The report uncovers a tale of two labor markets; shares what the difference means for recruiting and how talent acquisition teams should adapt their strategy in 2026.
Joveo, the global leader in AI-led, high-performance recruitment marketing, released its Recruiting Benchmarks Report 2026. The report offers a data-driven look at how the US labor market transformed in 2025 – creating two parallel realities for talent acquisition teams.
In one, applicant volume surged. In the other, it remained flat. And while national headlines pointed to a cooling job market, employers continued to face very different challenges depending on the roles they were trying to fill.
“Most recruiting benchmarks still describe the labor market as a single story. That’s no longer true,” said Kshitij Jain (KJ), Founder and CEO of Joveo. “Our data shows two labor markets operating at the same time – excess volume in some roles, real scarcity in others. This report helps talent acquisition leaders see where they’re over-investing, where they’re under-served, and how to adjust based on what’s actually happening.”
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“It’s become a consensus view amongst talent acquisition professionals that the surge in job applicant volume is increasing time to hire,” added Hung Lee, Curator of Recruiting Brainfood. “The traditional hiring funnel in many cases can no longer operate under the volume of applications which are now standard per job post.”
Key findings from the report:
- The Applicant Avalanche: Up to 9x growth in applicant volume in certain occupations between November 2022 and November 2025.
- Labor Market Split: For some white-collar jobs, recruiters faced more applicants than they could reasonably review. Meanwhile, location-bound, licensed roles remained supply-constrained, with no meaningful relief in candidate volume.
- Volume Isn’t Progress: The increase in applicant volume didn’t translate into easier hiring for employers. Manual screening emerged as the bottleneck. Recruiters often hired from the first wave of applicants and never reached the best-fit candidates buried deeper in the queue.
- Experience Became a Filter: In applicant flooded roles, employers became more selective and raised experience requirements. Tech postings asking for 5+ years of experience rose from 37% to 42%. That shift reduced entry ramps and pushed up employer costs.
- Structural Constraints, Not Cyclical Trends: In jobs requiring licensed or credentialed talent, macro conditions didn’t create more talent supply. Recruiters still faced long time-to-fill windows.
The Recruiting Benchmarks 2026 Report draws on Joveo’s Interactive Insights platform, along with data from TalentNeuron, Talroo, and JobGet. It covers activity across 16 major occupations in all US states, representing millions of job postings and applications.
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