Minnesota Small Business Statistics: 2026 Numbers and Growth

How many small businesses operate in Minnesota? The SBA’s latest count says 560,428, which is 99.5% of every company in the state, with 1.3 million people on their payrolls, or 45.8% of Minnesota’s workforce.

Add the large companies and Minnesota reaches roughly 563,000 businesses in total. The growth picture takes both hands to tell. New business applications dipped slightly in 2024, then hit a series high of about 73,825 in 2025. The churn data runs on its own calendar: between March 2023 and March 2024, more establishments closed than opened statewide, yet small firms still finished that window with a few hundred more jobs than they started.

Every figure below traces to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, the Census Bureau, the Bureau of Economic Analysis or a Minnesota state agency, each linked in the sources at the end.

Sizing Up Minnesota’s Small Business Population

The latest SBA state profile for Minnesota and Census data put hard edges on the count, and the count keeps moving: the prior edition listed 547,493 small businesses, so the 2025 profile added nearly 13,000 to the tally.

Behind the headline figure sit two very different populations. On one side, 118,083 small employer firms make up 97.5% of Minnesota employers; they paid $67.9 billion in wages in 2022, some 38.2% of the state’s payroll. On the other side sit the businesses with nobody on staff at all: 442,345 nonemployer operations that still brought in $25.2 billion in receipts that year.

Put differently, when you come across a Minnesota company, the odds it counts as small are better than 99 in 100, and close to four in five of those small businesses run without a single employee.

What Work Pays Across Minnesota

These 2024 averages span every private employer in the state, and the spread between the top and bottom sectors is wide.

• Across all private employers, 2024 pay averaged $74,792 a year.
• Management of companies pays the most, $145,344 on average, a reflection of the state’s corporate headquarters payrolls, with finance and insurance at $136,572, utilities at $134,890, and professional, scientific and technical services at $122,103.
• The bottom of the scale belongs to accommodation and food services at $26,730 and retail at $39,364.

Geography moves the needle almost as much as industry does. Hennepin County pay averages $90,957, about $16,000 above the statewide figure, while Dakota County sits at $72,828.

Inside Minnesota’s Industry Mix, From Clinics to Factories

Care work and factory work anchor the employment table, while consultancies and small offices dominate the establishment count. Health care and social assistance employs 510,901 people, about 1 in 5 private jobs, and its 20,704 jobs added in 2024 were the largest gain of any sector. Manufacturing sits second at 320,271 jobs, though it slipped 1.7% over the year.

• Retail trade employs 284,854 people and accommodation and food services 223,530.
• Professional, scientific and technical services runs the most establishments of any sector, 30,128 statewide.
• Counting firms of every size including solo operations, professional services leads with 78,850 small firms, ahead of transportation and warehousing (65,835) and construction (58,099).

Minnesota’s Growing and Shrinking Sectors

The year-over-year map shows care and culture climbing while office-adjacent work thinned out. Between 2023 and 2024, arts, entertainment and recreation grew fastest at 5.5%, with health care up 4.2%, educational services 2.1%, and transportation 1.6%.

On the losing side, administrative and waste services shed 5.3% of jobs, 6,833 positions, while management of companies fell 3.1%, information 2.7%, and manufacturing 1.7%. The short version: people-facing work expanded across Minnesota, back-office work contracted.

Twin Cities, Rochester and the Map of Minnesota Business

A caveat before the county numbers: the federal wage census counts every private employer in a county, whatever its size. Hennepin County, home of Minneapolis, holds 44,151 establishments and 824,584 private jobs, about 32.4% of the state total. The headquarters effect shows up plainly there: management of companies employs 51,998 people at $143,235 on average, and finance and insurance pays $165,586, the county’s highest-paying major sector.

• Ramsey County and Saint Paul add 270,987 jobs; management-of-companies roles there average $173,147.
• Together the two Twin Cities counties carry about 43.1% of Minnesota’s private employment.
• In Dakota County (166,495 jobs), health care has become the largest private employer at 24,929 jobs, with retail just behind at 24,020.
• Olmsted County around Rochester grew fastest of the four in 2024, up 1.7%, and health care alone accounts for about 52% of its private employment at an average $100,517.

Of the four counties profiled here, Olmsted is the outlier worth a second look: more than half of its private jobs sit in a single sector, something none of the others comes close to.

Startup Filings in Minnesota Surged Past 73,000

Formation numbers here are annual sums of monthly Census data, so treat them as close approximations. Minnesotans filed about 73,825 new business applications in 2025, the busiest filing year Census data has recorded for the state since at least 2018. That came after a slight dip in 2024, to about 67,673, making the 2025 jump worth roughly 9.1%. The longer arc bends up as well: about 47,431 filings in 2018, 64,971 in 2021, and 68,701 in 2023.

• Churn ran the other way in the most recent window measured: from March 2023 to March 2024, 16,029 establishments opened while 21,448 closed, across businesses of every size (the tally includes temporary closures and reopenings).
• Even so, small businesses ended that window up 617 jobs while the state total fell by 3,691.

The two series tell different stories because they measure different things. Applications are intentions filed with the government; the churn counts what actually opened and closed. In Minnesota’s case, filing intentions sit at a multi-year high while the turnover cooled.

