The Guernsey Business Census · Press
Numbers you can print
Nobody could say how many businesses Guernsey has. The company register records legal entities, not who actually trades; the directories say “dozens”. This census counts the Bailiwick’s real economy — every business, charity and public body with a live trading presence, each one verified against published evidence — and publishes the denominator beside every figure.
Everything below is free to reuse with attribution. Each line carries the base it is counted over and a citation you can paste. If the figure you need is not here, it is usually because it does not clear the bar yet — ask and we will tell you what we do have.
As of 25 August 2026
The lines
Every figure that clears the citable bar today: coverage high enough, count large enough, denominator named. They are ordered as the census itself ranks them.
Counted over all 3,038 active organisations
Presence, not paperwork: every one has a live trading or public presence verified against published evidence. The count is a floor.
Active businesses, charities and public bodies counted across the Bailiwick: 3,038. Island Graph, The Guernsey Business Census, island.gg/census#count — as of 25 August 2026.
Counted over all 3,038 active organisations
Alderney 146, Sark 51, Herm 12; Guernsey holds the remaining 2,829.
Of those, counted on Alderney, Sark or Herm rather than Guernsey: 209. Island Graph, The Guernsey Business Census, island.gg/census#islands — as of 25 August 2026.
Measured on 13 August 2026 by capture–recapture against independent listings (Google Business Profile and OpenStreetMap). The census has verified 3,038 of them, which is why every count on the page is a floor rather than a total.
Estimated true trading population of the Bailiwick: 5,000–6,000. Island Graph, The Guernsey Business Census, island.gg/census#coverage — as of 25 August 2026.
Counted over all 3,038 active organisations
1,167 organisations in a single parish — more than any other.
Share of everything counted that is based in St Peter Port: 38%. Island Graph, The Guernsey Business Census, island.gg/census#parishes-map — as of 25 August 2026.
Counted over all 3,038 active organisations
863 were verified from registers, press and sector bodies rather than from a site of their own.
Counted organisations with no website of their own: 28%. Island Graph, The Guernsey Business Census, island.gg/census#digital — as of 25 August 2026.
A sector on record for 2,900 of 3,038 organisations (95%)
Counted in every sector they work in, so the sector totals add up to more than the island does.
Organisations working in more than one sector: 27%. Island Graph, The Guernsey Business Census, island.gg/census#cross-sector-chord — as of 25 August 2026.
Counted over all 3,038 active organisations
144 organisations open their name with Le, La, Les, Des, Du or L’.
Names still carrying a French or Norman article: 1 in 21. Island Graph, The Guernsey Business Census, island.gg/census#names — as of 25 August 2026.
A parish on record for 2,675 of 3,038 organisations (88%)
The densest parish on record. Resident counts: States of Guernsey, Guernsey Annual Electronic Census Report 2023, Table 6.1.1 (population at 31 March 2023).
Organisations per 1,000 residents in St Peter Port: 59.3. Island Graph, The Guernsey Business Census, island.gg/census#parishes-per-capita — as of 25 August 2026.
Counted over all 3,038 active organisations
Discovery, not openings — these are businesses newly verified, not newly founded.
Organisations added to the register in the last 30 days: +489. Island Graph, The Guernsey Business Census, island.gg/census#pulse — as of 25 August 2026.
A capability on record for 2,527 of 3,038 organisations (83%)
Capabilities as published by each organisation and resolved to the graph.
Organisations with what they do resolved to the graph: 2,527. Island Graph, The Guernsey Business Census, island.gg/census#capability-rings — as of 25 August 2026.
Held back, on purpose: organisations trading for a century or more. Each of these is on the census page with its coverage badged, and each is real — but it sits over a base too thin to headline, so we will not hand it to you as a sentence.
The files
Regenerated hourly from the same aggregates the page reads, so a download and a chart can never disagree.
The desk
Writing a Guernsey business story? We will pull the numbers.
Standing offer, no charge, no exclusivity: tell us the question and we will run it against the graph and send back the figures with their denominators and the evidence behind them — openings and closures in a parish, how many of a trade there actually are, who is older than the harbour. The price is attribution and a link.
Licence
CC BY 4.0. Credit “Island Graph” with a link to the page or the edition you took the figure from. Licence terms.
Edition calendar
Editions are frozen quarterly. The next is Q3 2026 on 30 September 2026. If you are quoting a figure in print, cite an edition rather than the live page — it will still resolve next year.
How to word it
Every count is a floor: the census counts what it has verified, not what exists. So “3,038 counted” rather than “Guernsey has 3,038”, and “the oldest on record” rather than “the oldest”.
What we get wrong
Coverage is partial and stated openly; closures can lag reality by weeks; businesses with no web presence are under-represented. All three are on the methodology page in more detail than most people want.