Last updated: October 30, 2026: funds by city, a tool comparison, fund and accelerator terms checked against their own pages, and figures we could not confirm removed.
Pre-seed investors in Europe sit in four channels: dedicated early-stage funds, accelerators, angel networks and government co-investors. Start with funds that have closed a recent deal at your stage, check their geography and terms, then choose a warm introduction or a direct application route for each one.
Finding the list takes an afternoon; getting through the door with something real to show takes the rest of the round. This guide maps the European pre-seed landscape in late 2026, how it differs from the US, and what founders who close here do first: they build proof before they ask for the meeting.
The short answer: best route by founder type
Pre-product or still looking for a co-founder: a company-building program such as Entrepreneur First or Antler.
UK founder after a first institutional check: a first-check pre-seed fund such as Concept Ventures.
Founder in Central and Eastern Europe: a regional specialist such as KAYA VC or Day One Capital.
Filling out a round that already has a lead: angel networks and syndicates, found through the national member networks of EBAN, the European Business Angels Network.
Capital-intensive company with high research and development costs: government co-investment, reached through a lead fund that already works with it.
Founder with warm intros lined up: SeedForge, which builds a profile from your deck and documents and shares it as a single link that shows the latest version, so the investor reads the business before the call.
Your first step today: shortlist 25 funds that closed a deal at your stage in the last six months, then find a warm-intro path to each.
Tools for building your European pre-seed investor list
Tool | What it gives you | Best for |
|---|---|---|
Investors with a publicly evidenced deal in the last six months, each row linked to its dated source, refreshed weekly | Finding funds with a recent publicly evidenced deal at your stage | |
Data on startups, founders, investors and funding, strong on European ecosystems | Mapping a sector or a city's investors in depth | |
Private company and funding round records with investor profiles | Researching a fund's portfolio and co-investors | |
EBAN and its national networks | Member angel networks in more than 50 countries | Finding angels and syndicates by country |
Accelerator application pages | Published programs, deadlines and terms | Founders who want a structured first check |
A profile built from your deck and documents, shared as one link | Making each warm intro land with something the investor can read before the call |
Use the Index, the databases, the angel networks and the accelerator pages to build your list, and your SeedForge profile to give each investor the business before the call.
European pre-seed channels at a glance
Channel | Examples | Typical ticket (sourced) | How to Reach | Best For | What Gets You In |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Pan-European early-stage funds | Seedcamp: $350K to $1.25M first cheque | Warm intro via a portfolio founder | Companies selling to businesses or to consumers | An existing relationship plus written proof of traction | |
Regional and sector funds | Speedinvest €250K to €5M; Cherry Ventures €2M to €10M (larger seed) | Warm intro via a shared angel or an investor in the fund | Sector-specific companies (fintech, deep tech, climate) | Geographic and sector fit plus a traction signal | |
Dedicated pre-seed specialists | Concept Ventures, Day One Capital, KAYA VC | Concept up to $1.5M; KAYA VC $1M to $3M | Direct application or a short, specific message | First-check rounds and novel ideas | Founder background plus a clear thesis fit |
Accelerators and company builders | Seedcamp, Techstars, Entrepreneur First, Antler | Entrepreneur First $125,000; Techstars $220,000; Antler up to €500K | Application portal and published deadlines | Pre-product or early-stage teams | Application quality and how the team comes across in selection |
Angel networks and syndicates | EBAN member networks, HBAN | Smaller tickets alongside a lead | Network introductions and events | Filling out rounds, sector experts | A reference from an angel already in the network |
Government co-investment | European Innovation Council (EIC): grant below €2.5M, equity up to €10M | Via the lead fund | Capital-intensive companies with high research and development costs | A lead fund relationship and grant eligibility |
Pre-seed investors by city: London, Paris, Berlin, the Nordics and Central and Eastern Europe
Start with the city table below. Ada Ventures is a London option, while daphni and Breega are Paris options. Several funds work across cities: Breega has offices in London and Paris; Cherry Ventures lists Berlin, London and Stockholm; and Creandum lists Berlin and Stockholm among its offices. In the Nordics, byFounders is registered in Copenhagen. Credo Ventures and KAYA VC both have offices in Prague. SeedForge's Active Investor Index lists 1,399 investors with a publicly evidenced deal in the last six months, as of 26 October 2026; every fund in the table is among them, linked to its deal and source.
City | Funds to start with (linked to their latest deal in the Index) | Best for |
|---|---|---|
London | UK founders raising a first institutional check | |
Paris | French founders raising pre-seed or seed | |
Berlin | German founders who want a lead with European reach | |
Nordics | byFounders (Copenhagen), Creandum (Stockholm) | Nordic and Baltic founders at the first round |
Prague and Central and Eastern Europe | Founders building from Central and Eastern Europe |
What "pre-seed in Europe" looks like in 2026
Pre-seed in Europe means a first institutional round from a small fund, an angel syndicate, an accelerator, or a mix. The money is there in aggregate. Gené Teare at Crunchbase News reported that European startup funding reached $25 billion in the third quarter of 2026, the region's strongest quarter in four years, while seed funding fell quarter over quarter and was flat year over year at around $2 billion invested in more than 750 companies.
