3 Newsletters Worth Reading in September 2026
by Tobi ·
With this series I read a lot of new newsletters and share the ones I actually keep. Last month was gaming. This month is about data: three writers who show you the numbers driven insights. All three are free (and freemium), and all three publish research nobody else has.
Data Driven VC
By Andre Retterath · datadrivenvc.io
The one I find via podcast with Andre. Really liked this ideas and checked out the newsletter. It is a great read for anyone interested in venture capital and data-driven investing.
Andre Retterath is a Partner at Earlybird in Munich and wrote his PhD on data-driven investing before turning it into a newsletter in September 2022. The thesis has not changed since: venture capital is mostly built on gut feeling and network, and technology can fix that.
There are two regular formats. On Tuesdays he digests the startup research that actually matters, pulling from Carta, Stanford, a16z, Sequoia and whoever else published numbers that week. On Thursdays he writes essays that get hands-on, like what an investment firm should budget for AI per person, or how to roll out AI tooling across a fund without your legal team quitting. By now more than 45,000 people read it, a lot of them at the firms he keeps citing.
The free version covers both formats. There is a paid community on top with the full archive and an online summit, but you do not need it to get value.
Who it's for: Founders who want to understand how investors actually decide, and anyone who likes seeing the data before the take.
Growth Unhinged
By Kyle Poyar · growthunhinged.com
The most useful newsletter on this list if you are building something people pay for.
Kyle Poyar spent years as an Operating Partner at OpenView, the firm that coined the term product-led growth. He started Growth Unhinged in March 2021 as a side project, wrote more than 200 issues, and in 2026 he went full time on it. It lands every Wednesday morning and reaches 85,000 readers.
The topics are pricing, packaging, go-to-market and retention, but what makes it different is that he runs his own surveys. His State of B2B Monetization report is based on real company data instead of vibes, and it is where I first saw how fast usage-based and credit pricing took over from seats. If you have ever stared at a pricing page for an hour without deciding anything, this is your newsletter.
Who it's for: Founders and operators who need to decide what to charge and how to package it.
The Data Minute
By Peter Walker, Carta · carta.com
The shortest read here, and the one with the biggest dataset behind it.
Peter Walker is Head of Insights at Carta, which means he sits on cap table data from tens of thousands of private companies. Once a week he picks one chart and explains it. Founder dilution. Seed valuations by region. How many startups shut down last quarter. How hiring changed. No narrative, no prediction, just what the numbers say.
It takes about a minute to read, which is exactly the point. There is a podcast of the same name if you want the longer version with guests.
Who it's for: Anyone raising money, or anyone who just wants to know what normal looks like.
That is it for September. What all three have in common: they publish their own data instead of recycling someone else's headline. That is the kind of thing worth an inbox slot.
If you want to find more newsletters like these: the Newsletter Finder. 2 Minutes to find your next favorite newsletter.
If you know a newsletter I should check out, hit reply on any Polyletter email. I read everything.
