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2025 Work-Life Balance Report of Soloprenuers and Small Business Owners
Key Findings
- Most entrepreneurs surveyed (almost three in five) report a better work-life balance than they had in traditional employment, yet nearly half still find it difficult to disconnect while on time off.
- 82 percent of surveyed entrepreneurs lost sleep in the past year because of work-related concerns.
- Nearly two in five entrepreneurs surveyed have a goal to save time in 2025 by incorporating new AI tools.
- Entrepreneurs save an average of six hours a week, which equates to 26 hours a month or 310 hours a year, using AI, according to our findings.
The dream of being your own boss often carries the allure of achieving a better work-life balance. While challenges like self-imposed pressure and never-ending to-do lists can arise for some small business owners and solopreneurs, they may also encompass the freedom to pursue one's passion, the opportunity for creative expression, and the sense of fulfillment that comes with building something from the ground up.
To explore the work-life balance of starting a venture, Adobe surveyed 386 solopreneurs and 632 small business owners, collectively referred to as entrepreneurs in this research, to gain insights into how these individuals manage the delicate balance between their work and personal lives.
Navigating work-life balance in entrepreneurship
Work-life balance continues to be an important conversation for most working Americans. Almost three in five surveyed entrepreneurs report a better work-life balance since moving from traditional employment to entrepreneurship.
Disconnecting remains a challenge for many after shifting to be their own boss, with nearly half of the entrepreneurs we surveyed struggling to unplug and averaging only 11 days off annually (excluding national holidays). Gen Z respondents reported they take an average of 13 days off. To compare this to standard employed benefits, the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) notes that private sector employees with one year of service typically receive 10 days of paid time off (PTO), with this number increasing over time.
As a business owner or solopreneur, having the ability to own your schedule and even work on the go provides a major advantage. It may reduce the need to take as much time off as you did in previous roles since you can likely adjust your work schedule to better suit your needs.With Adobe Acrobat online PDF tools, as long as you have internet access, you can convert, edit, compress, sign, complete forms, rearrange pages and more to keep up with your PDF document needs on the go.
Balancing flexibility and commitment
The flexibility inherent in entrepreneurial work can foster an always-on mindset. Over one in five small business owner respondents work more than 50 hours a week, compared to 28 percent of solopreneurs surveyed. Gen Z entrepreneur respondents are less inclined to extend their working hours, with only one in 10 working over 50 hours weekly.
Our findings indicate that the average solopreneur works after 10 p.m. nine times a month, while small business owners tend to work late shifts seven times a month. This pattern does not necessarily suggest grueling hours; rather, it may reflect the greater ability to spend daytime hours with family and catch up on work after bedtime. Despite this flexibility, 82 percent of entrepreneurs surveyed report losing sleep due to work-related concerns. Of those, 61 percent attribute their sleeplessness to financial worries. Additionally, more than one in ten Baby Boomer entrepreneurs lose sleep over technological changes, while nearly one in four Millennial entrepreneurs are kept awake by a lack of family time, according to our findings.
By embracing digital PDF document editing tools like Adobe Acrobat, you can create seamless workflows and focus on what matters most—building a successful business while enjoying a fulfilling personal life.
The goals and ambitions of small business owners and solopreneurs in 2025
About half of the entrepreneurs surveyed indicated that they embarked on their entrepreneurial journey to take greater control of their financial future, and an impressive 79 percent have achieved this goal. However, what would they do if they had more time in the week, and what are their goals for 2025? We asked just that!
Our findings reveal that solopreneurs are 33 percent more likely than small business owners to have started their businesses to enjoy increased travel opportunities. In alignment, nearly one in three Gen Z respondents initiated their ventures to travel more, with 67 percent successfully realizing this ambition. Meanwhile, 39 percent of Millennial respondents were motivated to spend more time with their families, and 79 percent have found success in fulfilling this aspiration.
Finding ways to enhance productivity and streamline operations can significantly impact small business owners, solopreneurs, and freelancers who may be working alone or with small teams. PDF tools can be a game-changer for optimizing daily workflows. Integrating PDF tools like Adobe Acrobat would allow you to seamlessly create, edit, and convert PDFs, ensuring your business documents are streamlined and accessible.
Using Adobe Acrobat PDF tools to boost productivity
Understanding the importance of document tools is crucial for individuals in any business. For freelancers, solopreneurs, and small business owners alike, using PDF tools may help ensure efficiency, organization, and professionalism in documentation and client services within your business.
