There are 86,637 HVAC contractors on the US map in CUFinder’s places graph as of September 2026. And they are the best rated trade we measure, averaging 4.56 stars.
Updated September 2026. All first-party figures queried September 17, 2026.
I’m going to be honest with you. Most HVAC industry statistics pages are market-size projections stacked on top of each other, with no way to check any of them. I wanted the checkable layer: how many HVAC companies actually exist on the map, where they cluster, how they’re rated, and how reachable they are.
So I queried our own data. Every first-party number below comes from CUFinder’s places graph, dated September 17, 2026. Every external number comes from the BLS, the EIA, or AHRI, linked. This report is part of our business statistics hub. Cite anything with a link back.
HVAC Industry Statistics 2026: The Key Numbers
In a hurry? These are the headline HVAC industry statistics, each one ready to quote:
- 86,637 US HVAC contractors hold a public map listing (CUFinder, September 2026).
- Texas leads all states with 8,352 HVAC contractors; Texas, California, and Florida together hold 26% of the US total (CUFinder, September 2026).
- Rated HVAC contractors average 4.56 stars, the best of the four industries we measured this month (CUFinder, September 2026).
- 56.8% of rated HVAC contractors hold a 4.8-star average or better (CUFinder, September 2026).
- 35.1% of US HVAC contractors publish an email address, the highest share of any trade we measure (CUFinder, September 2026).
- 440,900 people worked as HVACR mechanics and installers in 2025, with 11% growth projected through 2035 (BLS).
- 88% of US households use air conditioning; in the South it’s 93% (EIA, 2020 RECS).
- Air-source heat pumps outsold gas furnaces for the fourth straight year in 2025 (AHRI shipment data).
Let’s take it from the top: what an “HVAC company” actually is in the data, and how many of each kind exist.
How Many HVAC Companies Are in the US?
86,637 HVAC contractors hold a public US map listing as of September 2026, counted across five contractor categories. Equipment stores and suppliers add another 8,450 businesses on top.
Here’s the trade mix inside that number:
| Contractor category | US listings | Share |
|---|---|---|
| HVAC contractor (full service) | 43,716 | 50.5% |
| Air conditioning contractor | 24,263 | 28.0% |
| Heating contractor | 12,759 | 14.7% |
| Air conditioning repair service | 5,357 | 6.2% |
| Furnace repair service | 542 | 0.6% |
The US HVAC trade mix by contractor category
Source: CUFinder places graph (210M+ local business listings), September 2026.
Stat 1: 86,637 US HVAC contractors hold a public map listing across five contractor categories (CUFinder, September 2026).
Stat 2: Half the trade (50.5%) now lists under the full-service “HVAC contractor” label rather than a single specialty like heating or AC (CUFinder, September 2026).
That 50.5% is a quiet story about consolidation of the trade identity. A generation ago you called “the furnace guy” or “the AC company.” Today half the industry brands itself as one combined trade, because heat pumps, service contracts, and year-round maintenance plans blurred the old seasonal split. The label data watched a trade merge with itself.
🧠 Fun fact: The dedicated "furnace repair service" category is down to 542 listings in the entire country. The furnace guy didn't disappear. He rebranded as an HVAC contractor.
Where the HVAC Companies Are: Climate Geography
Texas has the most HVAC companies of any state: 8,352. California follows at 7,250 and Florida at 6,883, and the three together hold 26% of the entire US industry.
That’s climate, not coincidence. The EIA’s residential energy survey found 93% of Southern households use air conditioning, against 73% in the West. Where compressors run ten months a year, contractors multiply. Here’s the top ten:
| State | HVAC contractors |
|---|---|
| Texas | 8,352 |
| California | 7,250 |
| Florida | 6,883 |
| New York | 4,074 |
| Illinois | 3,552 |
| Pennsylvania | 3,459 |
| North Carolina | 2,999 |
| Ohio | 2,873 |
| Georgia | 2,852 |
| Michigan | 2,535 |
Top 10 states by HVAC contractors
Source: CUFinder places graph (210M+ local business listings), September 2026.
