Raising Seed Round New York: The 2026 Market
New York prices seed SaaS above the rest of the US and concentrates in fintech and healthtech. The 2026 numbers, with the source period named on every figure.
Raising Seed Round New York: The 2026 Market
Raising seed round New York benchmarks in 2026 start with one number: Carta put the median seed-stage SaaS valuation in New York at $24.5 million in Q1 2026, versus $12.7 million in the rest of the US. This page tracks New York deal volume, valuations and sector mix, with the source period named on every figure.
New York is not a smaller San Francisco, and pricing your round as if it were will cost you. Carta's Q1 2026 median for New York seed SaaS ran to nearly double the rest of the country and was up 80% year over year, per Carta.
As of the August 2026 refresh, every number here is quarterly or annual, not weekly. Carta, PitchBook-NVCA and CB Insights publish quarterly, so the newest New York valuation figure covers Q1 2026, the deal-volume comparison covers Q1 2025, and sector shares cover full-year 2025. Nothing on this page is a live read on the last four weeks.
The headline data also hides who writes the checks. PitchBook-NVCA's geography tables record where a funded company is based, not which investor led the round, per the Venture Monitor Q1 2025. Building your list from "New York funds" assumes an answer the public data never gave you.
New York VC funding at a glance
Every hard number on this page, with the period it covers. Check the period column before you quote any of these in a pitch.
| Metric | Figure | Period | Source |
|---|---|---|---|
| New York venture deals | 441 deals, $7.1B | Q1 2025 | PitchBook-NVCA |
| Bay Area venture deals | 658 deals, $58.7B | Q1 2025 | Same report |
| Median seed-stage SaaS valuation, New York | $24.5M, up 80% YoY | Q1 2026 | Carta |
| Median seed-stage SaaS valuation, rest of US | $12.7M | Q1 2026 | Same report |
| Median pre-money, new primary seed rounds on Carta | $16M, up 14% YoY | Q3 2025 | Carta |
| New York fintech capital raised | $3.1B+, 48.5% of tracked metros | Full-year 2025 | Carta |
| New York healthtech share of tracked cash | 23.4%, ranked first | Full-year 2025 | Same report |
| New York hardware footprint | 3%, the smallest tracked | Full-year 2025 | Same report |
The Bay Area's lead shows up in dollars far more than in deal count, and those totals cover every stage, so read the dollar gap as a late-stage story rather than a verdict on seed.
NYC startup valuations and the 2026 premium
New York SaaS founders price against a different distribution than the national one. Carta's Q1 2026 read put the median seed-stage SaaS valuation at $24.5 million in New York against $12.7 million in the rest of the US.
The national anchor sits far below that, which is why generic benchmark posts mislead New York founders. Carta's median pre-money for new primary seed rounds was $16 million in Q3 2025, up 14% year over year, with seed making up nearly 40% of new funding events but only 9.4% of cash raised, per its State of Private Markets Q3 2025. Use it as context, not a target, alongside the seed valuation benchmarks guide.
A higher headline price is not automatically a better deal. Through Q3 2025, PitchBook put top-decile US seed valuations near $40 million pre-money against a series median of about $15 million, and reported typical seed investors taking roughly 24.7% of the company versus 20.0% in consensus rounds, in its analyst note on seed pricing. The top decile sells more of the company, not less.
Which sectors New York capital funds
Fintech and healthtech are where New York outweighs every other tracked US metro, and that should set your list before geography does.
| Sector | New York position, full-year 2025 |
|---|---|
| Fintech | First, 48.5% of tracked dollars, more than $3.1B raised |
| Healthtech | First, 23.4% of tracked cash |
| AI | Second |
| SaaS | Second |
| Hardware | Smallest footprint at 3% |
Every row comes from Carta's 2025 ranking of the top startup ecosystems, which also puts the Bay Area second in fintech at 25.9%.
Sector mix is the real difference between the coasts. Carta describes San Francisco as especially concentrated in AI and New York as carrying a broader mix of sectors, in the same SaaS analysis. Less AI-premium gravity, more funds whose thesis is not a foundation model. If you build hardware, do not run a New York only list: 3% of tracked cash is not a market you can raise a seed inside.
The 2025 fintech recovery was not spread evenly across stages. CB Insights reported fintech funding recovering in 2025 while deal count declined, with capital shifting to later-stage companies that had scale, revenue and regulatory footing, in its State of Fintech 2025. Do not read a metro-level fintech total as seed-stage demand.
