Trustpilot

Trustpilot Group plc
Type of site
Public limited company
Traded as
Founded2007 (2007)
Headquarters
Copenhagen, Denmark
Area servedGlobal
Owner
FounderPeter Holten Mühlmann
Key peopleZillah Byng-Thorne (Chair)
Adrian Blair (CEO)
Hanno Damm (CFO)
RevenueIncrease US$261.1 million (2025)[1]
Operating incomeIncrease US$16.0 million (2025)[1]
Net incomeIncrease US$7.8 million (2025)[1]
Total assetsDecrease US$127.5 million (2025)[1]
Total equityDecrease US$(6.7) million (2025)[1]
Employeesc. 1,000 (2025)[2]
URLwww.trustpilot.com

Trustpilot Group plc, founded in 2007, is a Danish consumer business that operates a review website hosting reviews of businesses worldwide. As of June 2025, Trustpilot hosts 330 million reviews and has 60 million monthly active users. The site offers freemium services to businesses. It has been criticised for its hosting of fake reviews, and for allowing companies to remove negative reviews.

History

Trustpilot was founded in Denmark in 2007 by Peter Holten Mühlmann, the company's former CEO.[3][4] At the time, he was studying at Aarhus University, School of Business and Social Sciences and would later leave university to create Trustpilot.[5]

After raising $3 million in early venture funding from 2008 to 2010, Trustpilot received an initial capital injection from SEED Capital Denmark and Northzone in November 2011.[6] One year later, Index Ventures, SEED Capital Denmark and Northzone invested $13 million in Series B funding in Trustpilot, which the company used for international growth.[7]

In 2013, Trustpilot opened offices in New York and London. In the same year, the company was named Danish Startup of the Year at Next Web's European Startup Awards.[8] In 2014, Draper Esprit (then named DFJ Esprit) invested $25 million in Trustpilot, along with support from the existing investors.[9] According to VentureBeat, the Series C funding round would help Trustpilot "bring its online retail reviews service to the U.S."[10] At the end of 2014, Trustpilot employed 325 people and 400,000 new reviews were posted each month.[11] According to Website Magazine, "Trustpilot soared in 2014," and experienced "record growth with an 80 percent year-over-year increase in revenue".[12]

In March 2015, Google announced the launch of product ratings in Germany, the UK, and France. In order to do this, Google aggregated data from various European sources, including third-party platforms like Trustpilot.[13] In May of that year, Trustpilot received $73.5 million in Series D funding.[14] The investment was led by Vitruvian Partners with contributions from all existing investors.[15]

In February 2020, the BBC reported that Trustpilot had removed at least 2.2 million fake reviews.[16][17] Of these, 1.5 million were deleted with fraud protection software and 600,000 were removed manually. Additionally, 469,000 companies reported fake reviews, and around 90,000 fake reviews were removed by consumers.[18] By 2024, Trustpilot removed 4.5 million fake reviews, with 90% of the fake reviews automatically taken down by AI tools.[19]

Trustpilot was listed on the London Stock Exchange in March 2021.[20] In March 2023, Mühlmann announced his resignation as CEO and transitioned to a non-executive board member.[21][4] He was succeeded by Adrian Blair in July of that year.[22] On 16 September 2025, the company announced a share buyback program worth up to £30 million.[23][24][25]

In March 2026, the Italian Competition Authority fined Trustpilot $4.6 million for misleading customers regarding how its services worked and failing to verify review authenticity. The company said that it planned to appeal the decision.[26]

Products and activities

Trustpilot operates a freemium business model and earns most of its revenue from subscription-based customers.[27] The company freely allows businesses to collect and respond to reviews, and also sells marketing tools.[28][29][30]

As of June 2025, the company hosts 330 million reviews and has 60 million monthly active users. Trustpilot employs approximately 1,000 people.[31][32]

Criticism

Independent investigations suggest that platforms like Trustpilot host fake reviews, leading to controversy over their legitimacy and the company's handling of complaints.[33][34][35] Trustpilot claims that it strives to only include genuine reviews.[36] Trustpilot featured fake reviews for Bizzyloans; it deleted them after they were brought to light by KwikChex, an online investigations company.[37]

On 14 September 2017, Trustpilot issued an open letter clarifying its review policy following allegations concerning the "validity of reviews of [online estate agent] Purplebricks by customers".[38][39]