Atomico's State of European Tech 2025 report, in its startup investment trends chapter, adds the longer view. Since 2022 the number of smaller, early-stage funding rounds in Europe has fallen by roughly 20% per year, driven mainly by a decline in sub-$1M rounds, and Atomico notes the same dynamic in the US.
So growth goes to large AI rounds and later stages while seed held steady at more than 750 companies in Q3: every first check is contested, and it has to last longer. Carta found the median wait from seed to Series A reached 774 days in Q4 2024, up from 420 in Q4 2021, for startups on its platform. Seed totals rise as late deals get reported; treat them as a floor.
Regional variation inside Europe is real: the fund that suits a French founder may have no mandate at all for a Polish one. Three things decide whether a fund belongs on your list: whether the fund is currently deploying capital, what check size it writes today, and whether your geography matches its target market. The first is the easiest to check: a deploying fund leaves dated public evidence of its deals.
The four channels that fund European pre-seed today
Most founders use two or three at once.
1. Dedicated pre-seed and early-stage funds
The active European early-stage funds in 2026 fall into three groups. The first is pan-European generalists with strong networks: Seedcamp in London, whose portfolio includes Wise, Revolut and UiPath, LocalGlobe, Index Ventures, HV Capital in Berlin, and Plural, which says serious founders deserve investors with company-building experience. The second is regional and sector specialists with deep coverage of a specific market: Speedinvest in Vienna, whose eight specialist teams each back 4 to 6 new companies a year, lead 85% of initial rounds and invest €250K to €5M from inception to seed; Project A in Berlin, with an operator-heavy model; Cherry Ventures in Berlin, which typically invests €2 million to €10 million and says it likes slightly larger seed rounds and cites an 80% graduation rate from seed to Series A; and Heartcore Capital in Copenhagen and Paris, which says the best way to reach it is via someone it mutually knows.
The third group is the pre-seed specialists. Concept Ventures, based in London, is a dedicated pre-seed fund with a standard term sheet; its own facts page lists cheques of up to $1.5m, typically as lead or co-lead, an $88m current fund, and a process of no more than five hours of a founder's time. Day One Capital, a Central and Eastern European investor, lists a €45M CEE Fund II on its website. KAYA VC, with an office in Prague, backs founders from Central and Eastern Europe and lists an $85M current fund and a $1M to $3M ticket for pre-seed and seed rounds.
Latest evidenced deals (Active Investor Index): LocalGlobe, Index Ventures, HV Capital, Speedinvest, Project A, Heartcore Capital, Day One Capital.
A fund whose last evidenced deal at your stage was recent is a live target; one with no recent public deal deserves a direct question before it takes a slot on your list. European pre-seed capital exists in 2026. The bottleneck is getting through the door of the funds that fit your stage, sector and geography.
2. Accelerator programs with structured pre-seed checks
European accelerators in 2026 act as pre-seed funds with a curriculum attached. Four programs to know:
Seedcamp (London) appears here and in the fund list because it invests like a fund and supports founders like a program, with operator support across hiring, product and go-to-market. Its FAQ puts the first cheque usually between $350K and $1.25M, and Seedcamp says it aims to run an end-to-end process within two weeks of meeting a founder, ending in a 45-minute partner pitch with the full team.
Techstars (cohorts across Europe): a mentorship-driven accelerator with fixed application windows that, by its own account, selects hundreds of companies a year for three-month programs. Per its help centre, most programs offer $220,000: $200,000 through an uncapped Simple Agreement for Future Equity (SAFE), an investment that turns into shares in a later round, with most-favoured-nation (MFN) terms that let it adopt better terms given to later SAFE investors, and $20,000 through a post-money convertible equity agreement; Techstars receives 5% in common stock plus the future value of the SAFE.
Entrepreneur First (London): funds individuals before they have a team, then helps them find a co-founder inside the program. Its London FAQ describes a £6,000 Talent Investment when you join and, for teams its Investment Committee backs at the end of the first 12 weeks, $125,000 through a post-money SAFE for 8% of the company. A further $125,000 from EF and its partner is optional and uses a separate uncapped MFN SAFE. It is available if the team moves to San Francisco for the second 12 weeks and incorporates as a C-corporation in the US state of Delaware.
