Data sourced from Dakota Private Markets, the private fund performance platform powered by Dakota. Learn More | Request Access
In Dakota Private Markets, the median US lower middle market buyout fund posts a 13.28% net IRR. The median US middle market buyout fund posts 12.16%. The 10 largest buyout funds in the dataset, each $21 billion or more, post a median of 8.90%.
Bigger funds do not reliably produce better returns, and the smallest buyout tier holds its own. But the median is only part of the answer. Fund size also changes how much of a fund's value has come back as cash, and how far apart the best and worst managers sit.
This post breaks down US buyout performance by size tier and explains what the results mean for fund managers raising capital.
The Data
|
Size tier
|
Funds
|
Bottom-quartile Net IRR
|
Median Net IRR
|
Top-quartile Net IRR
|
Median TVPI
|
Median DPI
|
|
Lower Middle Market Buyout
|
39
|
8.92%
|
13.28%
|
21.15%
|
1.41x
|
1.68x
|
|
Middle Market Buyout
|
453
|
5.95%
|
12.16%
|
18.80%
|
1.53x
|
0.90x
|
|
Large Market Buyout
|
29
|
10.60%
|
16.83%
|
25.80%
|
1.70x
|
1.01x
|
|
All US Private Equity
|
989
|
5.98%
|
12.36%
|
19.30%
|
1.50x
|
1.02x
|
Source: Dakota Private Markets, US private equity funds by sub-asset class, all vintages, data pulled October 2026. Performance as-of dates vary by fund.
Three things stand out. Lower middle market funds match or beat the middle market on net IRR and lead every tier on DPI. The middle market sits almost exactly on the all-PE line. And the large market tier posts the highest median, but on a sample of only 29 funds, which needs context before anyone reads it as "bigger is better."
1. Smaller Funds Hold Their Own, and Lead on Cash (1.68x Median DPI)
The median US lower middle market buyout fund has returned 1.68x paid-in capital in cash. The middle market median is 0.90x, and the large market median is 1.01x. On net IRR, the smallest tier's 13.28% median sits more than a point above the middle market.
The sample is small at 39 funds and spans vintages from 1999 to 2025, so the DPI figure leans on older, more mature funds. Even so, the direction is consistent: in this data, smaller funds have not paid a performance penalty for their size.
For managers in this tier, DPI is the strongest number to lead with. Allocators weigh realized cash heavily, and it is the one metric a smaller fund can show that a larger peer often cannot.
2. The Middle Market Is the Benchmark Most Funds Face (453 Funds)
Middle market buyout makes up 453 of the 989 US private equity funds in this view, about 46%. That is why its numbers sit almost on top of the all-PE figures: a 12.16% median net IRR against 12.36% for the full universe.
It is also the most crowded peer set and has the lowest bottom-quartile breakpoint of the three tiers, at 5.95%. A middle market manager competes against the largest field of comparables for allocator attention, so where a fund falls within that field matters more than the tier label.
3. Large Fund Numbers Need the Most Context (29 Funds)
The large market tier's 16.83% median net IRR is the highest of the three. But the sample is 29 funds, and it includes some of the earliest buyout vehicles on record: KKR's 1976 and 1980 funds, Blackstone's 1987 fund, and Apollo's 1990 fund. Those early vintages pull the median up.
A different cut of the same dataset points the other way. Among the 10 largest buyout funds in Dakota Private Markets [ADD LINK], each $21 billion or more, the median net IRR is 8.90% and only one ranks in the first quartile of its vintage. At the very top of the size range, scale has not translated into top-quartile results.
4. Dispersion Is Similar Below the Large Market
The gap between top- and bottom-quartile net IRR is 12.2 points in the lower middle market and 12.9 points in the middle market. TVPI spreads are nearly identical too, at 0.73x and 0.72x. The large market tier shows wider spreads (15.2 points of IRR and 1.64x of TVPI), though its small sample and wide vintage range account for much of that.
The practical reading: manager selection carries about the same weight for a $300 million fund as for a $3 billion fund. Size tier tells an allocator which peer group to use. It does not tell them whether the manager is good.
What This Means for Fund Managers
Benchmark against your size tier, not all of private equity. A lower middle market fund measured against the full PE universe is being compared to a field dominated by middle market funds. Use the tier that matches your fund, then narrow by vintage.
Lead with the metric your tier wins on. For smaller funds, that is often DPI. For middle market funds, it is quartile position within a large peer set. For large funds, it is vintage-relative quartile, not fund size or brand.
State the sample size. A quartile claim built on 29 funds and one built on 453 carry different weight. Saying which one you are citing makes the claim more credible, not less. Best Practices for Creating Private Fund Performance Benchmarks [ADD LINK] covers how many funds are enough.
Do not pitch size as a proxy for quality. The data does not support it in either direction.
How We Built This Analysis
We filtered Dakota Private Markets to private equity funds with a US geography tag (national and all US regions), then used the Lower Middle Market Buyout, Middle Market Buyout, and Large Market Buyout sub-asset classes as size tiers. All vintages are included. Quartile breakpoints are calculated across each tier, and each fund's as-of date reflects its most recent reported performance. Sub-asset class reflects how a fund is classified by strategy tier, not a fixed fund size cutoff.
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