Job Vacancies 2025: Labour demand gradually shifting to growth areas as firms adjust hiring plans
Overview
The labour market remained tight1, with more job vacancies in 2025 compared to 2024. Labour demand is shifting towards growth areas, with firms creating more new positions compared to previous years. Newly created positions formed one in two job vacancies, reflecting a growing share of openings driven by business expansion. Structural developments continue to drive strong demand for workers in engineering and technology-related roles, which have remained among those most in demand.
2 Employers are increasingly prioritising skills and competencies over academic qualifications, citing hiring efficiency, broader access to talent and improved employee performance as reasons for adopting a skills-based hiring approach. The decline in vacancies remaining unfilled for prolonged periods suggest that overall mismatches between job requirements and available workers are narrowing, even though some roles are harder to fill.
Key Findings
Newly created positions made up 49.3% of vacancies in 2025, up from 45.7% in 2024, mainly arising from business expansion
3 Newly created positions2, which were mostly due to business expansion, formed 49.3% of all vacancies in 2025, up from 45.7% in 2024. Information & Communications (74.2%), Professional Services (58.2%) and Financial & Insurance Services (54.0%) were among sectors with shares of newly created vacancies that were above the overall average (49.3%).
Robust demand for skilled workers in technology and engineering
4 Technological developments continue to drive demand for skilled PMETs, particularly in digital and technology‑related roles. Software, web, multimedia and game developers and designers remained among the most sought‑after occupations. Strong hiring demand was also observed for systems analysts, data scientists and applications and systems programmers, including AI and machine‑learning engineers. Advanced manufacturing and infrastructure projects also supported demand for engineering professionals across various fields.
Broadening hiring criteria beyond academic qualifications enabled better outcomes
5 The hiring criteria for most job vacancies have broadened beyond requirements for academic qualifications, where employers increasingly emphasised skills over qualifications. Academic qualifications were not the main determinant in hiring for 79.6% of vacancies in 2025, a further increase from 78.8% in 2024. A key reason cited by employers was the better outcomes they observed from adopting a skills-based hiring approach. These outcomes could be related to faster hiring, access to a broader talent pool and improved employee performance.
6 Skills such as software development, systems analysis and data analytics, alongside problem-solving and adaptability, are commonly required for in-demand professions, including technology roles and analytical positions in finance and engineering. These jobs, which involve tasks with high AI potential, will require workers to develop fluency in using AI-enabled tools.
Vacancies are available across a range of experience levels, though experience requirements were keener within sectors with specialised or technical functions
7 Employers showed openness to hiring candidates with limited to moderate prior experience. Overall, 31.5% of vacancies were for jobs requiring no prior experience, 20.2% required 1 year of experience, and the rest required more than 2 years of working experience. This also reflects the availability of entry‑level PMET job opportunities3, supporting fresh graduates’ entry into these roles. Overall, PMET jobs tend to cluster around mid-level experience requirements (i.e. 51.1% of vacancies requiring 2 to 5 years of experience), which require niche skills where employers typically seek candidates with industry or job exposure in technical or professional functions.
Hiring difficulties eased overall but persisted in specialised roles
8 The percentage of vacancies unfilled for at least six months fell significantly from 39.0% in 2015 to 17.1% in 2025. While this longer-term improvement was observed for both non-PMET and PMET roles, long-duration PMET vacancies edged up from 14.4% in 2024 to 16.0% in 2025 after three consecutive years of improvement, reflecting growing specialisation that may require more time to assess job fit. PMET vacancies that were more difficult to fill4 include software, web, multimedia & games developers and designers, data scientists, and applications & systems programmers, where a lack of specialised skills and necessary work experience were the reasons most cited by employers for these roles being difficult to fill.
Remote-capable jobs are becoming more common, while overseas recruitment for such roles has declined
9 With increased digitalisation, cross-border hiring for positions that can be done remotely has become a possibility. While the proportion of vacancies for jobs that can be done remotely in 2025 (22.7%) increased from 2024 (14.4%), the share of vacancies where employers intended to recruit from overseas declined from 23.0% in 2024 to 16.5% in 2025, reflecting employers’ preference for suitable local candidates. This points to a gradual shift in how some roles can be organised, potentially supporting greater labour force participation among workers who benefit from flexible work arrangements, such as caregivers.
