Industry comparison

Professional, Scientific & Technical Services vs Retail Trade (general)

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

Summary

Professional, Scientific & Technical Services (NAICS 54) and Retail Trade (NAICS 45) represent vastly different scales of H-1B sponsorship in the U.S. labor market.

Professional, Scientific & Technical Services leads dramatically on H-1B activity, with 5.36 million filings across 57,468 employers. This sector encompasses software development, engineering, management consulting, and specialized technical roles—fields with documented skills gaps and high demand for foreign talent. The sheer filing volume reflects both the size of the sector and its reliance on H-1B sponsorship for specialized positions.

Retail Trade generated 250,553 filings from 2,757 employers—roughly 4.7% of Professional Services' volume. Retail's lower H-1B activity aligns with the nature of retail work, which typically involves entry-to-mid-level roles, domestic labor supply sufficiency, and lower prevailing wages. Professional Services sponsors roughly 21 H-1B filings per employer on average, while Retail averages 91 filings per employer, reflecting different hiring and organizational structures rather than comparable labor-market dynamics.

Professional services H-1B filings
Retail trade H-1B sponsorship
NAICS 54 vs NAICS 45
H-1B sector comparison
Technical services employer sponsorship
Retail H-1B trends

Sector A

Professional, Scientific & Technical Services

NAICS 54Rank #1

Sector B

Retail Trade (general)

NAICS 45Rank #7

Key metrics

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

Metric	Professional, Scientific & Technical Services	Retail Trade (general)
Total filings	5,362,182▲	250,553
National share %	57.46%▲	2.68%
Distinct sponsors	57,468▲	2,757
Filings / employer	93	91
Rank	#1▲	#7
Top sponsor	INFOSYS LIMITED	AMAZON.COM SERVICES LLC (VA)
Top occupation	Software Developers	Software Developers

Filings by fiscal year

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

Professional, Scientific & Technical Services

Time series
Period	Value
FY2010	162,393
FY2011	184,930
FY2012	237,548
FY2013	270,996
FY2014	334,578
FY2015	420,866
FY2016	442,248
FY2017	408,878
FY2018	415,563
FY2019	418,841
FY2020	341,992
FY2021	433,810
FY2022	318,868
FY2023	324,927
FY2024	279,362
FY2025	273,304
FY2026	93,078

Retail Trade (general)

Time series
Period	Value
FY2010	3,089
FY2011	3,674
FY2012	4,146
FY2013	4,743
FY2014	6,059
FY2015	7,463
FY2016	8,728
FY2017	11,457
FY2018	13,585
FY2019	17,470
FY2020	22,645
FY2021	33,213
FY2022	27,820
FY2023	27,462
FY2024	24,688
FY2025	26,082
FY2026	8,229