Hacker News is a company within the Media and Publishing category. Hacker News is a social news website focusing on computer science and entrepreneurship. It is operated by the investment fund and startup incubator Y Combinator, serving as a primary hub for the global technology and startup ecosystem.
Hacker News was founded in 2007 and is headquartered in Mountain View, CA.
Hacker News is part of Y Combinator.
Hacker News is rated Leader on the Optimly Brand Authority Index, a measure of how well AI models can accurately describe the brand. The exact score is locked for unclaimed profiles.
AI narrative accuracy for Hacker News is Moderate. Significant factual deltas detected. Inconsistent representation across models.
AI models classify Hacker News as a Challenger. AI names competitors first.
Hacker News appeared in 6 of 8 sampled buyer-intent queries (75%). Hacker News dominates queries related to 'tech news aggregator' and 'YC community,' but its minimalist site structure means it rarely appears for specific product-related queries unless a thread is currently trending.
AI correctly perceives the brand as a highly influential, 'no-frills' hub for the global developer ecosystem. It excels at explaining the site's cultural significance but often lacks real-time data on trending topics or specific recent moderation controversies. Key gap: The most common gap is the distinction between 'Hacker News' the community and 'Hacker News' the specific algorithm/codebase (Arc), which is often conflated or ignored.
Of 6 key facts verified about Hacker News, 4 are well-documented (likely accurate across AI models), 2 have limited sourcing, and 0 are retrieval-dependent and may be inaccurate without live search.
The specific moderation policies and the identity of current moderators (other than dang) are often outdated or speculative in AI responses.
Buyers turn to Hacker News for Direct Website Visiting: Manually visiting individual tech blogs, personal sites, and engineering journals., RSS Feeds: Setting up RSS feeds for specific authors or topics to avoid a central aggregator., Social Discovery: Relying on physical networking, word-of-mouth, or company Slack channels for interesting links., among 3 documented problem areas.
Buyers evaluating Hacker News typically ask AI models about "where to post tech startup news", "best tech news aggregator for developers", "Y Combinator social news site", and 3 similar queries.
Hacker News's core products are Social news aggregation, community discussion, job board..
Hacker News uses Free.
Hacker News serves Software engineers, startup founders, venture capitalists, technologists..
Hacker News A strict culture of 'intellectual curiosity' enforced by minimalist design and algorithmic moderation that prioritizes signal over engagement metrics.
Brand Authority Index (BAI) tier: Leader (exact score locked for unclaimed brands)
Archetype: Challenger
https://optimly.ai/brand/hacker-news-y-combinator
Last analyzed: April 10, 2026
Founded: 2007
Headquarters: Mountain View, CA