Keep your pitch deck to under 20 megabytes
It’s not an arbitrary rule, I promise. Here’s why.
Keeping your pitch deck under 20 megabytes might seem small in a world where streaming a high-quality Netflix movie can take up gigabytes of bandwidth per hour. Still, it can greatly affect how it is received - literally and figuratively. Let's face it: In most cases, email is still the go-to way for sending pitch decks, and most email servers have limits on attachment sizes—usually around 20 to 25 MB. If your file is too big, there's a good chance it won't even make it to the recipient. It might bounce back or get stuck in some spam filter, never to be seen.
It’s also a courtesy: VCs are often on the road, checking emails on their phones. That means you’re at the mercy of their cell phone connections. Yes, on a decent 5G connection it’s barely noticeable, but if you’re on semi-flaky airplane Wi-Fi… That’s a different story. A smaller file is much easier to download, open, and review, no matter where they are. You want your pitch to be accessible and convenient.
In a competitive environment, where multiple pitch decks might be fighting for attention, a large file could be the one that gets skipped over simply because it takes too long to open. Think of it like a meal at a restaurant: If you’re hungry and have to wait for 40 minutes before your burger arrives, it almost doesn’t matter if it’s a fantastic burger - you waited 40 minutes!
Another perk of keeping your pitch deck small is that it forces you to be concise and focused. When you have to work within a size limit, you're more likely to optimize your images, choose efficient file formats, and strip out anything unnecessary. The result is a cleaner, clearer presentation that gets your message across more effectively.
How does this play out statistically?
An analysis of 3,000+ pitch decks (predominantly pre-seed, seed, and Series A decks), shows that the vast majority of decks are between 1-5 megabytes in size. Image Credit: Pitch Guide
The vast majority of decks are small: 60% of pitch decks are under 5 megabytes. 82% are under 10 megabytes, and 92% of the more than 3,000 decks analyzed were under 20 megabytes in size.
The final consideration is that pitch decks more and more often are analyzed by AIs. They need to be machine readable (which means doing proper SEO) - and file size is part of that, just like for SEO for websites.
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