Architecture Firm Video Statistics

Key takeaways

1. Channels that say they are architects or architecture firms posted 6.8% of YouTube’s 529 most-viewed ‘architecture’, ‘architect’ and ‘house design’ videos and drew 2.2% of their views; architects placed in the U.S. drew 0.1% (our read, Nov 2026). (Mark Studios) See details
2. Render, 3D and AI studios and faceless design-ideas channels drew 42.5% of all views in the sample and 66.2% in ‘house design’; videos of 60 seconds or less drew 62.8% of the views. (Mark Studios) See details
3. Employers had 106,770 wage and salary architects in May 2025, at a median annual wage of $99,280; BLS estimates that 14.0% of architect jobs are held by the self-employed, against 5.8% of all jobs. (BLS) See details
4. Florida’s licensee file held 13,248 architect licences on October 31, 2026; 54.2% list an address outside Florida, and 1,093 are in Palm Beach, Broward and Martin counties (our count). (Florida DBPR, Mark Studios) See details
5. The U.S. had 29,991 private architecture-firm establishments (NAICS 541310) in 2025, 22.3% more than in 2019, while their jobs rose 3.4% (our calculation from BLS QCEW). (BLS, Mark Studios) See details
6. NCARB says a new architect took 12.3 years on average to earn a licence in 2025; the overall ARE pass rate was 55%, and its experience program requires 3,740 hours. (NCARB) See details
7. In Architizer and Enscape’s 2023 survey, 32% of design professionals said their firm uses fly-through videos and 35% virtual reality; in Chaos and Architizer’s 2025 survey, 26% used animations frequently. (Architizer, Enscape, Chaos) See details
8. U.S. colleges reported 12,909 architecture completions in 2023-24, 21.2% more than in 2013-14; 87.7% of architecture master’s degrees are now reported under the building-sciences code 04.0902 (our count of IPEDS data). (NCES, Mark Studios) See details

Who makes the most-viewed architecture videos on YouTube?

Channels that say they are architects or architecture firms drew 2.2% of the views of the most-viewed 'architecture', 'architect' and 'house design' videos on YouTube on November 5, 2026, from 6.8% of the videos (our count). We read YouTube's own view-sorted search results, the top 200 for each of the three searches, through the YouTube Data API, with no country filter. The three lists held 529 unique videos from 309 channels (our count). We sorted every channel by hand from its own title, description and video text. An architect here is any channel whose own text says its owner is an architect, a team of architects or an architecture firm, practice or studio, anywhere in the world; 20 channels qualified. We did not check any of them against a licence register.

The architects' videos sit below the middle of the list. Their median video had 1,916,138.5 views, against 3,716,846 for the whole sample, and the median architect channel had 180,500 subscribers, against 626,000 for media, entertainment and music channels (our count). On a stricter reading, counting only channels whose description itself says architect or firm (not just the channel name or a video title), 1.9% of the views remain.

Channels that design houses or interiors, or show their own designs (architects, archviz studios, plan services and interior designers), posted 138 of the 529 videos; architects posted 36 of them (our count). Plan services that do not name an architect, mostly draftsmen and civil engineers selling house plans in South Asia, posted more videos than architects did. Of the 280 videos whose title contains 'architect' or 'architecture', 257 came from channels that do not say they are architects (our count).

How many U.S. or Florida architects appear in YouTube's most-viewed architecture videos?

Almost none. Architect channels placed in the United States by their own text or country setting drew 0.1% of the views of the 529 most-viewed videos on November 5, 2026: three videos, all from one practice in Maine (our count). India-set architect channels drew 1.1% of the views from 11 videos. Only 1 of the 20 architect channels stated a registration in its own text, a UK and Canada registered architect; none stated AIA membership, NCARB certification or a U.S. state licence. 0 of the 20 architect channels named Florida or a Florida place; the only channel in the sample that tied itself to Florida was a New York and Florida residential drafting company (our count).

U.S. channels as a whole are not absent. Channels whose country setting is the United States drew 42.2% of the views, from 29.7% of the videos, while India-set channels drew 29.2% (our count). The U.S. views come mostly from Architectural Digest's celebrity home tours, 3D-render channels and faceless clip channels, not from architects.

Does YouTube show different makers for 'architecture', 'architect' and 'house design'?

Yes. In the 200 most-viewed 'architecture' results, architect channels drew 2.4% of the views, while house-tour and architecture-media channels drew 34.4% (our count). The 'architect' search is mostly music and entertainment: those channels drew 52.7% of its views, and 31 of its 200 videos were songs by the band Architects. Channels that say they are architects posted 12.5% of the 'architect' videos, their best showing in any of the three lists, but drew only 5.0% of its views. In the 'house design' list, archviz, 3D and AI channels and faceless compilations drew 66.2% of the views and architects 1.8%; house-plan services posted 24.0% of its videos (our count).

The first two searches overlap; the third does not. 62 videos were in both the 'architecture' and 'architect' lists, but only 7 were in both 'architecture' and 'house design' (our count).

How much of the attention goes to rendered, AI or faceless house videos?

Channels that say they make 3D renders, archviz animations or AI video and faceless compilations that name no maker together drew 42.5% of the views of the 529 most-viewed videos on November 5, 2026 (our count). The single most-viewed video, a 5-second faceless 'house design' clip, had 389,148,833 views, 7.8% of all views in the sample; its channel's two clips held 55.5% of the faceless class's views. Many faceless clips look rendered, but we counted a channel as archviz, 3D or AI only when its own text says so. YouTube's API showed its altered or synthetic content flag on none of the 529 videos, although 18 channels in the sample say they make 3D, render or AI video (our count).

Views are concentrated. The 10 channels with the most views held 47.9% of all views in the sample (our count). 109 of the 529 videos had 10 million views or more and 5 had 100 million or more. The median video had 15.2 likes per 1,000 views.

Are the most-viewed architecture videos short and recent?

Short videos take most of the views. Videos of 60 seconds or less were 39.3% of the 529 videos and drew 62.8% of their views on November 5, 2026 (our count). In the 'house design' list, 68.5% of the videos ran 60 seconds or less, and they drew 81.9% of its views. The median short video had 5,862,645 views, against 2,473,349 for longer ones. 85.4% of the archviz, 3D and AI channels' videos were 60 seconds or less, against 38.9% of the architect channels' videos.

Most are new. 53.9% of the 529 videos were published in 2025 or 2026, 168 of them in 2026, and only 4.3% before 2020 (our count). Topic channels also ride the word: 3.7% of all views went to 8 videos about hostile or anti-homeless architecture, all from facts, comedy and documentary channels.

How active are the AIA, NCARB and the largest firms on YouTube?

Their channels post a few dozen videos a year to audiences in the low thousands. In the 12 months to November 5, 2026, the confirmed channels of the AIA, NCARB, Gensler, SOM and HOK posted 165 videos with a median of 250 views each (our count from the YouTube Data API). 0 of the five had a video among the 529 most-viewed architecture videos. Gensler, SOM and HOK together posted 101 videos, 80 of them from HOK.

Each channel was found from a YouTube link on the organisation's own website, except the AIA's, whose site refused our reader; its channel was matched by handle and description. No official channel was found for Foster + Partners, BIG or Snohetta. The channels at the handles @zahahadidarchitects and @perkinswill hold one video each, last uploaded in 2013 and 2016, and neither is linked from the firm's site, so we do not count them as the firms' own. Subscriber counts are rounded by YouTube, and all view counts include ad views.

How many architects are there in the U.S., and what do they earn?

U.S. employers counted 106,770 wage-and-salary architects (SOC 17-1011, architects except landscape and naval) in May 2025 (BLS OEWS). Their mean annual wage was $106,260 (BLS OEWS) and the median was $99,280 (BLS OEWS). The lowest-paid tenth earned less than $62,300 (BLS OEWS) and the highest-paid tenth more than $161,420 (BLS OEWS). These figures come from the OEWS employer survey, so they leave out self-employed architects and partners who draw no wage. BLS says OEWS estimates are not built for year-over-year comparison.

Counting every class of worker, BLS's Employment Projections program put the occupation at 124.6 thousand jobs in 2025 (BLS Employment Projections). The household survey (CPS) counted 254 thousand employed people whose main job was architect in 2025 (BLS CPS Table 11). The counts differ because each survey counts a different thing: payroll jobs, all jobs, and people who name architecture as their main job. BLS also notes that its 2025 CPS averages cover 11 months, because October 2025 data were not collected during the federal shutdown.