- Streamline your workflow: With PDF merge capabilities, seamlessly combine documents for enhanced efficiency. Imagine working on a project where you need to combine multiple documents into one polished file for easy sharing and to demonstrate your expertise effectively. You can achieve this seamlessly by extracting and merging PDF files into a single, shareable document.
- Share large files quickly: When collaborating with clients, you may often exchange numerous documents for editing, feedback, and finalization. Simplify sharing lengthy documents using a tool to compress PDFs that will help you seamlessly and securely share large files via email.
- Make contracts a breeze: Take care of contracts in minutes so you can get busy doing the work. Filling form fields and adding text boxes, checkmarks, or your signature or initials is easy. Use the Adobe Acrobat sign PDF tool to share your PDF file securely in just a few clicks. The recipients will receive a link or attachment by email. Also, using Acrobat AI Assistant can help you comprehend complex terms and identify differences between multiple agreements and contracts, making it easier and faster to understand and verify information.
- Keep files consistent: Whether your files are Microsoft Word, Excel, PowerPoint, JPG, or PNG, you can convert them to PDF online quickly and easily for consistent formatting across all your documents.
What would you do with 10 extra hours a week?
An additional 10 hours per week could significantly enhance work-life balance by allowing individuals to prioritize other tasks and hobbies outside of work. When we asked these entrepreneurs how they would spend an extra 10 hours a week, the Gen Z and Gen X respondents were most interested in spending more time with their loved ones, while Millennial respondents desired more time for hobbies. On the other hand, the Baby Boomers we surveyed wanted to invest this extra time in their health and wellness.
To free up this extra time, nearly one in five entrepreneurs from our survey have set a goal to incorporate more AI tools into their workflow this year. In a previous Adobe study, we analyzed the time-saving potential of Acrobat AI Assistant and found that AI Assistant could potentially help individuals reduce the time spent on editing, summarizing, reading, and creating documents from over 24 hours a week to just two hours and 18 minutes.
Here are just a few ways that entrepreneurs can integrate Acrobat AI Assistant for everyday document needs that may help achieve time savings:
- Chat with PDF documents - You can converse with any PDF document to help you find and summarize information faster. Not only that, but you can also ask it to help you create, edit, and style your PDF documents for more impactful content. Here are some sample questions you can ask your PDF.
- Summarize reports - Utilizing a PDF AI summarizer for quick and accurate summaries may help you save time previously spent on manual extraction and summarization on lengthy reports. You can store the summary for future reference, add comments using an online PDF editor, or convert PDF to Word for easier sharing.
- Extract key insights - Explore reports swiftly with Acrobat AI Assistant to help you craft executive summaries and address specific questions you may have. Adobe's proprietary AI and custom attribution engine can also help create citations, enabling you to verify the sources of AI Assistant's answers quickly.
Embracing AI in entrepreneurial workflows in 2025
Now that we know incorporating more AI tools is a primary goal for many entrepreneurs, we wanted to explore what they currently use it for and what it is they they aim to automate their document management in the coming year.
According to our findings, entrepreneurs report spending an average of 30 percent of their weekly workflow on document management, and nearly half feel burnt out from these administrative tasks. Incorporating AI into workflows could allow entrepreneurs to save more time and focus on the high-value tasks that drive growth and innovation.
Our findings uncovered that 56 percent of entrepreneurs use AI in their workflow. Specifically, solopreneur respondents use AI 17 percent more frequently than small business owners. Regarding overall time savings, entrepreneurs surveyed report saving an average of six hours a week, which could equate to 310 hours a year.
We also found that the top AI automation priorities for surveyed entrepreneurs this year include:
- using AI to generate leads and identify sales opportunities (53 percent)
- automate accounting tasks (53 percent)
- automate data entry and processing (51 percent)
Importance of work-life balance among entrepreneurs
Striking a balance between work and personal life is essential to safeguard one's well-being and foster sustainable success. By cultivating organizational habits and efficient time management strategies, entrepreneurs can optimize productivity, reduce stress levels, and enhance overall quality of life.
Whether you need to convert a document to PDF occasionally or frequently use PDFs to collaborate with clients, Adobe Acrobat online tools have what you need. These tools for PDF documents make it easier to draft and sign contracts, collaborate, share work, and stay organized. You can even chat with PDF documents to ask questions and help summarize the documents.
Methodology
We explored the work-life balance of entrepreneurs by surveying 1,018 individuals, including 386 solopreneurs and 632 small business owners. "Entrepreneurs" in this context refers to both groups combined. This sample size provides a 95 percent confidence level with a low 3 percent margin of error. Because this exploratory research relied on self-reported data, respondents may have biases, and discrepancies may exist between their answers and their actual experiences.
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