Internet Vacancy Index: 212,400 job ads, and how to use the count to aim your applications
The Internet Vacancy Index is the monthly count of online job ads in Australia, and in August 2026 it stood at 212,400 ads in seasonally adjusted terms, up 0.3% (560 ads) on the month. Jobs and Skills Australia says that is around 25% more ads than the monthly average for 2019. In plain terms, employers are still advertising steadily, well above pre-pandemic levels, but the national total will not tell you whether your own occupation, state or region is busy. That needs the breakdowns, and this guide shows how a recruiter reads them.
What the Internet Vacancy Index counts, and what it leaves out
The Internet Vacancy Index (IVI) is compiled every month by Jobs and Skills Australia. It counts online job advertisements and can be broken down by occupation, skill level, state or territory and region.
Those breakdowns matter most: a welder in Perth and an accountant in Sydney are looking at very different markets in the same month.
Keep three limits in mind before you build a plan on it:
- An ad is not a hire. The index counts advertisements, not people who were employed from them.
- An ad is not a shortage. Lots of ads can mean high demand, high staff turnover, or both. Shortage has its own measure, covered below.
- Seasonally adjusted figures are smoothed. They take out the regular rise and fall that comes with the time of year, so one month can be fairly compared with the next.
The August 2026 figures in plain numbers
The latest release came out on 23 September 2026 and covers August. You are always reading the recent past, not today.
| Measure | Figure | What it means for a job seeker |
|---|---|---|
| Online job ads, August 2026 (seasonally adjusted) | 212,400 | Employers across Australia are still advertising in large numbers. |
| Change over the month | Up 0.3% (560 ads) | A steady month, not a hiring surge and not a slump. |
| Level in July 2026 (rough calculation) | About 211,800 | August's count minus the monthly rise; the two months are almost level. |
| Compared with the 2019 monthly average | Around 25% higher | Demand for staff is above where it was before the pandemic. |
| Implied 2019 monthly average (rough calculation) | Roughly 170,000 | Worked back from the rounded 25% figure, so treat it as a ballpark only. |
Why a quiet month can still be a good month to apply
A rise of 560 ads on a July base of about 211,800 is close to flat. From a recruiter's chair, that is not bad news. A steady count usually means employers are hiring in a planned way: roles are signed off, budgets are set, and managers are reading applications rather than rushing to fill seats.
In a steady market a hiring manager has time to compare candidates, so a generic CV sent to fifty ads tends to lose to a tailored one sent to ten.
Reading job ads next to the other labour market data
Job ads show employer demand. Four official sources, each answering a different question, complete the picture.
| Source | What it measures | How often | Best used for |
|---|---|---|---|
| Internet Vacancy Index (Jobs and Skills Australia) | Online job ads by occupation, skill level, state and region | Monthly | Spotting where employers are advertising now |
| Labour Force, Australia (ABS) | Employment, unemployment and underemployment | Monthly | Judging how much competition there is for work |
| Occupation Shortage List (Jobs and Skills Australia) | Which occupations employers struggle to fill, nationally and by state | Yearly | Checking whether your occupation is genuinely hard to fill |
| Employment projections (Jobs and Skills Australia) | Expected job growth by industry and occupation | Five and ten year outlook | Choosing a direction for the next few years |
The worker side: September 2026 labour force figures
The ABS Labour Force release for September 2026 shows the unemployment rate up 0.1 percentage points to 4.7%, with 732,000 people unemployed (up 8,900). Total employment fell by 39,300 to 14,782,700, but the detail is mixed: full-time employment rose by 34,400 while part-time employment fell by 73,700.
In August 2026, the underemployment rate was 6.2% and the underutilisation rate 10.8%, and youth unemployment was also 10.8%. Note that these are a different month from the ad count, so read them as the backdrop, not as a match for the 212,400 figure.
Put together: ads are holding up, but more people are looking. For more on why one national figure can mislead, see our piece on why sector-level data beats the headline jobs numbers.
The shortage side: where ads are hardest to fill
Jobs and Skills Australia treats an occupation as in shortage when employers cannot fill vacancies, or find it very hard, at current pay and conditions and in reasonably accessible locations. One signal it uses is the fill rate: below 67% (two-thirds) of vacancies filled, an occupation has a high chance of being in shortage.
In the 2025 Occupation Shortage List, 29% of occupations (293 of the 1022 assessed) were in national shortage, down from 33% in 2024 and 36% in 2023. That fits a market that has cooled a little while job ads stay high. Our guide to how recruiters read the Occupation Shortage List explains each rating in detail.
Where the demand points: trades, regions and growing industries
The national ad count is the starting point. The shortage list and the projections show where the pressure sits.
- Trades. Almost 1 in 2 Technicians and Trades Workers occupations were in shortage in 2025. Of the 139 occupations in shortage every year from 2021 to 2025, 71 (51%) were trades, especially construction, engineering and automotive. See what construction employers screen for when they shortlist trades.
