Startups are creative, energetic companies with significant growth potential and a requirement for operational agility. When attempting to upend established markets with distinctive goods or services, they frequently run into resource limitations. Graduates in commerce have a solid background in management, finance, and business principles. Many, nevertheless, find it difficult to use these abilities in the fastpaced, unstructured world of startups. The motivation behind this study is to identify the gaps between academic training and real-work startup demands. The purpose of conducting this research is to evaluate the challenges faced by commerce
graduates in startups. The technique used in this study is one sample t-test. The findings of the study indicated that Cash Flow Management, Inefficient Decision-Making, Scaling the Business, Work-life Balance, and Retaining Customers are low impact challenges. However, Limited Initial Capital, Lack of Financial Backup, High Operational Costs, Hiring and Team Building, building a Customer Base, Sales Strategies, Lack of Technical Skills, and Innovation Challenges (Staying unique and creative in a crowded market) are high impact challenges.