EBITDA Multiples by Industry (2026 Private-Company Data)

One that clears the top of your sector-and-size band in a competitive process. As orientation: private equity deals in the middle market averaged 7.0x in Q2 2026 (GF Data, 85 deals), most lower-middle-market services sectors carry indicative ranges of roughly 4x to 7x, and premium recurring-revenue sectors reach 9x to 13x at $10M or more of EBITDA (Windsor Drake ranges). Good is relative to the right benchmark, never an absolute number.

Most private companies with $1M to $10M of EBITDA sell for about 3x to 10x LTM adjusted EBITDA on an enterprise value basis, with sector, size and revenue quality setting the position in that span. Smaller Main Street businesses sell on a different metric: 2.30x to 3.73x average cash flow (SDE) in Q3 2026, depending on whether the sale price was under or over $1 million (BizBuySell).

Sectors that combine recurring revenue, high margins and low capital intensity: profitable B2B SaaS, fintech and payments, healthcare IT, insurance brokerage and cybersecurity services, with indicative ranges of 8.5x to 13x at $10M or more of EBITDA (Windsor Drake ranges). Public markets show the same ordering: application and systems software at 24.5x EV / EBITDA against oil and gas production at 5.2x (NYU Stern, January 2026).

Below roughly $1M of earnings, the market prices seller’s discretionary earnings rather than EBITDA: BizBuySell’s Q3 2026 data shows 2.30x cash flow for businesses that sold for under $1 million and 3.73x above it, across 2,132 closed sales. In the $1M to $3M EBITDA band, indicative enterprise value ranges run roughly 3x to 5.5x for most sectors (Windsor Drake). A reasonable figure is one benchmarked on the right earnings basis for the company’s size.

Fewer credible buyers, less available financing, heavier key-person and customer concentration, and thinner management and systems. Each raises the buyer’s risk, and price compensates for risk. The effect is measurable: GF Data’s H1 2025 small-deal analysis shows deals under $10M of TEV near 5.5x to 5.6x against 6.2x to 6.7x for the $10M to $25M bracket, a persistent gap of nearly a full turn.

Earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization, normalized to show the ongoing earning power of the business under new ownership: owner compensation reset to market, personal and one-time expenses removed, related-party rent adjusted and non-recurring items excluded. It is a non-GAAP measure, so the definition is negotiated in every deal, and every adjustment must reconcile to the financial statements to survive diligence.

SDE adds the owner’s full compensation and benefits back to earnings, because a Main Street buyer replaces the owner and captures that pay. EBITDA charges a market salary for the management the business needs, because a financial or strategic buyer must hire it. The same company can show SDE far above its EBITDA, which is why a 3x SDE figure and a 6x EBITDA figure can describe similar economics.

Start with enterprise value, subtract funded debt and debt-like items (finance leases, earnouts owed, deferred compensation, unfunded liabilities), add excess cash, then apply the working-capital adjustment against the negotiated target. The result is indicative equity value. Cash actually received at closing differs again for escrow, rollover equity, transaction fees and taxes, so model those before accepting any headline number.

Private company deals in this market price on trailing twelve-month (LTM or TTM) adjusted EBITDA. GF Data’s benchmarks are TTM-based, and this page follows that convention. Public comps are often quoted on forward estimates, which usually have a larger denominator and therefore a lower multiple. Never compare an LTM private multiple with a forward public one without saying so.

Before. An EV / EBITDA multiple prices enterprise value, the whole capitalization, regardless of how the current owner financed it. Existing debt does not change enterprise value; it changes how that value splits between lenders and shareholders. Sellers receive equity value: enterprise value minus debt and debt-like items, plus excess cash, adjusted for working capital.

No: a negative base makes the arithmetic meaningless. If losses are temporary and well explained, buyers may underwrite a normalized or run-rate EBITDA, with proof. Otherwise the market switches metric: ARR or revenue multiples for recurring-revenue software, asset-based approaches for tangible-asset businesses, and structured deals (earnouts, contingent pricing) where value depends on a recovery a buyer will not prepay for.