Stat 3: Texas (8,352), California (7,250), and Florida (6,883) hold 22,485 HVAC contractors, 26.0% of the US total (CUFinder, September 2026).
Stat 4: 93% of Southern US households use air conditioning versus 73% in the West, and the contractor map mirrors that gap (EIA 2020 RECS + CUFinder, September 2026).
I understood this one viscerally before I understood it statistically. My Hamburg flat had no AC, like most of Germany. My first Texas August as a visitor rewired my brain. In half of America, HVAC isn’t home improvement. It’s life support with a maintenance plan.
But don’t read the map as cooling-only. New York and Illinois sit fourth and fifth, and Michigan makes the top ten. Those are furnace states. Heating keeps the northern half of this industry busy from October to April, which is exactly why the full-service HVAC label took over: a contractor who only cools starves half the year in Chicago, and one who only heats starves in Houston.
The Best Rated Trade on the Map
Rated HVAC contractors average 4.56 stars, and 56.8% of them hold a 4.8 or better. No other industry we measure scores higher.
Here’s the distribution across the 62,302 rated contractors, and the cross-industry comparison that puts it in context:
| Average score band | Share of rated HVAC contractors |
|---|---|
| 4.8 to 5.0 | 56.8% |
| 4.5 to 4.79 | 15.6% |
| 4.0 to 4.49 | 14.3% |
| 3.0 to 3.99 | 10.5% |
| Under 3.0 | 2.8% |
Where HVAC review scores land (rated contractors)
Source: CUFinder places graph (210M+ local business listings), September 2026.
Stat 5: HVAC contractors average 4.56 stars, ahead of landscaping (4.51), restaurants (4.21), and trucking (4.01) measured the same way (CUFinder, September 2026).
Stat 6: 71.9% of US HVAC contractors have at least one Google review; 28.1% sit at zero, well below the 44.5% all-business average (CUFinder, September 2026).
Why do HVAC companies rate so well? Urgency plus relief. A tech who restores your AC during a July heat wave gets a five-star review written from a cool living room. Add service contracts, which mean repeat customers with a relationship, and careful reputations follow. The comparison with landscaping industry statistics is close on averages, but HVAC gets far more of its customers to actually write the review. We track how these patterns hold across every category in our online review statistics report.
🔍 Did you know? Only 2.8% of rated HVAC contractors average under 3.0 stars. In an urgency trade, chronically bad operators don't survive the review economy long enough to accumulate a bad average.
The Most Reachable Trade
35.1% of US HVAC contractors publish an email address, the highest share of any industry we measure. For once, the inbox is a real channel.
| Channel | Contractors with it | Share of 86,637 |
|---|---|---|
| Phone number | 82,767 | 95.5% |
| Website | 52,376 | 60.5% |
| Email address | 30,442 | 35.1% |
| 24,520 | 28.3% | |
| 16,942 | 19.6% | |
| 10,617 | 12.3% | |
| Twitter/X | 8,756 | 10.1% |
| YouTube | 7,141 | 8.2% |
| TikTok | 1,118 | 1.3% |
Digital channels of US HVAC contractors
Source: CUFinder places graph (210M+ local business listings), September 2026.
Stat 7: 35.1% of US HVAC contractors publish an email address, versus 29.6% of restaurants, 27.8% of landscapers, and 17.4% of trucking companies (CUFinder, September 2026).
Stat 8: 39.5% of US HVAC contractors still have no website, close to the pattern in the wider no-website economy (CUFinder, September 2026).
The email number fits how this trade sells. HVAC runs on quotes: a homeowner requests three bids for a $12,000 heat pump install, and quotes travel by email. Landscapers guess a lawn from the curb; HVAC contractors write formal proposals. Even so, four in ten contractors run without a website, a milder case of what we mapped in the no-website economy, and 28.1% still sit at zero reviews, the gap we sized across all industries in our review gap report.
