Billion-Dollar AI Rounds Push April To Third-Highest Startup Funding Month In A Year

Global venture funding reached $56 billion in April, marking the third-largest monthly funding in a year. Funding was up 100% year over year from $26 billion, according to Crunchbase data. This increase was driven by large rounds to AI lab Anthropic and Jeff Bezos’s Project Prometheus, which is focused on AI manufacturing. The two companies raised $15 billion and $10 billion, respectively, together accounting for 45% of venture capital in April. Billion-dollar rounds were also raised by Swedish green steel production plant Stegra, New York-based AI data operations provider Vast Data, and London-based AI lab Ineffable Intelligence, which was founded by former DeepMind employees. Rounds $500 million and above were raised by Michigan-based modular electric pickup truck manufacturer Slate Auto, Colorado-based space defense company True Anomaly, Shanghai-based humanoid robotics startup TARS, another London-based frontier lab, Recursive Superintelligence, and London-based Ebury, a global payments platform majority-owned by Santander. Artificial intelligence funding in April reached $37 billion, accounting for 66% of global venture investment last month. AI model companies raised the lion’s share of capital at $26.7 billion. Physical AI in robotics, aerospace, drones and autonomous vehicles represented around $5.3 billion. And AI infrastructure in semiconductor and data centers raised $1.8 billion. The U.S. once again dominated startup funding, with American companies raising $39 billion, or around 70% of global venture capital. The first quarter of this year showed the dominance of AI in both the public and private markets, and that continued into April. As the hyperscalers Alphabet, Microsoft and Amazon topped analyst revenue expectations and continued heavy AI expenditures, around half of the 2% U.S. GDP growth in Q1 was due to AI buildout, per an estimate from Oliver Allen, an economist with Pantheon Macroeconomics. That was mirrored on the private-market side. Global venture investment is up 139% year over year through April, per Crunchbase data, with nearly 60% of that capital going to just five companies backed by deep-pocketed public technology companies, private equity and venture investors. The data contained in this report comes directly from Crunchbase, and is based on reported data. Data reported is as of May 4, 2026. Note that data lags are most pronounced at the earliest stages of venture activity, with seed funding amounts increasing significantly after the end of a quarter/year. Please note that all funding values are given in U.S. dollars unless otherwise noted. Crunchbase converts foreign currencies to U.S. dollars at the prevailing spot rate from the date funding rounds, acquisitions, IPOs and other financial events are reported. Even if those events were added to Crunchbase long after the event was announced, foreign currency transactions are converted at the historic spot price. Seed and angel consists of seed, pre-seed and angel rounds. Crunchbase also includes venture rounds of unknown series, equity crowdfunding and convertible notes at $3 million (USD or as-converted USD equivalent) or less. Early-stage consists of Series A and Series B rounds, as well as other round types. Crunchbase includes venture rounds of unknown series, corporate venture and other rounds above $3 million, and those less than or equal to $15 million. Late-stage consists of Series C, Series D, Series E and later-lettered venture rounds following the “Series [Letter]” naming convention. Also included are venture rounds of unknown series, corporate venture and other rounds above $15 million. Corporate rounds are only included if a company has raised an equity funding at seed through a venture series funding round. Technology growth is a private-equity round raised by a company that has previously raised a “venture” round. (So basically, any round from the previously defined stages.) Illustration: Dom Guzman