The Austin economy
With this month’s release of the Bureau of Labor Statistics’ December 2025 labor market information, we have a preliminary look at job growth for the Austin metro area in 2025. These numbers will ultimately be revised in April, when the BLS releases the January data which includes annual benchmark revisions based on a more exhaustive dataset of employers. Also released in February were GDP by County numbers for 2024. Here are some highlights:
- The Austin region added 14,133 jobs during 2025, growing by 1.0%,slower than the overall growth rate for Texas at 1.3%, but slightly faster than the U.S. at 0.9%.
- Since Opportunity Austin’s founding in 2004, the Austin region has been the fastest job creator among the Large metros, more than doubling its total number of jobs by adding 718,700 jobs, ahead of Orlando, Nashville, Dallas & San Antonio.
- The Austin region’s GDP totaled $268 billion in 2024, growing 3.7% in real GDP from 2023. Austin is the best-performing Large metro over the last 5 years.
Non-Farm Payroll Job Growth
Job growth in Austin increased in December 2025, with the region adding 2,900 jobs since November 2025 in the seasonally-adjusted series. With this boost, Austin’s job growth over the past year climbed to 10,100, or growth of 0.7%, in Dec. 2025. Final 2025 job growth figures will be released in March.
Austin’s job growth of 0.7% from Dec. 2024 to Dec. 2025 was slightly lower than the overall rate in Texas (0.9%), but exceeded the U.S. rate of 0.4%. The combined job growth in all metro areas was just 0.3%. Austin ranked as the 15th best-performing of the Top 50 metros with Charlotte ranking as the fastest growing at 2.7%, followed by Salt Lake City at 1.8%.
Source:U.S. BLS, CES.
Top Job Gains/Losses by Industry, Nov. 2025
The best performing industries in Austin over the last year were Government (up 7,100, 3.4%), Education & Health Services (4,200, 2.5%), and Retail Trade (3,100, 2.5%). Austin’s growth rate for Government jobs outperformed both Texas and the U.S., while Education & Health Services in Austin overperformed Texas’s growth in that sector, but trailed the U.S.
The worst performing industries were Professional & Biz. Services (-6,000, -2.1%), Information, (-2,000, -4.0%), and Wholesale Trade (-1,000, -1.8%). Each of these industries performed better in Teas & U.S. overall. However, only Texas had growth in one of those sectors, Wholesale Trade.
Source:U.S. BLS, CES.
GDP by Metropolitan Area, 2024
Real GDP growth from ‘23 to ‘24 for the Austin MSA was 3.7%, 7th among all major metro areas. However, looking at the time frame from 2019 to 2024, Austin has a stunning 36.4% GDP growth, the highest in the nation. The Austin MSA is 25st largest MSA by population, but has the 21st largest GDP among all MSAs.
The $268.4B current dollar GDP value is split across the five MSA counties as follows (Real growth ’23 to ‘24 in parenthesis):
- Travis: $202.7 billion (3.0%)
- Williamson: $44.6 billion (6.0%)
- Hays: $15.3 billion (7.3%)
- Bastrop: $4.3 billion (3.8%)
- Caldwell: $1.6 billion (5.4%)
Source: Bureau of Economic Analysis (BEA).
Unemployment
The recent low mark for the total number of unemployed in the Austin region was in 2022 with just 42,100 out of work jobseekers. Each of the last three years saw increases in the number of unemployed, reaching 53,500 in 2025, however, the rate of growth of the unemployed has stabilized.
In Dec. 2025, the number unemployed totaled 49,626, which is 1.916 more people than Dec. 2024 when the total unemployed was 47,710. Texas has 40,461 more unemployed compared to this time last year, while the U.S. had 551,000 more unemployed.
Source: U.S. BLS, LAUS.
Unemployment Rate Comparison
The unemployment rate for the Austin region was 3.2% in Dec. 2025, slightly up from 3.1% in Dec 2024. Austin’s rate continues to perform better than that of TX at 3.9% and the U.S. at 4.1%. Other TX metros including Fort Worth, 3.5%; San Antonio & Dallas, 3.7%; and Houston, 4.2% were all higher than Austin’s rate.
