40+ Yelp Statistics Every Business Should Know (2026)

I checked Yelp’s 2025 annual report last month. The numbers surprised me, and not in the way you’d expect.

Most people assume Yelp is slowly fading out, replaced by Google. The data says something different. Yelp just delivered its highest-ever net revenue in 2025, added an OpenAI partnership, and shipped more than 55 new product features in a single year.

That’s not a platform in decline. That’s a platform reinventing itself.

I’ve pulled together 40+ Yelp statistics from the official 2025 annual report, Yelp’s investor relations page, and verified third-party research. If you run a local business, manage a brand’s online reputation, or are trying to understand where review platforms are heading in 2026, these numbers are worth your time.

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Key Yelp Facts at a Glance (2026)

Here’s the short version before we go deep:

• Yelp generated a record $1.46 billion in net revenue in 2025, up from $1.41 billion in 2024
• Net income hit $146 million in 2025, a 10% year-over-year increase
• 330 million cumulative reviews now live on the platform, with 22 million added in 2025 alone
• 8.4 million active business pages, reflecting strong growth from local service providers
• 28 million monthly active mobile devices are using the Yelp app
• 57% of Yelp users contact a business within one day of searching
• 4 out of 5 Yelp users are ready to make a purchase when they land on a business page
• Yelp signed a partnership with OpenAI in early 2026, marking a significant AI pivot

Now let’s break these down properly by category.

Also check: 77 Online Review Statistics (New 2026 Data)

Yelp User Statistics and Engagement

Understanding who uses Yelp and how they use it tells you a lot about whether the platform fits your business.

I’ve broken this into three sub-sections: traffic, demographics, and purchase behavior, because each one drives different decisions.

Platform Traffic and Monthly Users

1. Yelp receives approximately 97 million unique devices across web and mobile every quarter.

That’s a massive reach for a platform often written off as niche.

2. The Yelp app had 28 million monthly active users in 2024, growing to 29 million in early 2025.

Mobile is where most Yelp activity happens. Around 80% of Yelp searches now come from mobile devices.

3. Yelp reaches over 75 million monthly visitors across its mobile app, mobile web, and desktop platforms, spanning food, home services, auto repair, beauty, and health categories.

4. Around 2.5 million people search on Yelp every single day.

For local service businesses, that’s 2.5 million potential customers actively looking for exactly what you offer.

Yelp User Demographics

5. More than 50% of Yelp users have annual household incomes above $100,000.

This is the stat I mention most when talking to premium service businesses. Yelp’s audience skews affluent in a way that most review platforms don’t.

6. The core Yelp user age group falls between 25 and 54 years old.

People aged 55 and above actually hold the highest share of U.S. users at around 41%, which surprises most marketers who assume Yelp skews younger.

7. 75% of Gen Z users have never written a Yelp review.

Younger consumers are moving to TikTok and Instagram for local recommendations. This is a real demographic challenge for Yelp’s long-term review growth.

8. Yelp’s audience spans a broad educational range, with a majority of users having completed at least some college education.

This matters because educated consumers tend to read reviews more carefully and leave more detailed ones.

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Purchase Intent and Consumer Behavior

9. 4 out of 5 Yelp users are ready to make a purchase when they visit a business page.

Compare this to social media platforms, where users are mostly browsing. Yelp traffic has commercial intent baked in.

10. 57% of Yelp users contact or visit a business within one day of searching on Yelp.

This is one of the most striking behavioral stats in local marketing. The gap between search and action is smaller on Yelp than almost anywhere else.

11. 45% of customers check Yelp reviews before visiting a business.

That number puts Yelp firmly in second place behind Google (at 63.6%), but ahead of Facebook and TripAdvisor.

12. 35% of people who search on Yelp visit the business they looked at within 24 hours.

Yelp drives real-world traffic faster than most digital channels.

13. Over 80% of consumers check Yelp reviews before visiting a store or booking a service.

Depending on the industry and category, this number is even higher for home services and healthcare.

Also check: 70 Online Reputation Management Statistics (New Data)

Yelp Review Statistics

Yelp’s review system is the backbone of everything the platform does. I’d argue it’s also the most misunderstood part.

These numbers explain the scale, the quality, and the catch that trips up most business owners.

Review Volume and Growth

14. Yelp hit 330 million cumulative reviews as of December 31, 2025.

That’s up 7% from 308 million at the end of 2024.

15. Users contributed 22 million new reviews in 2025 alone.

That’s a slight increase from the 21 million added in 2024, showing consistent engagement from the platform’s user base.

16. Approximately 76% of all Yelp reviews are “recommended”

by Yelp’s automated filtering system, meaning they contribute to a business’s visible star rating. The remaining 24% are filtered out as potentially low-quality or suspicious.

