Women 43.5% of frontline applicants, but only 13% jobs seek them: Report

Bengaluru: Women are making up a growing share of India’s frontline job seekers, but employer demand for women workers appears to be lagging, with women accounting for 43.5% of applications while only 13% of job postings on WorkIndia’s platform explicitly seek female candidates.The findings are from the WorkIndia Rojgar Report 2026, which analysed more than 650,000 job postings and 9.8 million applications recorded on the platform between April and June 2026 across 772 cities and more than 50 frontline job categories.The share of women among applicants rose from 40.4% a year earlier to 43.5%, indicating a larger pool of women actively seeking frontline employment. However, the relatively small share of postings specifically seeking women points to a gap between job-seeker participation and employer hiring preferences.“More women are actively looking for work. But the data also tells us that employer demand has some catching up to do,” said Nilesh Dungarwal, co-founder and CEO of WorkIndia. He said addressing barriers around accessibility, flexibility, safety and workplace design could help businesses tap the growing pool of women workers.Sales emerged as the largest category for female applicants, with women making more than 5.6 million applications for sales roles, followed by office-based jobs and travel and hospitality.Women’s participation remains particularly high in some occupations. They accounted for 86.6% of applications for beautician roles and 80.7% of applications for teaching positions. At the same time, the report found increasing interest among women in sales, office, marketing and other customer-facing jobs.Overall competition for frontline jobs also intensified. Applications rose 65% year-on-year in June and July 2026, compared with a roughly 40-48% increase in job postings, the report said. Competition was particularly high in IT, HR, accounts, sales and office roles, while delivery, driving and manufacturing jobs saw relatively fewer applications.Language could also influence access to frontline jobs. About 92% of postings required either no English proficiency or only basic conversational English, underscoring the role of Hindi and regional languages in recruitment.The report said its findings were based on actual job applications and postings rather than survey responses, offering a snapshot of changing demand and job-seeker behaviour in India’s frontline workforce.You use AI every day. Now get your AI Quotient. Take the AIQ test.