Graduate job postings in Australia dropped 24% from 2023 to 2024, and a further 16% in early 2025. Yes, the market is harder than it was two years ago. No, it is not harder than it was before the pandemic, when postings were still 1.7 times lower than the post-COVID boom.
If you are making decisions based on "the market is impossible right now," you are working from the wrong premise. That belief is shaping your strategy, and it is probably making you apply more and network less.
Why 2022 and 2023 were not a normal market
Post-pandemic, Australia had genuine skills shortages across almost every industry. Graduate job postings in 2023 were 2.4 times higher than in 2018. Employers were competing for graduates, roles sat open for months, and hiring spread across the full year instead of peaking in March and April as it normally does.
That was the anomaly. The correction was inevitable.
What the data actually says now
Postings dropped 24% from 2023 to 2024. The full-time employment rate for graduates fell from 79% to 74% in the same period. For international graduates already navigating visa hesitation from employers, that shift felt sharper.
But graduate postings in 2024 were still 1.7 times higher than 2019. Three years after graduating, 91% of Australian undergraduates are in full-time work. The market corrected. It did not collapse.
The problem is not that jobs are gone. The problem is that the strategies that worked when employers were desperate, bulk applying, waiting for grad program timelines, no follow-up, do not work when employers have a full inbox.
What "more competitive" actually means for you
In 2022, sending 30 applications might get you 10 interviews. Today, 30 weak applications might get you one or two.
It means quality matters more than volume. It means timing matters more. Graduate hiring has returned to its traditional peak in March and April. Miss that window and you're often waiting a full year for the same roles to come back around.
It means networking carries more weight now than it did during the boom years. When 400 people apply for 15 spots, a referral or a familiar name moves you out of the pile. In accounting and professional services, the average firm receives nearly 6,000 applications for 225 graduate positions.
That's not impossible odds. But a generic application has almost no chance.
Ask someone who got hired in 2015
Ask a graduate who landed a role in 2015 or 2016 how many applications they sent. Most will say somewhere between 20 and 60.
Ask a 2024 graduate the same question and you'll often hear numbers in the hundreds.
Part of that is because applying on LinkedIn takes 10 seconds. Part of it is that applicant-to-role ratios have genuinely increased in competitive industries. But a big part of it is strategy. If each individual application is generic and untailored, you send more of them to compensate. It doesn't work.
The graduates landing roles right now are sending fewer, better applications and spending the rest of their time having direct conversations with people in their target industry. That's what the data supports, and what we see in practice through our 1-on-1 mentoring sessions.
The honest answer
Yes, it's harder than 2022 and 2023. No, it's not harder than it was before the boom.
For international students specifically, the challenge has always been real. Visa uncertainty, employer hesitation, less of a built-in network. None of that is new. What changed is that the unusually forgiving market briefly masked those challenges. Now it doesn't.
The graduates succeeding right now are not the ones who got lucky. They're the ones who started building relationships and local experience before they needed them.
Headstart mentors landed their roles in 2023, 2024, and 2025, across this exact market. They know what's working now, not what worked five years ago. Book a free call to find out what that looks like for your specific situation.
For a breakdown of what actually gets international students hired beyond the market conditions, read: Your University Degree Doesn't Get You Hired in Australia. Here's What Does.