The archive · Developer & Business Tools · Product decision · 2025–2026
TrustMRR's open-books bet: verified revenue hits PH #2 with 599 votes
TrustMRR makes founders prove MRR by connecting Stripe read-only; Marc Lou's bootstrapped database hit #2 Product of the Day on Nov 11, 2025 with 599 upvotes.
TrustMRR
What the business is
TrustMRR is a public database of verified startup revenue with a marketplace attached. Founders connect a read-only account from a supported payment provider — Stripe at launch, later RevenueCat, Superwall and Creem — and the platform pulls MRR and total revenue straight from the processor, refreshing it hourly so the number cannot be edited or cherry-picked. Each startup gets a public profile and leaderboard ranking, listing is free, and profiles feed an acquisition marketplace with an API that buyers such as ExitBid use to verify revenue at the source.
Starting capital：None raised — TrustMRR is bootstrapped by solo maker Marc Lou; no funding round was reported in the sources read.
How it started
TrustMRR grew out of the build-in-public world's fake-MRR problem: anyone could type numbers into a dashboard mockup or crop a chart at its best week. Marc Lou — the solo indie maker behind ShipFast and DataFast — launched the platform in late October 2025. Leedlime's October 30 story described founders connecting a read-only Stripe API key and appearing on a public leaderboard ranked by last-30-days revenue, with free listings and a dofollow backlink on every verified profile.
What happened
The Product Hunt launch on Nov 11, 2025 put TrustMRR at #2 Product of the Day with 599 upvotes (Talo led the day with 625), and it finished #5 on the November monthly leaderboard with 770 votes. Leedlime reported that within 48 hours of launch the database drew 35,000 visitors and Marc Lou sold ad slots worth $10,085 in MRR. By August 2026 ExitBid described the top of the leaderboard above $3.5M in verified monthly revenue, hourly-refreshed numbers across Stripe, RevenueCat, Superwall and Creem, and said it had built on TrustMRR's API to verify sellers' revenue inside its own auction listing flow.
How it ended up
As of September 2026 TrustMRR remains live and bootstrapped. Its homepage shows a leaderboard whose top entry sits above $3.5M in verified MRR with data updated hourly, and claims roughly 200,000 monthly visitors browsing startups for acquisition. The product has expanded from a leaderboard into a marketplace and an API used by third parties, and no funding round, acquisition or shutdown has been reported.
Background
TrustMRR's bet is that build-in-public credibility collapsed because revenue was self-reported: a founder could paste any number into a dashboard mockup, and a screenshot of a good week traveled as proof. Marc Lou, the solo indie maker behind ShipFast and DataFast, launched TrustMRR in late October 2025 to remove the human from the reporting chain — founders connect a read-only Stripe API key and the platform pulls MRR and total revenue directly from the processor, refreshing it hourly.
The early traction was immediate: Leedlime's October 30, 2025 story reported 35,000 visitors within 48 hours of launch and $10,085 in MRR from ad slots Marc Lou sold. On Nov 11, 2025 TrustMRR launched on Product Hunt and finished #2 Product of the Day with 599 upvotes, behind Talo's 625; it then ranked #5 on the November monthly leaderboard with 770 votes.
A year later the database had become infrastructure. ExitBid's August 2026 review reported the leaderboard top above $3.5M in verified monthly revenue, expansion from Stripe to RevenueCat, Superwall and Creem, and a marketplace where the same provider-verified number powers acquisition listings. As of September 2026 TrustMRR remains live and free to list, with its homepage claiming roughly 200,000 monthly visitors and data updated hourly.
What has to be true
- Read-only keys lowered the trust hurdle: the platform could see revenue but could not move money or read sensitive data, so sharing numbers cost founders nothing but privacy.
- Hourly freshness made good months believable: because bad months also show up automatically, a verified figure carried more weight than any curated screenshot.
- Free was the growth model: with no paywall between a founder and verified status, adoption spread through the indie community that already knew Marc Lou's ShipFast and DataFast.
- One verified number fed a marketplace and an API, making the database exit infrastructure: ExitBid wired it into listings because bidders pay more for revenue they need not discount.
What can be applied
Make trust the product: TrustMRR removed the human from revenue reporting, so credibility became automatic, free and impossible to fake — and the community spread it.
Aftermath
As of September 5, 2026, TrustMRR is still live, bootstrapped and free to list. Its late-October 2025 launch drew 35,000 visitors in 48 hours and $10,085 in ad-slot MRR (Leedlime), and its Nov 11, 2025 Product Hunt launch finished #2 of the day with 599 upvotes and #5 on the month with 770. By August 2026 ExitBid reported the leaderboard top above $3.5M in verified monthly revenue; the product now supports RevenueCat, Superwall and Creem, and its homepage claims about 200,000 monthly visitors. No funding round, acquisition or shutdown has been reported.
Sources
- ProductHunt Daily Pick for November 11, 2025
- TrustMRR — The database of verified startup revenues | Product Hunt Launch Dashboard
- Product Hunt Monthly Top | 2025-11
- TrustMRR: A Simple Way to Share Real Startup Numbers
- TrustMRR Review (2026): Is It Legit? We Verify Sellers With It
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