{"id":54522,"date":"2026-09-14T12:48:02","date_gmt":"2026-09-14T12:48:02","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/employmenthero.com\/uk\/?post_type=news&p=54522"},"modified":"2026-09-14T12:48:04","modified_gmt":"2026-09-14T12:48:04","slug":"computer-science-graduates-ai-jobs-uk","status":"publish","type":"news","link":"https:\/\/employmenthero.com\/uk\/news\/computer-science-graduates-ai-jobs-uk\/","title":{"rendered":"Computer Science Graduates\u2019 Job Prospects Are Shifting Because of AI"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
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Computer science and economics graduates<\/a> are finding it harder to land coding and software development roles, data compiled for the Guardian University Guide 2027<\/a> has found. While some experts believe AI is responsible for that shift, external figures from Employment Hero<\/a> suggest the story may be more complex.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Drawn from the Higher Education Statistics Agency’s graduate outcomes survey, which gathered responses from more than 350,000 former students 15 months after they completed their courses in 2024, the data within the Guardian’s<\/em> report shows the share of computer science graduates landing professional coder or programmer roles falling from around 40% to just 28% in a year. The proportion moving into any graduate-level occupation at all also declined, from more than 60% two years ago to just 50% now.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Employers Are Hiring More Graduates, Not Fewer<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

But Employment Hero’s global AI Paradox survey<\/a> of 8,800 business leaders and employees, including UK respondents, conducted with Focaldata between April and May 2026, found that businesses with AI at the core of their operations grew entry-level headcount by 62% over the past two years, more than double the 30% rate among businesses that haven’t adopted it. In fact, only 16% of companies cut entry-level roles at all in that period, and AI was the most-cited reason among that smaller group.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The same survey found AI skills have climbed to sixth place among all hiring criteria surveyed, ahead of prior work experience and ahead of holding a degree at all. Among the most AI-invested businesses, AI skills rank first, and job descriptions are catching up with this new normal: mentions of AI skills in job postings are up 235% year on year, with “Claude” now the fastest-growing skill term of 2026.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Speaking to the Guardian<\/em>, Matt Hiely-Rayner, director of the consultancy Intelligent Metrix, which compiles the guide’s employment data, suggested that “with AI providing such responsive and cheap grunt work in this field, it’s hard not to conclude that this is behind the trend”.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

However, Charlie Ball, head of labour market intelligence at Jisc, the UK’s data and technology agency for education and research, was more cautious about pinning the trend on AI alone.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“It is clear that something did happen to the software developer labour market last year.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“While I’m reluctant to say that AI did it, because there’s little evidence, it’s very hard to escape the conclusion that AI has played a role.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Hiring Fix for UK SMEs<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

For an SME hiring a graduate this year, that may mean that job specs need rewriting, for example, checking whether they reflect the AI-literacy and adjacent skills employers are already screening for.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

As The Economist <\/em>reported this month<\/a>, predictions of an immediate “AI jobs apocalypse” haven’t yet materialised in the American labour market, where unemployment sits at 4.1% and the gap between youth and overall unemployment is close to a multi-decade low. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

In the UK, Employment Hero’s research from July<\/a> found a comparable shift already under way: 64% of UK employers say AI has changed what they look for in candidates, with AI skills now among the top five attributes they screen for, ahead of prior experience, and that change is moving fastest at entry level, where 37% of workers say junior roles increasingly specify AI knowledge.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Charlie, Jisc’s head of labour market intelligence, makes similar observations. He suggests that while the trajectory for computer science graduates has changed, these are “the signs of an industry that is changing, and graduates are feeling the sharp end of that because they are the largest group of new employees.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“It’s not collapsed entirely, there are still roles available, but pure coding jobs seem to have been in particularly short supply in 2025,” he said, citing cybersecurity and network engineering as two of the fields absorbing this change. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Economics graduates are seeing a version of the same pattern in finance, where employers have historically paid well for analysis work AI can now do faster. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

“I’ve talked to a lot of finance employers about their use of AI, and most are saying they are not replacing jobs with it, they are changing jobs,” Charlie adds.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“They expect new hires to have familiarity with AI. But it is a fast-moving field and employers are not unanimous on this. Some have an appetite for risk and are embracing AI tools and laying people off, in the hope that it will give them an edge. But that may not persist, because everyone is experimenting right now.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n

What This Means for the Wider Graduate Jobs Market<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

Computer science and economics graduates aren’t navigating this alone. UK youth unemployment reached 16.4% this summer, its highest rate in more than a decade, with 743,000 16 to 24-year-olds out of work<\/a>, 112,000 more than the year before. Even so, the same data shows some routes into work expanding rather than shrinking: Gen Z employment in construction and trades rose 10.8% in July compared with April, and nearly half of UK SMEs (46%) now value apprenticeships and degrees equally.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Productivity pressure is doing some of the same work behind the scenes. Employment Hero’s Quarterly SME Pulse<\/a> found productivity and output are UK business leaders’ single biggest pressure this quarter, at 36%, part of why businesses are turning to AI to close that gap rather than simply cutting headcount. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

For computer science and economics graduates, the more urgent question is no longer whether these jobs exist, but whether their skills meet the new requirements employers have attached to them.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n

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