The Industry Nearly Doubled Its Revenue in Six Years. Most Coaches Still Aren't Profitable
The Chart That Should Worry You More Than It Reassures You
Every year the coaching industry publishes a chart that looks fantastic. Revenue up. Practitioner count up. Everyone in the room nods like this means something good is happening to them personally.
It usually isn't. Market growth and growth in your bank account are two different numbers, and I've watched too many talented coaches confuse them.
The Math
In 2019, the ICF Global Coaching Study put the global coaching industry at $2.849 billion in revenue, spread across roughly 71,000 practitioners.
By 2025, revenue had climbed to $5.34 billion. Practitioner count had grown to 122,974. Both numbers grew. Revenue grew 87%. Headcount grew 73%. On paper, the pie got bigger, and the average slice should have gotten a little bigger too.
Here's the number that should stop you. In 2019, the average coach earned about $47,100 a year from coaching. In 2025, six years and 87% of industry growth later, the average coach earned $49,283.
That's a 4.6% increase over six years. Inflation alone ate most of that. The market nearly doubled. The average coach barely moved.
And "average" is doing a lot of quiet lifting in that sentence. The 2025 study also breaks earnings out by tenure. Coaches with ten or more years of experience average $69,721 a year. Millennial coaches, who skew newer to the field, average $33,553. The headline number blends a smaller group of established coaches pulling strong revenue with a much larger group of newer coaches pulling a fraction of it.
Coach and industry critic Tim Brownson has raised something else worth taking seriously. He argues ICF's survey sample leans heavily toward business and executive coaching respondents, the segment of the field that tends to charge the most and struggle least. Coaches who are barely making it are less likely to fill out an industry survey about how their business is going. If that's right, and it's a reasonable read of who bothers to respond to these things, the real median sits lower than the average suggests, not higher. That's his critique, not an ICF-confirmed figure, but it matches what I see in this business every day.
Put it together, and the honest headline isn't "the industry doubled." It's "the industry doubled, and most of that growth went to more people entering the field, not to the people already in it making more money."
What's Actually Happening
More coaches are entering a market with real demand. That part is genuinely good news, and I don't want to undersell it. But more coaches entering the field means more competition for the same pool of business owners looking for help, and competition without differentiation just splits the pie into thinner slices.
The coaches earning the $69,721 average, not the $33,553 one, aren't earning more because they're better coaches. Across 170+ client relationships and five years building a team of 25 Coach Partners, I've seen the gap almost never come down to coaching skill. It comes down to whether the coach runs their practice like a business with a P&L, or like a hobby that happens to send invoices.
Where This Shows Up by Phase
In the Creator phase, $0-$100K, most coaches don't know their own numbers. Not their client acquisition cost, not their average client lifetime value, not what percentage of their week is billable versus spent chasing invoices. You cannot fix a profitability problem you haven't measured.
In the Hustler phase, $100K-$250K, the coach has enough clients to feel busy and not enough pricing discipline to feel secure. This is where feast-or-famine lives. Revenue looks fine in a good month and terrifying in a slow one because the coach never built the financial buffer or pricing model to smooth it out. This is also where a lot of coaches quietly take on discounted or ill-fitting clients just to fill a calendar gap, which caps the average rate for everyone, including themselves.
What I Learned the Hard Way
I built my first year of coaching revenue without a real handle on my own margins. I was profitable, but by accident, not by design, and I didn't know it until I finally sat down and ran the actual numbers eight months in. It's an uncomfortable thing to admit for someone who now coaches other people on financial acumen for a living. It's also exactly why I take this competency as seriously as I do. If a business coach can't run their own P&L, that's not a small gap. That's the whole job, applied to the wrong business.
Practical Guidance for Coaches
1️⃣ Build a real P&L for your own coaching practice, not just a revenue tracker. Know your margin per client type, not just your top-line number.
2️⃣ Calculate your effective hourly rate including unbilled time. Prep, admin, marketing, and sales calls all eat into what your quoted rate actually pays you.
3️⃣ Set a floor price you will not go below, even for a client you want badly. Every discount you give trains the market on what you're actually worth.
4️⃣ Track revenue per client type for one full quarter before deciding what to niche into. Guessing what's profitable is how coaches end up busy and broke at the same time.
✅ DO treat your own coaching business as your first and hardest client.
✅ DO separate "I'm busy" from "I'm profitable." They are not the same sentence.
✅ DO revisit your pricing every year. The industry average moved 4.6% in six years. Your fees shouldn't be frozen that long either.
❌ DON'T mistake industry growth headlines for personal financial progress.
❌ DON'T let a slow month talk you into taking a client who doesn't fit your niche or your rate.
❌ DON'T wait until you're in trouble to build the P&L you should have built on day one.
➡️ The industry is growing. Your business only grows if you're running it like one.
A Question for You
If you pulled a real P&L for your coaching practice today, right now, would you like what it showed you? And if you're not sure, what does that tell you about how closely you're actually watching it?
Quick Answers
How much do business coaches actually make? The 2025 ICF Global Coaching Study puts the global average at $49,283 a year, but that figure hides a wide gap. Coaches with ten or more years of experience average $69,721, while Millennial coaches, who skew newer to the field, average $33,553. Industry-wide averages are not a reliable guide to what any individual coach will earn, especially in the first few years.
Why isn't the coaching industry's growth translating into higher coach incomes? Global coaching revenue grew from $2.849 billion in 2019 to $5.34 billion in 2025, an 87% increase, while the number of practitioners grew 73% over the same period. Most of that growth added new coaches to the market rather than raising what existing coaches earn, which means competition, not opportunity alone, is driving outcomes for the typical coach.
What's the fastest way for a coach to increase their own profitability? Start by building a real P&L for your own practice, including unbilled hours, and set a pricing floor you won't discount below. Coaches in the Creator and Hustler phases who apply the same financial rigor to their own business that they'd apply to a client's business consistently outearn those who treat their practice as a side hustle with better branding.
If This Hit Close to Home
If you're a coach, consultant, or fractional executive who's tired of watching industry growth headlines that don't show up in your own bank account, the 2026 Business Survival Guide walks through the pricing, positioning, and financial discipline work that actually moves your numbers. It's free. Download the Guide here.
If you'd rather build your practice on a proven financial model instead of guessing your way through it, the Certified My Biz Coach license gives you the tools, pricing frameworks, and support system already built, without the six-figure investment or restrictions of a coaching franchise. Learn more about becoming a Certified My Biz Coach at MyBizCoaches.com.
If you'd rather talk it through than read about it, I'm glad to have that conversation. Reach out for a free conversation this week, and we'll look honestly at whether this path fits your background.
And if you coach clients who are busy but not profitable, put the My Biz Navigator in front of them. It's a free 5-minute assessment that shows exactly what's working in their business and what it's quietly costing them.
To Your Success,
Eric T. Whitmoyer, Business Growth Strategist
Founder & CEO at MyBizCoaches.com
Host of The Biz Coach Show
From Startup to Exit, We’re There for Your Biggest Decisions
P.S. If you’re serious about taking your business to the next level, then you may find value in getting a copy of our 2026 Business Survival Guide, full of strategies, tactics, and solutions to help move your business forward faster this year.
Because the difference between ordinary and extraordinary isn’t luck; it’s the information you act on.
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