Journaling app Rosebud has raised $6 million in seed funding as it seeks to further flesh out its app as an AI mentor for self-reflection and personal growth. 

Rosebud uses AI to analyze your journal entries, identify patterns over time, and provide insights, questions, and guidance. The company says its goal is to help users better understand themselves, build new habits, and track goals, just like a human mentor would.

Since its launch, Rosebud says, users have journaled 500 million words and spent more than 30 million minutes on its platform.

Rosebud was founded in 2023 by Chrys Bader, a Y Combinator alum and co-founder of Secret; and Sean Dadashi, a UC Berkeley Cognitive Science graduate. The pair met at a men’s group, and came up with the idea for Rosebud based on their own experiences with therapy and coaching. 

“Everybody is different, and everyone has different languages, not just spoken languages, but different emotional language, different ways of communication,” Bader said in an interview with TechCrunch, explaining that AI allows for a level of personalized coaching and support that wasn’t available so far.

“So one person might want validation and a soft approach, whereas somebody might want the really hard, like, ‘hey, challenge me, call me out on my BS’ approach,” he continued. “Part of understanding somebody is using that understanding to best support each individual. That’s what AI unlocks; that’s never been possible before, to scale that kind of personalized advice or support where every individual could have this wildly different experience than the other, depending on what they shared.”

Rosebud says it isn’t looking to replace therapists, and instead wants to open up access to quality mentorship.

The company plans to use the new funding to expand its team of four with engineering and product talent, and investing more into marketing. The startup also plans to invest more in its proprietary memory technology, and build out the app’s features. 

In addition, Rosebud wants to explore ways to make its AI journal more accessible, possibly through partnerships with schools, businesses and clinics. 

The seed round was led by Bessemer Venture Partners, with participation from 776, Initialized Capital, Fuel Capital, Avenir, Tim Ferriss, and other investors.

Looking forward, Bader and Dadashi envision Rosebud as a mentor, teacher and partner that can develop strategic, long term engagement plans with users. For instance, if someone is about to become a father, Rosebud could create personalized content around that milestone with journaling and other resources. 

“What if everybody had something that was looking out for what’s best for them? Or something that’s helping them become their best self? I think that’s the exciting thing that AI enables,” Dadashi said. “I benefited so much from having mentorship throughout my life at various times, and I’ve suffered in times when I haven’t had that mentorship. I think what we’re seeing is a future where this can be available to everybody in a way that it just wasn’t possible for it to be available before. You can have something that’s actually thinking about you, actually trying to understand you, and is aligned with who you want to become.” 

Rosebud’s basic journaling features are free to use, but the startup offers a $12.99 monthly subscription that unlocks premium features, such as long-term memory, and voice and call modes. 

The AI journal is accessible via the web, and on iOS and Android.