How many companies and self-employed people are there in Germany?

How many companies are there in Germany?

In 2024, Germany had around 3.5 million companies, counted as legal units. The Federal Statistical Office (Destatis) reports this from its Statistical Business Register. These companies had 40.1 million employees and a combined turnover of around €9.8 trillion.

84 percent of them had fewer than ten employees.

The figure can only be compared with earlier years to a limited extent: from reporting year 2024 onward, the Federal Statistical Office switched its employment data to the so-called job concept (Jobkonzept).

How many small and medium-sized enterprises are there?

In 2024, 3.2 million companies counted as small and medium-sized enterprises, that is 99.3 percent. Around 2.7 million of them were micro-enterprises; around 21,500 were large enterprises.

Small and medium-sized enterprises employed 54 percent of the 39.3 million persons employed: around 18 percent in micro-enterprises, 20 percent in small and 16 percent in medium-sized enterprises.

This analysis covers companies in manufacturing, energy and water supply, trade, hospitality and other service sectors. It therefore does not cover all sectors of the economy and is not directly comparable with the 3.5 million legal units from the business register.

How many self-employed people are there in Germany?

In 2024, around 3.6 million people in Germany were self-employed as their main occupation: around 2.4 million men and 1.2 million women (IfM Bonn, microcensus). The self-employment rate, i.e. the share of self-employed people among all persons in employment, was 8.4 percent. For men it was 10.5 percent, for women 5.9 percent.

For 2025, the Federal Statistical Office reports around 3.66 million self-employed people in Germany. By this count, there were still 4.04 million in 2020.

The two values differ because they are determined differently. IfM Bonn analyzes the microcensus. The Federal Statistical Office uses the employment accounts of the national accounts and also counts contributing family workers. Anyone quoting one of the figures should name the source.

How many solo self-employed are there?

Around 1.8 million self-employed people had no employees in 2024. That is 50.6 percent of all self-employed people (IfM Bonn).

Measured against all persons in employment aged 15 to 64, 3.5 percent were solo self-employed in 2025: 3.1 percent of women and 3.8 percent of men. The share rises with age, from 1.1 percent among 15- to 24-year-olds to 5.2 percent among 55- to 64-year-olds (Federal Statistical Office, Labor Force Survey).

How many new businesses are started each year?

According to the KfW-Gründungsmonitor 2026 (KfW’s annual start-up survey), around 690,000 people became self-employed in 2025, up from 585,000 the year before. 483,000 of them started as a sideline, 206,000 full-time. 40 percent were younger than 30, 35 percent were women.

IfM Bonn arrives at around 395,000 business start-ups for 2025. It counts people who newly took up full-time self-employment in the respective year. There were 78.1 start-ups per 10,000 people of working age.

The two figures cannot be compared directly: KfW surveys around 50,000 people every year, while IfM calculates with official data. Anyone quoting one of the figures should name the source.

How are company insolvencies developing?

In 2025, German local courts registered 24,064 company insolvency filings, 10.3 percent more than in the previous year. The last time the figure was higher was 2014, with 24,085 cases. In 2009 there were 32,687 (Federal Statistical Office).

Creditors’ expected claims came to around €47.9 billion in 2025, after around €58.1 billion in 2024. There were 69 insolvencies per 10,000 companies. The most affected sectors were transport and storage (133), hospitality (108) and construction (104).

The number also rose in the first half of 2026: from January to June, 12,812 company insolvency filings were registered, 6.7 percent more than in the same period of the previous year.

The statistics record a filing only after the insolvency court’s first decision. In many cases, the actual filing was made around three months earlier.

How punctually are invoices paid in Germany?

In Germany, 22 percent of invoices are paid late (17 percent) or not at all (5 percent). The European average is about one in four invoices.

The average payment term in Germany is 22 days for consumers and 31 days for business customers. When the deadline is exceeded, consumers pay on average 20 days and business customers 23 days after the due date.

The basis is the EOS study European Payment Practices 2025: 2,200 finance decision-makers in 11 European countries, surveyed by Kantar between March and May 2025. How to follow up on an overdue invoice is covered in the guide Writing a dunning letter.

Where the figures come from

Every figure on this page comes directly from its publisher: the Federal Statistical Office, the Institut für Mittelstandsforschung (IfM) Bonn, KfW and EOS. Where two sources give different values, both are shown with an explanation.

The page is reviewed as soon as a source publishes new data. The month of the last review is shown at the top of the page.