UK Candidate Attraction Report 2026

Press Release:

Eploy, an enterprise Talent Acquisition software leader, published the 10th Annual UK Candidate Attraction Report today. Eploy and HR Grapevine surveyed over 700 recruiters to determine the candidate sourcing channels and recruitment marketing techniques that deliver the best results. Sourcing channels surveyed include Career Sites, Talent Pools, Professional Social Networks, Generalist Job Boards, Specialist Job Boards, Events, Social Media, Employee Referrals, CV Databases, Job Aggregators, Programmatic Advertising and PSLs.

The survey captured responses from the full spectrum of UK industries, ensuring that the report reflects real world recruitment challenges and strategies across both public and private sectors, providing talent acquisition professionals with a reliable and representative benchmark for their activities.

Sourcing channel quadrants for sectors and company size

The survey asked recruiters to rate each of their main sourcing channels in terms of the quantity and quality of candidates they typically generate. The complete report charts responses within a ‘Sourcing Channel Quadrant’, enabling recruiters to identify the effectiveness of each channel in each sector/industry and by company size.

2026 In-house Sourcing Channel Quadrant

Some of the key findings in the report include:

Candidate scarcity remains the #1 challenge for recruiters

For the tenth year, the biggest recruitment challenge remains the scarcity of suitably qualified/skilled/experienced candidates, affecting 52% of organisations. While this challenge declined in recent years (61% cited it in 2024, 53% in the 2025 report), the latest data shows only a marginal further reduction of 1%.

While the top challenge hasn’t changed for many years, a new one has taken second place on the list this year. 34% of survey respondents reveal that hiring managers have unrealistic expectations, making finding suitable talent in an already scarce market even more difficult. 

AI-generated applications are a shared concern for recruiters

Flagged by 28% of recruiters, this is a new challenge included for the first time in the 10th report. The use of AI in candidate applications is making it harder for recruiters to assess authenticity. The IT and Legal sectors are most affected.  

Candidate experience remains a priority for recruitment and talent teams

We asked survey participants to report their most pressing candidate sourcing priorities. Similarly to the previous year, candidate experience/engagement remains the top priority for in-house recruitment teams (63%).

Fewer Employers Expect Growth, and More Than a Third of Recruitment Marketing Budgets Face Cuts

Budget pressure is at its highest in the survey’s history, with enterprise organisations (43% facing cuts) hit hardest. The Government and Public Sector face the most difficult outlook of any sector, with 52% expecting hiring to decrease, and 58% anticipating budget cuts.

Job advert optimisation is now the most adopted AI application in recruitment.

This is used by 39% of in-house teams. AI in recruitment is no longer theoretical. But adoption beyond job adverts remains thin, with most other applications still in the planning stage.

Only 1 in 5 Careers Sites are measured, despite high usage.

The most widely used channel in recruitment is also among the least understood. Peak Careers Sites that invest in process transparency, employee stories and interview guidance consistently outperform, yet most Career Websites lack these basics. Our findings share candidate-centric content useful at each stage of the candidate attraction funnel and the content that makes a Career Site a peak performer.

Peak Performing Careers Sites are 9x more likely to have Interview hints and tips, 3x more likely to have content about how the recruitment process works, 3x more likely to have a Chatbot, and 2x more likely to have FAQs and Employee Videos than Poor-Performing Careers Sites.

DE&I has dropped from the top challenges list

DE&I has been considered as one of the top challenges consistently for years. However, the latest Candidate Attraction Report findings reveal DE&I has dropped from the top sourcing challenges list. Cited by 33% in 2025 and down to 19% in 2026, this is the sharpest single-year shift in the survey. Whether this reflects genuine progress or shifting priorities is a question organisations should be examining.

Comment from Eploy:

Commenting on the release of the report, Eploy’s Co-founder & CEO, Chris Bogh, said: “Eploy are pleased to share the report findings for the 10th consecutive year. We received over 700 responses from the talent acquisition community across all industries and company sizes, giving us a solid understanding of how candidate attraction challenges vary across different demographics.

“Since its inception, the report has provided detailed insight into hiring challenges and the ways various sectors approach talent acquisition. We offer the report as a free resource, knowing that the research provides valuable insight into candidate attraction and talent acquisition trends in the UK.

We thank all talent acquisition and recruitment professionals who participated in the survey.”

The full 100-page report is available for general download on Eploy’s website.

Notes for Editors:

For logos, photos, etc., please find them on Eploy Brand Guidelines page. 

Please contact Eploy if you wish to use any of the report, graphs or require further clarification. Email marketing@eploy.co.uk

About Eploy

Eploy, an Access Group Company, is the complete, cloud-based recruitment platform for modern recruiters. Combining Recruitment CRM, Applicant Tracking, Onboarding and Self-service Analytics into a unified solution, Eploy adds value for every stakeholder at every step in the recruitment journey. Learn more about Eploy's features.