16 of the most exciting startups from YC W’26 Demo Day

AI was also a buzzword at the company’s latest YC Demo Day. About 190 companies participated in the Y Combinator Winter ’26 crowd and presented their startups in the Expo Day on Tuesday.

These companies are working on products in many industries such as legal, transportation, and healthcare.

I did not listen, any listening to the content given due to the size of the group and the quality of this year’s Demo Day available to the press: YC sent the videos, one by one, about 20 minutes after giving their presentations (instead of listening, or individual invitations).

Instead, I read through all 190 starters that showed up and spent the day watching games from the ones we found interesting, then narrowed it down to the 16 that stood out as the most interesting starters of this entire YC class.

ARC Prize Foundation
What it does: They create benchmarks to measure towards AGI.

Why it’s interesting: Nonprofit at YC! But then again, when OpenAI, Anthropic, and GoogleMind are already using the organization’s benchmarks, it makes sense why they would be included. This foundation aims to promote open AGI research by hosting competitions and funding research. One of the reasons for this change in AI is the arrival of AGI (which Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang says has already arrived), and it will be a matter of history to find out how close we are to AI machines with full intelligence.

Asimov
What it does: They collect information about people’s movements to train humanoids

Why it’s interesting: People from all over the world send videos of themselves doing activities and tasks to the company so that it can turn them into datasets that can help train robots. It is part of a group that is trying to make humanoids into a commodity, finding a job for them beyond the means of earning and entertainment. I’m a fan of humanoid technology, even if our “Rosey the Robot” era may not yet be here. Using data to teach humanoids how to walk and – dare I say it fairly, the beauty – of human movement can help them a little, better, when robotics work.

Words
What it does: It helps to make the tedious work of not having to deal with construction companies

Why it’s interesting: It’s not every day that you hear about new technology that is targeting the construction industry. Only the founders realized that this market is incomplete (although rich in potential). This tool uses AI to help streamline tasks that creative types such as architects find tedious, such as reviewing specifications, drawings, contracts and proposals.

Click on Computer
What it does: Intelligent AI

Why it’s interesting: Everyone is trying to create a wearable AI as a product while the world is waiting for the OpenAI product from the acquisition of Johnny Ive’s company. A pair of Apple veterans (shall I call them?) teamed up to launch Button, essentially a small computer, the founders explained, designed for AI. Button connects to apps like email, Slack, and Salesforce and uses voice commands to perform certain tasks. The next must-have could be some sort of wearable AI, so it’s interesting to see what that looks like.

CodeWisp
What it does: Let’s everyone make a game using AI

Why it’s interesting: The developers say all you have to do is tell the AI ​​how to make a game, and it will make the game. It’s fun, creative, fun! I tried to make games when I was a kid and I always found it difficult and boring, but the joy of making pictures never went away. While vibe coding has become all the rage in software development, tools like these make it easy to integrate. Maybe this will be the next generation of vibe building.

Crosslayer Labs
What it does: It helps to detect website errors

Why it’s interesting: The rise of technological tools means that websites are becoming easier to hack and bad guys are not shying away from using this technology to trick people. Crosslayer Labs helps its customers identify and manage their online settings so they can stay safe from this shadow of cyber threats.

Doomersion
What it does: It teaches you languages ​​as soon as you destroy it

Why it’s interesting: We spend so much time wasting away, it fills our brains with negativity that can irritate or disrupt our brains. This startup is an app that shows users short videos, as they watch and go through the TikTok feed, in the language they are trying to learn. If there is to be meaning to all the things we put into our heads throughout the day, what a great way to find it. It combines what consumers can’t stop doing (spending hours on their phone scrolling through content) with something cool like learning a language. Very interesting.

Lexius
What it does: It injects advanced AI into the security system

Why it’s interesting: This uses AI to improve existing security cameras, enabling images to detect and report theft or falls, and eliminating a fragmented, mostly manual process. The founders say that they are targeting businesses with cameras without AI intelligence, where the camera can capture an event, but the company is slow to act.

Libra Labs
What it does: An AI-powered library management tool

Why it’s interesting: This is AI about one of the industries that the technology industry often ignores – libraries. This startup has developed an AI-powered library management system to help, from now on, schools with reading and writing. As the founder said in a statement, there isn’t much competition when it comes to self-made or pre-owned products in this space, making every new idea competitive with “the next big thing.”

Milliray
What it does: A radar system to help track small drones

Why it’s interesting: Defense tech is one of the hottest sectors in technology right now. As the founder of the company said, at the moment, people are in the fields doing everything they can to look for small drones, but the human eye can miss a lot or mistake a small bird drone and vice versa. This startup uses sensors to detect what is actually a small drone in the sky. Given the current state of the world, new technology is needed – and emerging – for any country to stay ahead of the game with its rivals.

MouseCat
What it does: They use AI to detect fraud

Why it’s interesting: AI is a great tool for work, and this is true for those whose work is fraudulent and fraudulent. The company pulls company data from cloud storage sites like Databricks or Snowflake, analyzes consumer data and activity for anything suspicious, and gives recommendations on how to act. AI tools like this are important when dealing with bad AI that can also be unleashed.

Opalite Health
What it does: They use AI to help healthcare providers communicate with people who don’t speak English

Why it’s interesting: There is still much to interpret when two people do not understand each other. In medicine, it can be life or death. This AI medical translator helps overcome the language barrier, helping healthcare providers understand patients who speak a different language. In a globalized world (and in a country as diverse as America), it is important that people have access to the health care they need, regardless of language. Of course, this idea is not original, because several other startups and healthcare providers offer a similar service.

Stock Markets
What it does: Let people trade in different markets, like crypto and prediction, on one platform.

Why it’s interesting: As someone who likes everything in one place, I understand that I want a less expensive way to trade in these markets. It’s the same reason I still like to go to big box retailers to buy brands (I like to see all my options at once).

ShoFo
What it does: A video library is really everything

Why it’s interesting: This startup is billing itself as a “universal movie library,” which is pretty cool if you ask me. I grew up on YouTube and Tumblr and I remember how easy searching was back then, when you were looking for something. Although this is a video guide that helps AI Labs find different datasets efficiently, I like any tool that makes searching and organizing easier.

Sonarly
What it does: It helps software to solve its production problems

Why it’s interesting: This startup is creating technology that makes the most sense. It integrates with other monitoring systems, promises to reduce alert noise (interfering with getting the information that is most important), identifies the causes of problems, and then finds ways to fix them or provide additional information to engineers. Although there is an increasing number of AI code review startups (and this part is also provided by model developers), there should be an independent place when the process hits production systems. This is another part of the workflow that startups create for themselves.

Terranox AI
What it does: They use AI to find uranium deposits in North America

Why it’s interesting: Uranium will be needed to power the next generation of nuclear power, the company’s founders reminded us. (Nuclear powermost are considered safe today(although uranium itself, apparently, is toxic – and the inventor did not include how it could be mined safely.) The inventors believe that nuclear will be needed to support all the new data power that is being built. The world will need a lot of energy, from many sources, to ensure that its inhabitants can meet the goals of the AI ​​revolution.