---
title: "How Many Gas Stations Are in the US: 2026 Census Count"
description: "There were 109,174 US gas stations with paid employees in 2023 (Census CBP), 88% of them with a convenience store. Counts by type and how we counted."
url: "https://vantainsights.com/insights/how-many-gas-stations-in-the-us"
category: "statistics"
primary_keyword: "how many gas stations in the us"
naics: "44711, 447110, 447190"
published: "2026-09-14"
updated: "2026-10-19"
---

# How Many Gas Stations Are in the US: 2026 Census Count

**109,174** - US Gas Stations With Paid Employees (Census CBP, 2023)

## Key Metrics

| Metric | Value | Source | Trend |
| --- | --- | --- | --- |
| Gas Stations With a Convenience Store | 96,002 | Census CBP, 2023 |   |
| Share That Also Run a Convenience Store | 87.9% | VantaInsights Analysis · Census CBP, 2023 |   |
| Gas Stations With No Paid Employees | 6,817 | Census Nonemployer Statistics, 2023 |   |
| Gas Station Employees | 1.0M | Census CBP, 2023 |   |

## How Many Gas Stations Are in the US?

The United States had **109,174 gas stations with paid employees** (Census CBP, 2023). Adding the 6,817 gas stations run with no paid employees (Census Nonemployer Statistics, 2023) gives 115,991.

The employer count is falling: it has been lower in every year since 2017. Gas stations with paid employees employ about 1.0 million people (Census CBP, 2023).

> **Key Takeaway** Almost nine in ten US gas stations are classified as convenience stores that sell fuel rather than as fuel stations. The classification follows what the site carries, which is why a gas station count and a convenience store count overlap in a way that catches people out.

## Gas Stations With and Without a Convenience Store

Most US gas stations are also convenience stores. Of the 109,174 with paid employees, 96,002 sell food and convenience items alongside fuel: 87.9% of the total, by our calculation from Census CBP data.

The remaining 13,172 are other gasoline stations (Census CBP, 2023): stations without a convenience store, including those built around repair service, truck stops and marine fuel stations.

The split is a classification of formats, not of sales. Census assigns an establishment to the convenience code if it carries convenience or food mart merchandise at all, so the figure tells you how many sites have a shop, not how much of the industry's revenue comes through it. A site with a small cabinet of drinks and snacks counts the same as a large forecourt store.

> **What the 87.9% Does and Does Not Say**
>
> It says that the fuel-only forecourt is now the exception in American retailing. It does not say how the average site earns its money, which depends on fuel volumes, store sales and repair work, none of which a count of establishments can show.

## What Counts as a Gas Station

Census splits fuel retailing in two, on a single test: whether the site carries convenience merchandise.

**Gasoline Stations with Convenience Stores (NAICS 447110)** comprises establishments retailing automotive fuels such as diesel, gasohol and gasoline in combination with convenience store or food mart items. Census is explicit that these establishments can be in a convenience store setting or in a gasoline station setting, and that they may also provide automotive repair services. The look of the site does not decide the code; the combination of fuel and merchandise does.

**Other Gasoline Stations (NAICS 447190)** comprises gasoline stations without convenience stores, primarily retailing automotive fuels, possibly in combination with repair services, oils, replacement parts and accessories, or food services. Census lists truck stops and marine service stations as examples of this code.

That last point surprises people: a truck stop, however large, is classified here rather than with convenience-store stations, and so is a marine fueling dock.

Working in the other direction, a convenience store without fuel pumps is not a gas station at all. Census classifies it as a convenience store under NAICS 445120, in food retail, and none of the figures on this page include it.

## Convenience Retail Is Split Across Two Industries

The consequence of that boundary is that American convenience retailing does not sit in one industry, and anyone sizing the sector needs both halves.

Sites with fuel pumps are gasoline stations. Sites without them are convenience stores in food retail, where Census counted 36,992 locations with paid employees (Census CBP, 2023). The great majority of the country's convenience retailing sits on the gas station side of that line.

> **A Common Sizing Error**
>
> Quoting the food-retail convenience store count as the size of US convenience retailing understates it severely, because it excludes every forecourt store in the country. Quoting the gas station count as the size of fuel retailing overstates how many sites are primarily fuel businesses. Both figures are correct; both answer narrower questions than they appear to.

Our grocery store count covers the food-retail side of the same boundary and explains the other half of it.

