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Ask HN: How are you finding the job market in 2026?

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21–27 of 27 posts

Re: Ask HN: How are you finding the job market in 2026?

#22
For the unlucky, regular joe-shmoes who have to hunt for jobs, and don't come with the privilege of having relevant connections, the job market is getting tougher by the minute, not the least because of a flood of AI written applications paired with HR departments equally using AI for pre-filtering. Nobody reads any job descriptions, cover letters, CV's or applications anymore.

Re: Ask HN: How are you finding the job market in 2026?

#23

Jobs are dead, start a business. Even if it's the same thing you'd do as an employee. Trying to be a "software engineer looking for work" in 2026 is depressing - everyone hates that idea now

Well, this has me rethinking my tentative desire to pivot into software development after a year away from almost a decade in the wine import / distribution industry. Grew up during the 'Wild West' years of the WWW and have spent many moments regretting not pursuing the interest when the iron was hot. Is it gauche to ask if this would be an extremely poor decision for someone in their mid 30's?

Go build something in the wine import / distribution business. You have the domain knowledge no programmer or ai will.

Re: Ask HN: How are you finding the job market in 2026?

#24

Jobs are dead, start a business. Even if it's the same thing you'd do as an employee. Trying to be a "software engineer looking for work" in 2026 is depressing - everyone hates that idea now

Well, this has me rethinking my tentative desire to pivot into software development after a year away from almost a decade in the wine import / distribution industry. Grew up during the 'Wild West' years of the WWW and have spent many moments regretting not pursuing the interest when the iron was hot. Is it gauche to ask if this would be an extremely poor decision for someone in their mid 30's?

[dead]

Re: Ask HN: How are you finding the job market in 2026?

#25
Particularly in tech companies, I think we're in the midst of a shift toward folks that can own the work end to end from product, design, engineering, and beyond including with going to market.

People that can do this with a verifiable track record I think are in a good position to connect with job opportunities right now.

Re: Ask HN: How are you finding the job market in 2026?

#26
I find it terrible. I am applying and trying to find a software developer job for far too long now with 10 yoe. I might got myself into a awkward place by being a developer with Blazor technology that is kind of niche and not having enough paper trail of being a backend developer even though i can and i did work on backend easily but still. Every time i see a position i can easily do i just get automated rejections, or just silence. There is no humanity anymore at all. And i am in a position where i have a child on the way without light at the end of the tunnel regarding the job search.

Re: Ask HN: How are you finding the job market in 2026?

#27
My whole team got laid off recently and I have been in constant communication with them, I also have multiple friends who got laid off this year who shared the pain it has been to get a new role,

Market seems better than the last few years but it still does not feels right to me,

We have got multiple people reaching out but the majority of the roles are in-office or hybrid while I work fully remotely.

I posted on LinkedIn, with the help from friends I got quite a lot of visibility (most viral post I have ever had) but still, out of the ~10 recruiters that reached out, only 2 are remote roles, I also got a few offers to work for equity only.

I posted on the monthly "Who's wants to be hired?" thread, it has lead to a few offers to work for equity only + shady people that want me to attend calls and "delegate" the work to them while splitting the revenue.

I also got the people reaching out with promising offers with the intention of getting me to run their malware hidden in coding challenges + recruiters that magically have a role that hasn't been published yet but they use a gmail address, these ones just keep requesting more and more info like an Executive Summary.

I have also got a few referrals and even for these, they are moving slowly.

To put it in perspective, years before I'd easily get 10 recruiters in my inbox per week.

Market seems tough and I can't imagine what junior people are passing through while trying to get a job.

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