How long do job postings stay up?
Measured from JobsPipe crawl sightings rather than from the date printed on the board. On boards read straight from the employer’s applicant tracking system, the median posting that closed recently was live for about 14 days on Greenhouse and 8 days on Lever. On LinkedIn and Indeed, closures cluster at the 30-day listing expiry.
Days live by job board
The table covers postings that closed in the last 60 days, dated from their first sighting in the crawl log. Two mechanisms produce two very different pictures. Boards read straight from the employer’s applicant tracking system (Greenhouse, Ashby, Lever, Y Combinator, Paylocity) drop a posting from their feed when the requisition closes, and JobsPipe records the removal at the next crawl. LinkedIn, Indeed and the enterprise boards checked on a recheck cycle (Workday, Workable, SmartRecruiters) keep a listing until the employer closes it or the 30-day listing expiry runs out, so their closures land at the expiry mark almost by definition.
| Board | Median days live | 75th percentile | Closed within 7 days | Closed within 30 days | Closure detection |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Lever | 8 | 10 | 43.8% | 93.0% | continuous, from the board feed |
| Paylocity | 13 | 14 | 22.7% | 96.5% | continuous, from the board feed |
| Ashby | 14 | 33 | 20.4% | 69.6% | continuous, from the board feed |
| Greenhouse | 14 | 36 | 20.5% | 68.1% | continuous, from the board feed |
| Indeed | 30 | 35 | 8.4% | 51.8% | at the 30-day listing expiry |
| 30 | 36 | <0.5% | 51.5% | at the 30-day listing expiry | |
| Y Combinator | 33 | 47 | 16.9% | 43.4% | continuous, from the board feed |
- Lever93.0%
- Paylocity96.5%
- Ashby69.6%
- Greenhouse68.1%
- Indeed51.8%
- LinkedIn51.5%
- Y Combinator43.4%
Still open after two and four weeks
Survival is only meaningful where removals are detected continuously, so this cut is limited to the boards fed by an applicant tracking system. It answers the question the other way round: of the postings first sighted 14 and 30 days ago, what share is still open today?
| Board | Still open after 14 days | Still open after 30 days |
|---|---|---|
| Greenhouse | 35.0% | 27.1% |
| Ashby | 71.6% | 69.5% |
| Lever | 66.0% | 56.7% |
| Y Combinator | 98.0% | 86.8% |
| Paylocity | 100.0% | 13.7% |
How to see when a job was posted
The date a board prints is the date of the latest renewal, not the first publication. LinkedIn and Indeed reset it on every repost and many applicant tracking systems do the same when a recruiter edits the requisition. A crawl log keeps the first sighting. Every JobsPipe record returns discovered_at (first sighting), last_seen_at, date_posted (the board’s date), status and closed_at. To pull the closed postings for one company and read how long each was live:
curl -X POST https://api.jobspipe.dev/v1/jobs/search \
-H "Authorization: Bearer $JOBSPIPE_API_KEY" \
-H "Content-Type: application/json" \
-d '{ "company_name_or": ["Acme"], "status": "closed", "limit": 50 }'For a single posting, the checker on the ghost jobs page takes a LinkedIn, Indeed or ATS URL and shows the same fields. The six manual methods are in How to find old job postings.
FAQ
How long do job postings stay up?
It depends on where the posting lives. On boards read straight from the employer's applicant tracking system, the median posting that closed in the last 60 days was live for about 14 days on Greenhouse and 8 days on Lever. On LinkedIn and Indeed, listings run until the employer closes them or the 30-day listing expiry ends, so closures cluster at the 30-day mark.
How long do job postings stay up on Indeed?
Indeed listings stay up until the employer closes them or the listing expires, which for most postings happens around the 30-day mark. Indeed sponsored postings can be renewed, so a role you saw last month may be the same requisition renewed rather than a new opening.
How long do job postings stay up on LinkedIn?
LinkedIn job posts expire after 30 days unless the poster renews them, and free posts can close earlier once the employer has enough applicants. In JobsPipe sightings, LinkedIn closures land almost entirely at the 30-day expiry rather than spread across the month.
How can I see when a job was actually posted?
The date on the board resets whenever a posting is renewed or reposted. A crawl log does not: the JobsPipe API returns discovered_at (first sighting), last_seen_at and date_posted on every record, and the checker on the ghost jobs page shows them for any supported posting URL.
Does a job posting still being up mean the job is still open?
Not always. 28.6% of active postings on the ten collected boards were first sighted more than 30 days ago, and 8.0% were seen again after a gap of ten days or more. Long-lived and reposted listings are the raw material of ghost jobs.