Picks for AI Engineers, Entrepreneurs, and Builders

Why subscribe: Called the “best AI newsletter atm” by Andrej Karpathy, this well-curated daily is built “by AI engineers for AI engineers” – summarizing top AI discussions from Discord, Reddit, and X. Co-created by Shawn “swyx” Wang, AI News is praised by deep AI insiders as “the highest-leverage 45 mins” of their day and “surprisingly decent.” It’s hierarchical and thorough, covering new model releases, benchmarks, research highlights, and open-source projects – basically a one-stop daily download for serious AI practitioners. (Bonus: It’s open-source).

Why subscribe: Ben’s Bites is a popular daily AI newsletter (100k+ subscribers) by VC Ben Tossell, known for its friendly, accessible style and Product Hunt roots. It delivers a quick rundown of the day’s top AI news and product launches, plus weekly deep dives into how businesses are using AI. What makes it relevant for builders is the breadth: one day you’ll get a summary of a new open-source model, another day an insight from an AI conference. It’s broad but curated.

Why subscribe: Few technical newsletters focus on leadership or organizational implementation aspects of AI. Pointer curates a unique blend of engineering management and development insights, with a significant focus on AI-driven engineering tools and best practices. It’s perfect for AI engineers looking to optimize workflows and leadership skills within AI-focused teams.

Why subscribe: Alpha Signal markets itself as “the newsletter for AI engineers” and has a large community (200,000+ developers subscribed). It’s a 5-minute daily email that aggregates the latest breakthrough news, models, research, and repos in AI. Alpha Signal features and algorithmic curation of what top researchers are talking about – essentially bubbling up key topics and papers that are trending among AI experts – essentially a collective signal of AI Twitter/Arxiv without doomscrolling. The content spans from new model releases and GitHub projects to interesting Twitter threads by folks like Oriol Vinyals or François Chollet.

Why subscribe: The AI Frontier stands at the intersection of industry and research. Launched by Joey Gonzalez and Vikram Sreekanti (the team behind the RunLLM startup), it offers lessons from building an AI product and from academic projects (their research group helped develop Vicuña and Gorilla models). Expect insightful discussions on topics like AI system design, high-precision use cases, and even the “vibes” vs. metrics debate in LLM evaluations. For AI builders wanting to learn from people who are actually shipping AI systems (and pushing the state of the art), this newsletter is a goldmine of hard-won knowledge.

Why subscribe: Founded by editor-in-chief of TechCrunch Connie Loizos, StrictlyVC provides a synthesis of venture capital investments, startup funding rounds, and strategic moves in the AI ecosystem. Indispensable for AI engineers and founders keeping tabs on market dynamics, competitive intelligence, and emerging trends influencing AI funding.

Why subscribe: Gwern offers deeply researched essays, meticulous analyses, and rigorous explorations into the theoretical aspects of AI, generative models, and related fields. Authored by the pseudonymous Gwern Branwen, it’s ideal for advanced readers, researchers, or engineers deeply interested in the foundational and theoretical dimensions of AI rather than immediate practical applications. Not a traditional newsletter, but you can get notified of new articles via email.

Why subscribe: The Neuron is a daily AI newsletter that has exploded in popularity (reportedly 500k+ subscribers). It’s known for being “hilarious, entertaining, educational, and informative all at the same time.” Each day, The Neuron tracks top AI headlines, tools, and research and delivers them with a bit of wit – making it an enjoyable yet informative read. For AI builders, it’s valuable because it not only highlights new tech and research but often adds context or analysis in plain English.

Why subscribe: Latent Space is a technical newsletter companion to the popular podcast by AI engineers for AI engineers. Co-founded by Shawn “swyx” Wang and Alessio Fanelli in 2022, it dives into LLM dev tools, AI agents, infrastructure, and open-source models. Each issue balances deep-dive tutorials with interviews of builders and researchers.

Why subscribe: A no-nonsense newsletter that curates useful updates on LLMs and AI development. Started in 2023 by Rick Lamers (an AI researcher/engineer who built an Airflow-like startup), it surfaces interesting repos, research papers, demos, and product releases in AI. The tagline is literally “No BS,” and it shows – each issue cuts straight to what’s relevant for practitioners, with minimal fluff. It’s perfect for staying on top of new libraries, model releases, or techniques without wading through noise.

