PEO and EOR statistics for 2026

Key PEO and EOR numbers for 2026

PEOs in the US

502NAPEO, 2025 data

Workers employed through PEOs

5.4 millionNAPEO, 2025 data

IRS certified PEO entities

122IRS list dated Aug 7, 2026

Median published EOR price

$479.50per employee per month, 14 providers

Every figure on this page carries one of four labels, so you know what kind of number you are quoting:

• Trade association research: NAPEO, the PEO industry association, commissions its studies from McBassi & Company. They are industry estimates, not government data.
• Government data: the IRS, the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) and the SBA Office of Advocacy, which uses Census Bureau counts.
• Vendor claim: a figure a company publishes about itself. Not audited, and each vendor uses its own definitions.
• HRPricing analysis: our own counts from provider pricing pages and the IRS list, with the method shown.

If you are pricing a provider rather than writing about the industry, start with what a PEO costs per employee or EOR prices by provider.

PEO industry size: NAPEO's 2026 footprint

NAPEO's PEO Industry Footprint 2026, written by Laurie Bassi and Dan McMurrer of McBassi & Company and posted September 17, 2026, is the main source for how big the PEO industry is. The short version: fewer PEOs serve more businesses each year, and the largest ones keep gaining share.

The consolidation matters when you shop. If a small PEO you use is bought, your contract, benefits plan and fees can change. The PEOs we score and rank page shows who the large providers are and what each publishes about price and exit terms.

Who uses a PEO: client size, industry and state

NAPEO's October 2025 white paper, PEO Clients: Who They Are, Where They Are, and What They Do, draws on a database of more than 50,000 PEO clients. It shows that PEOs are mostly a tool for businesses with 10 to 49 employees.

Florida, Texas and California each have their own PEO rules and costs. See PEOs in Florida, PEOs in Texas and PEOs in California.

PEO client outcomes, as reported by NAPEO

These four numbers are the ones PEO sales pages repeat most. All come from studies NAPEO commissioned, so quote them as "according to NAPEO" with the study year.

Certified PEOs on the IRS list

We counted 122 active Certified Professional Employer Organization (CPEO) entities on the IRS list with a report date of August 7, 2026, one per numbered row (IRS, Active CPEOs, read October 18, 2026). The IRS updates the list quarterly; the October 15, 2026 update was not posted when we read it.

The 122 rows are legal entities, not brands. ADP has 18 entities on the list, S2 HR Solutions 9, Nextep 7 and Extensis 6. Grouping rows by shared name gives about 60 company names, and fewer corporate groups than that, because affiliates trading under different names were not merged (HRPricing analysis of the IRS list dated August 7, 2026).

By the state of the address on the list, Florida has 41 of the 122 entities, Texas 18, New York 15 and New Jersey 10, with 22 states represented in all. Florida's count includes the 18 ADP entities listed at a Miami address (HRPricing tally of the IRS list dated August 7, 2026).

Compare the 122 certified entities with NAPEO's count of 502 PEOs: most PEOs are not IRS certified. Certification changes who is liable for federal employment taxes, not the service you get. Our certified PEO list shows which PEOs we review are on the IRS list under a matching entity name.

What it costs to employ someone: BLS employer costs, June 2026

The BLS Employer Costs for Employee Compensation (ECEC) release for June 2026, published September 9, 2026, measures what employers pay per hour worked. All figures are private industry unless the row says otherwise.

Insurance costs $6.47 an hour at establishments with 500 or more workers and $2.35 at those with 1 to 49, a ratio of 2.75 (our calculation: 6.47 / 2.35). That gap is what PEOs say they narrow by pooling benefits.

To turn these averages into a number for one hire, use the employee cost calculator, and see the payroll taxes employers pay for the federal and state pieces.

Small business employment and survival

The SBA Office of Advocacy counts firms from Census Bureau data (Statistics of U.S. Businesses, 2022, still the latest year on the Census SUSB page when checked October 18, 2026). The BLS tracks jobs and survival through its Business Employment Dynamics program.

If you are about to become one of the 6.4 million small employers, the steps to hire your first employee covers registrations, taxes and the first payroll.