NYC vs SF fundraising: what the deal data does and does not say
On Q1 2025 volumes, New York sat much closer to the Bay Area in deal count than in dollars.
| Q1 2025 | New York | Bay Area |
|---|---|---|
| Venture deals | 441 | 658 |
| Deal value | $7.1B | $58.7B |
Both figures come from the PitchBook-NVCA Venture Monitor Q1 2025.
The caveat is definitional, and it changes your outreach list. That data records where funded companies are based, not which investor led each round. If New York rounds are led from outside the city, these tables will not show it, so treat "New York fund" as a starting filter and never as the boundary of your pipeline. The general case is covered in raising VC outside Silicon Valley.
Investors got more selective in 2025 even while prices rose. Carta reported first-half 2025 deal count down 10% year over year as early-stage valuations kept climbing, in its State of Private Markets Q2 2025, and CB Insights recorded global venture funding of $469 billion in 2025, up 47% year over year, on a deal count down 17%, in its State of Venture 2025. Fewer rounds at higher prices argues for a longer list, not a shorter one.
NYC seed investors and how to sequence them
Sequence by thesis fit and current deployment, not by zip code. OpenVC's New York investor list names Lerer Hippeau, Primary Venture Partners, Insight Partners, Starta VC, Thrive Capital and Hypothesis among the seed investors competing for New York deal flow, and singles out BoxGroup as a New York firm leading pre-seed and seed rounds, with Plaid, Airtable and Ramp among its investments.
Know the paper before the meeting. Carta reported post-money SAFEs remained the standard pre-seed instrument in 2025, with median caps around $10 million for rounds of $250,000 to $1 million and $15 million for $1 million to $2.5 million, in its State of Pre-Seed 2025 review.
How to order the outreach:
- Sector before city: a fintech fund in Boston is a better first email than a New York generalist two subway stops away.
- Leads before follows: find the firms that will price and lead first, because the rest of the list moves only once a lead exists.
- Deployment before reputation: a famous fund between vehicles is a slower no than an active fund you have not heard of.
Market data tells you what is normal. It does not tell you which funds are deploying into your stage and sector right now, and that is what decides who belongs at the top of your list. Causo matches you to the investors most likely to fund you and drafts the outreach; for something you can work today, start from the seed funds that were very active this quarter.
FAQ
How much do NYC startups raise at seed? The public data anchors price rather than round size, so start there. Carta put the median seed-stage SaaS valuation in New York at $24.5 million in Q1 2026, against $12.7 million in the rest of the US, and its median pre-money for new primary seed rounds was $16 million in Q3 2025. Globally, CB Insights recorded a record median early-stage deal size of $2.7 million in Q1 2025, up from $2 million across full-year 2024.
Which VCs invest in New York startups? OpenVC names Lerer Hippeau, Primary Venture Partners, Insight Partners, Starta VC, Thrive Capital and Hypothesis among the seed-stage investors competing for New York deal flow, and singles out BoxGroup as a New York firm that leads pre-seed and seed rounds, with Plaid, Airtable and Ramp among its investments. Do not stop at the local names: PitchBook-NVCA's geography data records where a funded company is based, not which firm led the round.
Is it harder to raise in NYC than SF? Different, not harder, on the Q1 2025 numbers. PitchBook-NVCA recorded 441 venture deals worth $7.1 billion in New York against 658 deals worth $58.7 billion in the Bay Area, so the capital gap is far wider than the deal-count gap. On price, New York runs ahead in SaaS: its median seed-stage SaaS valuation was $24.5 million in Q1 2026, versus $12.7 million in the rest of the US.
What sectors get funded in New York? Fintech and healthtech lead. Carta's 2025 ecosystem ranking shows New York startups raised more than $3.1 billion in fintech during 2025, which was 48.5% of all fintech dollars across the tracked metros, with the Bay Area second at 25.9%. New York also ranked first for healthtech at 23.4% of tracked cash, second in AI and second in SaaS, and had the smallest hardware footprint at 3%.
How do I find startup investors in NYC? Start from sector fit, not from a zip code. Carta's full-year 2025 data puts New York's concentration in fintech and healthtech, so the funds that matter are the ones with a live thesis in your category, wherever they sit. Public geography tables record where funded companies are located rather than which fund led the round, so a New York only list will miss leads.
Related on the hub
- Raising a seed round for an AI agent startup in 2026 — Related fundraising basics guide.
- Seed valuation 2026: fair ranges, SAFE caps, and dilution math — Related valuation guide.
- Seed round valuation 2026: the benchmark report — Related fundraising basics guide.
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