U.S. venture funding hits record $267B in Q1 2026 as AI mega-deals dominate

U.S. venture capital deal value more than doubled the previous quarterly record in Q1 2026, with $267.2B recorded, though 73% of that total was concentrated in just five deals: OpenAI ($122B), Anthropic ($30B), xAI ($20B), Waymo ($16B), and Databricks ($7B), according to PitchBook's quarterly Venture Monitor report. AI accounted for 89% of total U.S. venture deal value in the quarter, while excluding the five mega-deals, underlying activity remained stable at $72.2B across an estimated 4,595 deals. Exit activity also set a quarterly record at $347.3B, though that figure was dominated by SpaceX's $250B acquisition of xAI; stripped of that deal, exits still reached $97.3B, the strongest quarter since late 2021.