Vurb
Vurb was a free mobile search and discovery app that unified places, restaurants, events, movies, and music into shareable Cards and collaborative Decks, serving consumer travelers, foodies, and local-discovery users before shutting down in November 2016.
- Company typePrivate
- Founded2011
- HeadquartersSan Francisco, United States
- Headcount11–50
- GTM typeB2C
- OfferingSoftware
What Vurb does
Vurb was a consumer mobile application founded in 2011 by Bobby Lo that aimed to unify fragmented mobile search and discovery across restaurants, events, movies, music, travel, and local experiences. The core product was a free iOS, Android, Amazon App Store, and Apple Watch app that surfaced results as portable, shareable Vurb Cards embedding reviews, ratings, directions, trailers, and direct integrations with Yelp, Fandango, Google Maps, Netflix, Uber, and OpenTable. Users organized saved Cards into Vurb Decks (collaborative bucket lists) and, from August 2015 onward, coordinated plans via in-app Vurb Chat.
Under the hood, Vurb combined text-based NLP search with a recommendation engine that personalized Cards based on user interests, location, time of day, weather, and community signals from a Featured Tastemaker program (including celebrity tastemakers such as Chef Michael Mina) and a Vurb Insider VIP community. The technology layer was differentiated less by underlying machine learning and more by integration interoperability: stitching together actions from third-party services so users could read, book, stream, ride, and reserve without leaving the app.
Vurb's go-to-market was product-led and community-led, relying on app store discovery (it earned Apple's 'Best New App' designation in 2015), earned media (Forbes, NYT, LA Times, TechCrunch, TIME, MIT Technology Review, CNBC), and a partnership with Thrillist for a $3K Dream Foodie Trip contest. The legal entity was Verbify, Inc., domiciled in California. Total disclosed funding was approximately $10M across a $2M+ seed round (2013) and an $8M Series A (August 2014) led by Redpoint Ventures with participation from Stanford University, Tencent, Max Levchin, Drew Houston, Naval Ravikant, Atlas Venture, Caffeinated Capital, Crunchfund, Data Collective, and Susa Ventures. No monetization or pricing model was ever disclosed, and the company announced it would take the app offline on November 14, 2016 to focus on a successor project.
Vurb firmographics
Firmographics- Name
- Vurb
- Legal name
- Verbify
- Website
- https://vurb.com
- Company type
- Private
- Founded year
- 2011
- Operating status
- Closed
- Headcount range
- 11–50 employees
- Short description
- Vurb was a free mobile search and discovery app that unified places, restaurants, events, movies, and music into shareable Cards and collaborative Decks, serving consumer travelers, foodies, and local-discovery users before shutting down in November 2016.
- Ownership category
- akta.pro rank
Where Vurb is headquartered
LocationHeadquarters
- HQ city
- San Francisco
- HQ country
- United States
- HQ region
- North America
Offices1 record
Markets served
Vurb business model
Business model- GTM type
- B2C
- Offering type
- Software
- Cost components
- Personnel, Technology or R&D, Marketing or Sales, Operations, Infrastructure
Go-to-market motion3 records
Distribution channels3 records
Marketing channels7 records
Vurb product offering
Product offeringCore offering
Vurb was a consumer mobile application that unified search, discovery, saving, and sharing of things to do — including places, restaurants, events, movies, music, and travel ideas — into a single interface. Search results and recommendations were delivered as actionable "Cards" that integrated directly with Yelp, Fandango, Google Maps, Netflix, Uber, and OpenTable, and users organized saved Cards into shareable collaborative "Decks," with in-app "Vurb Chat" enabling social planning.
Product overview
Vurb was a single, unified mobile search and discovery platform — not a modular platform-plus-components architecture. The core product was the Vurb mobile app (iOS and Android), which delivered search results through Vurb Cards (portable, actionable content cards) and allowed users to organize saved items into Vurb Decks (shareable collections). A messaging layer called Vurb Chat enabled in-app communication with direct Card/Deck sharing. The product went through one major version evolution, from the initial 2015 app to Vurb 3.0 in August 2016, which added personalization and discovery features. The service was discontinued in November 2016. Vurb Cards integrated with third-party services including Yelp, Fandango, Google Maps, Netflix, Uber, and OpenTable to enable in-card actions without app-switching.
Differentiator
Problem solved
Functional benefit
Products and services
- Vurb Mobile App Free consumer iOS, Android, and Apple Watch mobile application that unified search, discovery, saving, and sharing of places, restaurants, events, movies, music, and travel into a single interface for individual mobile users, delivering results and recommendations as actionable Cards with direct integrations to Yelp, Fandango, Google Maps, Netflix, Uber, and OpenTable.
