List of largest chemical producers

Chemical & Engineering News publishes an annual list of the world's largest chemical producers by sales, excluding formulated products such as pharmaceutical drugs and coatings.[1] In 2018, sales of the top fifty companies amounted to US$951.0 billion, an increase of 11.8% compared to the top fifty producers of 2017.[2] The American Chemistry Council estimated that global chemical sales in 2014 rose by 3.7% to US$5.389 trillion.[3]

In 2018, Forty-eight of the companies on the list disclosed chemical profits, which totaled US$110.1 billion, an increase of 1.3% from 2017. The average profit margin for chemical operations for these companies was 9.6%.[1]

Top fifty producers by sales (2021)

Top fifty producers by sales (2018)

• A.Some figures converted at 2018 average exchange rates of US$1.00.00 = BRL3.6513 Brazilian, CN¥6.609, 0.8462 EUR, ₹67.16, ¥110.1, 1099.29 KRW, 3.75 SAR, R13.2255, CHF0.9784, 30.129 TWD, and 32.303 THB.[1]
• B.Estimate by Chemical and Engineering News.[1]
• C.Sales include a significant amount of non-chemical products.[1]
• D.Chemical sales less administrative expenses and cost of sales.[1]

Largest companies since 1988

Since Chemical & Engineering News began keeping records in 1989, BASF has been the world's largest chemical producer by annual sales more frequently than any other company. The other companies that have headed the list are Dow Chemical, DowDuPont (which broke up into Dow, a new DuPont, and Corteva Agriscience in 2019), Hoechst (which merged with Rhône-Poulenc in 1999 and is now a subsidiary of Sanofi), ICI (acquired by AkzoNobel in 2008) and Bayer.

• A.Foreign currencies converted to USD using average exchange rates of that year.