How long startup directories take to list you, measured

How I measured the wait

A wait on this page is one of two things. For 28 sites it is observed: a launch date, a queue position, or a live listing that the site gave my own submission, with the date I saw it. For the other 29 it is stated: the review time the site itself promises, because nothing was assigned to me. A stated time is a promise; an observed one is a date on my dashboard. Both come from 4 October 2026 or earlier, and both change, so my list carries the date on every row: https://github.com/mmmmingos/where-to-submit-your-startup

The 57 leave out the sites that say nothing at all about time, which is a finding of its own: 22 of the 62 directories marked Free* on my list gave neither a date nor an estimate. I come back to those at the end. I took the free path everywhere and bought nothing, so every paid price below is what the site showed me, not what I paid for.

One caveat. My project is a free website. A few sites in the fast groups turned me away for reasons that won't apply to you, and I say so where it happened.

Within a day: 9

Six listings went live the day I made them. Indie Hackers put my product page up as soon as I finished it (25 September). Crunchbase published my company profile the moment I saved it (26 September), and F6S the same day, once I'd created the page under a name that wasn't already taken. PromoteProject listed me straight away on 4 October, after I'd earned the 5 credits it needs by voting for 5 other startups. Twelve Tools and Uno Directory went live the moment each had verified its badge on my homepage; both also replace your tracking tags with their own on the live link.

GreenRocket's launch page was public as soon as I scheduled it on 4 October, for the next day; it takes at most 10 launches a day and 8 slots were open. Two more are stated rather than seen: AIToolsCapital says it typically reviews within 24 hours (mine was pending as I wrote), and AgentMRR says a listing goes live in the same API call, but only with a read-only revenue key, which I don't have.

Within a week: 12

BuildVoyage says a person reads every submission, usually within 48 hours. Side Projectors says its review typically takes 2 to 3 business days. WaildWorld estimated 3 days. SiteLike approves changes by an emailed link and updates within 3 days, but wants an email on your own domain. MarketingDB's admin review is usually 2 to 3 days, with its badge required and re-checked every two weeks.

The weekly launch boards sit here too. Peerlist Launchpad put me in the following week's launch, the week of 5 October, once I had verified a work email on my own domain. Launch AI scheduled mine for 7 October, about 7 days out and behind its paid launches. Resource.fyi schedules free listings at least 7 days ahead, three a day; the first open day was 11 October.

Four fast doors were shut to me for reasons that may not apply to you. Startup Benchmarks lists within 2 days but turned down a directory as "not a software product". AI Directories lists within 72 hours but requires an Ahrefs Domain Rating of at least 10, AI Tools Saver within a week but a rating above 0, and Startup Fame within 7 days with its badge and a rating above 0. My site is at 0, as every new domain is.

Within a month: 11

Startup Inspire's curated review typically takes 3 to 7 business days. AI Pulse's Normal Review is within 2 weeks, or 24 to 48 hours if you add a backlink. Turbo0 reviews within 2 weeks, with its badge linked to your exact Turbo0 page and an introduction of at least 1,200 characters. Versily's first free launch date was 18 October, two weeks out, because the earlier dates were full.

A1 Gallery said the free review wait was 3 to 4 weeks. Dang.ai's free review takes up to 4 weeks, after a dofollow link to it is verified. Foundrlist set my free launch for the week of 26 October, 22 days out, with 428 in its queue. Launch Llama says free listings are published in about 4 weeks; 702 were in its free queue on 2 October. Tiny Launch's first free date was 2 November, because its free slots were full for four weeks. Fazier says free launches are listed within 30 days, but needs its badge, 3 comments on other products, and a Domain Rating above 0. Product Watch's free queue is 30 days, to 3 November; its badge, or a $20 Priority Pass, launches straight away.

One to three months: 8

StartupBase showed 1,587 startups ahead of me and said free launches take about 4 to 5 weeks; it reviewed mine on 2 October and turned it down, because it doesn't feature free online tools. ProductBurst's earliest free launch week was 16 to 22 November, after I'd upvoted other products. ScrollLaunch's was the same week, with 25 free slots a week and its badge re-checked weekly. ToolPilot's free listing, with a mandatory link back, may take up to 60 days. WhatLaunched.Today dated my free launch 3 December, after a review of 2 to 4 business days.

PeerPush put me at position #4,318, about 2 months out, and hides a product in its free queue from its community, AI assistants, and crawlers until launch. AI Tools runs a 30 to 90 day queue with no guaranteed placement. Startup Fast says free launches go live within 90 days, 5 a day, but its only badges say "Powered by Startup Fast", which would be untrue on my site, so I stopped.

