Half of them were worth between $127,000 and $1.4M. You almost certainly bid on none of them.
Today's live count is briefly unavailable, so the figure above is from completed FY2025 records instead. We would rather show you a settled number than a number we cannot vouch for.
See the list Free. No card.Most federal money is not reachable. 70.8% of the dollars are ordered against contract vehicles — long-term agreements between an agency and a pre-approved list of companies. Once a firm is on that list the government buys from them directly: no public competition, no proposal requested. Outsiders break into that work 1.9% of the time.
If that term is new to you, that is the point — it is the most important idea in federal contracting and almost nobody explains it. We do, in plain English.
And every tool filters you into your own registration code. Yours describes your paperwork, not what you can do — in your sector there are typically another 49 codes carrying live federal work.
70.4% of small businesses win in exactly one code. Their median year is $60,804. Firms winning in two clear $272,490. That is a relationship, not proof of cause — bigger firms naturally spread wider. But the one-code group is where seven in ten firms sit, and it is the poorest by a distance.
The obvious objection is that a contract with one bidder was already promised to somebody. So we measured it.
| Offers received | Share won by a firm brand new to that buyer and category |
|---|---|
| 1 offer | 61.2% |
| 11+ offers | 48.3% |
Quiet contracts go to newcomers more often than crowded ones do. The crowded fights are where the established players are, because that is where the established players are looking.
Federal buying runs in hard seasons. September carries 29.6% of the year's small-business dollars; October carries 2.7%.
And everyone will tell you the season is September, because that is when the federal year ends. For 43% of industries that is wrong. Diagnostics peaks in January. Nonwoven fabric in June. Frozen food in May. Bolts and nuts never.
We work out yours from your own category's history and switch you back on before it starts. Pause in your quiet months; we will wake you for the loud ones.