Review Categories and Star Ratings

17. Home and local services account for 20% of all Yelp reviews, making it the largest category.

Restaurants come in second at 17%, followed by shopping (15%), beauty and fitness (11%), and health (9%).

18. 53-54% of Yelp reviews are 5-star ratings.

Positive feedback dominates, but the 18% of 1-star reviews is what consumers pay closest attention to. (Yelp annual data)

19. The recommended review breakdown is: 75% recommended, 16% not recommended, and 9% removed.

This matters if you’re managing a business page: nearly 1 in 4 reviews your customers leave may never be visible.

Yelp’s Review Filtering System

20. Yelp’s automated filtering system hides roughly 24% of reviews due to low-trust signals, new accounts, or suspicious patterns.

This is the platform’s most controversial feature and a constant source of frustration for business owners.

Here’s what I tell businesses dealing with filtered reviews: the system isn’t random. It filters reviews that look suspicious.

Reviews from accounts with only one review, reviews left immediately after a promotional push, and reviews from accounts with no Yelp activity are the most likely to get filtered.

The fix isn’t to argue with Yelp. It’s to encourage customers who already use Yelp regularly to leave reviews.

Our guide on review management software covers tools that help you automate review collection in a way that maximizes the chance those reviews actually stick.

Yelp Business Statistics and Advertising

This section covers what the platform looks like from the advertiser and business owner side. The shift in category mix is the most important story here.

Business Pages and Advertiser Growth

21. Yelp hosts 8.4 million active business pages in 2025.

That’s up from 7.74 million in mid-2024, a 10% year-over-year increase driven largely by service businesses. (Yelp 2025 Report)

22. There are approximately 496,000 paying advertising locations on Yelp as of 2025.

This is down slightly from 515,000 at mid-2024, reflecting that Yelp is generating more revenue per advertiser rather than growing advertiser volume.

Average revenue per location hit an annual record in 2025.

23. Yelp operates in approximately 30 countries, though more than 90% of its traffic comes from the U.S. market. Internationally, Yelp has a limited presence compared to Google or TripAdvisor.

24. Yelp ranks #2 among U.S. review platforms after Google.

Google hosts 73% of all online reviews. Yelp holds around 6%, well ahead of Facebook at 3% and TripAdvisor at 3%. (ReviewTrackers)

Category Shifts: Services vs. Restaurants

25. Service-based businesses now account for 68% of Yelp’s total advertising revenue.

Restaurants, retail, and other categories make up the remaining 32%. This is a dramatic shift from even five years ago.

26. Services ad revenue grew 11% in 2024, reaching $879 million.

Home improvement, auto services, and health services are the categories driving this growth. Businesses in these categories see the highest ROI from Yelp advertising because searcher intent is extremely high.

27. Restaurant and retail advertising fell 3% to $470 million in 2024.

This doesn’t mean restaurants are failing on Yelp. It means the restaurant advertising market on Yelp is maturing while service categories are still expanding fast.

28. Advertisers spent approximately 8% more per business page in 2024, reflecting Yelp’s shift toward higher-value advertisers rather than volume.

Average cost per click increased 10% year over year. (Yelp 2025 Annual Report)

29. Yelp now offers over 20 advertising tools, including call-to-action buttons, business highlights, review response features, and project cost estimators.

The platform added more than 55 new features and product updates in 2025 alone.

Also check: Google vs Yelp Reviews: Which Drives More Local Customers?

Yelp Revenue and Financial Performance

Yelp’s financials tell a story that gets overlooked: this is a profitable, growing company, not a struggling also-ran. I find myself correcting this misconception in almost every conversation I have about local marketing platforms.

30. Yelp’s 2025 net revenue reached a record $1.46 billion. That’s up from $1.41 billion in 2024, a 6% year-over-year increase, and up significantly from $942 million in 2018.

31. Net income grew 10% in 2025 to $146 million. In 2023, net income was $99 million. In 2024 it was $133 million. The upward trajectory is consistent.

32. Adjusted EBITDA reached $369 million in 2025, about 25% of total revenue, showing strong operating efficiency.

33. Yelp’s Q1 2025 net revenue was approximately $359 million, with consistent quarterly performance throughout the year. Q2 2025 came in at $370 million in quarterly revenue with $44 million in net income.

34. Yelp projects 2026 net revenue in the range of $1.455 billion to $1.475 billion. The company is guiding for stable growth while investing heavily in AI-powered features.

35. Yelp generated $1.277 billion from advertising in 2023.

By 2024, advertising revenue had grown further, with services-based ad revenue consistently outpacing restaurant and retail categories.

Yelp’s Impact on Local Business Revenue

This is where the data gets actionable. If you’re managing a local business’s reputation, these numbers are the ones that actually affect your bottom line.

