Most startups building payments for AI agents were founded in 2025 or 2026
Dealroom maps 112 startups that let AI agents hold money, spend within limits, check out and pay for content. They have raised $115M in venture funding in 2026, more than in all of 2025.
By Boris Bavinck and Dealroom Next-Gen API · AI agents can already search, compare and fill in forms. To buy something they also need money, a spending limit and a way to pay that merchants accept. Dealroom maps 112 startups building that infrastructure. 81 of them were founded in 2025 or 2026, and they have raised $115M in venture funding this year.
The landscape
Payment rails move and settle money between agents, people and businesses (48 startups). Spending controls give agents wallets, cards and budgets (22). Checkout lets agents buy from online shops (14). Paid access charges agents for content and APIs (11). Trust and risk startups verify and underwrite agent transactions (17). Each company is placed by its main product; many offer more than one layer.
2026 is the biggest funding year
The 112 startups have raised $115M in venture funding so far in 2026, across 14 rounds, against $81M across 10 rounds in 2025 and $48M in 2024. Two companies account for 70% of this year’s total: Sapiom raised $51M in two rounds and Natural $30M.
Agent-payment startups have raised $115M in 2026, more than in all of 2025
Venture funding raised by 112 startups building payments for AI agents · number of rounds below each year
The biggest rounds
Sapiom’s $35M Series A in August, led by Dragonfly, is the largest round in the category. Natural raised $30M in July, led by Forerunner. The largest round before 2026 was TollBit’s $24M Series A in October 2024, for charging AI crawlers to access publisher content.
The two largest agent-payment rounds both closed in 2026
Largest venture rounds raised by startups building payments for AI agents since 2024 · 2026
- 1$35M · Aug 2026
- 2$30M · Jul 2026
- 3$24M · Oct 2024
- 4$19M · Sep 2025
- 5$19M · Mar 2025
- 6$18M · Sep 2025
- 7$16M · Feb 2026
- 8$9.8M · Oct 2025
- 9
$8.5M · Aug 2024 - 10$8.3M · Apr 2026
The startups with the most momentum
Rye, Natural and Sapiom have the highest Signal. Rye and Crossmint were founded in 2021, for checkout APIs and crypto wallets, and now sell to agent developers. Six of the top ten have not raised in 2026.
The ten agent-payment startups with the highest Dealroom Signal
Signal is Dealroom’s 0 to 100 score of a company’s momentum · Rye and Crossmint were founded before they built for agents
- 194$16M
- 293$40M
- 391$51M
- 489$42M
- 587$5.0M
- 687$5.0M
- 784–
- 884$9.5M
- 983$2.8M
- 1082$3.0M
What to watch
- Visa’s Intelligent Commerce Connect, in pilot since April with seven partners including Sumvin, is due to reach more partners this year.
- Credit for agents: Natural secured a credit facility of up to $100M from Upper90 in August.
- Transaction volumes: Sapiom says it has processed more than 270 million transactions since launch. Few others publish volumes yet.
- First rounds for the startups founded in 2026: 41 of the 44 have not raised.
Research notes: cohort, method and sources
Cohort. Dealroom has no tag for agent payments. The 112 companies were found with semantic searches of Dealroom data (payments for AI agents, agentic payments, agentic checkout, wallets for agents, spending controls and virtual cards, stablecoin and machine-to-machine payments, paid access for crawlers, usage billing, agent identity for transactions, x402) and screened by hand. A company is included when its own description puts an AI agent in the payer or payee seat. Removed: AI agents that do finance, shopping or support work; billing tools for companies that sell agents; agent marketplaces; trading bots; events; duplicate records and products listed separately from their company (ATXP belongs to Circuit & Chisel, Lobster.cash to Crossmint). The cohort is an editorial selection, not a census. Layers: wallets, cards and spending controls (22), checkout for agent shopping (14), payment rails and settlement (48), paid access to content and apis (11), trust, risk and credit (17).
Launch year. 94 of the 112 companies have a recorded launch year. New companies reach Dealroom with a delay, so the 2026 count will rise.
Funding. Venture rounds with a disclosed amount, from Dealroom funding rounds, pulled 19 October 2026. Natural’s credit facility is debt and is not included. Crossmint, Rye and Nevermined raised part of their funding for earlier products, and Sapiom now also sells model routing, so not all of their money is for agent payments. Map totals include all round types.
Signal. Dealroom Signal is a 0 to 100 score of a company’s momentum. For older companies it reflects the whole business.