What EU country had the highest job vacancy rate in the EU in Q3 2024?

The Netherlands boasted the highest job vacancy rate of any EU country in the third quarter of the year, with a rate of 4.3%, new data from Eurostat has revealed.

Other high vacancy rates were recorded in Belgium (4.2%), Austria (3.8%), Cyprus (3.5%) and Czechia (3.3%).

At the other end of the scale, the lowest job vacancy rate (in countries for which data is available) was recorded in Romania (0.8%), Bulgaria (0.8%), Poland (0.9%) and Spain (0.9%).

Job vacancy rate in European Union

In the third quarter of the year, the job vacancy rate stood at 2.3% in the European Union, down from 2.4% in the previous quarter and 2.7% in the corresponding period a year earlier. In the euro area, meanwhile, the rate stood at 2.5% in Q3, down from 2.6% the previous quarter and 3.0% the previous year.

Compared with the third quarter of 2023, the job vacancy rate increased in five EU countries, with the biggest increases seen in Cyprus (+0.6 percentage points) and Greece (+0.5 percentage points), and Germany seeing the biggest decrease, of 1.1 percentage points.

In terms of sectors, the job vacancy rate stood at 2.0% in industry and construction, and 2.5% in services in the EU in the third quarter of 2024. Read more here.

Job vacancy rate by EU member state, Q3 2024 (%)