Home / Low-density ZIPs nearby
Enter a ZIP or city, choose a radius and one industry. We list ZIP codes around you where the business is statistically sparser than the U.S. rate — how many exist, how many the national rate predicts, and how confident the gap is. If there are none, the page says so.
Distance is a straight line between census ZIP-area points, not drive time. Only ZIPs in our 500 covered counties are searched. For a whole state, see lowest measured density.
Index. Businesses with paid employees per person present — residents plus 0.5 × jobs located in the ZIP — divided by the U.S. rate. 100% means the ZIP has the national density.
Who can be listed. Only ZIPs in the 500 covered counties, whose county has at least 15 ZIPs in our data, with at least 10,000 residents, and at least 5 published businesses in that industry. Census hides counts of 0–2, and derived counts are excluded.
“Statistically low”. A one-sided Poisson test asks whether the published count is lower than the national rate predicts, beyond what rounding and chance explain: P(X ≤ n | expected) < 0.05. Each test has a 5% false-positive rate, so in a radius with about 30 comparable ZIPs roughly 1–2 results can clear the bar by chance. Treat every line as a question to check locally.
Small ZIPs are under-represented. A ZIP with 10,000 residents needs a very low count to reach significance; one with 60,000 residents reaches it more easily. “Not significant” therefore does not mean “no gap”.
Bedroom ZIPs can look low by construction. The index assumes residents spend locally, but commuters eat and shop near work. In a mainly residential ZIP, some of that demand is counted at home while the businesses are counted in the employment ZIPs, so a low index can reflect leakage rather than an opening. The ZIP-type tag on each card is a jobs-to-residents ratio, not a zoning classification.
What the data cannot see. Rent, foot traffic, revenue, zoning and commercial space, closures, and businesses with no paid employees. A low count can mean an unmet market, a different trade area, or a street with nowhere to open. Nothing here is a recommendation.
Read next. Bedroom ZIPs look empty by construction · Why nail salons have almost no statistically low ZIPs · 0–2 is not zero.
Where near me has the fewest competitors? Pick an industry and a radius. We list ZIP codes around you where the published Census count is statistically below the U.S. rate. If none clear the test, the page says so.
How many of this business are near me? Each result is a ZIP-level Census count inside your radius, not a pin for every shop. Distance is a straight line between ZIP-area points, not drive time.
Does a low-density ZIP mean I should open there? No. A low count can mean weak demand, no space, residents shopping near work, or businesses with no paid employees that this dataset does not count. Treat every line as a question to check locally.
Can I compare two of these ZIPs? Yes. Each card links to Compare ZIPs. That page shows the same Census counts side by side with county, peer, and ring context. It does not pick a winner.
BizGapMap — free, no-login small-business saturation reports for major U.S. counties. Built entirely from public U.S. Census, BLS, and IRS data (ZBP 2023, ACS 2024 5-year, PEP 2024, LODES, QCEW, IRS SOI). No forecasts, no revenue guesses — withheld cells are marked, and the few derived counts are labelled as estimates.