Ghost jobs waste applicants’ time. Bad advice wastes even more. Learn how to judge suspicious ads without talking yourself out of a real opportunity.
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Key Takeaways
You saw a great job and did everything right. Tailored your resume, submitted a thoughtful cover letter, then followed up.
And heard nothing.
You knew you were a great fit for the role. What you didn’t know was that the job didn’t even exist.
Welcome to the weird world of ghost jobs.
What are ghost jobs?
A ghost job is a job posting published by a real company for a position that either does not exist or the employer has no current intention of filling.
For the sake of clarity, it’s important to unpack the key points of this definition.
Published by a real company
This is important because it separates ghost jobs from outright scams.
Scammers post fake listings to steal money or identities. Ghost jobs come from legitimate employers with real employees, real careers pages, and real Glassdoor profiles.
That’s what makes them hard to spot.
No current intention of filling
This matters because the company might fill the role someday but there is no approved vacancy right now with a hiring manager waiting to screen applicants.
However, although the definition is clear, how you prove a job posting is a ghost job can be tricky because you don’t know what is happening behind closed doors in these companies.
One measure commonly applied for research purposes is time posted. The norm is considered to be 30 days and if the job ad remains after that it is seen as a red flag.
But, as a recruiter, I know this is too simplistic.
For example, I currently have multiple real jobs advertised for clients that have passed 30 days because the interview process is taking longer than anticipated. I have kept the job ads up, but I am telling new applicants that we are already at interview stage. This way they know where they stand, and I have backups in case the earlier applicants aren’t successful.
So, although a job advertised for longer than 30 days may be an indicator of it being a ghost job, it doesn’t prove that it actually is.
The best way of proving if a job is genuine or a ghost is when companies admit they are doing it, and several studies have shared their findings on this.
How common are ghost jobs?
No single methodology exists yet, so the figures vary depending on the country, platform and definition used. Some studies analyse whether advertised roles ultimately result in hires. Others rely on posting age or ask hiring managers whether their companies knowingly advertise positions they are not currently filling.
One of the more credible estimates comes from Greenhouse, which can see what happens to jobs posted through its hiring platform. It classified 18% to 22% of jobs posted in any given quarter as ghost jobs. Meanwhile, three in five candidates believed they had encountered one.
Here’s a quick snapshot.
The estimates differ considerably because the studies are not measuring precisely the same thing. Greenhouse used hiring outcomes from its own platform. A UK analysis from StandOut CV examined more than 91,000 listings and found that 34.4% of ads across 20 popular occupations had been live for more than 30 days. However, it treated age as an indicator of a probable ghost job not proof that every one of those positions was not real.
A 2024 working paper analysing Glassdoor data with machine-learning methods estimated that up to 21% of job advertisements could be ghost jobs. It also argued that these postings may distort official impressions of labour demand and contribute to job-search fatigue. It is a working paper rather than settled academic consensus, but its estimate sits in broadly similar territory.
So, we cannot confidently claim that a precise percentage of all job ads are ghosts. What we can say is that several very different studies have found the practice is common enough to be more than jobseeker paranoia.
By now you might have a few questions relating to why this practice even exists. Surely, it’s just a waste of everyone’s time? What does anyone gain from this?
To make this a bit clearer, I’m going to break this down into why employers do it and why recruiters do it. There’s definitely some natural overlap but there are slightly different use cases at play here.
Why do employers post ghost jobs?
Talent pipeline building
This is the number one reason cited across all surveys. Companies want to keep a warm database of candidates for roles they know will be coming available once something happens such as a budget is approved or a project is won. This way they get ahead of the game and don’t have to start from scratch when they get the green light.
If an ad is clearly labelled EOI (Expression of Interest), you shouldn’t automatically call it a ghost job. The employer is being reasonably upfront that it is building a pipeline rather than filling an immediate vacancy. The problem begins when an anticipated future requirement is advertised as though an approved vacancy exists today.
Growth signaling.
Job postings signal health to investors, clients, and competitors. Put simply, a hiring company looks like a thriving company. Again, these jobs aren’t real but this time the likelihood of them becoming available is more wishful thinking than reality.
Organisational change.
For example, say a role is approved in Q1, posted, but then frozen in Q2 due to uncertainty. Nobody takes the listing down because nobody knows if they should. They are waiting for someone somewhere to let them in on the secrets of change, so the listing drifts for months. Again, the job doesn’t exist but in this case, nobody knows if it ever will.
Market intelligence.
Resumes reveal salary expectations, competitor employee availability, and skill trends. It’s basically free labour market research at the applicant's expense. No job, no intention of recruiting.
Compliance theatre.
For example, for some Australian employer-sponsored visa nominations, businesses must show that they have tested the domestic labour market. This generally means advertising the position for at least four weeks during the four months before lodging the nomination.
