Slingshot AI
An AI companion built for therapy-style conversations, trained on behavioral health data rather than the open web.
About
Ash is a free iOS and Android app from Slingshot AI that positions itself as the first AI designed specifically for therapy. Instead of general internet text, the company says it trained a specialized psychology model in three phases: pre-training on a large behavioral-health dataset covering CBT, DBT, ACT, psychodynamic therapy, and motivational interviewing; fine-tuning by its clinical team; and reinforcement learning from conversation signals. Slingshot says 50,000 beta users tested Ash over 18 months before the July 2025 public launch, and the company has raised $93 million total from a16z, Radical Ventures, Forerunner, Felicis, and Menlo.
The company was founded by CEO Daniel Cahn with co-founder Neil Parikh (of Casper), and its advisory board includes former NIMH director Dr. Thomas Insel. Slingshot reported a company-run 300-person NYU-linked study showing improvements in anxiety, depression, and loneliness, but independent commentators have flagged that the safety evidence is still thin. The app explicitly warns it is not for crisis situations and is not a medical device, so treat it as structured self-reflection support, not a replacement for a licensed therapist.
What it can do
- Therapy-style conversational AI (text and voice)
- Psychology foundation model trained on behavioral-health data
- CBT, DBT, ACT, psychodynamic, and motivational interviewing styles
- Memory across sessions with weekly pattern insights
- Goal-based support programs
- Free iOS and Android app with in-app purchases for unlimited access
Setup
- Download Ash (free) on iOS or Android and create an account (18+).
- Complete the onboarding questions about your goals.
- Start text or voice conversations with Ash about stress, anxiety, or personal goals.
- Review weekly insights that surface patterns across sessions.
- If you are in crisis, use a crisis line (the app points to findahelpline.com) instead of the app.
Prerequisites
Smartphone (iOS 15.6+ or Android); must be 18 or older.
Use cases
Works with
Trust score — 7/10
Scored 7/10 (verified tier, metrics-v1). Evidence: $93M raised from a16z, Radical Ventures, Forerunner (Goodwin Law, July 2025); 50,000 beta users over 18 months claimed; advisory board includes former NIMH director Dr. Thomas Insel; company-run 300-person NYU-linked study claimed anxiety/depression improvements (company, reported Aug 2026). Strengths: serious funding, therapy-specific training approach, named clinical advisors. Docked for: (1) efficacy and safety evidence is company-run, not peer-reviewed; (2) explicitly not for crisis use, which limits the clinical envelope. License: proprietary.
How the trust score is built
Full methodology →- Adoption · stars/downloads, log-scaled vs peers
- 7.0/10
- Maintenance · recency, releases, issue load
- 7.0/10
- Openness · license + docs
- 6.0/10
- Manual review · sanity read + red-flag check
- 7.0/10
- · $93M total raised from a16z, Radical Ventures, Forerunner (Goodwin Law, July 2025)
- · 50,000 beta users over 18 months before July 2025 public launch
- · Advisory board includes former NIMH director Dr. Thomas Insel
- · Company-run 300-person NYU-linked study claimed anxiety/depression improvements (reported Aug 2026)
- · Ash app live on iOS and Android (v2.8.3, updated 2026); explicit crisis-use exclusion
Sources
Every fact above was checked against these sources. Where a claim comes from the provider and couldn't be independently verified, the text says so.