Women were 29.8% of employed architects in 2025, and Hispanic or Latino workers were 10.5% (BLS CPS Table 11). Both shares come from a household sample and carry sampling error.

Who employs architects, and how many are self-employed?

BLS estimates that 14.0 percent of architect jobs were self-employed in 2025 (BLS Employment Projections), against 5.8 percent for all U.S. jobs (BLS Employment Projections). The Occupational Outlook Handbook puts 74% of architect jobs in architectural, engineering, and related services firms (BLS Occupational Outlook Handbook); self-employment, construction and government account for much of the rest.

The OEWS industry estimates count 92,180 wage-and-salary architects inside NAICS 541300 Architectural, engineering, and related services in May 2025 (BLS OEWS). By industry, the median architect in government (excluding state and local education and hospitals) earned $115,920 (BLS Occupational Outlook Handbook) and the median architect in construction earned $95,760 (BLS Occupational Outlook Handbook), against $99,280 for the occupation as a whole.

Two neighbouring occupations are counted separately and are not architects in these figures: landscape architects (SOC 17-1012), 19,600 payroll jobs (BLS OEWS), and architectural and civil drafters (SOC 17-3011), 103,700 payroll jobs (BLS OEWS), both in May 2025.

How many architects work in Florida and its southeast metros?

Florida employers counted 5,580 wage-and-salary architects in May 2025 (BLS OEWS). Florida's location quotient for the occupation was 0.82, so architects made up a smaller share of jobs there than nationally (BLS OEWS). The Miami-Fort Lauderdale-West Palm Beach metro area (Miami-Dade, Broward and Palm Beach counties) counted 1,810 (BLS OEWS). The Port St. Lucie metro area (St. Lucie and Martin counties) counted 50 (BLS OEWS). BLS published every one of these estimates for May 2025; none was suppressed, but the small metro counts carry wide sampling error.

Will there be more architect jobs over the next decade?

BLS projects architect employment to grow 4.3 percent from 2025 to 2035 (BLS Employment Projections), from 124.6 thousand to 129.9 thousand jobs (BLS Employment Projections). That is close to the 3.5 percent projected for all occupations over the same decade (BLS Employment Projections). BLS expects about 6.9 thousand openings a year (BLS Employment Projections), most of them to replace architects who move to other occupations or retire rather than new positions. The Handbook ties future demand to sustainable design and to new and renovated homes, schools and healthcare buildings, and says BIM software, measuring technology and AI are making design work more efficient.

What counts as an architecture firm in federal statistics?

Federal statistics count architecture firms under NAICS 541310 Architectural services: establishments primarily engaged in planning and designing residential, institutional, leisure, commercial and industrial buildings and structures (Census NAICS 2022 manual). Land planning belongs to 541320 Landscape architectural services, and firms that both design and build, or manage construction, are classed in construction. Every firm count below uses this definition.

How many architecture firms are there in the U.S.?

The U.S. averaged 29,991 private architecture-firm establishments with employees in 2025 (BLS QCEW), up from 24,529 in 2019 (BLS QCEW). Those firms averaged 201,705 jobs in 2025 (BLS QCEW), against 195,096 in 2019 (BLS QCEW), and average annual pay was $110,780 (BLS QCEW). QCEW counts everyone on an architecture firm's payroll (architects, drafters, office staff) and leaves out owners with no employees. By our calculation, establishments rose 22.3% from 2019 to 2025 while jobs rose 3.4%, so the average establishment shrank from 8.0 to 6.7 jobs (our calculation).

Census counts set the population a little differently. County Business Patterns counted 22,805 employer establishments in 2023 (Census County Business Patterns) with 189,468 employees in mid-March (Census County Business Patterns). The 2022 Economic Census counted 22,644 establishments (Census Economic Census) belonging to 21,258 firms (Census Economic Census). Most are small: 14,512 establishments had fewer than 5 employees in 2023 (Census County Business Patterns), and 10,624 firms that operated all of 2022 had fewer than 5 employees (Census Economic Census), while 29 firms had 500 or more (Census Economic Census).

Many architects work with no employees at all. Census counted 45,694 nonemployer architecture businesses (NAICS 54131, mostly sole proprietors with receipts of $1,000 or more) in 2024 (Census Nonemployer Statistics) and 46,255 in 2023 (Census Nonemployer Statistics), the year that sits beside the County Business Patterns count. That is 2.0 nonemployer architecture businesses for every employer establishment in 2023 (our calculation), and 63.6% of employer establishments had fewer than 5 employees (our calculation).

How much do U.S. architecture firms earn, and from what work?

Employer architecture firms had receipts of $48,566,045 thousand in 2022, according to the Economic Census (Census Economic Census). The product-line data show where that money came from. Architectural services for apartment-building and nonresidential projects made up 72.9 percent of receipts, and residential projects other than apartment buildings made up 13.1 percent (Census Economic Census, products).

Lines inside the nonresidential total overlap with it, so the table rows should not be added to 72.9 percent.

Who pays architecture firms?

Government was the largest single named customer class in 2022: federal, state and local bodies accounted for 20.1 percent of architecture-firm receipts in the Economic Census class-of-customer data (Census Economic Census, class of customer). Households and individuals accounted for 11.4 percent (Census Economic Census, class of customer), other architecture firms (subcontracted work) 9.7 percent (Census Economic Census, class of customer), and construction contractors 6.9 percent (Census Economic Census, class of customer). The largest block, 42.7 percent, is "all other customers", which includes private businesses and developers (Census Economic Census, class of customer).

Census does not publish an advertising figure for architecture firms alone. For the wider NAICS 5413 group (architecture, engineering and related services), employer firms spent $1,709,473 thousand on purchased advertising and promotional services in 2024 (Census Annual Integrated Economic Survey); engineering firms make up most of that group, and the figure leaves out in-house marketing staff.

How many architecture firms are in Florida, Palm Beach, Broward and Martin counties?

Florida averaged 2,293 private architecture-firm establishments in 2025 (BLS QCEW), with 11,975 jobs (BLS QCEW) and average annual pay of $102,879 (BLS QCEW). The 2022 Economic Census counted 1,672 Florida employer establishments (Census Economic Census) and County Business Patterns counted 1,741 in 2023 (Census County Business Patterns). Census counted 3,768 Florida nonemployer architecture businesses in 2024 (Census Nonemployer Statistics).

QCEW averages establishments over the year and counts only firms with employees covered by unemployment insurance; County Business Patterns uses a mid-March snapshot; nonemployer counts cover businesses with no paid employees. The three sources count different populations and should not be added together. Together the three counties had 411 of Florida's QCEW architecture establishments in 2025, 17.9% (our calculation).

How many licensed architects does Florida have?

Florida's licensee file dated October 31, 2026 lists 13,248 architect licences (our count). The Florida Department of Business and Professional Regulation (DBPR) publishes the file for its Board of Architecture and Interior Design; it holds active, inactive and voluntarily inactive licences and leaves out null and void, delinquent and involuntarily inactive ones. Of the 13,248, 12,997 carry the Active status, 15 of those under suspension, and 251 are inactive (our count). These are licences, not people working full time as architects.

More than half of the licences belong to architects based elsewhere. Only 6,062 list a Florida mailing address, while 7,186 list an address in another state, abroad or no state, which is 54.2 percent of the file (our count and calculation). New York is the most common outside address, with 741 licences. The Florida-address count works out to about 109 licences for every 100 wage and salary architects BLS counted in Florida in May 2025 (our calculation; the two counts have different dates and populations, and BLS leaves out the self-employed).

DBPR's annual reports do not split architects from interior designers. They give one line for the whole board: 15,312 licensees in fiscal year 2023-24, of which 14,949 were active DBPR. That total covers architects, interior designers and business records together.

How many architects are based in Palm Beach, Broward and Martin counties?

In DBPR's October 31, 2026 file, 514 architect licences have a Palm Beach County address, 535 a Broward County address and 44 a Martin County address (our count). Together that is 1,093 licences, or 18.0 percent of the licences with a Florida address (our calculation). Miami-Dade County has the most, with 1,403. County is the DBPR county code of the mailing address of record, which can be a home or an office.

Source: our count from DBPR's public licensee file lic02ai.csv. The architecture business column counts DBPR's "Architect Business Information" records, the file's only business type; those records carry no licence number. Palm Beach, Broward and Martin counties hold 526 of them, 20.8 percent of the business records with a Florida address (our calculation).

