As of early September 2026, 659,090 sole proprietors were operating in the retail sector in Ukraine—that is, nearly one in three registered entrepreneurs in the country—according to data from the Unified State Register cited by Opendatabot.
After a decline in 2025, the number of entrepreneurs in retail began to grow again. From January through August 2026, 8,196 more sole proprietors were registered in the sector than ceased operations.
The trend in recent years has been uneven. In 2021, 2022, and 2025, the number of business closures in the retail sector exceeded the number of new registrations. The most challenging year was 2022, when the net loss amounted to nearly 25,000 entrepreneurs.
The most common sector remains retail in non-specialized stores—this is the business of about 208,000 sole proprietors, or 32% of all retail entrepreneurs.
Another 159,900 entrepreneurs, or 24%, work in markets and sell from stalls. About 107,400, or 16%, make sales outside of stores, including online.
Thus, about three-quarters of Ukrainian retail entrepreneurs are concentrated in just three major formats—non-specialized stores, market trade, and sales outside of brick-and-mortar retail outlets.
The Dnipropetrovsk region has the highest number of sole proprietors in the retail sector—46,400. It is followed by the Odesa region with 44,500, Kyiv with 43,900, the Lviv region with 40,700, and the Kharkiv region with 40,600.
The Opendatabot study was published on September 11, 2026, and is based on data from the Unified State Register.
Original source: Opendatabot—nearly one in three sole proprietorships operates in retail
#Ukraine #SoleProprietorship #Retail #Entrepreneurship #Trade
