Comment by burkaman

You can find a lot of testimonials from people who have appeared on Shark Tank, and all the ones I've seen say "I was surprised by how real the show is". The only major change is that there's an hour-long pitch/discussion that gets edited down to 5 or 10 minutes of interesting TV. Nothing is scripted, the sharks don't know what's coming, the negotiation is real, etc.

I guess it's possible that these people were paid to lie about the show, but it seems like Shark Tank is one of the most realistic reality shows.