What skills job postings ask for — and AI's footprint
From the posting text we extract the skills employers name, the seniority mix, and how often AI/LLM tooling is mentioned.
Key figures
| Measure | ||
|---|---|---|
| Junior / mid / senior | 9.8 / 77.9 / 12.3% | from the title |
| Mention AI / LLM tooling | 2.2% | |
| Postings not in English | 21.4% | heuristic |
| EEO / pay-transparency wording | 1.5% / 2.5% | |
| Most-requested skills (postings naming each) | top 10 below | extracted from the posting text |
| #1 communication | 543,262 | |
| #2 leadership | 500,411 | |
| #3 customer service | 456,008 | |
| #4 marketing | 368,008 | |
| #5 nursing | 253,168 | |
| #6 patient care | 203,773 | |
| #7 inventory | 193,765 | |
| #8 excel | 151,440 | |
| #9 recruitment | 141,150 | |
| #10 teamwork | 140,829 |
Frequently asked
Which skills are requested most?
Communication (543,262 postings), leadership (500,411 postings) and customer service (456,008 postings) lead — soft skills outrank every technical one.
What is the top requested skill?
Communication, named in 543,262 postings — ahead of leadership and customer service.
How many postings mention AI?
2.2% mention AI/LLM terms; the leaders are machine learning and ‘ai-powered’.
Is the market top-heavy with seniors?
No — it is flat: 9.8% junior, 77.9% mid, 12.3% senior.
Press, research and custom cuts: [email protected] · Cite as: DeUnemployment, “Skills demand and AI mentions in job postings — 2026-11-06”, https://deunemployment.com/data/skills-and-ai (2026-11-06).
Where this connects. Outside work that defines or studies the measure on this page:
- Jobs mentioning AI are growing amid broader hiring weakness — Indeed Hiring Lab
- Artificial intelligence and employment: cross-country evidence — PMC
Need a different cut? Every figure on this page comes from one index, so we can extract almost any slice on request — a city, a role, an industry, a time window, or a comparison between platforms. Tell us what you need at [email protected] and we will pull it, publish it with its method, and hand you the numbers. All we ask in return is a citation.
More data
- All datasets & measures
- State of Jobs — monthly report
- Data health — what our corpus can vouch for
- Request a custom cut
“Still listed” is a listing-age measure from the source publish date, not a verification that a role is open; link liveness is measured separately. The percentages are the October 2026 edition (full pass, measured 2026-10-06); the index counts are rebuilt by every nightly update, most recently 2026-11-06. Page generated 2026-11-06.