Three years into the AI boom, The Crunchbase Unicorn Board is approaching $7 trillion in collective value for the first time amid an unprecedented rise in valuations for the hottest private companies.
A total of $1.6 trillion of value was added to the board this year, which lists the most highly valued, private, venture-backed startups in the world. That increase marks the second-largest valuation boost in a year — following only 2021 — an analysis of Crunchbase data shows.
OpenAI is the most highly valued private company at $500 billion, followed by TikTok owner ByteDance, valued at $480 billion. Up next is SpaceX at $400 billion, and Anthropic at $183 billion. All four of these companies were valued in the second half of 2025, with the leading three via secondary sales to provide liquidity to employees or investors.
Those deals triggered a major reshuffling at the top of the board this year. A year ago, the highest-valued unicorn was ByteDance at $220 billion, followed by OpenAI at $157 billion. Newcomers to the top 10 this year include Anthropic, now the fourth-most valuable, and fintech decacorn Revolut with a valuation of $75 billion placing it in the No. 9 spot.
At the end of 2024, there were 70 startups on the board valued at $10 billion or more. There are now 82 such decacorns, 24 of which joined this year. Five decacorn startups also exited the board this year via IPOs or acquisitions, six companies were downgraded in value below $10 billion, and one merged with another decacorn .
The board added $1.6T
At the end of 2024, The Crunchbase Unicorn Board was valued around $5.4 trillion collectively. It’s now approaching $7 trillion in total value — marking the second-largest valuation spike in a year, following 2021. That year, the board gained $2 trillion in valuation — excluding those that exited — to close at $4 trillion.
The valuation increases seen this year and in 2021 are massive compared to most years. Even last year, as AI investment surged, the board added around $400 billion by year end. In 2023, around $100 billion was added for still-private companies on the board.
Hottest valuations in 2025
Below are the 36 private companies that achieved the largest valuations in a funding in 2025. Of these companies, 40% reached decacorn-plus valuations in less than five years from founding — some in even less time — with their rapid valuation increases driven by the AI wave.
Reached in less than one year:
Reached in less than two years:
Reached in less than three years:
Reached in less than four years:
Reached in less than five years:
New unicorn counts and exits were also up this year, back to pre-pandemic levels, after a slower few years in 2024 and 2023. In the new year, we will report on the 2025 unicorn cohort, the investors who made their bets early, and those that invested in rounds with massive valuation hikes this year.
Related Crunchbase unicorn lists:
Related reading:
Methodology
The Crunchbase Unicorn Board is a curated list that includes private unicorn companies with post-money valuations of $1 billion or more and is based on Crunchbase data. New companies are added to the Unicorn Board as they reach the $1 billion valuation mark as part of a funding round.
The unicorn board does not reflect internal company valuations — such as those set via a 409a process for employee stock options — as these differ from, and are more likely to be lower than, a priced funding round. We also do not adjust valuations based on investor writedowns, which change quarterly, as different investors will not value the same company consistently within the same quarter.
Funding to unicorn companies includes all private financings to companies that are tagged as unicorns, as well as those that have since graduated to The Exited Unicorn Board.
Exits analyzed here only include the first time a company exits.
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.
Illustration: Dom Guzman
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