Industry comparison

Educational Services vs Manufacturing (metal/machinery/electronics)

NAICS-sector comparison built from the H1B Report corpus. Filing volume, distinct sponsor count, sponsor concentration and dominant occupations.

Summary

Educational Services and Manufacturing are two of the largest H-1B sponsoring sectors in the U.S. economy. Manufacturing leads on total filings with 657,405 to Educational Services' 613,346—a difference of about 44,000 filings. However, Educational Services sponsors through fewer employers: 6,945 compared to Manufacturing's 12,667, indicating that educational institutions concentrate H-1B sponsorship among a tighter group of larger employers.

Manufacturing's scale reflects broad sponsorship across metal fabrication, machinery, and electronics subsectors, drawing from a geographically dispersed base of companies. Educational Services' filings come from universities, colleges, and research institutions, which tend to be concentrated in academic hubs and research centers. Both sectors remain among the top H-1B users, reflecting their reliance on specialized talent in research, engineering, teaching, and technical roles.

Educational Services vs Manufacturing H-1B
H-1B filings comparison
Manufacturing H-1B sponsorship
Educational Services H-1B filings
NAICS sector H-1B analysis

Sector A

Educational Services

NAICS 61Rank #4

Sector B

Manufacturing (metal/machinery/electronics)

NAICS 33Rank #2

Key metrics

Filings / employer is a concentration hint — higher means a few sponsors do most of the filing.

Metric	Educational Services	Manufacturing (metal/machinery/electronics)
Total filings	626,270	680,015▲
National share %	6.55%	7.11%▲
Distinct sponsors	7,516	13,769▲
Filings / employer	83	49
Rank	#4	#2▲
Top sponsor	University of Michigan	Apple Inc.
Top occupation	Biological Science Teachers, Postsecondary	Software Developers

Filings by fiscal year

Year-over-year H-1B demand within each sector.

Educational Services

Time series
Period	Value
FY2010	39,175
FY2011	34,146
FY2012	35,379
FY2013	34,165
FY2014	33,842
FY2015	34,126
FY2016	34,254
FY2017	32,741
FY2018	34,175
FY2019	34,638
FY2020	29,870
FY2021	48,175
FY2022	36,695
FY2023	46,343
FY2024	41,453
FY2025	45,692
FY2026	31,401

Manufacturing (metal/machinery/electronics)

Time series
Period	Value
FY2010	24,379
FY2011	28,553
FY2012	29,695
FY2013	29,093
FY2014	32,346
FY2015	32,605
FY2016	33,183
FY2017	35,036
FY2018	37,966
FY2019	38,898
FY2020	37,942
FY2021	69,187
FY2022	52,902
FY2023	54,392
FY2024	46,170
FY2025	54,231
FY2026	43,437