Farmers Market Statistics: Counts by State, Market Days, Hours and Seasons

By the Farmers Market Days editors · Updated October 15, 2026

• Key figures
• Farmers markets by state and per resident
• Which day markets meet
• Market hours
• Season: when markets open and close
• SNAP/EBT
• Vendors per market
• What kind of place
• Sources, definitions and how to cite

Key figures

33,797

farmers markets, farm stands, pick-your-own farms and public markets in our directory, merged from federal, state and city registers and open places data

6,623

farmers markets listed in the USDA Local Food Directories, the one national register that covers every state the same way (1.9 per 100,000 residents)

5,407

listings with a market day from a public register or the market's own website

61%

of farmers markets with a sourced schedule meet on Saturday; 31% on Sunday

9 AM

the most common opening time of a market day; the median market day lasts 4 hours

May

the most common opening month and October the most common closing month, from 2,350 dated seasons

6,997

markets and stands authorized to accept SNAP in the USDA retailer register

1,212

listings whose register or own website says they are open year-round

Farmers markets by state and per resident

Ranked by USDA-listed farmers markets per 100,000 residents. Vermont (10.9), Wyoming (9.9), District of Columbia (7.5) have the most per resident; Ohio (0.5), Texas (0.7), Nevada (0.8) the fewest. By plain count, California (548), Minnesota (395), New York (388) list the most. The other columns count all listings in our directory, whose coverage is deeper in states that publish their own market register (New York, Massachusetts, South Carolina, Washington and others), so compare states on the USDA columns. The USDA directory is filled in by the markets themselves, so a low count can also mean that few of a state's markets registered (Ohio has 58 USDA-listed farmers markets but 1,243 listings in our directory).

Download the state table (CSV)

Which day markets meet

Among the 4,558 farmers markets (stands and shops left out) whose market days come from a register or their own website, Saturday is the most common day (61%), followed by Thursday (38%) and Wednesday (37%). 62% meet on a single day of the week, and 30% meet only on weekdays. A market that meets on two days counts for both, so the shares add up to more than 100%. More in which day is market day.

Market hours

From 3,939 market days with readable opening and closing times at 3,190 farmers markets (markets open five or more days a week, which keep shop hours, are left out). The most common opening time is 9 AM (25% of market days) and the most common closing time 1 PM (19%). The median market day lasts 4 hours. 22% of market days open before 9 AM. Saturday markets most often open at 9 AM (38% of Saturday sessions), while 44% of weekday market days start at 2 PM or later: the after-work market. Hours by day of the week and by state, and a list of after-work markets, are in the farmers market hours guide.

Season: when markets open and close

From 2,350 markets whose season a register or the market's own website dates. May is the most common opening month (34%) and October the most common closing month (48%). Where the source names both the opening and the closing day (1,283 summer seasons), the median season lasts 20 weeks. 1,212 listings say in a register or on their own website that they are open year-round. State by state: farmers market season; for the cold months: winter farmers markets.

SNAP/EBT

6,997 markets and farm stands in our directory match a retailer authorized to accept SNAP in the USDA Food and Nutrition Service retailer register (store type "Farmers and Markets"). The most are in California (641), Massachusetts (470), New York (402), Michigan (324), Washington (268). How EBT works at a market, and the matching programs that add to it, is in using SNAP/EBT at farmers markets.

Vendors per market

323 farmers markets state on their own website how many vendors they have. The median is 45 vendors, and 156 (48%) state 50 or more. Markets that publish a vendor count are probably larger than average, so read this as a figure for those markets, not for all.

What kind of place

The kind comes from the source: a USDA directory entry, a state register's category, or the category of an open places record. "Farmers market or farm stand" means the sources disagree or do not say.

Sources, definitions and how to cite

• Listings: our merged directory (data as of October 16, 2026), built from the USDA Local Food Directories, the USDA FNS SNAP Retailer Locator, Overture Maps open places data and 34 state, county and city registers. The methodology lists every source.
• Schedules, hours and seasons: only text from a public register or the market's own website; registers older than 2023 and weak website text are left out. 5,407 listings have a sourced schedule.
• Population: U.S. Census Bureau, Population Estimates Program, Vintage 2024, annual estimates of the resident population for states (NST-EST2024-ALLDATA), July 1, 2024.
• Limits: a directory count is not a census of every market; small and new markets are missing, and some listed markets have closed. The figures describe the markets in our sources.

Cite as: Farmers Market Days, "Farmers Market Statistics," farmersmarketdays.com/guides/farmers-market-statistics/, data as of October 16, 2026. The state table may be reused with a credit and a link to this page.