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Industrial production (IP) edged up 0.1 percent in May after rising 0.9 percent in April. Manufacturing output was unchanged in May after increasing 0.7 percent in April. In May, the index for mining rose 1.3 percent, and the index for utilities decreased 0.4 percent. At 102.6 percent of its 2017 average, total IP in May was 1.7 percent above its year-earlier level. Capacity utilization edged up to 76.2 percent, a rate that is 3.2 percentage points below its long-run (1972–2025) average.

Industrial Production and Capacity Utilization: Summary

Market Groups

The major market groups posted mixed results in May. Production of consumer goods declined 0.5 percent, with a 0.8 percent fall in the index for nondurable consumer goods more than offsetting a 0.5 percent increase in the index for durable consumer goods. Production of business equipment rose 0.6 percent led by an increase of 1.9 percent in the index for transit equipment. Output of defense and space equipment rose 0.9 percent. The index for construction supplies moved up 1.1 percent, while production of business supplies was unchanged. The index for materials gained 0.3 percent.

Industry Groups

Manufacturing output moved sideways in May. Production of durable goods rose 0.8 percent, with increased output in almost all categories. Within durables, the indexes for wood products, for nonmetallic mineral products, for primary metals, and for motor vehicles and parts each grew more than 1.0 percent. Production of nondurable goods fell 0.9 percent in May, with declines in almost all categories.

In May, mining output grew 1.3 percent. The index for utilities fell 0.4 percent, with a 1.7 percent decline in electric utilities output more than offsetting an increase of 8.5 percent in natural gas utilities output.

Capacity utilization for manufacturing was unchanged in May at 75.7 percent, a rate that is 2.5 percentage points below its long-run (1972–2025) average. The operating rate for mining increased 1.2 percentage points to 86.5 percent in May, and the operating rate for utilities moved down 0.4 percentage point to 70.6 percent. The rate for mining was 1.3 percentage points above its long-run average, while the rate for utilities remained substantially below its long-run average.

Revision of Industrial Production and Capacity Utilization

The Federal Reserve Board plans to issue its annual revision to the indexes of industrial production (IP) and the related measures of capacity utilization in the autumn of 2026. The base year for the revised indexes will be 2022. New annual benchmark data for manufacturing from the Census Bureau for 2023 will be incorporated, as well as other annual data, including information on the mining of metallic and nonmetallic minerals (except fuels). The updated IP indexes will include revisions to the monthly indicator (either product data or input data) and to seasonal factors for each industry. In addition, the estimation methods for some series may be changed. Any modifications to the methods for estimating the output of an industry will affect the index from 1972 to the present.

Capacity and capacity utilization will be revised to incorporate data for manufacturing through the fourth quarter of 2025 from the U.S. Census Bureau's Quarterly Survey of Plant Capacity Utilization, along with new data on capacity from the U.S. Geological Survey, the U.S. Department of Energy, and other organizations.

Note. The statistics in this release cover output, capacity, and capacity utilization in the U.S. industrial sector, which is defined by the Federal Reserve to comprise manufacturing, mining, and electric and gas utilities. Mining is defined as all industries in sector 21 of the North American Industry Classification System (NAICS); electric and gas utilities are those in NAICS sectors 2211 and 2212. Manufacturing comprises NAICS manufacturing industries (sector 31-33) plus the logging industry and the newspaper, periodical, book, and directory publishing industries (except exclusive Internet publishing). Logging and publishing are classified elsewhere in NAICS (under agriculture and information respectively), but historically they were considered to be manufacturing and were included in the industrial sector under the Standard Industrial Classification (SIC) system. In December 2002, the Federal Reserve reclassified all of its industrial output data from the SIC system to NAICS.

G.17 Release Tables:

• Summary: Industrial Production and Capacity Utilization
• Chart 1: Industrial Production, Capacity, and Capacity Utilization
• Chart 2: Industrial Production and Capacity Utilization
• Chart 3: Industrial Production of Selected Industries
• Table 1: Industrial Production: Market and Industry Groups (percent change)
• Table 2: Industrial Production: Special Aggregates and Selected Detail (percent change)
• Table 3: Motor Vehicle Assemblies
• Table 4: Industrial Production Indexes: Market and Industry Group Summary
• Table 5: Industrial Production Indexes: Special Aggregates
• Table 6: Diffusion Indexes of Industrial Production
• Table 7: Capacity Utilization: Manufacturing, Mining, and Utilities
• Table 8: Industrial Capacity: Manufacturing, Mining, and Utilities (percent change)
• Table 9: Industrial Production: Gross Value of Products and Nonindustrial Supplies
• Table 10: Gross-Value-Weighted Industrial Production: Stage-of-Process Groups
• Table 11: Historical Statistics for IP, Capacity, and Utilization: Total Industry
• Table 12: Historical Statistics for IP, Capacity, and Utilization: Manufacturing
• Table 13: Historical Statistics for IP, Capacity, and Utilization: Total Industry excluding Selected High-Technology Industries
• Table 14: Historical Statistics for IP, Capacity, and Utilization: Manufacturing excluding Selected High-Technology Industries
• Table 15: Industrial Production: Reliability Estimates

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