--- title: "In-demand skills in 2026: what live job postings ask for, by function" description: "[NewSearch millions of jobs from your AI agent with MCP→](/blog/jobspipe-mcp-server)" canonical: https://jobspipe.dev/blog/in-demand-skills last_updated: 2026-09-10 --- [NewSearch millions of jobs from your AI agent with MCP→](/blog/jobspipe-mcp-server) [All posts](/blog) ![](/listly/card-field.png) ReferenceDemand Reference·Sep 9, 2026·7 min read # In-demand skills in 2026: what live job postings ask for, by function The share of active postings naming each skill, per job function, read off live job postings rather than a survey: Engineering, Sales, Marketing, Finance and Accounting, IT and Security, Healthcare. Includes an honest answer on AI skills, why the ranking shifts by board, and the API query that reproduces any slice. ![Dvir Atias](/authors/dvir-atias.jpg) Dvir Atias Founder, JobsPipe Every list of in-demand skills you have read was written from a survey or from the author’s head. This one is read off live job postings: for each job function, the share of active postings that name a skill, extracted from the title and description against a curated lexicon. The shares are cross-sectional, refreshed with the corpus, and reproducible through the API. ## What are the most in-demand skills right now? Across every function the most-named skill is communication, followed by compliance and leadership; the first hard skill depends on the function. In Engineering it is Python, named in 19.2% of postings; in Finance it is Excel; in Healthcare it is patient care; in IT and Security it is cybersecurity. The tables below give the top skills per function. A note on reading them. The lexicon includes soft skills, so “communication” leads everywhere and tells you little. The signal is in the hard skills and in the gaps between functions: a skill near the top of one function and absent from another’s top 25 is a hiring-market fact, not an opinion. ## What “in demand” means in postings data In this dataset a skill is in demand when a large share of postings in a function name it. That is an employer ask, not a hire, and it mixes two different things: skills that are common because every posting lists them, and skills that are scarce and therefore spelled out. Communication is the first kind. Kubernetes is the second. The share also depends on how the skill is written. A lexicon matches the phrases employers use, so a skill with one canonical name (Excel, CPR, Salesforce) counts cleanly, while a skill with many names is split across slugs and each slug looks smaller than the skill. Survey-based lists do not have this problem and have a worse one: they measure what respondents say they value, not what they wrote into a requisition. Read the tables as what employers ask for in writing, function by function, and nothing more. ## In-demand skills by job function ### Engineering - communication45.1% - compliance25.2% - leadership24.0% - python19.2% - mentoring15.4% - lean manufacturing13.6% - CI/CD13.1% - AWS11.5% - agile11.1% - teamwork10.8% - project management10.8% - adaptability9.8% Share of active Engineering postings naming the skill. Top 12 of the 25 published. ### Sales - communication50.0% - CRM25.0% - leadership23.0% - customer support21.3% - lead generation15.9% - negotiation15.8% - account management15.8% - mentoring14.2% - compliance13.4% - excel12.7% - teamwork11.2% - adaptability10.0% Share of active Sales postings naming the skill. Top 12 of the 25 published. ### Marketing - communication51.8% - leadership28.3% - attention to detail19.9% - CRM15.3% - excel14.3% - SEO13.7% - project management12.8% - mentoring11.5% - creativity10.9% - compliance10.4% - ecommerce10.4% - teamwork10.3% Share of active Marketing postings naming the skill. Top 12 of the 25 published. ### Finance & Accounting - communication50.6% - accounting43.9% - compliance42.4% - excel38.9% - leadership29.2% - attention to detail28.2% - tax21.4% - mentoring16.9% - CPA15.0% - financial reporting14.3% - risk management13.2% - adaptability11.6% Share of active Finance & Accounting postings naming the skill. Top 12 of the 25 published. ### IT & Security - communication50.5% - compliance33.4% - leadership28.8% - cybersecurity21.1% - azure16.3% - customer support15.9% - mentoring15.2% - lean manufacturing14.5% - AWS14.4% - identity and access management12.8% - python12.3% - adaptability11.8% Share of active IT & Security postings naming the skill. Top 12 of the 25 published. ### Healthcare - nursing43.3% - communication39.0% - patient care36.9% - CPR31.0% - leadership22.6% - compliance22.5% - mentoring12.2% - teamwork12.1% - customer support11.5% - adaptability10.1% - attention to detail9.0% - problem solving8.8% Share of active Healthcare postings naming the skill. Top 12 of the 25 published. ## What stands out per function - **Engineering.