Jobs report: what the October 2026 numbers mean for your job search

The monthly jobs report, officially called the Employment Situation, is published by the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) at 8:30 a.m. ET, usually on the first Friday of the month. It combines two surveys: one of employers, which counts jobs, and one of households, which measures unemployment. The jobs report for October 2026 came out on November 6:

August and September are revised figures; October is a first estimate and will be revised twice in the next two reports. The BLS describes the unemployment rate as little changed, since a move of 0.1 point is within the margin of its household survey. The jobs number itself is the clearest signal: 165,000 is more than three times the monthly average of the past year.

• Professional and business services: +70,000. That includes professional, scientific and technical services (+33,000), administrative and support services (+28,000) and management of companies (+9,000). Temporary help services, part of this group, added about 19,000 jobs.
• Health care: +42,000, above its usual pace: hospitals (+16,000), home health care (+11,000) and outpatient care centers (+5,000). If you are applying in health care, see our nurse resume example.
• Transportation and warehousing: +25,000, mostly couriers and messengers (+17,000). The sector has added 104,000 jobs since February, just as holiday hiring starts. Our page on seasonal jobs lists who is recruiting for the holidays.
• Manufacturing: +19,000, with gains in computer and electronic products, machinery and primary metals. It is up 101,000 since December 2025.
• Little change: construction, retail, information, financial activities, leisure and hospitality, and government.

A strong month does not mean every search gets easier. The same report shows that 2.0 million people had been unemployed for 27 weeks or more, more than a quarter of all job seekers, and that the number of people working part time because they could not find full-time work or had their hours cut jumped by 339,000 to 4.8 million. Unemployment also depends on education: 2.6% for people with a bachelor's degree, 3.9% with some college or an associate degree, 3.8% with a high school diploma and 5.8% without one.

Where employers are adding jobs, a few habits make the difference:

1. Aim where the hiring is. Office, technical, health care and logistics roles grew the most. If your experience fits one of them, put the matching job title and skills at the top of your resume.
2. Tailor each resume to the job posting. Reuse its key terms honestly in your summary and skills. Our guide to resume skills shows how to choose them.
3. Make the file readable by the applicant tracking system (ATS): selectable text, standard section headings, nothing important inside an image.
4. Explain a long gap in one line rather than hiding it: a course, caregiving, freelance work or a temporary job all count. Temporary and seasonal roles are growing, and they are a common bridge back to a permanent job.

Average hourly earnings for private-sector employees rose by 14 cents in October, to $38.00, and by 3.1% over twelve months. For production and nonsupervisory employees, the figure was $32.75. Consumer prices rose 3.7% over the year to September, as reported by NPR and USA Today, so pay is still growing a little more slowly than prices on average.

The jobs report covers the whole country. Unemployment rates by state and by metro area come from separate BLS releases published later, and they can be very different from the national 4.1%. For a job search in a given state, its labor department and its own data are the better guide.

• JOLTS report for October (job openings, hires, quits): Tuesday, December 1, 2026, at 10:00 a.m. ET. See our JOLTS report page.
• ADP National Employment Report for November (private payrolls): published two days before the jobs report. See our ADP jobs report page.
• Jobs report for November 2026: Friday, December 4, 2026, at 8:30 a.m. ET.

We update this page with each new jobs report. For announced layoffs and hiring plans, see the Challenger report.