Antler (Amsterdam, Stockholm, Berlin and globally): also runs the company-formation model. In the UK it backs founders with up to £500,000 at inception and pre-seed; in continental Europe it commits up to €500K: €200K at inception and up to €300K invested in the next round within nine months, on the same terms as external investors. Antler says its commitment typically converts into around 10% equity at a €5M valuation.
Latest evidenced deal in the Index: Techstars, Entrepreneur First, Antler.
Accelerators are easy to enter and hard to win: places are scarce, and most founders who get in have already done the preparation an investor would ask for.
3. Angel networks and syndicates
EBAN, the European Business Angels Network, describes itself as the pan-European representative of the early-stage investor community, with over 100 member organisations in more than 50 countries. National networks operate underneath it: HBAN in Ireland, BAND in Germany, LBAN in Luxembourg (200+ members, 15+ projects invested a year), and dozens more.
The structural shift in European angel investing, per Sifted's coverage of EBAN, is that angels are moving from solo checks into syndicates and small funds. For founders, that means one coordinator to negotiate with.
Syndicate platforms have grown alongside the networks. AngelList operates in Europe, Seedrs, now Republic Europe, runs equity crowdfunding for UK and European startups. Crowdfunding and syndicate channels usually write smaller tickets that fill out a round led by a fund.
4. Government-backed early-stage capital
Most European countries run state-backed early-stage funds that co-invest with private capital. Bpifrance in France, the British Business Bank and Innovate UK in the UK, KfW Capital in Germany, the EIF (European Investment Fund) across the EU, and various regional development banks. The EU's own EIC Accelerator funds startups directly, with a grant component below €2.5 million and up to €10 million of equity investment. These are rarely lead investors at pre-seed, but they often anchor rounds, match private capital, or provide grant funding alongside equity.
For most pre-seed founders, the entry point is a fund that already takes EIF or national co-investment and handles the paperwork.
Why a list of 100 funds leaves the hard part open
Start with funds that fit your stage, sector and geography, then choose a practical way to reach each one.
In a 2016 survey of 885 institutional VCs at 681 firms, Paul Gompers and his co-authors found that only 10% of deals came inbound from company management. Over 30% came through professional networks, 20% through other investors and 8% through portfolio companies, and the funds generated almost 30% themselves. The survey is US-weighted and maps where deals came from, so read it as a guide to channels: more than half of the deals reached the funds through networks and referrals.
An introduction works as a trust signal. A note from someone the investor already knows, such as "I trust this person, you should take the meeting", gives the deck a reason to be opened; a cold email has to earn that attention on its own.
How to get warm intros in Europe
Build the network in the 6 to 12 months before you raise. Founders who close fast tend to do three things in that year.
They engage with the investor's portfolio companies first. Start with the portfolio published on your target fund's website. Pick the 15 most relevant companies (your sector, stage and geography) and become useful to their founders: comment thoughtfully on their posts and share their job openings. After six months, those founders know your name. When you raise, ask one of them for an intro to their investor.
They join programs where the investor shows up. Accelerators are one path. Industry summits, EBAN Congress events, Sifted Summit, Slush and 4YFN all create rooms where investors come to meet founders. A five-minute conversation followed by a thoughtful message a week later gives the investor a face and a context.
They build the proof artifact before they need it. This is the part most founders skip. A warm intro opens the door; the meeting that follows has to convert, and the investor leaves it knowing whether the business is real.
Where the proof artifact comes in
The proof artifact is what you hand an investor so they learn in one read what would otherwise take several meetings. The deck is the marketing layer; the proof artifact is the structure underneath: traction data, your reasoning about the market, references they can check, and the financial picture without rounding errors.
Founders who build this before the first meeting get a deeper meeting: an investor who already knows the market sizing logic can go straight to the harder question, "Where does that sizing break if X happens?"
SeedForge builds that page from your deck and documents and shares it as a single link. Keep it up to date as you build: the same link shows the latest version, so an investor can come back to it after the call. An optional 30-minute AI Session adds your answers to the questions European pre-seed investors ask, from market logic to the assumptions you still have to test, and the first AI Session is free. When a warm intro lands, the investor opens your profile link and reads the business before the call. See an example at seedforge.com/s/hYoiPikkCoVt. If you connect LinkedIn and approve every message, SeedForge can also run outreach from your account to matched investors and to founders in their portfolios, asking them for a warm intro to the investor.
How European pre-seed differs from US pre-seed (and what to do about it)
Three things shape how European founders should approach pre-seed.
The round size is smaller, but the proof bar is similar. Atomico's State of European Tech 2025 puts the median European Seed round at 50% of the US median, the steepest discount of any stage, narrowing to 79% by Series B; Atomico adds that Europe's most established firms lead rounds closer to US sizes. Diligence still covers the same ground (market, team, traction, financials), so a smaller European round faces roughly the same questions as a larger US one, and shortening the proof step matters more.
