Leading Honey-Producing States In The US

American beekeepers had a brutal 2025. Honey production fell 14 percent to 116 million pounds, the lowest annual total since the early 1980s, with severe varroa mite die-offs tearing through commercial operations across the Dakotas, the Plains, and Florida. The 2.41 million surviving honey-producing colonies averaged just 48.0 pounds each. The one bright spot was price: a 27 percent jump to $3.05 per pound pushed the total crop value to $352.9 million, with pollination work adding another $224.7 million. North Dakota held the top US honey-producing rank for the 22nd consecutive year, though its 2025 crop was its smallest in seven years. The ten states below are the largest producers by 2025 volume, per USDA National Agricultural Statistics Service (NASS) data released March 13, 2026; the table at the end of the article covers the top 20.

1. North Dakota (30.82 million pounds)

One in every four pounds of American honey came from North Dakota in 2025. The state produced 30.82 million pounds, nearly three times the next-largest state's crop, from 460,000 honey-producing colonies averaging 67 pounds each. The total crop was worth $58.3 million, comfortably the highest of any state, even though North Dakota's $1.89-per-pound average price was the lowest in the country, reflecting the commercial-wholesale market that dominates the state.

The dominance is not accidental. The Prairie Pothole Region across the Dakotas and eastern Montana is one of the best honey bee forage environments on Earth, with sweet clover, alfalfa, sunflower, and canola plantings blooming in sequence from May through September. North Dakota has held the top US honey-producing rank every year since 2003, a 22-year streak with no close challengers. The 2025 crop was the smallest since 2018, a reflection of the varroa die-offs that hammered the rest of the industry.

2. California (11.03 million pounds)

California is the country's biggest honey customer as well as its second-biggest producer. The state's 11.03 million pounds in 2025 came from 315,000 colonies with an average yield of just 35 pounds per colony, third-lowest among the top ten, putting the 2025 crop value at $28.3 million at an average price of $2.57 per pound. California's own honey production has stayed relatively stable through the state's recurring drought, with sage, eucalyptus, manzanita, citrus, and avocado forage feeding the colonies that remain in state year-round.

The bigger story is almond pollination. Central Valley almond growers need approximately 2.4 million hives for the February-March bloom, roughly three-quarters of every honey bee in the United States. California beekeepers maintain only 500,000 to 600,000 colonies locally. The rest arrives by semi-truck from North Dakota, Montana, Minnesota, and South Dakota in what the industry calls, without exaggeration, the largest paid pollination event on Earth.

3. Montana (10.46 million pounds)

While most of the country's bees were collapsing in 2025, Montana's were thriving. The state was one of the few to increase production, churning out 10.46 million pounds from 123,000 colonies. The average yield of 85 pounds per colony was the second-highest in the top ten (behind only Mississippi's 89-pound average), and the $22.8 million crop value pushed Montana past South Dakota into third place nationally for the first time in several years. Montana's honey production has more than doubled over the past 40 years, riding the same Prairie Pothole forage system that powers North and South Dakota.

Operations here run bigger than in surrounding states. A handful of commercial beekeepers manage upward of 30,000 hives across leased land throughout Montana, and for the largest, pollination contracts generate $6 million or more annually on top of honey income. The annual circuit moves hives to California almond orchards in February, Washington state apple and cherry orchards in April, and Wisconsin cranberry bogs in June.

4. South Dakota (8.20 million pounds)

South Dakota's beekeepers lost more than a third of their crop in 2025. The state produced 8.20 million pounds, down 38 percent from 2024, the steepest single-year percentage drop among the top ten producers. The collapse cost the state its third-place ranking to Montana. The 2025 production came from 205,000 colonies with an average yield of 40 pounds per colony at $2.44 per pound, total value $20.0 million. The state's Department of Agriculture pointed to extended summer drought across western South Dakota plus severe varroa mite losses through autumn as the twin drivers.

Most South Dakota honey is the alfalfa-sweet clover blend typical of Northern Plains prairie beekeeping. The state's roughly 200 commercial operations are a primary winter departure point for almond-pollination convoys heading to California. The 2025 collapse hit yields harder than colony counts: operators kept their hives, but the bees in them simply weren't producing.

5. Minnesota (5.65 million pounds)

Inside a brick building on the University of Minnesota's St. Paul campus, scientists have spent more than a century breeding bees that fight back. The U of M Bee Lab, founded in 1918, is one of the oldest and most active academic apiculture research centres in the United States, internationally known for its hygienic-stock breeding program that selects honey bees for the ability to detect and remove diseased or mite-infested brood. The program is currently one of the most promising long-term weapons in the industry's fight against Varroa destructor.

Minnesota produced 5.65 million pounds of honey in 2025 from 113,000 colonies, averaging 50 pounds per colony at $2.38 per pound, a $13.4 million crop. The state shares the Upper Midwest farmland that powers the Dakotas, but denser forest cover and more mixed-use farming give Minnesota honey a more varied profile than the prairie monoculture. Wild basswood blooms in July add a distinctive note many connoisseurs prize over commodity clover.

6. Michigan (3.74 million pounds)

Cherry. Apple. Blueberry. Michigan honey tastes like the state's orchards because Michigan's bees mostly work them. The state produced 3.74 million pounds in 2025 from 89,000 colonies, with a yield of 42 pounds per colony at $3.27 per pound, a $12.2 million crop. The premium price reflects a higher proportion of direct retail and specialty sales than the larger Plains states see. Michigan varietals trace specific blooms: cherry honey from the Traverse City region, apple honey from the Lower Peninsula orchards, blueberry honey from the western fruit belt.

