Better Auth, an authentication tool by a self-taught Ethiopian dev, raises $5M from Peak XV, YC

It is rare to see a solo founder build a widely adopted developer infrastructure tool. Even more if the founder is from Africa. Beket EngidaA self -taught Ethiopia programmer quietly builds what some developers say they are the best authentication tool they have ever used.

Startup of Engida, Best Authoroffers an open source framework that promises to simplify the way developers manage user authentication, and it has drawn the attention of certain major investors. He recently collected around 5 million dollars in seed funding from Pic XV (formerly Sequoia India and Southeast Asia), Y combinator, P1 ventures and chapter one.

But the most interesting part here is not that is on the startup cap: Engida says that it has built the entire product at home in Ethiopia before setting foot in the United States

Engida told Techcrunch that he had started to program at 18 after a friend refused to help him create an electronic commerce research application, and he started working on the project itself. He then won certain distant software works and finally built a web analysis platform that allows developers to monitor user behavior on their websites.

But throughout his different jobs, Engida says he continued to see a problem appear everywhere: authentication. Each application must manage how users connect and come out and reset passwords, and sometimes administrators must manage the authorizations and roles of users. But he found that existing tools were either too limited or too rigid – companies like Auth0, Firebase and Nextauth offer managed services, but they store outdoor user data, limit personalization and are costly on a large scale.

“I remember needing an organizational feature. This is a very common case of use for most Saas applications, but it was not available from these suppliers,” Engida in Techcrunch told. “So I had to build it from scratch. It took me about two weeks, and I remember thinking:” It’s crazy; There must be a better way to solve this problem. “”

He then deleted this project and started working on an authentication framework based on Typecript which would allow developers to access user data via open source libraries, support cases of use of common authorizations – such as teams and roles – outside the box and evolve with plug -ins.

“The idea was that you could add advanced features in just two or three lines of code,” said Engida.

Why developers love it

More than six months, working mainly from his room in Ethiopia, Engida built the first version of the library which would become better Auth. When he published it on Github in September 2024, the developers quickly saw the potential.

Since then, Better Auth has timed more than 150,000 weekly downloads, more than 15,000 Github stars and a community of more than 6,000 discord members, the startup said.

Better Auth Pitch is simple: let the developers implement everything, from simple authentication flows to business quality systems directly on their databases and integrate everything on the back. Unlike the accommodated services, Better Auth is an open source library that developers can integrate directly into their code base, keeping all user data on the premise, in their database. For companies that are wary of putting user critical information to third parties, this functionality alone is a major point.

The library has also found an unexpected traction among AI startups at an early stage, which must build personalized authentication flows that fit in owners, manage tokens safely and be able to develop without accumulating high costs.

“We first heard of the product of many startups with which we have worked,” said Arnav Sahu, partner of Peak XV and former director of Y Combinator. “Their Author product has experienced phenomenal adoption among the next generation of AI startups.”

Better Auth marks the first direct investment of Peak XV in an African founder.

Engida says that Better Auth, currently free, will focus on improving its basic features and will launch a paid corporate infrastructure that connects to its open source base. This will give developers the flexibility of auto-hoster or to opt for the Complementary Cloud modules of Better Autha as needed.

He also thinks about how to expand without exchanging the feeling of the product community. On the roadmap, he hires a small team to help maintain the code base, extend the documentation and support business users. For the moment, however, Engida still writes most of the code itself.

Better Auth, who has just graduated from the recent YC spring lot, is the third Ethiopian startup to go through the accelerator, following a digital health platform based on drones, and to the Beu Delivery food delivery platform.

“The construction of this seems important not only because people like the product, but because of what it represents,” said Engida. “There are not many Ethiopian founders who build global products. For many, it seems almost impossible. So see that the traction gives the hope that others are trying to be more ambitious. ”