Orlando businesses are opening at a faster clip than anywhere else in the country, with a new analysis putting the metro’s business entry rate at 14.14 percent — the highest of any metropolitan area studied. But the same report found Orlando also posted the nation’s highest exit rate, at 11.49 percent, underscoring just how much churn comes with the region’s entrepreneurial boom.
The findings come from a Squarespace ranking built on federal data, as reported by WFTV. Researchers pulled business entry and exit figures from the U.S. Census Bureau’s Business Dynamics Statistics program and layered in establishment survival data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics’ Business Employment Dynamics program, covering 19 industries. Squarespace produced the ranking using that federal data, and the station noted the information was current as of June 22, 2026, per Squarespace. The company also stressed the list is not an official government ranking.
Despite the high exit rate, Orlando still posted a net business growth rate of 2.65 percent, meaning new companies outpaced closures overall even as turnover ran hot. The Orlando-Kissimmee-Sanford metro area landed at No. 11 among the 50 largest U.S. metro areas in the broader rankings, with researchers noting that rapidly growing markets often experience considerable business turnover as new companies enter and reshape the local economy, per researchers cited in the same report.
How Orlando Stacks Up Against Other Fast-Growing Metros
Hartford, Connecticut, actually topped the overall metropolitan ranking, recording a business entry rate of 13.11 percent and a net business growth rate of 4.69 percent — outpacing Orlando on net growth even though Orlando’s raw entry rate ran higher. Hartford also posted the top exit rate among that specific measure at 8.42 percent, though Orlando’s exit rate of 11.49 percent was described as the highest among the metropolitan areas studied overall. San Antonio, Nashville, Raleigh and Austin rounded out the top five metros in the broader ranking…