Firebolt
Firebolt is an open-source analytical database platform delivering sub-second query performance for AI agents, real-time analytics, and ELT workloads, serving data-intensive engineering teams at technology companies through managed cloud, self-hosted, and BYOC deployments.
- Company typePrivate
- Founded2019
- HeadquartersTel Aviv, Israel
- Headcount101–250
- GTM typeB2B
- OfferingSoftware
What Firebolt does
Firebolt is a cloud data warehousing and analytical database company founded in 2019 and headquartered across San Francisco, Tel Aviv, Munich, and Bengaluru. The platform is engineered for sub-second query performance on petabyte-scale datasets, targeting AI-agent workloads, real-time analytics, and efficient ELT — use cases where existing warehouses struggle with high-concurrency, low-latency query profiles. Its core technology is a single-binary engine that runs identically on a laptop (using SQLite for metadata) and as a 100+ node cluster (using Postgres for metadata), with a PostgreSQL-compatible SQL dialect, native Apache Iceberg and DuckLake support, ACID transactions with MVCC and OCC, and HNSW vector indexes. Firebolt exposes engines through ADBC, JSON REST, and the Postgres wire protocol, and runs on AWS (GA), GCP (GA), and Azure (Preview) across six cloud regions.
The company operates three coordinated deployment modes: a fully managed cloud service, a self-hosted free open-source edition (Firebolt Core on GitHub with 214+ stars), and a Bring Your Own Cloud (BYOC) option. Revenue is generated through per-second usage-based compute billing across seven engine tiers ($1.84-$58.88/hour), pass-through storage at $0.0264/GB/month, and the managed/BYOC offerings — with Firebolt Core functioning as a freemium land-and-expand funnel. Customers span Similarweb, IQVIA, Sweet Security, Bigabid, Primer, Anyscale, and others, with named AI-infrastructure and enterprise-scale workloads cited as evidence of production readiness. Firebolt has raised approximately $270M in cumulative funding across a Series A ($37M, Dec 2020), Series B ($127M, Jun 2021), and Series C ($100M at a $1.4B valuation, Jan 2022), with no new funding round disclosed since.
The go-to-market motion is hybrid: product-led growth via the firebolt.io free-credit signup and one-line open-source install, combined with direct enterprise sales for anchor accounts and a content-heavy developer marketing stack (technical blog, The Data Engineering Show podcast, regional CXO events). Compliance posture includes SOC 2 Type II, ISO 27001, ISO 27018, HIPAA support with BAA, and GDPR alignment, enabling enterprise and regulated-industry deployments.
Firebolt firmographics
Firmographics- Name
- Firebolt
- Legal name
- Firebolt Analytics Inc.
- Website
- https://firebolt.io
- Company type
- Private
- Founded year
- 2019
- Operating status
- Operating
- Headcount range
- 101–250 employees
- Short description
- Firebolt is an open-source analytical database platform delivering sub-second query performance for AI agents, real-time analytics, and ELT workloads, serving data-intensive engineering teams at technology companies through managed cloud, self-hosted, and BYOC deployments.
- Ownership category
- akta.pro rank
Firebolt industry classification
Industry- Product category
- Cloud Data Warehouse
- NAICS
- Computing Infrastructure Providers, Data Processing, Web Hosting, and Related Services (5182), Computing Infrastructure Providers, Data Processing, Web Hosting, and Related Services (518), Computing Infrastructure Providers, Data Processing, Web Hosting, and Related Services (51821), Computer Systems Design and Related Services (54151), Computer Systems Design and Related Services (5415)
- SIC
- Computer Storage Devices (3572), Services-Computer Integrated Systems Design (7373)
- akta.pro primary industry
- Lakehouse Platforms (HDAEABAB)
- akta.pro secondary industries
- SaaS Security Posture Management (SSPM) (HDABAHAE), Key Management, Encryption & Secrets Management (KMS/HSM/Vault) (HDABAHAG), Data Security & Privacy for Cloud (DLP, DSPM, Tokenization) (HDABAHAK)
Keywords
Where Firebolt is headquartered
LocationHeadquarters
- HQ city
- Tel Aviv
- HQ country
- Israel
- HQ region
- Middle East
Offices5 records
Markets served
Firebolt business model
Business model- GTM type
- B2B
- Offering type
- Software
- Cost components
- Personnel, Technology or R&D, Infrastructure, Operations, Marketing or Sales
Revenue model
- Managed Cloud Service (Usage-Based Compute): Compute billed per second across tiered engine sizes (S, M, L, XL, 2L, 2XL, 4XL) ranging from $1.84/hour (S, 1 node/8 vCPU) to $58.88/hour (4XL, 4 nodes/256 vCPU) for US East (N. Virginia). Scale to zero supported.
- Object Storage Pass-Through: Storage billed at $0.0264/GB/month on object storage (pass-through at cost).
- Open Source (Firebolt Core): Firebolt Core is fully open source and free for self-hosted deployment — intended as a land-and-expand funnel into the managed service or BYOC offering.