How many new architect licences does Florida issue each year?

Of the licences still in the file, 721 were first issued in 2023, the most of any year (our count). 3,328 were first issued from 2021 through 2025, and 590 in 2026 up to October 31. Licences that lapsed or were cancelled drop out of the file, so older years are undercounted; the figures show licences that are still on the books, not every licence ever issued.

How many licensed architects are there in the United States?

NCARB says the number of U.S. architects rose 6% in 2025 NCARB, after falling 4% to 116,000 in 2024 (NCARB by the Numbers 2025). The National Council of Architectural Registration Boards (NCARB) is the certification body made up of the 55 U.S. architectural licensing boards; it runs the licensing exam (ARE) and experience programme (AXP) and charges candidates for them. Its counts come from its annual Survey of Architectural Registration Boards. Architects also held 146,321 out-of-state (reciprocal) licences in 2025, down 3% (NCARB). Architects over 65 made up 14% of the total.

Just over 51,500 architects held an active NCARB Certificate in 2025, the credential that eases licensing in another state (NCARB). 127,400 people held an NCARB Record that year, and just over 9,300 opened a new one. NCARB sent over 16,500 record transmittals to licensing boards, more than 13,000 of them for reciprocal licences.

How long does it take to become a licensed architect?

The average person who earned an architect licence in 2025 took 12.3 years, counting degree, experience programme and exam (NCARB). Nearly 3,500 people became new architects in 2025, 6% fewer than in 2024, from a pool of just over 39,000 active candidates. Of people who opened an NCARB Record in 2012, 46% had become licensed by 2025; 37% had stopped. In 2025, 13% of new architects earned extra experience in place of a degree from a NAAB-accredited programme NCARB press release.

What are the ARE 5.0 pass rates?

The overall ARE 5.0 pass rate was 55% in 2025, the same as in 2024 (NCARB). Candidates took 44,093 exam divisions, and 17,747 candidates tested at least once. The average candidate who finished the exam in 2025 took 2 years to do so, a record low. 30% of those who finished passed all six divisions on the first try, and candidates who used NCARB's free practice exams were 15 percentage points more likely to pass. NCARB writes and sells the exam.

Who are America's licensed architects?

In 2025, 28% of U.S. architects identified as women and 21% as people of color, NCARB reports from its Record holder data NCARB. White men made up 60% of all architects. The candidate pool is more diverse: women were 47% of licensure candidates in 2025. The average woman who earned a licence that year took 11.7 years, more than a year less than the average man.

How many architect licences do other states' open data files list?

State open-data files show the same pattern as Florida: many licences belong to architects based elsewhere. Connecticut's file lists 4,553 active architect credentials, only 1,234 with a Connecticut address, plus 393 active architecture firm credentials (our count, data.ct.gov). Colorado's lists 8,789 active architect licences, 4,009 with a Colorado address (our count, data.colorado.gov). Washington's Department of Licensing counted 7,325 active architect licences in September 2026 and 1,394 active architect firm licences (our sum, data.wa.gov). These are licence records, and one architect can hold licences in several states.

Who can call themselves an architect in Florida?

Only a license holder. Under the 2026 Florida Statutes, knowingly practising architecture without a license, or using the title "architect" or "registered architect" without one, is a misdemeanor of the first degree (s. 481.223). A licensed architect who lets the license go may still use the title "Architect, Retired". The rules are written and enforced by the Board of Architecture and Interior Design, which has 11 members: five architects, three registered interior designers and three laypersons (s. 481.205).

Advertising is regulated too. Each registered architect must print the architect's license number in any newspaper, directory or other advertising medium, and a firm must show its qualifying agent's number (s. 481.221(10)). Advertising that is fraudulent, false, deceptive, or misleading in form or content is a ground for discipline (s. 481.225), and the board may fine an architect up to $1,000 per count, or up to $5,000 for a material Florida Building Code violation (s. 481.225(3)(c)).

Which buildings need an architect in Florida?

Most homes do not. Florida's exemption covers any one-family or two-family residence, townhouse or domestic outbuilding "regardless of cost", plus farm buildings (s. 481.229(1)). Any other building costing less than $25,000 is also exempt, except a school, auditorium or other building intended for public use (s. 481.229(1)(c)). Other states draw the line in different places, as the table shows.

Public buildings are stricter. In Texas only an architect may prepare plans for a new publicly owned education, assembly or office building costing more than $100,000, or a wall-moving alteration of one costing more than $50,000 (Occ. Code 1051.703). New York exempts alterations that leave structural and public safety untouched if they cost ten thousand dollars or less in New York City, or twenty thousand dollars or less elsewhere in the state (Educ. Law 7307). Texas's board has nine members (Occ. Code 1051.101) and may impose an administrative penalty of up to $5,000 per violation, with each day counted separately (Occ. Code 1051.452). New York requires college study and experience that together total eight years (Educ. Law 7304).

How do you get an architect license?

Through a degree, an experience programme and a six-part exam. Florida licenses an applicant who has passed the board's licensure exam and graduated from a programme accredited by the National Architectural Accreditation Board (s. 481.209). The exam is NCARB's Architect Registration Examination. NCARB, the certification body that develops it for U.S. licensing boards, says ARE 5.0 has six divisions and that every U.S. jurisdiction requires passing all six (NCARB). The divisions differ in length:

NCARB lists Programming & Analysis and Construction & Evaluation at 75 items and 3 hours each. It charges $1,578 for all six divisions, or $263 per division and per retake (NCARB fees). On April 27, 2026 NCARB adjusted 12 of the 91 exam objectives without changing the divisions, item counts or testing times (NCARB).

The experience programme (AXP) asks for 3,740 hours across six experience areas (NCARB). Project Development & Documentation takes the largest share at 1,520 hours and Practice Management, the area that covers marketing a firm and winning projects, the smallest at 160 (NCARB). About half must be earned inside an architecture firm; up to 1,860 hours can come from work outside one (NCARB). Since November 2025, experience older than a year earns 75% credit instead of expiring after five years (NCARB).

Architects moving between states usually go through NCARB too. The NCARB Certificate costs $1,415 to apply for and $300 a year to renew (NCARB fees). Florida charges an NCARB certificate holder $65.00 for a license by endorsement, against $175.00 for other applicants (Rule 61G1-17.001), and every out-of-state architect seeking endorsement must take a 2-hour board-approved class on wind mitigation (s. 481.213).

What does Florida require to keep an architect license?

At least 24 hours of health, safety and welfare continuing education every two years under the board's rule (Rule 61G1-24.001). The statute sets a floor of 20 hours of at least 50 minutes each (s. 481.215(3)), of which 2 hours must cover the Florida Building Code (s. 481.215(5)). Licenses renew in odd-numbered years, with the cycle ending on February 28 (Rule 61G1-24.001).

The board's own fees are small next to NCARB's. Florida charges $35.00 for licensure by initial examination and $100.00 for an active biennial renewal (Rule 61G1-17.001). The statute caps the initial application and exam fee at $775 plus the cost of buying the exam from NCARB (s. 481.207).

Does an architecture firm need its own license in Florida?

A firm practises through a qualifying agent who is a registered architect. If that agent leaves and was the firm's only one, the firm must qualify a replacement within 60 days and may not practise architecture until it does (s. 481.219). Sealed drawings can be filed electronically: each digitally signed file needs an authentication code under federal hash standard FIPS 180-4 (Rule 61G1-16.005).

How does the federal government choose architects?

By qualifications first, price second. The Brooks Act, added to federal law in 1972 (40 U.S.C. 1104 notes), requires an agency to hold discussions with at least 3 firms and rank at least 3 of the most highly qualified in order of preference before negotiating a fee (40 U.S.C. 1103). The FAR repeats the rule for evaluation boards, which talk with at least three of the most highly qualified firms (FAR 36.602-3), and tells agencies to weigh a firm's ability in computer-assisted design when they classify it (FAR 36.603). FAR 36.606, as published in FAC 2026-01, has the contracting officer negotiate with the top-ranked firm first (FAR 36.606). The fee for designs, plans, drawings and specifications on a public work may not exceed 6 percent of the estimated construction cost (FAR 15.404-4).

Firms apply on Standard Form 330. The government estimates it takes 29 hours to fill in: 25 hours for Part I, which is written for one contract, and 4 hours for Part II, the firm's general qualifications (SF 330). Part I asks for 10 projects as examples unless the agency says otherwise (SF 330).

