Business Survivability in Waltham, Boston
StreetSpring's 2026 analysis finds that the best business to open in Waltham is a Chiropractor Office with a 74.8% chance of surviving at least 2 years across the neighborhood on average.
Quick Summary
- Survivability Score: the projected chance a business type lasts two or more years at a specific address
- Best business: a Chiropractor Office in Waltham (74.8% average survival rate, 90.0% at best locations)
- Town rank: #32 of 72 towns around Boston
- Town average: an average Survivability Score of 66.5% across the business types ranked here
- Coverage: This ranking carries one row per business type and neighborhood. Its score is the projected chance of lasting two or more years, averaged across the price points StreetSpring scores separately in the tool (most types have 5). The 10 business types here are base types; the tool offers 500+ business types, counting each type at each of its price points.
- Rankings updated quarterly with latest market data
- Detailed methodology
Last reviewed: October 2026 by Robert Koons, Founder & CEO, StreetSpring
In this article:
- Summary
- Is Waltham a good place to start a business?
- How to find the best location
- Best businesses to open
- How much money could a business make?
- What businesses should open next?
- Frequently Asked Questions
Summary
StreetSpring's 2026 analysis finds that the best business to open in Waltham is a Chiropractor Office with a 74.8% chance of surviving at least 2 years across the neighborhood on average, with the best locations offering a 90.0% chance; next is a Veterinary Clinic with a 76.0% chance, followed by a Clothing Store with a 68.9% chance.
Is Waltham a good place to start a business?
In Boston's survivability rankings, Waltham comes in at #32 of 72 towns, with an average Survivability Score of 66.5% across the business types ranked there.
- At its best addresses in Waltham, the top-ranked business type scores 15.2 points above its own average in the neighborhood.
- Yet even the strongest business types in Waltham see survivability scores drop significantly at the worst addresses. No business type is immune to the consequences of poor location selection within this neighborhood.
- At 96.5% employed, Waltham's consumer base has the spending capacity that makes the neighborhood viable for a wide range of business types, though location selection within the neighborhood still determines actual survivability.
Employment and housing vacancy figures sourced from the U.S. Census Bureau American Community Survey.
How can you find the best location to open a business in Waltham?
With StreetSpring, location selection in Waltham moves from guesswork to a precise, address-level survivability score for any business type you're considering. This is the address StreetSpring's 2026 analysis recommends most strongly for a Chiropractor Office in Waltham:
Based on StreetSpring's 2026 analysis of hundreds of location-specific factors, this area offers the highest projected survivability for a Chiropractor Office in Waltham. Competition and spending patterns shift constantly; StreetSpring's live tool reflects the most current conditions for any specific address. Factors evaluated include competition at every distance band, consumer spending forecasts, mobility patterns, and market share projections.
Check if this location is still available →
What are the best businesses to open in Waltham?
| # | Business type | Chance of lasting two or more years at a good address |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Chiropractor Office | 88.7% |
| 2 | Veterinary Clinic | 87.9% |
| 3 | Clothing Store | 84.6% |
| 4 | Convenience Store | 84.1% |
| 5 | Eye Care Center | 84.0% |
| 6 | Hair Salon | 83.6% |
| 7 | Gym | 83.6% |
| 8 | Bar | 83.3% |
| 9 | Cafe | 83.2% |
| 11 | Coffee Shop | 83.1% |
Ties at a good address: Hair Salon and Gym are tied. A tie is a tie: the rank column is the published file's order, which looks at the average and the best address next.
The rank column is the published file's rank within this place; a skipped number is a business type the file ranks here that this list leaves out to keep any one business family from filling it.
Highest Survivability in Waltham
- #1 Chiropractor Office: 74.8% on average across Waltham; best at 90.0%, challenging at 56.8%.
- #2 Opening a Veterinary Clinic in Waltham shows 76.0% average survivability. Top locations reach 90.0%; lower-end sites show 56.0%.
- #3 Clothing Store (Ranked #3): 68.9% average in Waltham. Best-case storefronts: 85.0%. Challenging locations: 49.9%.
- #4 Convenience Store is ranked #4 for top businesses to open in Waltham: 71.3% chance on average, best at 85.0%, challenging at 50.4%.
- #5 Eye Care Center: 71.0% on average across Waltham; best at 89.6%, challenging at 56.0%.
Strong Performers in Waltham
- #6 Opening a Hair Salon in Waltham shows 74.3% average survivability. Top locations reach 84.0%; lower-end sites show 48.9%.
