UK Job Market Report
22 June 2023
Adzuna has the most complete index of UK job vacancies covering all regions in the UK, based on every job vacancy advertised online in the UK from over 1000 sources. This data is then normalised, de-duplicated, mix-adjusted and outliers are removed in real time to give an accurate, complete, up to the minute view of the job market. Our Job Market Report tracks advertised vacancies, average advertised salaries, competition for jobs, trending roles, time to fill positions, and more.
We also supply real-time data to the Number 10 Dashboard, the Cabinet Office and the Office for National Statistics labour market indices. For more granular data breakdowns at a local authority level, job title, or skill level, please contact our labour market intelligence division.
Vacancies
There were 1,050,930 UK advertised vacancies in May 2023, up slightly +0.48% from 1,045,949 in April 2023, with job postings rising for the fourth consecutive month. Total advertised vacancies remain -16.8% lower compared to 1,263,098 in May 2022.
Salaries
Advertised UK salaries averaged £37,750 in May 2023, up +0.2% from £37,658 in April and +3.3% greater than £36,559 in May 2022. It marks the highest peak in advertised salaries in over two years, since April 2021.
Salary transparency in the UK fell back month-on-month, with just 50.9% of jobs ads stating a salary in May 2023, slipping from 51.5% in April and nearly 10 percentage points lower than 60.5% a year ago. Salary disclosure remains near its lowest level since we began collecting data in April 2016.
Time to fill
Job vacancies are being filled faster than at any time since Adzuna began collecting data in 2016. On average, UK job postings remained open for just 34.9 days in February 2023, down from 43.3 days a year ago. The average time taken to fill a role has been falling month-on-month since June 2022.
Competition
There were 1.47 jobseekers per vacancy in May 2023, down from 1.51 in April. By comparison, May 2022 saw 1.25 jobseekers per vacancy, as competition for jobs has become tighter year-on-year.
Hottest cities
The top city to find work in May 2023 was Cambridge, home to an average of just 0.26 jobseekers per vacancy, meaning four times the number of jobs on offer than people to fill them. Guildford (0.35), Exeter (0.43), Oxford (0.55) and Reading (0.58) rounded out the top 5.
By contrast, the cities with toughest competition for jobs in May 2023 were Bradford (5.50), Rochdale (4.06), Middlesbrough (3.96), Luton (3.36), Wolverhampton (3.28) and Sunderland (3.28).
UK regions
Hiring activity has risen year-on-year in just 2 out of 12 UK regions, Scotland (+8.4%) and Wales (+2.4%). By comparison, the regions seeing the largest annual decline in job openings were the East Midlands (-24.3%), South West (-22.0%) and London (-21.2%).
Advertised salaries meanwhile, have been rising. London was the only region seeing average advertised salaries fall year-on-year to May 2023, down -2.1%. The regions seeing the largest annual growth were Northern Ireland (+9.4%), Wales (+8.3%) and Yorkshire and the Humber (+8.0%).
UK sectors
Advertised vacancies have increased year-on-year in just two sectors: Teaching (+30.9%) and Energy, Oil & Gas (+9.3%). Every other sector has seen an annual decline in hiring activity, with HR & Recruitment jobs falling most (-53.3%).
By comparison, 24 of 27 sectors have seen advertised salaries increase year-on-year in May 2023. Social work (+21.7%), Healthcare & Nursing (+15.7%) and Property (+15.0%) top the salary growth charts, while Scientific & QA (-4.5%), IT (-3.7%) and HR & Recruitment (-3.2%) are falling behind.
Looking at the latest data on the average duration of job ads, for February 2023, PR, Advertising & Marketing jobs took the longest to fill at an average of 43.2 days, followed by Travel openings (40.8) and Creative & Design jobs (39.6). The Voluntary sector remains the area where jobs are filling fastest, at an average of just 27.5 days.
Trending jobs
The data also tracks the most popular occupations among UK jobseekers. Social care worker job postings continued to attract the highest level of interest in May 2023, with an interest quotient of 146.3, followed by warehouse worker (132.3) and lorry driver roles (112.6). Compared to April, there has also been an increase in demand for delivery driver roles, and project manager positions.
The data that Adzuna produce is an exceptionally rich and industry-leading source of real time insights into the labour market, local economies and what employers want. We’ve worked with the Adzuna team and their data across a range of projects, including labour market analysis, policy research and workforce planning and would highly recommend them.
Tony Wilson
Director
Institute for Employment Studies
Methodology
About Adzuna
Adzuna is a smarter, more transparent job search engine used by tens of millions of visitors per month. We love using the awesome power of technology to bring together every job in one place, help match people to better, more fulfilling jobs and keep Britain working.
Adzuna supplies real-time data to the Number 10 Dashboard, the Cabinet Office and Office for National Statistics labour market indices. In 2018, Adzuna won the contract to run Find a job, one of the British government’s most used online services.
Adzuna.co.uk was founded in 2011 by Andrew Hunter and Doug Monro, formerly of eBay, Gumtree, Qype and Zoopla and is backed by leading Venture Capital firms LocalGlobe, Index Ventures and Smedvig Capital.
We’ve spent a decade developing smarter, more transparent job search so jobseekers worldwide (we’re in 20 countries) can zero in on the right role faster.
About the Job Market Report
Adzuna has the most complete index of UK job vacancies covering all regions in the UK. The technology collects every job vacancy advertised online in the UK from over 1000 sources. This data is then normalised, de-duplicated, mix-adjusted and outliers are removed in real time to give users an accurate, complete, up to the minute view of the job market.
Claimant count data is based on the latest Labour Market Statistics released by the ONS. The city areas referred to in this study are the top 50 cities in the UK, ranked by comparing the job vacancies in Adzuna’s comprehensive search index of over 1,000,000 live jobs to the number of claimants in each city from the latest ONS data. The full Jobseeker’s Allowance claimant count statistics are available for download here: www.nomisweb.co.uk.
The interest quotient for key roles is calculated by comparing how many views job postings for different occupations on Adzuna receive over a given month and comparing this to the overall job posting views over the same period. It provides a proxy for talent supply in the jobs market.
For more granular data breakdowns at a local authority level, job title, or skill level, please contact our labour market intelligence division.