Startup MRI
A structured 7-dimension evaluation of your idea — validation, market opportunity, competition, distribution, monetization, build difficulty, and founder fit — in under 60 seconds. Free, no signup.
Last updated · August 30, 2026
Quick answer
A startup idea evaluator is a tool that turns a one-sentence idea into a structured evaluation across the dimensions that determine whether the idea is worth building. A startup idea evaluator typically scores market opportunity (is there a real demand for this?), distribution (can the founder reach the buyer?), monetization (does the business model produce revenue at the chosen price?), competition (is the market already saturated?), build difficulty (how long will the MVP take and what skills does it require?), and founder fit (does the founder's skills, time, and audience match the work?). Each dimension is scored on a 0–100 scale, and the dimensions are combined into an overall startup score. The output is a structured report, not a verdict: the report names the assumption most worth testing next, the risks that matter most, and the smallest experiment that can produce evidence before any code is written. Yibud's startup idea evaluator is called Startup MRI. It produces the report in under 60 seconds, free, with no signup. The scores come from a deterministic rule engine — the same inputs always produce the same report.
Key takeaways
Comparison framework
Two kinds of risk. Four ways to choose. Before you run another validation experiment, decide whether your biggest risk is the idea or the execution — and what to do once you can see it.
Why the dimensions split into two stacks
CB Insights' recurring post-mortem analyses of failed startups have placed "no market need" and "not the right team" among the top failure causes across reports — typically as the two largest categories in both the original sample and the 2024 update of 431 cases. Steve Blank's customer-development framing makes the same point: a startup is a chain of hypotheses, half about the market and half about the team. The evaluator's six dimensions split the same way. The four idea-side dimensions — market opportunity, competition, distribution, monetization — test whether the market is real and reachable at the chosen price. The two execution-side dimensions — build difficulty, founder fit — test whether the founder can ship and sell it. Treating them as one undifferentiated risk is the most common mistake when evaluating an idea for the first time.
The four decision quadrants
Place the idea on the grid: idea strength on one axis, execution readiness on the other. Each quadrant implies a different next action.
Strong idea · Weak execution fit
The market is real, but the founder does not have the skills, time, or audience to reach it at the chosen price. The honest next actions are: find a co-founder who covers the missing execution piece, narrow the build scope so execution fits the founder, or pass on this idea. Idea-side strength does not rescue execution-side weakness.
Strong idea · Strong execution fit
Both stacks are aligned. The next move is to pick the single critical assumption — usually the lowest-scoring dimension — and run the cheapest experiment that produces a behavior signal. Avoid the temptation to "one more dimension check"; the alignment is the signal.
Weak idea · Weak execution fit
Both stacks are weak. The founder's time, the founder's audience, and the chosen market all point away from this idea. The honest next action is to pick a different one. The 2 × 2 is most useful here — it gives the founder permission to move on without wondering whether one more dimension would have changed the read.
Weak idea · Strong execution fit
The founder has the skills, time, or audience, but the chosen idea is too small or too crowded to be worth them. The next actions are: a different niche, a sharper angle, or a different idea entirely. Founder expertise does not rescue a market that cannot support the chosen monetization at the named price.
Comparing two or three candidate ideas
Run each candidate idea through Startup MRI in turn. For each, compute two aggregate reads: the average of the four idea-side dimensions and the average of the two execution-side dimensions. Place each candidate on the grid. The strongest combined outcome — strong idea, strong execution — is the one to start with. When two candidates tie, the differentiator is usually the cheapest critical assumption to test, not the overall score.
How to act
Knowing your quadrant is the first step. The next step is to commit to a concrete sequence of actions with a rough timeframe, before the read goes stale.
Quadrant 1
The report's lowest-scoring dimension is the one whose failure would invalidate the rest of the plan. Write it on a sticky note. Everything else is secondary.
One to two weeks. A problem interview, a landing page priced at the planned tier, or a 30-day concierge — whichever produces evidence fastest at the named buyer. Do not ship the full MVP yet.
Pick the smallest shippable slice of the MVP that produces customer value. Lock a date. The milestone forces scope discipline; without it, founder time tends to leak.
Quadrant 2
One to two days. The missing skill, the missing time, the missing audience. Write it down. Vague gaps are impossible to fill; named gaps can be filled or passed.
One to two months. A founder who already has credibility in the missing domain — they will not need to be sold on the problem. Avoid generalists; this is the place for a specialist.
A smaller version of the same idea, built in a week or two with tools you already know, is better than a six-month build that needs the missing skill.
Idea-side strength does not rescue execution-side weakness. The 2 × 2 has given you permission to move on.
Quadrant 3
Usually one of: market opportunity (the buyer is too small), competition (the angle is not sharp enough), distribution (the channel does not match), or monetization (the business model does not produce revenue at the named price).
One week each. A different segment, a sharper wedge, a higher price tier. Each repositioning test is one week of founder time plus the inputs the engine can re-score.
Re-run Startup MRI on each alternative. The one with the highest aggregate of the four idea-side dimensions is the one worth pursuing.
