Non-equilibrium steady states underpin a large number of essential cellular processes. Examples range from the dissipative self-assembly of actin filaments and microtubules to the directed mechanical motion found in motor proteins. In all these examples, nature uses enzyme catalysis and the availability or the lack of chemical fuel to enable spatial and temporal control over nontrivial functions (e.g. directed transport, mitosis, muscle contraction). To create artificial non-equilibrium steady states in the lab, typically an equilibrium between two well-defined chemical species is coupled with an exergonic process in such a way that the components of the reaction cycle act as catalysts for the transformation of a chemical fuel 4 into waste. Several fuel classes and building blocks for the design of artificial reaction cycles have been investigated. A first example by van Esch and co-workers explored a methyl iodidedriven reaction cycle which was used to induce the transient gelation of aryl esters. More recent studies focussed on other fuels including agents for acylation, methylation, and oxidation, as well as triphosphates, sugars, decarboxylating acids and carbodiimides . Especially, carbodiimide-driven reaction cycles, which rely on the transient formation of carboxylic anhydrides and esters attained popularity in non-enzymatic systems chemistry (Figure ). Despite drawbacks related to N-acyl rearrangements and the problematic accumulation of urea waste products (H bond donor and acceptor), carbodiimides are excellent fuels, because they exhibit only minor background hydrolysis and therefore allow efficient and reliable control of reaction cycle steady states. On this basis, impressive feedback effects, and the coupling of two reaction cycles in a thermodynamic cascade were developed. Supramolecular assemblies such as vesicles, microdroplets, and cryptands could be generated in a transient, carbodiimide-driven manner as well. However, compared to nature, where enzyme catalysis is used to assert kinetic control over the hydrolysis of otherwise inert phosphoanhydrides, few studies on artificial reaction cycles focus on catalytic control. Pioneering work by Eelkema and coworkers demonstrated how organocatalysis can be used in a beneficial way to tune the kinetics of a carboxylic ester reaction cycle. We previously reported a phosphoramidate reaction cycle that exhibited exceptional kinetic control afforded by the use of 1-ethylimidazole as an organocatalyst. Also, Leigh and coworkers recently showcased how chiral organocatalysts can be applied within an carboxylic anhydride reaction cycle to induce a directionally biased rotation around a C-N single bond. The design of life-like systems is also highly relevant to prebiotic chemistry and especially to the question how a possible "RNA world" arose. A compound class, which was recently identified to be potentially of prebiotic importance, are acylphosphates. Specifically, these mixed phosphorus/carbonanhydrides were applied in non-enzymatic oligoribonucleotide ligations, as prebiotic phosphorylation and acylation agents, and as aminoacyl precursors to drive peptide formation. Moreover, acylphosphates hold a prominent role in nature, as they serve as vital intermediates in numerous biological processes. Their significance becomes evident in various metabolic pathways, including glycolysis and pyruvate metabolism. Moreover, acylphosphates in the form of tRNAs are indispensable in protein biosynthesis. In light of this background, and because methods for the nonenzymatic formation and for the hydrolysis of acylphosphate have been reported, we wondered whether the two reactions could be combined under mild, preferably organocatalyzed conditions to furnish a new type of reaction cycle. Herein, we report on acylphosphates as highly versatile transient species in chemically-driven reaction networks (Figure ). In proof-of-principle experiments, we demonstrate that non-equilibrium steady states from acylphosphates can give rise to transient aggregation and to the transient formation of excimers. We describe the wide scope of substrates and fuels and we propose methodology that streamlines the search for efficient hydrolysis catalysts (optical well plate screenings).