
Hands your agent all 9 fields this form asks for, none of them optional, already filled from your pack.
Warns you that Startup Vessel looks for its badge on your site, so it has to be live before you submit rather than after.
Types it into Startup Vessel in your own browser, and stops for you when the form wants a sign-in.
Records what it sent, so the dashboard can answer "did I ever submit to Startup Vessel?".
Connect your agentHow this worksTools and endpointsWorks with Claude Code, Claude, Codex, Cursor, VS Code and Hermes.
Startup Vessel FAQ
How long does Startup Vessel approval take?
Startup Vessel does not publish how long approval takes.
How much does it cost to submit to Startup Vessel?
Submitting to Startup Vessel is free.
Does Startup Vessel give a dofollow backlink?
Yes, a listing on Startup Vessel carries a dofollow link. The site has a domain rating of 46.
Does Startup Vessel require a backlink to your site?
Yes, Startup Vessel expects a link back from your site as part of listing.
What gets you rejected from Startup Vessel?
Anyone who cannot put a badge on their own site, since the third step does not exist until their checker finds it; Anyone whose site their crawler cannot reach, because the check is a live fetch of the page you nominate.