– We see neither an increase nor a decrease in the number of job openings, says Katja Olofsson, labour market statistician at Statistics Sweden. Therefore, employers demand for labour provides no strong signal of where the Swedish economy is heading.

109 300 job openings in the business sector

The 143 600 job openings were in different categories:

• Recruitment method: Of the job openings, 114 400 were advertised while 29 200 were job openings where the employer had tried to recruit in other ways.
• Desired access: The number of job openings where the employer wanted immediate access amounted to 85 400.
• Excluding temporary work: The number of job vacancies, excluding temporary work, amounted to 108 800.

The total number of job openings applies to the whole economy. In the table the different sectors are presented.

In relation to the number of employments, there were 2.8 job openings per 100 employments during the first quarter of the year, of which 1.7 were job openings to be filled immediately.

From a regional perspective, more than 50 percent of job openings were located in the Metropolitan counties of Stockholm, Västra Götaland and Skåne. However, relative to the number of employments, the distribution was different.

More than half of employers in Kronoberg and Norrbotten report recruitment difficulties

In the last six months

• 45 percent of employers had experienced recruitment issues
• 26 percent of employers had not experienced recruitment issues
• 30 percent of employers did not recruit or tried to recruit at all.

Employers in Kronobergs and Norrbotten counties more often reported recruitment difficulties than in many other counties. There, 54 percent of employers had experienced recruitment problems during the last six months, compared to 36 and 37 percent in counties such as Blekinge and Dalarna.

Unchanged share of employers failing to recruit

Employers may experience recruitment issues but still succeed in hiring as many employees as they seek. However, if they fail to recruit the desired number, this can be an important indicator of labour shortage.

Among the employers that tried to recruit in the last six months

• 64 percent had succeeded in recruiting
• 36 percent had not succeeded in recruiting the sought number.

The share of employers that failed to recruit has remained relatively stable since the statistics were first published in the third quarter of 2024.

Three out of ten expect reduced recruitment

In the following year

• 30 percent of employers expect to increase their number of employees
• 12 percent of employers expect to decrease their number of employees
• 35 percent of employers expect their number of employees to remain unchanged
• 23 percent of employers cannot estimate their hiring plans.

Employers’ expectations of the future recruitment needs are more or less unchanged since the third quarter of 2025. Also, expectations do not differ much between different parts of Sweden.