The SAFE has crossed the Atlantic, but convertible notes have not disappeared in Europe. In the US the SAFE is the default pre-seed instrument: Carta's State of Pre-Seed data, drawn from US startups on its platform, puts convertible notes at a record low of 7% of pre-seed rounds in Q1 2026. In Europe, local equivalents and convertible loans remain common in specific geographies and for larger or more structured deals, so European pre-seed founders should understand both. For the differences and when each makes sense, see Convertible Note vs SAFE for Founders 2026.
Decision processes vary, so ask each fund about its own. Find out who approves the investment and whether a co-investor or a grant review adds a step. In the 2016 Gompers survey, the average venture deal took 83 days to close, with early-stage deals shorter; the sample was US-weighted and covered several stages, so treat it as background and plan for months. Some funds set fast targets for their own process: Seedcamp aims to finish within two weeks of meeting a founder, and Antler says its continental decision typically comes within weeks.
The pre-fundraise checklist for European founders
Before approaching any investor, have these ready.
A clear sector and stage match. Which 25 funds actually invest at your check size, in your sector, in your geography? Check who has a recent evidenced deal at your stage; Dealroom, Crunchbase and Sifted carry the detail on each fund's portfolio and partners. Keep the list short and tightly matched.
A warm-intro path to each. For each fund, name the portfolio founder, angel or shared connection who could introduce you; a fund with no path is a lower-probability target.
Build your profile. Put your deck, data and documents in one place the investor can read before the meeting, so the intro is followed by substance.
A 90-second narrative. "What does this company do?" deserves a concrete 90-second answer that ends with your sharpest data point. Rehearse it until it is automatic.
A short list of references. Three customers, two prior investors or advisors, and one industry expert. In the 2016 Gompers survey the average firm called 10 references before investing, so have yours briefed before the first meeting.
The next-round logic. Pre-seed investors underwrite the Series A: know which milestones unlock it.
For a deeper version of this checklist applied to the angel-investor channel, see How to Find Angel Investors for Your Startup in 2026. For how to narrow a long fund list down to the right partners, see How to Find the Right VC for Your Startup. For the fundraising timetable, see How Long Does It Take to Raise a Seed Round? The Real Timeline in 2026.
Frequently Asked Questions
How many European pre-seed funds should I approach in a round?
Aim for 20 to 30 well-targeted funds. For each fund, identify a relevant introduction or a direct application route, and check for a recent deal at your stage.
What is the average European pre-seed round size in 2026?
Use the published first-cheque ranges as your guide: Seedcamp's first cheque is usually $350K to $1.25M, Concept Ventures writes up to $1.5M and KAYA VC lists $1M to $3M, and Atomico puts the median European Seed round at 50% of the US median. We found no reliable Europe-wide average for pre-seed alone, so check the terms for your country and stage.
Are European angel networks like EBAN actually useful for pre-seed?
Yes, mostly as a way to find specific angels. EBAN groups over 100 member organisations in more than 50 countries; find angels who match your sector and stage through a national network, then meet them at its events. Angel syndicates often co-invest alongside a lead fund.
How do I get a warm intro to a VC in Europe?
Build the path before you raise: become useful to founders in your target funds' portfolios for a few months, then ask one of them for an introduction to their investor. Events such as Slush, Sifted Summit and EBAN's are the second route.
Which European accelerators fund pre-seed startups?
Seedcamp, Techstars, Entrepreneur First and Antler all run programs that invest at pre-seed in Europe. Entrepreneur First and Antler suit founders who are still forming a team; Seedcamp and Techstars suit teams with a company already in place. Each publishes its application process and deadlines.
How long does it take to close a pre-seed round in Europe?
Plan for months and ask each fund for its own timetable. We found no Europe-wide survey of time to close; the US-weighted 2016 Gompers survey of 885 VCs reported an average of 83 days to close across venture deals, shorter at the early stage. Some funds set fast targets for their own part: Seedcamp aims to finish its process within two weeks of meeting a founder. See How Long Does It Take to Close a Seed Round in 2026.
Should I join a European accelerator before raising pre-seed?
If you are pre-product or pre-team, yes. Programs like Entrepreneur First and Antler are designed for this stage. If you have a working product and early traction, the opportunity cost of a three-month program may exceed the value of the check and network. Run the numbers against your specific milestones.
Is it possible to raise pre-seed in Europe without a warm intro?
Yes. Some pre-seed funds accept direct applications, and accelerators publish application windows. Check each fund's process and send a short explanation of why your company fits. A relevant introduction can add context when one is available.
Build the profile your warm intros point to
The European pre-seed map gives you the door; the proof artifact decides whether the meeting converts. Upload your deck and documents at seedforge.com and share one link with every investor on your list. See an example: seedforge.com/s/hYoiPikkCoVt.