- Bring Your Own Cloud (BYOC): BYOC deployment option for customers who want managed Firebolt in their own cloud account.
Pricing tiers
| Model | Billing | Price |
|---|---|---|
| Freemium | Pay-as-you-go | Open Source / Self-Hosted — Free, unlimited, single binary on your own hardware |
| Usage-based | Pay-as-you-go | Managed Service — Per-second compute billing across S, M, L, XL, 2L, 2XL, 4XL engine tiers |
| Other | Pay-as-you-go | BYOC (Bring Your Own Cloud) — Firebolt managed in customer's cloud |
Go-to-market motion1 record
Distribution channels4 records
Marketing channels8 records
Firebolt product offering
Product offeringCore offering
Firebolt is a high-performance, open-source analytical database and cloud data warehouse that runs as a single binary on a laptop and scales to hundreds of nodes and petabytes of data. It exposes a PostgreSQL SQL dialect, supports Apache Iceberg and DuckLake open table formats, and is engineered for AI-agent and real-time analytics workloads with sub-second latency and high concurrency.
Product overview
Firebolt is an open-source analytical database platform offered through three coordinated deployment modes: Firebolt (the fully managed cloud data warehouse on AWS, GCP, and Azure), Firebolt Core (the self-hosted, free open-source binary/OSS edition), and Firebolt BYOC (Bring Your Own Cloud). All three share a single engine binary and a PostgreSQL SQL dialect, with Firebolt extending the core with capabilities such as the Firebolt MCP Server for AI/LLM integration and Firebolt Auror for Kubernetes container-image security, so the platform spans laptop single-binary development, self-hosted clusters, and managed cloud analytics.
Differentiator
Problem solved
Functional benefit
Brands
- Firebolt Core: Self-hosted, free, open-source edition of Firebolt that runs as a single binary on a laptop or scales to hundreds of nodes in the cloud.
Products and services
- Firebolt Managed Cloud Data Warehouse High-performance PostgreSQL-compatible analytical database / cloud data warehouse that runs as a single binary and scales to hundreds of nodes and petabytes, built for AI agents, real-time analytics, and ELT workloads. Offered as a fully managed service with per-second compute billing and SOC2/ISO 27001/ISO 27018/HIPAA compliance.
- Firebolt Core
- Firebolt MCP Server
- Firebolt Auror
- Firebolt BYOC (Bring Your Own Cloud)
Companies that use Firebolt
Customer profileNamed customers10 records
Segments4 records
Ideal customer profiles3 records
Firebolt technology and API
TechnologyTechnology focussed Yes
API detail
- Has API
- Yes
- API docs
- API detail
Core technology
AI maturity
App detail
Integration3 records
AI capability3 records
Feature8 records
Firebolt partnerships and signals
Strategic signalPartnerships
Twelve partnerships are on record, tiered flagship, core and minor.
- Amazon Web Services (AWS)flagshipFirebolt's managed service runs as GA on AWS; AWS is the primary cloud target. Cloud coverage spans US East (N. Virginia), US West (Oregon), Europe (Frankfurt, Ireland), and Asia Pacific (Singapore, Mumbai).
- Google Cloud Platform (GCP)coreFirebolt managed service is GA on GCP, expanding cloud portability for customers.
- Apache Iceberg (open table format)flagshipFirebolt treats Apache Iceberg as a first-class citizen. The READ_ICEBERG capability provides sub-second querying directly on Iceberg tables; planned support for automated column statistics on Iceberg tables is documented in the engineering blog.
- Open Semantic Interchange (OSI) initiativecoreOSI is an open-source project launched by Snowflake with participation from AWS, Informatica, and other industry firms to standardize semantic definitions and data interoperability. Firebolt ecosystem participants are referenced indirectly via the broader data industry partnership.
- Salesforce.comcoreListed in Firebolt's privacy policy as a third-party data processor used for managing customer interactions, leads, and CRM.
- Auth0coreUsed by Firebolt for authentication services for platform users.
- SlackcoreListed in Firebolt's privacy policy as a third-party processor used for internal and customer communications.
- HubSpotcoreHubSpot is used for marketing automation, newsletter, and CRM functionality (cookies: Hubspotutk, messagesUtk).
- StripecorePayment processing partner (stripe.com merchant cookie referenced).
- Onfire.aiminorB2B identity-resolution and outbound marketing partner (onfire.ai, onfire_id cookie used for marketing outreach).
- SmartleadminorCold email outreach partner used for lead generation campaigns.
- ClayminorData enrichment and outbound tooling partner.
Scale indicators13 records
Recent moves8 records
Expansion highlights6 records
Firebolt competitors and assessment
Company assessmentBroad incumbents
- Snowflake: Snowflake is the dominant cloud data warehouse, offering Postgres-compatible SQL and Iceberg support that directly overlaps with Firebolt's positioning. It serves the same enterprise analytics workloads but at hyperscaler scale, making it the primary incumbent Firebolt must displace.
