Who are Appen's competitors?

153 companies on our register sell at least two of what Appen sells (labeling software, datasets, expert and human data, RL environments, evaluations and benchmarks and annotation). The largest by the money on record: Mercor at $2B (run rate, Jun 2026), Surge AI at $1.2B (FY2024), Handshake AI at $1B (run rate, Aug 2026). Appen is #11 of the 69 with money on record, on $249M (12 months to Jun 2026).

Who is Appen's biggest competitor?

Mercor, by the money on record: $2B (run rate, Jun 2026), against Appen's $249M (12 months to Jun 2026). Mercor sells datasets, expert and human data, RL environments and evaluations and benchmarks, as Appen does.

Which of Appen's competitors buy data from companies?

27 of them take data from the companies that hold it, through a published programme or in their own words: Mercor, Handshake AI, micro1, Scale AI, Turing, AfterQuery, Wirestock, Labelbox and others.

Updated 8 Nov 2026

Appen competitors in 2026, ranked by revenue.

The largest companies that sell what Appen sells, by the money on record: Mercor ($2B, run rate, Jun 2026), Surge AI ($1.2B, FY2024), Handshake AI ($1B, run rate, Aug 2026), micro1 ($1B, run rate, Oct 2026) and Scale AI ($870M, FY2024). Appen itself is #11 of 69, on $249M (12 months to Jun 2026).

153 companies on our register sell at least two of what Appen sells (labeling software, datasets, expert and human data, RL environments, evaluations and benchmarks and annotation), read on their own pages. 68 have revenue, a valuation or funding on record and are ranked below with Appen, every figure linked to the filing or article it comes from.

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153

companies selling what Appen sells

with money on record

#11

Appen's place among them

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Appen, head to head

The comparisons people search, each side by side on revenue, valuation, funding and what each sells.

Appen and its 68 ranked competitors

10 of them rank above Appen. Each company is ranked on the first of these it has on record: its revenue over twelve months (a run rate or a year as published, or its last four quarters added up; an AI segment where the rest of its business is not AI data), then its newest valuation, then the money it disclosed raising. No company pays for a place.

