What are the best free venture capital newsletters for tracking fundraising, exits, and startup trends?

Here are some of the best free VC/newsletters for tracking fundraising, exits, and startup trends:

Broad VC / startup market

• StrictlyVC — Great for VC gossip, funding rounds, investor moves, and market chatter.
• Mattermark Daily — Useful roundup of startup and market news, especially company/funding activity.
• Term Sheet (Fortune) — Strong for VC, deals, exits, and broader startup ecosystem trends.
• The Information’s free newsletters — Occasional free digests with high-quality coverage of startups, fundraising, and M&A.

Fundraising / deal flow

• Crunchbase News — One of the best free sources for funding announcements, investor activity, and company updates.
• TechCrunch Newsletter — Good for startup funding rounds, acquisitions, and notable product/company news.
• PitchBook newsletters — Some free email content and reports, especially around market trends and fundraising activity.
• CB Insights newsletters — Strong market intelligence and trend analysis; free versions are useful even if some content is gated.

Exits / M&A / public markets

• Axios Pro Rata — Excellent for dealmaking, M&A, and IPO-related news.
• DealBook (NYT) — Broader finance newsletter, but solid for major exits and market context.
• Sifted — Especially good if you care about European startups, exits, and investment trends.

Startup trend / market analysis

• a16z newsletter — Good for long-form analysis on startup trends, AI, markets, and company building.
• Not Boring — High-quality essays on startups, tech trends, and market shifts.
• Lenny’s Newsletter — More product/growth focused, but helpful for understanding startup and SaaS trends.
• First Round Review newsletter — Very useful for operator and startup trend insights.

If you want a shorter “must-read” list

If I had to pick just a few free ones:

1. Crunchbase News
2. StrictlyVC
3. Axios Pro Rata
4. Term Sheet
5. TechCrunch Newsletter

If you want, I can also give you:

• a “best by use case” list (fundraising vs exits vs trends),
• a Europe-focused or US-focused list,
• or a weekly reading stack of the top 5 newsletters.