Weekly Skills Pulse — April 18, 2026

Software Engineering leads hiring activity this week, with 8,955 new listings added across 17,618 active roles from 148 companies. Agile / Scrum is the biggest mover in the market, with demand surging to 7.8% in Software Engineering — a jump of 2.7 percentage points week over week.

Key Movements This Week

• Stakeholder Mgmt: 42.4% demand (down 10.3pp from last week) — This pullback in Product & Design suggests employers are reducing emphasis on this skill.
• AWS: 22.6% demand (down 8.1pp from last week) — This pullback in Security suggests employers are reducing emphasis on this skill.
• AWS: 20.2% demand (down 7.4pp from last week) — This pullback in Product & Design suggests employers are reducing emphasis on this skill.
• Scala: 23.8% demand (down 7.2pp from last week) — This pullback in Software Engineering suggests employers are reducing emphasis on this skill.
• AWS: 20.8% demand (down 7.0pp from last week) — This pullback in Software Engineering suggests employers are reducing emphasis on this skill.
• Excel: 15.5% demand (down 7.0pp from last week) — This pullback in Software Engineering suggests employers are reducing emphasis on this skill.
• LLMs / GenAI: 23.2% demand (down 6.8pp from last week) — Demand cooled materially in AI & Machine Learning, likely due to changing implementation preferences.
• Excel: 26.4% demand (down 6.6pp from last week) — This pullback in Product & Design suggests employers are reducing emphasis on this skill.

Category Spotlight: Software Engineering

1. Scala — 23.8% (↓ 7.2pp)
2. AWS — 20.8% (↓ 7.0pp)
3. Stakeholder Mgmt — 18.6% (↓ 3.8pp)
4. Excel — 15.5% (↓ 7.0pp)
5. Python — 14.2% (↓ 3.1pp)
6. React — 13.8% (↓ 1.5pp)
7. Java — 12.7% (↓ 3.2pp)
8. Node.js — 12.1% (↓ 4.2pp)
9. SQL — 11.8% (↓ 2.9pp)
10. TypeScript — 11.6% (↓ 1.5pp)

Rising Signals

Skills with the strongest upward momentum across all categories:

• Agile / Scrum +2.7 percentage points — now at 7.8% in Software Engineering
• CI/CD +2.3 percentage points — now at 20.3% in DevOps & Infrastructure
• Agile / Scrum +2.1 percentage points — now at 7.1% in AI & Machine Learning
• Power BI +1.7 percentage points — now at 5.8% in Data & Analytics
• Machine Learning +-1.6 percentage points — now at 6.0% in Software Engineering

Declining

• Stakeholder Mgmt -10.3 percentage points — down to 42.4% in Product & Design
• AWS -8.1 percentage points — down to 22.6% in Security
• AWS -7.4 percentage points — down to 20.2% in Product & Design

What This Signals

Agile/Scrum and CI/CD are the skills to prioritise this week, with Agile rising 2.7 percentage points in Software Engineering and CI/CD climbing 2.3 points in DevOps — signals that hiring managers are weighting delivery methodology and pipeline discipline over cloud platform credentials. Job seekers should deprioritise AWS certifications as a lead selling point after an 8.1-point drop, and anyone leaning on Stakeholder Management as a differentiator faces the steepest headwind in the market at -10.3 points. With 8,955 new listings entering a pool of 17,618 this week and Full Stack Developer accounting for 5,697 of those roles, hiring managers in Software Engineering — the most volatile category — should move quickly on screened candidates before competition resets again.

By the Numbers

• Total active listings: 17,618
• New listings this week: 8,955
• Most-hired role: Full Stack Developer (5697 listings)
• Top skill overall: Stakeholder Mgmt (42.4%)

Frequently Asked Questions

What tech skills are trending this week?

The fastest-rising skills this week are Agile / Scrum, CI/CD, Agile / Scrum. These showed the largest week-over-week demand increases across 17,618 active listings.

How many tech jobs were posted this week?

This week saw 8,955 new postings added, bringing the total active listings to 17,618 across 148 companies.

Which tech category has the most hiring activity?

Software Engineering showed the most hiring activity this week, with the largest aggregate skill movement across all tracked categories.

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Data sourced from 148 company career pages via Greenhouse, Lever and Ashby APIs. Updated daily. About our data & methodology.