Entrepreneurs who start and grow a business, create wealth, and provide the majority of the nations’ jobs, have rightly earned the reputation as the modest heroes of the U.S. economy. Less visible, however, are the swiftly rising numbers of solopreneurs who are successfully attracting customers, increasing their revenues, and extending their reach all while working by themselves.
That low public profile of business owners who have no employees masks their growing ranks and economic might. Data published in May by the U.S. Census Bureau said there were 29.8 million non-employer companies that generate about $1.7 trillion in revenues, about 6.8 percent of total GDP. But while those were the most recent official figures, they date way back to 2022. More recent estimates by independent organizations say the number of solopreneurs now likely exceeds 41 million.
That figure may be even higher. MBO Partners, which specializes in matching solo workers with companies looking for outside help, released a report last month pegging the total number of “independents” – which also includes solopreneurs, freelancers, and contractors — at 72.9 million. Those single-person businesses now far outnumber traditional small companies the make up by far the largest part of the private sector.
Last year the Small Business Administration (SBA) said it received an average of 440,000 applications from solopreneurs each month, representing a 90 percent increase over pre-pandemic volumes. Those owner staffed companies made up “81.9 percent, or 28,477,518” of the total “34,752,434 small businesses in the U.S.” in 2024, according to the SBA.
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What’s driving that go-it-alone growth? In large part, solopreneurs share many of the same ambitions as small business employers.
Those include the desire to be their own boss, having more control over their financial fates, and having more flexibility in how they decide to work than if they were employees. Additional factors make the solitary approach appear increasingly appealing, and more financially viable than ever before.
Tech Boosts Solopreneur Viability
A big element in that is the spread of artificial intelligence (AI) applications, which offer solopreneurs virtual workforce support that they don’t have to hire or manage. Business owners working on their own can now delegate research, accounting, marketing, emailing, and an array of other tasks they’d previously shouldered themselves to many affordable — sometimes free — chatbots.
Those same virtual assistants are of course available to small business employers and corporations as well. But they’ve proven particularly helpful to solopreneurs launching and staffing their companies alone, and growing them afterward.
According to experts cited in a recent CNBC report on those solitary business owner-operators, AI gave solopreneurs a boost in creating, then strengthening business plans to present to outside partners.
“And that business plan would probably be solid enough for a first draft to go to a bank or a banker or an SBA lender and say, ‘Hey, you know, I got a business plan and I have a little bit of money and I want to start this venture and how can you help me?’” Mark Valentino, the head of business banking at Citizens Bank, told CNBC while explaining how AI and other tech is boosting solopreneurship. “I think the barriers to entry for being a small business owner now are probably the least they’ve ever been.”
Online platforms have lowered those obstacles further by helping solo business owners to expand their customer base.
Instagram, YouTube, Patreon, and particularly TikTok have permitted solopreneurs to rapidly establish brands based on their personalities, and use those to market products or services to potential clients around the nation and world. That exposure, combined with AI and other powerful tech tools, now give single-person businesses the ability to promote themselves in ways only large companies could afford in the past.
Solo Bosses Earn $500K Within Five Years
That is also translating into higher revenues that make solopreneurship viable, and often quite profitable.
According to MB Partners’ 2025 study, “5.6 million Independent workers reported earning more than $100,000 annually — well above the typical U.S. worker salary of approximately $66,000.” That cohort increased by 19 percent over last year, and was nearly double the number earning six figures in 2020.
Even more remarkably, a recent study by payroll and HR platform Gusto found solopreneurs on average increase their revenues by 15 percent annually during their first five years of operation. By the end of that initial half decade, its findings said, most of those single-staff businesses are earning $500,000 per year.
“This report shows that solopreneurs don’t just earn a living, they’re building something durable,” the Gusto study said. “Over time, they outpace traditional employees in both revenue and pay. And while their paths vary by industry, age, and structure, the signal is clear: for those who choose it, solopreneurship is a viable and often rewarding career path.”