Based on more than 224M reviews and hundreds of millions of photos, Yelp has amassed a unique dataset that can be used to uncover local economic trends and insights.
Yelp's Data Science team holds a wide range of analytical expertise, driving decision making throughout the company. They tell stories with data, empowering Yelp to uncover more ways to provide value to users and local businesses.
Our data scientists dig into millions of reviews, photos, and searches to find consumer trends, popular businesses, and local insights on everything from the best restaurants to linguistic patterns. We work with journalists who use our data insights to track the rise of poke and vaping and find the best airports to eat in. We share data with researchers and students through our open dataset, and award prizes to the best uses of the data. Researchers have used our data to study what underlies poor patient experiences at hospitals, positive food-hygiene effects from posting inspection scores, the kinds of businesses whose openings are associated with increases in housing prices, the impact of minimum-wage levels on restaurant success, consumers’ willingness to travel within their cities for food, and why restaurants that are out-of-the-way are often better. Through Yelp data we're able to tell both broad economic stories and niche vertical stories that help inform the general public – including business owners, consumers and policy makers – about the world around us.
Interested in learning more or using Yelp Data to inform a story? Please reach out at press@yelp.com. Join our mailing list to receive an email when new reports are released.
Fortune
“At the onset of the pandemic 140,104 [businesses] were marked temporarily closed on Yelp.com, but by August that had fallen to 65,769...More than 97,966 businesses have permanently shut down during the pandemic, according to Yelp.com's Local Economic Impact Report.”
The New York Times
“And it’s tough enough out there already: Yelp estimates that 60 percent of closed businesses on its platform aren’t expected to reopen.”
CNBC
“Home and professional services such as landscapers, contractors and lawyers, see a much lower closure rate than clothing stores and even home decor businesses...“consumers still need these services,” Norman said. “Through the rise of virtual consultations, and contactless or socially distanced services, these businesses have been particularly resilient during this time.””
NPR Marketplace
“Yelp reports 31,000 restaurants on its platform have closed, the majority permanently. Restaurants have not been entirely helpless though, Justin Norman is VP of Data Science at Yelp “there are actually many businesses that have found a lot of new ways to innovate.””
Yahoo Finance
“Mentions of homeschooling are actually up 144% in our reviews and 172% in our searches...there's a consumer demand increase for additional resources connected to childcare, as parents are looking to supplement the virtual learning efforts that are being provided by schools.” - Justin Norman, Yelp VP of Data Science
Fox Business
“Yelp data shows that businesses are closing at a higher rate in most college towns, and as of Aug. 17, businesses in college towns have a 24% higher permanent closure rate on average compared with the permanent closure rate of its respective state, since March 1.”
Good Morning America
“More than 6,500 New York City businesses permanently closed since March.”
Bloomberg
“Yelp Inc., the online reviewer, has data showing more than 80,000 permanently shuttered from March 1 to July 25. About 60,000 were local businesses, or firms with fewer than five locations.”
Wall Street Journal
“According to stats from Yelp’s website, over 15,000 U.S. restaurants have permanently closed during the coronavirus pandemic.”
NBC Nightly News
“According to Yelp of all closures due to Covid-19, 44% are permanent. The hardest hit are the beauty industry, retail and restaurants.”
The New York Times
“From June 15 to June 29, the most recent period for which data is available, businesses were closing permanently at a higher rate than in the previous three months, Yelp found. During the same period, permanent closures increased by 3 percent overall, accounting for roughly 14 percent of total closures since March.”
CNBC Squawk Box
“Retail, restaurants, beauty and fitness have been the hardest hit. In particular, in retail there have been about 30,000 businesses overall that have closed since the height of the pandemic and continue to close at a steady rate as we go through the reopening process.”
Washington Post
“The fastest-rising [Yelp] categories sound like a checklist to prepare for post-apocalyptic survival. People are seeking out weapons, hunting and fishing supplies, and fitness gear, while stockpiling water, meat, pharmaceuticals and groceries...Yelp paints a portrait of a country struggling to adjust to new emergency restrictions.”
CNBC Squawk Box
CNBC’s Roadback Barometer: “The first thing we’re looking at is Yelp Store closings. And this is an average of the national compared to a week. As you can see it’s still up 14% compared to a week ago and the change has not really altered very much.” - Steve Liesman
Fast Company
“Looking for a job? A new report from Yelp indicates which businesses near you are booming—and likely hiring. Yelp tracks consumer interest (page views, reviews, photo posts) for millions of businesses.”
Washington Post
“In one such effort, Carl Bialik, data science editor at the online review giant Yelp, measured how consumer interest — visiting pages, writing reviews, posting photos — in the site’s 500 largest categories changed from the beginning of March, when the country had fewer than 100 cases of the coronavirus, to early this week, when cases neared 50,000.”
The Wall Street Journal
“Ammunition sales and the share prices of major gun manufacturers rose in March as the crisis took hold in the U.S. Yelp reported a 360% uptick in consumer interest in gun and ammunition stores in recent weeks.”
TODAY
“According to Yelp data provided to TODAY, three of the six worst days for Chinese restaurant searches in the U.S. over the past 12 months occurred in February. Since Jan. 31, Chinese restaurants' share of "connections" which include phone calls, orders placed and reviews posted, have fallen about 20% below their usual level.”
The New York Times
“According to new data from the restaurant reviewing website Yelp, the share of Chinese restaurants in the top 20 metropolitan areas has been consistently falling. Five years ago, an average of 7.3 percent of all restaurants in these areas were Chinese, compared with 6.5 percent today. That reflects 1,200 fewer Chinese restaurants at a time when these 20 places added more than 15,000 restaurants over all.”
The Wall Street Journal
“Yelp provided averages of its ratings for all restaurants at each airport for the 12 months ended Sept. 30.”
Adweek
“Yelp 15 gives people a way to discover trends via Yelp data from hundreds of millions of people, 192 million reviews, tens of billions of connections between people and businesses and over 40 million words of gratitude over the past 15 years.”
The Washington Post
“Yelp’s vast databases, which allow us to break out segments not yet tracked by the government, agree. Since the end of 2012, vape shops have been the fastest-growing large retail segment tracked by the online review site. The shops are concentrated in the West and South, Yelp data show, with Nevada and Oklahoma competing for the title of vapingest state.”
The Atlantic
“Restaurants hovering around a 3.5 rating are on the razor’s edge of success and total failure; a half-point rise in Yelp ratings for such restaurants can increase sell-out evenings by about 50 percent. These mediocre-rated restaurants operate on such slim margins that a one-dollar increase in the minimum wage can seriously increase the likelihood of closing.”
The Washington Post
“Yelp, a site where people review and rate restaurants and other businesses, has released some fascinating data on what convention goers are searching for most. The results vary a lot by party, in sometimes predictable and sometimes surprising ways.”
