Gizmo has raised $22 million in Series A funding, led by Shine Capital. Other investors include Ada Ventures, Seek Investments, GSV, and NFX, which also led Gizmo’s $3.5 million seed round.
The company was founded in London in 2021 by three University of Cambridge graduates, Petros Christodoulou, Robin Jack, and Paul Evangelou. Since then, the AI learning platform has grown to 13 million users across 120 countries, mostly through word of mouth.
The company’s original idea came from listening to users, based on the belief that social media features such as personalisation, instant feedback, social connection, and variable rewards could help students grow. Students told Christodoulou that they studied better with Gizmo because it helped them avoid distractions from platforms like TikTok.
“Our users started regularly describing Gizmo as a game and telling us they’d never been able to study so much before because they’d usually get distracted and go on TikTok instead, but that this wasn’t happening when they used Gizmo. Then we realised that learning is able to be as addictive as social media if it is designed correctly,” Christodoulou tells Tech Funding News.
Students can upload notes, documents, or web links to the platform, which then creates personalised flashcards, adaptive quizzes, and gamified challenges. Social features allow users to study together, compete on leaderboards, and keep each other accountable. Many users say the product feels like a game, and some have kept study streaks for over 100 days.
With many AI flashcard and tutor apps like Quizlet, Anki, and Brainscape on the market, Gizmo sets itself apart by focusing on gamification and network effects.
“We make learning fun by deeply committing to gamification, and we have network effects, so the more users we have, the more fun it is for new users who join. We have 13 million users and have grown almost entirely organically through word of mouth across the world. Many of our users use Gizmo every day and are on 100+ day streaks,” Christodoulou says.
The $22 million will help Gizmo expand into the US college market, which is very different from the exam-focused markets where the company has been most successful. Gizmo plans to use the new funding to grow its engineering and AI teams in San Francisco and London.
In the long run, the company wants to reach one billion learners and make education as engaging as the most popular entertainment apps.
