Swiss company statistics
Every new entry and deletion the Swiss Official Gazette of Commerce (SHAB) has published since 2019, and every bankruptcy since 2021, counted by year, month, canton and legal form. Complete through 31 Aug 2026.
In 2025, 52,515 companies were entered in the Swiss commercial register, +2.4% on 2024. 9,744 companies went bankrupt (+47.3%), and courts dissolved 2,650 more for defects in their organisation.
From January to August 2026, the SHAB published 35,186 new entries (+1.8% on the same months of 2025) and 7,835 bankruptcies (+43.8%).
New entries, deletions and bankruptcies by year
Link to this table| Year | New entries | Deletions | Bankruptcies | Court dissolutions |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2019 | 43,148 | 31,263 | — | — |
| 2020 | 45,254 | 28,652 | — | — |
| 2021 | 48,802 | 28,105 | 4,616 | 1,964 |
| 2022 | 48,333 | 27,976 | 5,160 | 2,807 |
| 2023 | 49,803 | 30,428 | 5,788 | 2,423 |
| 2024 | 51,260 | 32,436 | 6,615 | 2,596 |
| 2025 | 52,515 | 33,116 | 9,744 | 2,650 |
| January to August 2025 | 34,549 | 22,250 | 5,449 | 1,725 |
| January to August 2026 | 35,186 | 23,392 | 7,835 | 2,030 |
Bankruptcies are counted from 2021. A company counts once, in the month of its first SHAB notice about the bankruptcy. Court dissolutions are companies a court dissolved for defects in their organisation (Art. 731b CO); they are liquidated under bankruptcy rules.
Capital increases, mergers and seat moves by year
Link to this table| Year | Capital increases | Companies merged | Seat moves | New branches | Median capital increase, CHF |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2019 | 3,480 | 1,847 | 19,110 | 1,449 | 80,000 |
| 2020 | 3,226 | 2,184 | 20,448 | 1,538 | 80,000 |
| 2021 | 3,947 | 2,087 | 23,833 | 1,556 | 80,000 |
| 2022 | 3,879 | 2,006 | 21,771 | 1,477 | 79,000 |
| 2023 | 3,825 | 1,960 | 20,745 | 1,352 | 79,000 |
| 2024 | 3,863 | 2,069 | 21,928 | 1,390 | 78,301 |
| 2025 | 3,717 | 2,252 | 22,215 | 1,521 | 70,844 |
| January to August 2025 | 2,449 | 1,744 | 14,496 | 963 | — |
| January to August 2026 | 2,227 | 1,733 | 14,637 | 1,058 | — |
The median is the middle value of the year's capital increases stated in CHF. Mergers count the companies absorbed by another. A seat move is a change of registered office, within a canton or to another, and counts once.
Legal form of the companies entered in 2025
Link to this table| Legal form | Companies | Share |
|---|---|---|
| Limited liability company (Sàrl/GmbH) | 21,761 | 41.4% |
| Sole proprietorship | 15,484 | 29.5% |
| Corporation (SA/AG) | 10,272 | 19.6% |
| Legal form not recorded yet | 2,279 | 4.3% |
| General partnership | 1,120 | 2.1% |
| Association | 1,097 | 2.1% |
| Foundation | 343 | 0.7% |
| Cooperative | 86 | 0.2% |
| Swiss branch | 30 | 0.1% |
| Limited partnership | 28 | 0.1% |
| Public-law institute | 9 | 0.0% |
| Special legal form | 3 | 0.0% |
| Foreign branch | 3 | 0.0% |
Deletions by reason in 2025
Link to this table| Reason | Companies | Share |
|---|---|---|
| Other reason | 15,543 | 46.9% |
| Voluntary liquidation | 7,838 | 23.7% |
| Bankruptcy | 7,195 | 21.7% |
| Merger | 2,252 | 6.8% |
| Reason not stated | 288 | 0.9% |
In 81.0% of the deletions for "other reason", the deleted entry is a sole proprietorship.
