Ghost Jobs Report 2026

How much of the remote job market you see online is already gone. Measured, not surveyed: every listing on this board is checked daily against the employer's own careers system and removed the day it closes, which makes the closing date of 9,243 recent remote jobs a matter of record.

Last updated: September 2, 2026 · Recomputed daily · Free to cite with a link to this page

The ghost rate by posting age

Take every remote job posted in a given window and ask how many the employer has since closed. That share is what a job board that never re-checks its listings is still showing you as open.

Overall, 24% of everything posted in the last 90 days has already closed. Of the roles that closed, 29% were gone within a week and 53% within two.

How fast remote jobs close, by category

Median days from posting to closing for categories with at least 20 postings in the last 90 days. Faster means more competition and a shorter window to apply.

Company by company

Employers with at least 15 remote postings in the last 90 days. "Open over 60 days" counts roles still live two months after posting: either a genuinely hard search, or a posting nobody is hiring for. Judge each company by its own median.

Companies are named because the data is theirs and it is public on their own careers pages. A long median is not an accusation; some roles are hard to fill. A large "open over 60 days" count next to a short median is worth a second look.

Method

• Listings are synced from employers' applicant tracking systems (Greenhouse, Lever, Ashby and others), not scraped from other boards.
• Every listing is re-checked against the employer's careers site daily. A job that has disappeared is removed from RemoteOnly the same day and its closing date recorded.
• "Closed" means the employer took the posting down. The data cannot tell whether a role was filled, cancelled, or reposted under a new ID.
• Only fully remote roles are included. Hybrid and on-site postings are excluded at import.
• The report covers the 9,243 jobs posted in the 90 days before September 2, 2026 and is recomputed every day.

Questions

What is a ghost job?

A job listing that is still published even though the employer has stopped hiring for it: the role was filled, cancelled, or never really open. Job boards that copy listings and do not re-check them keep showing these for weeks or months.

How is this report calculated?

RemoteOnly syncs listings directly from employers' applicant tracking systems and re-checks every one daily. When a job disappears from the employer's careers site it is removed from RemoteOnly the same day and the closing date is recorded. The report compares posting dates with closing dates for the 9,243 jobs posted in the last 90 days. It is recomputed every day.

Why does this matter for job seekers?

52% of remote jobs posted one to three months ago are already closed. On a board that never re-verifies, a large share of what you see is dead. Applying to closed roles costs time and, worse, teaches you that nobody replies. Filter by posting date, prefer boards that verify, and apply within the first two weeks whenever you can: 53% of roles that close do so within 14 days.

Can I use these numbers?

Yes. Cite them with a link to this page. The figures change daily, so quote the date shown at the top.