About us
AskSia was started in 2023 by international students who remember the feeling: the course that stops making sense, the question you're embarrassed to ask at 2am. We build the companion we wished we had. It learns your actual courses and stays with you all the way to the grade.
Hear stories from our users
So far, AskSia has been the perfect companion for math and CS problem sets. It has clear steps that are always in the right direction, whether it is for proof questions or algorithm problems. Instant feedback is much needed during late-night grinding, when TAs aren't available!
Cognitive Science majorQuestion library has been a game changer. Helpful to know what other questions people are struggling with, and to flash review all questions under one concept during finals.
CS & MathPhoto to answer within 3 seconds. Pretty accurate and detailed answers. Ease the pain of building foundation in Calculus and CS.
CSIt provides step-to-step explanations and guidance on the problems involved. So I can focus on understanding the concepts through a very user-friendly interface.
Joint program studentIts instant feedback closes the knowledge gap and validates my approach very fast. So I actually spend more focused time studying with constant positive feedback.
Information Technology majorYou'll find Sia in lecture halls at
What we believe
Every feature we ship traces back to one of them.
Study help should be judged the way students are judged: by the result at the end of term. Sia tracks your progress against the real assessment, tells you plainly where you stand, and backs paid plans with the Grade Confidence Guarantee.
80%+ of students are still with Sia in their second month — the clearest sign this works.
Every student takes a course differently. So Sia begins by learning yours: the syllabus, the slides, the recordings, the questions you have already asked. One memory follows you across web, mobile and desktop, and every explanation starts from where you actually are, in the language you think in.
Where this started
It started with international students — our own co-founders among them. A first year taught in a second language, at native speed, on top of assumptions set by a school system that was never yours. And the barrier that makes it worse: when following the lecture is already a struggle, putting your hand up feels like an admission. So you say nothing, and grind through it alone at night.
The students who most need to ask are the least likely to raise a hand.
Paying for help was no way out either — tutoring at the level that would fix it is priced for a few families, booked weeks ahead, and asleep at 3am. And when we asked first-year students across the United States, the European Union, India, China and Africa where a subject stopped making sense, the answers showed the problem was bigger than one group: it converged on the start of a degree, and the cause was rarely ability. It was preparation, and access to someone you could comfortably ask.
That gave us the shape of the company: a companion aimed at the exact window where the damage happens and is still reversible — high school, and the first two years of university. Getting help to students was the first promise. Standing behind their results became the second.
The story so far
Three product generations, one arc: a helper that solves, a builder that structures, a companion that remembers.
The company is built around a single problem rather than a broad category, with support from the Education Entrepreneurship programme at the Penn Graduate School of Education.
A step-by-step problem solver goes live: every answer arrives with the working behind it and the concept it rests on, across the subjects students actually take.
AskSia learns to listen and read: live lecture transcription and translation, uploaded recordings, web videos, and PDFs past 500 pages — with answers that point back to the exact passage they came from.
The pieces connect. Materials, questions and notes become one personal knowledge graph, with a tutor of your own that remembers how you learn.
The iOS and Android apps launch — record a lecture on your phone and find it transcribed, organised and synced on every other device.
The browser extension brings one-click import from Canvas, Blackboard, Brightspace and other LMS platforms, so course content flows straight into AskSia.
A desktop agent that studies from the files already on your computer, starting with SAT test prep — and drawing warm feedback from early users within weeks of launch.
In the same month, full multilingual support lands on the web app — students worldwide can now study and ask in the language they think in, easing the barrier this company was started for.
AskSia 3.0 Pro and AskSia Super on web, mobile, Chrome and desktop; a study tool suite; a growing library of free course guides; and a programme for institutions.
The product today
Six things, each traceable back to something a student told us was missing.
Because the block appears at 3am, not during office hours.
Because an answer without its working teaches nothing.
Because the wrong answer is a symptom; the missing concept is the cause.
Because the questions that decide a grade are rarely single-step.
Because no template covers a niche seminar or an unusual major.
Because the same course is a different course depending on who is taking it.
The team
A deliberately small core, a worldwide network, and a working AI team.
Leads operations, growth and the student community.
Founding CFO, then President & COO of 2U, building online degrees with leading universities.
Educators, examiners, course specialists and student builders keep Sia current: real syllabi, real past papers, and the way each university actually teaches.
Alongside the humans, a crew of AI agents works around the clock: building course guides, refreshing the exam library, watching quality, keeping support quick at 3am. We run the company the way we build the product.
Independence
AskSia is an independent company. We are not affiliated with, endorsed by, or acting on behalf of any university. Our course guides are study aids built from public information and our own material. They are not the official course outline, and they cannot replace it.
Assessment structures, weightings and dates change between offerings. Always confirm the details against your university's official course outline and exam timetable before you plan around them.
FAQ
AskSia Inc. was founded in July 2023 by international students who had each lost time to a subject nobody was available to explain. The company grew out of the Education Entrepreneurship programme at the University of Pennsylvania's Graduate School of Education.
No. AskSia is an independent company. We are not affiliated with, endorsed by, or acting on behalf of any university. Course names, credit points and assessment details are taken from each university's own public handbook, and every guide tells you to confirm the details against the official course outline.
Every guide starts from the university's official handbook or course catalogue, plus the study material we hold for that course. Where a university does not publish something, such as the exact assessment weightings, we say it is unpublished rather than estimating a number.
High school students aged roughly 16 to 18, and students in their first two years of university, aged roughly 18 to 20. That is the stretch where foundational subjects decide what a degree can become.
Sia is built around your end-of-term result, and paid plans are backed by the Grade Confidence Guarantee. The exact terms live on the guarantee page.
Connect your LMS through the browser extension, upload slides and recordings, or record lectures in the app. Sia keeps one memory of your materials and questions across web, mobile and desktop, so every explanation starts from your actual course.
Through our contact page. The team aims to reply within 48 hours.
Step-by-step explanations, flashcards, quizzes and course guides — running on your own slides, notes and recordings.
Also on macOS and Windows