The phone data rounds out the picture: 90.7% of contractors publish a standard fixed or mobile line, 1.7% run toll-free numbers, and only 5.9% list no phone at all. Every channel is open in this trade. That’s rare.
💡 Pro tip: If you sell to HVAC companies, email actually works here, but timing rules everything. Reach out in the spring and fall shoulder seasons. In July and January, your prospect is on a roof.
Contractors vs the Equipment Ring
In the US, HVAC is a contractor’s industry: 86,637 contractors against 8,450 equipment stores and suppliers, a 10-to-1 ratio. Worldwide, that ratio nearly flips.
Globally we count 327,000 core HVAC contractors and 208,895 equipment stores and suppliers, including 145,944 businesses listed simply as “air conditioning store.” In much of Asia and the Middle East, an AC is a retail purchase: you buy a unit in a shop and someone mounts it on the wall. In the US, it’s an installed system sold through a contractor with ductwork, permits, and a maintenance plan.
| Segment | United States | Worldwide |
|---|---|---|
| HVAC contractors (core trades) | 86,637 | 327,000 |
| Equipment stores and suppliers | 8,450 | 208,895 |
Contractors vs equipment stores: the US ratio flips abroad
Source: CUFinder places graph (210M+ local business listings), September 2026.
Stat 9: US HVAC contractors outnumber HVAC equipment stores 10 to 1; worldwide the ratio is just 1.6 to 1 (CUFinder, September 2026).
Stat 10: 145,944 businesses worldwide are listed simply as “air conditioning store,” more than the entire US contractor base (CUFinder, September 2026).
Why does that matter beyond trivia? Because it shows “the HVAC industry” is structurally different by geography. A manufacturer expanding into Southeast Asia is entering a retail market; the same manufacturer in Texas is managing a contractor channel. Same machines, different industries.
The Workforce Behind the Vents
Is HVAC a growing industry? The BLS projects 11% employment growth for HVACR technicians from 2025 to 2035, much faster than the average occupation.
The BLS Occupational Outlook counts 440,900 HVACR mechanics and installers in 2025, at a median $61,010 a year, with roughly 48,000 jobs to be added over the decade. And the equipment mix is shifting under their feet: AHRI shipment data shows air-source heat pumps outsold gas furnaces for the fourth consecutive year in 2025. Electrification is not a forecast in this trade. It’s the current shipping manifest.
Stat 11: 440,900 HVACR mechanics and installers worked in the US in 2025, earning a median $61,010, with 11% growth projected to 2035 (BLS).
Stat 12: Air-source heat pumps outsold gas furnaces for the fourth straight year in 2025 (AHRI shipment data).
Put the workforce next to the company map: 440,900 technicians across 86,637 listed contractors is about five techs per listed company. That average hides the real shape: a few hundred private-equity-scaled platforms with big crews, and tens of thousands of two-van shops. Every stat on this page describes both at once.
The World Map of HVAC
The US holds 26.5% of the world’s listed HVAC contractors: 86,637 of 327,000. India is second at 27,015.
| Country | HVAC contractor listings |
|---|---|
| United States | 86,637 |
| India | 27,015 |
| Brazil | 16,207 |
| Germany | 15,761 |
| France | 15,588 |
| United Kingdom | 14,983 |
| Indonesia | 12,310 |
| Turkey | 11,263 |
Top countries by listed HVAC contractors
Source: CUFinder places graph (210M+ local business listings), September 2026.
Stat 13: 327,000 HVAC contractors are listed worldwide; the US holds 26.5%, more than the next three countries combined (CUFinder, September 2026).
The warm-climate giants (India, Brazil, Indonesia, Turkey) fill the top ten, while chilly, radiator-heated Europe lists proportionally fewer AC-centric contractors. The map follows the thermometer, at home and abroad.
