Too Many Grads, Not Enough Jobs? The Graduate Job Market in England

A reality check for uni and college leavers entering the 2025/26 job hunt

Let’s not dance around it, the graduate job market right now is… crowded. To put it politely. Every year, more and more people finish uni or college, walk across a stage, get the photo with the hat toss, and then immediately join a job market that looks like a mosh pit at capacity. I often refer to it as the gladiatorial arena.

The big question is “Is getting a degree still worth it?”

The short answer. Yes—but probably not in the way you think, and definitely not right away.

Let’s break it down without the fluffy “follow your dreams” nonsense.

Graduates Are Everywhere (And That’s Not Slowing Down)

If it feels like everyone and their dog has a degree now.

Over 800,000 students finish higher education every single year. In 2022/23 alone:

• 541,515 people got undergrad degrees.
• 433,520 finished postgrad qualifications (yep—Master’s degrees are basically the new gap year).

Since 2018, the number of grads entering the market has been climbing nonstop. The UK now has around 17.7 million people with higher education qualifications, and roughly a million more join the gang each year.

Why?

Simple, uni is still seen as the “default route,” and the government and colleges pushed participation hard for the past decade. By 2021, 38% of young people were going to university—more than ever before.

But here’s the kicker – the number of graduate jobs didn’t increase with them. At all.

Graduate Jobs Aren’t Keeping Up (By a Lot)

In 2023, there were 1.2 million applications for fewer than 17,000 graduate roles.

That’s an average of 70 people fighting over each job. That’s rough by any standards.

Application numbers jumped 59% in a single year, partly thanks to the “apply to everything” and “one click application” culture (plus AI making it easier to fire off 100 CVs).

Meanwhile, big employers cut hiring:

• Graduate recruitment fell 6.4% in 2023.
• Then it fell another 14.6% in 2024—the biggest drop since the 2008 financial crash.
• Over 6,000 planned grad roles were scrapped in 2024 alone.

Every sector has tightened belts—finance, tech, retail, public sector, the lot. Even famous grad schemes have slashed places or paused entirely.

And the icing on the cake? A ton of “entry-level jobs” now magically require 1–2 years’ experience. We’ve all seen it, and we all know it makes literally no sense at all. Employers are simply capitalising on desperation.

Some grads take retail or admin jobs to stay afloat. Others do unpaid internships. And yes, Master’s graduates are now applying for apprenticeships—because experience beats ultimatley beats more letters after your name. It sounds harsh, but it’s the truth.

So What Actually Happens to Recent Grads?

Here are some scary stats. Fifteen months after graduating:

• 61% of grads are in full-time work (sounds okay… until you realise that includes any job).
• Only 60.4% of young grads are in “high-skilled” jobs.
• 26.4% are in medium or low-skilled roles.
• 5.5% are still unemployed.

Put simply, nearly one-third of graduates aren’t in graduate-level jobs. It definitely seems worth all that time and money you sacrificed.

Fresh grad unemployment sits at around 12.7%—four times higher than the rate for older, established graduates.

Many spend months (or years) job-hopping, interning, or doing gig work before landing something remotely related to their degree. And yes, the job hunt feels “soul-destroying” for a lot of people. Even Oxbridge grads have shared stories of sending out hundreds of applications and getting ghosted.

Is a Degree Still Worth It? Honestly… Depends on the Timeframe

Short term

You finish uni and… boom. The market is overcrowded. Experience matters more than ever. Salaries haven’t rocketed. Debt is real. And having a degree guarantees absolutely nothing in the first few years.

If someone told you, “Get a degree, and you’ll walk into a job,” they were simply lying or are delusional.

Long term – a ray of sunshine…

Here’s the twist: the numbers flip completely. By your early 30s:

• Graduates earn 33% more on average than people who could’ve gone to uni but didn’t.
• Lifetime earnings are £200k–£400k higher for most graduates.
• Graduate unemployment drops to just over 3%.
• Every region in England shows a consistent “graduate premium.”
• Some industries (finance, law, engineering, medicine, computer science) offer 50–90% higher salaries for degree-holders.

So yes—the degree can pay off. You just have to treat it like long-term investing… Its purest form.

So What Should You Actually Do With This Information?

If you’re deciding between uni, an apprenticeship, or heading straight into work, here are some hard truths your college teacher won’t likely tell you:

• Yes, a degree gives you long-term security, higher earning potential, and more flexibility. But don’t expect any major returns for the first few years.
• An apprenticeship gives you income, experience, and a quicker path into work.
• Going straight into work can work—if you get into a field with progression and skills attached.

Ultimately, there’s no “one right path”—but there is a wrong approach:

Doing nothing and hoping the job market magically sorts itself out.

Today’s job market rewards people who:

• build experience early
• network aggressively
• tailor applications
• pick degrees with an actual labour market
• develop skills employers can use now, not “once you’ve graduated”

Your degree can still be a launchpad. But you’ll need to build the rocket as you go.

The Bottom Line

1. The graduate job market is brutally competitive right now and doesn’t show any signs of changing any time soon.
2. Yes, there are too many grads.
3. Yes, the number of graduate jobs is shrinking.
4. Yes, underemployment is real and at an all-time high.

But a degree still pays off over the long run—and for many careers, it’s non-negotiable.

If you’re heading into higher education, go in with your eyes open.

Choose wisely, get experience early, build skills employers actually want, and don’t expect the job fairy to turn up the day after graduation.

In the short term, brace yourself.
In the long term, it’s still one of the most reliable investments you can make.

Our advice if this applies to you, hunker down and brace for further turbulence. Whilst it’s choppy, work on building your own portfolio and skills to try and open doors and explore marketing apprenticeships as a solution to get you in the door with employers and to build up your paid work experience.

Further reading:

• Graduate numbers and increase in higher education qualificationsstandout-cv.comstandout-cv.com
• Institute of Student Employers data on graduate applications vs vacanciescom
• High Fliers Research on declines in graduate vacancies (2023–2024)ac.uktechinformed.com
• The Guardian on graduates’ job hunt difficulties and underemployment statscomtheguardian.com
• StandOut CV analysis of graduate unemployment (recent graduates ~12.7%)standout-cv.com
• Universities UK analysis of earnings premium for graduates by age 30ac.uk
• The Guardian/IFS on lifetime graduate earnings premium and benefitscom
• Office for National Statistics – Graduate labour market statistics (unemployment and employment rates)explore-education-statistics.service.gov.ukcom