Minnesota’s Loan Book and Export Ledger

Small firms fill most of the borrower list and most of the exporter list, though not most of the export dollars.

Minnesota’s Year in SBA Loans

Government-backed lending held its footing in fiscal 2024. Lenders approved 1,616 7(a) loans worth $687.2 million for Minnesota businesses; adding 195 504 loans ($159.5 million) brings the combined program total to about 1,811 loans and $846.7 million. The 7(a) side drove the gain, with roughly 3.4% more loans and 11.8% more dollars than in fiscal 2023.

• SBA microloans added 146 small advances worth about $2.6 million.
• Separately, CRA-reporting banks lent $1.1 billion to Minnesota firms with revenues under $1 million in 2023.

Minnesota Exporters, Large and Small

Most of the companies selling abroad are small; most of the dollars are not. Of the 7,946 Minnesota firms that exported goods in 2023, small businesses accounted for 6,785, or 85.4%. Their shipments came to $6.1 billion, about 25.8% of the state’s $23.7 billion in identified exports; larger companies carried the rest.

The Demographics of Minnesota Business Ownership

Two universes mix in the ownership rows: employer firms from the 2022 Census business survey, and totals that include solo businesses.

• Women own 41.8% of Minnesota businesses and make up 47.4% of the workforce; 22,395 employer firms are female-owned and another 12,901 are owned equally by women and men.
• Veterans own 5.5% of the state’s businesses: about 26,100 in all, 5,600 of them with employees.
• Hispanic owners hold 3.9% of businesses (2,477 employer firms); Black-owned businesses number 51,102 in total (2,602 employer firms) and Asian-owned 25,903 (4,903 employer firms).
• 141,775 Minnesota businesses are rural, set against 370,598 urban ones.

What Minnesota Produces and Who Comes to See It

Output keeps rising, and the visitor economy adds a layer of its own on top. State GDP came in at $531.47 billion for 2025, against $507.69 billion a year earlier; adjusted for inflation, that works out to real growth of about 1.6%, per federal economic accounts.

Lakes, Fairs and 81.6 Million Visitors

Explore Minnesota’s latest research condenses the 2024 travel year into a few big numbers.

• 81.6 million visitors came to Minnesota in 2024.
• They spent $14.7 billion across the state’s economy that year.
• Counting indirect and induced effects, the total economic impact reached $24.7 billion.

The 2026 Cost Sheet for Minnesota Founders

Minnesota’s paperwork is straightforward, and its renewal policy is friendlier than its tax brackets.

Forming a Minnesota LLC Costs $155, Renewing Is Free

The Secretary of State’s fee table is short, and its best line is the renewal.

• Articles of Organization cost $155 filed online or in person, $135 by mail.
• The annual renewal is free for an LLC in good standing, filed once each calendar year.
• A foreign LLC pays $205 online ($185 by mail) for its Certificate of Authority; reinstatement after administrative termination runs $85 online, and an amendment $55.
• Every LLC also needs a registered agent in Minnesota with a physical address in the state.

Our guide to starting an LLC in Minnesota walks the whole sequence, from the name search to that first free renewal.

How Minnesota Taxes Its Businesses and Workers

Minnesota taxes with more brackets, and higher top rates, than its modest filing fees might suggest.

• Individual income tax is progressive with four brackets: 5.35%, 6.80%, 7.85% and 9.85% for 2026; the top rate starts above $203,150 for single filers and $337,930 for joint filers, with brackets adjusted for inflation each year.
• The corporate franchise tax is a flat 9.8% of taxable income, set by Minnesota Statutes 290.06.
• Sales tax starts at 6.875% statewide, a 6.5% general rate plus a 0.375% rate that expires July 1, 2034. Per the Department of Revenue rate guide in effect in early 2025, Minneapolis charges 9.025% combined and Saint Paul 9.875%, the highest general rate in that guide, with Rochester at 8.125% and Duluth at 8.875%.
• The minimum wage is $11.41 an hour for all employers as of January 1, 2026, adjusted annually for inflation, with a $9.31 training rate for workers under 20 in their first 90 days and no tip credit allowed, per the Minnesota Department of Labor and Industry. Minneapolis and Saint Paul ordinances may require a higher rate.

The one-time filing fees are modest next to what an owner’s income-tax bracket can represent over time.

Minnesota Small Business FAQ

Sources

• The SBA Office of Advocacy, Minnesota 2025 Small Business Profile carries the counts, churn dynamics, ownership demographics, lending context, and export figures cited here.
• Industry and county pay, employment, and establishment figures for 2024 come from the Bureau of Labor Statistics, Quarterly Census of Employment and Wages.
• The Census Bureau’s Business Formation Statistics and Nonemployer Statistics feed the application series and the no-employee business totals.
• Fiscal 2024 loan approvals were tallied from U.S. Small Business Administration loan program data.
• GDP levels and the growth estimate derive from the Bureau of Economic Analysis, Regional Economic Accounts.
• Filing and renewal fees follow the Minnesota Secretary of State business fee schedule.
• Income tax brackets and local sales rates are published by the Minnesota Department of Revenue.
• Visitor volume and spending appear in Explore Minnesota’s tourism economy research.