36. A one-star increase on Yelp can boost restaurant revenue by 5-9%.

This comes from a Harvard Business School study by professor Michael Luca, and it’s one of the most replicated findings in review research. The effect compounds with each star gained.

37. Businesses with more positive reviews see an average 15-20% increase in leads and conversions from Yelp searches.

This isn’t just about star ratings. It’s about review volume and recency working together.

38. Tokyo Cowboy restaurant generated $250,000 in revenue from approximately $7,000 in Yelp advertising spend.

That’s a 35x ROAS, cited in an Embark Marketing case study and referenced by Yelp as a platform success story.

Not every business will see this. But it illustrates the conversion power of high-intent Yelp traffic.

39. 70% of people trust online reviews as much as personal recommendations.

Yelp has built its entire model around this trust signal. When a business has 200+ Yelp reviews with an average rating of 4.5+, it functions as a 24-hour word-of-mouth engine. (Yelp data)

40. Businesses that respond to Yelp reviews see stronger engagement and repeat customer rates.

Yelp’s own data consistently shows that active, responsive business pages outperform inactive ones in both search ranking and conversion.

If you want to understand how to manage your Yelp presence alongside other platforms, our guide to the best customer review sites for businesses walks through the full picture.

Also check: 48 TripAdvisor Statistics (New 2026 Data)

Yelp in 2026: What’s Changing

The biggest story in Yelp’s 2025 annual report wasn’t revenue. It was the AI pivot.

OpenAI partnership announced in early 2026.

Yelp signed a deal with OpenAI to make its review and business data available within ChatGPT’s search.

When someone asks ChatGPT to recommend a local plumber or restaurant, Yelp data can now surface directly in the response. This is a significant new distribution channel that most Yelp watchers haven’t priced in yet.

Yelp acquired Hatch.

Hatch is an AI-powered lead management tool for service businesses. Yelp bought it to help businesses capture and respond to leads faster.

This signals where Yelp is heading: not just a review platform, but an end-to-end local business growth platform.

Conversational search is the next frontier.

Jeremy Stoppelman, Yelp’s CEO, specifically said in the 2025 annual report that Yelp is working to make the platform “more conversational and action-oriented for consumers.”

Natural language search, AI-generated recommendations, and instant booking integrations are all in development.

Ad click volume dropped 7% in 2025 due to economic uncertainty.

But average cost per click increased 10%. Fewer clicks, higher value per click. This is Yelp optimizing for quality over quantity, which actually benefits advertisers who know how to work the platform.

For businesses managing reviews across multiple platforms, using an AI review management tool is becoming less optional and more essential as platforms like Yelp become more complex to manage.

What These Yelp Statistics Mean for Your Business

Let me give you the practical takeaways rather than just leaving you with a list of numbers.

Service categories are growing at 11% annually, making up 68% of Yelp’s ad revenue. The platform was built for exactly this use case: high-intent consumers searching for services they need right now.

Your customers still check it. 45% of them check it before visiting. The restaurant category still generates $470 million in annual Yelp ad revenue. The opportunity is there; it just requires more strategic use of the platform’s tools.

Yelp rewards active pages in its search ranking. And from a consumer trust perspective, a business that responds to criticism publicly is consistently rated as more trustworthy than one that stays silent.

It doesn’t work and risks having your page flagged. Encourage existing Yelp users to review you by asking customers directly.

The customers most likely to leave reviews that stick are the ones who already use Yelp regularly.

Hours, photos, services listed, and menu if applicable. Yelp’s algorithm surfaces complete profiles over incomplete ones, and consumers convert faster when they have all the information they need on one page.

WiserReview can help you collect and manage reviews across Yelp and other platforms from one dashboard. You can automate review requests, monitor all incoming reviews in real time, and respond without switching between apps. There’s a free plan to get started.

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Conclusion

Yelp is a different platform than it was five years ago. It’s more focused, more profitable, and betting its future on AI and service-based businesses rather than trying to compete with Google on every front.

The 40+ statistics in this post tell a consistent story: Yelp’s users have high purchase intent, its review content is massive and trusted, and its financial health is stronger than most people realize. For local businesses, especially in services, it’s still one of the most direct paths from “someone searching” to “someone buying.”

The businesses that treat Yelp as a passive listing they set up once will keep underperforming. The ones that actively manage their presence, respond to reviews, and keep their pages current will keep pulling ahead.

Want help building a multi-platform review strategy? Our guide to review management software compares the tools that make it practical at scale.

Also check:
53 Google Review Statistics Every Business Must Know (2026)

37 Trustpilot Statistics You Need to Know in 2026

70 Online Reputation Management Statistics (New Data)