Nirva raises $33M for a pendant that only listens to you

Nirva, an AI wearable startup founded in 2025, has raised a $25 million pre-Series A round, bringing its total funding to $33 million after an earlier $8 million raise backed by Lightspeed and South Park Commons. The company was founded by former Meta Reality Labs employees Wei Lyu and Jason Chen and fashion and jewelry founder Hanying Hu. Nirva’s first product is an approximately eight-gram pendant that can also be worn as a bracelet. The always-on device is designed to recognize and process only its wearer’s speech, using voice samples recorded during onboarding to filter out other people’s conversations. Nirva says it deletes audio and transcripts by default after processing, while retaining derived signals such as tone, pitch, volume, and speaking speed to generate emotion-related insights. The companion app analyzes speech to infer patterns involving users’ emotions, communication styles, routines, places, and relationships, and can surface reminders and action items. Nirva CEO Wei Lyu has positioned the product as a personal-insights tool focused on self-understanding, self-compassion, and self-awareness rather than productivity. Nirva plans to begin taking orders in November and ship early units by year-end. The device will cost $249 and come in silver, brushed silver, black, and gold, with up to three days of battery life.