In just one year, Turbo AI — an AI-powered notetaking and study assistant built by two 20-year-old college dropouts — has skyrocketed to 5 million users, eight-figure annual revenue, and 20,000 new sign-ups per day.
The viral growth of Turbo AI, founded by Rudy Arora and Sarthak Dhawan, highlights the demand for smarter, faster ways to learn. What started as a side project to help college students take better notes during lectures has quickly become one of the fastest-growing AI tools of 2025.
How Turbo AI Solves a Common Student Problem
Dhawan says the idea behind Turbo AI came from his own struggles in class.
“I could never both listen and take notes at the same time,” Dhawan said. “So I thought, what if I could use AI to do it for me?”
That simple question led to the creation of Turbolearn, an app that could record lectures, transcribe them, and generate summaries, quizzes, and flashcards automatically.
As more students shared it across campuses like Duke, Northwestern, Harvard, and MIT, the product took off. The team later rebranded it as Turbo AI to reflect its broader appeal beyond academics.
From Classrooms to Boardrooms: Turbo AI Finds a Wider Audience
While Turbo AI began as a tool for students, it’s now being used by professionals across industries — including consultants, doctors, lawyers, and analysts at Goldman Sachs and McKinsey.
Users can upload PDFs, reports, or YouTube lectures to generate summaries, flashcards, or even podcast-style audio versions for on-the-go learning.
“Students will upload a 30-page lecture and spend two hours going through 75 quiz questions in a row,” said Dhawan. “You don’t do that unless it’s really helping.”
The Secret Behind Turbo AI’s Explosive Growth
Turbo AI stands out by blending automation with interactivity. Users can let the AI take notes or collaborate with it in real-time — a hybrid approach that bridges manual tools like Google Docs and fully automated services like Otter.ai.
Co-founder Rudy Arora attributes their growth to smart viral strategies.
“We’ve built apps before that reached millions of users. But this time, we saw something bigger — a business that could last.”
Arora and Dhawan’s past ventures include UMax, a viral advice app that hit 20 million users and $6 million in annual revenue.
Their 15-member team, based in Los Angeles, has kept the company profitable since day one, having raised only $750,000 to date.
Why Students Love Turbo AI
Turbo AI’s $20-per-month pricing might seem high for students, but its time-saving benefits have made it worth it for many. The founders are now experimenting with new pricing models to make it more accessible.
“We’re running A/B tests to find what works best for students,” Arora said. “The goal is to stay close to our core community while we scale.”
With its rapid growth, Turbo AI is quickly becoming the go-to AI notetaker for students and professionals alike — and a model for how young founders can dominate the AI space through focus, creativity, and community-driven growth.
Key Takeaway
Two 20-year-olds just built Turbo AI, a study tool that’s transforming how millions learn and work — and they did it while staying profitable.