2025 State of the Nonprofit Sector Survey

In a few short months, NFF will be conducting the 2025 State of the Nonprofit Sector Survey to explore how nonprofits are faring in today's changing environment and the investments needed to secure their long-term futures. 

Launching in January 2025, with results released in late Spring 2025, our 10th Survey will focus on:  

• Timely social sector topics such as federal funding, real estate and asset ownership, workforce and staffing, and the implications of political events – including the election and recent federal court system rulings. 
• Racial equity in nonprofit finance and funding disparities. 
• Funding practices and how post-pandemic shifts have impacted nonprofits’ financial health. 
• Nonprofits’ contributions to community wealth and well-being. 
• Investments needed to secure the long-term operational and financial health of nonprofits. 
• Well-being of the nonprofit workforce.

This collective dataset, one of the largest of its kind, is used by many across the sector to advocate for meaningful actions philanthropy, government partners, and other community leaders can take to support nonprofits now and in the future. Your participation helps us provide an authentic, powerful picture of all that nonprofits do for communities, and what they need from their supporters to keep serving, especially during these turbulent times.

NFF has conducted the State of the Nonprofit Sector Survey nine times since 2009, garnering thousands of responses from nonprofits large and small, urban and rural, across sectors and geographies. Our 2022 Survey offered vital insights into the financial health and resilience of nonprofits, which we are actively leveraging to enhance the flow of capital and resources to underserved communities. Among our key findings: 

• As a result of the pandemic, 88% of respondents developed new or different ways of working that led to positive outcomes; 51% of those think these could be permanent changes.  
• In FY2021, 36% of nonprofits received more than half of their funding in unrestricted funds, including general operating support. Unrestricted funding is critical for most nonprofits; it lets them decide how to spend their funds to best support their work. Forty-one percent of white-led nonprofits received 50% or more unrestricted funds in FY2021 as compared to 26% of BIPOC-led organizations.   
• 66% of white-led organizations ended FY2021 with a surplus, as did 64% of AAPI- and Latinx-led organizations. 49% percent of Black-led organizations ended FY2021 with a surplus.  
• 28% were impacted a great deal by the events surrounding the murder of George Floyd. This rose to 49% for Black-led nonprofits. 

Over the years, NFF’s Survey data has been cited and used (for example):   

• by the White House Office of Social Innovation and in a California State Legislative Hearing;  
• to inform National Council of Nonprofits’ policy recommendations on the treatment of Indirect Costs and in its Investing for Impact publication;  
• in the New York City’s Human Services Council’s call for cost-of-living adjustments for nonprofits with government contracts;  
• by Independent Sector in its debate about the charitable deduction;  
• in The New York Times, Stanford Social Innovation Review, Nonprofit Quarterly, and Chronicle of Philanthropy; 
• in a report with for Los Angeles’s Mayor Bass with recommendations on how Los Angeles City can better partner with nonprofits to address homelessness and other urgent priorities   

We are looking for outreach partners willing to share the survey with their networks. There is an important story to tell about the sector and your support getting the word out will strengthen this story. Please contact us at [email protected] if you would be willing to help spread the word and we'll provide everything you need.

Results will be live in the summer of 2025, so please also let us know where you think this story and data should be shared. 

Thank you to our sponsors.