Who runs clinical trials?

Universities, hospitals and nonprofits lead about 320,000 of the 461,000 clinical trials registered on ClinicalTrials.gov as of September 2026, about 7 in 10. Drug, device and other companies lead about 113,000, or about 1 in 4; the U.S. National Institutes of Health leads about 7,900. The lead sponsor is the organization responsible for the trial; others may help pay for it.

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Key facts

Measure: Clinical trials (all years). Written from the data below.

  • Universities, hospitals and nonprofits has the highest figure, 321,826, followed by Companies (113,823) and Other governments (11,125).
  • Individuals has the lowest figure, 459, followed by Research networks (3,672) and Other U.S. federal agencies (4,314).
  • The highest is 701 times the lowest.

Source and date

Source
ClinicalTrials.gov (U.S. National Library of Medicine), counted with its API v2
License
Public domain (U.S. government work); source National Library of Medicine
Data as of
Published

Citation

Chartly. “Who runs clinical trials?” Chart. Data: ClinicalTrials.gov (U.S. National Library of Medicine), counted with its API v2, https://clinicaltrials.gov/data-api/api (data as of October 14, 2026). https://chart.ly/charts/clinical-trials-by-sponsor (accessed October 15, 2026).

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The data

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Lead sponsor Clinical trials (all years)
Universities, hospitals and nonprofits 321,826
Companies 113,823
Other governments 11,125
U.S. National Institutes of Health 7,881
Other U.S. federal agencies 4,314
Research networks 3,672
Individuals 459

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