Since recovering from a peak of 11.5% during COVID, Austin’s rate averaged 4.2% in 2021, 3.0% in 2022, and 3.5% in both 2023 & 2024. TX’s rate rose to 12.3%during COVID and declined to 5.6% in 2021 and has since averaged 4.0% the last 3 years. The US rate reached 14.4% in COVID and declined to 3.5% in 2022 & 2023 but rose to 4.0% in 2024.
Source: U.S. BLS, LAUS.
Workforce Hours & Earnings
The average number of hours worked for payroll jobs in the Austin region in Dec. 2025 was 34.9, down from 36.1 this time last year. For 2024 to 2025, hours worked increased 0.2 to 35.4. This is a smaller increase than the State of Texas as a whole (0.4); however, for the U.S. the avg. was unchanged.
Average hourly earnings have risen on average 3% in Austin the last two years, while the average earnings in TX were up 5% and in the U.S. 4.2%. For 2025, the average earnings in Austin were up 3.6% from $34.70 to $36.00. Increases both in TX and the U.S. were more profound at 4.6% and 4.0%, respectively.
Source:U.S. BLS, CES.
Metro Business Cycle Index
The Austin metro’s business cycle index continues to show growth YOY comparison. After robust growth of 12 to 13% in 2021 & 2022, the rate slowed to 3.5% for 2024-2025 compared to 2023-2024 growth of 4.4%.
Statewide, the business cycle index grew by 2.1% from 2024 to 2025, down from growth of 3.2% from 2023 to 2024. Across Texas, growth in the other major metros was between 1.2% in Houston to 2.1% and 2.2% in Dallas and Ft. Worth, respectively. San Antonio was at 1.3%. Produced by the Federal Reserve of Dallas, the business cycle index reflects broad economic conditions including unemployment, inflation-adjusted wage and retail sales growth.
Source:Dallas Federal Reserve.
Sales Tax Receipts
Sales tax allocation payments to the City of Austin totaled $356 million in 2025, a slight increase of 0.4% over 2024. Previously, payments were up 2.4% in 2024 and 3.3% in 2023. For February 2026, City of Austin received $35.78 million, up 1.7% from February 2025.
In Round Rock, receipts totaled $129M and were up 10.5% in 2025 following a drop of -1.4% in 2024 and growth of 1.4% in 2023. San Marcos received 0.5% more in sales tax receipts in 2025 to $39M, which follows a decline of -2.1% in 2024 and growth of 4.2% in 2023. For Feb. 2026, receipts were down 6.2% in Round Rock down 1% San Marcos year over year.
Source: Texas Comptroller.
AUS Airport Passenger Activity
Annual passenger counts through the Austin airport hit a record 22.1 million in 2023 and fell 1.5% in 2024. For 2025, final passenger counts ended at 21.7 million, a -0.4% decrease from 2024. Dec. 2025 was the busiest December of all time with 1.888 million passengers, up 3.4% from the same time last year.
Total cargo (including Belly freight, cargo and mail) totaled 301.9 million pounds in 2024, up 6.7% from 283.1 million pounds in 2023. For 2025, this number reached 276.4 million pounds. For Dec. 2025, 22.3 million pounds of cargo passed through the airport, a 9.7% decrease from December 2025.
Source: City of Austin.
Patent Activity
Austin inventors are averaging an impressive 4,500 patents awarded each year during the 2020’s, which is higher than the 3,750 averaged during the 2010’s. Patent activity totaled 4,442 in 2025, up 1.1% from 2024. Texas saw a 2.2% drop in patents in 2025, while the US was up 0.3%. For Jan. 2026, Austin inventors were awarded 423 patents, a 17% drop from January 2025.
Austin continues to represent approximately 30% of patent activity in TX. This is a truly remarkable data point since the Austin MSA only represents around 8% of the entire population of the State. Austin’s share of TX patents increased to 30.9% in 2025, up from 30.0% in 2024 and 29.5% in 2023.
