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Ranked: The Largest U.S. Corporations by Number of Employees

See this visualization first on the Voronoi app.

The Largest U.S. Corporations by Number of Employees

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Revenue and profit are common measures for measuring the size of a business, but what about employee headcount?

To see how big companies have become from a human perspective, we’ve visualized the top U.S. companies by employees. These figures come from companiesmarketcap.com, and were accessed in March 2024. Note that this ranking includes publicly-traded companies only.

Data and Highlights

The data we used to create this list of largest U.S. corporations by number of employees can be found in the table below.

Company Sector Number of Employees
Walmart Consumer Staples 2,100,000
Amazon Consumer Discretionary 1,500,000
UPS Industrials 500,000
Home Depot Consumer Discretionary 470,000
Concentrix Information Technology 440,000
Target Consumer Staples 440,000
Kroger Consumer Staples 430,000
UnitedHealth Health Care 400,000
Berkshire Hathaway Financials 383,000
Starbucks Consumer Discretionary 381,000
Marriott International Consumer Discretionary 377,000
Cognizant Information Technology 346,600

Retail and Logistics Top the List

Companies like Walmart, Target, and Kroger have a massive headcount due to having many locations spread across the country, which require everything from cashiers to IT professionals.

Moving goods around the world is also highly labor intensive, explaining why UPS has half a million employees globally.

Below the Radar?

Two companies that rank among the largest U.S. corporations by employees which may be less familiar to the public include Concentrix and Cognizant. Both of these companies are B2B brands, meaning they primarily work with other companies rather than consumers. This contrasts with brands like Amazon or Home Depot, which are much more visible among average consumers.

A Note on Berkshire Hathaway

Warren Buffett’s company doesn’t directly employ 383,000 people. This headcount actually includes the employees of the firm’s many subsidiaries, such as GEICO (insurance), Dairy Queen (retail), and Duracell (batteries).

If you’re curious to see how Buffett’s empire has grown over the years, check out this animated graphic that visualizes the growth of Berkshire Hathaway’s portfolio from 1994 to 2022.

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