$100 million-plus Series A rounds hit a multiyear high in 2026, led by AI
By EnkiReporting from Crunchbase News
Crunchbase counts at least 114 Series A rounds worth $100 million-plus so far this year, totaling about $33 billion, with more than 70% going to AI startups and roughly half to US companies.
The nine-figure Series A has gone from rare to routine. Startups worldwide have closed at least 114 Series A rounds of $100 million or larger so far in 2026, Crunchbase News reported, the highest yearly count in years and on pace to beat the all-time record.
Together those rounds add up to around $33 billion, and many sit far above the $100 million mark: at least 12 reached $500 million or more.
An AI story, mostly
Crunchbase data shows that more than 70% of these large Series A deals went to AI-focused companies. The biggest examples include a $1.2 billion round for River AI, a Silicon Valley platform that lets developers train and serve custom models, and $900 million for Xpeng Robotics, a Chinese developer of AI-enabled humanoid robots.
That share tracks the wider market. In the first half of the year, venture and growth funding for AI startups reached an estimated $394 billion, about 77% of all capital invested. Most of that went into later-stage deals, but the Series A figures suggest AI's share at the early stage is similar.
Where the money is going
US startups took roughly half of these big Series A deals, measured both by count and by dollars. That works out to about 62 deals worth around $15 billion, which also puts the US on track for a record.
Even so, Series A megarounds are more spread out geographically than venture funding overall. American companies drew over three-quarters of all seed to growth-stage funding worldwide in the first half, driven largely by enormous rounds for Anthropic and OpenAI. At Series A, the rest of the world is taking a noticeably bigger slice.
Crunchbase's count includes rounds explicitly announced as Series A as well as financings that looked like a Series A without being labeled that way.
Why rounds are getting bigger
Crunchbase points to several forces beyond AI demand. Top investors are sitting on unusually large reserves they need to deploy. Exit outcomes, historically and especially lately, favor companies with very large ambitions, which pushes investors toward bold bets.
At the Series A stage specifically, investors appear to share an unusually strong consensus about which sectors, business models and founding teams are worth backing. Because an expensive stake in a winner beats a cheap stake in a runner-up, capital is crowding into the startups seen as early leaders.
What it means for founders
- The bar for a standout round has moved. When more than 100 companies raise $100 million at Series A, investors benchmark leaders against that scale, which can make ordinary rounds look small by comparison even when they are healthy.
- Consensus cuts both ways. Investors piling into perceived category leaders means capital concentrates fast; companies outside the favored narrative may find the gap between leader and follower wider than it used to be.
- Big rounds bring big expectations. A nine-figure Series A sets a high valuation and growth bar for the next raise, so weigh how much capital the plan truly needs.
- Non-US AI companies have room. Series A megarounds are more globally spread than overall venture funding this year, a signal that large early checks are available outside the US.
Sources
Enki Daily
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