Companies are cutting back on hiring entry-level talent, citing AI and the high cost of investment. But being without Jun today means being without Mids tomorrow. What do the numbers say and what do IT employers think about it?
Companies are cutting back on hiring entry-level talent, citing AI and the high cost of investment. But being without Jun today means being without Mids tomorrow. What do the numbers say and what do IT employers think about it?
Maxim is 23 years old. He has completed frontend development courses, done three pet projects, learned React, and even got to grips with TypeScript. His resume is neat. GitHub is alive. He has sent over seventy reviews to Djinni. And only eight responses. Three employers have called him for an interview, but he still hasn’t received an offer.
He doesn’t complain publicly. He just keeps learning, adding new projects to his portfolio, and trying to figure out what he’s doing wrong. In fact, nothing. The market just changed, and Maksym found himself at the most inconvenient moment to start.
There are hundreds of such beginners. And their problem is not that they are bad specialists. Currently, the industry is going through a transformation that hits those who are just starting out the hardest. And if nothing changes, in a few years, this transformation will probably hit everyone.
At first glance, things aren’t so bad. In 2025, the 33 companies surveyed by DOU hired 3,470 specialists with up to a year of experience — 500 more than in 2024. But if you dig deeper, the picture is more complicated.
According to Djinni data for April 2026, the share of hiring specialists with up to two years of experience has decreased to 18% — while a year ago it was 26%. That is, the market is physically shifting upwards: the share of hires with 7+ years of experience has increased from 22% to 31%.
In January 2026, there were 30% fewer newbies searching on Djinni than a year ago. At the same time, there was a 20% increase in vacancies without experience requirements — but even for «junior» roles, companies often choose candidates with more background.
According to the DOU winter salary survey, juniors, interns and trainees make up only 12,6% of all IT workers in Ukraine. And the companies' plans for 2026 are not encouraging: Mono has no plans yet to hire juniors, and Ciklum rarely receives junior requests. «Middle and senior employees should actively learn to work with junior substitutes — artificial intelligence,» says Renata Delporte, vice president of human resources at SoftServe.
The exception is large players with their own infrastructure. EPAM plans to hire 750-800 junior specialists in 2026. But most market participants do not have such a Campus system.
When you ask companies directly whether AI has slowed down entry-level hiring, most respond cautiously. But if you read between the lines, the picture becomes clear.
«Our company is more focused on hiring Middle-level specialists and above,» Ciklum says. At Railsware, the numbers speak for themselves: 2024 — 6 juniors and interns, 2025 — 4, and since the beginning of 2026 — 3. This is not a catastrophe, but the trend is obvious.
«Hiring junior specialists has indeed become more difficult and slower,» admits Daryna Kuzmyk, Talent & Culture Lead at Railsware. But she immediately clarifies: «The reason is not that AI has completely replaced juniors. Rather, artificial intelligence has raised the threshold for entry into the profession and changed expectations for beginners.»
A few years ago, a June could come with basic knowledge of the language and framework — and that was enough. Now the expectations are different.
«Today, AI tools are already a basic part of the workflow that specialists at all levels must master,» explains Roksolana Kurylo, Senior Talent Fulfilment Specialist at Ciklum. But she immediately dispels any possible panic: «Artificial intelligence cannot completely replace basic processes, so junior specialists will continue to be in demand.»
It’s just that now they expect more from them. Not just «I know React» — but «I can think, learn quickly, and know how to use AI in my work.» «It’s no longer enough for Jun to just know the syntax or framework. It’s important to be able to work with AI tools, or at least have the desire and ability to learn it quickly,» says Kuzmik from Railsware.
Is AI-native a mandatory criterion for hiring? Companies are unanimous on this: not yet, but it is already a serious advantage. «If a beginner has a sufficient level of knowledge and a high level of motivation, then he will receive the AI-native level already in the company,» says Denis Hrynyov, head of EPAM Campus UA.
Companies rarely talk about the real cost of hiring a newbie. But Railsware is blunt: it’s about much more than just salary.
«This is also the time for the recruiting team, onboarding and mentoring processes, and involving the engineering team and managers,» explains Daria Kuzmik. Onboarding at Railsware is three months, clearly structured, with a coordinator, an adaptation plan, and criteria for successful completion. This is an investment of both money and the team’s time.
That’s why companies have become more careful. Not because they don’t want to develop beginners — but because every wrong hire is expensive. «The price of hiring through training is usually more profitable than simply hiring from the market,» says EPAM’s Grynyov. But EPAM has built its own talent factory through Campus. Most companies don’t have such an infrastructure — and therefore choose the easier way: hire someone with experience.
At EPAM, a specialist grows from beginner to intermediate in about 12 months through Campus. Three months are for specialization training, another three are for project adaptation. «The better prepared a candidate is at the start, the less time he needs to study,» says Grynyov.
At PlantIn and Ciklum, it is more realistic: from 1.5 to 2 years. «This is a very individual process,» explains Tetyana Kravtsova, HR Business Partner at PlantIn. Yulia Chervenets from Ciklum adds: independence, understanding of the business context, and effective interaction with the team are important.
A middleman is not someone who simply knows more about technology. He is someone who no longer needs to explain why a task exists at all and what will break if done poorly.
But here the market is setting itself up for trouble. If companies now massively refuse to hire beginners, in a few years the market will face a shortage of middlemen. Because middlemen are taken from juniors. And juniors are taken from those whom someone once hired and raised.
«Without investments in a new generation of engineers, product managers, and marketers, the industry will simply lose its sustainability in the long term,» warns Daryna Kuzmyk from Railsware.
Roksolana Kurylo from Ciklum looks to the future with cautious optimism: «Currently, IT specialties and specialized courses, especially in the AI direction, are still very popular. Therefore, we do not see any signals of a significant decrease in the interest of young specialists in the industry.»
But there is a difference between «youth is interested in IT» and «youth gets real work experience.» If the door is closed for beginners, courses and pet projects will not replace live project experience. It is this experience that shapes future middle and senior managers.
What is the right balance? Ciklum calls this model: 50% seniors, 30% mid-level, 20% juniors. EPAM goes the other way — with its own scaled training system. 750+ new specialists per year through Campus — this is not hiring from the market, it is growing its own reserve. And this is probably the most honest answer to the question of how to solve the problem: not to wait for the market to adjust itself, but to build its own pipeline.
Let’s get back to our hero. Seven months of searching, seventy reviews, zero offers.
In short, companies are no longer satisfied with a guy who just took a course and can repeat the tutorial. The list is not about technology — it’s about character:
«A good junior is no longer just someone who has learned technology,» Kuzmik summarizes. «For us, critical thinking, curiosity about the product, proactivity, the ability to learn quickly, and taking ownership of your work, even at the start of your career, are important.»
The market, according to hiring experts, won’t get any easier. But it still needs a new generation. According to Djinni, the chances of getting hired for newcomers in the first three months after registering on the platform in 2026 have almost doubled — and that’s probably the best news for those who don’t give up.»
For Maksym, this means a simple thing: you will have to search longer, learn more, and the competition will be tougher than for those who entered the industry five years ago. But there is another truth. If Ukrainian IT wants to have midgets in two or three years, someone like him will have to give a chance now. Because midgets don’t appear out of thin air. They are grown. And if the market massively saves on Junos today, tomorrow it will simply start hunting for the same few specialists that it refused to hire yesterday.
