A new UK government plan sets a shared ambition with industry to open around 200,000 genuine entry-level digital and technology jobs, including apprenticeships, over the next ten years. Published on 21 October, the Digital and Technologies Jobs Plan also estimates that employers may need to fill around 800,000 roles in relevant occupations between 2025 and 2035. The figures describe different things: the larger number is an indicative hiring estimate, while the smaller is an ambition, not a forecast.
The plan frames entry-level work as a route based on experience rather than age. It defines these roles as open to applicants with less than one year of relevant experience. Some posts may still require qualifications, depending on the occupation. The stated goal averages about 20,000 openings a year, with progress to be reported annually.
The estimate of 800,000 is not a prediction of 800,000 net new jobs. It combines an estimated 550,000 new positions across 30 priority occupations in sectors backed by the Industrial Strategy with roughly 250,000 replacements for people expected to retire or leave jobs in the digital and technologies sector. It excludes replacement needs in those occupations outside that sector. Within the digital and technologies sector itself, the plan gives a separate estimate of about 488,000 roles: around 239,000 additional jobs and 249,000 replacements.
The projections assume employment in the priority occupations grows from 2025 to 2035 at the average rate recorded in the closely related digital sector between 2011 and 2024. The analysis does not model the effect of artificial intelligence. Those qualifications matter: the estimate is a planning baseline, not a count of vacancies already available or a guarantee that the roles will materialise.
The plan’s proposed response is to bring several routes into a Digital and Tech Skills Deal, including work experience, T Level industry placements, apprenticeships, undergraduate placements and entry-level jobs. It calls on public and private employers to provide practical opportunities and says government should make it simpler and less risky for them to do so. It also proposes locally co-ordinated opportunities, with support for small and medium-sized businesses, and links skills development to public procurement.
The government says TechFirst will be used to inspire one million young people through technology and artificial-intelligence learning by 2028. The plan also points to expanded digital T Levels and technical pathways, and describes a goal of building practical AI skills among 10 million people by 2030. These are separate programme goals, rather than guaranteed job placements. The document says an updated assessment and refreshed commitments are due after a comprehensive review three years after publication.
An industry association that contributed to the plan says launch commitments include more than 10,000 work-experience, placement and learning opportunities from TechFirst partners. That figure is distinct from the 200,000 ambition and from actual hires: the opportunities include learning and placement activity, and the plan still depends on employers making commitments and delivering them. The association also cites a fall in the share of cyber-security job adverts open to people with under a year of experience, from 25 per cent in 2022 to 16 per cent in 2025, illustrating the challenge of turning training into a first job.
The plan identifies six frontier technology areas, including artificial intelligence, cyber security, semiconductors and advanced connectivity. For connectivity alone, it reports an estimated engineering shortfall of 30,000 over the next decade and notes that many telecoms engineers are over 50. Such sector-specific evidence points to workforce pressures, but does not establish that every occupation or region faces the same gap.
The central test will be whether the announced pathways translate into suitable openings that people can actually access. Annual reporting should help distinguish employer pledges, placements and completed hires; the plan itself acknowledges that the broad workforce estimates and the entry-level ambition need to be tracked separately.
