New Firms Are 12.95% of Thailand's Active Companies (2026)
In short
12.95 percent of Thailand's active companies were formed in the last year alone. That is 128,617 new companies added to the register in 2025. Thailand counts 993,373 companies as active today. The same 2025 cohort is only 6.46 percent of the full company register. That full register holds 1,989,709 companies, active and dormant combined. Measured against the working economy instead of the whole archive, the freshness ratio very nearly doubles. 2024 formations were almost as fresh, at 12.25 percent of the active base. The active register renews fast.
What share of Thailand's active companies were formed in the past year?
Thailand counts 993,373 companies as active right now. Of those, 128,617 were born in the last complete year, 2025, according to the DBD (2026). That is 12.95 percent of the active register. Roughly one in eight companies doing business in Thailand today filed its founding paperwork sometime in 2025. Widen the lens to the full company register, 1,989,709 entries with dormant firms included, and the picture changes. That same 2025 cohort now equals just 6.46 percent of the larger total. The active register turns over roughly twice as fast as the full archive suggests. 2024 tells a similar story, with 121,657 new companies added that year. Those equal 12.25 percent of today's active base, so 2025 was not an unusual spike. Thailand keeps adding companies to its working economy at a pace that refreshes about an eighth of it every twelve months.
Active register composition: how much is brand new
- Formed in 202513.0%13
- Formed before 202587.0%87
Companies formed before 2025 still make up most of the active base, but the newest single year already claims almost an eighth of it.
New companies as a share of two different registers
| Founding year | New companies | Share of active register | Share of full register |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2025 | 128,617 | 12.95% | 6.46% |
| 2024 | 121,657 | 12.25% | 6.11% |
| 2023 | 112,461 | 11.32% | 5.65% |
New company counts by founding year compared against the active register and the full register, as of 17 Jul 2026.
Why the denominator changes the story
A freshness ratio is only as honest as what sits underneath it. Thailand's company register holds 1,989,709 entries in total. Of those, only 993,373 are still active. The other 993,336 are dormant. That is close to an even split. Divide new formations by the whole register and Thailand looks like a place adding one new company for roughly every fifteen already on file. Divide the same formations by only the companies still doing business and the picture changes to roughly one new company for every eight. Neither number is wrong. They answer different questions. An investor scanning the full register for competitors sees a slow six percent refresh rate. A recruiter, a landlord or a supplier trying to work out who is actually still trading sees a market where close to an eighth of the counterparties on their list showed up within the last year. The active register is the one that reflects Thailand's economy as it operates today, not as the paper trail remembers it.
Definitions
- Active company
- A company the DBD registry currently classifies as operating rather than dormant or dissolved.
- Dormant company
- A registered company the DBD registry currently classifies as inactive, including firms that stopped filing without formally deregistering.
- Active register
- The subset of Thailand's company register made up only of currently active companies, used here as the denominator for a single-year snapshot ratio rather than a multi-year trend.
- Founding year
- The calendar year a company was originally registered with the DBD, independent of whether that company is still active today.
Assumptions
- The 2026 founding year cohort is still incomplete at this snapshot date and is excluded from every ratio on this page.
- About 3,000 companies lack a recorded size classification and are excluded from the active versus dormant split, a small gap against the 1,989,709 total register.
- The 128,617 figure counts every company founded in 2025 regardless of current status, so a small number of already dormant 2025 vintage firms may sit inside that count rather than strictly inside the active total.
Methodology
Active companies are entities the DBD registry currently classifies as operating rather than dormant, aggregated from the registry as of 17 Jul 2026. New companies are counted by founding year as recorded in DBD filings, regardless of whether that company is still active today. The 2025 figure covers the full calendar year. The year 2026 is still in progress and is excluded from every comparison here. Shares are aggregate counts divided by aggregate counts, not an average of individual company ages, and a small number of companies without a recorded size classification are excluded from the active total.
How we verified this
- Active plus dormant companies were summed as 993,373 plus 993,336, giving 1,986,709, which matches the total count of companies with a recorded size band exactly.
- The 2025 share of the active register was recomputed as 128,617 divided by 993,373, giving 12.9475 percent, rounded to 12.95 percent.
- The 2025 share of the full register was recomputed as 128,617 divided by 1,989,709, giving 6.4641 percent, rounded to 6.46 percent, cross checked against a separate register-wide freshness page that reports the same 6.46 percent.
- The ratio between the active-register share and the full-register share was recomputed as 1,989,709 divided by 993,373, giving 2.0030, confirming the near doubling follows from active companies making up almost exactly half the full register.
- The 2024 share of the active register was recomputed as 121,657 divided by 993,373, giving 12.2469 percent, rounded to 12.25 percent, and the 2023 share was recomputed as 112,461 divided by 993,373, giving 11.3211 percent, rounded to 11.32 percent.
References
- Department of Business Development. (2026). Registered juristic persons and financial statement aggregates. Ministry of Commerce, Thailand. https://www.dbd.go.th/
- World Bank. (2024). New business density, new registrations per 1,000 people ages 15 to 64. World Development Indicators. https://data.worldbank.org/indicator/IC.BUS.NDNS.ZS
Frequently asked questions
What share of Thailand's active companies were formed in 2025?
12.95 percent. The DBD registry currently classifies 993,373 companies as active. Of those, 128,617 were founded in 2025 alone.
Is 12.95 percent unusually high?
No. The 2024 cohort added 121,657 companies. That equals 12.25 percent of the same active base, so the pace has been steady rather than a one-year spike.
Why does a smaller share appear elsewhere on this site?
A separate page divides the same 128,617 companies by the full company register instead. That register holds 1,989,709 entries, active and dormant firms together. That produces 6.46 percent instead. Both numbers are correct. They simply use different denominators.
Cite this page
Chatpong L. (2026). New Firms Are 12.95% of Thailand's Active Companies (2026). Max Data Insights. https://maxdatathailand.com/insights/new-company-formations-as-share-of-active-register-2026
Data & corrections
Download the data (CSV)Spot something off, or want to ask about the data? Email insights@maxsolutions.co.th. We publish corrections.
Written by
Chatpong L.Founder, Max Data, Max Solutions Co., Ltd.
Chatpong L. leads Max Data, a company-intelligence platform built on Thailand's official business registry. He writes about the structure of the Thai economy using primary registry data. His work covers company formation, industry concentration, and regional business activity.
Related insights
This page reports company-level and aggregate statistics only. It names no individuals and makes no claims about any person. Figures are provided for information and may be revised as source data updates.