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Skills-based hiring is gaining ground, but it has not made degrees irrelevant. Employers may assess practical skills alongside education, and some jobs still require a degree or license. The useful question is what a specific role requires, what evidence of competence it accepts, and whether changes to hiring policy have produced different hiring outcomes.
What skills-based hiring means—and what it does not
Skills-based hiring means evaluating candidates for the abilities a job needs instead of relying specifically on degree or GPA signals. Employers might look at a work sample, an assessment, relevant experience, a credential, or how a candidate explains skills gained through coursework and other activities.
It is not necessarily degree-free hiring. A degree can remain a legal or professional requirement, a useful qualification, or one of several ways to demonstrate competence. A skills-based process can also evaluate skills during screening or interviews while still considering education and experience.
What the 2026 evidence actually measures
Employer use is rising, but the survey is not a count of hires
The National Association of Colleges and Employers (NACE) reported in its January 2026 Job Outlook 2026 survey that 70% of responding employers used skills-based hiring for entry-level hires, up from 65% in the prior survey. Seven in 10 said they used it at least half the time, most often during screening and interviewing. NACE collected the employer data from August 7 to September 22, 2025, and 183 employers responded.
That is self-reported survey evidence about employers’ practices—not the share of all entry-level hires made without a degree. Skills-based evaluation can happen in a hiring process that still includes a degree requirement.
Many students do not know the label
In a separate NACE student survey, fewer than 40% of graduating seniors said they were familiar with the term “skills-based hiring.” The survey ran from April 1 to May 30, 2025, and included 13,684 college students, including 1,479 bachelor’s-level Class of 2025 seniors. The finding measures familiarity with the phrase, not whether students can demonstrate job-relevant skills.
Minimum education requirements vary sharply by occupation
The U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics’ 2025 Occupational Requirements Survey (ORS), released in 2026, estimated that 32.5% of workers had no minimum formal education requirement, 39.3% required a high-school diploma, and 17.7% required a bachelor’s degree. These categories do not add to 100% because other education levels also apply.
The estimates represent 148,672,800 civilian workers and are based on samples collected from August 2023 through July 2025. The ORS measures minimum formal education requirements for jobs; it does not show which credential employers prefer when comparing otherwise similar candidates. Requirements also vary within the broader labor market: the survey estimated a bachelor’s degree requirement for 83.9% of fundraisers and 82.9% of marketing managers. BLS advises against treating the 2025 estimates as a time series with earlier ORS publications.
Policy changes, postings, talent pools, and hires are different measures
The National Governors Association (NGA) reported in February 2025 that more than half of state governments had policies encouraging skills-based hiring and that states with such policies saw faster growth in job postings without degree requirements. That is evidence of policy and posting changes, not by itself proof of increased hiring of candidates without degrees.
A 2024 report from Burning Glass Institute and Harvard Business School likewise found that many companies announced changes to degree requirements, while sustained hiring changes remained elusive for most. These findings caution against treating a revised job posting or policy as an outcome measure.
LinkedIn Economic Graph Research Institute’s March 2025 analysis modeled the potential global talent pool. It reported that skills-based hiring expanded the modeled pool 6% more for workers without bachelor’s degrees than for degree holders—6.3x versus 5.9x in the study. This is a modeled pool estimate, not a count of new hires, and the analysis found variation by industry and geography. LinkedIn also cautions against direct comparisons with its 2023 report.
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1Fix the driver behind crashes, sound loss and screen glitches2Repair Windows errors before they cause bigger problems3Scan for outdated or missing drivers - takes under a minuteEmployers may value both applied skills and education
WGU’s Workforce Decoded report draws on 3,147 U.S.-based respondents surveyed from September 30 to October 15, 2025. It reports that employers continue to value degrees while placing greater value on applied skills and familiarity with emerging technologies. The NC Employer Needs Survey similarly reports that demonstrated skills and work experience were valued more than degrees and certifications among its employer respondents. These surveys have different scopes; together, they support a role-dependent approach, not a universal claim that skills have replaced degrees.
How to compare the two pathways for a particular job
| Question | Degree-focused signal | Skills-focused signal | What to check |
|---|---|---|---|
| What does the role require? | A degree may be a stated minimum or preferred qualification. | Specific competencies may be named instead of, or alongside, a degree. | Separate legal or licensing requirements from an employer’s preferred screening criteria. |
| What evidence can a candidate offer? | A degree documents formal study, but does not alone establish every job skill. | Work samples, assessments, experience, credentials, or clear examples can demonstrate abilities. | Identify which forms of evidence the employer actually accepts. |
| Where are skills evaluated? | Education can be screened early as a qualification. | Skills may be assessed in screening, interviews, or later stages. | Look for an assessment or interview process that tests the skills the role uses. |
| Does the process widen access? | A degree minimum can exclude some otherwise capable candidates. | Removing that filter may widen the potential candidate pool. | Pool estimates and posting changes do not establish who was hired. |
| Did the change work? | A degree requirement may persist without evidence that it predicts success in the role. | Skills-first evaluation can be assessed through hiring and retention data. | Compare applicants, offers, hires, retention, and job performance against a baseline. |
For regulated or licensed work, verify the applicable credential or licensing rules before treating a degree as optional. For other roles, read the posting closely: a degree described as preferred is different from a required credential, and neither phrase alone tells you how skills will be evaluated.
What candidates can do with the reality gap
Translate experience into job evidence
Whether or not you have a degree, connect your experience to the role’s stated skills. Use specific examples from paid work, projects, coursework, volunteering, or other relevant activity, and explain what you did and what the result was. NACE president and CEO Shawn VanDerziel noted in January 2026 that graduates build skills through coursework and co-curricular activities, and that employers are interested in candidates who can articulate how those experiences relate to work.
Check hard requirements before investing in an application
If a role requires a license or a credential mandated for that occupation, a work sample is not a substitute. Where the posting does not identify a hard requirement, consider asking the recruiter which forms of experience, assessment, or work evidence can meet the qualification.
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Do not mistake the posting for a guarantee
A job ad that omits a degree requirement may broaden eligibility, but the available evidence does not establish that any individual applicant’s chances, pay, or long-term career outcomes will improve as a result. Focus on the skills the employer names and the evidence you can provide.
Independent reader supportYour contribution helps us test, update, and keep practical guides available for everyone.How employers can tell whether skills-first hiring changed anything
Changing a policy or rewriting a posting is an implementation step, not proof of impact. The NGA’s September 24, 2026 toolkit recommends measuring outcomes such as applicant volume and mix, offers and hires made to candidates without degrees, employee turnover and retention, changes to degree requirements, competency signals in postings, and how clearly skills are visible.
- Choose a focused pilot. Select a role or job family where the required competencies can be described and assessed.
- Set a baseline. Record existing applicant, offer, hire, retention, and posting data for the roles in scope.
- Specify acceptable evidence. Define which work samples, assessments, experience, credentials, or education demonstrate each competency, while retaining required degrees or licenses.
- Compare results before scaling. Review outcomes against the baseline and decide whether the process changed candidate access or hiring results—not just the language in the posting.
The NGA toolkit frames this as an additional pathway rather than a replacement for all others: “Skills-based talent practices are not about replacing one pathway with another.”
The practical verdict
In 2026, skills-based hiring is more visible in employer surveys and public policy, but the evidence does not show that degrees have stopped mattering. Some occupations have substantial formal education requirements; in others, employers may accept different evidence of competence. Treat adoption surveys, job-posting changes, modeled talent pools, and actual hires as separate measures. For any role, the decisive questions are what the job requires, how skills are assessed, and whether outcomes improve when the hiring process changes.
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