- Free allowance
- The Activate Founders tier offers USD 1,000 in AWS Activate Credits, plus USD 350 in AWS Developer Support credits, valid for two years.
- Verdict
- caveatusable, with a named limit or an unprobed read path
- Cost
- free tier
- Identity
- emailno card, no phone
- Binding limit
- write-gatedThe review fails first: AWS has unpublished internal requirements, applications go unedited once submitted, and reports of repeated rejection for legitimate applicants are common. After approval the two-year expiry and the USD 1,000...
- Evidence
- documented6 sources; a first-party page was read and the sentence quoted
- Freshness
- stale on 2026-12-05checked 2026-11-04 (live); stale on 2026-12-05
| Free tier | The Activate Founders tier offers USD 1,000 in AWS Activate Credits, plus USD 350 in AWS Developer Support credits, valid for two years. Eligibility: new to AWS Activate Credits, self-funded, a fully functioning company website, founded in the past 10 years, and a business email matching the startup domain. AWS states: 'If you do not have an Org ID, you are initially eligible for the Founders Package.' unit none; metered on wall-clock; one-shot-credit |
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| Price | none stated |
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| Limits | - write-gated (binding) The review fails first: AWS has unpublished internal requirements, applications go unedited once submitted, and reports of repeated rejection for legitimate applicants are common. After approval the two-year expiry and the USD 1,000 size are what bind. source
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| Identity | email No incorporation requirement appears in the English eligibility list or the seven-step application guide. The gates are an AWS Builder ID, a business email matching a startup domain (the guide says to use the business email for the Builder ID and the Activate profile), a live company website, and a linked AWS account. |
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| Egress | not published: the page read states no egress allowance and no overage price; the credits guide says standard AWS rates apply when credits run out; read 2026-11-03 |
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| Interface | unknown console only for the credit grant: a web application with an AWS Builder ID, credits viewed in the AWS console under Billing; the guide documents no API for the grant |
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| Tooling | not stated |
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| Composes with | USD 1,000 of EC2 and S3 plus USD 350 of Developer Support is the cheapest entry point at AWS and it does not disqualify a later Portfolio application, so the chain is Founders now, Portfolio after any accelerator affiliation. It composes with the Kiro Startup Credits promotion, which excludes applicants who already hold Activate credits. |
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| Reliability | no reliability event recorded |
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| Notes | The evidence reversed that verdict. AWS's seven-step application guide and its Japanese getting-started page both name a website, a domain business email and a LinkedIn profile rather than a legal entity, and one third-party tracker records solo-founder eligibility as yes. The residual risk is the unpublished internal review, which is where rejections actually happen. Its numbers stand, its identity field does not. |
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| Parsed numbers | |
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