Updated October 2026
Slack data for AI training: can you license it?
Cielo24 sold 13 years of Slack, Jira and email for "hundreds of thousands of dollars", Forbes reported.1
Slack is where a company thinks out loud. A support escalation, a pricing argument, a bug triaged at midnight: the reasoning that never makes it into a document often survives in a channel. That is why buyers of company data list Slack by name, and why closed startups have sold their Slack archives on their own.
Mercor and Polyshares both buy Slack history, and SimpleClosure brokers Slack archives for startups that have shut down. This page covers what in a Slack workspace buyers value, what usually has to come out first, and which questions about Slack's own terms to put to a buyer before anyone runs an export.
Buyers
Who buys Slack data
Each reason is the buyer's own published statement naming Slack or the kind of data it holds.
Featured partners
micro1
Lists internal comms and task histories among the data it wants.2
- $100K to $2M+, micro1 says3
Watch out for: Says it removes personal details only "when relevant", so ask exactly how.4
Polyshares
Buys Slack alongside email, Drive and CRM records.5
- $100K to $2M+, Polyshares says6
- None, Polyshares says7
- An offer in 1 to 2 weeks, then paid in 30 to 60 days8
Watch out for: Exclusive by default, and every deal it lists is exclusive with no end date.9,10
Everyone else we reviewed
By score, with full reviews. We have no referral agreement with these companies, so we do not link out to them.
Mercor
Lists Slack first among the tools it takes data from.11
Watch out for: It confirmed a cyberattack in 2026, and class actions followed.15,16
SimpleClosure
Sells the Slack and email archives of startups that have shut down.17,18
- Usually $10K to $100K for a closed startup18
Watch out for: Built for startups that are shutting down, so deals are smaller.18
What buyers value
What in Slack buyers value
The column on the right is not legal advice: it lists what to raise with the buyer before anything is exported.
| Data | Why a buyer values it | Raise with the buyer |
|---|---|---|
| Public channels by team | Day-to-day decisions with context: who asked, who answered, what was decided. | Nothing specific |
| Incident and escalation channels | Problems worked through under time pressure, with a resolution at the end. | Nothing specific |
| Threads linked to tickets, commits or deals | Conversation tied to an outcome in another system, which buyers value most. | How links to customer records are handled. |
| Direct messages and private channels | Often the most candid reasoning. | Whether DMs are in scope at all; many sellers exclude them. |
| Slack Connect channels with clients or vendors | Real client service in writing. | The other company's messages and names. |
Process
How it works with each buyer
In each buyer's own published words. Where a buyer publishes nothing, we say so rather than guess.
micro1
- Internal docs, SOPs and playbooks, knowledge bases, project management workflows, internal comms, templates, CRM and workflow metadata, task histories2
- 30 to 200 employees19
- $100K-$2M+ per data package; over $1M for unique data3
- PII removed "when relevant"4
- The company keeps ownership of its data and reviews samples before release20
- Not published
Polyshares
Mercor
FAQ
Slack data: questions, answered
Nobody prices Slack on its own. Closed startups' archives have typically sold for $10K-$100K through SimpleClosure. For operating companies, the buyers' own published ranges for broader packages mostly sit between $100K and $2M: micro1, Cognor Labs and Ventra all quote figures in that band.18,3,24,25
No buyer in our sources says DMs are required. Decide your scope before the first call and say it plainly; channels alone can be a complete package, and the buyer prices what you offer.11
It varies, and buyers do not publish it. Mercor says it supports 100+ tools. Ask each buyer how it extracts Slack data, who runs the export, and where the data sits before personal details are removed.11
We do not answer legal questions. Ask the licensing company: their team reviews this with you before anything is signed.
We do not answer legal questions. Ask the licensing company: their team reviews this with you before anything is signed.
Before you sign
Legal questions go to the licensing company
We do not answer legal questions. Ask the licensing company before you sign: their team reviews these with you.
Questions for this kind of business
- Does Slack's API or customer agreement restrict the export method you will use?
- How are Slack Connect messages from other companies handled?
- Are direct messages and private channels excluded by default?
Questions for any buyer
- Is the license exclusive, and for how long?
- Can you sublicense the data, and to whom?
- Which AI labs will receive it, and will you tell us?
- How long do you keep it, and how is it deleted?
- What is your liability cap, and who indemnifies whom?
- Will the contract ban re-identification of people in the data?
- Who removes personal data, by what method, and do we approve it first?