EBITDA Multiples by Industry in 2026 — Private Market Ranges by Sector and Deal Size

MergeX Research Team | Updated April 2026

If you've ever Googled "what is my business worth" and landed on a table of EBITDA multiples with no context, you know the feeling. The numbers look precise. But nobody explains what they mean, whether they apply to your business, or why a SaaS company and a landscaping business with identical profits can sell for completely different amounts.

This post fixes that. Here's what EBITDA multiples actually are, what the ranges look like across industries (those with most activity in private M&A in 2026), and most importantly what pushes your multiple higher or lower than the median in your vertical.

What is an EBITDA multiple and why do buyers use it

EBITDA stands for Earnings Before Interest, Taxes, Depreciation, and Amortization. It's your operating profit before accounting adjustments, essentially what your business generates at an operational level before the financial structure gets involved.

A multiple is the number a buyer multiplies your EBITDA by to arrive at a purchase price. If your EBITDA is $500,000 and buyers in your sector typically pay 5x, your business is worth approximately $2.5M.

Buyers use EBITDA because it strips out the noise. Two businesses can have wildly different tax situations, debt loads, or depreciation schedules, EBITDA ignores all of that and shows what the business actually earns operationally. That makes comparison across companies and sectors clean and consistent.

When EBITDA multiples don't apply: SDE threshold

One caveat before the numbers: EBITDA multiples apply to businesses with professional management in place, typically those above $1M-$2M in earnings with a GM or CEO capable of running operations without the founder in the seat. If you're a smaller owner operated business, buyers will use SDE (Seller's Discretionary Earnings) instead and the multiples there are lower because the buyer is pricing in the transition risk of replacing you.

That threshold matters more in 2026 than it did a year ago. Under SBA's revised SOP 50 10 8 (effective June 2025), collateral requirements dropped from $500,000 to $50,000, rollover equity has been effectively eliminated, and partial buyouts must be structured as stock deals rather than asset deals. A second round of changes taking effect March 1, 2026 tightens the pool further: SBA 7(a) loans can no longer go to businesses with any non-U.S.-citizen ownership (green card holders included), the minimum SBSS credit score floor rose from 155 to 165, and the 7(a) Small Loan cap dropped from $500,000 to $350,000. Fewer qualified SBA buyers means less competitive tension in your process if you're selling below the $2M EBITDA line and therefore you're subject to multiple compression.

For the full decision framework on which method applies to you, see SDE vs. EBITDA - which valuation method applies to you.

EBITDA Multiples by Industry in 2026 — Private Market Transaction Ranges

The table below reflects private market transactions for small to mid sized businesses. Note, this is not public company data, which runs significantly higher and is rarely relevant to a founder planning an exit. To keep this resource useful while protecting proprietary deal data, only median multiples per vertical are published here. Full quartile ranges, deal-size breakouts, and margin adjusted multiples are available to MergeX waitlist members.

The median is a starting reference point, not an answer. Your actual multiple depends on the factors covered in the vertical by vertical commentary below. To name a few, deal size within the vertical, margin quality, revenue durability, owner dependency, and buyer type are few factors that influence a company's valuation. A business in the same vertical as another with identical EBITDA can transact at materially different multiples depending on these factors.

Sources: Data reflects observations from the MergeX dataset covering 100+ private market verticals. Medians are shown; full quartile ranges available to waitlist members.

EBITDA Multiples by Deal Size — Why Bigger Businesses Get Higher Multiples

Within every industry, deal size is one of the single largest determinants of where your multiple lands. A $500k EBITDA business and a $5M EBITDA business in the same sector will transact at materially different multiples, because of risk, financing and buyer pool dynamics.

The logic is straightforward. Larger businesses are less dependent on any single person, easier to finance (institutional lenders offer better terms at scale), more diversified across customers and revenue streams, and attract a broader, more competitive buyer pool. Competition among buyers drives prices up.

Does a Higher EBITDA Margin Mean a Higher Multiple in the Same Industry?

