Pick an Agency · Annual Report · 2026
The State of the Marketing Agency Industry
Everything we know about the global agency market, in one report - built from 47,000+ analyzed marketing agencies and 4.2M+ aggregated reviews across 90+ countries. Each finding links to the full study with charts, raw distributions and methodology.
- 47k+
- Agencies analyzed
- 90+
- Countries covered
- 4.2M+
- Reviews aggregated
- 9
- Studies in series
The 9 numbers that define 2026
38%
of all marketing agencies on Earth are in North America
Full study
66.6%
of active agencies were founded after 2015 - and 48.5% in the last five years alone
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62%
of agencies have fewer than 5 people on staff - boutiques are the norm, not the exception
Full study
85%
of agencies offer 3 or fewer services - "full-service" is largely a myth
Full study
60%+
of listed agencies hold a perfect 5.0 rating - industry-wide rating inflation is real
Full study
8.6×
more agencies per capita in Bahrain than in the United States
Full study
+14%
São Paulo has more agencies than New York - the real top-city ranking isn't the one you'd guess
Full study
0.7★
gap between how Brazilian and German clients rate the same kind of work - culture moves ratings
Full study
1.6×
more specialist agencies target e-commerce than SaaS
Full study
Chapter 1
Where the industry lives
The agency market is global but lopsided. North America holds 38% of all agencies; São Paulo - not New York - is the single biggest agency city; and adjusted for population, small digital-first economies like Estonia dominate.
Chapter 2
The post-2020 founding boom
Most agencies alive today didn't exist a decade ago. The 2020–2024 window is the biggest five-year founding surge on record - driven by the creator economy, COVID-era brand retooling, and no-code ad tooling collapsing the cost of launching a shop.
Chapter 3
What an agency actually looks like
Forget the Madison Avenue mental model. The typical agency is a boutique: 62% have fewer than five people, 85% offer three or fewer services, and specialists cluster around e-commerce far more than any other vertical.
Chapter 4
The trust problem
More than 60% of listed agencies hold a perfect 5.0 - which is precisely why a perfect score alone means little. Ratings also vary by culture (Brazilian clients rate ~0.7★ higher than German ones) and by service line, which is why volume-weighted, source-attributed reviews matter.
Methodology
- • Dataset: 47,000+ marketing agencies with verifiable data (backed by client reviews or owner-claimed), surfaced from a wider pool of indexed business listings. Each underlying study states its own subset.
- • Sources: reviews aggregated from Clutch, Google Maps and agency websites, with attribution; profile data from public listings and owner submissions.
- • Refresh: every chart recomputes daily from the live database; this report reflects the data as of today.
- • Citation: free to quote and embed under CC BY 4.0 - credit “Pick an Agency”. Full counting and ranking rules: pickanagency.com/methodology.
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