The federal design programme itself is in flux. Executive Order 14344 says GSA set up its Design Excellence Program in 1994 and that the program "has not met this goal" (Federal Register). The order makes classical and traditional architecture the preferred style for courthouses, agency headquarters, federal buildings in the National Capital Region and other federal buildings costing more than $50 million (Federal Register). GSA's program page was cut to one line, "currently under evaluation", last updated Sep 5, 2025 (GSA, archived).

Can you film or photograph a building without the architect's permission?

Yes, if it can be seen from a public place. Buildings and plans have been protected as architectural works since a 1990 amendment to the Copyright Act (17 U.S.C. 102). But the copyright in a built work does not include the right to stop pictures or photographs of it when the building is located in or ordinarily visible from a public place (17 U.S.C. 120(a)). The exception covers pictorial representations. It does not cover copying the design as another building.

What are the drone rules for filming buildings and sites?

Under the FAA's Part 107, a commercial drone stays at or below 400 feet above ground level. It may go higher only within a 400-foot radius of a structure, and then no more than 400 feet above the structure's top (14 CFR 107.51). Groundspeed is capped at 87 knots (100 mph) (14 CFR 107.51). Flight visibility must be at least 3 statute miles (14 CFR 107.51). The remote pilot must be at least 16 (14 CFR 107.61) and must have passed the knowledge test or completed recurrent training within the previous 24 calendar months (14 CFR 107.65).

How much is the U.S. spending on the buildings architects design?

U.S. construction spending ran at a seasonally adjusted annual rate of $2,186.1 billion in September 2026, 2.7% below September 2025 (U.S. Census Bureau). The Census Bureau's Value of Construction Put in Place survey counts all construction work done in the month, not design fees, so it measures the size of the building market rather than architects' income. September figures are preliminary and will be revised.

In the first nine months of 2026, construction spending totalled $1,649.6 billion, 2.9% less than in the same months of 2025 (U.S. Census Bureau). For the full year 2025, the Census Bureau's first annual estimate was $2,164.4 billion, 1.4% below 2024 (U.S. Census Bureau).

Private residential spending includes improvements to existing homes. Private residential spending fell 5.5% from August to September 2026, while private nonresidential spending rose 1.1%.

Which building types are growing and which are shrinking?

Office construction, which the Census Bureau counts with data centers, ran at an annual rate of $162,299 million in September 2026, 33.4% above a year earlier (U.S. Census Bureau). Commercial construction (retail, warehouses and similar) was 4.0% lower than a year earlier and educational construction 2.6% lower. The table gives private plus public spending in millions of dollars.

The September column is a seasonally adjusted annual rate and the 2025 column is an annual total, so the two columns show levels, not a growth rate.

How many new homes are being permitted?

Privately owned housing units authorized by building permits ran at a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 1,400,000 in September 2026, 3.0% below September 2025 (U.S. Census Bureau). Single-family authorizations ran at 845,000, 4.0% below August (U.S. Census Bureau). A permit needs drawings, but many homes are built from builders' stock plans without an architect, so permits are a proxy for residential design work, not a count of it.

What do construction forecasters expect for 2026 and 2027?

In July 2026 the AIA Consensus Construction Forecast panel expected nonresidential building spending to fall 0.3% in 2026, down from the 1.0% rise the same panel forecast in January (AIA, July 2026). The American Institute of Architects is a membership association of architects; its panel is made up of outside forecasters, including Dodge Construction Network, S&P Global, Moody's Analytics, FMI, ConstructConnect and Associated Builders & Contractors. In January 2026 the panel had expected a 1.0 percent increase for 2026 and 2.2% for 2027 (AIA, January 2026). For 2027 the July panel raised its forecast to a 3.0% increase (AIA).

By AIA's count, spending on nonresidential buildings fell 2% to $846 billion in 2025 (AIA). That figure is AIA's own grouping of building categories and is smaller than the Census nonresidential total, which also includes infrastructure such as highways and power.

These are forecasts in current dollars made in July 2026, not measurements. Almost all of the commercial upgrade since January comes from data centers: without them the panel expects commercial spending to fall in 2026.

Are new nonresidential projects entering planning?

The Dodge Momentum Index, which tracks the value of nonresidential building projects entering planning, rose 2.4% in September 2026 to 288.0 (2000=100) (Dodge Construction Network). It was up 3.7% on September 2025, with the institutional portion up 17.2% and the commercial portion down 3.0% (Dodge Construction Network). Without data centers, Dodge says the commercial portion would have been down 14.9% from a year earlier (Dodge Construction Network).

45 projects valued at $100 million or more entered planning in September 2026, led by data centers and hospital projects (Dodge Construction Network). Across 2025, the index averaged 37% above its 2024 level (Dodge Construction Network).

Dodge Construction Network sells project leads and construction data, including to architects. It says its index leads nonresidential building spending by "a full year to 18 months" (Dodge Construction Network); the release does not show the test behind that claim. Planning is the stage at which architects are usually already at work, so the index is closer to design demand than spending is.

What do residential architects report about their clients?

Residential architecture firms' project billings, inquiries and design contracts have been falling since 2022, the American Institute of Architects reported in September 2026 (AIA). The figures come from AIA's Home Design Trends Survey, run quarterly with a panel of 300+ residential architecture firms (AIA). Project backlogs at those firms held at about 5 months through the second quarter of 2026 (AIA Home Design Trends Survey).

The survey asks firms whether client interest in a feature is increasing or decreasing and reports the net share (increasing minus decreasing), comparing Q2 2026 with Q2 2025.

These are architects' reports of what their clients ask for, from an association of architects, not a survey of homeowners.

How many renovating homeowners hire an architect?

8% of homeowners on Houzz who renovated in 2025 hired an architect, the same share that hired an interior designer (Houzz). Landscape architects or designers were hired by 6% (Houzz). Taken together, 22% hired at least one design-related professional (architects, interior designers or decorators, kitchen or bath designers, landscape professionals or lighting designers), unchanged from 2024 (Houzz).

Houzz surveyed 10,176 U.S. homeowners on its platform who renovated in 2025, fielded January to March 2026, and weighted the results to Houzz users, not to all U.S. homeowners. Houzz sells software, leads and advertising to architects and other design professionals.

How many architects use rendering software?

84% of architects surveyed by Houzz used drafting or rendering software in 2024, their most common software use (Houzz State of the Industry 2025). Houzz counted 300 architects among 1,537 home-renovation and design businesses with a Houzz profile, surveyed November 7 to December 15, 2024. Houzz sells software and marketing to these firms, and its panel leans residential. In the same survey, 44% of the architects used software for graphic design, presentations or branding (Houzz).

How many architecture firms make fly-through videos and animations?

32% of design professionals in a 2023 Architizer survey run with Enscape said their firm uses fly-through videos (Architizer and Enscape 2023). The survey reached more than 2,000 design professionals, 73% of them in the U.S.; just under half worked in architecture, and the report gives no field dates. Enscape is a rendering product sold by Chaos.

Animation remained a minority habit two years later. In the 2025 State of Archviz survey by Chaos and Architizer, only 26% of architects and designers said they use animations frequently (Chaos and Architizer 2025). That survey drew over 1,000 respondents in November 2024; 40% were in the U.S. and the rest came from 75 other countries (Chaos). Chaos sells the V-Ray and Enscape renderers. 43% of the firms said slow rendering times were a major challenge (Chaos and Architizer).

Do firms plan to spend more on animation and VR?

43% of respondents to the 2023 Architizer/Enscape survey said their firm planned to invest more in architectural animations over the next 12 months (Architizer and Enscape 2023), and 40% planned to invest more in virtual reality (Architizer and Enscape). These are stated plans from a vendor-audience sample, not measured spending.

What do architects use real-time rendering for?

More than 75% of respondents to the 2023 Architizer/Enscape survey used real-time rendering daily or at least twice a week (Architizer and Enscape 2023). 50% named walking through a 3D model with clients or collaborators as a main advantage (Architizer and Enscape), and 40% used real-time software to create marketing materials (Architizer and Enscape). 45% said they use visualisations when pitching for projects (Architizer and Enscape).

Most of this work stays in-house. Over 75% of respondents said their firm produces visualisations through a dedicated in-house expert or its own architects and designers (Architizer and Enscape).

How are architects using AI for visualisation?

11% of firms in the Chaos/Architizer survey of November 2024 were already using AI in their visualisation workflow (Chaos and Architizer 2025). The most common use was generating concept images and early design ideas, named by 44% (Chaos and Architizer). 52% of the respondents worked in hybrid office arrangements (Chaos).