Michigan beekeepers earn roughly a third of their income from pollination work and the rest from honey and hive products (beeswax, pollen, propolis). Pollination season runs late April through early July, more than twice as long as California's almond window, because Michigan's fruit growers bloom in sequence rather than all at once.

7. Florida (3.62 million pounds)

Most of Florida's honey isn't really made in Florida. The state's 3.62 million pounds in 2025 came from 113,000 colonies with an average yield of just 32 pounds per colony, the lowest in the top ten. The low number reflects Florida's role in the industry: its mild winters make the state a primary overwintering destination for commercial hives that produce most of their honey while stationed elsewhere during the summer. The 2025 crop's $14.2 million value, boosted by Florida's $3.94 average retail price, understates the state's actual significance to the industry.

Florida honey itself comes primarily from orange blossom (a single-floral varietal that commands premium prices), tupelo, palmetto, gallberry, and Brazilian pepper. The state's commercial citrus acreage has fallen sharply over the past decade because of huanglongbing (citrus greening disease), which has chewed deeply into the orange blossom honey crop. Florida operations are also America's nursery for replacement bees: packages and queens ship by the truckload to northern beekeepers every spring, restocking colonies lost over winter.

8. Louisiana (3.29 million pounds)

Twenty-five dollars a pound. Two weeks of bloom. One tree, in three river valleys, in one corner of the country. Louisiana's tupelo honey is the most prized varietal in North America, anchored by the white tupelo (Nyssa ogeche) trees that grow along the Apalachicola, Choctawhatchee, and other slow-moving Gulf Coast river systems. True tupelo commands retail prices of $15 to $25 per pound because of its tight two-to-three-week April-May bloom window, its distinctive light colour, and its unusual chemistry (a high fructose-to-glucose ratio that keeps the honey from crystallising for years).

Louisiana's 2025 total was 3.29 million pounds from 62,000 colonies, averaging 53 pounds per colony at $2.47 per pound, $8.1 million in all. Beyond tupelo, the state's hives work cotton, soybean, and a small wild blueberry varietal across the Mississippi Delta and the pine-belt parishes.

9. Idaho (3.02 million pounds)

While the rest of the country's bees were dying, Idaho's were quietly climbing. The state jumped from 13th to 9th in the 2025 rankings, producing 3.02 million pounds, up roughly 20 percent year-over-year against an industry trend of sharp declines almost everywhere else. The 2025 crop came from 104,000 colonies with an average yield of just 29 pounds per colony (second-lowest in the top ten) and an average price of $2.07 per pound, $6.2 million in value. The unusual combination of high colony count and low per-colony yield is the giveaway: Idaho is a recovery ward, not a primary production state.

Many of the colonies counted in Idaho statistics belong to commercial operations that station their hives in the state for queen breeding, colony recovery, or summer rest between pollination contracts in California, Washington, and Oregon. Idaho honey itself comes primarily from clover, alfalfa, and wildflower forage across the Snake River Plain and the high desert ranges of the southern part of the state.

10. New York (2.91 million pounds)

New York beekeepers got $5.14 per pound for their 2025 crop. North Dakota's commercial operations averaged $1.89. The pricing gap captures the gulf between the two opposite ends of the American beekeeping economy. New York produced just 2.91 million pounds from 52,000 colonies, a small total compared with the Plains states. But an average yield of 56 pounds per colony combined with the state's retail-heavy market pushed the 2025 crop value to $15.0 million, making it the seventh-most valuable honey crop nationally despite ranking tenth in volume.

New York honey comes from clover, alfalfa, basswood, and the wildflower forage of the Finger Lakes, the Hudson Valley, and the Adirondack foothills. Buckwheat honey (dark, strongly flavoured, and once a New York signature) has staged a niche revival over the past decade. The state's beekeepers also pollinate apple, blueberry, and cucurbit growers across the western and central counties.

Why North Dakota Dominates

The Prairie Pothole landscape that produces North Dakota's honey crop also makes the Great Plains the nerve centre of the US migratory beekeeping economy. Commercial beekeepers keep their hives in the Dakotas, Montana, and Minnesota through summer for honey production, then load them onto semi-trucks in late autumn and ship them to milder climates (Texas, Florida, California) for winter. The largest operations move 16,000 to 30,000 hives in a single annual cycle, criss-crossing the country chasing blooms.

The economic engine is California almond pollination. California's almond acreage roughly tripled between 2000 and 2024, but the local hive population did not grow proportionally, leaving a gap that out-of-state colonies fill. Pollination contracts at California almond orchards run $180 to $220 per hive for the three-to-four-week bloom, with the largest operations earning $3 million to $6 million annually from pollination alone. The pollination side now generates substantially more income for beekeepers than honey sales: $224.7 million in 2025 pollination income against $352.9 million in honey value, with most pollination revenue concentrated in a much smaller subset of operations.

The pressure on the system is biological as much as environmental. Varroa destructor mites drove sharply higher colony die-offs through 2024 and 2025; USDA NASS recorded a 7 percent drop in honey-producing colonies between the two years, and Apiary Inspectors of America survey data showed annual mortality above 50 percent for many commercial operations. Varroa control and treatment expenditure jumped 34 percent in 2025 to $22.2 million nationally, the biggest single-line expense increase anywhere in the industry. Climate volatility, drought across the Plains, pesticide exposure, and habitat loss to row-crop expansion all compound the underlying mite pressure.

The Top 20 Honey-Producing States in 2025

The table below lists the top 20 US states by 2025 honey production with colony counts, yields, and total value, per USDA NASS data released in March 2026. USDA publishes individual state estimates for these 20 states; remaining states are aggregated as "Other States" because individual operation data cannot be disclosed without violating confidentiality rules.