Founding through early 2019 Ibotta was founded by current CEO
Bryan Leach. The company was incorporated in 2011 and the app launched to both the
App Store and
Google Play stores in 2012. Early investors included entrepreneur and computer scientist
Jim Clark and Tom “TJ” Jermoluk, Chairman of
@Home Network. In 2015, Ibotta expanded beyond item level grocery, adding the ability to get cash back on in-store retail purchases. In 2016, in-app mobile commerce began, allowing users to navigate from the Ibotta app to its partners' apps to earn cash back on purchases. In 2016 with a Series C investment, Ibotta had raised over $73 million in funding. In March of that year, Ibotta partnered with
Anheuser-Busch to offer cash back for adults who purchased its products. At the time, the company had around 200 full- and part-time employees and moved from offices in Lower Downtown Denver (LoDo) to a 40,000-square-foot office in the central Denver business district. A year later, the company had to expand to a second floor as it added almost another 100 employees. A year later, in January 2019, the Ibotta app had been downloaded more than 30 million times with users receiving a reported $500 million in cash back rewards. That year, Ibotta was the largest mobile company in Colorado with six million monthly active users. The round was led by Koch Disruptive Technologies, a subsidiary of
Koch Industries. In response to the
COVID-19 pandemic, Ibotta partnered with CPG brands in their “Here to Help” campaign and together committed over $10 million in cash back to American consumers. The company added the ability to earn cash back from online grocery pick-up and delivery orders. Later that year, Ibotta started its free Thanksgiving program, providing users with 100% cash back on select groceries needed for a Thanksgiving meal. By 2022, the company had provided approximately 10 million Thanksgiving meals. In April 2022, the Ibotta Performance Network (IPN) was launched. The IPN allows brands to deliver digital offers to consumers through third party publishers. Retailers including
Walmart,
Dollar General and
Family Dollar, food delivery services including
Instacart, and convenience stores including
Shell are all part of the Ibotta Performance Network. This pay-per-sales or success-based performance network reaches over 200 million consumers. In October 2025, Ibotta announced a partnership with technology and analytics company
Circana, integrating Circana's Household Lift measurement into Ibotta campaigns to give CPG brands an increased understanding of the impact of their promotional campaigns. On November 3, 2025, Ibotta launched LiveLift, a tool for companies to measure the return on investment of digital promotions, in order to optimize performance marketing goals.
Athletic Partnerships Ibotta became the official jersey patch partner of the
New Orleans Pelicans for the 2020–2021 season, and continued the partnership through the 2023-2024 season. In March 2023, F1 driver
Logan Sargeant, the first U.S. racer to compete in F1 since 2015, partnered with Ibotta. The Ibotta logo was displayed on Sargeant's racing helmet throughout his F1 career. Ibotta became the official jersey patch partner of the
2023 NBA champion Denver Nuggets beginning in the 2023–2024 season. == Legal issues ==