Average advertised salaries in the UK rose in December 2024 to hit £40,263, up 1.56% from November, according to job matching platform Adzuna.
Its latest UK job market report found that a continuing demand for skilled staff, along with employer hiring hesitancy, increased salaries by 7.15% from £37,577 in December 2023.
Most sectors saw an average annual salary increase on a month-by-month basis from November, such as travel by 5.22%, maintenance by 3.41%, logistics and warehouse by 3.34%, manufacturing by 2.81%, and graduate by 1.9%. The admin sector saw an 0.1% average salary fall.
Legal was the only sector to see an average salary drop on an annual basis, down -3.5% compared to December 2023. Sectors that saw high growth include maintenance by 19.45%, logistics and warehouse by 16.5%, and retail by 15.72%).
Meanwhile, advertised salaries in Northern Ireland saw the biggest annual growth of 13.77%, followed by the West Midlands and North East England. London and South East England had the smallest annual growth, though South West England overtook London by 5.7% in December.
The report also found that more UK employers have been hiding salaries in job postings (53.71%) compared to those who have not (46.29%). Last year was found to be the worst year on record for salary transparency, with just February having more jobs with salary information (50.7%) than without (49.3%).
Andrew Hunter, co-founder of Adzuna, said: “Jobseekers who were hoping for a continued streak of growth in available roles following November’s bounce will be disappointed, as vacancies fell again in December. This could be attributed to the seasonal hiring slowing down over the Christmas period.
“Sectors such as teaching continue to have a high volume of roles while legal, logistics and warehouse and sales roles have all experienced an annual increase compared to the same time last year. While it appears employers are not hiring as much, they are loosening their purse strings, with the average advertised salary now reaching over £40,000 for the first time since we started tracking the UK job market in 2016.”
