Series A Capital Surges 60% to $42 Billion, But Deal Count Stalls

U.S. companies raised $42 billion in Series A rounds through October this year, up roughly 60% year over year, while deal counts stayed flat, Crunchbase data shows. More capital is chasing the same number of companies.

The gap between money and deals is now the defining feature of the early-stage market. AI demand is pulling record sums into the fastest-growing startups, while companies still converting first customers into repeatable sales face a funding crunch. Round counts have averaged about 1,200 U.S. deals of $1 million or more each year from 2023 through 2025, and this year is holding in that range, give or take 100 deals.

How low was the trough?

Series A bottomed in 2023 at $23 billion invested in U.S.-based startups, according to Crunchbase. Annual totals have climbed every year since. This year's figure is double the 2023 low.

The pattern extends beyond Series A. Series B shows the same trend of fewer but larger deals, a dynamic investors attribute directly to AI. Some startups backed by large checks are growing at unprecedented speed. Others cannot turn early pilots into repeatable revenue.

Why are investors split?

Venture firms are pursuing two opposing strategies, said Siddharth Ramakrishnan, a partner at Scale Venture Partners, which primarily leads Series A and B rounds. "On the application side, it's a bit harder, and that's where I think there's more of a Series A crunch," Ramakrishnan said.

The first strategy means writing bigger checks earlier. Seed rounds of $10 million to $20 million are no longer uncommon. "Instead of waiting till the Series A, where they have $4 million in revenue and growing, you're going to do it when they have $500,000 in revenue, they have a pilot, the team is smart," Ramakrishnan said.

The second strategy means waiting. "'I'm not getting any new information by the time they're at $2 million in revenue from $500,000, so I'm just going to wait until they actually take off,'" Ramakrishnan said, describing the mindset. "People are putting in a lot of money at the Series B, Series C onwards, because that's when you get the signal that things are really working."

Scale expects more variance in its current fund. The firm plans to stay at a Series A and B risk profile, "potentially pulling a little bit earlier and a little bit later and recreating it in the aggregate," Ramakrishnan said. Scale's most recent fund 8 is its largest to date at $900 million, up from its prior $600 million vehicle.

Series A remains attractive on pricing, he argued: "We still think that Series A is a great place to be if you can make it happen, because it's at that point where you ideally have enough information to make an informed bet, but not enough that there's still some of the growth investors that are scared to come in. And so you get great companies at great prices."

Are round sizes rising?

Yes, across every quartile. U.S. Series A rounds have trended up in size this year, Crunchbase data shows. So far in 2026, 10% of Series A rounds are $75 million or larger, up from $50 million in 2025.

The larger checks are producing faster growth. "Instead of going zero to $7 million, which in the old world would have been amazing numbers, now there's people going zero to $20 million, or zero to $30 million," Ramakrishnan said.

What do founders face?

Founders chasing large rounds must convert a handful of early customers into a repeatable sales process, and many stall at that step. "If you have the ambition to build a world-class company, then you also need to raise a big Series A to expand and go abroad, take on different types of markets," said Anke Huiskes of NP-Hard Ventures, a European seed investor in product-focused founders, speaking on-stage at the HumanX Amsterdam conference on AI earlier this year.

"I think the whole messy phase is in this go-to-market phase where you don't really know who your ideal customer profile is," Huiskes said. Many startups linger with a few customers and slow growth. "A lot of the companies hang out here," she said.

The reward for breaking through is immediate. "And then I get a text, 'Can you please give me an intro?' And all of a sudden, I have 10 term sheets. So it's really black and white," Huiskes said.

With capital concentrated and deal counts flat, the 2026 Series A market will likely keep rewarding the few startups that prove repeatable sales early, while the rest confront a sharper funding squeeze than the headline $42 billion suggests.