How Many Small Businesses Are There in the US in 2022? Data Reveals the Number.

How many small businesses are there in the United States? According to the Small Business Administration, there are currently 32,540,953 million small businesses in the US.

Small businesses represented 99% of all businesses in the US. Of these small businesses, 81% have no employees and 19% have paid employees. The SBA defines a small business as a firm with fewer than 500 total employees.

Now that we know the total number of small businesses in the US, the next question is how many businesses are started each year? Data from the US Census Bureau shows that an average of 4 million businesses start up every year—and that average is based on the previous five years of data.

The number of businesses created per year has increased thanks to the entrepreneurial awakening brought about by the pandemic. Here’s a look at the increase in the number of new businesses over the past five years:

• 2021: 5.4 million new business applications in the US (+22.7% vs. 2020)
• 2020: 4.4 million new business applications in the US (+25.7% vs. 2019)
• 2019: 3.5 million new business applications in the US (+0% vs. 2018)
• 2018: 3.5 million new business applications in the US (+9.4% vs. 2017)
• 2017: 3.2 million new business applications in the US (+6.7% vs. 2016)

The numbers look similar for likely employer businesses; these are businesses that are more likely to have full-time employees once they’re established. Data from the US Census Bureau, captured below by the Economic Innovation Group, shows the pandemic also encouraged more employer businesses to form.

That captures the country as a whole, but what about the states? Here are the states with the most small businesses in the US:

1. California: 4.2 million small businesses (and 7.3 million people are employed by small businesses in California)
2. Texas: 3.0 million small businesses (and 4.9 million people are employed by small businesses in Texas)
3. Florida: 2.8 million small businesses (and 3.6 million people are employed by small businesses in Florida)
4. New York: 2.3 million small businesses (and 4.1 million people are employed by small businesses in New York)
5. Illinois: 1.2 million small businesses (and 2.5 million people employed are employed by small businesses in Illinois)

The most common type of business in the US are service businesses, with Professional, Scientific, and Technical Services representing 4.5m small businesses, or roughly 14% of all small businesses.