** Python is the first hard skill at 19.2%, ahead of CI/CD at 13.1% and AWS at 11.5%. Lean manufacturing at 13.6% is a reminder that the function includes mechanical and industrial engineering, not only software. - **Sales.** CRM is named in 25.0% of postings and Salesforce by name in 9.4%; lead generation, negotiation and account management sit close together at 15.9%, 15.8% and 15.8%. - **Marketing.** SEO at 13.7% and Google Analytics at 10.2% lead the tool skills, with Canva at 10.1% ahead of Google Ads at 8.2%. - **Finance and Accounting.** Excel is named in 38.9% of postings, the CPA in 15.0%, and SAP in 9.3%. - **IT and Security.** Cybersecurity at 21.1% is the first hard skill; Azure at 16.3% edges AWS at 14.4%, the reverse of Engineering, and identity and access management reaches 12.8%. - **Healthcare.** Nursing at 43.3%, patient care at 36.9% and CPR at 31.0% dominate; EMR systems appear in 8.6% and HIPAA in 4.8%. Two functions are published in the dataset but not charted here: Human Resources, where recruiting, payroll and HRIS lead the hard skills, and Operations, where project management and lean manufacturing do. Both are in the JSON behind this page and in the [skills taxonomy post](/blog/skills-taxonomy). ## Are AI skills in demand? Yes in Engineering, where an explicit artificial-intelligence skill tag reaches the top 25; not measurably elsewhere. In every other function no AI tool or framework slug reaches the twenty-fifth skill, which is the cut-off of this dataset, so the honest answer for those functions is “below 3.9% of postings”, not zero. - Engineering9.1% Share of postings in the function naming an AI skill slug (artificial-intelligence, openai, anthropic, langchain, llm, machine-learning or generative-ai), where one reaches the published top 25. The pay side of the same question is on the [Labour Market Pulse](/pulse), which publishes the share of postings mentioning AI tooling per occupation and the gap in median advertised pay between AI and non-AI roles. Specific vendors are better queried than ranked: `skills_or` accepts slugs such as `openai`, `langchain` and `pytorch`, and `technology_slugs` on every returned row lists the tools the posting names. ## How this changes by board Skills are extracted from the description, so the first suspect when a ranking shifts between boards is description length. The data says it is a small effect: the share of scored postings the ghost scorer flags for a thin description, under 400 characters, is low on every collected board, 1.3% across all ten, and highest on Lever. - Lever6.7% - Paylocity2.1% - LinkedIn1.7% - Y Combinator1.1% - Indeed1.0% - SmartRecruiters0.7% - Ashby<0.5% - Workday<0.5% - Greenhouse<0.5% - Workable<0.5% Share of scored active postings flagged thin\_description (under 400 characters) by the ghost scorer, by board. What moves the ranking is the mix. Each board carries its own blend of functions, industries, countries and seniority levels, so the same skill has a different share on each. A ranking built from one aggregator inherits that aggregator’s mix; a ranking built from ATS feeds such as Greenhouse, Lever and Ashby leans toward the companies that use those platforms. The tables above merge all ten collected boards. When you build a skills ranking for one function, filter by `source_or` and compare the boards separately before merging them, and read the per-board field coverage in the [job scraping explainer](/blog/what-is-job-scraping) first. ## How to pull the same cut through the API There is no function filter on search, so scope by occupation code and then read `keyword_slugs` and `technology_slugs` off each row. This pulls recent ICT professional postings naming Python or Kubernetes: ``` curl -X POST https://api.jobspipe.dev/v1/jobs/search \ -H "Authorization: Bearer $JOBSPIPE_API_KEY" \ -H "Content-Type: application/json" \ -d '{ "occupation_code_or": ["25"], "skills_or": ["python", "kubernetes"], "posted_at_max_age_days": 30, "limit": 100 }' ``` Count slugs across the pages and divide by the rows returned, and you have the share table above for any slice you like: one