Source:U.S. Patent & Trademark Office.
Venture Capital Investment
Venture Capital funding in Austin reached record levels with a total $7.94 billion raised in 2025, up 116.4% from $3.67 billion in 2024. Previously, Austin’s record VC funding year was 2021 when $6.86 billion was raised. The top five funding rounds for 2025 include: Base Power, $1B; Saronic, $600M; NinjaOne, $500M; Ontic, $426M; and Apptronik, $403M.
With it’s best year ever in 2025, Austin moved up a spot to the fifth highest amount of VC investment of any metro in the US. Austin’s share of VC funding nationwide increased to 2.4% in 2025, up from 1.7% in 2024. Deal size in Austin increased to $21.3M in 2025 up from $8.9M in 2024. For 2025 Q4, Austin saw VC funding totaling $2.44B from 75 deals.
Source: Pitchbook.
Housing Permit Activity
Building permits issued in the Austin region came down from historic highs of between 42,000 to 51,000 units in 2021 and 2022. In 2025, a total of 26,964 units were issued, down 16.5% from last year when 32,294 were approved. Nationally, permits were down 3.5% in 2025 compared to 2024.
For the second year in a row, the share of single-family units approved in the Austin region (55.5%) exceeded multifamily permits., following three years (2021-2023) where more multifamily permits were issued. Over the past decade, single-family homes made up 60–64% of all permits issued nationwide. In 2025, the average dollar value of single-family permits was $315,000, up 3%.
Source: U.S. Census Bureau Building Permits Survey.
Home Sales
Home sales in the Austin region peaked at 41,094 in 2021. For the last three years, total sales were about 30,500. Preliminary sales totaled 30,278 in 2025, down 500 from last year, or -1.8% Nationally, sales were essentially unchanged up 1,000, while statewide sales were up 1.3% or 4,200 homes.
The average sales price in the Austin region was $564,141 in December 2025, down from $566,825 one year ago. Likewise, the YTD sales price was trending slightly higher this year. In Dec. 2025, months on inventory in Austin was 4.1 months, down from 5.9 early this summer. Months of Inventory is .8 months higher than one year ago.
Source: TX A&M Real Estate Research Center.
Consumer Price Index
After reaching a 40-year high of 8.0% in the annual percent change in 2022, the U.S. Consumer Price Index fell to 4.1% in 2023 and 2.9% in 2024. The rate of inflation continued to ease in 2025 ending the year at 2.6%.
While a CPI is not produced for the Austin metro, the Houston and Dallas metro indices were both up by 1.3% in 2025, which is improved from inflation rates of 2.5% and 3.9% in 2024, respectively. Nationally, some of the biggest contributors to increasing inflation in the Index were Natural Gas, up 9.8%; Electricity, up 6.3%; Medical Services, up 3.9%; Shelter, up 3.0%; and Food, up 2.9%.
Source:U.S. BLS, CPI.
Upcoming Releases
Release dates have largely returned to their regular cadence, with one notable remaining delay: January metro-level employment data will be released in April instead of March. A key release in March is the 2025 U.S. Census Bureau’s Population Estimates for counties and metro areas. Here are a few key releases and dates over the next few weeks:
- 2025 population estimates for counties and metro areas will be released by the U.S. Census Bureau in March 2026.
- The U.S. Federal Reserve will hold an FOMC meeting considering key interest rates is on March 17-18th.
- Metro area Employment and Unemployment for January 2026 will be released on April 16th.
More Info & downloads
- Labor force, employment & unemployment
- Employees on nonfarm payrolls
- Hours & earnings
- Consumer price index
- Metro business cycle index
- Sales tax & retail sales
- Housing permits
- Home sales, listings & prices
- Air service
- Patent activity
- Commercial real estate
For questions about this data, please contact Chris Ramser, Vice President, Research (512.322.5662) or Joseph Morones, Director, Research.