Three to six months: 11

Uneed set my launch for 10 January 2027, about 100 days out; its page says at most 5 months. BuiltByIndies' next open free week started 18 January 2027, 106 days out. StartupLibrary's free launch landed about 106 days out as well, and even its $0 option went through a payment checkout asking for a billing address. Launching Next estimated about 4 months. Smol Launch's and WeekHack's first open free week was 1 to 7 February 2027, and LaunchIgniter's free slot, after review, the same week. Awesome Indie showed 2,766 products ahead of me and estimated 11 to 18 February 2027.

Three say six months. DevHunt says its free launch queue averages 6 months, though it takes developer tools only. eBool's standard review queue is about 6 months. Firsto's standard free queue is about 180 days; the earliest free date it gave me was 2 April 2027.

A year or more: 6

Aura's free days opened only from 22 April 2027, and it assigned mine at random: 4 October 2027, a year to the day. IndieHunt set my free launch for the week of 15 November 2027, 58 weeks out, with 15 free slots a week; EarlyHunt, built the same way, the week of 3 January 2028, 65 weeks out. OpenHunts gave its plain free queue as about 60 weeks, every week to late November 2027 already full. NextGen Tools estimated 29 November 2027, with 4,211 tools ahead of mine.

10words is the far end. At submission on 25 September it said: "Your estimated feature date is 2,519 days from now based on the number of startups in the queue. (It's a lot, I know!)" That is about 7 years, into 2033, and skipping the line costs $19.

No date at all: 22

Twenty-two of the Free* directories on my list give no date and no estimate. Some are honest about the size of the pile: AlternativeTo's normal queue holds several thousand apps, and the site says most won't be looked at for a very long time ($5 buys a priority review in 1 to 2 business days); Website Hunt put its free queue at "approx. 12+ months", with 3,033 approved websites ahead of mine; Startup 88's form says it gets more than 200 pitches a month. Pitchwall's status page said more than 30 days. CtrlAlt.cc gave me a date, 11 October, then warned that its review can significantly delay it.

Others show no sign of movement. Alternative.me marked my submission "Pending Approval" with no time stated, and the newest entry under its Recently Added was created on 26 October 2022. Open Launch had no free slot to give: free launches were fully booked into 2027. The rest, App Rater, Gust, Startup Buffer, Tech Pluto, SnapMunk, StartUp Beat, Startup Stash, Startups Gallery, StartupTrusted, IndieProducts.io, Land-book, and Postmake, are editorial or manual reviews that say nothing about when. My oldest, App Rater, has been in review since 25 September.

The price of not waiting

Of the 48 sites with a wait longer than a day, 44 sell a paid option, and for 35 of the 36 with a wait longer than a week it is a faster or guaranteed date. The cheapest paid options run from $2.99 (a day of promotion at ProductBurst) to $129 (AI Tools' Fast Lane), and $19 is the most common price: eleven sites charge exactly that to skip their line. Only four sites with a wait sell nothing at all: AI Pulse, SiteLike, Startup Benchmarks, and WaildWorld.

A badge is the other currency. Firsto's badge moves a launch from about 180 days to about 30; BuiltByIndies' to the next week; OpenHunts' badge skips its 60-week queue for a review of about 3 weeks; Product Watch's launches straight away; AI Pulse's backlink turns 2 weeks into 2 days; Smol Launch's badge route would have given me 23 November 2026 instead of 1 February 2027, but its check refused my site. Fourteen directories require the badge for the free path at all. I bought nothing and I can't tell you what a paid launch delivers; I can tell you the wait is the product being sold.

What a short wait does and doesn't tell you

Fast doesn't mean seen. PeerPush hides a queued product from search engines and its own community; Uneed marks the page noindex until launch day; Pitchwall's free plan gives 1 day on its homepage when the wait ends; Side Projectors marks a project noindex and nofollow while it's under review. A same-day listing on a site nobody visits is still a same-day listing. I can't yet say which of these sends visitors: I measure the sessions each listing brings over its first 7, 30, and 90 days and record a number only after the window closes, and no window has closed.

If your launch is this month, the groups within a day and within a week are the ones that can reach you in time, and the planner at https://submitmystartup.com/planner/ sorts the places that fit your product by this same wait, with each site's price and badge rule beside it. If you can wait, join the long lines early; the wait runs while you build. An assistant with my MCP server can do the same sorting for you: https://submitmystartup.com/api/#mcp

What I don't know yet

Whether the dates hold. The first tests come quickly: GreenRocket on 5 October, Peerlist Launchpad that week, Launch AI on 7 October, Resource.fyi on 11 October, Versily on 18 October, then Foundrlist, Tiny Launch, and Product Watch in late October and early November. I'll mark each one on its row when it goes live, or when it doesn't, and update the counts here when they change the picture.

Whether a stated time means anything at the editorial sites, where my submissions from 25 and 26 September were still waiting on 4 October with no reply. And what any of this does for traffic or rankings, which I won't guess at. Unknown is not zero.