This is one of the most common questions in M&A and the answer is yes, but with important nuance.

Within the same industry, a business with a higher EBITDA margin will almost always command a higher multiple than a lower margin peer, all else being equal. Here's why:

Margin signals operational efficiency. A 30% EBITDA margin in a sector where the average is 18% tells buyers that management has built something structurally superior, better pricing power, better cost control, or a more defensible market position. Buyers pay for that.

Higher margins create more room for debt financing. In leveraged buyouts, buyers use the target's own cash flow to service acquisition debt. A higher EBITDA margin means more free cash flow, which supports a higher debt load, which in turn supports a higher purchase price.

Margin persistence matters more than margin level. A business that has maintained 28% EBITDA margins for four consecutive years is worth more than one that hit 32% last year for the first time. Buyers underwrite what they can count on, not what happened once.

The relationship isn't linear. Going from 15% to 20% EBITDA margin likely has a more meaningful multiple impact than going from 28% to 33%. The gains matter most when you're moving from below-average to above-average within your sector peer group.

Other factors can override margin. A high-margin business with severe customer concentration, owner dependence, or declining revenue will still get discounted. Margin is one input into multiple, not the only one.

In practice, M&A advisors look at margin alongside revenue quality, growth trajectory, and management depth. The multiple is a composite judgment, not a formula. But if you're optimizing for a higher exit multiple, improving your EBITDA margin and sustaining it for 2–3 years before going to market is one of the highest leverage things you can do.

Industry Deep Dives — What Moves the Multiple in Each Sector

Technology and SaaS:

SaaS valuation in 2026 operates on two parallel frameworks depending on company stage. Sub-$5M ARR businesses still reinvesting in growth are valued primarily on revenue multiples (EV/ARR), currently clustering 3-5x for bootstrapped operators and 4-6x for equity backed companies with stronger growth profiles. Above $25M ARR, EBITDA multiples take over once margin discipline is established, typically 10-16x for profitable operators with platform characteristics.

The most commonly referenced diagnostic is the Rule of 40, revenue growth rate plus EBITDA margin, which has been institutional shorthand in SaaS diligence since Brad Feld popularized it in 2015. A company growing 30% at 10% margin and one growing 15% at 25% margin both clear the 40% threshold, but sophisticated buyers don't treat them as equivalent. SaaS Capital's research shows growth contributes disproportionately to both the composite score and the realized multiple, which is why the "Rule of X" framework (weighting growth 2x relative to profitability) is gaining traction among more rigorous underwriters. Net revenue retention is the second lever that can override a strong Rule of 40 score: companies above 40 on the composite but below 100% NRR routinely receive below market multiples because the score hides a quality of revenue problem.

What pushes to the top of the range: multi year contracts with auto renewal, standardized pricing tiers, GAAP compliant financials with a clean metrics package (ARR, MRR, NRR, gross retention, cohort churn), and founder independence signals like a documented sales playbook with reps hitting quota.

What signals a discount: month to month contracts, QuickBooks exports in place of audited financials, concentrated revenue in a single customer tier, NRR below 100%, and metrics that can only be reconstructed from spreadsheets.

The most common unforced error at the lower middle market: going to market without 12-18 months of clean SaaS metrics. The bid ask gap from metric package deficiency alone is often wider than the entire Rule of 40 premium.

Healthcare Services:

Healthcare services is one of the most bifurcated verticals in the dataset. Multiples have moderated materially in 2026 from 2021-2023 peak, with median EV/EBITDA now around 11-12x for mid market platform scale practices and 5-7x for sub $1M EBITDA add-ons. The dispersion reflects the premium buyers pay for platform scale, ancillary revenue and payor mix.

Three factors push to the top of the range. Scale: practices at $3M+ EBITDA routinely trade 2-4 turns above sub $1M add-ons because they meet PE platform thresholds (most sponsors require $3M-$5M EBITDA minimums for platform investments rather than tuck in investments). Ancillaries: owned ambulatory surgery centers, imaging, pathology and cath labs commonly add 1-3 turns to the multiple versus practices limited to professional fees. Payor mix: predominantly commercial payor bases achieve 40-60% higher multiples than Medicaid heavy comparables, and buyers underwrite payor diversification as a direct proxy for earnings durability.

