The U.S. auto repair industry counted 149,164 employer firms running 167,884 repair and maintenance locations in 2022, with 958,913 employees and $161 billion in receipts. Nearly 96 percent of those firms have fewer than 20 employees, and together those small shops earn 60 percent of the revenue. Every figure below comes from the Census Bureau or the Bureau of Labor Statistics.
How many auto repair shops are there in the United States?
There are 149,164 employer firms classified as automotive repair and maintenance (NAICS 8111) in the United States, operating 167,884 establishments, according to the Census Bureau's 2022 Statistics of U.S. Businesses. The category covers general mechanical repair, body and paint work, glass replacement, transmission and exhaust specialists, oil-change shops and car washes. Because a firm can own several locations, the 18,720-location gap between firms and establishments is a rough measure of how many chains and multi-store franchisees operate in the industry.
The sub-industries show where the independents are. General automotive repair, the classic neighborhood mechanic, accounts for 79,429 firms and 84,101 locations. Body, paint and interior shops add 31,351 firms with 34,665 locations, car washes 15,675 firms with 19,463 locations, and automotive glass shops 5,597 firms with 7,033 locations. Oil-change and lubrication shops are the most chain-driven segment: 4,269 firms run 8,694 locations, more than two per firm. Transmission specialists (3,575 firms), exhaust shops (1,371) and other mechanical and electrical repair (3,525) round out the group. The Census counts each line separately, so the six-digit figures do not sum exactly to the industry total.
How much revenue does the average auto repair shop make?
Automotive repair and maintenance firms averaged about $1.08 million in receipts in 2022 ($161 billion across 149,164 firms), or about $959,000 per location. The spread by size is wide. A shop with fewer than five employees averaged about $358,000, one with five to nine employees about $1.08 million, one with 10 to 14 employees about $1.92 million, and one with 15 to 19 employees about $2.69 million. By specialty, a general automotive repair firm averaged about $903,000, a body and paint shop about $1.53 million, a car wash firm about $955,000 and an oil-change firm about $2.08 million, the last figure inflated by multi-location operators (about $1.02 million per lube location).
The 6,059 firms with 20 or more employees averaged about $10.5 million each and took in $63.6 billion, which is 39.5 percent of industry receipts. That leaves 60.5 percent, or $97.4 billion, with the 143,105 shops that have fewer than 20 employees. This is the reverse of industries such as fitness, where the large operators collect most of the money: in auto repair, the independents still earn the majority of the dollars, and the average small shop is a real business rather than a side trade.
How small is the typical auto repair business?
98,049 of the 149,164 repair firms, or 65.7 percent, have fewer than five employees, and 143,105 (95.9 percent) have fewer than 20. General automotive repair is the smallest-scale segment, with 68.4 percent of firms under five employees; body and paint shops run at 58.3 percent and car washes at 59.7 percent. Across the whole industry, the average location employs about 5.7 people.
Employment follows the firm count more closely than in most industries. Firms with fewer than 20 employees provide 557,512 of the industry's 958,913 jobs, or 58.1 percent; the 4.1 percent of firms with 20 or more staff employ the other 41.9 percent. A two-bay independent and a national collision chain sit in the same Census category, but the data says the typical auto repair employer is a shop with a handful of technicians and an owner who still turns wrenches.
How many people work in auto repair, and what do technicians earn?
The Bureau of Labor Statistics counted 1,034,500 jobs in automotive repair and maintenance in August 2026 (seasonally adjusted, Current Employment Statistics), down slightly from 1,042,100 in August 2025, a decline of 0.7 percent. The broader repair and maintenance sector (NAICS 811), which adds electronics, machinery and household goods repair, stood at 1,472,900 jobs in September 2026. The BLS payroll series runs higher than the Census employee count because it measures jobs at every establishment each month rather than employees in March of one year.
The technicians themselves number 825,800: that is how many automotive service technician and mechanic jobs the BLS counted in 2025, with a median pay of $50,620 a year, or $24.34 an hour. Employment is projected to grow 5 percent from 2025 to 2035, adding about 40,900 jobs, faster than the average for all occupations. Only 25 percent of technicians work in independent mechanical and electrical repair shops; 32 percent work at automobile dealers, 15 percent are self-employed and 6 percent work for parts, accessories and tire retailers. On the Census side, repair firms paid $44.2 billion in payroll in 2022, which is 27.5 percent of receipts and about $46,100 per employee; the per-employee figure sits below the technician median because the industry also employs part-time staff, car wash attendants and front-counter workers.