What This Means If You Sell to HVAC Companies
One honest section for the B2B readers. HVAC is the friendliest trade in our data for outbound: the highest email coverage (35.1%), near-universal phones (95.5%), and review profiles you can segment by. Two cautions from experience. First, seasonality is real: during a 2024 July heat wave, a partner’s HVAC prospects simply stopped answering sales calls because install queues ran three weeks deep. Sell in the shoulder seasons. Second, if you need the underlying records, our contractor email list covers HVAC alongside the other building trades, with the same honest limitation everywhere: the smallest one-van operators publish the least and stay hardest to reach.
Methodology: Where Every Number Comes From
First-party data. Counts come from CUFinder’s places graph of 210M+ local business listings worldwide, queried September 17, 2026. The 86,637 figure counts US listings whose primary category is one of five HVAC contractor labels (hvac contractor, air conditioning contractor, heating contractor, air conditioning repair service, furnace repair service). Equipment stores and suppliers are excluded from the core count and reported separately (US 8,450; worldwide 208,895).
Definitions. A listed contractor is a storefront place on the map, not a license registration, so counts run below license-registry totals. Digital presence flags are measured per listing. Zero reviews means no Google reviews at crawl time; score bands cover rated listings only. Review-count volume bands are deliberately not reported (our crawl stores very high counts conservatively).
External data. Workforce figures come from the BLS Occupational Outlook Handbook (2025 base year); household AC adoption from the EIA 2020 Residential Energy Consumption Survey; heat pump vs furnace shipments from AHRI monthly shipment data. Each is linked where cited.
How to Cite These HVAC Industry Statistics
Quote any number freely, with a link back. Ready-made citation: “According to CUFinder’s HVAC industry statistics report (September 2026), 86,637 US HVAC contractors hold a public map listing, and rated contractors average 4.56 stars, the best of any trade measured.” Canonical URL: https://cufinder.io/blog/statistics/hvac-industry-statistics/
FAQ
How many HVAC companies are in the US?
86,637 HVAC contractors hold a public US map listing as of September 2026 (CUFinder). License registries and business-count estimates run higher because they include registered entities without public listings. Both kinds of counts are valid; they measure different universes.
What state has the most HVAC companies?
Texas, with 8,352 listed contractors. California (7,250) and Florida (6,883) follow, and the three sun-belt giants hold 26% of the national total.
Is HVAC a booming industry?
Growing, yes. The BLS projects 11% technician-employment growth from 2025 to 2035, much faster than average, and heat pumps outselling gas furnaces keeps installation demand rising. “Booming” varies by market; the growth is steady rather than explosive.
Is HVAC becoming oversaturated?
The density math says no: 86,637 listed contractors serve a country where 88% of households use air conditioning, well over 100 million AC-equipped homes. Competition is real in metro cores, but demand per contractor remains deep.
How fast is the HVAC industry growing?
Technician employment is projected to grow 11% from 2025 to 2035, roughly 48,000 added jobs (BLS). That’s the workforce lens; equipment shipments and installed-base electrification add further growth on the revenue side.
What do HVAC technicians earn?
A median $61,010 per year as of May 2025 (BLS). Pay runs higher in union markets and high-demand metros.
What percentage of US homes have air conditioning?
88% of US households use air conditioning (EIA, 2020 RECS). The South leads at 93% and the Midwest at 92%, while the West sits lowest at 73%.
Do heat pumps really outsell gas furnaces?
Yes. AHRI shipment data shows air-source heat pumps outsold gas furnaces in 2025 for the fourth consecutive year. Electrification incentives and milder-climate installs keep widening the gap.
Are HVAC companies well rated?
The best of any trade we measure. Rated HVAC contractors average 4.56 stars, and 56.8% hold a 4.8 or better. Only 28.1% of contractors have no reviews at all, far better than the 44.5% all-business average.
It’s Time to Run the Numbers at Full Blast
86,637 contractors. A quarter of them in three hot states. The best ratings and the best email coverage of any trade on the map. And a heat pump revolution already showing up in the shipment data.
So next time you need HVAC industry statistics, quote the measured ones with dates and sources. Bookmark this page; the figures refresh as the graph grows.
Want a cut we didn’t publish, by metro, by trade line, by review band? Tell me. This report grows with its readers. You got this!
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