Silicon Valley may have started the tech boom, but New York City has emerged as a powerhouse in its own right. NYC now hosts over 25,000 tech-enabled startups and has secured its position as the world's second-largest startup hub.
What’s driving this growth in 2026? We can sum it up in two letters: AI. New York City is now home to over 2,000 artificial intelligence startups, including 35 AI unicorns—privately-held startup companies valued at $1 billion or more—and more than 40,000 AI professionals work in the city. The scene spans everything from building AI agents that can handle tasks independently (agentic AI engineering) to fine-tuning the large language models that power tools like ChatGPT and Claude (LLM development).
