The federal government employs about 3.9 million people in total. That figure combines roughly 2 million civilian workers in the executive branch, about 1.3 million active duty military members, and around 531,000 Postal Service employees. So when someone asks how many federal government employees there are, the answer depends on which of those groups you’re counting, and the civilian number in particular has been dropping fast through 2025.
Civilian Executive Branch Employees
The Office of Personnel Management’s Enterprise Human Resources Integration system, the central data warehouse for executive branch personnel records, currently shows 2,035,344 civilian employees.1Office of Personnel Management. Data Sources – Section: EHRI2Office of Personnel Management. Federal Workforce Data – Workforce Size and Composition That’s down from more than 2.27 million in March 2024.
A few departments account for a large share of the total. The Department of Veterans Affairs is the single largest civilian employer, though its headcount fell from roughly 484,000 in January 2025 to about 467,000 by June 2025, with more reductions planned.3Department of Veterans Affairs. VA to Reduce Staff by Nearly 30K by End of FY2025 The Department of Defense employs a separate civilian workforce of roughly 750,000 people supporting military operations in logistics, engineering, intelligence, and administration. The Department of Homeland Security has about 260,000 civilian employees working on border security, immigration, cybersecurity, and disaster response.4Department of Homeland Security. Annual Performance Report for Fiscal Years 2023-2025
Why the Civilian Number Is a Moving Target
Any 2026 headcount reflects a workforce in the middle of significant reshaping. Starting in early 2025, the administration rolled out a government-wide hiring freeze, voluntary early retirement offers, deferred resignation programs, and formal reductions in force at targeted agencies. According to the Office of Management and Budget, more than 260,000 workers left federal service through these combined efforts during 2025.
The cuts landed unevenly. The U.S. Agency for International Development lost over 90% of its workforce. The Education Department, Small Business Administration, and Department of Housing and Urban Development each saw reductions of roughly 30% to 40%. The VA shed about 29,000 positions, and the Treasury Department lost a similar number.3Department of Veterans Affairs. VA to Reduce Staff by Nearly 30K by End of FY2025 The Defense Department’s civilian side saw over 60,000 departures, bringing its headcount from about 799,000 at the start of the year to roughly 738,000 by mid-2025.
If you need the current figure for budgeting, career planning, or policy work, check OPM’s live workforce data portal, because the snapshot above will shift as budget proposals and legal challenges move through the system.2Office of Personnel Management. Federal Workforce Data – Workforce Size and Composition
Active Duty Military Personnel
Roughly 1.3 million people serve on active duty across the Army, Navy, Air Force, Marine Corps, Space Force, and Coast Guard. The Army is the largest branch. The Space Force, established in 2019, is the smallest, with approximately 9,400 active duty members. The Defense Department reports military statistics separately from civilian data because service members operate under the Uniform Code of Military Justice, codified in Title 10 of the United States Code.5Office of the Law Revision Counsel. 10 USC Chapter 47 – Uniform Code of Military Justice
About 800,000 additional personnel serve in the National Guard and Reserve components on a part-time basis. They aren’t counted in the 1.3 million active duty total.
Postal Service Employees
The Postal Service is usually left out of executive branch civilian counts because it’s structured as a self-supporting government corporation rather than a taxpayer-funded agency. The Postal Reorganization Act of 1970 dissolved the old Cabinet-level Post Office Department and set USPS up to fund itself through postage and services.
As of 2025, USPS employs roughly 531,000 workers, down from over 630,000 just a few years earlier.6U.S. Postal Service. Total Career Employees The 2024 total broke down into about 533,000 career employees and 106,000 non-career workers filling flexible or seasonal roles. More than 10,000 postal employees accepted early retirement offers in 2025.
Legislative and Judicial Branches
The executive branch accounts for well over 95% of the civilian federal workforce, which is why it dominates any total headcount. The other two branches are much smaller.
The legislative branch employs approximately 31,000 people. That includes congressional staff working directly for members of the House and Senate, plus employees of support agencies like the Government Accountability Office, the Library of Congress, and the Capitol Police. The judicial branch is smaller still, with roughly 30,000 to 33,000 employees inside the federal court system, including judges, clerks, probation officers, and administrative staff.
Federal Contractors
The official headcount doesn’t include the contractor workforce, and for many purposes that omission matters. Millions of additional workers perform federal work under government contracts without appearing on any agency’s payroll. They’re employees of private firms like Lockheed Martin, Booz Allen Hamilton, and Deloitte, doing work that ranges from building weapons systems to running IT infrastructure to providing consulting services.
The most commonly cited estimate puts the contractor workforce at roughly 3.7 million people, though the true number is hard to pin down because no single federal system tracks contractor headcount the way OPM tracks civilian employees. Add contractors to the 3.9 million on federal payrolls and the government’s full labor footprint exceeds 7 million people.
Where Federal Employees Actually Work
Federal workers are not concentrated in Washington, D.C. Only about 15% of federal jobs are in the D.C. metropolitan area. Roughly 83% of federal employees work in locations spread across all 50 states, and the remaining 2% are stationed abroad.7USAJobs. I Must Move to Washington DC if I Want to Work for the Federal Government
OPM data shows Virginia, California, and Maryland among the states with the highest concentrations of federal civilian employees outside of D.C. itself.8U.S. Office of Personnel Management. Federal Civilian Employment Those workers staff VA hospitals, manage national parks, inspect food processing facilities, secure airports, and process Social Security claims in local offices in every state.