How many new businesses opened in metro Atlanta this fall?

From August through October, 212 businesses opened or announced plans to open across the 29-county metro Atlanta area. Of those, 94 had already opened when they were first reported, and 118 were announced but not open yet.

What kinds of businesses are opening in metro Atlanta?

Mostly places to eat and drink. Restaurants, cafes, bakeries, and bars made up 147 of the 212 openings and announcements, about 69%. Shops added 25 more, and gyms and fitness studios added 15.

Where is Hickory Flat Marketplace?

Hickory Flat Marketplace is a 100,000-square-foot shopping center on Hickory Flat Highway in Canton, in Cherokee County. It's expected to open this fall, and its tenant list includes Chicken Salad Chick, Caribou Coffee, and Onelife Fitness.

Seven in 10 of metro Atlanta's newest businesses serve food or drinks

From August through October, 212 businesses opened or announced plans to open across metro Atlanta, and 147 of them were restaurants, cafes, or bars. Here's where they're landing.

From August 1 through October 31, 212 businesses opened or announced plans to open across the 29-county metro Atlanta area, and 147 of them, about 69%, were restaurants, cafes, or bars. Most of the rest were shops, gyms, and offices, along with a few markets, salons, and clinics, and one hotel.

Restaurants alone made up 97 of the 212. Cafes and bakeries added 31 and bars added 19, while shops came in at 25 and gyms and fitness studios at 15. Of the full group, 94 had already opened when they were first reported and 118 were announced but not open yet.

The city of Atlanta had 79 of the openings and announcements, or 37%, and 53 of those 79 were food and drink. Outside the city, Dunwoody led with 10, followed by Alpharetta and Decatur with nine each, Woodstock with eight, and Marietta and Lawrenceville with seven apiece. Some of the city's openings took years to get here, like Spina Pizza, which is finally opening at Atlanta Dairies after five years of delays, according to Atlanta magazine.

Where metro Atlanta's new businesses are clustering

Centennial Yards, the downtown entertainment district, picked up three. Shake Shack's 10th Atlanta-area location was set to open there on August 13 in a 3,010-square-foot space at 85 Centennial Olympic Park Drive NW, according to What Now Atlanta. Park Bench, the dueling piano bar, is planning a second location in the district but hasn't announced an opening date, and Fanatics is opening a store with the Atlanta Hawks that will sell Hawks gear year-round, according to the Atlanta Journal-Constitution.

At Ponce City Market, NoriFish and Okiboru opened in the central food hall in late August and brought sushi and ramen back to the market. It's the third NoriFish, after the original in Sandy Springs and a Buckhead location that opened in 2025. The activewear brand ALO and Dragon Denim, an online-first fashion brand, opened stores there in September and October.

Hickory Flat Marketplace in Canton lined up more new tenants than any other suburban development, and it's a 100,000-square-foot shopping center expected to open this fall on Hickory Flat Highway. Chicken Salad Chick, Caribou Coffee, Little Rosa's Pizza, Onelife Fitness, and Alloy Personal Training are all on its tenant list, and Alloy is taking a 1,600-square-foot space, according to What Now Atlanta. For Caribou, it fills a gap, since the closest Caribou Coffee shops to Canton right now are in Woodstock and Milton.

Gyms and fitness studios were a smaller group at 15, but five of them are in Cherokee County, in Canton and Woodstock. Four of the 15 are Pilates or barre studios: Calm Pilates in Kennesaw, Club Pilates in Tucker, JETSET Pilates in Canton, and barre3 in Woodstock.

The two biggest projects in the count are offices and a factory. Duracell opened its global research and development headquarters at Science Square in Atlanta on October 6, with Mayor Andre Dickens at the opening, and DeltaX, an energy technology company, is putting $141 million into a North American manufacturing headquarters in Monroe, in Walton County, according to FOX 5 Atlanta. Alpharetta was in the running for a bigger one, but Morgan Stanley picked Dallas for its $684 million regional hub with more than 3,800 workers, according to the Atlanta Journal-Constitution.

Only seven closings turned up over the same three months, and since closings get much less coverage than openings, the real number is likely higher. The Bahama Breeze in Kennesaw, the last one in Georgia, closed in late August as Darden Restaurants gets out of the Bahama Breeze brand, and the building is becoming a Cheddar's Scratch Kitchen, according to FOX 5 Atlanta. Moondog Pub & Grub, a locally owned neighborhood pub in Chamblee, set October 30 as its last day.

New openings, closings, and coming-soon signs go up on PinScene's Atlanta map as they're reported, next to road closures and other local news.

Sources

Counts cover August 1 to October 31, 2026, in the 29-county Atlanta metro area, compiled by PinScene from local news coverage and new Google Maps business listings. Each business is counted once, by its status in the first report.