How many applications does it take to get an interview?
There is no single number. A 2018 BLS survey of unemployed job seekers found about six applications per interview on average, while a New York Fed survey implies far more. The ratio depends on who applies, for what, and how it was measured.
Search "how many applications to get an interview" and you will find confident answers: 10, 50, 100, 200. Most of them have no source. This guide sticks to what government and Federal Reserve survey data actually report, with the date and the sample for each figure, so you can see how wide the range is and what to do about it.
What the BLS survey found
The best public look at applications and interviews together comes from a supplement to the Current Population Survey, the same household survey that produces the U.S. unemployment rate. In May and September 2018 it asked unemployed people who had looked for work in the past four weeks how many jobs they applied for in the last two months and how many of those led to an interview. The BLS published the results in a November 2020 Beyond the Numbers article.
Its headline: on average, jobseekers in the sample sent 13.67 applications and had 1.93 interviews, an interview-to-application ratio of 0.168, or roughly one interview per six applications. The BLS notes that this ratio relies on assuming the middle of each answer band, so it is an approximation rather than an exact count.
The spread behind that average is the more useful part. Here is how interviews were distributed by number of applications sent, from the same article:
| Applications in last 2 months | 0 interviews | 1 or 2 | 3 to 7 | 8 or more |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 to 10 | 38.3% | 47.3% | 12.6% | 1.8% |
| 11 to 20 | 26.7% | 35.1% | 32.0% | 6.2% |
| 21 to 80 | 19.2% | 32.7% | 33.4% | 14.7% |
| 81 or more | 14.8% | 19.9% | 35.4% | 29.9% |
Source: BLS, Current Population Survey supplement, 2018. Even among people who applied to 11 to 20 jobs, more than one in four had no interview in the period, and among those who applied to 1 to 10, nearly two in five had none. A single average hides a lot of people who got nothing and a few who got many.
Interviews and offers
The same BLS article reports what interviews led to. Jobseekers who had at least one interview from their recent applications had about a 37% chance of having received a job offer, against about 10% for those with none. Across all jobseekers in the sample, 26% had received an offer. The offer question covers any offer since the person last worked, so it is not limited to the two-month application window.
What the New York Fed survey found
A second source is the job search supplement that the New York Fed has fielded each October since 2013 as part of its Survey of Consumer Expectations. Researchers at the Federal Reserve and universities analyzed the 2013 to 2017 waves pooled together in NBER Working Paper 23731, revised in June 2020. It asks about the last four weeks, covers employed and non-employed people, and reports these averages:
| Group (October 2013 to 2017 waves) | Applications sent, last 4 weeks | Job interviews, last 4 weeks |
|---|---|---|
| Unemployed | 8.50 | 0.224 |
| Employed and looking for work | 4.17 | 0.314 |
Source: Faberman, Mueller, Şahin and Topa, NBER Working Paper 23731. The interview figures are for 2014 to 2017. These are survey averages including people who sent applications and got nothing.
The same paper found that employed job seekers received about as many job offers as the unemployed while sending far fewer applications. Its authors' New York Fed Liberty Street Economics post adds that even employed people who were not looking received employer contacts and offers, which points to the role of informal contacts and recruiting.
Why the numbers vary so much
The two surveys do not disagree so much as measure different things. Reasons the figures spread out:
- Different people. The BLS sample is unemployed people looking for work. The New York Fed survey splits unemployed, employed job seekers and others, and their results differ a lot.
- Different time windows. The BLS asked about two months; the New York Fed asked about four weeks. A short window can miss interviews that haven't happened yet.
- Self-reported counts. Both are surveys. People round, forget and count differently, for example whether a quick one-click submission counts as an application.
- Different roles and markets. The tables we used don't break the ratio out by occupation or by how many applicants each job attracted, so the averages cannot tell you what to expect for your role.
- Effort and prospects interact. Research using application data from a job search website found that people who searched longest sent relatively more applications per week throughout, which the authors interpret as people with the weakest prospects searching hardest. The paper, "The Intensity of Job Search and Search Duration" (San Francisco Fed working paper 2016-13), was later published in the American Economic Journal: Macroeconomics in 2019. Its data had no interview outcomes, as the BLS article notes, so it speaks to effort, not to interview rates.