The advertising may therefore be legally required even when the employer already has a preferred overseas candidate. Technically, though, the employer is still meant to test whether a suitable Australian worker is available, so not every labour-market-testing advertisement is automatically a ghost job.
Another example is when a company’s internal hiring policy requires them to advertise a role to the public even when they have a person they want to promote internally.
In both examples, applicants may have little realistic chance of securing the position but the circumstances are not identical, and neither automatically proves deliberate deception.
Employee motivation (or intimidation)
In one Resume Builder survey, 77% of hiring managers whose companies had posted fake listings claimed the practice had improved employee productivity.
That is a self-reported perception, not measured proof. It is also an impressively corporate way of saying, ‘We frightened people into working harder.’
The same survey found that 40% said their company had posted a ghost job during the previous year, 30% currently had one active and 69% considered the practice morally acceptable.Incompetence
This definitely can be a factor for a job still being advertised when it has either been pulled or filled. No good reason apart from disorganisation and laziness for this one.
Why do recruiters post ghost jobs?
Talent database building
A recruitment agency can have hundreds of jobs to recruit for but, if they don’t have the right candidates, they won’t make any money. It's a fast and cutthroat business and it's ‘first come first paid’ in terms of getting the right candidate to the right client at the right time. In other words, before another agency forwards them.
This means they often don’t have the luxury of waiting for advertising response for specific roles, so they need a steady supply of skilled workers ready to ship at short notice. This means they will regularly post job ads for positions that don’t yet exist but know they are likely to come available based on previously filled roles.
Confidential appointments
Sometimes recruiters simply cannot reveal the position they are recruiting for due to the sensitivity of the situation. Perhaps a senior executive is being promoted or not performing and being let go, or maybe a company is going in a direction they have yet to announce publicly.
Strictly speaking, this isn’t always a ghost job because there may be a genuine vacancy behind it. However, the advertised title, company, timing or reporting structure may be deliberately generic, making it look suspiciously ghost-like from the outside. It may also remain advertised for longer than 30 days while the situation unfolds.
Strength signaling
Just like employers doing this, recruiters may want to advertise roles that don’t yet exist in order to land permission for roles that do. If a prospective client company sees they have no roles advertised on their site, they may think twice about trusting them to recruit for their open positions.
Cost savings
Job advertising is expensive. Very expensive. Hundreds of dollars for one job ad that typically lasts for just 30 days. On top of that, it may not yield the results needed and therefore a recruiter won’t get paid by a client because they can’t provide the right candidate for the opening.
This is a big reason for ghost jobs being posted that cover multiple roles instead of just one to hedge their bets and pull in the maximum return for the recruiter’s investment. So yes, these are ghost jobs because the one described in the ad doesn’t exist but there are likely to be multiple real jobs it is based on.
Incompetence
Just like employers, this can be a reason for ghost jobs. They haven’t intentionally set out to post one but if they leave the ad up and it's filled or pulled, candidates are applying for jobs that no longer exist.
How to spot ghost jobs
This is tricky because, as mentioned before, you really don’t know or understand what is going on behind closed doors in companies or agencies.
The truth is that some ghost jobs simply aren’t ghost jobs at all, but that doesn’t mean they don’t exist and it’s not a problem for jobseekers.
Applying for jobs that were never genuinely available wastes time, damages trust and can contribute to job-search fatigue. The 2024 Glassdoor study cited earlier specifically warned about fatigue and distorted labour-market signals. That doesn’t mean every unanswered application was swallowed by an ATS or sent to a ghost job but repeated effort with no visible result takes a toll.To help you, here are the top tips given if you check out this subject in ChatGPT, Google or YouTube but with a word of caution from me for each.
Postings older than 30 days
The reasoning is that companies and recruiters are flooded with applications, thanks in large part to AI-assisted applications, so a role still advertised after 30 days must be suspicious.
Could be true but also might not.
There is evidence that application volume and relevance are moving in opposite directions: LinkedIn found that almost 40% of jobseekers were applying for more jobs but hearing back less, while 73% of HR professionals said fewer than half of the applications they received met all the advertised criteria.
Just because you have hundreds of applications doesn’t mean you find that one great fit for the role. AI assisted applications are so quick and easy that a lot of people are applying for a lot of jobs that they are honestly not qualified for. This is my daily reality as a recruiter, and I know this slows down the whole process.
If you then add that to the fact that most recruiters and companies are recruiting for multiple roles at once, it then becomes feasible that it may well take more than 30 days to find the right candidate.
In other words, applicants are sending more submissions and employers are rejecting more and more applications. A job remaining open after 30 days is a clue at best and certainly not proof of a ghost job.
The job isn’t on the company’s career page
The reasoning here is that the job ad may not be real if it is not included with other ‘real jobs’ on the company’s own site.
