The Almanack of Naval Ravikant by Eric Jorgenson, published in 2020, is a curated collection of ideas from Naval Ravikant, the investor and co-founder of AngelList. Naval never wrote a book himself. Jorgenson gathered his tweets, podcast answers, blog posts and interviews from about ten years and arranged them into two themes: how to get rich and how to be happy. The publisher also released it as a free download, which helped it spread among founders.
What is The Almanack of Naval Ravikant about?
The first half is about wealth. Naval separates wealth, meaning assets that keep producing income without your constant effort, from money and from status. He argues that anyone can get rich without getting lucky by combining a few ingredients: knowledge you built through genuine curiosity that others struggle to copy, accountability for results under your own name, and multipliers that scale your effort. He names the old multipliers, other people’s labour and capital, and the newer ones, code and media, and points out that the newer pair needs no one’s permission. He also stresses judgment: in a world of multipliers, the quality of your decisions matters more than the hours you work.
The second half is about happiness. Naval treats it as a skill that can be learned, like fitness. He talks about reducing desires, since every craving sets up a stretch of discontent until it is satisfied, and about habits like meditation, exercise, reading and spending time in nature. He writes about honesty, accepting reality and avoiding status games, which he sees as zero-sum and endless.
Jorgenson keeps his own voice almost invisible. Chapters are short, quotes from Naval sit next to each other with light editing, and the book ends with Naval’s reading list and some of his favourite sayings. The result reads like a notebook of compressed ideas that you dip into rather than a single argument.
What are the main lessons for founders?
- Own equity on top of selling time. A salary pays for hours. A stake in a company, product or body of work keeps paying after you stop working. Structure your deals to include ownership.
- Find your unusual knowledge. Look for the overlap between what you are curious about, what comes naturally and what the market needs. That overlap is hard for competitors to copy.
- Use code and media to scale. A newsletter, a podcast or a small software tool lets one founder reach thousands of people with no extra hires.
- Make fewer, better decisions. Spend your energy on the few big choices: what to work on, who to work with and where to live.
- Protect your peace. Burned-out founders make bad calls. Daily habits like walking, reading and sleep are part of the job.
Who should read The Almanack of Naval Ravikant?
It suits founders and early employees thinking about career strategy, ownership and what success means to them personally. Solo founders and indie makers find it especially relevant because the advice favours small teams with outsized reach. It also works for anyone in a stressful phase who wants a reminder that wealth and happiness need different strategies.
Founders who want a step-by-step guide to building a business can skip it. The book offers ideas to think about, with almost no process.
How do you put The Almanack of Naval Ravikant to work this week?
- Write down three things you know or do that others find hard and you find easy. Circle the one with the clearest market.
- Look at how you earn right now and list one way to add ownership, such as equity, royalties or a product you control.
- Pick one multiplier, either a piece of content or a small automation, and ship a first version before Sunday.
Code and media are cheaper to build than ever with AI tools, and the free AI for Startups module from Fe/male Switch shows founders how to use them to do more with a tiny team.
Where does The Almanack of Naval Ravikant fall short?
Because the book is a set of aphorisms, many ideas stay abstract, and readers have to work out the practical steps themselves. Naval’s advice comes from a successful Silicon Valley investor, and the claim that anyone can get rich without luck downplays starting conditions such as networks, health, money and citizenship. The happiness section mixes Stoicism, Buddhism and personal opinion without much evidence. Women’s experiences and the barriers many founders face are absent. For a structured view of how thinking errors shape decisions, read Thinking, Fast and Slow.