Here is a number that doesn't get enough attention: 5.6 million Americans who work entirely for themselves - no employees, no partners, just them - are now earning more than $100,000 a year.

That's a 19% jump from 2024. It's almost double the number from 2020. And it's not a fluke.

MBO Partners, a company that places and tracks independent workers, has been running its State of Independence in America report for 15 years. It's the longest-running annual study of the independent workforce in the country. The latest data, released in late 2025 and covering 2026 trends, is the most striking it's ever been.

The solo economy isn't just growing. It's maturing.

The Numbers First

72.9 million Americans currently work independently in some capacity. That covers everything from someone who does freelance photography on weekends to a solo management consultant who turned down an executive job to work for herself. The number has been climbing for years, but the composition of that group is changing.

What's new: the earners.

The 5.6 million solopreneurs crossing $100K annually are being driven by two forces MBO Partners identifies clearly: Millennials are now in their peak earning years, and many of them never left independent work after jumping in during the pandemic. And the independents who started five years ago when remote work made it possible have now accumulated enough clients, reputation, and pricing power to charge what they're actually worth.

That's not motivational fluff. It's arithmetic. A consultant who has been solo for five years has five years of case studies, referrals, and confidence. They charge differently than they did on day one.

Why AI Is Part This Story

74% of independent workers are now using generative AI tools, up from 65% in 2024. That's not a nice stat to drop in a newsletter - it's an economic event.

The MBO data shows those workers are using AI primarily for:

• Research (41%)
• Generating new ideas (37%)
• Writing and creative work (35%)
• Data analysis (21%)

And they're reporting an average time savings of nine hours per week.

Nine hours. For a solopreneur, that's not just efficiency - it's additional capacity. An independent consultant who saves nine hours per week has nine more hours to take on another client, build a product, write a proposal, or just not burn out by Thursday.

The compounding effect of AI adoption among solopreneurs is worth thinking about. A solo operator who runs their business alone was always at a structural disadvantage against a small firm with four people. AI shrinks that gap. A solopreneur with good AI workflows can now operate in ways that would have required a small team two years ago.

The Demographic Shift

Gen Z now represents 28% of the independent workforce. That number will keep growing - and it matters for how we think about the future of solo work.

For previous generations, freelancing was often a fallback: what you did when you lost a job, or while you figured out what you really wanted to do. For Gen Z, it's increasingly a first choice. They entered the workforce as remote work was normalizing, saw the pandemic reshape employment overnight, and many of them decided they didn't want to depend on an employer for their stability.

The ones who chose solo work intentionally - not by default - tend to build differently. They invest in positioning earlier. They pick a niche faster. They're more comfortable using tools and platforms to punch above their size.

Whether that translates to the same $100K+ trajectory as the older cohort remains to be seen. But the floor for what's achievable as a solo operator has moved.

The Practical Read

If you're running a business alone, or thinking about going solo, this data tells you something useful: the people doing it well are not unicorns. 5.6 million six-figure solopreneurs is too large a number to explain away as exceptional talent or lucky timing.

What the MBO data suggests about the high earners:

• They chose independence deliberately, not by default
• They reached a pricing floor and stopped negotiating down from it
• They adopted tools (especially AI) faster than their peers
• They stuck with it long enough to compound their reputation

The hard part isn't the business model. Solo work is available to more people than ever, and the tools to run it have never been better. The hard part is usually the first two years, before the compounding kicks in.

The 5.6 million already through it are evidence that the math works.

Source: MBO Partners State of Independence in America - 15th Annual Report via Future of Work Exchange coverage