Founder expertise does not rescue a market that cannot support the chosen monetization at the named price. Your time is worth a real market.
Quadrant 4
The score is a function of the inputs. If the inputs have not changed, the score will not either.
The grid is the cheapest way to know whether the next idea sits in the 'Build now' quadrant or another one — before you invest the time.
The 2 × 2 has given you permission to skip. Use it. The next idea deserves the same structured read.
When to stop
The grid is a snapshot, not a verdict. Re-run it after each action sequence above produces evidence — the per-dimension shifts tell you whether the idea is strengthening or weakening, and whether the quadrant placement has changed.
How it works
Six conceptual dimensions the evaluator scores. The numbers come from a deterministic rule engine so the same inputs always produce the same report.
Dimension 1
Is there real demand for what you want to build? The evaluator looks at the size and reachability of the target audience and the strength of the workarounds people already use. A large market with weak workarounds scores high; a small market with strong incumbents scores low.
Dimension 2
How saturated is the market you are entering? The evaluator considers the number of direct competitors, how well-funded they are, and how differentiated the planned product is. A crowded market with a sharp angle still scores well; a crowded market with no angle does not.
Dimension 3
Can the founder actually reach the buyer? The evaluator scores the chosen acquisition channel against the named target audience. SEO plus a content lead magnet is one profile; cold outreach to a niche B2B segment is another. The two are not interchangeable.
Dimension 4
Does the business model produce revenue at the chosen price? The evaluator looks at the monetization model (subscription, freemium, one-time, ads, marketplace take rate) and the willingness-to-pay signal for that model in the chosen market.
Dimension 5
How long will the MVP take, and what skills does it require? The evaluator scores the technical depth of the planned product and the founder's technical background against each other. A non-technical founder building an AI infrastructure product is a different signal than the same founder building a no-code tool.
Dimension 6
Does the founder's skills, time, and existing audience match the work? The evaluator scores the fit between the founder and the planned product. A domain expert with a deep network in the target market scores well; a first-time founder with no audience scores the inverse.
Who it's for
Four personas the evaluator is tuned for, each with a different set of assumptions to test first.
First-time founders
You have an idea but no prior reference for what a 'good' idea looks like. The evaluator gives you a structured, repeatable read on whether the idea is worth the next three to six months of your time.
Indie hackers
You have 5–10 hours a week and a strong preference for not wasting either. The evaluator gives you a 60-second read on whether the idea is worth the next month, and surfaces the one assumption most worth testing first.
Startup teams
You have two or three candidate ideas and limited runway. The evaluator scores each one across the same six dimensions, so the team can compare them on a like-for-like basis rather than on gut feel.
Non-technical
The report is written in plain language and explains what every score means. You do not need a data or engineering background to use it. The output is a decision, not a number.
Why evaluate
Most failed startups do not fail at launch. They fail at the keyboard — months earlier, when the founder chose to build a product nobody had asked for.
Reason 1
A founder who evaluates first learns in days what a builder who skips evaluation learns in months. The 3–6 months you save is the 3–6 months you can spend on the next idea — or on a different one entirely.
Reason 2
Every startup is a chain of assumptions. Evaluation surfaces the chain and names the single critical assumption — the one whose failure would invalidate the rest of the plan. Testing that one assumption first is the highest-leverage activity a founder can run.
Reason 3
Not every assumption deserves a six-month build. Evaluation tells you which assumption to test first and which experiment is cheapest to run. A landing page, a problem interview, or a 30-day concierge is usually enough to produce evidence before any code is written.
FAQ
Short answers, in the same vocabulary the Startup Validation hub uses. Longer answers live in the linked articles.
What you receive
Six sections, plain language, every score traceable to a specific fired rule in the rule engine.
Six named scores
Validation, market opportunity, competition, distribution, monetization, build difficulty, and founder fit — each on a 0–100 scale.
Per-dimension breakdown
Every dimension comes with a short plain-language explanation of what raised or lowered the score, so you know which assumption to test first.
Three top risks
The three risks most likely to invalidate the plan, each with a named failure mode and a recommended experiment.
MVP blueprint
A small list of features to build first, a list to skip, and a complexity estimate.
First-customer plan
The recommended acquisition channel, why it was chosen, and a 4-step plan you can run in the first 6 weeks.
Example output
Three worked examples — one for a SaaS idea, one for an AI startup, one for a mobile app — built around anonymised personas.
SaaS example
An anonymised niche vertical-SaaS idea — overall 74, with monetization as the weakest dimension and a 30-day concierge as the recommended first experiment.
Open the example report →AI example
An anonymised SMB sales-team AI wrapper — overall 67, with competition and monetization as the two weak dimensions and a paid-pilot as the test.
Open the example report →Mobile example
An anonymised consumer daily-trigger mindfulness app — overall 62, with freemium unit economics and incumbent feature-parity as the two assumptions to test first.
Open the example report →Limitations
The honest list, so you do not mistake the report for something it is not.
Five short questions. A structured 7-dimension report in under 60 seconds. Free, no signup, and the same inputs always produce the same report.