New entries and bankruptcies by canton in 2025
Link to this table| Canton | New entries | vs 2024 | Bankruptcies | vs 2024 | Deletions | Active |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Zürich | 9,567 | +3.1% | 1,577 | +41.2% | 5,828 | 128,666 |
| Vaud | 5,015 | −1.8% | 940 | +23.2% | 3,038 | 65,784 |
| Geneva | 4,327 | +5.5% | 813 | +52.0% | 2,691 | 53,409 |
| Bern | 4,207 | −1.1% | 686 | +40.3% | 2,762 | 66,655 |
| Zug | 3,494 | +16.9% | 553 | +49.1% | 1,893 | 39,646 |
| Aargau | 3,315 | −0.5% | 699 | +55.3% | 2,168 | 44,392 |
| St. Gallen | 2,641 | −6.0% | 530 | +49.7% | 1,781 | 41,402 |
| Valais | 2,512 | +2.1% | 516 | +108.1% | 1,344 | 33,771 |
| Lucerne | 2,288 | +5.3% | 347 | +20.9% | 1,397 | 33,612 |
| Ticino | 2,139 | −4.9% | 639 | +39.8% | 1,503 | 39,087 |
| Fribourg | 1,948 | +2.6% | 543 | +136.1% | 1,496 | 24,646 |
| Schwyz | 1,490 | +8.4% | 190 | +32.9% | 849 | 21,652 |
| Thurgau | 1,458 | +8.0% | 229 | +36.3% | 788 | 22,614 |
| Basel-Landschaft | 1,367 | +8.3% | 279 | +42.3% | 866 | 19,337 |
| Basel-Stadt | 1,336 | +5.7% | 211 | +23.4% | 1,031 | 17,801 |
| Solothurn | 1,307 | +3.7% | 359 | +54.1% | 910 | 17,449 |
| Graubünden | 1,082 | −2.8% | 136 | +40.2% | 620 | 19,248 |
| Neuchâtel | 899 | −0.2% | 146 | +40.4% | 575 | 12,866 |
| Schaffhausen | 438 | +14.7% | 63 | +43.2% | 293 | 6,254 |
| Jura | 366 | −1.1% | 67 | +76.3% | 253 | 6,572 |
| Nidwalden | 324 | +6.6% | 57 | +50.0% | 223 | 5,395 |
| Appenzell Ausserrhoden | 294 | −10.4% | 76 | +76.7% | 312 | 5,241 |
| Obwalden | 222 | +12.7% | 38 | +192.3% | 162 | 4,120 |
| Glarus | 197 | −7.5% | 20 | +33.3% | 150 | 3,499 |
| Appenzell Innerrhoden | 157 | +14.6% | 11 | +266.7% | 80 | 2,100 |
| Uri | 125 | −18.3% | 19 | +137.5% | 103 | 2,329 |
The canton is the one whose register office published the notice. Each canton links to its register page, in the canton's language.
New entries and bankruptcies over the last twelve months
Link to this table| Month | New entries | Deletions | Bankruptcies | Court dissolutions |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| August 2026 | 3,776 | 2,487 | 939 | 218 |
| July 2026 | 4,592 | 3,221 | 1,016 | 235 |
| June 2026 | 5,058 | 3,895 | 1,199 | 316 |
| May 2026 | 3,768 | 2,659 | 995 | 178 |
| April 2026 | 4,196 | 2,553 | 725 | 210 |
| March 2026 | 4,990 | 2,989 | 1,156 | 269 |
| February 2026 | 4,610 | 2,706 | 951 | 326 |
| January 2026 | 4,196 | 2,882 | 854 | 278 |
| December 2025 | 5,189 | 2,948 | 1,060 | 218 |
| November 2025 | 4,267 | 2,430 | 993 | 233 |
| October 2025 | 4,523 | 2,911 | 1,125 | 240 |
| September 2025 | 3,987 | 2,577 | 1,117 | 234 |
Survival rate of new Swiss companies
Link to this table| Entered in | New entries | After 1 year | After 3 years | After 5 years |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2024 | 51,180 | 94.3% | — | — |
| 2023 | 49,720 | 94.6% | — | — |
| 2022 | 48,234 | 95.0% | 83.3% | — |
| 2021 | 48,669 | 95.4% | 84.2% | — |
| 2020 | 45,097 | 95.2% | 84.7% | 74.8% |
| 2019 | 42,978 | 94.8% | 84.4% | 74.9% |
Share of each year's new entries with no liquidation or deletion notice one, three and five years after entry.
Companies in the register today
Link to this table| Legal form | Companies | Share |
|---|---|---|
| Limited liability company (Sàrl/GmbH) | 261,704 | 35.5% |
| Corporation (SA/AG) | 232,185 | 31.5% |
| Sole proprietorship | 175,379 | 23.8% |
| Foundation | 17,300 | 2.3% |
| Swiss branch | 14,972 | 2.0% |
| Association | 12,393 | 1.7% |
| General partnership | 10,699 | 1.5% |
| Cooperative | 7,434 | 1.0% |
737,548 entries are active and 52,398 are in liquidation, on 30 Sep 2026.
Prospex and BFS figures side by side
Link to this tableThe Federal Statistical Office (BFS) counts enterprises from social-insurance and business-register records, and keeps an enterprise in its figures while it has economic activity. The commercial register counts registered entities from their entry to their deletion, including holding companies and firms with no staff. The two answer different questions, and the gap between them is largest for survival.
