Fastest-growing SaaS added 133% more staff; mid-tier halved hiring

Software companies growing more than 100% a year increased median headcount by 133% in the first half of 2026, according to ICONIQ data covering 2022 through the second quarter of 2026.

That is higher than the 119% recorded in 2022-2023, the peak of the last funding boom.

The same band cut headcount growth to 65% in 2024, then went back to 119% in 2025. The discipline did not last.

Jason Lemkin, who published the figures on SaaStr, attributes the rebound to who now sits in that bucket: mostly AI-native B2B companies, well funded, competing directly with a handful of rivals.

The larger move in the data is one band down. Companies growing 50% to 100% cut median headcount growth from 46% to 25% in a year.

Nothing else in the dataset shifted that far. On Lemkin's arithmetic, using bucket midpoints, that cohort added roughly 0.7 points of headcount for every point of revenue growth in 2025, and about 0.4 in the first half of 2026.

The 25% to 50% band did the same thing more quietly, from 16% to 10%. In 2022-2023 it was 17%.

At the bottom of the range, the cuts have stopped and nothing replaced them. Sub-25% growers shed 6% of headcount in 2022-2023 and 5% in 2024, then added 4% in 2025 and 3% in the first half of 2026.

Three per cent at a 200-person company is six hires for a year, across every function. Lemkin's reading is that for companies that crossed $50m to $100m in the 2021 cohort and settled at 15% to 25% growth, the flat team is now the plan rather than a phase.

There are real limits to the numbers. The 2026 figure rests on 57 companies, against 195 for 2025, 200 for 2024 and 390 for 2022-2023, and it covers only two quarters.

The dataset is ICONIQ's own private venture and growth portfolio plus a selected set of public software companies, not the market as a whole. Lemkin also notes that ICONIQ's post describes the numbers as averages while the chart labels them medians, and that the bands contain different companies each year.

The 100%-plus figure is also a floor, not a midpoint. Companies tripling revenue could still be adding headcount more slowly than they add revenue, and the chart cannot separate them.

For a founder building a 2027 plan, the practical use is the ratio rather than the benchmark. If you expect 50% to 100% growth and your plan grows the team by 45%, your comparables cut that to 25% in twelve months, and the burden is on you to say why yours is different.

Below 25% growth, the peer group is no longer hiring its way to the number. That leaves price, mix, retention and sales productivity.