Leafly is a Seattle-based cannabis discovery platform that pairs a strain database with dispensary menus, online ordering and a newsroom. Founded in 2010, it runs one of the longest-standing strain libraries on the web and publishes Leafly News alongside it.
In March 2026 Leafly named Hash Burger its Strain of the Year for 2025, crediting California Seed Bank's Respect and Mrs. Respect with Skunk Master Flex of Skunk House Genetics.
From Irvine side project to Seattle
Scott Vickers, Brian Wansolich and Cy Scott, three web developers in Orange County, launched Leafly in Irvine in June 2010 as a side project for strain information. Privateer Holdings acquired it in 2011, and Brendan Kennedy led the business under Privateer before a run of CEOs that included Chris Jeffery, Tim Leslie and Yoko Miyashita, who took the job in August 2020.
Leafly's about page, updated in January 2026, lists the company's headquarters in Seattle, with Peter Lee as CEO and Suresh Krishnaswamy as CFO.
Nasdaq and the move to OTC
Leafly went public through a merger with the blank-check company Merida Merger Corp. I, which closed on February 4, 2022. Shares began trading on Nasdaq under LFLY three days later.
That listing ended on January 17, 2025, when Leafly was delisted from Nasdaq and moved to the over-the-counter market.
A strain library in the thousands
The strain database is the core of the site. Leafly's about page counts more than 5,000 strains and more than 1.3 million product reviews. Each strain page sorts by indica, sativa or hybrid type, THC level and terpenes, and readers can submit strains missing from the catalog.
The same data feeds Leafly's product pages, where brand listings tie back to strain entries and community reviews.
Strain of the Year and Leafly News
Leafly News runs sections for Cannabis 101, growing, strains and products, politics, lifestyle, science and tech, industry, reports and podcasts. Recurring franchises include the Leafly List, which ranked its top 100 US dispensaries of 2025, and Leafly Picks. The about page counts more than 11,000 articles and resources, from the Leafly Cannabis Guide to the Leafly Learn education section.
Strain of the Year is the headline franchise. Leafly bases the pick on how strains perform in its database, and Hash Burger won after averaging about 9,000 page views a month. The write-up framed the win as a break from the candy-gas era that followed Runtz. In 2022 the newsroom partnered with Whitney Economics on a Jobs Report counting 428,059 US cannabis jobs.
Menus, orders and retail tools
On the shopping side, the Leafly website and its iOS and Android apps connect readers to legal, licensed retailers for pickup ordering. The same about page lists 4,600-plus retailers online with Leafly, about 7,800 brands using it for customer acquisition, more than 4 million orders a year and 100 million annual visitors.
The B2B side of the Leafly business packages those listings, menus and ad placements for dispensaries. Display advertising and priority listings drive revenue, which puts Leafly in direct competition with Weedmaps for dispensary budgets.
Official channels
Find Leafly at leafly.com, on Instagram, YouTube and LinkedIn.