Draylo Data · updated monthly from the federal census
How many freight brokers are there in the US?
As of July 2026, FMCSA's registration census contains 133,294 entities holding active freight broker authority — out of 4,468,278 registered entities of all types (carriers, brokers, and freight forwarders).
We recompute this from the complete federal census file — 4M+ rows — on the 2nd of every month. The number above has a date and a method, which is more than most citations of this statistic can say.
What's inside the 133,294
Every entity holding active broker authority, split by whether it also runs trucks.
Both counts use the same active-docket basis, so the two rows sum exactly to the headline.
Monthly trend
| Month | Active broker authorities | New registrations | hybrid at registration | New (frame diff) |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| July 2026 · to date | 133,294 | 125 | 8 | — |
| June 2026 | — | 395 | 40 | — |
| May 2026 | — | 483 | 68 | — |
| April 2026 | — | 617 | 108 | — |
| March 2026 | — | 628 | 98 | — |
| February 2026 | — | 473 | 83 | — |
| January 2026 | — | 547 | 78 | — |
| December 2025 | — | 484 | 65 | — |
How many freight brokers are there in the United States?
As of July 2026, 133,294 entities hold active freight broker authority in FMCSA's registration census. This page recomputes the count monthly from the full federal census file.
How many new freight brokers enter the market each month?
In June 2026, 395 entities carrying broker authority were added to the federal census (counted by registration date) — 355 as dedicated brokerages and 40 as carrier-broker hybrids registering both authorities at once. The trend table shows recent months, including the current month to date; formation varies with the freight economy.
Where does this data come from?
Directly from FMCSA's public registration census (the federal record of every registered motor carrier, broker, and freight forwarder). We archive the full multi-million-row file monthly and count entities whose registration carries broker operating authority. No estimates, no third-party aggregators.
Other sources say around 25,000 freight brokers — why is this number so different?
Both numbers can be right, because they count different things. The widely repeated ~25,000 figure comes from business-count estimates of companies whose PRIMARY business is freight brokerage. This page counts every entity in the federal census holding broker OPERATING AUTHORITY — a much broader population: dedicated brokerage firms, trucking companies that hold broker authority alongside carrier authority, one-person operations, authorities held as a secondary line of business, and registrations maintained by entities that aren't actively brokering. If you need "how many brokerage firms exist," the smaller estimates fit; if you need "how many entities can legally broker a load" — the denominator that matters for vetting, fraud exposure, and market analysis — it's the authority count on this page. (One disclaimer worth making explicit: our carrier-broker hybrid count also happens to sit near 25,000 — pure numeric coincidence. The firm estimates are not counting hybrids; they're counting dedicated brokerage businesses, most of which live inside our "pure brokers" figure.)
Why do published freight-broker counts differ so much?
Because sources measure different things: brokerage firms vs. authority registrations, all authorities ever issued vs. only active dockets, bonded vs. registered, and dated one-time studies vs. living counts. This page states its method — entities in the current federal census whose registration carries broker authority, with the active-docket subset as the headline — and refreshes monthly, so the number has a date and a definition.
Method: counts are computed from FMCSA's public registration census (full file, archived monthly). "Broker authority" = registrations whose carrier/shipper type includes broker operating authority; the headline figure is the active-docket subset where the census provides docket status. Citing this page? Link to it — the number updates monthly. · More Draylo research