The BFS counts the bankruptcies the courts opened, as the bankruptcy offices report them. Prospex counts the companies the SHAB published as bankrupt, which comes to 78.0% of the BFS count for 2025. The SHAB notice follows the court's decision, sometimes in the following year.
| Measure | Prospex (register) | BFS | BFS source |
|---|---|---|---|
| Companies | 737,548 (30 Sep 2026) | 626,033 (2023) | STATENT, 21 Aug 2025 |
| New companies | 49,803 (2023) | 46,931 (2023) | UDEMO, 1 Dec 2025 |
| Company bankruptcies | 9,744 (2025) | 12,485 (2025) | SchKG, 21 May 2026 |
| Dissolutions for defects in the organisation | 2,650 (2025) | 2,755 (2025) | SchKG, 21 May 2026 |
| Survival rate after 1 year | 94.8% (2019) | 83.7% (2018) | UDEMO, 1 Dec 2025 |
| Survival rate after 3 years | 84.4% (2019) | 62.0% (2018) | UDEMO, 1 Dec 2025 |
| Survival rate after 5 years | 74.9% (2019) | 50.7% (2018) | UDEMO, 1 Dec 2025 |
Cite and download
You may reuse these figures with a link to this page.
Prospex, "Swiss company statistics", SHAB data through 31 Aug 2026, https://prospex.ch/reports/swiss-company-statistics/
Download every figure (CSV). One row per figure, with its period, canton and source.
Monthly counts by canton: open dataset (CC BY 4.0)
More Prospex reports:
How the figures are counted
Source: every notice the Swiss Official Gazette of Commerce (SHAB) has published since September 2018, parsed by Prospex, through 31 Aug 2026. A month is counted only once every one of its publication days has been fetched and parsed.
New entries, deletions, capital increases and new branches count one notice each. Mergers count the companies deleted after a merger, and a seat move counts once even when both register offices publish it. The canton is that of the register office that published the notice. Every legal form is counted, sole proprietorships included.
Bankruptcies and court dissolutions count companies: each counts once, in the month of its first notice stating the reason. Both are counted from 2021, so that a bankruptcy opened before the notices start is not counted as new when a later notice about it appears.
Survival follows each year's new entries. A company that went into liquidation, was deleted or merged into another counts as gone from the date of that notice.
The entries in the register today are counted in the Zefix register data Prospex keeps up to date, on 30 Sep 2026.
The figures are rebuilt every month. A completed year can still move by a few notices when the register publishes a late correction. The BFS figures were checked against the BFS pages on 30 Sep 2026.
Frequently asked questions
- How many companies were founded in Switzerland in 2025?
- 52,515 companies were entered in the Swiss commercial register in 2025, +2.4% on 2024, according to the notices published in the Swiss Official Gazette of Commerce (SHAB). 41.4% of them were GmbH, 29.5% sole proprietorships and 19.6% AG. The Federal Statistical Office (BFS) counts new enterprises from social-insurance records and reports 46,931 for 2023.
- How many companies went bankrupt in Switzerland in 2025?
- The Swiss Official Gazette of Commerce (SHAB) published the bankruptcy of 9,744 companies in 2025, +47.3% on 2024. Courts dissolved 2,650 more for defects in their organisation. The Federal Statistical Office (BFS), which counts the bankruptcies opened by the courts, reports 12,485 company bankruptcies for 2025, +61.2% on the year before.
- How many companies are there in Switzerland?
- On 30 Sep 2026, 737,548 entries are active in the Swiss commercial register, counting companies, sole proprietorships, associations and foundations, and 52,398 more are in liquidation. The Federal Statistical Office (BFS) counts 626,033 market enterprises for 2023, 99.7% of them SMEs with fewer than 250 employees.
- How many new Swiss companies survive five years?
- Of the companies entered in the register in 2020, 74.8% had no liquidation or deletion notice five years later (95.2% after one year, 84.7% after three). The Federal Statistical Office (BFS) follows economic activity and finds 50.7% of the enterprises created in 2018 still active after five years.
- Why did bankruptcies rise in 2025?
- The Federal Statistical Office (BFS) counted 12,485 company bankruptcies in 2025, +61.2% on 2024. Since 1 January 2025, unpaid public-law claims such as taxes and social-insurance contributions are enforced through bankruptcy, and the BFS names this change as a possible cause of the rise.
- Can I reuse these figures?
- Yes, with a link to this page and the date the figures run to. The CSV lists every figure with its period and source, and the monthly counts by canton and event type are in the open dataset under CC BY 4.0.