Professional Counselor: how many are there, and how many are in private practice?

National totals

Reading the sole-proprietor share

Among active NPI records with Professional Counselor as the primary taxonomy, 58,993, or 42.6%, are flagged as sole proprietors. For this specialty, that self-reported NPPES field is an imperfect proxy for private practice because it does not establish that a counselor works independently, owns a practice, or operates outside a group or other organization.

By state

New NPI registrations by year

Counts reflect the year each NPI was first issued, among records still active today. The final year is partial: this data covers through 2026-01-11.

Data notes

• The sole-proprietor field is self-reported by the provider in NPPES and is an imperfect proxy for private practice.
• A sole-proprietor count shown as <11 is suppressed: the true value is below 11, which could include zero.
• NPI records are not a headcount of individual counselors or practices, and an active record does not describe the provider's full current activity.
• The primary taxonomy may not capture every provider who offers counseling or distinguish credentials, scope of services, or practice setting.
• Providers are counted once, by their primary taxonomy code only.

Source: CMS National Plan and Provider Enumeration System (NPPES) Data Dissemination file, FOIA-disclosable public data under CMS-6060-N. Aggregated by Hero EMR on 2026-08-03; deactivated NPIs excluded; specialty assigned from the primary taxonomy code (NUCC 25.1). Counts below 11 are suppressed. Individual providers are never published. All provider data pages.

Common questions