What signals a discount: government pay concentration above what's standard for the service line, single location operations without scalable infrastructure, and high owner physician dependence on clinical volume. The hottest subsectors in 2026 continue to be cardiology, GI, and ophthalmology (retina specifically), where PE platforms are still actively bidding. Plastic surgery and medtech are the only subsectors consistently clearing 10x+ EBITDA, though both carry cyclical elective demand risk that buyers price in at diligence.

Home Services (HVAC, Plumbing, Electrical):

Home services has been the most active rollup category in private M&A for three years running, and the multiple structure reflects that. HVAC, plumbing and electrical businesses at $1M-$3M EBITDA currently transact 5-7x; below $1M EBITDA the same businesses trade 3-4.5x, with the gap widening rather than narrowing as PE backed consolidators become more selective about their platform criteria. The lower range is where SBA financed individual buyers dominate, while the upper range is PE platform and PE backed strategic territory.

What pushes to the top of the range: commercial revenue mix above 40%, service agreements with recurring revenue above 20% of total, documented technician certifications and licensing, fleet ownership with full maintenance records, and operational independence from the owner (dispatch systems, GM in place, founder not running service calls). What signals a discount: residential only revenue exposed to consumer discretionary spend, reliance on home warranty contracts that cap margin, concentrated geographic footprint without scalable density, and the single most common issue in this vertical, owner technician identity overlap, where the founder is still on roofs or in crawlspaces.

A useful frame: the 2026 multiple isn't really a multiple on trailing EBITDA, it's a multiple on the buyer's estimate of post transition EBITDA after backfilling the owner's operational role. Sellers who've already backfilled that role before going to market routinely clear the top of the range than sellers who haven't see 1-2 turns of compression.

Manufacturing:

Manufacturing multiples in 2026 span an unusually wide range because the category has bifurcated structurally. Commodity contract manufacturing with cyclical end market exposure transacts 4-6x EBITDA. Specialty manufacturing with proprietary products, long term customer contracts, or regulatory moats trades 7-10x. Aerospace, defense, and medical device manufacturing with qualified supplier positions can clear 10-12x. Deal size premium is pronounced, $1M EBITDA shops trade materially lower than $5M+ EBITDA platforms in the same subsector.

Reshoring tailwinds are the 2026 story. Domestic supply chain priorities and ongoing tariff policy have created sustained buyer appetite for categories previously considered unattractive such as fasteners, precision machining, injection molding, industrial coatings, where strategic acquirers are paying above historical multiples for qualified domestic capacity.

What pushes to the top of the range: proprietary products or IP, long term contracted revenue with blue chip customers, ISO/AS9100/FDA certifications appropriate to the category, clean environmental compliance history, and reduced owner involvement in shop floor operations. What signals a discount: single customer concentration above 25%, heavy reliance on a single major OEM, aging equipment without documented maintenance capex, and undocumented process knowledge concentrated in one or two long tenured employees.

The category where we see the widest dispersion in actual close prices is contract manufacturing with mixed customer portfolios, the final multiple depends heavily on the quality of the largest customer relationship and whether it's contracted or purchase order based.

Logistics and Transportation:

Logistics businesses are valued primarily on contract quality and asset intensity. Asset light 3PL models with long term shipper contracts and diversified lane density command the top of the range, currently 7-10x EBITDA for mid market platforms. While asset heavy trucking or last mile delivery businesses with spot market exposure trade 3-5x, reflecting the operating leverage risk. Technology enabled logistics platforms that sit between traditional 3PL and software, freight matching platforms, TMS enabled brokerages, visibility platforms, are attracting premium valuations from both strategic and PE buyers, clearing 8-12x in recent transactions.

