OREANDA-NEWS  The number of individual entrepreneurs (IE) in Russia has grown by 23% in three years and exceeded 4.5 million by the beginning of 2025, according to a study by analysts of the Kontur counterparty verification system.Focus", which was reviewed by RIA Novosti.

"The study showed that over the past three years (from 2022 to 2025), the total number of individual entrepreneurs in Russia has increased by 23.07%," the authors report. According to their data, if at the beginning of 2022 the total number of sole proprietors in Russia exceeded 3.707 million, then on January 1, 2025 there were already 4.563 million.

Last year, according to analysts, more than 978,000 new sole proprietors were registered. Experts analyzed the gender composition of entrepreneurs and found that there are usually slightly more men in this field than women: in 2024, the former accounted for almost 497 thousand new registrations.

The peak of registrations of new sole proprietors in Russia occurred in 2023, when more than 980,000 new entrepreneurs appeared. The statistics in this year differed from the usual ones: then women registered almost 498 thousand sole proprietors, that is, a little more than half.

"The gender division of the business is smoothly moving towards an even ratio of the parties. We see that the number of women and men registered as sole proprietors is about the same," the Kontur expert comments on the results of the study.Focus" by Anton Yakovlev.

Moreover, according to him, the trend of recent years has been the development of new types of commercial activities by women. The most popular business line among women, according to the authors of the study, is retail trade, the second most popular is the provision of services, followed by real estate transactions, land and pipeline transport, as well as the provision of food and beverages. Wholesale trade and construction work are also among the top business areas for women.