Companies that use Vurb
Customer profileSegments3 records
Ideal customer profiles3 records
Vurb technology and API
TechnologyTechnology focussed Yes
API detail
- Has API
- No
- API docs
- API detail
Core technology
AI maturity
App detail
Integration6 records
AI capability2 records
Feature6 records
Vurb partnerships and signals
Strategic signalPartnerships
Two partnerships are on record, tiered minor and core.
- ThrillistminorPartnership for $3K Dream Foodie Trip contest. Vurb teamed up with Thrillist to promote the app and drive user acquisition through a contest encouraging app downloads and Deck creation.
- Service Integrations (Yelp, Fandango, Google Maps, Netflix, Uber, OpenTable)coreTechnical integrations with external services allowing users to take actions directly from Vurb Cards. Includes Yelp (reviews), Fandango (tickets), Google Maps (directions), Netflix (streaming), Uber (rides), and OpenTable (reservations).
Scale indicators6 records
Recent moves6 records
Expansion highlights5 records
Vurb competitors and assessment
Company assessmentBroad incumbents
- Pinterest: Pinterest is a visual bookmarking and discovery platform where users save ideas into curated boards. Strongly comparable to Vurb's 'Decks' concept of curated, shareable bucket lists of saved items.
- Google Search: Google Search is the dominant general-purpose search engine and was the explicit competitor Vurb positioned against in mobile search (NYT, TechCrunch, VentureBeat coverage). Overlapping capability on mobile discovery and local intent queries.
Direct peers
- TripAdvisor: TripAdvisor is a travel and restaurant recommendation platform with user reviews and booking integrations. Comparable to Vurb's travel wish-list, restaurant discovery, and integration-driven action-taking flow.
- TripIt: TripIt is a travel planning app that organizes itineraries, reservations, and trip details in one place. Comparable to Vurb's travel Deck / collaborative trip-planning use case.
- Foursquare: Foursquare is a location-based discovery and check-in platform surfacing nearby places, restaurants, and experiences. Closely comparable to Vurb's local-discovery + personalization + curated lists use case.
- Yelp: Yelp is a local discovery platform for restaurants, bars, and services with reviews, photos, and reservations. Directly comparable to Vurb's local recommendation and review-reading functionality; Vurb integrated Yelp reviews inside its Cards.
- OpenTable: OpenTable is a restaurant reservation platform integrated directly inside Vurb Cards. Directly comparable on the restaurant discovery + reservation action that was a core Vurb flow.
Emerging players
- Citymapper: Citymapper is a mobile urban transit and city discovery app combining maps, directions, and local recommendations. Comparable to Vurb's location-aware, mobile-first 'things to do' discovery surface.
- Hopper: Hopper is a mobile-first travel booking and discovery app with personalized recommendations and price prediction. Comparable to Vurb's travel + actionable booking flow on mobile.
- Wanderu: Wanderu is a ground-travel search and booking platform (bus, train, etc.) for trips. Partial overlap with Vurb's travel discovery / actionable booking positioning on mobile.
Market position
Strengths3 records
Weaknesses5 records
Competitive moat4 records
Key risks6 records
Key highlights6 records
Customer concentration
Vurb social profiles
Digital presenceVurb financial estimates
Financial estimateRevenue estimate
Valuation estimate
Vurb leadership team
Management profileNumber of profiles
Profiles2 records
Vurb funding detail
Funding detailFunding overview
Funding rounds2 records
Investors11 records
Funding detail is available on the Subscription and Enterprise plan.Contact sales →
Vurb 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 Vurb
What does Vurb do?
Vurb was a consumer mobile application that unified search, discovery, saving, and sharing of things to do — including places, restaurants, events, movies, music, and travel ideas — into a single interface. Search results and recommendations were delivered as actionable "Cards" that integrated directly with Yelp, Fandango, Google Maps, Netflix, Uber, and OpenTable, and users organized saved Cards into shareable collaborative "Decks," with in-app "Vurb Chat" enabling social planning.
Is Vurb a public or private company?
Vurb is a private company. It is classified as venture growth investor backed and is currently closed.
When was Vurb founded?
Vurb was founded in 2011. It employs 11 to 50 people.
Where is Vurb based?
Vurb is headquartered in San Francisco, United States, in the North America region.
Who are Vurb's main competitors?
Broad incumbents on record are Pinterest and Google Search. Direct peers are TripAdvisor, TripIt, Foursquare, Yelp and OpenTable. Emerging players are Citymapper, Hopper and Wanderu.
Does Vurb have an API?
No public API is recorded for Vurb.