Fortune 500

The Fortune 500 is an annual list compiled and published by Fortune magazine that ranks 500 of the largest United States corporations by total revenue for their respective fiscal years. The list includes publicly held companies, along with privately held companies for which revenues are publicly available. The concept of the Fortune 500 was created by Edgar P. Smith, a Fortune editor, and the first list was published in 1955. The Fortune 500 is more commonly used than its subset Fortune 100 or superset Fortune 1000.

History The Fortune 500, created by Edgar P. Smith, was first published in January 1955. The original top ten companies were General Motors, Jersey Standard, U.S. Steel, General Electric, Esmark, Anderson-Prichard Oil Corporation, Armour, Gulf Oil, Chrysler, Mobil, and DuPont.

Methodology The original Fortune 500 was limited to companies whose revenues were derived from manufacturing, mining, and energy exploration. At the same time, Fortune published companion "Fortune 50" lists of the 50 largest commercial banks (ranked by assets), utilities (ranked by assets), life insurance companies (ranked by assets), retailers (ranked by gross revenues) and transportation companies (ranked by revenues). Fortune magazine changed its methodology in 1994 to include service companies. With the change came 291 new entrants to the famous list including three in the Top 10.

Influence The companies on the 2026 Fortune 500 had combined revenue of $21 trillion and combined profits of $2.1 trillion.

Overview The following is the list of top 20 companies. + Fortune 500 list of 2026 Rank Company State Industry Revenue in USD1AmazonInternet services and retailing$716.9 billion2WalmartGeneral merchandisers$713.2 billion3UnitedHealth GroupHealth care: insurance and managed care$447.6 billion4AppleComputers, office equipment$416.2 billion5McKesson CorporationWholesalers: health care$403.4 billion6Alphabet Inc.Internet services and retailing$402.8 billion7CVS HealthHealth care: pharmacy and other services$402.1 billion8Berkshire HathawayInsurance: property and casualty (stock)$371.4 billion9ExxonMobilPetroleum refining$332.2 billion10CencoraWholesalers: health care$321.3 billion11MicrosoftComputer software$281.7 billion12CostcoGeneral merchandisers$275.2 billion13CignaHealth care: pharmacy and other services$274.9 billion14Cardinal HealthWholesalers: health care$222.6 billion15NvidiaSemiconductors and Other Electronic Components$215.9 billion16MetaInternet Services and Retailing$201.0 billion17Elevance HealthHealth care: insurance and managed care$199.1 billion18CenteneHealth care: insurance and managed care$194.8 billion19Chevron CorporationPetroleum refining$189.0 billion20Ford Motor CompanyMotor vehicles & parts$187.3 billion

Breakdown by state

This is the list of the top 18 states with the most companies within the Fortune 500 as of 2024.

+Breakdown by state Rank State Companies1 5725252432527624722820918101711161613151414151212171010

Breakdown by metropolitan area

This is the list of the top 10 metropolitan statistical areas with the most companies within the Fortune 500 as of 2024.

+Breakdown by metropolitan area Rank Metropolitan area Companies1 46230323420202071681591414

Fortune 500

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