How big can a house walk-through get on YouTube?

The most viewed video on Architectural Digest's YouTube channel, a celebrity house walk-through, had more than 50M views, YouTube's Culture & Trends team wrote (YouTube Blog). That is a magazine's channel, not an architecture firm's, and YouTube published no architecture-wide totals.

How many people finish architecture programs in the U.S. each year?

U.S. colleges reported 12,909 architecture completions in academic year 2023-24 at 173 institutions, counting every award level (our count of NCES IPEDS data, provisional). That count adds two federal program codes: CIP 04.0201, Architecture, which NCES defines as a program that "prepares individuals for the independent professional practice of architecture" (NCES CIP 2020), and CIP 04.0902, Architectural and Building Sciences/Technology, a building-technology program that includes instruction in architecture (NCES CIP 2020). In 2022-23, the latest year with final data, the total was 12,765 at 170 institutions (our count). These are awards to first majors at institutions in the 50 states and DC, not people.

The two-code total rose 21.2% in ten years, from 10,647 in 2013-14 to 12,909 in 2023-24 (our calculation). Of the 2023-24 awards, 7,288 were bachelor's degrees from 137 institutions and 5,100 were master's degrees from 124 institutions (our count). Research doctorates are rare: 119 from 23 institutions.

Why did "architecture" degrees in federal data drop so fast?

Most of the drop is a change of label, not of students. NCES's own tables show U.S. colleges conferred 4,285 master's degrees under the Architecture code in 2013-14 and only 758 in 2021-22 (NCES Digest table 318.30). Over the same years, master's degrees under Architectural and Building Sciences/Technology went from 85 (NCES Digest 2015) to 3,687 (NCES Digest 2023). The IPEDS files carry the shift into 2023-24: Architecture-code master's fell to 626 while the building-sciences code reached 4,474 (our count), so 87.7% of architecture master's degrees were filed under 04.0902 that year (our calculation).

Bachelor's degrees moved less. Colleges conferred 5,952 bachelor's degrees under the Architecture code in 2013-14 (NCES Digest 2015) and 3,569 in 2021-22, while the building-sciences code had 2,840 (NCES Digest 2023). Any count that uses CIP 04.0201 alone undercounts architecture graduates after 2015.

The wider family, which also covers planning, interior architecture and other design codes, had 19,918 completions in 2023-24 at 331 institutions, up from 18,392 in 2013-14 (our count).

Who earns U.S. architecture degrees?

Women earned 51.7% of U.S. architecture bachelor's and master's degrees in 2023-24, 6,407 of 12,388 under the two codes (our calculation of IPEDS data). NCES's table for 2021-22 shows women earned 1,760 of the 3,569 bachelor's degrees under the Architecture code (NCES Digest table 318.30). The accreditor's count agrees: women received 3,284 (51%) of the accredited degrees awarded in 2021-22 (NAAB 2022 Annual Report), and were 18,297 (55%) of students enrolled in accredited programs in 2023-24 (NAAB 2024 Annual Report).

Graduate study draws many international students. Students counted as nonresidents earned 33.8% of U.S. architecture master's degrees in 2023-24, 1,723 of 5,100 (our calculation).

How many accredited architecture programs are there?

NAAB, the accreditor of professional architecture degrees, says 180 NAAB-accredited programs are offered by 142 institutions in the U.S. and abroad (NAAB). An accredited degree meets the education requirement for NCARB registration in all 55 U.S. jurisdictions, according to NAAB (NAAB). In its 2025 annual report, covering 2024-25, 119 of the 180 were Master of Architecture programs (NAAB 2025 Annual Report), 60 were Bachelor of Architecture programs and one was a Doctor of Architecture (NAAB 2025 Annual Report). NAAB was also managing 14 programs seeking or in candidacy at the end of 2025 (NAAB 2025 Annual Report).

NAAB's online directory listed 176 accredited programs at U.S. addresses on November 5, 2026, in 46 states, Washington DC and Puerto Rico (our count). 19 were in New York, the most of any state, and 18 in California (our count).

Florida had 8 NAAB-accredited programs on that date: 3 B.Arch. and 5 M.Arch. at six institutions, Florida A&M University, the University of Miami, Florida Atlantic University, the University of Florida, the University of South Florida and Florida International University (our count of the NAAB directory). Florida Southern College's B.Arch. was granted eligibility for candidacy in 2025.

How many students are in accredited architecture programs?

NAAB counted 36,350 students enrolled in accredited architecture programs in 2024-25 (NAAB 2025 Annual Report). Enrolment rose by a net 2,792 students, or 8%, from 33,558 a year earlier, according to the accreditor (NAAB 2025 Annual Report). NAAB moved its annual reporting to a new system that year, and its split between B.Arch. and M.Arch. enrolment swung sharply, so the degree split should be read with care.

The latest graduate count NAAB has printed is for 2021-22: accredited programs awarded 6,459 accredited degrees, 3,660 M.Arch. and D.Arch. and 2,799 B.Arch. (NAAB 2022 Annual Report). In 2018-19 the figure was 5,985 (NAAB 2019 Annual Report). These are accredited professional degrees only. The IPEDS counts above also include pre-professional four-year degrees, which is why they are larger.

Programs report that most graduates find related work. For 2023-24 graduates whose employment was known, the job placement rate within a year was 74% for B.Arch. programs and 83% for M.Arch. and D.Arch. programs (NAAB 2025 Annual Report). B.Arch. programs kept 88% of eligible students from one year to the next (NAAB 2025 Annual Report).

The programs employed 8,164 faculty in 2024-25, and 4,575 of them were part-time or adjunct (NAAB 2025 Annual Report). ACSA, the membership association of architecture schools, gives rounder figures for its wider membership: some 7,000 faculty (ACSA) educating more than 40,000 students (ACSA).

How many architecture graduates does Florida produce?

Florida colleges reported 674 architecture completions in 2023-24 at 7 institutions, under the two architecture codes (our count of provisional IPEDS data). That was 5.2% of the U.S. total (our calculation). The state's count rose 31.6% from 512 in 2013-14 (our calculation). In 2023-24 Florida institutions reported 331 bachelor's degrees and 320 master's degrees in architecture (our count). Across every CIP 04 code, including planning, Florida reported 972 completions at 15 institutions (our count).

What do publicly traded design firms say about architecture in their annual reports?

None of the listed U.S. design firms counts its architects separately in its fiscal 2025 annual report; they report total headcount and backlog for all disciplines together. AECOM, which employed about 51,000 people at the end of fiscal 2025 (about 18,000 in the United States) (AECOM 10-K), repeats Engineering News-Record's 2025 Design Survey, which ranked it the largest general architectural and engineering design firm in the world by 2024 design revenue (AECOM 10-K). Its 10-K lists architectural, landscape and interior design among the skills behind its segments but gives no architecture revenue (AECOM 10-K).

Jacobs names architecture among its core skills and lists architects among the staff it must hire and keep (Jacobs 10-K). Tetra Tech's Commercial/International Services Group provides planning, architectural and high-performance building engineering services for commercial and government buildings (Tetra Tech 10-K). Willdan's 1,814 employees at January 2, 2026 included licensed architects and landscape architects, but the filing does not say how many (Willdan 10-K).

Staff counts cover every discipline (engineers, scientists, planners, architects and support staff). Jacobs' figure includes about 1,800 contingent workers (Jacobs 10-K); Stantec's splits into about 13,200 in the United States, 9,400 in Canada and 11,400 elsewhere (Stantec AIF). Stantec's backlog is in Canadian dollars. NV5 has filed no 10-K since its fiscal 2024 report.

Which listed firm grew its architecture business in 2025?

Stantec did, by acquisition: its Buildings business, which delivers integrated architecture, engineering, interior design and planning (Stantec AIF), earned net revenue of C$1,970.2 million in 2025, against C$1,661.7 million in 2024 (Stantec MD&A). Most of the increase came from buying Page Southerland Page, a Washington, DC firm with about 1,400 employees, in July 2025 (Stantec MD&A); organic growth in Buildings was 1.2%. Stantec says Page added over 30% to Buildings backlog (Stantec MD&A). In the same report Stantec quotes the AIA's Architecture Billings Index at 48.5 in December 2025, up from 44.1 a year earlier, and calls architectural billings "still soft" (Stantec MD&A). The Buildings unit is the clearest architecture line any SEC filer in this group reports.

