Search a trade, a town, or both.
39 trades, 6 families, 1,072 towns and 3,191 trade-and-town pages. Type any part of a name: "sparky", "man" or "cleaning lut" all find something.
Six families, 39 trades.
Companies House publishes SIC codes, not trades. The 39 groups here are ours, each a set of SIC codes a small business would recognise as its trade, gathered into six families. Property investment & letting is the largest single trade on the register, at 62,879 new companies over the last twelve months, 12% of everything counted here.
Management consultancy, Web & software development, IT consultancy, Advertising & design, Business support services, Architecture & engineering, Education & training, IT support, Estate agents, Accounting, Recruitment, Photography, Legal services Retail and food 127,519 8 trades · Last 12 months
Online retail, Takeaways, Restaurants & cafes, Hairdressing & beauty, Convenience stores, Catering & events, Pubs & bars, Wholesale Property 82,489 2 trades · Last 12 months
Property investment & letting, Property management Building and trades 75,611 4 trades · Last 12 months
Construction, Electricians, Plumbers & HVAC, Landscaping People and care 42,853 7 trades · Last 12 months
Health practitioners, Cleaning services, Care services, Fitness, Security services, Childcare, Veterinary Transport and logistics 36,013 5 trades · Last 12 months
Freight & couriers, Motor vehicle repair, Used car dealers, Taxi & private hire, Removals
Property investment & letting · Construction · Online retail · Management consultancy · Web & software development · Takeaways · Property management · Restaurants & cafes · Freight & couriers · Health practitioners · IT consultancy · Advertising & design · Hairdressing & beauty · Business support services · Cleaning services · Convenience stores · Education & training · Architecture & engineering · Catering & events · Motor vehicle repair · IT support · Used car dealers · Pubs & bars · Plumbers & HVAC · Wholesale · Electricians · Care services · Estate agents · Taxi & private hire · Accounting · Recruitment · Landscaping · Fitness · Security services · Photography · Legal services · Removals · Childcare · Veterinary
All 39 trades in one table, with the September count and the twelve-month running total for each.
The busiest towns.
New companies registered over the last twelve months, by the post town on the registered office address, or, where that office is a formation agent, by the town the company's directors run their other companies from.
London is counted as a single post town, so it is not really in the same contest as the rest of the list. It took 5.1 times as many new companies last year as Birmingham, more than the next eight towns put together. Leaving it in the ranking below would squash every other bar to a stub, so it sits up here on its own.
Ranked 2 to 9, without London
Bars scaled to Birmingham at 13,458, not to London
That is the top 9 of 1,072 towns, each of which has a page of its own with all 39 trades counted separately on it. See every town ranked, with a trade count for each.
Is the country really starting more businesses?
Partly. The register goes back over a century, and on it every one of these 39 trades looks like it is growing, which is the first sign that something other than growth is going on.
New companies in these 39 trades, so far this year
January to September 2026, against the same months of 2025
Older years undercount. The register only holds companies that still exist. Anything formed in an earlier year and since dissolved has dropped off it, so the further back the chart goes the more it undercounts. That alone makes every trade look like it is growing. Some of the rise here is real growth and some of it is simply that recent companies have had less time to close. On the yearly series 39 of the 39 trades show 2025 above 2015, which twenty-four separate industries do not do together. The long view takes it apart properly.
Where every number comes from.
One free public file: the Companies House bulk company data snapshot of 1 October 2026. Nothing on this site is modelled or estimated: every figure is a count of rows in it, and the awkward parts are written down rather than smoothed over.
The three things worth knowing before you quote any of it: the register only holds companies that still exist, so older years undercount; a company can carry four SIC codes and so land in more than one trade; and a registered office is very often a formation agent's mailbox rather than anywhere the company trades. The method in full, with the figures, and how to find newly registered companies yourself.
278,800 new companies, registered March to October 2026. Any month from £15.
278,800 companies registered across the UK in March to October 2026 are in the file, each with its name, number, registered address, directors and trade. Every company registered, with its website, email and phone number where we can find one. Most companies this new have no website yet, so many rows will be the company, its address and its directors.
Bought per trade, or as one file for a family of trades. National, the whole UK; filter by town in the file. Any month from £15. 3p a company, £15 minimum an order. Pick one month, any mix, or everything.
- Construction 40,243 companies £1086.56
- Property investment & letting 38,881 companies £1049.79
- Online retail 30,598 companies £826.15
- Management consultancy 21,892 companies £591.08
- Web & software development 17,110 companies £461.97
- Every trade, with its count and price
Every list shows its count and price before you pay. Pay by card; within a minute an email tells you when your file will arrive.
Not ready to buy? Every one of the 39 trades has a free sample: its 25 newest companies, with each one's registered address and directors, as a CSV. Pick the trade.