Beef Packing Industry 2025: Small Plants Grow in Number While Large Plants Lose Market Share

In 2025, total cattle slaughter was 29.252 million head, down 6.4% year over year and down 13.1% from the recent cyclical peak in 2022. Cattle slaughter in 2025 was at the lowest level since 2015.

Table 1 shows the breakdown of 2025 cattle slaughter by size categories of beef packing plants. This includes both fed and cow slaughter plants. Out of a total of 937 federally inspected packing plants, 94.8% (888 plants with capacity up to 100,000 head per year) accounted for 1.92 million head, 7.14% of total slaughter. By contrast, a total of 11 plants, with capacity in excess of 1 million head per year, accounted for 13.834 million head, or 47.3% of total cattle slaughter.

On average, fed slaughter is about 80% of total cattle slaughter. These 11 plants accounted for 58.1% of fed slaughter (Figure 2). Fed slaughter is currently 81.4% of total cattle slaughter, the highest percentage since 2007. Low cow slaughter since 2022 has increased the fed slaughter percentage.

The general structure of the beef packing industry has been in place for nearly 35 years. Figure 1 shows the four-firm concentration ratio for beef packing as calculated by the Packers and Stockyards Division of USDA. Beef packing in the U.S. consolidated rapidly in the 1980s and early 1990s. By 1993, the industry achieved a high level of concentration that has remained mostly constant since.