Comparable baseline
Georgia at a glance
| Population | 11,302,748 | July 1, 2025; +5.3% since 2020 |
|---|---|---|
| Business applications | 25,863 | July 2026, seasonally adjusted |
| Trailing-12-month applications | 277,705 | 2,457.0 per 100,000 residents |
| High-propensity applications | 6,069 | 23.5% of July applications |
| Projected employer formations | 1,017 | Census four-quarter projection for July's cohort |
| Small businesses | 1,374,972 | SBA 2025 profile; underlying employer and nonemployer data are from 2022 |
| Small-business employment | 1,806,632 | 42.5% of private employment in 2022 |
| Employer establishments | 261,320 | 2023 County Business Patterns |
Application rankings cover the 50 states and use unrounded figures. Applications are qualifying EIN filings, not confirmed business openings. Measurement years differ because federal datasets are released on different schedules.
Georgia is a high-application state by both scale and population-adjusted measures. The Census Bureau recorded 25,863 seasonally adjusted business applications in July 2026, fifth among states by count and seventh at 228.8 applications per 100,000 residents. Its trailing-year rate ranked sixth.
The operating-business data are less employer-heavy. Nonemployer establishments—businesses without paid employees—made up 85.5% of Georgia’s published small-business count, the third-highest share among states. Small firms provided 42.5% of private employment, ranking 48th.
High application volume, moderate recent growth
Georgia recorded 277,705 applications during the 12 months ending in July 2026, or 2,457.0 per 100,000 residents. That level ranked sixth nationally. The total increased 15.3% from the preceding 12 months, close to the 50-state median and 28th in the growth ranking.
July showed a similar direction: applications were 20.7% above July 2025 and 2.6% above June 2026. Compared with July 2019, the current count was 83.3% higher. Those results support a high and rising application-level story, but not a claim that Georgia is among the fastest-growing states in the latest year.
Georgia’s trailing-year application rate ranked sixth, while its high-propensity share ranked 37th and modeled formations per 100 applications ranked 43rd. The application volume does not measure payroll creation.
Georgia’s small-business count is largely nonemployer activity
The SBA’s 2025 profile reports 1,374,972 small businesses using underlying 2022 data, the fifth-largest state total. That number combines 199,431 small employer firms with 1,175,541 nonemployer establishments. In other words, roughly six out of seven counted businesses had no paid employees.
Small employer firms provided 1,806,632 jobs. That is a large workforce in absolute terms, but it represented 42.5% of private employment, the third-lowest share among states. Georgia’s business total is numerically dominated by nonemployers even though small employer firms support a large workforce in absolute terms.
Atlanta is the largest node, not the whole state
Georgia’s 2023 County Business Patterns data counted 261,320 employer establishments and 4,405,730 employees. Fulton County held 928,068 employees, 21.1% of the state total. Cobb and Gwinnett counties each held about 8.5%; the three Atlanta-area counties together accounted for 38.1%.
Transportation and warehousing employed 319,353 people, 7.3% of state private employment and 1.54 times the 50-state share. Georgia’s logistics footprint is a useful description of its employer economy, but the data do not establish that logistics businesses produced the recent application totals.
Population also supplies context rather than an explanation. Georgia’s population reached 11,302,748 in July 2025, up 5.3% from the 2020 base and 11th-fastest among states. A larger market and more applications can grow at the same time without one series demonstrating the cause of the other.
Where to start with Georgia requirements
- The Secretary of State explains how to register a domestic entity.
- The Department of Revenue handles applicable accounts through the Georgia Tax Center registration process.
- The Secretary of State’s First Stop Business Information Center routes state, county, and municipal license questions.
- The University of Georgia SBDC provides assistance through its statewide network.
- The Secretary of State’s annual-registration guide lists the current filing window; dates and fees should be checked for the applicable year.
Source and calculation note
July figures come from the seasonally adjusted July 2026 BFS release. The trailing-year total sums unadjusted applications from August 2025 through July 2026 and compares them with the preceding 12 months. Per-capita rates use Georgia’s July 1, 2025 population estimate of 11,302,748; rankings cover 50 states using unrounded values. Small-business figures use 2022 employer and nonemployer components in the SBA profile, and county/industry employment uses 2023 CBP. Sources were retrieved or checked September 3, 2026.