The market is split. Overall hiring stayed cautious through a subdued 2025, yet specialist skills kept firms busy, with clear demand hotspots for AI, data, enterprise applications and cyber security Computer Weekly's tech recruitment outlook. That specialist pull is showing up in the wider figures too: the largest volume rise in vacancies through August to October 2025 came in the professional, scientific and technical activities sector, up by 5,000 the ONS vacancies bulletin for November 2025.
AI itself is the sharpest signal. Demand for AI skills rose nearly 200 percent in a year, with London alone accounting for 80 percent of AI-related job postings and close to two-thirds of all UK technology vacancies figures reported by The Register from Accenture data. So the picture is not slow hiring across the board. It is firms spending carefully, and concentrating that spend on the people who can build.
Agentic AI, software that plans and acts on tasks with limited human prompting, needs a specific mix of people. Firms are opening roles for AI and machine learning engineers, data specialists, and the architects who design the systems these agents run on. IT business analysts, architects and systems designers, a group of around 193,000 workers, sit among the occupations in critical demand, with three of five indicators flagged critical in 2025 the GOV.UK Occupations in Demand analysis.
Security is the other constant. Agentic systems act on data and infrastructure, so cyber talent is essential, and it is scarce: 70 percent of cyber firms reported at least one hard-to-fill vacancy the AI Labour Market Survey 2025, while the UK cyber security workforce sits at roughly 143,000 people the GOV.UK cyber security skills report.
The entry route into these roles is changing. Adzuna has recorded a 30 percent drop in entry-level postings since ChatGPT launched analysis published by techUK. Firms want proven, job-ready skills, and they are building some of that skill in-house.
Start with the problem, not the job title. Agentic AI roles blend engineering, data and security, so write a brief around the outcome you need and the systems it touches, rather than a long list of tools. That widens your pool and helps you compare people fairly.
Look beyond the graduate pipeline. With entry-level postings falling and apprenticeships rising per DSIT's survey, the firms filling these roles are the ones building talent as well as buying it. Most technology and engineering hires still come from the resident UK workforce, which points to low reliance on international recruitment for these skills the GOV.UK review of professionals in IT and engineering.
Move quickly on the specialists. Demand is concentrated and heavily weighted to London as the Accenture data shows, so a slow process loses the strongest people. Broader hiring conditions ease and tighten month to month, tracked in the KPMG and REC UK Report on Jobs, but for AI and cyber the competition stays high. Define your must-have skills, shortlist fast, and keep candidates warm through interview.
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