Bowman Consulting, a smaller U.S. engineering firm whose services include landscape architecture, earned $220,233 thousand, or 44.9% of gross contract revenue, from building infrastructure in 2025 (Bowman 10-K). It ranked 72nd on ENR's Top 500 Design Firms list in 2025, up from 144th in 2021 (Bowman 10-K), and about 35% of its workforce held a professional licence (Bowman 10-K). NV5 reported that Building Design + Construction ranked it #8 among data center architecture firms in 2024 (NV5 10-K).

How much do listed design firms spend on advertising?

Of the listed design firms, only Bowman and NV5 print a figure: Bowman Consulting's advertising expense was $0.3 million in both 2025 and 2024 (Bowman 10-K), and NV5's was $3,302 thousand in fiscal 2024, up from $1,977 thousand in 2022 (NV5 10-K). AECOM, Jacobs, Tetra Tech, Willdan and Stantec do not report an advertising figure.

The software companies that sell to architects spend more. Autodesk's advertising expenses were $69 million in fiscal 2026 (Autodesk 10-K), and Trimble's advertising and promotional expense was about $83.8 million in 2025, up from $57.9 million in 2024 (Trimble 10-K). Both figures cover every product line, not only design software.

What do design software sellers report about architecture?

Autodesk's Architecture, Engineering, Construction and Operations product family brought in $3,583 million in the fiscal year to January 31, 2026, up from $2,580 million two years earlier (Autodesk 10-K); the figure covers architects, engineers, builders and owners together. Autodesk says Revit models let architects, engineers and builders make decisions earlier in design (Autodesk 10-K), and that 3ds Max lets design visualization professionals create realistic images, animations and scenes that communicate architectural concepts (Autodesk 10-K).

Trimble sells SketchUp for design and visualization, 3D modeling and construction documentation to architects and designers (Trimble 10-K), and lists AI-powered model rendering in architectural design among its 2025 product highlights (Trimble 10-K). Stantec names augmented and virtual reality among the technologies it combines with its engineering and architectural practices (Stantec AIF). None of these filings gives a count of users or a spend on visualisation.

How often do 10-K annual reports mention architectural services, renderings or virtual reality?

Rarely, and mostly from architects' clients rather than design firms. Our count of SEC full-text search results found 15 Form 10-Ks filed in 2025 containing the phrase "architectural services", against a peak of 28 in 2002 (our count). Over 2001-2025, 181 different companies used it; Jacobs is the only one that did every year (our count). Companies classed as engineering, architectural and surveying services filed just 11 of the 471 matching filings; landlords, REITs, homebuilders and contractors filed far more (our count).

• "Architectural firm" or "architectural firms": 10 filings in 2025, down from 27 in 2008 (our count). Builders and contractors filed 104 of the 431 matches since 2001, led by Toll Brothers (our count).
• "Architectural renderings": only 46 filings in 25 years, from 37 companies (our count).
• "Renderings": 251 companies over 2001-2025, led by the watchmaker Movado; design and engineering firms filed only 3 of the 418 filings (our count).
• Both "virtual reality" and "architects": 50 filings in 2020-2025, against 17 in 2001-2019, with a peak of 12 in 2022 (our count). Some matches refer to software architects.

These are counts of annual reports returned by EDGAR full-text search for each filing year, with amendments excluded; they are not counts of companies doing the work. Private architecture firms and foreign filers such as Stantec file no 10-K. The yearly counts and the filer list are in our CSV files (edgar-architecture-10k-counts.csv and edgar-architecture-10k-filers.csv).

How many architecture firms are there in the U.S., and how big are they?

AIA counts more than 19,000 architecture firms in the United States, most of them very small (AIA Firm Survey Report 2024). In AIA's 2024 Firm Survey, which covered 2023 and drew more than 1,200 firms, 28% of firms were sole practitioners and about 75% had fewer than 10 employees (AIA). AIA is a membership association. It published a 2026 edition on November 2, 2026, based on 900 firms, but those figures sit behind a form.

Houzz's residential-leaning panel shows the same small scale. 81% of architectural firms in Houzz's 2025 State of the Industry survey had revenue below $500,000 in 2024 (Houzz), and 43% had no employees (Houzz).

How much do U.S. architecture firms bill?

Gross billings at U.S. architecture firms were $104.1 billion in 2023, AIA reported (AIA Firm Survey 2024 key findings). Average net billings per employee were $143,000, and firm profitability averaged 13.2% of net billings (AIA).

Architects on Houzz, who mostly do residential work, drew 27% of 2024 revenue from commercial projects (Houzz). The two panels measure different populations, so the shares are not comparable.

Who works at architecture firms?

41% of architecture staff at U.S. firms were female in 2023, up from 36% in 2021 and 25% in 2005, AIA reported (AIA). 36% could be identified as members of a racially or ethnically diverse group, up from 31% in 2021 (AIA).

Are architecture firm billings growing in 2026?

No. The AIA/Deltek Architecture Billings Index stood at 44.5 in May 2026, below the 50 line that marks no change (AIA ABI May 2026). The index comes from AIA's monthly Work-on-the-Boards panel of firm owners and principals; Deltek sells project software to firms. It came closest to growth at 49.8 in March 2026 (AIA ABI March 2026), after 43.3 in September 2025 (AIA ABI September 2025). Backlogs averaged 6.1 months in September 2025 (AIA). Later monthly releases were not readable to our automated check, so May 2026 is the newest score shown here.

Houzz's quarterly barometer for residential architects is less gloomy. Its expected-activity reading for architects was 62 for Q4 2026 (Houzz Pro Industry Barometer), its recent-activity reading was 53 for Q3 2026 (Houzz), and architects reported a 5.9-week wait before starting a new midsize project (Houzz). The Q4 wave surveyed 189 architects on October 2 to 13, 2026 (Houzz).

How did residential architects do in 2024?

Architects on Houzz reported a 2.4% fall in average revenue in 2024 (Houzz State of the Industry 2025) but expected 9.4% growth in 2025 (Houzz). 60% had a positive outlook, the lowest of the seven groups Houzz surveyed (Houzz). 39% said a typical midsize project brought in more than $50,000 (Houzz).

How do architects find clients and market themselves?

Finding clients is the top problem. 32% of architects on Houzz named difficulty finding prospective customers as their No. 1 challenge in 2024 (Houzz). Few used marketing tools: 35% used software to build a website and 15% used marketing, CRM or lead-tracking software (Houzz).

How many architects use AI?

Only 6 percent of the profession regularly used AI for their jobs, AIA reported in March 2025 (AIA). 8 percent of firms had implemented AI solutions, with a further 20 percent working on it (AIA), and 90 percent of architectural professionals were concerned about accuracy, misuse, security, authenticity and transparency (AIA). The study was made with Deltek and ConstructConnect, which both sell software to firms; the press release gives no sample size. AIA's 2024 Firm Survey put day-to-day AI use at one-third of firms, and at 61% of large firms (AIA).

What do the popular architecture numbers really say?

Five numbers that architecture pages repeat trace back to narrower sources than the repeats suggest: a 9-to-12-month lead for the Architecture Billings Index that rests on one graph from 2005; a 40% or 39% share of energy and emissions whose year, scope and country change from one repeat to the next; a 90% indoor-time figure that comes from a 1992-1994 telephone diary survey; pay and licensure claims that lean on old or unnamed agency numbers; and a video vendor's client tests. Each claim below gives the claim as repeated, where it came from, what the original measured, and what to use instead. Earlier editions were read in Internet Archive captures.

"The Architecture Billings Index leads construction spending by 9 to 12 months"

The claim as repeated. The American Institute of Architects (AIA), the architects' membership association, still prints the claim: its November 2025 ABI infographic, produced with the software seller Deltek, says the index "leads nonresidential construction activity by approximately 9-12 months" (AIA/Deltek, 2025 capture). Calculated Risk, an economics blog, reprinted AIA's wording in 2013 as an approximate "nine to twelve month lead time" (Calculated Risk) and in July 2025 wrote in its own words that the index "usually leads CRE investment by 9 to 12 months" (Calculated Risk), moving the target from construction spending to commercial real estate investment.

