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Come build with us: Cloudflare's new hubs for startups

2025-09-22

3 min read

Cloudflare’s offices bring together builders in some of the world’s most popular technology hubs. We have a long history of using those spaces for one-off events and meet ups over the last fifteen years, but we want to do more. Starting in 2026, we plan to open the doors of our offices routinely to startups and builders from outside of our team who need the space to collaborate, meet new people, or just type away at a keyboard in a new (and beautiful) location.

What are our offices meant to be?

Prior to 2020, we expected essentially every team member of Cloudflare to be present in one of our offices five days a week. That worked well for us and helped facilitate the launch of dozens of technologies as well as a community and culture that defined who we are.

Like every other team on the planet, the COVID pandemic forced us to revisit that approach. We used the time to think about what our offices could be, in a world where not every team member showed up every day of the week. While we decided we would be open to remote and hybrid work, we still felt like some of our best work was done in person together. The goal became building spaces that encouraged team members to be present.

Several hard hats and a few leases later, we’ve created a network of offices around the world designed to evolve with the way people work. These spaces aren’t just places to sit — they’re environments that empower people to do their best work — whether that means quiet focus, creative problem-solving, or lively collaboration. From a library tucked into a quiet zone in our waterfront Lisbon office, to the high-ceilinged collaboration areas in the heart of Austin, each office reflects our belief that great spaces support diverse working styles and help teams thrive together.

Our offices are meant to connect our teams, and we believe that by opening our doors to the wider community, we can foster even more innovation and help new companies collaborate better. Cloudflare has always been a hub for builders, and now we're making that commitment official by welcoming startups into our physical spaces.

Why make them even more open to the community?

Our spaces have served as hosts to community events since the earliest days of Cloudflare. We have brought together just about every group from hackathons to language meet-ups to university orientation sessions. Cloudflare exists to help build a better Internet and in many cases a better digital environment starts with relationships built in a real life environment.

One of the most common pieces of feedback we have received in the last few years after hosting these events is “I really miss connecting with people like this.” And we hear that most often from small teams in the earliest stages of their journey. In the last few years as the start-ups we support with our platform increasingly begin remote-first and only open dedicated spaces in later stages of their growth.

We know that building a company can be a lonely path. We have helped over the last several years by providing a robust free plan and a comprehensive start-up program, but we think we can do more.

Cloudflare’s network supports a significant percentage of the Internet and, as you would expect, the Internet follows the sun. More people use it during the daytime than at night, meaning our data center utilization peaks in specific times of the day. We take advantage of that pattern to run services that are less latency-sensitive in regions overnight.

Our physical locations follow a similar pattern. Utilization resembles a bell curve with Tuesdays, Wednesdays, and Thursdays seeing a lot of traffic while Mondays and Fridays tend to be quieter. Like our CPUs at night, we think we can use that excess capacity to help build a better Internet by giving builders a space to congregate and helping our team connect with more of our users.

How will this work?

Beginning in January of 2026, we plan to make our office locations available to a capped number of external visitors as all-day coworking spaces on select days of each week. We will provide a registration process (more on that below) and set some ground rules. To start, we plan to expand this offering to San Francisco, Austin, London, and Lisbon.

When external visitors arrive, they’ll have access to our common spaces to bring together their teams or just get some work done by themselves. No mandatory talks or obligations. Just fantastic working spaces available to use at no cost.

How can you participate?

We will provide more details in the next few weeks, but the general structure will be based on the following steps.

  1. Enroll in the Cloudflare for Startups Program. Bonus if you are a Workers Launchpad participant or alumni.

  2. Sit tight for now. We will email participating Startup Program customers first to participate with a form requesting office access.

  3. Once the form is filled out, a member of our team will reach out after. If you want to get a head start, fill out the form here.

  4. We plan to roll this out on a cohort basis. Once approved and all requirements are met, register your visit (and that of any additional team members) at least three business days prior to the date requested.

  5. Respect our working spaces as you would your own.

What’s next?

We hope to expand to other locations in the future. Want to get to the front of the line? Sign up for our Startup program here today and we will reach out to Startup Program participants before we roll out the program.

Cloudflare's connectivity cloud protects entire corporate networks, helps customers build Internet-scale applications efficiently, accelerates any website or Internet application, wards off DDoS attacks, keeps hackers at bay, and can help you on your journey to Zero Trust.

Visit 1.1.1.1 from any device to get started with our free app that makes your Internet faster and safer.

To learn more about our mission to help build a better Internet, start here. If you're looking for a new career direction, check out our open positions.
Birthday WeekWorkers LaunchpadDevelopersDeveloper PlatformServerlessCloudflare WorkersCloudflare for Startups

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Caroline Quick|@seacue
Cloudflare|@cloudflare

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