country with `job_country_code_or`, one seniority with `job_seniority_or`, or one company with `company_name_or`. The [ISCO-08 post](/blog/isco-08) lists the occupation prefixes. How this was measured Measured from active postings on the ten collected boards within the named job function; share = postings in that function naming the skill. Generated 2026-09-09. Shares only: JobsPipe publishes percentages, not counts. The top 25 skills per job function are published; rows with too few postings behind them are dropped. Skills are matched against a curated lexicon covering hard and soft skills, so the same posting can name many. The thin-description shares come from the ghost scorer and are measured over scored postings (seen at least twice or older than 14 days), scored 2026-08-29. Shares are cross-sectional and do not support trend claims. ``` curl -X POST https://api.jobspipe.dev/v1/jobs/search \ -H "Authorization: Bearer $JOBSPIPE_API_KEY" \ -H "Content-Type: application/json" \ -d '{"occupation_code_or":["25"],"skills_or":["python"],"posted_at_max_age_days":30,"limit":100}' ``` Rank skills for any function, country or company from live postings. ![](/listly/shape-heart.png) FAQs ## Frequently Asked Questions ### What are the most in-demand skills right now? Measured as the share of active postings naming a skill, communication leads every job function, followed by compliance and leadership. The first hard skill depends on the function: Python in Engineering, Excel in Finance and Accounting, CRM in Sales and Marketing, cybersecurity in IT and Security, nursing and patient care in Healthcare. The post publishes the top skills for each function as shares of postings. ### Are AI skills in demand? In Engineering, yes: an explicit artificial-intelligence skill tag reaches the published top 25 skills. In every other job function no AI tool or framework slug reaches the twenty-fifth skill, which is the dataset's cut-off, so the honest answer there is below the twenty-fifth skill's share rather than zero. The JobsPipe Pulse publishes the AI share and pay premium per occupation, and skills\_or accepts vendor slugs such as openai or langchain for direct queries. ### Where does this in-demand skills data come from? From active job postings on the ten boards JobsPipe collects. Skills are extracted from each posting's title and description against a curated lexicon of hard and soft skills, then the share of postings in each job function naming the skill is computed. Only shares are published, rows with too few postings behind them are dropped, and no trend claims are made because the corpus is about three months deep. ### Why do the top skills look different on different job boards? Mostly because each board skews toward different functions, industries, countries and seniority levels, not because of description length: the share of scored postings the ghost scorer flags as thin (under 400 characters) is low on every collected board and highest on Lever. The published tables merge all ten collected boards; filter by source\_or to compare boards before merging them. ### How do I query in-demand skills through the JobsPipe API? There is no job function filter, so scope by occupation code with occupation\_code\_or (an ISCO-08 prefix such as 25 for ICT professionals), optionally add skills\_or, and read keyword\_slugs and technology\_slugs off every returned row. Count the slugs across pages and divide by rows returned to reproduce the share tables for any country, seniority or company. [ ← Previous What is a hiring freeze? Definition, signs in posting data, and how to check a company ](/blog/what-is-a-hiring-freeze)[ Next → Is the job market bad right now? What live job postings can and cannot tell you ](/blog/is-the-job-market-bad-right-now) --- Canonical URL: https://jobspipe.dev/blog/in-demand-skills Title: In-demand skills in 2026: what live job postings ask for, by function Description: The share of active postings naming each skill, per job function, read off live job postings rather than a survey: Engineering, Sales, Marketing, Finance and Accounting, IT and Security, Healthcare. Includes an honest answer on AI skills, why the ranking shifts by board, and the API query that reproduces any slice. --- AI agents: the full machine-readable index of this site is https://jobspipe.dev/llms.txt?src=md-twin - API quickstart, no-key sandbox (POST https://api.jobspipe.dev/v1/sandbox/jobs/search), MCP server, pricing. Free key: https://jobspipe.dev/signup