Again, could be true but might not.
Definitely check if contact details correspond with the actual company because it may in fact be a fake job.
However, recruiters don’t always place all their jobs on their own job pages for a multitude of reasons.
Plus, remember it costs nothing to place it on their site but hundreds of dollars to advertise on a career site. If anything, you’re more likely to find ghost jobs on their own site so this reason doesn't stand up to real world scrutiny.
Vague and short job descriptions
The reasoning here is that if you see an ad with no named hiring manager, limited duties, minimal essential skills and no specific reporting structure then it is a ghost job.
Again, yes, it could be.
But it might just be that the person posting it lacks the necessary skills to write a good job ad or they need to be vague for various confidential reasons that we covered before.
There’s also another reason for shorter job ads. People’s attention spans are far smaller these days and there is a trend of keeping ads to the bare minimum to stop the scroll and keep their attention.
So again, this could be a sign of a ghost job but it’s not conclusive.
My reason for challenging these popular assumptions is not to confuse you. I just want to give you the full story so you will be in a good position to answer this question.
Should you apply for ghost jobs?
Common advice on LinkedIn, Instagram and Reddit is no way, don’t go anywhere near them. You’ll waste your time and there is never a positive outcome.
I disagree that you should never apply.
Here’s why.
Why wouldn’t you want to be in an employer’s or recruiter’s talent pool?
Whilst it might be disappointing if the actual job they advertised doesn’t exist yet, you will be in the running for it if and when it does. Also, they may well have other suitable opportunities they haven’t advertised yet that you will be the first to know about.
Genuine multiple roles
A lot of the research points the finger at repeated similar ads over months as proof of ghost jobs. Again though, that is simplistic and shows they don’t fully understand the recruitment industry.
For example, when I was working as an internal recruiter for a civil construction company we had repeat roles in different geographical areas every single month. Site Engineers, Project Engineers, Senior Project Engineers and Project Managers. This was because we had new projects coming on board all the time and we were internally promoting people leaving skill gaps in the business. Did I run virtually the same ads every 30 days? Yes. Were the jobs real? Also yes.
Multiple identical or similar job ads can of course be employers or recruiters posting ghost jobs but often they are a sign of a growing organisation. Don’t you want to be part of that?
If it’s a company you want to join, you get on their radar regardless
Oftentimes employers and recruiters have a list of people they are aware of that would be a great fit for opportunities. Other times, there are candidates that are perfect but they are unaware of them. Don’t you want them to know about you?
Conclusion
Don’t let a potential ghost job spook you.
Ghost jobs are real but, unfortunately, much of the advice about spotting them isn’t.
An ad being 30 days old doesn’t prove the job isn’t real. Neither does a vague description, a repeated listing or its absence from the company’s careers page. They are clues, not conclusions.
That doesn’t mean you should donate hours of your life to every suspicious vacancy on LinkedIn. Be selective. If the role looks questionable and you couldn’t care less about the company, move on. Your time is worth more than a speculative application to an employer you weren’t particularly interested in anyway.
But if it is a company you genuinely want to work for and a role you are really interested in, apply. Then go beyond the application. Contact the recruiter or hiring manager, introduce yourself and get on their radar.
Just alter what success means in your mind.
You may not be applying for an immediate vacancy. You may be introducing yourself before the real one appears. Treat it as a targeted marketing exercise, not an expectation that an interview is coming.
The biggest mistake isn’t applying for a job that turns out to be a ghost.
It’s allowing bad advice about ghost jobs to frighten you away from a real opportunity.
FAQ
What is the difference between a ghost job and a fake job?
A fake job is typically posted by a scammer to obtain money or personal information. A so-called ghost job usually comes from a legitimate company and may represent a future vacancy, talent-pipeline campaign, delayed appointment or role that has recently changed status.
Is an Expression of Interest the same as a ghost job?
No. An Expression of Interest (EOI) openly tells applicants that there may not be an immediate vacancy. It allows employers to identify suitable people before projects, budgets or workforce requirements are confirmed.
Why do companies advertise jobs before receiving final approval?
Recruitment takes time. Advertising early allows a company to understand candidate availability, likely salaries and how difficult the role may be to fill. If approval arrives, their recruitment campaign can move quickly instead of starting from scratch.
What does it mean when a company says it will keep your resume on file?
It usually means you were not selected for that particular opportunity, but the employer or recruiter believes your experience could suit another role. Whether anything comes from it depends on the quality of the talent database and whether anyone remembers to search it.
How can you ask whether a job is currently active without sounding suspicious?
Keep it neutral and practical:
“I’m interested in the role and wanted to check where you are in the recruitment process. Are you actively interviewing now, or building a candidate pipeline for a future requirement?”
That gives you useful information without accusing the employer of advertising an imaginary job.
