A job in Britain’s booming technology sector is something of a golden ticket for young people lucky enough to find one. The average advertised tech salary is around 60 per cent above the UK average. The government’s industrial strategy expects the digital and technologies sector to create more than half a million jobs by 2035. The task now is to make sure more young people, including those without degrees, get the chance to hold one of those tickets. Our new tech labour market briefing gives us the clearest picture yet of how. It uses data from Lightcast, a labour market analytics firm that collects and analyses job adverts posted online across the UK, covering more than six million tech job postings since 2019. The picture is of a sector changing fast. Tech job postings fell from around 1.5 million in 2022 to roughly 470,000 in the year to June 2026, though they are now showing signs of stabilising. The focus has also shifted towards senior roles, whose share of tech vacancies rose from 13 per cent to 24 per cent since 2019, while entry-level adverts fell from 114,000 to 57,000. Some new roles are booming. AI engineer job ads, for example, rose 42 per cent in the past year. But most specialist AI roles are aimed at graduates rather than younger talent. In fact, eight of the ten fastest-growing tech occupations advertised no entry-level roles at all. The good news is that employers are still backing non-graduate talent. Of entry-level tech adverts that state an education requirement, almost half are open to people without degrees, a share that has held steady since 2019. Non-degree entry-level postings also rose by 7 per cent in the latest year. Young people want in, too. DfE figures show 18,250 16 to 24-year-olds were enrolled on digital technology courses in further education in 2024-25, and starts on digital apprenticeships have more than doubled in four years to more than 31,000. The appetite is there. The challenge is making sure there are first-rung jobs waiting at the end. Employers are also telling us what they want, and in tech the demand for essential skills has risen faster than across the rest of the labour market. Communication appears in 67 per cent of non-degree entry-level adverts, alongside attributes like problem solving and customer service. Technical support and Microsoft 365 skills also feature, while demand for AI skills is growing rapidly, including in entry-level roles. This is territory FE knows well. Strong essential skills, practical technical training and confidence with new tools are what the sector does best. Linking that training closely to the roles employers are advertising, and to the places those jobs are, could open the door for thousands more young people. The FE sector also has long experience of serving the students most in need. We know that young people without degrees are more likely to come from disadvantaged backgrounds and to be at risk of falling out of education and employment. For their part, employers can protect and grow their first-rung roles. That means investing in apprenticeships and structured junior jobs, and asking whether a degree requirement is needed at all. Opening up a role to non-graduates widens the talent pool overnight. Training providers can build provision around real demand. The data shows which occupations are hiring at entry level and which skills they ask for. Courses that combine those skills with work experience and employer contact give young people the best chance of being hired. Policymakers can join the dots. Programmes such as TechFirst are a very welcome step, and local skills strategies will go furthest when they are grounded in where entry-level tech jobs are and what they require. The Hg Foundation wants to play its part. Today, with JPMorganChase, we are launching a £3.4 million AI & Economic Opportunity Fund. Over three years it will support the most promising programmes helping more than 900 young people without degrees into tech apprenticeships and careers. The Fund will back programmes that teach AI-relevant skills and pair them with what young people need most to get hired: work experience, mentoring and connections to employers. It will also build the evidence on what works, so the best approaches can be shared and scaled across the country. Tech can be one of the UK’s clearest routes to social mobility. With the rapid onset of AI, it has never been more important that the sector harnesses talent from all walks of life. Together, we can make sure the first rung is within reach for every young person with the talent to climb.