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Pinecone

Pinecone for Startups

Free Pinecone Standard tier and Pro Support plus usage credits and discounts for startups at Series A or earlier.

Partially verifiedLast verified Nov 3, 2026Official source

Worth

Free Standard tier + Pro Support, plus usage credits and discounts (amounts not published)

Pinecone's program page does not state the credit amount, discount or duration.

Quick facts

Value
Free Standard tier + Pro Support, plus usage credits and discounts (amounts not published)
Type
Credits + discount
Duration
Not stated
Stages
Pre-seed, Seed, Series A
Regions
Global
Max funding raised
Not stated
Max company age
Not stated
Last verified
Nov 3, 2026 · Partially verified

Ways to get it

  1. Apply directly

    Apply directly

    Free Standard tier + Pro Support + credits and discounts

    • Fewer than 100 employees
    • Series A stage or earlier

    Pinecone also partners with AI/ML, search and cloud infrastructure organizations; a partner referral may be requested on the form.

    Open program page

Eligibility

Requirements

  • Fewer than 100 employees
  • Series A or earlier

Not eligible

  • Organizations already on a Standard or Enterprise plan cannot also activate the separate $300 Standard trial

How to apply

  1. 1

    Create a Pinecone account at app.pinecone.io so you have an organization to attach the benefits to.

  2. 2

    Open pinecone.io/startup-program and submit the application with company size, stage and investor/partner details.

  3. 3

    On approval Pinecone upgrades the organization to the Standard tier with Pro Support and applies any credits or discounts.

Gotchas

  • No published credit amount or duration; benefits are set on approval.
  • Strict size cap: fewer than 100 employees and no later than Series A.
  • The $300 / 21-day Standard trial is a different offer and is limited to one per organization.
  • If you bill through GCP Marketplace, credits are handled by Google, not Pinecone.

About the Pinecone program

Pinecone for Startups (pinecone.io/startup-program) gives eligible early-stage companies free access to Pinecone's Standard Tier and Pro Support, which the page says comes with any cloud/region deployment, RBAC, Backups, Import, Prometheus Metrics and a dedicated Slack channel. Startups in the program also receive usage credits and discounts. Pinecone frames the program around its partnerships with organizations in AI/ML, search and cloud infrastructure, and offers a separate Become a Partner route for those organizations.

Eligibility stated on the page: fewer than 100 employees and Series A or earlier. Pinecone does not publish the credit amount, the discount size or the program duration, so we leave those as unknown rather than guessing. Questions go to startups@pinecone.io.

Do not confuse the startup program with the self-serve Standard plan trial, which gives $300 in credits over 21 days, once per organization, and is unavailable to organizations already on Standard or Enterprise. Paying through the GCP Marketplace moves billing (and any credits) to Google, not Pinecone.

Frequently asked questions

What do startups get from Pinecone?

Free access to the Standard tier and Pro Support, plus usage credits and discounts. Pinecone does not publish the dollar value.

Who is eligible for Pinecone for Startups?

Companies with fewer than 100 employees at Series A stage or earlier, per the program page.

Is this the same as the Standard trial?

No. The Standard trial is a self-serve $300 credit over 21 days available once per organization; the startup program is an application-based upgrade with credits, discounts and Pro Support.

Compare

Verification. Checked by our automated checker on Nov 3, 2026 against https://www.pinecone.io/startup-program/. Status: partially verified.

Fetched directly on 2026-11-03. Page states free Standard Tier + Pro Support (features listed), 'usage credits and discounts', and eligibility of fewer than 100 employees and Series A or earlier. No credit amount, discount size or duration is published, so value numbers are null. Standard-trial details are from docs.pinecone.io excerpts.