Africa's venture capital market continued its steady recovery through the third quarter of 2025, showing encouraging resilience despite persistent global and domestic headwinds. The latest AVCA Q3 2025 Venture Capital Activity Report indicates that investor appetite is gradually returning, particularly at the early stages, even as late-stage funding remains constrained. Together, the findings point to an ecosystem that is beginning to normalise after a turbulent two-year period.
Early-stage momentum strengthensAfrica recorded 122 venture capital deals in the third quarter of the year, representing a 17 increase compared with the same period in 2024 and marking a third consecutive quarter of steady deal flow. Although overall activity remains below the peak levels seen between 2022 and 2024, the market is clearly stabilising.
A total of 362 deals were completed in the first nine months of 2025, which is broadly in line with activity recorded in 2023 and 2024. Disclosed deal value fell sharply to US0.2bn, compared with the US0.6bn reported in each of the first two quarters of the year. A rising share of transactions, however, are now being completed without public disclosure, suggesting that headline figures may underrepresent the true volume of capital deployed. The data indicates that while investors are returning, they remain cautious about deal sizes and increasingly selective in the information they release.