- Machinery operators and drivers. The share of these occupations in shortage rose by 3 percentage points to 28%, against the overall trend.
- Regional areas. 21 occupations were in regional shortage without a matching shortage in the capital cities, up from 12 in 2024. Most of Australia outside Sydney, Melbourne and Brisbane counts as a designated regional area for migration; our guide to designated regional areas and what those employers want covers the categories.
- Longer term. Jobs and Skills Australia projects employment to grow by nearly 2.0 million people (13.3%) over ten years, with services-related industries making up 84% of that growth and Technicians and Trades Workers growing by 195,800 (9.8%) to May 2035. Our read on the industries hiring in Australia to 2035 goes sector by sector.
Jobs and Skills Australia adds a fair warning: more vacancies in a shortage occupation does not necessarily make a job easier to get, because some specialisations are not in shortage, or the shortage is concentrated in certain places.
How to use the Internet Vacancy Index to aim your applications
- Start with your occupation, not the total. Use the index's occupation breakdown and look at the trend over several months, not one release.
- Check the state and regional view. If ads in your field cluster in one state or outside the big cities, that is where your applications are most likely to be read.
- Compare with the shortage rating. Many ads plus a Shortage rating is a strong signal; many ads with No Shortage often means high turnover and plenty of applicants.
- If you need sponsorship, check the occupation lists. Demand is not the same as visa eligibility. Home Affairs publishes a combined list of eligible skilled occupations showing whether an occupation is on the Core Skills Occupation List and which body assesses it.
- Read live ads and list the duties. Pull the duties and requirements from three or four current ads in your field, then rewrite your CV around them. A tool such as Build AI CV can help you produce a tailored version for each role.
- Check the pay against the award. Job ads in Australia cannot advertise pay below the minimum in the applicable award, enterprise agreement or the National Minimum Wage order. Our guide to finding your modern award code shows how to check.
- Apply where the demand is. Browse current roles by sector, for example IT & Technology jobs, or open a specific listing such as this Software Engineer role in Melbourne, and apply to the roles that match your experience.
What employers want to see when the ad count is steady
When ads hold level, employers can be selective. The applications that get a call back answer the employer's questions before they are asked.
- Proof you have done the duties. Match each listed duty with a line of real experience: the tools, the systems, the size of the work.
- Certificates and licences ready. Have copies scanned and named clearly, so you can send them the day they are requested.
- Clear recent experience. For a Skills in Demand (subclass 482) visa, applicants need at least 1 year of relevant work experience gained in the last 5 years, so a sponsoring employer will look closely at your recent dates.
- Work history someone can check. A profile on Talent Tabloid lets you show verified work history alongside your CV.
Common mistakes when reading job-ad data
- Treating the total as your market. 212,400 ads is the national count across every occupation. Your field may be much busier or much quieter.
- Reading one month as a trend. A 0.3% move is noise-sized. Look at several months before changing direction.
- Assuming every job is 25% busier than in 2019. The comparison is for all ads together, not for each occupation.
- Mixing up demand and visa eligibility. An occupation can be heavily advertised and still not be on a skilled occupation list, or the reverse.
- Believing that high demand means someone can sell you a job. Subclass 482 applicants must not have asked for, offered, received or provided a benefit in return for visa sponsorship in the past 3 years. Anyone asking you to pay for sponsorship is putting your visa at risk.
Frequently asked questions
What is the Internet Vacancy Index?
It is a monthly count of online job advertisements in Australia, compiled by Jobs and Skills Australia. You can view it by occupation, skill level, state or territory and region, which makes it useful for seeing where employers are advertising.
How many job ads were there in August 2026?
In seasonally adjusted terms there were 212,400 online job ads in August 2026, up 0.3% or 560 ads on the month. The figures were released on 23 September 2026.
Are job ads higher than before the pandemic?
Yes. Jobs and Skills Australia says job ad numbers in August 2026 were around 25% higher than the monthly average for 2019. That is a national total, so individual occupations can be well above or below that level.
Does a high number of ads mean my occupation is in shortage?
Not on its own. Shortage is measured separately in the yearly Occupation Shortage List, which looks at whether employers can fill vacancies at current pay and conditions. In 2025, 29% of assessed occupations were in national shortage.
How should I use the index if I am applying from overseas?
Use it to find where your occupation is advertised most, then check the shortage rating and the Home Affairs occupation lists if you need sponsorship. After that, tailor your CV to the duties in live ads and apply to roles that match your experience.
Key takeaways
- The Internet Vacancy Index counted 212,400 online job ads in August 2026, up 0.3% on the month.
- Ads were around 25% above the 2019 monthly average, but that is a national figure.
- Read the occupation, state and regional breakdowns, not just the total.
- Check demand against the Occupation Shortage List and, if you need a visa, the skilled occupation lists.
- In a steady market, tailored applications with ready certificates stand out.
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