What pushes to the top: contracted revenue percentage above 60%, diversified shipper base (no customer above 15%), dedicated fleets with long term agreements, and technology investment that reduces dispatcher headcount per load. What signals a discount: spot market exposure, owner operator driver dependencies, single mode concentration (dry van only, for example), and the single most common issue , operating margin compression from rate softening that hasn't been reflected in the seller's own trailing EBITDA calculation.

Professional Services (Accounting, Consulting, Legal Tech):

Professional services valuation varies dramatically by subsector. Accounting firms are unusual in being valued primarily on revenue multiples rather than EBITDA, typically 1.0-1.3x annual revenue for smaller firms, 1.3-1.8x for firms with strong recurring compliance bases and partner succession depth. Management consulting trades on EBITDA at 5-8x for project based firms and 8-11x for firms with productized recurring engagements. Legal tech and regulatory services platforms are valued more like SaaS, with revenue multiples in the 3-6x range (depending on retention and growth).

What pushes to the top in accounting: recurring compliance revenue above 70% of total, client retention above 95% annually, partner succession planning already underway, and specialization in a named niche (healthcare practices, law firms, manufacturers, etc.). What pushes to the top in consulting: retainer based engagement structure, documented methodology or IP, diversified client base with no single account above 15%, and reduced rainmaker dependency on the founding partner. What signals a discount across the category: high partner concentration billings (founder does 40%+ of origination), project based revenue with short average engagement length, and the most common issue, nontransferable client relationships where the professional and the client have a personal bond rather than a firm bond.

Equipment Rental & Industrial Services:

Equipment rental has become one of the quieter consolidation stories of 2024 to 2026. Regional rental platforms with diversified fleets are trading 5-7x EBITDA, with larger platforms capable of national coverage clearing 7-9x multiples. Specialized industrial services such as aerial work platforms, earth moving, trench safety, power generation, trade at the upper end when fleet age is controlled and utilization metrics are strong.

What pushes to the top: fleet age below 5 years on average, utilization above 65%, diversified end market exposure across construction/industrial/events, and documented preventive maintenance programs. What signals a discount: aging fleets requiring near term capex, concentration in a single cyclical end market (residential construction exposure is currently viewed as elevated risk), and underinvestment in rental management software. Buyers pay attention to the rental fleet to EBITDA ratio and the implied replacement capex, a seller who's been underinvesting in fleet renewal will see the deferred capex come out of the purchase price.

Insurance Services (Brokerage, Agency, TPA):

Insurance brokerage and agency multiples have remained elevated through the 2022 to 2024 market correction that compressed most other verticals, because the category's recurring revenue profile and consolidation dynamics attract continuous buyer demand. Retail P&C agencies currently trade 8-11x EBITDA for $1M-$5M shops, 10-14x for $5M+ platforms. Specialty wholesale brokerages and MGAs clear 11-15x. Third party administrators, depending on captive versus independent structure, trade 6-10x.

What pushes to the top: retention above 90%, organic growth above 8%, diversified carrier relationships (not captive to a single carrier), balanced commercial/personal lines mix, and documented producer compensation structure that travels post sale. What signals a discount: producer concentration (top producer doing 30%+ of commissions), captive carrier dependency, heavy personal lines exposure without commercial balance, and the most common issue in mid market deals, producers without non solicits or with expired non solicits, which buyers price in as commission runoff risk.

Food & Beverage (CPG Brands):

F&B brand valuation is a category where the 2021 multiple peak corrected most severely and has only partially recovered. DTC-heavy brands that traded 4-6x revenue in 2021 now transact 1-2x revenue in most cases, with strategic acquirers specifically unwilling to pay for unit economics that don't work at scale. Retail distributed brands with documented velocity in named national accounts trade better, currently 1.5-3x revenue or 8-12x EBITDA for profitable brands. Specialty categories with genuine brand moats (premium spirits, heritage brands, regulatory protected categories like alcohol) continue to clear 12-15x EBITDA for the right profile.