How fast are auto repair prices rising?
Auto repair prices rose 5.2 percent between August 2025 and August 2026. The BLS consumer price index for motor vehicle maintenance and repair stood at 465.136 in August 2026 (1982–84 = 100) against 441.987 a year earlier, and it is up 5.8 percent since December 2025 alone. In plain terms, a repair bill that cost $1,000 a year ago costs about $1,052 today.
For a shop owner, the index cuts both ways. Average ticket sizes rise with parts and labor costs, which lifts revenue per bay, but the same inflation raises the cash tied up in parts on the shelf and in work-in-progress on the lifts, and body shops that wait on insurer payments carry that larger receivable for weeks. The cost of a new lift, scan tool or paint booth climbs with it, which is why most shops finance equipment against the equipment rather than paying from a month's receipts.
What these numbers mean for financing an auto repair shop
The data describes a trade of small, owner-run businesses that each turn over about a million dollars a year with thin staff and expensive equipment. Lifts, alignment racks, diagnostic systems and paint booths are usually bought with equipment financing, where the machine is the collateral; parts inventory and the gap between finishing a job and getting paid are covered by a line of credit or revenue-based funding sized on monthly card receipts. A shop with fewer than 20 employees and $360,000 to $2.7 million in annual receipts is exactly the profile that cash-flow lenders underwrite most often.
Our guides to auto repair business loans, the best auto repair shop funding options, funding for auto body shops, funding for tire shops and funding for car washes cover the products that fit each model. The Broker Shop is a funding broker, not a lender: one application is matched to the lenders among 50+ whose guidelines fit your shop, and those lenders compete for the deal. Checking your options won't affect your credit score, and it is free to apply.
Frequently Asked Questions
How many auto repair shops are in the U.S.?
The Census Bureau's 2022 Statistics of U.S. Businesses counts 149,164 employer firms operating 167,884 automotive repair and maintenance establishments. That includes 79,429 general automotive repair firms, 31,351 body and paint shops, 15,675 car wash firms, 5,597 auto glass shops and 4,269 oil-change firms. About 96 percent of all of them have fewer than 20 employees.
What is the average revenue of an auto repair shop?
Automotive repair and maintenance firms averaged about $1.08 million in annual receipts in 2022 ($161 billion across 149,164 firms), or about $959,000 per location, according to Census SUSB data. A shop with fewer than five employees averaged about $358,000 and one with five to nine employees about $1.08 million; general automotive repair firms averaged about $903,000, while body and paint shops averaged about $1.53 million.
Sources: U.S. Census Bureau — 2022 Statistics of U.S. Businesses, firms, establishments, employment, payroll and receipts by NAICS 8111 and its six-digit industries, by enterprise size · Bureau of Labor Statistics — Current Employment Statistics, all employees, automotive repair and maintenance (series CES8081110001), and repair and maintenance (CES8081100001) · Bureau of Labor Statistics — Consumer Price Index, motor vehicle maintenance and repair, U.S. city average (series CUUR0000SETD) · Bureau of Labor Statistics — Occupational Outlook Handbook, Automotive Service Technicians and Mechanics (2025 employment, median pay, 2025–35 projections, employment by industry)
Found these figures useful? You are welcome to cite or link to this page. Suggested attribution: “Auto Repair Industry Statistics 2026,” The Broker Shop — thebrokershopinc.com/auto-repair-industry-statistics-2026.html. Every figure links to its original primary source; averages, shares and the price change are computed from the Census and BLS figures named above.
Fund the lift before the next ticket
Equipment, parts inventory and the wait on insurer payments all come before the job is paid. One 2-minute application is matched to the lenders whose guidelines fit a repair shop. It's free, and checking your options won't affect your credit score.
See What I Qualify For →The bottom line: The auto repair industry is 149,164 firms and 167,884 locations earning $161 billion, where 96 percent of shops have fewer than 20 employees and those small shops collect 60 percent of the revenue; with repair prices up 5.2 percent in a year and technicians earning a $50,620 median, the independent shop's growth is paced by how it finances equipment and parts.