| Your situation | What to check | Planning use |
|---|---|---|
| You want to rank employers by size | Revenue and expenses in the Form 990 summary | Use revenue to build a shortlist, then confirm headcount on each employer’s career page. |
| You are eyeing a hospital or university | The full Form 990 return | Organizations above the filing thresholds file the full return, so there is more to compare year to year. |
| You prefer community or human services work | Form 990 plus the employer’s current postings | Revenue shows scale. Postings show whether the roles match your skills. |
| You are considering a small employer | Form 990-EZ or Form 990-N filings | Smaller filers disclose less, and the smallest disclose no financial details. |
| You want to judge financial stability | The Philadelphia Foundation’s financial health report on area nonprofits | Gives regional context before you read any single employer’s numbers. |
Filing categories and revenue summaries here come from ProPublica’s Nonprofit Explorer, which displays IRS data. Regional context comes from the Philadelphia Foundation’s nonprofit page.
The largest nonprofits in Philadelphia are best identified by comparing revenue on public Form 990 filings and then confirming headcount on each employer’s career page; no single figure ranks them, so match the size measure to the job you want.
If you are weighing openings across the sector, start with our overview of nonprofit jobs in Philadelphia and return here to compare specific employers by size.
How nonprofit size is measured
Size has no single definition, and the two usual yardsticks are revenue and staff count. Revenue is the one you can check quickly in public filings. Staff count is the one that matters most to a job seeker, because it hints at how many roles an employer fills.
The IRS builds its filing rules around money, which makes revenue the natural public measure. Nonprofit Explorer explains that Form 990 is an information return most organizations claiming federal tax-exempt status must file yearly. Organizations with less than $200,000 in revenue and less than $500,000 in assets may file the shorter Form 990-EZ instead. Those with gross receipts under $50,000 can file only the Form 990-N postcard, which carries no financial details.
Those thresholds tell you something useful. A large employer sits well above them, so its full return is public and can be compared across years. A very small employer may leave almost no financial trail.
Revenue and headcount are different measures, and they do not always move together. Use revenue to shortlist organizations, then treat the employer’s own career page as the place to confirm how many people it employs and what it is hiring for.
Checking staff size and revenue yourself
Public filings let you build your own ranking of Philadelphia employers. All Form 990 data in Nonprofit Explorer comes from the IRS, and ProPublica presents it in a searchable format. The steps below work for any organization on your list.
- Search by legal name. Open Nonprofit Explorer and enter the organization’s name. A hospital or university may file under a name that differs from its public brand.
- Read the revenue and expenses summary. The organization page summarizes each fiscal year’s figures, which is enough to compare employers of similar type.
- Compare several years. Nonprofit Explorer holds IRS-digitized Form 990 data for filings processed in 2012 and later, so you can see whether an employer is growing, flat or shrinking.
- Confirm headcount and openings on the career page. Revenue does not tell you how many people work there. The employer’s own postings show current hiring volume and the range of roles.
A revenue ranking built this way is a shortlist, not a verdict. Two organizations with similar revenue can employ very different numbers of people, so always finish with the career page.
Health care and university employers
Hospital systems and universities are the institutions most readers have in mind when they search for the biggest nonprofit organizations in Philadelphia. Both are worth researching by filing and by career page, because their scale usually means a wide spread of job types.
Hospital and health system nonprofits
Look up the system under its legal name in Nonprofit Explorer and read the revenue trend over several years. Then open the career page and scan postings by department. The spread of postings, from patient-facing roles to administration and operations, shows what a large health employer offers. Revenue alone cannot show that.
This group suits people who want many possible entry points and internal moves within one employer. It suits less well anyone who wants a small team where one person covers many tasks.
University and education nonprofits
Universities work the same way. Search the institution’s filing, compare revenue across years, then read its postings. Academic institutions often post administrative, research-support and student-services roles alongside teaching roles, so read job titles rather than assuming a role exists.
If you want to stay in education but prefer a closer-knit team, compare a large institution’s filing with a smaller education nonprofit’s. The size gap in the filings will be obvious.
Community and human services employers
Community-facing nonprofits often have smaller headcounts than hospitals or universities, but they are where much direct service work happens. The decision here is less about rank and more about whether the organization’s size matches the kind of role you want.
Social services organizations
Human services employers run programs that serve residents directly, so their postings often center on case work, program coordination and front-desk or intake duties. Check how many positions an organization currently lists and whether those roles match your background. For a wider sweep of employers grouped by mission, the Philadelphia nonprofit organizations list is the better starting point than a size ranking.
Food security: Philabundance
One local example to research is Philabundance, which a Philadelphia directory lists as a South Philadelphia nonprofit at 3616 South Galloway Street, Philadelphia, PA 19148. Anti-hunger organizations of this kind are good test cases for the method above. Search the legal name in Nonprofit Explorer, read the revenue trend, then compare it with current postings.
This type of employer suits people motivated by a specific mission who are comfortable in operational, logistics-heavy or program roles. It suits less well anyone who wants the institutional breadth of a hospital or university.
Small and mid-sized nonprofit employers
Smaller filers behave differently in the data. The Nonprofit Explorer summary for a small Philadelphia-area organization with a fiscal year ending Dec. 2022 shows revenue of $147,500 and expenses of $181,221. Expenses ran above revenue in that year, and a single year cannot say whether that is a pattern.
When you consider a small employer, compare several years before drawing conclusions. If the organization files only the 990-N postcard, there is no financial summary to read at all. In that case, rely on its own materials and ask direct questions in interviews about funding and the continuity of the role.
Small employers suit people who want broad responsibility early and can accept less institutional structure. Their size often limits formal training and promotion paths, so ask about both.
Choosing a nonprofit employer beyond its size
Size is a starting filter, not a measure of how good a workplace is. A “best nonprofits to work for in Philadelphia” list depends on what you value, so weigh these factors alongside the filings.
- Financial health. The Philadelphia Foundation publishes a report on the financial health of Philadelphia-area nonprofits. Read it for sector context before you judge a single employer’s numbers.
- Pay. Revenue does not equal compensation. Compare typical pay in our guide to Philadelphia nonprofit salaries before treating a large employer as the better-paying one.
- Role fit. Match the actual postings to your skills. A large employer with few openings in your field is a weaker choice than a mid-sized one that is hiring.
- Mission and work type. Decide whether you want clinical, academic, program or operations work, then narrow the employer list by that, not by rank.
- Reviews. The GreatNonprofits Philadelphia listing returned no results and zero reviews, so do not count on review sites to rank local employers. Filings and current postings are the more dependable evidence.
Combine these checks and you will have a shortlist that reflects your priorities rather than a headline ranking.
Frequently asked questions
| Question | Answer |
|---|---|
| What does 501(c)(3) mean for a nonprofit organization? | It is one of the nonprofit designations under section 501(c) of the tax code. Nonprofit Explorer notes there are 27 designations, based on the numbered subsections of that section. |
| Will churches appear in Form 990 databases? | Not necessarily. Churches are not required to file Form 990, so a religious employer may have no public return to compare. |
| How far back does Form 990 data go in Nonprofit Explorer? | It holds IRS-digitized Form 990 data for filings processed in 2012 and later, which is enough to compare several years of an employer’s revenue. |