On 22 March 2019, The Times reported that estate agents Purplebricks and Foxtons were "gaming" Trustpilot feedback by paying to help gain better scores. In August 2016, five reviews of Foxtons were published on Trustpilot, with an average score of 2.2 stars out of five. The following month there were 467 reviews, 90% of which awarded five stars.[40][41] Trustpilot stated that it had found evidence that some companies had attempted to game its system and said it had a "zero tolerance" policy towards such tactics.[42]

On 6 February 2020, industry publication Property Industry Eye reported that Trustpilot was looking into reviews of estate agents "at large" after claims from property review website allAgents that 70% of their reviews could be fake.[43]

Hiding negative reviews

Paying Trustpilot subscribers using the "Trustbox" feature can filter review scores to only display high-scoring reviews.[44][45]

References

  1. ^ a b c d e "Annual Results 2025" (PDF). Trustpilot. Retrieved 17 March 2026.
  2. ^ "Trustpilot First Half Results" (PDF). Trustpilot. Trustpilot. 16 September 2025.
  3. ^ "The 12 European tech startups that are most likely to be worth $1 billion next". Business Insider. 28 September 2015. Retrieved 27 July 2021.
  4. ^ a b Walsh, Dominic (2023-03-22). "Trustpilot founder Peter Holten Mühlmann to hand over the controls". www.thetimes.com. Retrieved 2026-03-03.
  5. ^ "Trustpilot IPO: Why the reviews platform is all set to float". City Index. 16 March 2021. Retrieved 20 June 2021.
  6. ^ "Trustpilot Raises $4.5m To Scale Up Trust Ratings For Shopping". TechCrunch. 2011-11-01. Archived from the original on 2015-11-18. Retrieved 2015-11-17.
  7. ^ "With Nearly 7M Reviews Of 100K Sites, Trustpilot Raises $13M From Index And More To Build Out A Yelp For The World Of E-Commerce". TechCrunch. 2012-12-11. Archived from the original on 2015-11-18. Retrieved 2015-11-17.
  8. ^ Martin Bryant (26 March 2013). "The Winners of The Next Web's European Startup Awards 2013". Thenextweb.com. Archived from the original on 2015-10-31. Retrieved 2015-11-17.
  9. ^ "Trustpilot Secures $25 Million Funding to Accelerate Growth". North Zone. 13 January 2014. Retrieved 26 March 2026.
  10. ^ Christina Farr (2014-01-13). "TrustPilot nabs $25M to bring its online retail reviews service to the U.S. | VentureBeat | Business | by Christina Farr". VentureBeat. Archived from the original on 2015-11-19. Retrieved 2015-11-17.
  11. ^ "Trustpilot the story so far". Archived from the original on 2015-10-06.
  12. ^ "Need Proof Reviews Matter? Trustpilot Soared in 2014". www.websitemagazine.com. Archived from the original on 2019-01-13. Retrieved 2019-01-13.
  13. ^ "Google Takes Its Amazon-Style Starred Product Ratings To Europe To Boost Shopping Searches". TechCrunch. 2015-03-26. Archived from the original on 2015-11-09. Retrieved 2015-11-17.
  14. ^ Jennings Moss, J (28 May 2015). "Review platform Trustpilot scores $73.5M to help with U.S. expansion". www.bizjournals.com. Retrieved 2025-12-15.
  15. ^ "Already a hit in Europe, Trustpilot gets $73.5M to become "the review site for the entire online world"". Pando. 2015-05-28. Archived from the original on 2019-01-13. Retrieved 2019-01-13.
  16. ^ "Trustpilot removed 2.2 million bogus reviews in 2020". BBC News. 2021-02-18. Retrieved 2021-07-27.
  17. ^ Price, Chris (2022-05-12). "Trustpilot removed nearly 2 million fake reviews in 2021". Tech Digest. Retrieved 2025-12-09.
  18. ^ "Trustpilot removed 2.2 million bogus reviews in 2020". 18 February 2021 – via www.bbc.com.
  19. ^ "Trustpilot tackles false reviews with AI - TechInformed". 2025-05-29. Retrieved 2025-12-10.
  20. ^ "Trustpilot surges in stock market debut as tech companies flock to London". CNBC. 2021-03-23. Retrieved 2021-05-10.
  21. ^ Mendel, Jack (21 March 2023). "Trustpilot: Founding chief executive to step down after 16 years at the top". City AM. City AM.