Where it came from. AIA's panel survey of firms began in late 1995 (AIA, 2005 capture). In the February 7, 2005 article that introduced the index, AIA's chief economist Kermit Baker and Diego Saltes wrote that construction activity "moved in tandem" with the ABI "once the ABI is shifted forward 13 months" (AIA, 2005 capture). The article based the lead on an AIA survey that put the average time from design contract to construction contract at about a year (AIA, 2005 capture), and on its claim that 75 percent of nonresidential buildings are designed by architects (AIA, 2005 capture). AIA's January 2006 release then described the index as giving an "approximately six month glimpse" into nonresidential construction (AIA, 2006 capture). By January 2007 the same boilerplate read "approximately nine to twelve month" (AIA, 2007 capture), and from January 2008 each release opened with an "approximate nine to twelve month lag time between architecture billings and construction spending" (AIA, 2008 capture). We found no new analysis published between the six-month and the nine-to-twelve-month wording.

What the original measured. One visual alignment of two graphed series over roughly 1996 to 2004, with no correlation statistic, error range or out-of-sample test. The project-level lag it rests on varies widely: for almost 40 percent of commercial and industrial projects in AIA's survey, design through contract award took less than six months, and for more than a quarter it took over a year (AIA, 2005 capture). We found no independent test of the lead time.

What to use instead. Say "AIA describes the ABI as a leading indicator of nonresidential construction, by about 9 to 12 months by its own estimate", and check it against the record. Billings have declined in most months since October 2022, AIA said in January 2026 (AIA/Deltek, 2026 capture); Census construction-spending data for the same years, in the demand section of this page, show whether spending followed.

"Buildings account for 40% of energy use and 39% of CO2 emissions"

The claim as repeated. The pair usually appears without a year, a country or a scope. Architecture 2030, the nonprofit behind the 2030 Challenge, now says the built environment is responsible for about 42% of annual global CO2 emissions (Architecture 2030).

Where it came from. There are three separate sources, each counting something different.

• U.S. energy, about 40%. The U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA) said in 2017 that in 2015 "about 40%" of total U.S. energy consumption was used in residential and commercial buildings (EIA, 2017 capture). The Department of Energy still says buildings use 40% of U.S. energy and 75% of its electricity, with no data year (DOE). EIA's current answer is 36.9% in 2023, counting the losses in generating the electricity buildings use (EIA).
• World emissions, 39%. The 2019 Global Status Report for Buildings and Construction, summarised by the International Energy Agency (IEA), said the buildings and construction sector accounted for 36% of final energy use and 39% of energy and process-related CO2 emissions worldwide in 2018, with 11 points of that 39% from manufacturing materials such as steel, cement and glass (IEA, 2020 capture) (IEA, 2020 capture).
• Architecture 2030's "almost half". In 2007 Architecture 2030 said buildings were responsible for "almost half (48%)" of U.S. energy consumption and greenhouse gas emissions, after it "combined" parts of the industry, residential, commercial and transportation sectors into one buildings sector (Architecture 2030, 2007 capture); the same page said 76% of power-plant electricity operates buildings (Architecture 2030, 2007 capture). By 2010 the figures were 49% of U.S. energy (Architecture 2030, 2010 capture) and 46.9% of U.S. CO2 emissions in 2009 (Architecture 2030, 2010 capture).

What the originals measured. The 40% is U.S., operational and energy, not emissions. The 39% is world, 2018, and includes construction and materials manufacturing. Architecture 2030's current 42% is world and adds infrastructure: building operations about 27% and the embodied carbon of cement, iron, steel and aluminum an additional 15% (Architecture 2030) (Architecture 2030). Later editions of the global status report on unep.org were not read: that site's robots.txt excludes this research agent, and globalabc.org refused automated readers.

What to use instead. Name the year, the country and the scope with each number: for U.S. building operations, EIA's 36.9% of total energy in 2023; for the world, the IEA-reported 39% of energy and process CO2 in 2018, labelled as buildings plus construction.

"People spend 90% of their time indoors"

The claim as repeated. The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) says "Americans, on average, spend approximately 90 percent of their time indoors" (EPA), and its guide The Inside Story says "other research indicates" people spend approximately 90 percent of their time indoors (EPA). BuildingGreen, a publisher that sells memberships to architects, wrote in December 2016 that the figure is heard constantly in the architectural community's talk about healthy buildings (BuildingGreen).

Where it came from. EPA's footnote for the sentence is its own Report to Congress on indoor air quality, Volume 2, from 1989 (EPA), which we did not find as readable text. The measured figure most often given as the basis is the National Human Activity Pattern Survey (NHAPS), sponsored by EPA and published by Neil Klepeis and colleagues in 2001: a two-year probability-based telephone survey of 9,386 people (Klepeis et al., PubMed), with interviews completed in 63% of households contacted (Klepeis et al., PubMed).

What the original measured. NHAPS respondents, from September 1992 to September 1994, reported spending an average of 87% of their time in enclosed buildings and about 6% in enclosed vehicles, from 24-hour recall diaries (Klepeis et al., PubMed). BuildingGreen reads the study's chart as 86.9% indoors plus 5.5% in a vehicle. The 90% therefore counts all buildings (homes, workplaces, shops), roughly 30 years ago, and either rounds 87% up or adds car time; the EPA's 1989 citation predates the survey.

What to use instead. "Americans reported spending 87% of their time in buildings and 6% in vehicles in EPA's 1992-1994 national survey." No newer national measure of the same kind was found.

"Architects are underpaid" and "most architecture graduates never become architects"

The claim as repeated. Architect Duo Dickinson wrote on the opinion site Common Edge that architects are "underpaid", putting licensed U.S. architects' median wage at about $76k against $110k for licensed engineers and $130k for lawyers, with no source named (Common Edge). Monograph, a project-management software seller to architecture firms, wrote in 2026 that the median base salary for licensed architects is $97,500 to $99,000, from "cross-source data" it does not name (Monograph). On careers, a 2018 study call posted by the Architectural Research Centers Consortium said "according to UK-based data, 66% of architecture graduates will never become architects" (ARCC).

Where it came from. The pay figures lean on the Bureau of Labor Statistics' Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics for architects (SOC 17-1011): about $76k is the BLS median of the mid-2010s, and the 2026 range sits on the May 2025 median. That BLS series counts everyone employed as an architect, licensed or not, so neither repeat measures licensed architects. The 66% names no dataset and is about the UK; we found no original for it.

What the counts show. Architectural Record wrote in June 2026 that the most widely cited sources put the U.S. total at roughly 120,000 architects (Architectural Record), built from three different counts: 123,600 BLS jobs in 2024 (Architectural Record), roughly 116,000 licensed architects counted by the National Council of Architectural Registration Boards (NCARB) (Architectural Record), and AIA staff estimates, with AIA surveys suggesting 35 to 40 percent of architectural staff are not licensed (Architectural Record). The same article put graduates of accredited programmes at roughly 6,000 to 7,000 a year and said schools often lack precise data on where graduates go (Architectural Record). No published U.S. rate of graduates who go on to be licensed was found.

What to use instead. The current BLS median wage for architects with its year, in the workforce section of this page, labelled as covering all employed architects; NCARB's licence counts in the registry section; and no "share of graduates who become architects" figure until a source measures one.

"Video on a landing page lifts conversions 80%"

The claim as repeated. VEC, a video editing company, wrote in April 2026 that landing page video increases conversions "by 80% or more" and that "the 80% conversion lift statistic comes from EyeView Digital's widely-cited study", which it says Unbounce data corroborate (VEC). Saleslion lists the same figure as "80%" from "Eye View Digital", dated 2019 (Saleslion). We found no architecture-marketing page that repeats the 80% figure.

Where it came from. EyeView Digital, a vendor that made and tested the videos, wrote on its blog on December 4, 2008 that viewers of its video on eToro's site were 20% more likely to download the product (EyeView, 2009 capture), and on February 10, 2009 that viewers of its UMOO videos were 80% more likely to become depositing users (EyeView, 2010 capture). In November 2009 it quoted a TutorVista manager saying one test boosted conversion "by over 80 percent" (EyeView, 2009 capture); its case study gave 86 percent for that test (EyeView, 2010 capture). Its 2010 white paper said "in some cases" the boost was over 80% (EyeView, 2010 capture), and reported the eToro test, earlier told as 20%, as almost 32 percent (EyeView, 2010 capture). By August 2010 Unbounce, a landing-page software seller, wrote that "a study by eyeviewdigital.com" shows video can increase conversion by 80% (Unbounce, 2010 capture), dropping "in some cases".

What the original measured. A few clients of one vendor, comparing people who chose to watch with people who did not, plus single A/B tests with no visitor counts published. None involved architecture firms.