Competition is the mechanism that moves a company from the bottom of its credible range toward the top; a single negotiated buyer has no reason to pay a clearing price. No honest universal premium figure exists, and this page does not publish one: the effect depends on how many qualified buyers genuinely compete and how well the process holds that tension through diligence. It is one of the few drivers a seller fully controls.

For private companies there is no single average per industry worth quoting, because size moves the number as much as sector does. In the $3M to $10M EBITDA band, Windsor Drake’s ranges run from 4.0x to 5.5x (construction, consumer products, staffing) up to 7.0x to 10.0x (B2B SaaS, fintech and payments). GF Data’s first-half 2026 sector averages for deals of $10M to $500M were 7.5x for business services, 7.7x for healthcare services, 7.1x for manufacturing and 6.0x for distribution. US public companies averaged 19.7x in aggregate (NYU Stern, January 2026).

Small businesses under roughly $1M of earnings are priced on SDE, not EBITDA: 2.30x average cash flow for businesses that sold for under $1 million in Q3 2026, and 3.73x for those that sold for more (BizBuySell). For small private equity deals, GF Data measured about 5.5x EBITDA for deals of $1M to $5M of enterprise value in the first half of 2025.

It depends on profit, not sales. Main Street businesses that sold for under $1 million averaged 0.62x revenue in Q3 2026 (BizBuySell), which puts $1,000,000 of sales near $620,000; the cash-flow method usually gives a tighter answer. A company with $1,000,000 of sales and $200,000 of seller’s discretionary earnings at the 2.30x average cash-flow multiple would be worth about $460,000. A highly profitable, recurring business can be worth well above both.

The buyer pays enterprise value equal to ten years of current EBITDA: $2M of EBITDA at 10x is $20M of enterprise value, before debt and cash. Put the other way, the buyer accepts a 10% pre-tax EBITDA yield because it expects growth or synergies. In private markets, 10x is the top of the range for premium recurring-revenue sectors such as B2B SaaS and fintech at $3M to $10M of EBITDA, and inside the range at $10M or more.

A service business with under $10M of revenue usually earns under $2M of EBITDA, which puts it in the $1M to $3M band: about 4.0x to 5.5x for business and professional services, 4.5x to 6.0x for IT services and MSPs, and 3.5x to 5.0x for accounting firms and marketing agencies (Windsor Drake ranges). Below roughly $1M of earnings, buyers price SDE instead, at 2.30x to 3.73x in Q3 2026 (BizBuySell).

Private equity deals in GF Data’s $10M to $500M cohort averaged 7.0x TTM adjusted EBITDA in Q2 2026 across 85 completed deals, and 7.1x for the first half of the year. Smaller deals priced lower: about 5.5x to 5.6x under $10M of enterprise value in the first half of 2025. In the second quarter of 2026, add-on acquisitions priced 1.2x above platform deals, so a company that fits an existing platform can command more.

Divide enterprise value by LTM adjusted EBITDA. To estimate value, run it the other way: normalize EBITDA (owner pay to market, one-time costs out), choose the band for the company’s industry and EBITDA size, multiply, then bridge to equity by subtracting debt and debt-like items and adding excess cash. The calculator on this page does each step.

The ranges cover private companies in the United States and Canada, in US dollars. GF Data covers North American private equity deals and the NYU Stern table covers US listed companies. For the UK and continental Europe, use local deal data: financing markets, buyer pools and deal structures differ. NYU Stern publishes separate regional datasets for public companies.

Match the database to the deal size and the question. For sponsor-backed deals of roughly $10M to $500M of enterprise value, GF Data and the subscription deal databases (PitchBook, S&P Capital IQ, Mergermarket) hold the transaction-level evidence. Below that, DealStats and the IBBA and M&A Source Market Pulse survey cover Main Street and lower-middle-market closings. Public-company sector multiples from NYU Stern are free and useful for orientation, not for pricing a private company. The data providers table on this page sets out the coverage and access model of each.

In the download section of this page: the CSV has every range with its provenance fields, and the PDF reproduces the table with sources. Both are version 2026.10 and free to use with attribution. The earlier Q1 2026 PDF edition is superseded.