Why subscribe: A long-running newsletter by Jack Clark (co-founder of Anthropic and ex-OpenAI Policy Director) that tracks cutting-edge AI research and policy. Import AI is beloved by experts for mixing technical developments – like new model evaluations, training techniques, and even debates on RL algorithms – with Jack’s insightful commentary on why these matter. It’s more research-focused than most on this list, but crucial for engineers who want to peek around the corner at what’s coming.

Why subscribe: The Rundown AI bills itself as about actionable AI news. Each issue gives a crisp update on the latest AI breakthroughs or tools and then focuses on why it matters and how you can apply it. The newsletter often includes guides, quick tips, or examples of applying generative AI in business and development contexts. Built to be a 5-minute read.

Why subscribe: A comprehensive weekly AI roundup with both written and podcast summaries, boasting ~30k subscribers. Curated by a dedicated team, Last Week in AI provides editorial commentary on why certain research or product announcements matter. It covers everything from technical breakthroughs to societal impacts, which gives AI builders a well-rounded perspective. By scanning this, you can catch up on major developments (new model releases, policy changes, notable applications) without having to scour dozens of sources yourself.

Why subscribe: SemiAnalysis, authored by Dylan Patel and team, offers deep and rigorous breakdowns of semiconductor innovations, hardware performance benchmarks, and infrastructure trends critical for understanding the underpinnings of cutting-edge AI systems. Essential reading if your AI work hinges on performance and scale.

Why subscribe: Eye on A.I. by Fortune “explores how AI is rapidly transforming business” and “how the Fortune 500 is addressing AI’s opportunities and challenges, and AI’s impact on the wider economy and society.” It’s particularly valuable for engineers and tech leaders looking for broader context and in-depth analysis on applied AI in the enterprise globally and the gulf between Silicon Valley and global enterprise application.

Why subscribe: One of the few mainstream tech publications consistently focused on AI developer tools, infrastructure, and enterprise AI trends. VentureBeat AI Weekly offers thorough analysis on practical applications, tooling developments, and market insights useful for engineers actively shaping AI’s future.

Why subscribe: Written by Dr. Sebastian Raschka (a machine learning author and educator), Ahead of AI offers accessible yet deep digests of ML and AI research. It’s read by tens of thousands of researchers and practitioners. Each issue breaks down recent AI papers (often focusing on LLMs and generative models) into plain language insights.

Why subscribe: Interconnects by Nathan Lambert is a newsletter known in the community for its LLM-centric news and rich discussions. Nathan Lambert, a researcher in the LLM space, provides detailed breakdowns – for example, the newsletter’s coverage of Llama 2’s release was noted for being both fast and thorough. It blends technical and non-technical aspects, often sparking conversations about the implications of new models or papers.

Why subscribe: CIO Journal offers strategic insights into the intersection of technology, AI, and business from a CIO’s perspective. Ideal for AI engineers and tech leaders who need to align technological advancements with corporate strategy and broader industry trends.

Why subscribe: These newsletters from The Information get scoops and do old-school, in-depth reporting on major AI industry stories. While paywalled, their rigorous insights make them a good resource for AI professionals who want to stay ahead of big developments and strategic shifts.

Why subscribe: TLDR AI’s editors distill essential AI developments into concise, actionable daily updates. Ideal for busy AI engineers, it provides quick, no-fluff insights into the latest research papers, model releases, and tools without overwhelming your inbox.

Why subscribe: Turing Post, authored by Ksenia Se (formerly of The Sequence), covers major developments in AI, including the latest research, trends in AI policy, and practical engineering insights. Good for those who want comprehensive, thoughtful analyses and clear explanations that bridge theory and real-world application.

Why subscribe: The Sequence offers in-depth breakdowns of foundational and applied AI and traditional machine learning research. It’s known for its clear, insightful explanations of complex papers and trends, making it a trusted resource for engineers and researchers seeking both breadth and depth in ML and AI developments.

Why subscribe: A go-to newsletter for the AI/ML operations crowd, this weekly roundup features the latest in tooling, best practices, platform engineering, and real-world deployment strategies. Backed by a strong community, it’s invaluable for engineers working to scale and productionize machine learning systems.

Why subscribe: Arize AI’s “The Evaluator” focuses explicitly on AI and agent engineering, from testing and evaluation to observability in production. Offering detailed guidance and insights, it’s essential for AI engineers responsible for deploying, evaluating, and maintaining reliable agents and AI systems.