- Databricks: Databricks is a broad lakehouse + AI platform that competes with Firebolt in analytical SQL workloads and increasingly in agentic AI use cases. Its Databricks SQL product and open table format leadership put it in direct competition for the same data engineering buyers Firebolt targets.
- Google BigQuery: BigQuery is Google's serverless cloud data warehouse, part of the broader GCP ecosystem. It is a default alternative for the same analytical SQL workloads Firebolt targets, with native integration advantages for GCP-native customers.
- Amazon Redshift: Amazon Redshift is the AWS-native cloud data warehouse. As Firebolt's managed service runs GA on AWS, Redshift is the incumbent it must displace for AWS-resident analytical workloads, particularly for price/performance-sensitive workloads.
Direct peers
- ClickHouse: ClickHouse is an open-source column-oriented analytical database with a managed cloud offering, serving the same real-time, sub-second analytics workloads as Firebolt. Both target petabyte-scale customer-facing analytics, with ClickHouse typically referenced alongside Firebolt in 'Specialized Tools' categories.
- Starburst: Starburst provides a Trino-based lakehouse query engine for federated analytics across data sources. It competes for the same data engineering buyer evaluating Firebolt, particularly for Iceberg-based lakehouse workloads at enterprise scale.
- Dremio: Dremio offers an open Iceberg-native lakehouse platform that competes with Firebolt in SQL analytics over open table formats. Both target data teams seeking warehouse performance without vendor lock-in and are frequently listed together in data lake startup rankings.
Emerging players
- DuckDB: DuckDB is an open-source embedded analytical database with similar single-binary architecture philosophy. While it targets single-node workloads rather than 100+ node clusters, it shares Firebolt's 'analytical database on a laptop' developer experience and is increasingly listed as a complement or alternative.
- Motherduck: Motherduck is the cloud-native managed service for DuckDB, offering a serverless analytical data warehouse. It overlaps with Firebolt's value proposition (fast, simple, Postgres-compatible analytics) and targets similar SMB and engineering-led adoption patterns.
- Apache Druid: Apache Druid is a real-time analytical database originally architected by Firebolt's CTO Mosha Pasumansky. It overlaps with Firebolt's high-concurrency sub-second analytics positioning and is often evaluated as an alternative for event/streaming analytics use cases.
Market position
Strengths5 records
Weaknesses5 records
Competitive moat5 records
Key risks6 records
Key highlights7 records
Customer concentration
Firebolt social profiles
Digital presenceFirebolt compliance and trust
Trust signalCompliance5 records
Firebolt financial estimates
Financial estimateRevenue estimate
Valuation estimate
Firebolt leadership team
Management profileNumber of profiles
Profiles16 records
Firebolt subsidiaries and ownership
Company hierarchySubsidiaries1 record
Firebolt funding detail
Funding detailFunding overview
Funding rounds3 records
Investors10 records
Funding detail is available on the Subscription and Enterprise plan.Contact sales →
Firebolt M&A and investment
M&A and investmentM&A
Investments
M&A and investment is available on the Subscription and Enterprise plan.Contact sales →
Frequently asked questions about Firebolt
What does Firebolt do?
Firebolt is a high-performance, open-source analytical database and cloud data warehouse that runs as a single binary on a laptop and scales to hundreds of nodes and petabytes of data. It exposes a PostgreSQL SQL dialect, supports Apache Iceberg and DuckLake open table formats, and is engineered for AI-agent and real-time analytics workloads with sub-second latency and high concurrency.
Is Firebolt a public or private company?
Firebolt is a private company. It is classified as venture growth investor backed and is currently operating.
When was Firebolt founded?
Firebolt was founded in 2019. It employs 101 to 250 people.
Where is Firebolt based?
Firebolt is headquartered in Tel Aviv, Israel, in the Middle East region.
How does Firebolt make money?
Four revenue lines are on record. Managed Cloud Service (Usage-Based Compute) is the primary driver. The others are object Storage Pass-Through, open Source (Firebolt Core) and bring Your Own Cloud (BYOC).
Who are Firebolt's main competitors?
Broad incumbents on record are Snowflake, Databricks, Google BigQuery and Amazon Redshift. Direct peers are ClickHouse, Starburst and Dremio. Emerging players are DuckDB, Motherduck and Apache Druid.
Does Firebolt have an API?
Yes. Firebolt offers multiple developer-facing connectivity options: a JSON REST API with REST endpoints on each engine, ADBC (Arrow Database Connectivity) for high-throughput analytical workloads, and the Postgres wire protocol for PostgreSQL-compatible SQL access. The platform supports a PostgreSQL SQL dialect and exposes engines as scalable endpoints serving SQL queries. Developer documentation is at docs.firebolt.io/intro.
What industry is Firebolt in?
Firebolt's product category is Cloud Data Warehouse. Its primary akta.pro industry code is HDAEABAB, Lakehouse Platforms, with a secondary code of HDABAHAE, SaaS Security Posture Management (SSPM). Its NAICS code is 5182 and its SIC code is 3572.