## Why the Code Changed Between 2017 and 2022

Gasoline stations were renumbered in the 2022 edition of the industry classification. The 2017 code 4471 is 4571 in the new edition, which moved the industry out of the retail trade sequence it had occupied since the classification began.

In practice this matters because the two Census programs used here are on different editions. County Business Patterns still reports on the 2017 codes, while Nonemployer Statistics uses the 2022 codes. Joining the two requires knowing that 4471 and 4571 describe the same industry, and a join done on the code alone silently returns nothing for one of the two.

It is also a warning about any longer comparison. A series that crosses the revision without accounting for it is comparing two differently numbered versions of the same thing, and a series that switches source mid-way may be comparing two different scopes. Where we show a trend for this industry, it is built on a single program and a single code.

## The Count Is Falling While Employment Is Not

The number of gas stations with paid employees has fallen in every year since 2017. Over the same period, employment at those stations has risen.

Both facts come from the same Census program and the same industry code, so this is not an artifact of two sources disagreeing. There are fewer sites, and more people working at them.

A count of establishments cannot tell you why, and we are not going to guess on a page like this. What it does establish is that the decline in station numbers is not a decline in the industry's employment, and that anyone citing the falling count as evidence of a shrinking business is citing the wrong measure for that claim.

## How We Counted

Gas stations with paid employees come from County Business Patterns, which counts each location that had payroll during the year, across the 50 states and the District of Columbia. Gas stations with no paid employees come from Nonemployer Statistics, which Census builds from tax records.

The share with a convenience store is our calculation: the convenience-store count divided by all gas stations with paid employees. Nonemployer Statistics does not split owner-run stations by type, which is why the split above covers only stations with employees.

The two programs do not overlap, because a business with any payroll is excluded from the nonemployer file. Both suppress figures that would disclose an individual business, most heavily at detailed geography, so national totals are more complete than the county figures beneath them.

## What the Count Does Not Show

A national total does not show where stations are, how much fuel they move or what they earn.

The full VantaInsights report covers the industry's market size from the Census Economic Census, with our projection; a five-year forecast with bull and bear cases; employment, establishment, payroll and wage trends (Census CBP, BLS); an industry outlook with growth drivers and risks; the competitive landscape; operating conditions: labor costs, wage pressure and macroeconomic factors; a SWOT analysis; state-by-state employment and establishment tables; and official Census market concentration (CR4, and HHI where Census publishes it).

**Get the report:** [Gas stations with convenience stores →](https://vantainsights.com/reports/44711-gasoline-stations-with-convenience-stores)

The state-by-state breakdown and the industry's trend over time are in our Gas Stations with Convenience Stores report, built from the same federal data with the dataset and year beside every figure.

For what a station earns on each gallon, see our analysis of [gas station fuel margin per gallon](https://vantainsights.com/insights/gas-station-fuel-margin-per-gallon). For the economics of the site as a whole, see [gas station profit margins](https://vantainsights.com/insights/gas-station-profit-margins).

## Frequently Asked Questions

### How many gas stations are in the US?

There were 109,174 gas stations with paid employees (Census CBP, 2023). Adding the 6,817 run with no paid employees (Census Nonemployer Statistics, 2023) gives 115,991.

### How many gas stations have convenience stores?

96,002 gas stations with paid employees also sell food and convenience items, 87.9% of the total, by our calculation from Census CBP data for 2023. The classification depends on whether the site carries convenience merchandise at all, not on how much of its revenue comes from the shop.

### How many people work at gas stations?

Gas stations with paid employees employed 1,016,960 people (Census CBP, 2023).

### Is the number of gas stations in the US declining?

Yes. The count of gas stations with paid employees fell in every year from 2017 to 2023 (Census CBP). Employment at those stations rose over the same period, so the falling count is not evidence of a shrinking industry.

### Are truck stops counted as gas stations?

Yes. Truck stops are counted with other gasoline stations, the group without a convenience store, which had 13,172 locations with paid employees (Census CBP, 2023). Census lists truck stops and marine service stations as examples of that code.

### Are convenience stores counted as gas stations?

Only if they sell fuel. A convenience store with pumps is a gasoline station with a convenience store. A convenience store without pumps is classified in food retail under NAICS 445120 and is not in any figure on this page.

### Why does the gas station NAICS code change between datasets?

The industry was renumbered in the 2022 edition of the classification, from 4471 to 4571. County Business Patterns still reports on the 2017 codes while Nonemployer Statistics uses the 2022 codes, so joining the two datasets requires mapping one code to the other.

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