Americans and Granite Staters continue to flock to entrepreneurship. Business formations hit record highs in 2025 across the country, a trend that continues into 2026 with more than 500,000 monthly business formation applications, according to the U.S. Census Bureau. “The rate of new entrepreneurs increased in 2025 and remained higher than pre-pandemic levels,” states a national report on early-stage entrepreneurship from Kauffman Indicators of Entrepreneurship.
According to the Kauffman report, NH has a robust startup community. More than 83% of entrepreneurs in NH who started a business did so by choice instead of out of necessity and 75% of NH startups survived past the first year. Nationally, about 78% of new startups survive their first year.
Depending on who you turn to, the Granite State is a mixed bag when it comes to creating a nurturing environment for startups. U.S. News and World Report ranked NH 10th for states with the best business environment in 2025, but NH was ranked 42nd among the best and worst states to start a business in 2026
by WalletHub.
To help startups succeed in a more challenging environment, Business NH Magazine compiled its fourth annual Startup Guide as part of our annual Business Resource Directory, enlisting experts from the Small Business Development Center (SBDC) and Small Business Administration.
The NH SBDC provides counseling and training to small businesses, and develops and provides informational tools to support business startups and existing business expansion. Their professional business advisors provide individualized and confidential advising at no charge. Over the past 42 years, NH SBDC has advised or trained more than 124,650 New Hampshire entrepreneurs, helping them to start over 2,510 businesses, take over 24,000 eCourses, raise over $608 million in capital infusion, and help create or save over 19,000 jobs.
In addition to articles that help startups navigate common challenges, we are spotlighting intriguing startups that launched in NH in the past five years. We invited startups from across the state to complete a survey to be considered for the Startup Stars section, and we asked for suggestions from the SBDC, SBA and the NH Tech Alliance. We whittled that field down to the 10 Startup Stars featured in this guide.
These organizations play vital roles in supporting NH’s startup eco system. This startup guide, coupled with the overall information collected within this business resource directory, provides companies the information they need to succeed in the Granite State.
