Carrier Geography Analysis

Analysis

· as of July 1, 2026

The most counterintuitive pattern in this dataset is the divergence between carrier count rankings and power unit rankings, which reveals that registration volume and operational scale point to meaningfully different geographies. Georgia, for example, ranks fifth in carrier count with 134,467 registrations but holds 7,209,714 total power units — placing it third nationally by that measure and above Florida (8,317,816) only by a narrow margin, with an average fleet size of 58.7 units per carrier. Florida presents a similar divergence: its 189,442 carriers rank third by count, but its average fleet of 48.4 power units is well above California's 33.8 despite California holding nearly twice as many carrier registrations (374,441 vs. 189,442). This gap likely reflects differences in carrier composition, with California's registry including a higher proportion of small and owner-operator entities relative to its total registration base, while Florida and Georgia skew toward larger fleet operators. Massachusetts adds another notable case: 47,936 carriers — ranking 19th by count — but an average fleet of 98.2 power units, the highest among the major US states in this dataset, with 4,415,221 total power units. That ratio is consistent with a registry dominated by larger commercial fleets rather than independent operators. Texas, the second-largest state by carrier count at 248,130 and 9.14% of national registrations, carries an average fleet of 31.5 units, below the averages for FL, NY, GA, and MA, which may indicate that growth in Texas registrations has been driven partly by smaller entrants. The dataset also spans 115 distinct geographic codes, including Canadian provinces and a small number of entries from Mexican states and other jurisdictions, though those non-US registrations collectively represent well under 2% of total carriers. Across the five-year window reflected in this data, the concentration of registrations in a handful of large states has remained a persistent structural feature of the FMCSA registry.