Tech is adding jobs at nearly 10 times the rate of the city’s overall economy. Here’s how to continue that momentum.
A new report by Tech:NYC and the Center for an Urban Future (CUF) takes stock of where NYC’s tech sector stands and what it will take to keep our momentum going:
Tech accounts for a whopping 14% of all employment growth citywide over the past decade.
Tech has become New York’s largest and most dependable source of new middle- and high-wage jobs.
Between 2014 and 2024, the tech sector added an average of 8,000 jobs a year across the five boroughs.
“It is amazing how big [tech] has become and how far it has come,” Jonathan Bowles, executive director of CUF and the author of the report, told THE CITY.
The momentum is building.
“It will probably take 10 years, but New York will be the largest tech center in the U.S.,” said Kevin Ryan, Founder and CEO of AlleyCorp, and a member of the Tech:NYC board.
So how do we get there? Let’s take a look at the top takeaways from the report:
NYC’s tech sector is powering job growth.
Since 2014, NYC tech jobs grew 64%, far outpacing the rest of the economy.
Tech accounted for 41% of the city’s net job growth since 2019.
Nearly half of all NYC job postings in 2024 required tech skills.
More startups, more sectors.
NYC is now home to 8,750 funded startups, more than San Francisco.
The fintech, digital health, e-commerce, and AI sectors are rocketshipping.
In 2024, New York accounted for 30% of all U.S. investment in fintech companies, up from 22.7% in 2020.
New York captured 21.4% of all VC funding in digital health in 2024, up from 17.6 percent in 2020.
AI job postings surged past 25,000 in 2024 — #1 in the U.S.
VC is on the up.
NYC has seen a steady stream of VC firms opening offices in the city in recent years.
Think: Andreessen Horowitz (a16z), Sequoia Capital, Lightspeed Venture Partners, Index Ventures, and many more.
“The VC infrastructure in New York is now massive,” said Neil Blumenthal, founder and CEO of Warby Parker and a Tech:NYC board member. “You have tons of world class New York-based VCs, and every Silicon Valley-based VC now has an outpost in New York, whether it’s an explicit office or partners that are based here. This absolutely wasn’t the case 15 years ago.”
Key challenges remain.
Yes, the tech sector is booming in NYC. But the ecosystem is not without obstacles:
Housing affordability is the biggest threat to future growth, making it harder to attract and retain talent.
A growing disconnect between the tech sector’s importance and how policymakers regulate it.
This report is a call to action.
This report is more than just data. It’s a call to action for NYC and the tech leaders who call it home.
The report outlines six recommendations to build on this momentum to keep NYC a global tech hub:
Build more housing at all income levels.
Invest in livability — transit, parks, schools, culture.
Unlock city data to drive AI innovation.
Support deep tech with faster permitting and more prototyping space.
Reform procurement to make it easier for startups to work with the city.
Expand computing education, especially through teacher prep at CUNY.
The report is filled with simply too many great tech stats and data to share all of them in one blog post. Download the full report here.