Appen and its competitors, ranked by revenue, valuation and funding on record
#	Company	Ranked on	Measure	Valuation	Sells	Pays companies for data
1	Mercor	$2B	Revenue, run rate, Jun 2026	$10B	RL environments, Datasets, Expert and human data, Evaluations and benchmarks	Through our introductions
2	Surge AI	$1.2B	Revenue, FY2024		RL environments, Datasets, Expert and human data, Evaluations and benchmarks
3	Handshake AI	$1B	Revenue, run rate, Aug 2026	$3.5B	RL environments, Evaluations and benchmarks, Expert and human data, Annotation	Through our introductions
4	micro1	$1B	Revenue, run rate, Oct 2026	$4B	RL environments, Evaluations and benchmarks, Expert and human data, Datasets	Through our introductions
5	Scale AI	$870M	Revenue, FY2024	$29B	Labeling software, RL environments, Datasets, Expert and human data, Evaluations and benchmarks, Annotation, Simulation	Through our introductions
6	Prolific	$500M	Revenue, run rate, May 2026		Evaluations and benchmarks, Expert and human data, Datasets, Annotation
7	Snorkel AI	$375M	Revenue, run rate, Sep 2026	$3.5B	Datasets, RL environments, Expert and human data, Evaluations and benchmarks, Annotation
8	Innodata	$350M	Revenue, 12 months to Sep 2026		Labeling software, RL environments, Datasets, Expert and human data, Evaluations and benchmarks, Annotation
9	Turing	$300M	Revenue, run rate, Mar 2025	$2.2B	RL environments, Datasets, Expert and human data, Evaluations and benchmarks	Through our introductions
10	TaskUs	$250M	Revenue, 12 months to Sep 2026 (AI Services)		Annotation, Expert and human data, Datasets
11	Appen	$249M	Revenue, 12 months to Jun 2026		Labeling software, Datasets, Expert and human data, RL environments, Evaluations and benchmarks, Annotation	Its own programme
12	Proximal	$200M	Revenue, run rate, Sep 2026	$300M	Evaluations and benchmarks, Datasets
13	Invisible Technologies	$134M	Revenue, FY2024	$2B	RL environments, Datasets, Expert and human data, Evaluations and benchmarks, Annotation
14	AfterQuery	$100M	Revenue, run rate, Apr 2026	$3.2B	RL environments, Datasets, Expert and human data, Evaluations and benchmarks	Through our introductions
15	Arena	$100M	Revenue, run rate, Oct 2026	$3.1B	Evaluations and benchmarks, Datasets
16	Mecka	$100M	Revenue, run rate, Jun 2026	$500M	Datasets, Expert and human data, Evaluations and benchmarks
17	Wirestock	$40M	Revenue, run rate, May 2026		Datasets, Expert and human data	Its own programme
18	Toloka	$26.4M	Revenue, FY2024		RL environments, Datasets, Expert and human data, Evaluations and benchmarks, Annotation
19	Eigent AI	$12M	Revenue, run rate, Oct 2026		RL environments, Datasets, Evaluations and benchmarks
20	Applied Intuition	$15B	Valuation, 2025		Simulation, RL environments, Evaluations and benchmarks, Annotation
21	Labelbox	$1.3B	Valuation, 2026		RL environments, Expert and human data, Evaluations and benchmarks	Its own programme
22	Mechanize	$500M	Valuation, 2026		RL environments, Evaluations and benchmarks, Datasets, Simulation
23	Vals AI	$400M	Valuation, 2026		Evaluations and benchmarks, Datasets
24	Kled	$100M	Valuation, 2025		Datasets, Expert and human data, Evaluations and benchmarks, Annotation	Its own programme
25	Lightwheel	$145M	Money raised, disclosed		Datasets, Expert and human data, Evaluations and benchmarks, Annotation, Simulation
26	Encord	$90M	Money raised, disclosed		Labeling software, Annotation, Expert and human data, Datasets, Evaluations and benchmarks
27	Patronus AI	$70M	Money raised, disclosed		RL environments, Datasets, Expert and human data, Evaluations and benchmarks, Simulation	Through our introductions
28	Sama	$70M	Money raised, disclosed		Expert and human data, Annotation, Evaluations and benchmarks
29	XDOF	$70M	Money raised, disclosed		Evaluations and benchmarks, Datasets, Annotation
30	CloudFactory	$65M	Money raised, disclosed		Datasets, Annotation, Expert and human data, Evaluations and benchmarks
31	Defined.ai	$62.3M	Money raised, disclosed		Datasets, Expert and human data, Annotation, Evaluations and benchmarks	Its own programme
32	Centific	$60M	Money raised, disclosed		RL environments, Datasets, Expert and human data, Evaluations and benchmarks, Annotation	Its own programme
33	David AI	$50M	Money raised, disclosed		Datasets, Expert and human data, Evaluations and benchmarks
34	SuperAnnotate	$49.5M	Money raised, disclosed		Labeling software, Expert and human data, RL environments, Evaluations and benchmarks, Annotation, Datasets	Its own programme
35	Deeptune	$43M	Money raised, disclosed		RL environments, Datasets
36	Bespoke Labs	$40M	Money raised, disclosed		RL environments, Evaluations and benchmarks, Datasets, Simulation
37	Gray Swan AI	$40M	Money raised, disclosed		Evaluations and benchmarks, Datasets
38	Dataloop	$33M	Money raised, disclosed		Labeling software, Annotation
39	Kili Technology	$32M	Money raised, disclosed		Labeling software, Annotation, Expert and human data, Evaluations and benchmarks
40	Luel	$31.2M	Money raised, disclosed		Datasets, Expert and human data, Evaluations and benchmarks, Annotation
41	Halluminate	$30M	Money raised, disclosed		RL environments, Evaluations and benchmarks	Its own programme
42	Maxinsights	$30M	Money raised, disclosed		Expert and human data, Evaluations and benchmarks, Annotation, Simulation
43	Deccan AI	$25M	Money raised, disclosed		RL environments, Datasets, Expert and human data, Evaluations and benchmarks, Annotation
44	HumanSignal	$25M	Money raised, disclosed		Labeling software, Annotation, Evaluations and benchmarks
45	iMerit	$23.5M	Money raised, disclosed		Labeling software, Expert and human data, Evaluations and benchmarks, Annotation, Datasets
46	HUD	$16M	Money raised, disclosed		RL environments, Evaluations and benchmarks
47	Sapien	$15.5M	Money raised, disclosed		Evaluations and benchmarks, Annotation
48	Datacurve	$15M	Money raised, disclosed		RL environments, Datasets, Expert and human data, Evaluations and benchmarks, Annotation	Its own programme
49	Midcentury	$15M	Money raised, disclosed		Datasets, Expert and human data, Simulation, Evaluations and benchmarks, Annotation
50	General Reasoning	$10.9M	Money raised, disclosed		RL environments, Evaluations and benchmarks
51	Chakra Labs	$10.1M	Money raised, disclosed		RL environments, Expert and human data, Evaluations and benchmarks, Datasets
52	Arga Labs	$10M	Money raised, disclosed		RL environments, Evaluations and benchmarks
53	BioStack Platforms	$9.5M	Money raised, disclosed		RL environments, Datasets, Evaluations and benchmarks, Simulation
54	Idler	$9M	Money raised, disclosed		RL environments, Datasets, Evaluations and benchmarks, Simulation	Its own programme
55	Perle AI	$9M	Money raised, disclosed		Datasets, Expert and human data, Evaluations and benchmarks, Annotation
56	Veris AI	$8.5M	Money raised, disclosed		Evaluations and benchmarks, RL environments
57	Human Archive	$8.2M	Money raised, disclosed		Datasets, Expert and human data, Annotation
58	Runloop	$7M	Money raised, disclosed		Evaluations and benchmarks, Datasets, RL environments
59	clickworker	$6M	Money raised, disclosed		Datasets, Annotation
60	VisionLab AI	$6M	Money raised, disclosed		Datasets, Annotation, Expert and human data
61	Build AI	$5M	Money raised, disclosed		Datasets, Evaluations and benchmarks
62	Latch	$5M	Money raised, disclosed		Evaluations and benchmarks, Datasets, Annotation
63	Troveo	$4.5M	Money raised, disclosed		Datasets, Annotation	Its own programme
64	Macrodata Labs	$4M	Money raised, disclosed		Annotation, Evaluations and benchmarks
65	Good Start Labs	$3.6M	Money raised, disclosed		RL environments, Datasets, Expert and human data, Evaluations and benchmarks, Annotation
66	Poindexter Labs	$2.7M	Money raised, disclosed		Datasets, Expert and human data, Evaluations and benchmarks, Annotation
67	CVAT	$2M	Money raised, disclosed		Labeling software, Annotation
68	Quesma	$2M	Money raised, disclosed		RL environments, Evaluations and benchmarks
69	Segments.ai	$1.1M	Money raised, disclosed		Labeling software, Annotation