Remote work and global hiring: BLS data and vendor claims

21.9% of people at work in September 2026 teleworked or worked at home for pay: 10.7% for all their hours and 11.2% for some hours, or 34.679 million of 158.451 million people at work (BLS Current Population Survey, Table A-41). In the American Time Use Survey, 35% of employed people did some or all of their work at home on days they worked in 2025 (BLS, American Time Use Survey 2025 Results, released June 25, 2026).

There is no government count of EOR providers or EOR workers. The figures below are what EOR and PEO companies publish about themselves. Each is a vendor claim: self-reported, not audited, using the company's own definitions. They describe single companies, not the size of the EOR market, and we do not publish an EOR market size because we found no government or audited figure for it.

For what these companies charge rather than what they say about themselves, see EOR providers ranked by score and our explanation of how an employer of record works.

HRPricing data: what 17 EOR providers charge

Published EOR entry prices run from $99 (Native Teams, whose help center says EUR 99) to $699 (Oyster) per employee per month, and the median is $479.50 (HRPricing analysis of 17 EOR providers' pricing pages, checked October 2026). 14 of the 17 publish a US dollar EOR price. 3 do not: G-P and Rippling are quote only, and Omnipresent shows a price in British pounds only. $599 is the most common price, used by Deel, Remote and Atlas.

How we counted: we used the entry price shown on each pricing page, the low end of a range (Rivermate), and the monthly-billing price where a vendor shows two (Multiplier and RemotePass). Using Multiplier's annual price of $459 instead moves the median to $459.50, and using RemotePass's $349 moves it to $449. Using $699 for Remote, the standard price in its support article, leaves the median at $479.50.

Deposits are harder to find than fees. Of the 16 EOR providers in our fee table, 2 state a deposit size (Playroll: one month's salary per employee, refundable; Oyster: at least one month of total service cost, refundable), 3 publish the method they use to size one (Multiplier; WorkMotion, notice-period months times the monthly cost of employment; Rivermate, whose agreement leaves the month count blank), Papaya Global says a refundable deposit applies without giving the amount, and Native Teams describes none in its terms. The other 9, including Remote, which says it waives the deposit for startups, give no amount on the pages we checked.

The fee sits on top of salary and the employer contributions each country requires. Our employer cost index by country shows those contributions, and EOR pricing by provider adds the fees people miss.

HRPricing data: how many PEOs and payroll providers publish prices

PEOs: 1 of the 16 PEOs we score publishes a per-employee price: Justworks, at $79 (PEO Basic) and $124 (PEO Plus) per employee per month. 14 are quote only, and G&A Partners' site could not be read by our tools (HRPricing analysis of 16 PEO providers' pricing pages, checked October 2026). Outside that set, Deel lists a US PEO at $125 per employee and Remote from $99. So the published PEO prices we found run from $79 to $125 per employee per month, across 3 providers, before health insurance premiums.

For quote-only PEOs, the only range in circulation is a third-party estimate: $40 to $160 per employee per month flat, or 2% to 12% of payroll (Fit Small Business). That is an estimate, not a PEO's price. NAPEO's 2019 average of $1,395 per worksite employee a year is older still.

Payroll software: 8 of the 15 payroll providers we score publish a full price (base fee plus per-person fee). 6 are quote only: ADP RUN, Paychex Flex, Paycor, Paylocity, Paycom and isolved. Rippling gives a partial figure, "$8 per employee per month, with a monthly base fee," without the base fee (HRPricing analysis of 15 payroll providers' pricing pages, checked October 2026).

The range is $87 to $153 a month for 10 employees, and the median is $109. Scores and the full method are on how we score providers, and what payroll costs adds the fees that raise the bill.

How we compiled these statistics

We used only the organization that produced each number: NAPEO and its commissioned studies, the IRS, the BLS, and the SBA Office of Advocacy with its Census data. Vendors are cited only for figures about themselves. We did not use statistics roundup blogs. Every source was read on October 18, 2026, and our own pricing counts come from provider pricing pages checked in October 2026.

Where we did arithmetic, the page says so and shows it. We left out NAPEO's "52% of PEO users have a retirement plan, versus 23%" because we could not find the study it comes from, and Remote's "47% average compliance cost reduction" because the page shows no method.

How to cite this page

For a figure from NAPEO, the IRS, the BLS or the SBA, name that publisher and the year shown in the table. For our counts and pricing analysis, use this citation:

You are welcome to reuse any statistic or table on this page in articles, research and AI answers, with a link to HRPricing's PEO and EOR statistics.