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Compare your fund metrics against industry benchmarks
Built by Trace Cohen · Free to use · Data refreshed regularly · Reach out at t@nyvp.com
Compare your fund's performance against Carta, PitchBook, and Cambridge Associates benchmarks. Filter by vintage year, fund size, and strategy. Data sourced from 1,200+ VC funds. The 2025-2026 IPO window reopening has materially improved DPI figures for mature vintages.
TVPI (Total Value to Paid-In) is a fund's total value — cash already distributed to LPs plus the remaining unrealized NAV — divided by the capital LPs paid in. It answers "what is every dollar I put in worth today, on paper and in cash combined." DPI (Distributions to Paid-In) is only the cash actually returned to LPs divided by paid-in capital — the only number an LP can spend. Net IRR is the annualized rate of return on those cash flows after fees and carry; it is the most quoted and the most gameable of the three, because subscription credit lines and early markups can inflate it years before any real cash comes back. MOIC (Multiple on Invested Capital) is TVPI's gross cousin — the same math before fees and carry — which is why a fund's pitch deck MOIC always looks better than the TVPI its LPs experience.
Worked example: a $50M fund has returned $30M in cash to LPs and holds portfolio positions marked at $45M. Its DPI is $30M ÷ $50M = 0.6x, and its TVPI is ($30M + $45M) ÷ $50M = 1.5x. The 0.9x gap between the two numbers is unrealized paper value — the portion of the fund's story that still depends on future exits.
| Vintage | TQ TVPI | Median TVPI | TQ Net IRR | Median Net IRR | TQ DPI |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2016 | 3.6x | 2.1x | 29% | 15% | 2.5x |
| 2017 | 3.3x | 2.0x | 27% | 14% | 2.2x |
| 2018 | 3.1x | 1.9x | 25% | 13% | 1.8x |
| 2019 | 2.9x | 1.7x | 23% | 11% | 1.5x |
| 2020 | 2.6x | 1.5x | 21% | 9% | 1.1x |
| 2021 | 1.9x | 1.2x | 15% | 5% | 0.5x |
| 2022 | 1.5x | 1.0x | 12% | 2% | 0.3x |
| 2023 | 1.3x | 0.9x | 8% | — | 0.1x |
Top quartile means your fund beats 75% of funds from the same vintage year — the comparison is always vintage-to-vintage, because deployment-era market conditions move returns more than manager skill. For vintages younger than about five years, IRR is mostly noise: the J-curve means fees are drawn before value is created, so early IRR punishes normal pacing and rewards aggressive early markups. From roughly year 7 on, the ranking that matters flips to DPI — a 2016-vintage fund still below 1.0x DPI in 2026 is behind regardless of what its TVPI claims.
Always compare against funds of the same vintage year — market conditions at deployment time drive returns more than manager skill in many cases. A 2019 fund benchmarks against 2019 peers, not 2021.
TVPI is most relevant in early years (years 1-5). DPI becomes the dominant metric in later years (6+) once exits have occurred. The 2025-2026 IPO reopening has boosted DPI for 2016-2019 vintages as portfolio companies finally access public markets. A high-TVPI, low-DPI fund at year 8+ is a red flag — ask why capital hasn't been returned.
Seed funds benchmark against seed funds. Growth equity funds benchmark against growth equity. Comparing a seed fund's net IRR to a growth fund's DPI is meaningless — strategy determines the appropriate comparison set.
Smaller funds (< $100M) typically show higher IRRs due to the power law math of smaller checks. Compare your fund's size tier: micro (< $50M), emerging ($50-150M), mid ($150-500M), or large ($500M+). Top-quartile thresholds differ materially across size buckets.
PME compares VC returns to what the same cash flows would have earned in public markets (S&P 500 or Russell 2000). LPs increasingly require PME > 1.2x to justify the illiquidity premium of VC. Cambridge Associates' 2026 data reports the median VC fund PME at ~1.15x — modestly above public markets as the IPO window improves exit timing.
The 2/20 standard (2% management fee, 20% carry) is giving way to more LP-favorable terms for newer or first-time managers: 2/20 with a 6-8% hurdle and European-style waterfall. GPs with strong performance records command 2.5/25 or better. In 2026, DPI-focused LP scrutiny is at an all-time high — managers who returned capital through the 2025-2026 IPO window are commanding better fundraising terms.
TVPI (Total Value to Paid-In) measures a fund's total value — cash already distributed plus the remaining unrealized NAV — divided by capital paid in. DPI (Distributions to Paid-In) counts only the cash actually returned to LPs divided by capital paid in. The difference is realization: a fund can show a 1.5x TVPI with a 0.6x DPI, meaning most of its value is still paper markups. DPI is the only number LPs can spend.
As a general rule for mature venture funds: below 1.5x TVPI is underperforming, 2.0x is solid, and 3.0x or higher is excellent. Benchmarks vary sharply by vintage — the top quartile for the 2016 vintage is ~3.6x TVPI, while for the tougher 2021 vintage it is ~1.9x, per Carta and Cambridge Associates 2026 data. Always compare against your own vintage year, not an all-vintage average.
For mature vintages (2016-2020), top-quartile TVPI starts at approximately 2.6-3.6x depending on the vintage year. The 2020 vintage top quartile benchmark is ~2.6x TVPI; the 2016 vintage top quartile is ~3.6x TVPI, per Carta and Cambridge Associates 2026 data. Top decile funds in strong vintages often exceed 5-8x TVPI. The 2025-2026 IPO window reopening has nudged these figures upward as unrealized markups convert to realized exits.
Top-quartile net IRR is approximately 21-29% for mature vintages (2016-2020). For the 2020 vintage, top-quartile net IRR is around 21%; for the 2016 vintage, it is around 29%. These figures are net of management fees and carry. Micro funds (< $50M) often show higher IRRs due to the power of small check sizes in early-stage deals.
IRR is an annualized rate that can be inflated early in a fund's life through subscription credit lines, early markups, and recycling — it is a time-weighted estimate, not money in hand. DPI is actual cash returned to LPs and cannot be gamed. After roughly year 7, LPs weight DPI over both IRR and TVPI: a fund at year 8+ with a high TVPI but a DPI below 0.5x is a warning sign that paper value is not converting to distributions.
The primary sources for VC fund benchmark data in 2026 are Carta (large sample of emerging managers, quarterly updates), Cambridge Associates (institutional LP perspective, global coverage), PitchBook (broad coverage, some survivorship bias), Burgiss (institutional-quality, widely used by endowments), and Aduro Advisors (emerging managers specialist). Most require subscriptions; Cambridge Associates and PitchBook publish summarized benchmarks publicly.
The IPO window reopened in late 2025 and has continued into 2026, with notable tech and AI-driven IPOs improving liquidity for VC funds. DPI for 2016-2019 vintages has increased meaningfully as portfolio companies that deferred listings during the 2022-2024 downturn finally accessed public markets. Top-quartile DPI for the 2016 vintage has risen to ~2.5x, up from ~2.2x just a year prior. Funds that timed exits well during this window are separating from peers.
To compare your fund to VC benchmarks: (1) identify your vintage year, fund size tier, and strategy (seed/early/growth/sector-specific); (2) pull top-quartile, median, and bottom-quartile TVPI, DPI, and net IRR for your vintage from Carta or Cambridge Associates 2026 reports; (3) calculate where your fund falls across each metric; (4) weight DPI more heavily if your fund is past year 6; (5) calculate your PME vs. a public market index for the same cash flow schedule.