Business value · Agencies and SaaS
What's your agency or SaaS business worth?
The short answer
In disclosed deals, the middle half of software companies sold for 8.3x to 20.1x EBITDA (median 10.1x) or 1.7x to 4.3x revenue (median 2.8x); marketing businesses sold for 5.1x to 10.9x EBITDA (median 6.0x, from only 11 deals) or 0.9x to 3.0x revenue. Smaller companies sell for less: across all sectors the median is 7.0x EBITDA at $1m to $3m of EBITDA and 10.2x at $10m to $30m.
On this page 6 sections
Every figure on this page comes from one published source: FairlyValued.com, Valuation multiples by sector, Q3 2026. It summarises 10,220 disclosed transactions from September 2014 to July 2025 (data as of 21 April 2026). 2,116 of them disclosed a multiple. Ranges are the middle half of deals (first to third quartile) and n is the number of deals behind each figure. FairlyValued is a property of FIH, our affiliate.
Multiples by sector
| Sector in the report | Closest to | EV / EBITDA | EV / revenue |
|---|---|---|---|
| Software | SaaS and licensed software | 8.3x to 20.1x, median 10.1x (n=40) | 1.7x to 4.3x, median 2.8x (n=109) |
| Internet Software and Services | Web platforms, online services | 8.2x to 26.2x, median 11.4x (n=44) | 1.4x to 5.9x, median 3.1x (n=102) |
| Information Technology | IT services, consultancies, implementation partners | 6.0x to 15.2x, median 8.5x (n=59) | 0.9x to 3.2x, median 1.5x (n=129) |
| Marketing | Marketing and advertising agencies | 5.1x to 10.9x, median 6.0x (n=11) | 0.9x to 3.0x, median 1.5x (n=25) |
| Digital Media | Content, publishing and media businesses | 5.5x to 10.7x, median 8.3x (n=21) | 1.2x to 3.5x, median 1.6x (n=35) |
| Business Services | Outsourced and professional services | 6.8x to 12.6x, median 10.0x (n=49) | 0.6x to 2.3x, median 1.1x (n=114) |
| All sectors | Every priced deal in the archive | 6.3x to 12.9x, median 8.9x (n=828) | 0.9x to 2.9x, median 1.5x (n=2050) |
The marketing row rests on 11 EBITDA multiples, too few to treat as a benchmark; read it as indicative. Software and internet businesses show the widest spread: the top quarter of deals priced at more than 20x EBITDA, usually for growth or strategic fit rather than current profit.
Multiples by size
| EBITDA | EV / EBITDA | Note |
|---|---|---|
| Under $1m EBITDA | 4.4x to 8.8x, median 6.0x (n=33) | Shaped by the archive's $1m deal floor |
| $1m to $3m EBITDA | 5.0x to 9.4x, median 7.0x (n=129) | |
| $3m to $10m EBITDA | 6.4x to 15.6x, median 8.8x (n=224) | |
| $10m to $30m EBITDA | 7.4x to 14.6x, median 10.2x (n=223) | |
| $30m EBITDA and over | 7.0x to 12.5x, median 9.5x (n=219) | Shaped by the archive's $1bn ceiling |
The genuine size effect sits in the middle rows: about 7x EBITDA at $1m to $3m rising to about 10x at $10m to $30m. The top and bottom bands are bent by what the archive can hold (no deal under about $1m or over $1bn), so do not read them as a market trend.
Range check
Apply a sector’s middle-half multiples to your own figures. It runs in your browser.
Range check
- On EBITDA (8.3x to 20.1x, n=40)
- -
- On revenue (1.7x to 4.3x, n=109)
- -
The middle half of priced deals in the sector, applied to your figures. It is a sense check, not a valuation: real prices fall outside this band more often than inside it, and deals under about $1m are not in the archive at all. Nothing you type is sent anywhere.
What moves the price
Two businesses with the same EBITDA can sell a long way apart. The levers buyers look at first:
- For agencies: retainers rather than projects, no single client carrying a large share of revenue, a team that delivers without the founder, written processes and contracts that transfer to a buyer.
- For SaaS: growth rate, net revenue retention, gross margin, churn by cohort and the payback period on acquisition spend. Our LTV to CAC calculator, churn calculator and cohort retention calculator produce the figures a buyer will ask for, and the SaaS metrics guide explains them.
- For both: clean books with recurring revenue separated out, and measurement a buyer can verify. A diligence team that cannot reconcile your dashboards to your revenue discounts both.
Limits of this data
- Deals with a disclosed multiple skew towards listed buyers and targets. Those tend to be larger and better run than the typical private agency.
- No deal under about $1m is in the archive, so owner-operated businesses priced on seller’s discretionary earnings are not represented.
- A range is not a valuation. Prices outside the middle half are common: in back-testing on this archive, the quartile range contained the actual price less than half the time.
- Sector labels are the report’s own. A marketing technology company may sit in software, marketing or internet services.
- This page is general information, not financial, tax or investment advice.
Questions
- Is a SaaS business valued on revenue or on profit?
- Both appear in disclosed deals. Fast-growing software companies with little profit are usually priced on revenue (or recurring revenue); mature, profitable ones on EBITDA. In the FairlyValued archive, 109 software deals disclosed a revenue multiple and only 40 an EBITDA multiple: the sector mostly prices on revenue.
- Why are marketing agencies valued lower than software companies?
- Buyers pay for revenue that stays. Agency revenue depends on client contracts that can end at short notice and on people who can leave; software revenue is usually contracted and renews without a person in the loop. In the archive the median marketing deal was 6.0x EBITDA against 10.1x for software, though the marketing figure rests on only 11 deals.
- My agency makes $400,000 a year. Does this table apply?
- Not directly. The archive only holds deals of roughly $1m and up, and most owner-run agencies below that size sell on a multiple of seller's discretionary earnings (owner pay added back) through brokers, a market this data does not cover. Treat the figures as the ceiling a larger, less founder-dependent version of your business might reach.
Source: FairlyValued.com, Valuation multiples by sector, Q3 2026.