High-tech job vacancies climb to multi-year highs
Economists point to exports, defense demand and foreign investment.
The 2025 annual job vacancy data published on Sunday by the Central Bureau of Statistics (CBS) paint a largely optimistic picture for Israel’s high-tech sector.
In high-tech services, the job vacancy rate reached 4.8% in 2025, up from 4.2% in 2024 and 4.5% in the first nine months of 2023, the period preceding the war. In the high-tech industry sector, the vacancy rate stood at 3.1% in 2025, a slight increase from 3% in 2024 and a more notable rise from 2.7% in 2023.
At the same time, the depth of the crisis in demand for high-tech workers during the judicial reform and the war is reflected in longer-term data from the same CBS survey. In December 2021, demand for software developers stood at 13,300 vacancies. By December 2022, after much of that demand had been absorbed, the figure had fallen to 7,300. In December 2023, it dropped to a low of 5,000, before recovering to 6,400 in December 2024 and 7,200 in December 2025.
Professor Gil Epstein, an economist at Bar-Ilan University and chief labor-market researcher at the Taub Center for Social Policy Research, says the figures indicate a recovery. “The CBS data show that high-tech is coming back into its own,” he said. “There is growing global demand for Israeli products, strong high-tech exports, foreign investment, a weakening dollar, and significant exports from the defense industries.”
A central factor that has affected the labor market for two years, and for which there is no solution in sight, is the shortage of reservists. Since high-tech mainly employs non-Haredi Jews, with a strong concentration of young workers, the impact of extended reserve service is particularly pronounced in the sector.
However, the broader picture is more complex. Employment Service labor-market pulse reports over the past year have pointed to a steady weakening even among traditionally strong segments of the labor market.
A report published in July showed that the number of job seekers from high-tech professions more than doubled, rising 112% from around 7,000 in January 2019 to nearly 15,000 in April 2025. The share of high-tech job seekers among all job seekers increased from 6% to 10.9% over the same period.
The crisis has also reached veteran and experienced workers, as well as core technological professions that companies typically try to retain.
In December, the number of job seekers who are software developers and application analysts stood at about 8,200, compared with 2,800 in December 2024. This figure is heavily influenced by rising demand in the defense and cyber industries. The key question is whether the renewed demand for high-tech workers will be sufficient to reverse the upward trend in job seekers.
High-tech was not the only notable area in yesterday’s CBS release. The total number of job vacancies across the economy rose by 0.8%, from 151,000 in November 2025 to 152,100 in December (seasonally adjusted), the highest level since measurements began in 2009. Adjusted for demographic growth, this is also an all-time record.
The previous peak, 151,400 vacancies, was recorded in September 2022, as the economy emerged from the Covid-19 crisis. The data suggest the upward trend has yet to peak.
It should be noted that this record refers to seasonally adjusted data, which is the standard benchmark for job-vacancy analysis. In the original, non-adjusted data, a higher figure of 157,400 vacancies was recorded in August 2022. In addition, CBS vacancy figures are recalculated retroactively each month, meaning month-to-month comparisons should be treated with caution.
The overall job vacancy rate rose slightly from 4.58% in November to 4.59% in December, the highest level since October 2022 (4.64%). The historical peak was recorded in August 2022, when the vacancy rate reached 5.02%.
A high number of job vacancies does not necessarily signal a healthy labor market; it often reflects structural problems preventing positions from being filled.
Before the Covid-19 crisis, at the beginning of 2020, the number of vacancies typically ranged between 95,000 and 100,000. During the first lockdown in April 2020, the figure collapsed to 36,000, before rebounding sharply and repeatedly breaking records, culminating in 151,400 vacancies in September 2022.
A study prepared for the Ministry of Labor by Arnon Barak of the Pareto Group, together with Hadas Fuchs, a senior economist at the ministry, found that these record levels reflected a skills mismatch that emerged after the pandemic. Demand surged in high-tech, health and welfare, while employment declined sharply in entertainment, leisure and hospitality. This mismatch constrained economic growth during the post-Covid recovery.
By September 2023, vacancies had fallen to 114,700, raising questions about a new equilibrium. The outbreak of war in October 2023 changed that trajectory. After a brief decline, vacancies resumed climbing and have now reached a new peak.
The primary driver is the prolonged absence of reservists from the civilian labor market. This is particularly evident in hospitality and food services, where vacancy rates have remained exceptionally high at 8.9% for the second consecutive year. In trade services, vacancy rates rose from 3.7% before the war to 4.4% in 2024 and 4.9% in 2025.
Epstein attributes the rise in vacancies to several overlapping factors. Reserve service is among the most prominent. Another is a severe shortage of blue-collar workers, including construction workers, cleaners, nurses and caregivers. This shortage is exacerbated by restrictions on Palestinian labor, reluctance to employ Israeli Arab workers, and the absorption of many workers into public services to address wartime needs. These dynamics, he notes, are also affecting labor shortages in food and trade sectors.