Competitors with no money on record (85)

6thSense, Abaka AI, Abundant, Align AI, Andromede, Anolytics, Anthromind, Aptura, Archal, ARIMLABS, Asimov, Aviro, BasicAI, Besimple AI, Claru, CleverX, Cogito Tech, Collinear, Contra Labs, Cortex AI, Cua, CueBench, DARE Labs, DataOcean AI, Datoric, Dissei, e2f, EdotEnv, Emulated, Enact, exponential, Fleet, Foundry AI, Hillclimb, Hitech BPO, Humyn Labs, Huzzle Labs, Incalmo, isahit, Karya, Keymakr, Labellerr, LightWrk, LXT, Magma, Maingen, Markov, Metaphi, Mind Lab, Monte, Noumad, Olam Labs, Ooak, OpenTrain AI, Paper Instruments, Pareto, Parsewave, Petrarch, Polymath, pre.dev, Prime Intellect, ReasonCore, Refresh, Revelo, Rise Data Labs, Sepal AI, Shaip, Sieve, Symbal, Synthetic Sciences, Tacit Labs, TELUS Digital, Theta, Theta Lab, TrainAI by RWS, Trajectory Labs, Uber AI Solutions, Ulam, Unidata, V7, Vetto AI, Vibrant Labs, Vmax, Welocalize, Zeton.

Who is a competitor.: A company whose own pages, read word for word, say it sells at least two of the things Appen sells. Not our opinion of who competes, and nobody pays to be here.
The place.: Each company's place among these, renumbered from its place on the whole register's ranking (/best), by the same rule.
Pays companies for data.: "Through our introductions": it takes companies' data through AIData.Broker's introductions and pays us a referral fee when one goes ahead. That never moves its place: the order is the money on record. "Its own programme": a published programme for buying data. "Says it buys data": its own words, linked.

The latest money moves

The newest rounds, valuations and revenue figures among Appen and its competitors, each linked to its record.

5 Nov 2026Innodata reported $350M revenue (12 months to Sep 2026)
4 Nov 2026TaskUs reported $250M revenue (12 months to Sep 2026, AI Services)
27 Oct 2026CVAT raised $2M
22 Oct 2026Maxinsights raised $30M
22 Oct 2026BioStack Platforms raised $9.5M
14 Oct 2026Labelbox raised $100M at a $1.3B valuation
12 Oct 2026micro1 was valued at $4B valuation
12 Oct 2026micro1 reported $1B revenue (run rate, Oct 2026)

The questions people ask

Who are Appen's competitors?: 153 companies on our register sell at least two of what Appen sells (labeling software, datasets, expert and human data, RL environments, evaluations and benchmarks and annotation). The largest by the money on record: Mercor at $2B (run rate, Jun 2026), Surge AI at $1.2B (FY2024), Handshake AI at $1B (run rate, Aug 2026). Appen is #11 of the 69 with money on record, on $249M (12 months to Jun 2026).
Who is Appen's biggest competitor?: Mercor, by the money on record: $2B (run rate, Jun 2026), against Appen's $249M (12 months to Jun 2026). Mercor sells datasets, expert and human data, RL environments and evaluations and benchmarks, as Appen does.
Which of Appen's competitors buy data from companies?: 27 of them take data from the companies that hold it, through a published programme or in their own words: Mercor, Handshake AI, micro1, Scale AI, Turing, AfterQuery, Wirestock, Labelbox and others.

Where Appen ranks

Its place on each list of the market it belongs to, by the same rule.

Every ranking

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Value your data Everything recorded about Appen