Companies in Columbus, Ohio: 46,419 businesses, 25 big employers and a $254 billion headquarters

This page is for anyone sizing up the companies in Columbus, Ohio: job seekers, people looking for a supplier or partner, site selectors and B2B sellers deciding where in Central Ohio to work. It covers the largest employers, the public companies headquartered here, how many businesses there are and what they do, and how to check an Ohio company.

The largest employers in Columbus

The City of Columbus's Annual Comprehensive Financial Report for 2025 (Table 22) ranks the 25 largest employers in the Greater Columbus area by full-time employees, reprinted from Business First of Columbus's list of employers in Delaware, Fairfield, Franklin, Licking, Madison, Pickaway and Union counties:

Places 16 to 25 are DHL Supply Chain (3,461), South-Western City Schools, Columbus State Community College, Dublin City Schools, Giant Eagle, FedEx, DLA Land and Maritime, Licking Memorial Health Systems, Cameron Mitchell Restaurants and NetJets (2,200). The 25 employ 226,557 full-time staff. The report notes that the list includes only employers that submitted data to Business First, so a large employer that didn't respond is missing. Health care has grown fastest: OhioHealth's count rose from 15,417 in 2016 and Nationwide Children's from 9,262. Victoria's Secret was part of L Brands, 13th in 2016 with 7,456.

One Columbus, the regional economic development organization, publishes its own largest employers list, with JPMorgan Chase (17,480) and Nationwide (16,000) at the top among companies; it gives no date for the figures and leaves out universities and hospitals, so use the city's table for rankings.

Public companies headquartered in Columbus

Ranked by revenue in each company's latest 10-K, among SEC-registered listed companies whose 10-K cover gives a principal executive office in the metro:

The 20 reported $357.18 billion, and Cardinal Health, a drug and medical products distributor, accounts for 71.2% of it. Huntington's figure is net interest income plus noninterest income ($5.99 billion plus $2.18 billion), not its $10.31 billion of interest income; Bread Financial's is the total net interest and non-interest income it reports. Mettler-Toledo's 10-K cover lists two principal executive offices, in Columbus and in Greifensee, Switzerland. Greif changed its fiscal year, so its latest report is a transition report covering the 11 months to September 30, 2025. Marzetti is the former Lancaster Colony. Worthington Enterprises ($1.38 billion) and Park National of Newark ($557.2 million in net interest and other income) come next.

Note that the two lists barely overlap. Cardinal Health is the biggest company by revenue but 14th by local employment, while three of the top five employers are public institutions that don't file 10-Ks.

How many businesses are in Columbus

County Business Patterns (CBP) for the Columbus, OH Metro Area (CBSA 18140), all sectors, 2023:

By size, 37,708 establishments have 1 to 19 employees, 7,105 have 20 to 99 and 1,606 have 100 or more, including 64 with 1,000 or more. Union County, where One Columbus lists Honda's Marysville operations, averages 24.0 employees per workplace and Madison County 25.2, both above Franklin's 22.7. CBP counts locations with paid employees, excludes the self-employed and government (so Ohio State and the State of Ohio aren't in these counts), and measures employment in the pay period including March 12, 2023.

What Columbus businesses do

Average pay is our calculation. Transportation and warehousing employs more people than manufacturing, and general warehouses alone employ 52,754 at an average of 179 per site. Insurance is the other cluster: 218 insurance carrier establishments, four of them with 1,000 or more employees. For the region's insurers, see insurance companies in Columbus.

How to check a Columbus company

Prospecting Columbus warehouses

Illustrative example. The company, prices and results are fictional; the counts are from CBP 2023.

Scioto Fleet (sciotofleet.example) leases and services electric forklifts for distribution centers.

• General warehousing and storage establishments with 50 to 999 employees: 39 + 30 + 14 + 12 = 95.
• It assumes 60% lease their equipment rather than own it: about 57.
• Winning 6 fleet contracts at an average of $150,000 a year is $900,000 in annual revenue.

The buyer is the site's general manager or the operator's regional operations director, and the window is a lease renewal or the opening of a new building. Working out who operates each of the 95 buildings, whether a third-party logistics firm or a retailer running its own, and when their leases end, is the slow part; Bebop researches each site and names the person to contact.

Subject: Forklift uptime at [site]

Hi [first name],

Peak season is when a forklift fleet shows its age: a few trucks down and the dock backs up for the whole shift.

We lease and service electric forklifts for Columbus-area distribution centers, with a technician on site within four hours and spare units in stock. Could I price a replacement for the trucks coming off lease at [site] next year?

[Your name], Scioto Fleet

Next step: see the carriers that serve these warehouses in trucking companies in Ohio.