UK Job Market Report
30 June 2025
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 1,000 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 UK 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, Adzuna Intelligence.
Vacancies
Vacancies dipped -0.51% month-on-month to 858,465 jobs in May 2025, but remained +0.49% higher than May 2024, the third consecutive month of year-on-year gains.
Zooming out to a global scale, vacancies in the UK returned to pre-pandemic levels, outperforming the global average but still behind major markets such as the US, France, and Germany.
Salaries
Following the National Minimum Wage increase of +6.7% in April 2025, average advertised salaries rose to yet another record high of £42,403 – up +0.3% on April’s figures, +9.38% above last year’s level and the strongest run of annual pay growth since mid-2022. Annual pay growth across the private sector as a whole rose by +5.1% in May, with the public sector seeing slightly higher annual pay growth, at +5.6% for the same period.
Salary transparency fell to 43.5%, reversing months of progress made at the start of the year and suggesting more employers are holding back on pay visibility.
Time to fill
The average time it takes to fill a job has settled at 35.8 days – down from 39.5 days and just above the 35.3-day mark for two months’ prior. This suggests that while hiring is moving slightly faster, employers are still navigating a tight talent pool.
Competition
The number of jobseekers per vacancy rose slightly to 2.02, up +1.98 from April.
Hottest cities
Cambridge remains the top city for job hunters, with the lowest jobseeker to available roles ratio at 0.4, with 6,893 roles available. Guildford comes second with 0.53 and Oxford third with 0.61.
The hardest city to find a role is Bradford, with 9 jobseekers per role, followed by Birmingham (5.3) and Luton (5.2).
UK regions
The number of jobseekers per vacancy increased in 10 of the UK’s 12 nations and regions last month, with Wales seeing the sharpest rise at +0.1. Five regions – London, North East, North West, West Midlands and Yorkshire and the Humber – saw identical +0.06 monthly rises. Northern Ireland and the South West experienced declines, with competition easing by -0.18 and -0.02 respectively.
The North East remains the most competitive region overall, with 3.32 jobseekers per vacancy, followed by Northern Ireland (3.21) and the West Midlands (3.18). At the other end of the scale, the South West continues to see the lowest competition, with just 1.32 jobseekers per role, followed by the South East (1.44) and Eastern England (1.67).
Northern Ireland once again led the UK on annual salary growth, with average advertised pay rising +12.63% year-on-year to £40,726. Annual salaries in the region have now increased by double-digit percentage points for four consecutive months and it remains one of now seven UK regions offering average pay above £40,000, after Yorkshire and Humber made the list for the first time in May. London remains the highest-paying region at £48,680, followed by Eastern England (£41,013).
UK sectors
As we head further into summer, May saw continued strength across seasonal and frontline sectors. Logistics & Warehouse roles increased +9.77%, whilst Creative & Design and Hospitality & Catering jobs rose +6% and +5.61% respectively. Teaching roles climbed again, by +1.63% with 169,064 live vacancies in May, keeping education the UK’s most active hiring sector.
However, gains were far from universal. Having been one of the UK job market’s most resilient sectors in 2025 to date – with strong vacancy and salary growth throughout Q1 – Healthcare & Nursing vacancies saw a sharp -10.21% dip in May. Admin (-9.22%) saw similar declines, followed by Maintenance jobs (-7.95%), and Domestic Help & Cleaning (-5.72%).
Graduate hiring also continued to weaken, with advertised vacancies falling a further -4.2% in May – now sitting -28.4% below the same time last year, and at the lowest level since July 2020. Looking more widely, entry-level jobs – including graduate jobs, apprenticeships, internships, and junior jobs with no degree requirement – fell -31.89% since ChatGPT commercial breakthrough in Nov 2022. Entry-level jobs now account for 25% of all jobs in the UK, down -3.86 percentage points from 28.9% in Nov 2022 and the lowest level since the breakthrough.
On the salary front, Teaching roles led monthly wage growth, rising +2.83% while Graduate salaries rose +1.1% to £25,427. This represents a +5.7% annual increase that may be indicative of just how competitive the market is for the best university leavers. At the opposite end of the spectrum, almost half (13 out of 28) of sectors saw month-on-month declines, with Travel dropping the most sharply at –3.83%, followed by Maintenance (–3.07%) and Energy, Oil & Gas (–2.67%).
However, yearly figures were much more promising. Logistics & Warehouse (+20.38%), Teaching (+15.75%), and Maintenance (+13.43%) all saw standout annual rises, while only one sector – Energy, Oil & Gas – posted an annual decline – a marginal -0.01%.
Roles in Legal and Admin remain the quickest to fill, averaging 32.1 days and 31.9 days respectively. Creative & Design roles last month took the longest to fill, at 42 days, followed by Energy, Oil & Gas at 40.2 days.
In terms of hiring speed, Admin roles remain the quickest to fill, taking an average of less than 30 days. At the other end of the spectrum, roles in Creative & Design (42 days), Scientific & QA (40.6 days), and Energy, Oil & Gas (40.2 days) are taking the longest to secure new hires.
Trending jobs
Healthcare Support Worker remained the most in-demand role on Adzuna’s Trending Jobs list in May, topping the Interest Quotient rankings for the sixth month in a row. Social Care Worker held onto second place, followed by Sales Assistant, which climbed into the top three for the first time this year. Warehouse Worker dropped to fourth, after briefly reclaiming second in April. This ranking is based on the Interest Quotient, a metric that tracks how often job postings are viewed relative to other occupations. A higher quotient reflects stronger interest among jobseekers.
Further down the list, Software Developer re-entered the top five – marking a return to tech interest after dropping out in March and April – while Cleaner, Healthcare Assistant, and Administrator continued to show steady appeal. Project Manager edged back into the top 10, while Labourer appeared for the first time in the list since 2023, rounding out the list.
The continued presence of frontline roles in healthcare, retail, and logistics reflects a strong appetite for accessible, stable employment. At the same time, the fluctuating appearance of roles like Software Developer and Project Manager suggests demand still persists for skilled professionals, even if interest is largely consolidated around entry-level and support positions.
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 19 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 1,000 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, Adzuna Intelligence.