  22. ^ Dorrell, Chris (17 July 2023). "Trustpilot: Former Just Eat exec who took it into FTSE 100 is new CEO". City AM. City AM.
  23. ^ "Trustpilot hails 'strong' first half amid profit surge; starts buyback". 2025-09-16.
  24. ^ "Trustpilot Advances Share Buyback Program with Latest Purchase". The Globe and Mail. Retrieved 2026-01-02.
  25. ^ "Trustpilot Continues Buyback, Cancelling Nearly 15 Million Shares Since September - TipRanks.com". TipRanks Financial. Retrieved 2026-01-08.
  26. ^ "UK's Trustpilot fined $4.6 million by Italian regulator for misleading consumers". Reuters. 2026-03-23. Retrieved 2026-03-31.
  27. ^ Nandini Roy Choudhury (2019-03-06). "Consumer Review Platform Trustpilot raises $55 Million in Latest Round of Funding". The Guardian Tribune. Archived from the original on 2019-04-01. Retrieved 2019-04-01.
  28. ^ Robinson, Mark (2025-09-16). "Trustpilot grows revenue as AI boosts its subscription model". Investors Chronicle.
  29. ^ Kolodny, Lora (2015-05-28). "Trustpilot Raises $73.5 Million for Credible Reviews of Businesses Online". Wall Street Journal. ISSN 0099-9660. Retrieved 2025-12-10.
  30. ^ Wiggers, Kyle (2019-03-05). "Trustpilot raises $55 million for online business reviews". Venture Beat.
  31. ^ "Trustpilot H1 2025 Results" (PDF). Trustpilot. 16 September 2025.
  32. ^ "2019 Most Innovative Companies". Fast Company. Retrieved 21 February 2020.
  33. ^ Smith, Mike Deri (26 January 2013). "Fake reviews plague consumer websites". The Guardian. Archived from the original on 2015-10-06. Retrieved 2015-10-06.
  34. ^ Belton, Padraig (22 June 2015). "Navigating the potentially murky world of online reviews". BBC News. Archived from the original on 2015-10-06. Retrieved 2015-10-06.
  35. ^ Barsby, Adam (19 June 2015). "Fake Online Reviews and Endorsements: Competition Regulator to Investigate Unlawful Practices". e-xanthos.co.uk. Xanthos. Archived from the original on 2015-10-06.
  36. ^ "Trustpilot tackles false reviews with AI - TechInformed". 2025-05-29. Retrieved 2025-12-17.
  37. ^ "KwikChex works with BBC to expose Review Fraud". kwikchex.com. 23 June 2015. Archived from the original on 2016-08-26.
  38. ^ "Open Letter in response to questions regarding Purplebricks and Trustpilot" (Press release). London: Trust Pilot. 2017-09-14. Archived from the original on 2017-09-21. Retrieved 2017-09-21.
  39. ^ "Exclusive: Trustpilot review company explains its Purplebricks policy". Estate Agency Today. 2017-09-14. Archived from the original on 2017-09-22. Retrieved 2017-09-21.
  40. ^ Graham Norwood (22 March 2019). "Purplebricks and Foxtons reviews on Trustpilot come under scrutiny". Estate Agent Today.
  41. ^ Tom Calvin; Andrew Ellson (22 March 2019). "Estate agents and banks 'gaming' feedback website Trustpilot". The Times. ISSN 0140-0460. Archived from the original on 2019-03-25.
  42. ^ Calver, Tom; Ellson, Andrew (2019-03-22). "Estate agents and banks 'gaming' feedback website Trustpilot". www.thetimes.com. Retrieved 2025-12-17.
  43. ^ Renshaw, Rosalind (6 February 2020). "Trustpilot looking into reviews of estate agents 'at large' as it condemns new claims by allAgents". popertyindustryeye.com. Property Industry Eye. Archived from the original on 2020-02-24. Retrieved 2020-02-24.
  44. ^ White, Pricilla (2025-11-27). "Trustpilot Fake Reviews and the Business of Buying Stars — What SafePaper Found". GBHackers Security | #1 Globally Trusted Cyber Security News Platform. Retrieved 2025-12-21.
  45. ^ West, Paige (2025-11-04). "Can You Trust Trustpilot? Review Manipulation Marketing - SafePaper". Retrieved 2025-12-21.
  • Official website Edit this at Wikidata
  • Business data for Trustpilot Group plc.:
This article is issued from Wikipedia. The text is available under Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 4.0 unless otherwise noted. Additional terms may apply for the media files.