Channing Allen

Co-founder of Indie Hackers, now building the Hatch AI workspace

@ChanningAllen New York City, United States22K followersCommunity Builders AI Builders Productivity Tools Creators & Writers

About Channing Allen

Channing Allen is the co-founder and president of Indie Hackers, the community, interview site and podcast for founders building profitable online businesses. He joined his brother Courtland as co-founder in 2017, around the time Stripe acquired the young site, and helped grow it into one of the largest gathering places for bootstrapped founders on the internet.

Inside Stripe, Channing worked on the community, newsletter and the Indie Hackers podcast, which he later co-hosted with Courtland. In March 2023 the brothers spun Indie Hackers back out of Stripe as an independent company, with Stripe remaining a seed investor.

In 2025, while running Indie Hackers, Channing started Hatch, an AI workspace where chats, documents, files and memory live together so the assistant actually knows what you're working on and can help carry work forward. He shares his workflows and the story of building Hatch openly on X and Indie Hackers.

Products by Channing Allen

Indie Hackers

indiehackers.com

Community, interviews, newsletter and podcast for founders of profitable online businesses, co-run with his brother Courtland.

Hatch

usehatch.com

AI assistant and workspace that keeps chats, docs and files together so the AI knows your context and can write and organize documents.

Builds indie alternatives to:ChatGPT

Channing Allen's journey, 2017–20265 milestones · self-reported

First product
Launch / milestone
Started 2017

2016First product: Launched Indie Hackers
2017Milestone: Joined Indie Hackers as co-founder
2023Milestone: Spun Indie Hackers out of Stripe as an independent company…
2025Launch: Started Hatch, an AI workspace and assistant, while running…
2026Milestone: Shared publicly how he uses Hatch documents as reusable AI…

Timeline

2017 — Joined Indie Hackers as co-founder as it was acquired by Stripe.
2023 — Spun Indie Hackers out of Stripe as an independent company with his brother Courtland.
2025 — Started Hatch, an AI workspace and assistant, while running Indie Hackers.
2026 — Shared publicly how he uses Hatch documents as reusable AI workflows, such as planning his day.

How Channing builds

Founders learn best from transparent, real-world examples of others' businesses.
AI is most useful when it has persistent context about your actual work.
Turn repeated tasks into reusable instructions and workflows.
Community and peer support make the lonely parts of entrepreneurship easier.

Learn from Channing Allen

[podcast]

Indie Hackers Podcast

Co-hosted conversations with indie founders turning side projects into profitable businesses.

by Channing Allen

[community]

Indie Hackers Community

Free founder forum for sharing progress, feedback and support.

by Channing Allen

Channing Allen vs Courtland Allen

Channing Allen FAQ

Who is Channing Allen?

Channing Allen is the co-founder and president of Indie Hackers, which he runs with his brother Courtland, and the builder of Hatch, an AI assistant and workspace.

What is Hatch?

Hatch is an AI workspace where your chats, documents and files live together, so the AI knows what you're working on and can write and organize docs for you. Channing started it in 2025.