Foreigners opened over 1.6 thousand sole proprietorships in Ukraine in 2025 – the most active citizens are from Azerbaijan, Russia, and Uzbekistan
Kyiv • UNN
In the first nine months of 2025, foreigners registered 1,648 sole proprietorships in Ukraine. The most active were citizens of Azerbaijan, Russia, and Uzbekistan, with Russians most often ceasing operations.
In the first nine months of 2025, foreigners registered 1,648 individual entrepreneurs (IEs) in Ukraine. This is evidenced by the data from the Unified State Register, published by Opendatabot analysts, UNN writes.
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Although this figure is 10% lower than in the same period last year, the number of active non-resident entrepreneurs continues to grow – the net increase was 490 IEs.
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The most active among foreign entrepreneurs were citizens of Azerbaijan (229 IEs), Russia (222), and Uzbekistan (160). Also in the top five are Moldova (125) and Armenia (95).
At the same time, citizens of Russia most often cease entrepreneurial activity – 241 closures (21%), followed by Azerbaijanis (157), Moldovans (102), Uzbeks (91), and Belarusians (69).
Every third foreign entrepreneur opens a business in Kyiv (544 IEs). This is followed by Odesa region (300), Kyiv region (138), Kharkiv region (104), and Lviv region (83). The fewest foreign entrepreneurs are registered in Volyn, Chernihiv, Sumy, Donetsk, and Kherson regions – from 2 to 17 IEs.
The most popular areas of activity are retail trade (almost 30%), public catering (14%), wholesale trade (9%), computer programming (6%), and information services (4%). Business closures most often occur in the same sectors.
Among foreigners who open businesses in Ukraine, 69% are men, while women make up 31%. Interestingly, foreign IEs turn out to be even more resilient than Ukrainian ones: the median term of their work is 3.1 years, while for Ukrainian citizens it is 2.5 years.
The record holder was a citizen of the Russian Federation who ran a business in Ukraine for 30 years and closed it at the beginning of 2025.
The opening of IEs by foreigners is an absolutely normal and legal practice. People who have a temporary or permanent residence permit in Ukraine receive a tax number (RNOCPP), can officially conduct entrepreneurial activity, and pay taxes on an equal footing with citizens of Ukraine. As for citizens of the Russian Federation, they are no exception. Only those who legally reside in Ukraine can open their own business, explains Denys Popov, head of the legal department of Opendatabot, lawyer and insolvency practitioner.