This release is categorised as a CSO Frontier Series Output. Particular care must be taken when interpreting the statistics in this release as it may use new methods which are under development and/or data sources which may be incomplete, for example new administrative data sources.
This release will shortly begin using the new NACE Rev.2.1 classification. This updated EU-wide system of classification replaces NACE Rev.2 and will better reflect emerging economic activities and provide a more accurate picture of the Irish economy. Users will be advised when this new classification system will be applied to this release. For more information on the upcoming changes, visit our NACE - Classification of Economic Activities webpage.
To publish Labour Market Churn (LMC) in a timelier manner and to better align with our National Accounts Division’s Quarterly National Accounts release, LMC releases are produced using an earlier version of Revenue’s PAYE Modernisation (PMOD) data and this commenced with the LMC Q1 2025 release. Due to this change, reference quarter data will be released provisionally and finalised in the subsequent release. Provisional data may be subject to larger revisions than previously experienced. Finalised figures will continue to be subject to the yearly revision of PMOD data.
Data for Q2 2025 has been revised in line with current revision methodology. Additionally, Q2 2025 data contains revisions due to a restructuring of a number of business entities.
Job churn in Quarter 1 (Q1) 2026 was 341,128, up 32,856 (10.7%) from Q1 2025. The associated job churn rate for Q1 2026 was 12.0%, up 1.1 percentage points from the 10.9% recorded in Q1 2025.
The total number of jobs created in Q1 2026 was 132,779, an increase of 27,014 (25.5%) when compared with Q1 2025.
There were 113,880 job destructions in Q1 2026, which was 27,326 (19.4%) less than the number recorded 12 months earlier.
The 303,343 hirings recorded in Q1 2026 were 43,442 (16.7%) more than the 259,901 noted in Q1 2025.
In Q1 2026 a total of 284,444 job separations were recorded, down 10,898 (3.7%) from the 295,342 recorded in Q1 2025.
There were 142,191 separations from primary employments in Q1 2026. Of these, 105,770 (74.4%) people were no longer on the Revenue PAYE Modernisation (PMOD) system, 22,688 (16.0%) were employed but in a different economic sector, and 13,733 (9.7%) remained employed in the same economic sector but with a different organisation or company.
There were 2,558,629 people who stayed in their current employment, or stayers, in Q1 2026, up 19,337 (0.8%) from the 2,539,292 observed in Q1 2025.
Labour Market Churn is part of the CSO's Frontier Series of releases. It uses Revenue PMOD data to provide insights on employee turnover within the labour force. In addition, while the release does not capture the reasons behind employee job moves, it does detail whether job leavers remained employed in the same economic sector, a different sector, or have left PMOD employment.
The series covers the time period from Q2 2020 to the end of the current quarter, Q1 2026.
Job churn: Is a measure of employee turnover providing insight into the number of employees who changed job and stayed in the same job. It is a measure of employee turnover that captures employee job matches over and above the minimum that would be required to accommodate total labour market growth or decline.
Job churn rate: Measures job churn relative to total employment.
Stayers: People who remain in the same job are referred to as stayers; those who take up a new employment are referred to as hirings; and those who leave an employment are called separations.
Total employments: A combination of stayers and hirings.
Job creations: If an enterprise has more hirings than separations in a quarter, then it is said to have had job creations, with the net difference between hirings and separations being the number of job creations. Example:
Job destructions: Conversely, if an enterprise has more separations than hirings in a quarter, then it is said to have had job destructions, with the net difference between separations and hirings being the number of job destructions. Example:
Job creations and job destructions are a net figure based on hirings and separations at enterprise level. In each time period, an enterprise experiences either job creations, no change, or job destructions.
Primary employment: This refers to the main job of employees who have more than one employment. The Background Notes has more information.
| Table 1.1 Job Creation, Destruction, Churn, and Churn Rate | |||||
| Job Creation | Job Destruction | Job Churn | Job Churn Rate | ||
| Number | % | ||||
| Q1 2025 | 105,765 | 141,206 | 308,272 | 10.9 | |
| Q4 2025 | 119,561 | 150,756 | 354,024 | 12.4 | |
| Q1 2026 | 132,779 | 113,880 | 341,128 | 12.0 | |
| Quarterly Change (pp1) | 13,218 | -36,876 | -12,896 | -0.4 | |
| Annual Change (pp) | 27,014 | -27,326 | 32,856 | 1.1 | |
| Source: CSO Labour Market Churn | |||||
| 1pp refers to percentage point change | |||||
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Statistician's Comment
The Central Statistics Office (CSO) has today (28 May 2026) published Labour Market Churn results for Q1 2026.
Labour Market Churn is part of the CSO's Frontier Series of releases, which means care must be taken when interpreting these results as methodologies may change and data sources may be incomplete.
This release uses Revenue PMOD data to provide insights on employee turnover within the labour market. The release contains figures on employees who stay in their current job, those who leave an employment, and those who take up new jobs. It also provides breakdowns of the employee turnover figures by economic sector and firm size. For more information and definitions of the terminology used in the release, please see the Editor's Note below.
Commenting on today’s release, Conor Delves, Statistician in the Labour Market Analysis Section, said: “The job churn figure for Q1 2026 was 341,128, which was an increase of 32,856 (10.7%) from Q1 2025. The job churn rate, that is the job churn figure relative to total employment, for Q1 2026 was 12.0%, up 1.1 percentage points from the 10.9% recorded in Q1 2025.
There were 132,779 (25.5%) job creations in Q1 2026 and 113,880 (-19.4%) job destructions in the same period.
The largest year-on-year increase in job creations in Q1 2026 were seen in Accommodation & Food Service Activities, where creations rose by 8,382 and Human Health & Social Work Activities where creations were up 5,440.
In Q1 2026, the highest job churn rate was recorded in the Administrative & Support Service Activities sector (25.3%), while the lowest rate (3.6%) was recorded in the Services sector.
The firm size group that saw the highest job churn rate in Q1 2026 was those employing 50-249 people (14.4%). The lowest job churn rate in the quarter was in firms with between one and nine employees (6.2%)”