Global Early Careers Benchmark 2026: from growth to resilience

Early careers hiring has entered a new phase.

After years of post-pandemic recovery and growth, the Global Early Careers Hiring Benchmark Report 2026 reveals a market defined by cooling demand, rising competition, and rapid transformation driven by AI and skills-based hiring.

Drawing on data from NACE (US), the Institute of Student Employers (UK), and AAGE (Australia), this report is the only annual research piece produced solely using independent survey data from the leading regional employer bodies.

The takeaway is clear, early careers hiring is no longer about scaling up—it’s about doing it better.

Executive summary: high intensity, low growth

Across the United States, the UK, and Australia, early careers hiring is now characterised by:

• Slowing or declining hiring demand
• Record application volumes
• Growing (but cautious) adoption of AI
• A maturing shift toward skills-based hiring

This has created what can best be described as a “high-intensity, low-growth” environment.

Employers are:

• Hiring fewer graduates in some markets
• Processing more applications than ever before
• Managing longer, more complex hiring processes, with limited resources

At the same time, both candidates and employers are using AI, introducing new challenges around authenticity, fairness, and assessment. The result? A market that is no longer recovering but recalibrating.

Together, these forces are pushing early careers hiring into a new phase—one that requires greater efficiency, stronger assessment methods, and more deliberate design. 

1. Global graduate job outlook: contraction meets competition

The first major theme is a global slowdown in hiring demand but with important regional differences.

• US: Modest growth of +1.6%, with employers describing the market as “fair”
• UK: Graduate hiring is forecast to decline by 7%, driven by cuts from large employers
• Australia: Demand remains stable, but applications surged +23% year-on-year

At the same time, competition is intensifying:

• UK roles now attract 140 applications per vacancy
• Australia averages 42 applications per role

The result is a widening imbalance. Fewer roles and more applicants means more pressure on hiring teams. Employers are responding by focusing hiring on critical roles (tech, finance, engineering) and prioritising efficiency and quality over volume. 

2. Candidate experience: managing volume and expectations

The candidate experience is being reshaped by this new environment of scale and competition. While organisations continue to attract strong interest, the sheer volume of applications is making it harder to deliver fast, personalised, effective, and transparent hiring processes.

Key trends include:

• Rising application volumes globally
• Longer hiring timelines
  • US: 27.3 days from interview to decision
  • Australia: 3–4 month hiring processes
• High offer acceptance rates
  • UK: 86%
  • US: 78%
  • Australia: 84%

Acceptance rates remain relatively high, suggesting that candidates are becoming more cautious in a competitive market. At the same time, reneges and disengagement are increasing, particularly in the US, where reneges have risen to 10%. 

This creates a tension; candidates expect fast, seamless experiences, and employers are managing unprecedented volume. Organisations that can balance these competing demands, delivering both scale and quality, will have a clear advantage.

Case study: Mitsubishi UFJ Trust and Banking Corporation (MUTB)

A strong example of this comes from Mitsubishi UFJ Trust and Banking Corporation (MUTB), which faced significant challenges managing high volumes of applications. By introducing AI-powered assessments, MUTB was able to process substantially more interviews while expanding its reach to a wider pool of universities. Importantly, this increase in efficiency did not come at the expense of candidate experience, with strong satisfaction and engagement scores demonstrating that scale and quality can coexist when the process is designed effectively. 

By implementing AI-powered assessments, they were able to:

• Process 61% more interviews
• Expand outreach to 19% more universities
• Improve both efficiency and diversity outcomes

• NPS: 58.4 and CSAT: 82.4%

The key insight; scaling hiring doesn’t have to mean sacrificing candidate experience.

Read the full case study here.

3. AI and automation: from experiment to infrastructure

AI is now firmly embedded in the conversation around early careers hiring. While adoption among employers is steadily growing, across areas such as screening, scheduling, and assessment, candidates have embraced AI more rapidly, using it to write applications and prepare for interviews. 

Adoption is growing across all regions:

• US: 22% of employers using AI, with another 22% planning adoption
• UK: 62% anticipate implementing AI
• Australia: 22% adoption, up from 16%

However, the biggest shift is happening on the candidate side:

• US: 65% using AI for applications
• UK: 61% using AI in interviews
• Australia: 79% believed to be using GenAI significantly

This creates a new challenge. How do you assess candidates when AI is shaping their responses?

