Arx vs Carta
Carta keeps the record.
Arx runs the raise.
Carta is a system of record for your equity — built to hold the truth about who owns what, for years. Arx is a system of action for your raise: the cap table is one of ten tools that get the round closed.
Equity system of record
A
ARX
Fundraising operating system
ALL YOUR TOOLS IN ONE WORKSPACE
Why settle for a slice,
when you can have the whole pie.
Carta lets you manage your cap table. In Arx, that's just a feature. The Arx workspace runs your entire fundraise — not a slice of it. Open your investor list and add anyone to the data room, which connects to your forecast, your deck, and your cap table. Ask Arx to make changes for you, get suggestions and action items that will help you close the round.
Carta
An equity-management platform.
Cap table of record, 409A valuations, fund administration, equity and option management, secondary transactions, data room. Deep, compliance-grade, and built to serve a company — and the funds on the other side of the table. Primarily focuses on growth-stage startups; early-stage companies use a fraction of the features available while paying the full cost.
System of record · built for scale
Arx
A fundraising operating system.
Investor CRM, warm-intro paths, deck analytics, live data room, forecast, investor updates, bookings, and an AI that acts across all of it. Your cap table and data room sit inside the workflows that actually close the round. Built on the best industry practices, specifically for early-stage startups.
System of action
★ Where Arx pulls ahead · Onboarding
Carta needs lawyers to start.
Arx walks you through it.
Using Carta comes with wrangling legal docs and a setup that assumes you already know how equity works.
Arx is guided from the first screen: a step-by-step onboarding explains each concept in plain language as you go. You finish with a cap table you actually understand how to manage at early stage.
- Guided onboardingA step-by-step wizard sets up your cap table for you — founders, option pool and SAFEs — and explains the why behind each step as you go.
- ResourcesBuilt on the best industry standards. A glossary sits one click away whenever a term trips you up.
- Ask ArxStill have questions? Just ask. Arx pulls context directly from your cap table and helps you figure things out.
Cap table setup · GuidedAdd your SAFEs
Step 2 of 4
✓
Founders & shares
2 founders · 8,000,000 shares issued
2
Add your SAFEs In progress
Drop a signed SAFE PDF — Arx reads the cap, discount & date for you.
New to this? Here's what a SAFE is
A SAFE lets an investor give you money now in exchange for shares later — at a discount or valuation cap set when you raise your next priced round. We track every one so your pro forma shows the fully-diluted picture.
3
Set the option pool
Reserve equity for your early hires.
4
Review the pro forma
See post-round ownership before you sign a thing.
Ownership so far
Founders 64%Pool 20%SAFEs 10%Other 6%
Where they diverge
Feature by feature, by stage.
Arx covers the entire early-stage fundraising workflow end to end. Carta goes deeper on equity administration that's needed at Series A and beyond.
Capability
Arx
Carta
Fundraising workflow
Investor CRM & pipelineStages, check sizes, conversation history
✓ Built in
✕ Not offered
Warm-intro pathsMap advisors and existing investors to funds
✓ Built in
✕ Not offered
Pitch deck analyticsPer-slide dwell, viewer-level tracking
✓ Per-slide heatmap
✕ Not offered
Investor updatesComposed, sent from your own domain
✓ Built in
✕ Not offered
Forecast / financial modelDrivers-driven, benchmarked
✓ Built in
✕ Not offered
Meeting bookingsInvestor scheduling with prep briefs
✓ Built in
✕ Not offered
AI assistantActs across your data · Claude via MCP
✓ Built in
✕ Limited
The data room
Investor data roomShare diligence materials with investors
✓ Built in
✓ Fundraising add-on
Live-linked materialsDeck, cap table, forecast auto-update in the room
✓ Always current
✕ Manual re-upload
Per-investor scoped roomsDifferent contents, different lifespans
✓ Built in
✕ Limited
Per-file activity logWho opened what, for how long
✓ Per viewer
✓ Available
Mix files & external linksLoom, Linear, Docs — tracked uniformly
✓ Built in
✕ Files only
Email gate & expirationsOne-time code, auto-revoke access
✓ Built in
✓ Available
Equity & back office
Cap table & SAFEsShareholders, options, convertibles
✓ Founder-grade
✓ Category standard
Pro-forma round modelingPre/post, dilution scenarios
✓ Built in
✓ Available
409A valuationsCompliance-grade, audit-ready
✕ Not offered Series A+
✓ Built in
Fund administrationFor funds, not founders
✕ Not offered Series A+
✓ Built in
Equity admin at scaleRSUs, option exercises, 83(b), filings
✕ Basic Series A+
✓ Built in
Secondary transactions & liquidityTender offers, secondaries
✕ Not offered Series A+
✓ Built in
Pricing & onboarding
Pricing modelWhat you actually pay
✓ Flat $99/mo, unlimited seats
Scales with stakeholders
OnboardingSetup & time to first value
✓ Guided onboarding
Often requires lawyers
★ Where Arx pulls ahead · The data room
The room that
stays current.