So a high application count can mean a hard search as much as a thorough one, and a low count can come with a strong interview rate.
More applications are not always better
In the BLS data, the share of jobseekers with an offer rose with applications up to the 21 to 80 band: 27.2% for 1 to 10 applications, 29.5% for 11 to 20, and 30.9% for 21 to 80. For jobseekers who sent 81 or more, it fell to 20.4%. The BLS authors offer two possible explanations: people who apply to many jobs may expect lower chances and apply widely to compensate, or they may be under more pressure and less targeted. Those are interpretations, not findings, and the survey cannot say which is right. What it does show is that volume alone is not a guarantee.
The useful number is your own. Count applications sent, interviews received and the dates, and check the ratio after a few weeks rather than a few days.
How to raise your interview rate
None of the surveys above tested tactics, so the steps below are practical advice rather than findings. They are ways to change the ratio you can measure for yourself:
- Apply where you fit. Match the job's core requirements before you spend time on it. A smaller number of closer matches is easier to tailor and follow up.
- Mirror the job ad honestly. Use the ad's own wording for skills you really have. Our guide to tailoring your resume to a job description covers how to do it without exaggerating.
- Reach a person. A short message to someone on the hiring team can put your name in front of them directly. See whether to email the hiring manager after applying.
- Follow up on a schedule. A reminder at 3 and 7 business days is easy to keep; the follow-up date calculator works out the dates.
- Track every application. A simple sheet is enough. The job application tracker template has columns for date applied, contact and status.
- Change one thing at a time. If the first 20 applications bring no interviews, adjust your targeting or resume, then compare the next 20.
How Applier handles this
Applier finds open roles that match your profile, tailors your resume to each job ad's wording and writes a new cover letter per role. It submits on the employer's own application form or applicant tracking system, then can email the hiring team from your Gmail. In Review mode you approve each application. Applier fills in answers you haven't given and lists them under "Answers to check". How it works.
What these numbers can't tell you
All of the figures here come from surveys of people searching in 2013 to 2018. The BLS tabulation we used is from November 2020 and describes 2018. We did not find a more recent public BLS tabulation of applications and interviews, so treat the figures as a historical range, not a forecast for today's market. They do not cover how long a search takes either; for that, see how long it takes to find a job.
What the data does support is a range, not a target. For the BLS sample of unemployed jobseekers in 2018, about six applications per interview was the average. The New York Fed survey's figures imply a much larger number. If you are sending applications and not hearing back, the first thing to check is fit and follow-up, not a quota.
Related guides
- How long does it take to find a job?
- How to tailor your resume to a job description
- What an applicant tracking system does with your resume
Frequently asked questions
How many job applications does it take to get one interview?
There is no fixed number. In a 2018 BLS survey of unemployed job seekers, the average worked out to about one interview per six applications, using an approximation the BLS describes. A New York Fed survey pooled over 2013 to 2017 implies a much higher ratio for the unemployed, so treat it as a range.
Does sending more applications mean more job offers?
Not always. In the 2018 BLS data, the share of job seekers with an offer rose from 27.2% (1 to 10 applications) to 30.9% (21 to 80), then fell to 20.4% for 81 or more. The survey cannot say why, and the figures are associations, not proof that volume causes anything.
Are these interview-rate figures current?
They are not recent. The BLS figures describe 2018 and were published in November 2020, and the New York Fed figures cover October 2013 to 2017. We did not find a more recent public tabulation of applications and interviews, so use them as a historical range.
Sources
- How do jobseekers search for jobs? New data on applications, interviews, and job offers, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, 2020
- Job Search Behavior among the Employed and Non-Employed (NBER Working Paper 23731), National Bureau of Economic Research, 2020
- How Do People Find Jobs?, Federal Reserve Bank of New York, Liberty Street Economics, 2017
- The Intensity of Job Search and Search Duration (Working Paper 2016-13), Federal Reserve Bank of San Francisco, 2016