At the same time, governance is lagging:

• UK: 79% are redesigning their processes
• Australia: only 3% of employers have formal AI policies

4. Skills-based hiring: from trend to standard

Skills-based hiring is no longer emerging. It’s embedded globally. It has become one of the defining trends in early careers recruitment. Across all regions, organisations are placing less emphasis on academic credentials and more on the capabilities candidates bring. A new hybrid model is emerging.

Across regions:

• US: 70% of employers use skills-based hiring, though 79% of roles still require degrees
• UK: 2:1 degree requirements dropped from 71% to 47%
• Australia: Only 30% of employers consider exam results important

What stands out is the level of global alignment around the skills that matter most, reflecting the importance of human capabilities in an increasingly complex and technology-driven workplace. 

Top skills assessed:

• Communication
• Teamwork
• Critical thinking

Case Study: WTW

WTW provides a compelling example of how this can be addressed. By integrating Game-Based Assessments and AI-powered assessments into its hiring process, the organisation has been able to evaluate both cognitive and behavioural attributes at scale. The results include strong satisfaction with candidate quality and diversity outcomes, demonstrating the potential of structured, skills-based approaches to deliver meaningful impact. 

The results:

• 78% stakeholder satisfaction with candidate quality
• 80% satisfaction with diversity outcomes
• 50% female hiring ratio
• 30% hires from ethnic minority backgrounds

Watch the case study video here.

Skill validation: A new vue on recruitment

McKinsey and Company recently reported that skills-based hiring is 5  times more predictive of job performance than hiring for education and more than twice as predictive as work experience. Skills+ is an emerging concept and encompasses a person’s interests and motivations. These are often not very well assessed in a hiring process, but they are hugely important to how someone performs. Often, a role requires a combination of all different skill types, including technical and soft skills.

There are different levels of data value when it comes to assessing skills. They can be inferred based on experience, this is speculative. When skills are self-reported they often have a lot of value, but there’s a wide variety in how candidates describe themselves. Increasingly, the gold standard is now validated skills. Validated skills have been scientifically tested and establish which skills are present, which is highly predictive of job success. A New Conversation on Skills explores how leading organisations are shifting from inferred to validated skills—and from assumptions to accuracy.

5. Recruitment teams: more pressure, limited resources

Behind these shifts is a growing operational challenge for recruitment teams. Across all regions, teams are being asked to manage higher volumes of applications, longer processes, and increased expectations around candidate experience—often without additional resources. 

Across regions:

• US: Recruiters manage 25 hires on average
• UK: Recruiters manage 17 hires each
• Australia: Recruiters manage 53 vacancies each, up from 50 last year

At the same time:

• Costs are rising (UK: £2,600 per hire, AU: $2,041)
• Processes are getting longer
• Expectations for candidate experience are increasing

This creates a capacity mismatch. Teams are expected to deliver more—with the same or fewer resources. As a result, organisations are turning to technology and process redesign to improve efficiency and maintain quality. 

Case Study: Philips

Philips offers an example of how this can be achieved. By implementing video interviews and game-based assessments, and integrating these tools into its broader systems, the organisation has streamlined its hiring process and reduced time-to-fill. Recruiters benefit from reduced administrative burden, while hiring managers gain clearer insights into candidate capabilities. Watch the case study video here.

Strategic implications for global TA leaders

So what does all of this mean in practice?

The report highlights five key priorities:

1. Design for scale without sacrificing humanity

Use AI and automation for consistency and efficiency—while preserving human interaction where it matters most.

2. Make skills your organising principle.

Move beyond removing degree requirements. Build structured frameworks to define, assess, and validate skills.

3. Shorten and clarify the hiring process.

Longer timelines increase reneges and drop-off. Streamline processes and improve communication.

4. Govern AI. Don’t ignore it.

Introduce clear policies and guidelines for candidate AI use, and equip recruiters with the tools to assess fairly and predictively.

5. Measure quality of hire.

Link hiring decisions to performance and retention to prove the value of new approaches.

Download your copy of the report and start reimagining your early careers hiring so that it’s future-ready.