What to use instead. Unbounce's own August 2021 analysis of about 35,000 customer landing pages in each of three periods found video had a "minimal or negative" effect on conversion overall (Unbounce) (Unbounce). The 2026 repeat cites Unbounce in support of a figure Unbounce's newer data contradict. A firm's own A/B test is the only number that applies to its own site.

Every popular claim our research pages trace, 763 in all, is on one page: popular video statistics, fact-checked.

How we built this page

We started from the questions people search for about architecture firm video statistics and looked for the organization that actually produced each answer. Every figure on this page sits in an evidence ledger with its source, the exact table or paragraph it came from, the measurement period, the population measured, and the date we checked it. This edition holds 499 figures from 44 publishers.

On November 5, 2026, each sourced figure on this page was re-fetched with the fetch cache cleared and matched against the recorded wording: BLS occupation wage estimates (through the BLS data API), Employment Projections, the Occupational Outlook Handbook and the Current Population Survey (bls.gov pages through Internet Archive copies, because bls.gov refuses automated requests), the Quarterly Census of Employment and Wages; Census County Business Patterns, Nonemployer Statistics, the 2022 Economic Census and the Annual Integrated Economic Survey (through the Census data API), the 2022 NAICS Manual and Census construction spending and permit releases; NCES Digest tables and program codes; Florida’s architecture statutes and board rules, the Texas, California and New York architects acts, the Brooks Act, the Federal Acquisition Regulation, the Copyright Act and the FAA’s drone rules; NCARB’s, NAAB’s and ACSA’s own figures; Florida DBPR’s annual report; the 10-K and 40-F filings of AECOM, Jacobs, Tetra Tech, NV5, Bowman, Willdan, Stantec, Autodesk and Trimble; AIA’s firm survey, billings index, consensus forecast and home design trends pages; Houzz’s, Chaos’s, Architizer’s and Dodge Construction Network’s own reports; YouTube’s own posts; and the pages behind each popular claim. Where a site refuses automated requests we read an Internet Archive copy. Our licence counts come from Florida DBPR’s public licensee file and the Connecticut, Colorado and Washington open licence data, our graduate counts from the IPEDS completions files and NAAB’s program directory, our 10-K phrase counts from EDGAR full-text search, and our YouTube figures from the YouTube Data API. We left out architizer.com and zaha-hadid.com (robots rules), AIA billings releases after May 2026 and NCARB’s state-by-state pages (not readable to automated checks), AIA’s 2026 Firm Survey Report and the Chaos and DroneDeploy full reports (behind forms), and ENR’s rankings (paywalled), which appear only as companies repeat them in their own filings.

We only cite the producer: government agencies, regulators, company filings and official posts, and the survey owner's own report. We do not cite statistics roundups, Statista-style aggregators, or salary sites without a public method. We did not bypass paywalls or sign-up forms; where a full report was gated, we used only the figures its publisher states publicly.

Figures marked "our calculation" are arithmetic on the cited numbers, and anyone can reproduce them:

This edition contains no Mark Studios customer data.

Limitations

• Our YouTube read follows YouTube’s ranking. The 529 videos are what YouTube’s search returned for ‘architecture’, ‘architect’ and ‘house design’ (the top 200 results of each, sorted by views, with no country filter) on November 5, 2026. It is not a census of architecture video, view counts are lifetime snapshots that include views from ads, and we sorted 309 channels by hand from their public text. We counted a channel as an architect only when its own text said so, and as AI or 3D only when its text said so.
• Job and firm counts count different things. BLS’s payroll survey leaves out the self-employed, the household survey counts more people than the payroll survey, and OEWS is not built for year-to-year comparison. QCEW, County Business Patterns and the Economic Census count employer establishments at different times; nonemployer counts cover businesses with no paid staff.
• Licence counts count paperwork. More than half of Florida’s architect licences belong to architects with addresses outside the state, and an architect licensed in several states is counted in each. NCARB’s national counts come from its own survey of licensing boards.
• Company and association figures are self-reported. Houzz, Chaos, Architizer, Autodesk, Trimble and Dodge sell to architects; AIA and ACSA are membership bodies, NCARB is the certification body and NAAB the accreditor. We give each survey’s sample and dates where the publisher states them, and the visualization surveys are not limited to U.S. firms.
• 2023-24 graduate counts are provisional, and the program codes moved. Most architecture master’s degrees are now reported under CIP 04.0902 rather than 04.0201, so we count the two codes together; our counts use first majors only.

How to cite this page

For a single figure, cite the original publisher named next to it, and link here if the verification trail is useful to your readers. Each figure has its own anchor, so you can link straight to it, for example https://www.markstudios.com/research/architecture-firm-video-statistics#DRV-203. To cite the page as a whole:

Mark Studios. "Architecture Firm Video Statistics." Last verified Nov 5, 2026. https://www.markstudios.com/research/architecture-firm-video-statistics

@misc{markstudios_architecture_firm_video_statistics_2026,
  author = {{Mark Studios}},
  title = {{Architecture Firm Video Statistics}},
  year = {2026},
  month = nov,
  url = {https://www.markstudios.com/research/architecture-firm-video-statistics},
  note = {Last verified 2026-11-05}
}

Our calculations and the evidence table are free to reuse with attribution and a link to this page. Each underlying figure remains the claim of its original publisher, and some publishers ask for a link when their figures are reused.

Sources

Download the evidence table (CSV)

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135. Architecture 2030 (nonprofit advocacy group), The Building Sector: Why? (Architecture 2030, the problem) (2010). Accessed 2026-11-05.
136. U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, Indoor Air Quality (EPA Report on the Environment) (undated (read 2026-11-05)). Accessed 2026-11-05.
137. U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, The Inside Story: A Guide to Indoor Air Quality (undated (read 2026-11-05)). Accessed 2026-11-05.
138. Journal of Exposure Analysis and Environmental Epidemiology (Klepeis et al.), The National Human Activity Pattern Survey (NHAPS): a resource for assessing exposure to environmental pollutants (2001-05). Accessed 2026-11-05.
139. BuildingGreen (design-industry publisher; sells memberships and continuing education to architects), We Spend 90% of Our Time Indoors. Says Who? (2016-12-15). Accessed 2026-11-05.
140. Common Edge (architecture opinion site; Duo Dickinson), The Uneasy Relationship Between Architects and Money (2016-2017 (first archive capture 2017-05-05)). Accessed 2026-11-05.
141. Monograph (practice-management software seller to architecture firms), Architect vs Architectural Engineer Salary 2026 (2026). Accessed 2026-11-05.
142. Architectural Research Centers Consortium (ARCC, North American research consortium; reposting an EAAE study invitation), Architecture's Afterlife Survey (2018-12-08). Accessed 2026-11-05.
143. Architectural Record (trade magazine; Jacob Reidel), By the Numbers: Counting America's Architects (2026-06-02). Accessed 2026-11-05.
144. Video Editing Company (VEC; sells video editing), Landing Page Video: Boost Conversions by 80% or More (2026-04-10). Accessed 2026-11-05.
145. Saleslion (sales-statistics listing), Do you use Videos on your Landing Pages? (undated (read 2026-11-05)). Accessed 2026-11-05.
146. EyeView Digital (video production and testing vendor; sold the videos it tested), EyeView - The new "Conversion" game (2008-12-04). Accessed 2026-11-05.
147. EyeView Digital (video production and testing vendor; sold the videos it tested), UMOO - a prime beef example of EyeView's success (2009-02-10). Accessed 2026-11-05.
148. EyeView Digital (video production and testing vendor; sold the videos it tested), Another video conversion success story (2009-11-10). Accessed 2026-11-05.
149. EyeView Digital (video production and testing vendor; sold the videos it tested), Case study: TutorVista (2009). Accessed 2026-11-05.
150. EyeView Digital (video production and testing vendor; sold the videos it tested), Making Video Accountable (EyeView white paper) (2010). Accessed 2026-11-05.
151. Unbounce (landing-page software seller), The benefits of using video on landing pages (2010-08). Accessed 2026-11-05.
152. Unbounce (landing-page software seller; analysis of its own customers' pages), Video on landing pages means more conversions, right? Wrong. Here's why (2021-08-26). Accessed 2026-11-05.

Update policy and change log

We re-verify every figure quarterly and when a major source publishes a new edition. The next scheduled review is February 2027. Corrections go to contact@markstudios.com.

• Nov 5, 2026: First published with 499 figures from 44 publishers, each checked against its original source.