According to the report, “Vacancy rates for AI solutions leaders are nearly 27% in the US, 18% in the UK, and 10.3% in India. Vacancy rates for machine learning (ML) engineers are 8.2% in the US and 11.2% in India.”
According to Randstad, a human resources consulting firm headquartered in the Netherlands, the vacancy rate is the percentage of all vacancies currently waiting to be filled, and when it exceeds 10%, it represents a large-scale talent crisis.
According to the report, Japan has one of the most severe talent shortages in the world, with a 46.8% vacancy rate for AI engineers and a 25% vacancy rate for GenAI engineers, indicating a significant gap in execution.
Hiring schedules reflect this talent shortage. Research suggests that the time it takes to hire an AI manager has more than doubled, from 25 days four years ago to 53 days in the first quarter of 2026.
The US (29%) and India (20.5%) together account for almost half of the world’s AI technology jobs.
“India is a global powerhouse, accounting for one-fifth of global AI jobs, but the biggest challenge today is not a talent shortage, but a lack of advanced skills,” said Milind Shah, Managing Director, Randstad Digital India. As companies move from experimenting to implementing AI, roles for AI augmented developers have surged 597% globally since 2021, compared to just 28% for traditional developers. In India, the need for developers with AI skills is rapidly increasing, increasing by over 660% by early 2026.
Randstad’s findings are based on an analysis of more than 35 million job postings worldwide from 2021 to 2026, including approximately 8.7 million in the United States and 4.07 million in India.
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