Trade guide, national
Pool contractors in the United States
This site publishes 11,778 pool contractor records across all fifty states and the District of Columbia, or 0.35 per 10,000 residents. 2 of them publish a business-level licence source for pool that a listing can be matched against.
This page is the one place on this site that explains what pool work involves, what its credentials are and where to check one. The counts for a particular metro area are on that metro’s own page, and what a licence class means in a particular state is on that state’s page.
The national facts
- Pool contractor records
- 11,778Foursquare Open Source Places, release August 11, 2026
- Per 10,000 residents
- 0.35 per 10,000Population 334,914,895, Census Bureau Vintage 2023 population estimates, as of July 1, 2023
- States publishing a licence source for this trade
- 2 of 51State license files, as of September 2, 2026California and Florida.
- Licensed share where a source exists
- 10.3%State license files, as of September 2, 2026Counted only inside the states that publish a source, and never across a state line. It measures how often a published listing and a published licence could be matched to each other, which is not the same question as whether a business holds one.
- Active licences with no public listing
- 3,993State license files, as of September 2, 2026Active licences covering this trade with no matching record in open place data, summed over the states that publish a source. This is the home-based tail.
- Most records per resident
- Arizona, 0.87 per 10,000Population 7,431,344, Census Bureau Vintage 2023 population estimates, as of July 1, 2023The fewest is District of Columbia, at 0.01 per 10,000. Both ends describe where businesses are recorded, not where work is done.
- Employment and pay for this trade
- Not published for this tradeBLS Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics, May 2025 OEWS, published May 15, 2026No single BLS occupation maps to this trade cleanly enough to print, so no employment or wage figure is shown rather than one built from an occupation that means something else.
- Independent, franchise, corporate
- 11,547 independent, 0 franchise brand, 76 corporate owned, 155 awaiting chain reviewFoursquare Open Source Places, release August 11, 2026
What each row counts, and the universe it counts it in, is set out on the methodology page.
What is particular about pool and spa work
Pool work carries two safety rules that exist nowhere else on this site, a federal efficiency standard that changed what pumps may be sold, and a maintenance question that never stops.
Barriers and entrapment are the two safety rules
Residential pool safety is built on a barrier: a fence of a stated height with self-closing, self-latching gates that a small child cannot open, plus alarms or door hardware where a wall of the house forms part of the enclosure. The requirement is written into local building codes and is the part of a pool project most likely to be inspected.
The second rule is about suction. The Virginia Graeme Baker Pool and Spa Safety Act requires compliant anti-entrapment drain covers and, on single-drain systems, a secondary anti-entrapment device on public pools and spas. Residential pools are outside the federal requirement, and the same drain covers are made and sold for them; a cracked or missing main drain cover on a home pool is a repair to make immediately rather than at the end of the season.
Anyone quoting a renovation should be able to say what the barrier and the drain arrangement will look like when the work is finished.
Source: U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission, pool and spa safety
The pump rule changed what can be sold
Federal energy conservation standards for dedicated-purpose pool pumps mean that most single-speed replacement pumps above a small size are no longer manufactured for sale, and a variable-speed pump is the ordinary replacement. Running longer at a lower speed moves the same water for a fraction of the electricity, and the pump is usually the largest single electrical load a pool adds to a house.
A quote that proposes a like-for-like single-speed replacement on an older pool is worth questioning, and a variable-speed replacement often needs a controller and sometimes a different electrical connection, which belongs in the price rather than in a later change order.
Source: U.S. Department of Energy, appliance and equipment standards
Water chemistry is the recurring half of the job
A pool is a small water treatment plant with a diving board. Sanitiser level, pH, alkalinity, calcium hardness and stabiliser all move against each other, and the equipment fails in predictable ways when they are left alone: heaters scale, plaster etches, liners bleach, and a salt-chlorine generator's cell gives up early.
Salt systems are chlorine systems. They generate chlorine from dissolved salt rather than replacing it, which is why a salt pool still has to be tested. Weekly service contracts and one-off repairs are sold by the same companies listed on this page, and they are different purchases.
Where pool work is separately licensed
A handful of states license swimming pool and spa contracting as its own classification, and most do not, so the licensed share on a pool hub is published in fewer places than on a plumbing hub. Pool construction also touches three other trades at once, excavation, plumbing and electrical, so the permit for a new pool is usually several permits.
Every rule stated above links the public page that states it: U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission, pool and spa safety; U.S. Department of Energy, appliance and equipment standards.
Pool state by state
Each state page carries its own licence classes, its number formats and what its rules do to this trade in particular. The record counts below are that state’s whole pool universe, the same figure its own page prints.
| State | Records | Per 10,000 | Licensed share |
|---|---|---|---|
| Alabama | 118 | 0.23 | Not published |
| Alaska | 4 | 0.05 | Not published |
| Arizona | 649 | 0.87 | Not published |
| Arkansas | 58 | 0.19 | Not published |
| California | 2,120 | 0.54 | 12.9% |
| Colorado | 91 | 0.15 | Not published |
| Connecticut | 160 | 0.44 | Not published |
| Delaware | 27 | 0.26 | Not published |
| District of Columbia | 1 | 0.01 | Not published |
| Florida | 1,933 | 0.85 | 7.5% |
| Georgia | 400 | 0.36 | Not published |
| Hawaii | 30 | 0.21 | Not published |
| Idaho | 30 | 0.15 | Not published |
| Illinois | 206 | 0.16 | Not published |
| Indiana | 164 | 0.24 | Not published |
| Iowa | 32 | 0.10 | Not published |
| Kansas | 62 | 0.21 | Not published |
| Kentucky | 97 | 0.21 | Not published |
| Louisiana | 142 | 0.31 | Not published |
| Maine | 36 | 0.26 | Not published |
| Maryland | 158 | 0.26 | Not published |
| Massachusetts | 210 | 0.30 | Not published |
| Michigan | 210 | 0.21 | Not published |
| Minnesota | 72 | 0.13 | Not published |
| Mississippi | 76 | 0.26 | Not published |
| Missouri | 135 | 0.22 | Not published |
| Montana | 16 | 0.14 | Not published |
| Nebraska | 14 | 0.07 | Not published |
| Nevada | 217 | 0.68 | Not published |
| New Hampshire | 55 | 0.39 | Not published |
| New Jersey | 294 | 0.32 | Not published |
| New Mexico | 45 | 0.21 | Not published |
| New York | 429 | 0.22 | Not published |
| North Carolina | 339 | 0.31 | Not published |
| North Dakota | 3 | 0.04 | Not published |
| Ohio | 251 | 0.21 | Not published |
| Oklahoma | 111 | 0.27 | Not published |
| Oregon | 83 | 0.20 | Not published |
| Pennsylvania | 389 | 0.30 | Not published |
| Rhode Island | 31 | 0.28 | Not published |
| South Carolina | 205 | 0.38 | Not published |
| South Dakota | 5 | 0.05 | Not published |
| Tennessee | 223 | 0.31 | Not published |
| Texas | 1,372 | 0.45 | Not published |
| Utah | 57 | 0.17 | Not published |
| Vermont | 10 | 0.15 | Not published |
| Virginia | 198 | 0.23 | Not published |
| Washington | 85 | 0.11 | Not published |
| West Virginia | 37 | 0.21 | Not published |
| Wisconsin | 81 | 0.14 | Not published |
| Wyoming | 7 | 0.12 | Not published |
Nothing on this page is a rating, an endorsement, or a recommendation, and no figure here describes any individual business. Ordering never depends on payment, claim status, license status, or any commercial relationship, on this page or any other.