Overall Assessment of Vacancy Situation and Outlook
10 Overall, firms are expected to remain cautious in their hiring decisions, with the proportion of firms expecting to hire in the next three months remaining modest (43.3% in December 2025). Early indications based on polls conducted in January 2026 suggest a pick-up in hiring expectations, pointing to a cautiously positive outlook for labour demand.
11 While restructuring activities have led to elevated retrenchments in sectors such as Financial Services, Information & Communications and Professional Services, opportunities continue to be available for PMETs, as PMET job vacancies in these sectors remained high throughout 2025 and have also increased over the decade. Many of these in-demand professions are jobs involving tasks with high AI potential, signalling the need for workers to develop fluency in using AI-enabled tools. Taken together, these trends suggest ongoing restructuring and skills transition rather than a broad-based contraction in demand for PMET roles due to AI.
12 Employers’ demand remained strong for workers with specialised and technical skills, alongside a growing emphasis on skills‑based hiring to access a wider talent pool. While challenges persist in filling some specialised roles, the overall reduction in vacancies unfilled for extended periods suggests improved matching between job requirements and available workers, as employers and workers continue to adapt to structural shifts and economic changes.
Upskilling and Reskilling Support for Employers and Employees
13 The Government will support employers to press on with business and workforce transformation and continue to empower Singaporeans to strengthen their career health, upskill and improve their employability as they work towards their career aspirations.
14 Employers are encouraged to consider the following to support talent attraction and workforce development:
a. Adopt a skills-based approach towards workforce development, by focusing on what individuals can do, not just what qualifications they hold. To support employers, we introduced the TalentTrack and TalentTrack+, digital tools to help employers assess their workforce skills readiness and identify suitable training interventions. TalentTrack+, with JobTech being our first partner, also support internal mobility by enabling employers to more easily identify which current employees have the skills needed for new roles or projects. We also launched the Career and Skills Passport (CSP) and partnered online job portals like JobStreet and FastJobs, enabling individuals to use Government-verified jobs and skills data to facilitate job applications and hiring. This helps employers better identify suitable candidates, including those from non-traditional backgrounds.
b. Adopt a “plug-train-play” approach instead of “plug-and-play” when hiring allows employers to expand their pool of available hires and reduce the amount of manpower shortages. More experienced hires may also come with higher expectations on salary and benefits, making it more difficult to find a match. To do so, employers can tap on initiatives to reskill workers into job roles such as Career Conversion Programmes. The Singapore Opportunity Index (SOI) also features Career Launchers, or companies who have successfully invested in fresh graduates or mid-career switchers and reaped the benefits.
c. HR professionals are key in driving skills-based transformation, from job redesign to recruitment practices. To strengthen their HR capabilities, employers can tap on a time-limited additional $100 subsidy for professional certification by the Institute of Human Resource Professionals, available until 30 September 2026 under the Singapore Economic Resilience Taskforce support package.
15 Individuals are encouraged to embark on their career health journey and take steps to strength their human capital and agility:
a. Assess and chart their career health by leveraging career coaching and guidance services provided by WSG and NTUC’s Employment and Employability Institute.
b. Embark on their career health journey and tap on a wide range of SkillsFuture training programmes such as the SkillsFuture Level-Up Programme, which has been recently expanded to include more industry-relevant courses, in line with evolving sectoral needs and workforce transformation priorities. SkillsFuture Credit can be used to cover their out-of-pocket fees for eligible training programmes.
16 To address the growing need for AI literacy, the Government will coordinate efforts through the National AI Council, aligning industry transformation and workforce upgrading to ensure that AI uplifts our workers. The Government will support workers to build AI and digital capabilities through SkillsFuture programmes and IMDA’s TechSkills Accelerator (TeSA), alongside efforts to provide hands-on access to AI tools. The Institutes of Higher Learning (IHLs) are also working closely with sector agencies and industry partners to keep their curricula relevant, integrating AI competencies, domain-specific training, and core skills like critical thinking, creativity, and communication.
17 The SOI provides employers and workers a data-driven yardstick to see how the very best workplaces are shaping outcomes like pay, progression and retention. This enables employers to make sharper talent decisions while helping individuals identify organisations that align with their career aspirations. More information on the SOI can be found at https://www.singaporeopportunityindex.sg/.
For More Information
18 MOM’s “Job Vacancies 2025” report is released on 20 March 2026 by the Manpower Research and Statistics Department, Ministry of Manpower. The full report and technical notes on the various indicators are available at stats.mom.gov.sg.