The United States holds 28 announced sites for small modular reactor projects as of 2026, more than the combined total of the next four countries on the list.

The siting count measures a different stage than reactor construction. A siting announcement indicates a developer and host have identified a specific location, typically with preliminary agreement on interconnection and often with a utility or industrial offtaker attached. Converting those announcements into operating plants requires licensing, financing, and construction phases that each carry attrition risk, so the figure describes pipeline depth rather than committed capacity.

The concentration reflects several US-specific conditions. Federal cost-share programs have directed funding toward designs furthest along in regulatory review. Retiring coal plants offer sites with existing transmission interconnection and cooling infrastructure, reducing the capital and schedule burden of greenfield development. Data center operators seeking firm carbon-free power have signed agreements that provide revenue certainty developers could not obtain from merchant markets.

On installed capacity the picture differs. The United States leads globally with 97 gigawatts across 94 reactors, followed by France at 63 gigawatts, China at 55 gigawatts, Russia at 27 gigawatts, and South Korea at 26 gigawatts. China holds 37 reactors under construction totaling roughly 42.9 gigawatts of new capacity, more than six times the volume being built in either India or Russia, and is projected to reach close to 186 gigawatts of total capacity.

Source: Visual Capitalist - https://www.visualcapitalist.com/sp/npuc26-ranked-countries-building-the-most-small-modular-nuclear-reactors/