What pushes to the top: documented velocity data in national retail accounts, gross margin above 40% at scale, diversified retail and DTC mix, and brand IP that can command pricing power post-acquisition. What signals a discount: heavy dependency on promotional spend to drive revenue, co-packer concentration risk, ingredient cost volatility without hedging, and the recurring 2026 issue, DTC unit economics that require paid acquisition spend to hit topline growth targets, which strategic acquirers now heavily discount.

Automotive Aftermarket & Collision:

Automotive aftermarket services and collision repair have become a consolidation category led by PE backed platforms building regional density. Independent collision shops at $1M-$3M EBITDA currently transact 5-7x, with single location shops below $1M EBITDA trading 3-4.5x. Multi location platforms with 5+ locations and established DRP (direct repair program) relationships clear 7-9x, and platforms with 15+ locations trade 9-11x.

What pushes to the top: DRP relationships with major insurance carriers, I-CAR certified technician depth, documented cycle times below market average, OEM certifications (particularly for aluminum and EV work), and multi-location operational independence. What signals a discount: single insurance carrier dependency, technician shortage issues that limit throughput, aging equipment that can't handle modern vehicle materials (aluminum, high strength steel, EV battery work), and the most common issue, owner operator shops where the owner is still writing estimates or supervising production, which compresses the multiple by 1-2 turns because the buyer has to backfill that role.

All other industry and vertical specific commentary is available to waitlist members.

What actually moves your multiple within the range

The industry gives you a range. Where you land inside it comes down to five things.

Revenue quality. Recurring, contracted revenue is worth more than project revenue. A business where 70% of next year's revenue is already locked in through contracts or subscriptions is dramatically less risky than one that starts every quarter from zero. Buyers pay for predictability.

Customer concentration. If one customer accounts for more than 20% of your revenue, every serious buyer will flag it and most will either price it down or structure part of the payment as an earnout tied to that customer staying. Spread your revenue base before you think about selling.

Owner dependence. The question every buyer asks: what happens to this business if the current owner leaves on day one? If the answer involves significant risk, the multiple gets compressed. Document your processes, build your management team, and make yourself replaceable before you go to market.

Growth trajectory. Buyers are buying the future, not the past. A business that grew 20% last year signals something different than one that's been flat for three years. Even modest consistent growth 8%–12% annually, signals health and gives buyers confidence in their projections.

Clean financials. This sounds obvious but it's where deals die. Mixed personal and business expenses, inconsistent records, or revenue that's hard to verify creates doubt in a buyer's mind and doubt gets repriced. Clean books close faster and at higher multiples. Get your financial statements in order at least 12 months before you plan to go to market.

Why the multiple you read about online might not apply to you

Most EBITDA multiple data you find online is based on public company transactions. Public companies trade at significantly higher multiples than private businesses, they have liquidity, analyst coverage, diversified ownership, and no key person risk. A public SaaS company might trade at 20x EBITDA. A private SaaS business with $2M EBITDA is more likely to transact at 8x–12x.

Size also matters within the private market. Larger businesses command higher multiples because they're less risky, more diversified, more institutionalized, easier to finance. A business doing $5M EBITDA will typically achieve a higher multiple than one doing $500k EBITDA in the same sector, even if the underlying business quality is similar.

This is why generic multiple tables are a starting point, not an answer. The real number for your business depends on your specific metrics, your sector's current buyer appetite, and how your business compares to the deals that have actually closed recently in your space.

How to use this data

If you're a business owner thinking about an exit in the next one to three years, use these ranges to set a realistic expectation and then identify the specific levers in your business that would move you toward the top of the range rather than the middle.

If you're a founder raising capital, EBITDA multiples are less relevant at early stage (revenue multiples dominate pre-profitability), but understanding how profitability gets valued helps you make smarter decisions about when to prioritize margins versus growth.

If you're an investor evaluating a deal, these ranges give you a market context for pressure testing a seller's ask and understanding where a business's specific risk profile puts it relative to sector benchmarks.

MergeX benchmarks your business against real transaction data in your specific vertical, not generic public market averages