Oak, an identity security firm that went public just three months ago with a $60 million seed round, topped LinkedIn’s 2026 ranking of the best Israeli startups, the company said Wednesday. Greylock Partners, Accel and CRV led the seed investment. Shai Morag, who previously founded two cybersecurity companies later acquired by Palo Alto Networks and Tenable, co-founded Oak with Tal Marom.
The list tells a story about money, talent and ambition. It also reminds us that Israel’s civilian economy continues to produce world-class companies even as the region’s political crisis drags on without a negotiated horizon. Both things are true at once. Neither cancels the other.
The Rankings
“Our annual LinkedIn Top Startups list surfaces the 15 emerging Israeli companies growing fast, gaining attention and recruiting top talent right now,” LinkedIn said in a statement.
The three-year-old AI development firm doubleAI ranked second. Wonderful, which develops an AI operating system, took third place. Kela Technologies claimed the fourth and fifth spots, listed once as an open software platform and once as a business-to-business cybersecurity firm.
The remaining companies map where global capital is flowing: Cyera (private network security), Notch (AI automation), Mate Security (cybersecurity), Eon (cloud data protection), Port (workflow automation), Encore AI (AI data analysis), Limitless Labs (AI for precision manufacturing), Adaptive6 (spending control), Dream (AI cybersecurity) and FINQ (an AI fintech firm).
LinkedIn said it identified companies developing pioneering cybersecurity solutions, AI “expert intelligence” and workflow automation. Cybersecurity and AI dominate the ranking.
How the List Was Built
LinkedIn based its methodology entirely on its own data. The company used only information available on its platform, assessing employee growth, engagement, job interest and the ability to attract top talent.
The company measured engagement through “views and follows of company pages by non-employees, as well as non-employees’ views of startup employees’ profiles.” Job interest came from views of, and applications to, advertised roles. The measure of top-talent recruitment reflected whether companies could hire workers from LinkedIn’s global Top Companies lists.
The eligibility rules were strict. Companies had to be no more than seven years old, privately held, fully independent and not owned by larger firms. They needed at least 30 employees from July 2025 to June 2026. Any startup that laid off 10% or more of its workforce between July 1, 2025, and the list’s publication was disqualified.
That final rule matters. It excludes firms that expanded quickly and then made deep cuts, while rewarding companies that held onto their people through a year of regional turbulence.
What the List Doesn’t Measure
A professional-network ranking can’t tell us who these companies employ, who the tech sector leaves out, or how its gains reach wider society. The list says nothing about Palestinian economic life, shaped by restrictions on movement, access and trade that no venture round can solve. It says nothing about Israelis and Palestinians living far from the glass towers where seed rounds get signed. The data simply doesn’t reach that far. Readers should keep that limit in view when assessing the ranking.
The numbers do show concentration. A handful of fields, led by cybersecurity and AI, are attracting outside investment and ambitious workers at a pace most of the region’s economy can’t match.
Why This Matters: The ranking shows a thriving, globally connected Israeli technology sector drawing U.S. venture capital and top talent, and it deserves attention on its own terms. But the gap it suggests is stark. Israeli startups raise nine-figure sums and compete for the world’s best engineers, while Palestinians live under a political and economic system that offers no comparable opening. A durable resolution to the conflict would let both peoples build on equal footing; without one, prosperity remains unevenly distributed. This is perspective, not a conclusion drawn from the ranking itself: economic strength alone hasn’t produced a political settlement, and people left outside the boom still have a stake in what comes next.
- israeli startups
- linkedin top startups
- oak
- cybersecurity
- artificial intelligence
- greylock partners
- accel
- crv