NAICS and PSC codes explained

Two sets of codes follow you through federal contracting. NAICS codes describe the industry your business is in. PSC codes describe the product or service the government is buying. They answer different questions, they are maintained by different bodies, and you will use both: NAICS to register and establish your size, PSC to understand what agencies actually purchase.

NAICS: what industry you are in

The North American Industry Classification System (NAICS) is the standard used by federal statistical agencies to classify business establishments. In the United States it is maintained by the Census Bureau, in coordination with Canada and Mexico, and it is revised every five years. The codes are hierarchical, and the six-digit code is the most specific U.S. level.

Reading a code from left to right narrows the industry. For example:

Other examples from different sectors include 561720, Janitorial Services, and 238210, Electrical Contractors and Other Wiring Installation Contractors. The Census Bureau's NAICS site has a search tool and the full definition of each code, including what is included and excluded. Read the definition, not only the title: two codes with similar names can cover quite different work.

Why NAICS decides whether you are small

The Small Business Administration (SBA) assigns a size standard to each NAICS code. A size standard is expressed either as average annual receipts or as average number of employees, and it varies widely between industries. SBA's regulations in 13 CFR part 121 explain how to calculate your receipts or employees, including how affiliates are counted.

This matters because every federal solicitation is assigned one NAICS code by the contracting officer. That code's size standard is the one that decides whether you qualify as small for that specific acquisition. You might be small under one of your NAICS codes and other than small under another. When you register in SAM.gov, your reported size is compared with the size standard for each code you list.

Choosing your NAICS codes

• Start with the work you already do and can prove. Find the code whose definition best matches it and make that your primary code.
• Add secondary codes for other lines of work you genuinely perform. Each one should be supportable by capabilities, people and past performance.
• Look at which codes agencies use when they buy your kind of work. Contract data often shows a pattern you would not guess from the titles alone.
• Revisit your codes when your business changes. You can update them in SAM.gov.

PSC: what the government is buying

Product and Service Codes (PSC) describe the products, services and research and development purchased by the federal government. Every contract action reported to the government's contract data systems carries a PSC. The codes are published in the PSC Manual, maintained by the General Services Administration and available on Acquisition.gov.

PSCs are four characters long, and their first character tells you the broad type of purchase:

• Codes that begin with a digit are products, grouped into federal supply groups.
• Codes that begin with a letter are services. For example, codes beginning with R cover professional, administrative and management support services, S covers utilities and housekeeping services, Y covers construction of structures and facilities, and Z covers maintenance, repair and alteration of real property.
• Codes that begin with A are research and development.

Two service examples: R408 is program management and support services, and S201 is custodial and janitorial housekeeping. As with NAICS, read the manual's description before relying on a code, and check the current edition, because the manual is updated over time.

How NAICS and PSC work together

A single purchase carries both codes. A contract for cleaning a federal building might be coded NAICS 561720 (the industry of the business doing the work) and PSC S201 (the service being bought). Together they give you two different lenses on the same market:

• NAICS tells you whether you are small for a solicitation and helps agencies find you in SAM.gov and SBA's Dynamic Small Business Search.
• PSC tells you precisely what agencies spend money on and lets you compare your offering with the way the government itself describes it.

Using codes for market research

The most useful thing you can do with your codes is look up who buys under them. Public contract data lets you filter past awards by NAICS and PSC:

1. Search USAspending.gov (opens in a new tab) for awards under your primary NAICS code. Note which agencies and offices award the most actions, and the typical size of those awards.
2. Repeat the search with the PSCs that describe your service. You will often find agencies buying your service under a NAICS code you had not considered.
3. Look at who won. The recipients are your competitors, and some are potential teaming partners or prime contractors who subcontract work of your size.
4. Search current opportunities on SAM.gov (opens in a new tab) with the same codes to see what is being solicited now.

Record what you find. A short list of target agencies with the codes they use for your work is far more useful than a long list of codes in your registration.

Common mistakes

• Choosing by title alone. The definition, including its exclusions, is what counts.
• Listing every plausible code. Codes you cannot support dilute your profile and can misrepresent your business.
• Assuming you are small everywhere. Size is determined against the size standard for the NAICS code on each solicitation.
• Ignoring PSCs. They are how the government describes what it buys, and they make contract data far more precise.

How ONE VIEW Launchpad helps

Your company profile holds your NAICS and PSC codes, marks the primary NAICS, and shows them in monospace so they are easy to check against official records. The market research workspace prompts you through agency, industry, NAICS and PSC research with links to the official data sources, and saves what you find alongside your roadmap. Nothing in the product determines your size status for you; that remains a calculation under SBA's rules.

Official sources

• Census Bureau NAICS (opens in a new tab): search codes and read definitions.
• SBA table of size standards (opens in a new tab): the size standard for each NAICS code.
• PSC Manual on Acquisition.gov (opens in a new tab): the official list of Product and Service Codes.
• USAspending.gov (opens in a new tab): past federal awards, searchable by NAICS and PSC.
• SAM.gov (opens in a new tab): current contract opportunities and your entity registration.