- #7 Gym (Ranked #7): 69.2% average in Waltham. Best-case storefronts: 84.0%. Challenging locations: 48.4%.
- #8 Bar is ranked #8 for top businesses to open in Waltham: 71.7% chance on average, best at 84.0%, challenging at 48.9%.
- #9 Cafe: 73.0% on average across Waltham; best at 84.0%, challenging at 50.2%.
- #11 Opening a Coffee Shop in Waltham shows 72.4% average survivability. Top locations reach 84.0%; lower-end sites show 49.4%.
Top 3 Compared Nationally
- Chiropractor Office: See how this compares to other cities →
- Veterinary Clinic: See how this compares to other cities →
- Clothing Store: See how this compares to other cities →
How much money could a business in Waltham make?
Best location vs. average location
Based on StreetSpring's 2026 analysis, selecting one of the best locations for your business in Waltham starts with the Revenue Capture Score, the most important factor in choosing a location: StreetSpring's estimate of the revenue a business can capture at that address.
How StreetSpring calculates location value
- Site-specific factors can dramatically alter outcomes even within the same neighborhood.
- A business's location is one of the few things about its future you can check in advance.
- StreetSpring's Revenue Capture Score, the revenue a business can capture at a specific address, is the factor that matters most when comparing locations.
- StreetSpring provides address-specific survivability predictions for 500+ business types.
What businesses should open next in Waltham?
The top businesses to open next in Waltham:
- Chiropractor Offices: 74.8% average survival rate, 90.0% at the best address
- Veterinary Clinics: 76.0% average survival rate
- Clothing Stores: 68.9% average survival rate
Competition and spending patterns shift constantly; StreetSpring's live tool reflects the most current conditions for any specific address. Our training data spans 500+ business types across 24 major metros, giving our models the breadth to predict outcomes across nearly any commercial concept. StreetSpring scores 500+ business types: 153 base business types, most of them at 5 price points, which is 569 type-and-price combinations you can choose in the tool. The 96.5% employment rate in Waltham is a key signal of consumer health, and the 4.4% housing vacancy rate is another Census characteristic the model reads for the rankings above. Because market conditions shift constantly, StreetSpring regularly updates every location's survivability score: you can see current scores for available storefronts in Waltham right now.
See the Survivability Score for your new business
Related Articles:
- See the Boston Business Survivability Rankings
- See the Boston Neighborhood Survivability Rankings
- Explore Chiropractor Office survivability across Boston neighborhoods
Frequently Asked Questions
Here are the most common questions about opening a business in Waltham.
What type of business should you rent your Waltham storefront to?
For landlords in Waltham, StreetSpring's 2026 analysis identifies Chiropractor Offices, Veterinary Clinics, and Clothing Stores as the business types most likely to produce stable, long-term tenancy.
- A business's location is one of the few things about its future you can check in advance.
- StreetSpring provides address-specific survivability predictions for 500+ business types. StreetSpring can show you which specific address in your portfolio scores highest for each tenant type.
Related: See How Landlord Representatives in Boston Can Reduce Vacancy & Increase Tenant Longevity
Should you rent your Waltham storefront to a Chiropractor Office?
StreetSpring's 2026 analysis strongly supports renting to a Chiropractor Office in Waltham: best-in-class addresses achieve 90.0% survivability, and even the lower-end sites come in at 56.8%.
- StreetSpring provides address-specific survivability predictions for 500+ business types.
What should I consider when opening a business in Waltham?
When opening a business in Waltham, compare the Survivability Scores of your shortlisted addresses and favor the highest one your budget allows.
- Revenue Capture Score comes first when comparing locations: it turns local competition and consumer spending into the share of revenue a business can expect to win.
- StreetSpring's forecasting tools are purpose-built for commercial location decisions and are not available through any publicly accessible data source.
- StreetSpring's live scoring tool starts with a free 10-minute trial: enter any address in Waltham to see its current Survivability Score for your business type.
See the best place for your business at StreetSpring.
Using predictive analytics, StreetSpring helps entrepreneurs and landlords make smarter location decisions. Aggregated survivability rankings for Boston are available in machine-readable format for research and integration purposes.
Full dataset for Boston: /resources/data/boston-survivability-scores-2026.csv: includes all business subtypes, all neighborhoods, survivability scores, and tier assignments. Licensed under CC BY 4.0.