Why the first four answers you get will all be different
You got an unsolicited offer, or you started wondering, and you did what everyone does. You searched for what your business is worth.
You are going to get a different answer from every source, and they will all sound certain.
I went and checked, on the same day, for the same size company. Four sites quoting the same industry survey said a $5 million to $50 million business trades at 5.3x, 6.5x, 4.8x, and 4.0x. Same survey, four answers, a spread of two and a half turns. On $3 million of earnings that is a seven and a half million dollar disagreement.
None of them is lying. They are quoting different quarters, different bands, and different subsets, and then rounding toward whatever supports the business they are in.
So here is the honest version.
What the actual data says, with the caveats attached
Two real datasets exist for companies your size. IBBA Market Pulse surveys business brokers on closed deals. GF Data collects from private equity sponsors. Everything else you will read is built on one of those two.
IBBA, businesses selling in the $5M to $50M range: roughly 4.0x to 5.3x EBITDA, depending on which quarter you read.
GF Data, private-equity-sponsored deals in the $10M to $500M range: about 7.2x.
Look at that gap, because it is the most useful number on this page. It is not that PE overpays. It is that the deals in the GF Data set are bigger, cleaner, and have management teams that survive the owner leaving. The multiple is a description of those qualities, not a reward for them.
And size moves it more than industry does. A business with $20 million of EBITDA typically trades 30% to 60% above one with $3 million in the same sector. Size is the most predictable driver there is, ahead of what you actually do for a living.
One honest oddity worth knowing: in Q1 2026 the $2M-$5M and $5M-$50M bands both printed the same 4.0x median, which erases the size premium you would normally expect. That is either a real softening or a small sample. I do not know which and neither does anybody quoting it at you.
The four things that actually move your number
1. Whether it runs without you. This is most of it. If the customer relationships, the pricing decisions and the key vendor calls all route through you, a buyer is not buying a company. They are buying a job that they now have to fill with someone who does not exist. The single highest-return thing you can do in the two years before a sale is make yourself unnecessary, and it is also the hardest.
2. Customer concentration. One customer at 30% of revenue takes turns off. Not because the customer will leave, but because the buyer has to price the possibility that they might.
3. Whether the earnings survive a quality of earnings review. Your EBITDA and your adjusted EBITDA after a QoE are different numbers. The gap is usually made of add-backs you believe in and a buyer does not. You already know which ones they are going to fight about.
4. Recurring versus repeat. Contracted revenue and loyal customers who come back are not the same thing, and buyers pay very differently for them.
And the part I care about more than the multiple
The multiple is one of six numbers in your deal and it is the one that gets all the attention.
The other five are how much is cash at close, how much is a seller note, how much is an earnout and on what metric, how much sits in escrow and for how long, and whether you are working for the buyer for three years.
I have watched a 4x deal ruin somebody and a 7x deal make somebody, on the same kind of business in the same year. The one who paid 75% more risked about 80% less, because he negotiated the other five numbers and the other guy only negotiated the first one.
So the answer to "what is my business worth" is a range, and the structure moves you inside that range further than the multiple moves the range itself.
What I would actually do
Get a real valuation if you are inside 24 months of a transaction. Not a broker's opinion of value, which is free for a reason. A paid, independent one. It costs a few thousand dollars and it is the cheapest negotiating leverage that exists.
If you are more than two years out, do not bother. Spend the money on the QoE prep instead and fix what the review would have found. The number will take care of itself, and you will have fixed the business either way, which is the only outcome that is good regardless of whether you ever sell.