Did African Startups Raise $1.1B, $2.2B, or $3.2B in 2024? Why Nobody Knows (And Why That’s a Problem)

Three respected data sources. Same year. Same ecosystem. Numbers that differ by almost 3X. Welcome to African startup data tracking, where everyone’s counting but nobody agrees on what they’re counting.

If you’re a founder benchmarking your fundraising progress, a VC reporting to LPs, or a policy maker allocating resources, you’d assume the basic question “How much capital did African startups raise last year?” has a straightforward answer.

It doesn’t.

The Numbers Don’t Add Up

Here’s what four major reports say African startups raised in 2024:

Disrupt Africa: $1.12 billion (200 startups funded)

Africa: The Big Deal: $2.2 billion (188 startups raising $1M+)

Daba Finance: $2.0 billion (based on preliminary estimates through November)

Partech Africa: $3.2 billion in total funding (equity + debt)

That’s a $2.1 billion spread between the lowest and highest estimates. To put that in perspective, the difference between these numbers is larger than the entire annual funding total for most African countries.

Why the Numbers Differ So Dramatically

The problem isn’t that anyone’s lying. It’s that everyone’s measuring different things and calling them the same thing.

1. Equity vs. Equity + Debt

Partech’s $3.2B includes both equity ($2.2B) and debt ($1B). When you strip out debt, their equity number matches Africa: The Big Deal almost exactly.

Africa: The Big Deal’s $2.2B includes equity, debt, AND grants—but tracks fewer deals because they only count rounds of $1M or more.

Disrupt Africa’s $1.1B appears to focus primarily on disclosed equity deals, which explains why it’s roughly half of the others.

2. Deal Size Thresholds

Africa: The Big Deal only tracks startups that raised $1M+. They counted 188 deals.

Disrupt Africa tracks 200 deals, suggesting a lower threshold or different inclusion criteria.

Partech counted 457 equity deals and 77 debt deals—far more than either of the others, indicating they’re tracking much smaller rounds.

3. Geographic Coverage

Not all reports define “Africa” the same way. Some include North Africa comprehensively, others focus primarily on Sub-Saharan Africa. Egypt alone can swing numbers significantly—MNT-Halan’s $157.5M round is a massive outlier that may or may not be counted depending on the report’s scope.

4. Timing and Disclosure

Daba Finance published in December with data through November—meaning Q4 deals might be incomplete.

Africa: The Big Deal and Partech likely have different data cutoff dates, and not all funding rounds are publicly disclosed or disclosed accurately. Some deals surface months after they close.

Disrupt Africa notes their figure represents a 53.5% decline from 2023, but their 2023 baseline number differs from what other reports show, making year-over-year comparisons between sources meaningless.

5. Double-Counting and Exclusions

When a startup raises a blended round (equity + debt), does that count as one deal or two? What about grants that convert to equity? Revenue-based financing? SAFEs that haven’t converted yet?

Every data provider makes different judgment calls, and most don’t publish their full methodology.

Why This Matters More Than You Think

For Founders:

You’re setting fundraising expectations based on headlines. If you read “African startups raised $3.2B!” you think the market is hot. If you read “$1.1B,” you think it’s dead. Neither may reflect the capital actually available to you.

When founders don’t know what “normal” looks like, they either:

• Underprice their rounds (thinking capital is scarce when it isn’t)
• Overprice their rounds (thinking money is flowing when it’s actually dry)
• Waste months chasing the wrong types of capital

For Investors:

VCs benchmark their portfolio performance and fund deployment against market data. If your fund deployed $50M into African startups in 2024 and you think the total market was $1.1B, you’re a major player (4.5% market share). If the real number is $3.2B, you’re a bit player (1.5% market share).

LPs make allocation decisions based on this data. If they think Africa only raised $1.1B while Southeast Asia raised $7B+, they conclude Africa’s too small to bother with. Even if the real African number is closer to $3B—still smaller than SEA, but not negligibly so.

For Policy Makers:

Governments and development finance institutions use this data to design interventions. If they think funding dropped 53%, they launch emergency liquidity programs. If it only dropped 25%, different response.

Inaccurate data leads to misallocated resources.

For the Ecosystem:

Narratives matter. “African funding collapsed by 53%” creates panic. “African funding stabilized with equity holding steady” suggests resilience. Both can be technically true depending on which numbers you use.

When three respected sources can’t agree on the basic facts, the ecosystem operates on perception rather than reality. And perception creates self-fulfilling prophecies—if everyone believes funding is dead, it becomes harder to raise.

What Actually Happened in 2024 (Our Best Guess)

Synthesizing across sources, here’s what we can say with reasonable confidence:

Equity funding: $1.5B – $2.2B (depending on deal size threshold)

Debt funding: $700M – $1B (significant decline from 2023)

Total funding (equity + debt + grants): $2.2B – $3.2B

Deal count: 188 deals of $1M+ (Africa: The Big Deal) or 457 total equity deals (Partech); 200 total deals tracked by Disrupt Africa

Year-over-year change: Down 25-53% depending on the source and what’s measured

Key sectors: Fintech dominated (59-60% of equity), with transport/logistics, cleantech showing strength

Geographic concentration: Nigeria, Kenya, South Africa, Egypt captured 67-89% of funding (depending on source), down from 79% in 2023

Stage distribution: Seed funding held up better than growth stages; Series A and B ticket sizes declined

New unicorns: 2 (Moniepoint at $1B+, TymeBank at $1.5B)

The trend is clearer than the absolute numbers: African startup funding declined year-over-year in 2024, but the decline was more moderate than 2023’s drop, and H2 2024 showed recovery momentum driven by major fintech deals.

The Solution: Standardization and Transparency

Other ecosystems have solved this. The NVCA (National Venture Capital Association) provides standardized US data. LAVCA does the same for Latin America. Africa needs similar infrastructure.

What would help:

1. Standardized definitions: Agree on what counts as “equity,” “debt,” “grant,” and “Africa”
2. Transparent methodologies: Each data provider should publish exactly what they’re counting and what they’re excluding
3. Harmonized timing: Align on calendar years and disclosure windows
4. Public deal database: A shared, open-source database (even if some details remain confidential) would let different analysts work from the same base facts
5. Regular audits: Periodic reconciliation between major data providers to identify and explain discrepancies

The African Private Equity and Venture Capital Association (AVCA) is well-positioned to lead this, given their role coordinating ecosystem data.

For Founders: How to Navigate This Mess

Until the data improves, here’s how to avoid being misled:

1. Read the methodology, not just the headline. Understand what each report actually counted.
2. Look at deal count, not just dollar totals. If 188 startups raised $1M+ but 457 deals happened total, that tells you most of the market is sub-$1M rounds.
3. Focus on YOUR segment. Overall African funding might be down, but if you’re in fintech at the seed stage, your micro-environment might be growing.
4. Talk to investors directly. Ask what they’re seeing in their pipelines. Real-time intelligence beats lagging indicators.
5. Track relative changes, not absolute numbers. Even if you don’t know whether total funding was $2B or $3B, if all sources agree it’s down 25-30% YoY, that’s the signal that matter.