San Francisco, November 26, 2025 — Leads & Copy —Onton, a search and discovery engine for products, has secured $7.5 million in seed funding to expand its product, team, and global presence amid rising demand for reliable, AI-driven search.
The funding round was led by Footwork, with participation from Liquid 2, Parable Ventures, 43 and others, bringing Onton’s total funding to approximately $10 million. The company aims to transform the online shopping experience by providing informed decision-making tools that simulate expert advice and friendly recommendations.
Onton is addressing the challenges of traditional e-commerce, which often leaves consumers overwhelmed by unstructured data and irrelevant search results. Traditional search engines rely on keyword matching, outdated filters, and advertising incentives, which can compromise relevance, the company said.
Zach Hudson, CEO and Co-Founder of Onton, said the company’s platform combines a new interface with a neurosymbolic AI foundation that learns from each search. This method increases accuracy and reduces the time from discovery to decision. He added that Onton aims to provide an intelligent, transparent, and effortless shopping experience.
Onton’s platform allows users to search using natural language and images. It gathers information from across the web into single product listings, eliminating the need for users to visit multiple sites. Features like Imagine and Surfaces also enable users to generate shoppable versions of their ideas. Onton reports a conversion rate three times higher than the industry average, with over 20% of users active weekly.
Onton’s co-founders, Alex and Zach, connected at a YC Startup School event. They realized they shared a similar vision for addressing the frustrations of online shopping. Alex’s difficulty finding a specific couch and Zach’s experience building Rcmmd and studying online reviews converged. This led them to collaborate on Onton, which was recognized by Pioneer and accepted into the On Deck Fellowship.
Onton has scaled its monthly active users to over 1 million, with plans to expand from home decor and furniture to include apparel and electronics. The company aims to further refine its knowledge graph and data pipeline to introduce a customizable search engine tailored to individual users, the company said.
Onton’s users have reported that the platform helps them find quality products, confirms the uniqueness of items, and reduces decision cycles, enabling them to furnish their homes with confidence.
For further information, contact the Onton press office at press@onton.com.
Source: Onton
