Do I need terms of service for an MVP / early-stage product?

Yes, even for an MVP. Terms set default rules in your favor (governing law, liability cap, dispute resolution, IP). Without them, default state law applies and you lose protections you could have had. A 2-minute generation is worth doing pre-launch.

When should I have a lawyer review my startup terms?

Common triggers: raising a seed or Series A (investors will diligence your legal docs), enterprise customers in your pipeline (their procurement will redline), entering regulated industries (health, finance, insurance), reaching meaningful revenue ($500k+ ARR for SaaS). Pre-revenue, the generated terms are usually sufficient.

Can I just use a template I found online?

You can, but most public templates are either too generic (missing jurisdiction-specific items) or too specific to someone else's business model (SaaS template on an e-commerce site). The generator produces terms calibrated to your specific stack via the 2-minute wizard.

Home / Terms of Service / Terms of Service for Startups

Terms of Service for Startups

Terms a pre-seed or seed startup can actually ship — not a 12-page legal artifact that took a $5k engagement to draft.

Generate my startup terms → Free preview · No signup · 2 minutes

Calibrated for what you actually need at pre-seed / seed stage
Covers the fundamentals without the Fortune-500 padding
Upgrade path: re-audit and re-generate when you raise / hit thresholds

A pre-seed startup's terms of service do not need to be the 12-page legal artifact a Series-B company has. They need to cover the fundamentals — who you are, what your product does, what users can't do, how payment works, governing law, and how disputes get resolved. Everything beyond that is optimization. This page generates terms calibrated for the "we need this to launch on Tuesday" reality, not the "let's spend $5k on legal review" reality.

What your startup terms of service needs to cover

Disclosures that matter for startup.

Identity + governing law

Who the legal entity is, where it's incorporated, what law governs the contract. Most early startups skip "incorporated in Delaware" and end up with an ambiguous jurisdiction.

Product description

A one-paragraph plain-language description of what the product does. Required for EU CRD Art. 6 if you have any EU users, useful for clarity even if not.

Acceptable use / prohibited conduct

What users can't do with the product — abuse, scraping, reverse engineering, building competing products from the data. The shape of this clause matters more than the length.

Liability cap + standard carve-outs

Cap aggregate liability at fees paid in trailing 12 months (or $100 for free products). Carve out fraud, gross negligence, IP infringement, confidentiality breach. Skip the over-broad waivers — courts won't enforce them.

Dispute resolution

Pick courts (small claims-friendly) or arbitration. For startups, courts in your state of incorporation is the simplest default. Add arbitration later when you have the volume to justify it.

Modification mechanism

Reasonable notice (30 days) for material changes, right to terminate if user doesn't accept. Skip "we can change at any time without notice" — it's unenforceable.

Common mistakes

Where startup terms usually go wrong.

Copy-pasting from a Series-B company's terms

Reads as a tonal mismatch (way too lawyerly for your product), creates obligations you can't meet (SLAs, support response times), and bakes in operational assumptions you don't have.
No terms at all

Common at pre-launch. Even a 1-page terms is better than none — sets default rules in your favor and signals professionalism.
Over-broad content licenses

Asking for "perpetual, worldwide, irrevocable license to use your content for any purpose including training AI models" attracts negative attention and gets you on bad-startup lists. Standard SaaS license scope is sufficient.