Traditional data rooms like Carta go stale fast, because they can only rely on manual file uploads. Arx room pulls live from the rest of your workspace — deck, cap table and forecast update automatically.
- Live-linked materialsChange the deck; the room serves the latest version with no broken link.
- Files and links, one roomDrop in a Loom, a Linear board or a customer letter alongside your PDFs.
- Per-investor, scopedHide the cap table from associates, show it to leads — different rooms, one workspace.
Diligence roomNorthbeam Capital
14 VIEWS · 14m AGO
📂 The pitch
PDF
Pitch deck — current ● LINKEDSynced from Deck · v14 · always-latest
11m ago
142
···
URL
Loom — founder walkthrough 14:22 · 47 views across 3 funds
9d ago
12
···
📂 Financials
PDF
Cap table — export ● LINKEDSynced from Cap Table · post-money $14.0M
1h ago
17
···
XL
Financial forecast ● LINKEDSynced from Forecast · v6 · base scenario
22m ago
28
···
📂 Customers & traction
URL
Public roadmap (Linear) Live link · revoked on close
5d ago
9
···
Per-investor access
Different investors,
different rooms.
A partner needs the model. An associate needs the customer references. The lead needs the SAFE. Arx gives each a separate, scoped room — same structure, different contents, different lifespans — and tracks every open per viewer.
- One workspace, many roomsSpin up a fresh room in 30 seconds.
- Per-file permissioningDecide who sees the cap table and who doesn't.
- Auto-expiryRevoke access 14, 30 or 90 days out — whatever you set.
CONTENT TYPES
One room · files and links, tracked alike
PD
Pitch deck — current
PDF · synced from Deck · v14
142
● LIVE
XL
Financial forecast
Synced from Forecast · v6
28
● LIVE
▶
Founder walkthrough
Loom · 14:22 · expires May 31
12
URL
↗
Public roadmap
Linear board · read-only · revocable
9
URL
PD
Customer reference letters
PDF · access by email · revocable
6
FILE
The honest part
Use Arx to run the raise. Get Carta when you scale.
Carta is good for what it's for. It's the category standard for cap-table-of-record, and once you're managing a fund-heavy cap table, secondaries or 409As at scale — typically beyond Series A — it's built for exactly that. Arx is not the forever equity system of record for a 200-person company.
When the job isn't administering equity but raising the money in the first place, a $99/mo workspace that runs the entire raise beats paying for an enterprise equity platform you're using at a fraction of its capability. Arx is the tool for the years before you need Carta.
Carta
Talk to Sales
Traditional Carta plans are custom quotes that scale with your shareholder count.
Arx
$99/mo
Flat, unlimited seats. The cap table plus nine other tools you'd otherwise buy separately. Zero sales calls.
The bottom line
Run the raise in Arx.
Carta can wait.
At the early stage, your job is closing the round — not administering equity. Arx runs the whole raise from one $99/mo workspace, and the cap table comes with it. Carta is there when you've grown into it.
Start free trial →ARX · ONE SUBSCRIPTION
10
TOOLS IN ONE
$99
FLAT, PER MONTH
∞
SEATS INCLUDED
14 Days
FREE TRIAL, NO CARD