Skills

Digital skills are a foundational metric for understanding regional economic strength. The UK's economic growth is inseparable from its digital workforce; the regions that build digital capacity will drive the most economic momentum.

Drawing upon Lightcast jobs data, the Local Digital Index highlights digital job postings by region and digital intensity – the share of firms in that region that advertised digital roles. Digital intensity adds an important nuance to job posting data: it's not just where there are lots of jobs, but in how many firms in the area there is demand for digital roles. A region might host a handful of large tech businesses posting hundreds of digital roles, but if nearly all other local firms are disconnected, that region is still not resilient.

What is clear is that while a number of regions outside of Greater London are benefitting from high levels of digital jobs and digitalisation in businesses across sectors, there remain structural challenges that must inform how government and industry think about technology. The UK economy's productivity problem is a dual digital skills and digital adoption challenge, and regions with lower skill diffusion cannot easily transition to high-value, tech-enabled work.

People won't train unless they believe their skills will be used, and businesses won't invest unless they're confident those skills are available and will drive value. Skills utilisation is the missing link between training and productivity.

We must join the dots on challenges around digital skills, adoption and regional economic development. In doing so, we can boost UK productivity by driving innovation and supporting more people across every part of the country to take up the opportunity of high-quality digital jobs.

Key Findings
  • Tech and digital economic activity are unevenly distributed across the UK: West of England, Greater Manchester, West Midlands, and West Yorkshire are among those with high digital job volumes. Regions like Tees Valley, York & North Yorkshire have relatively low numbers of such job adverts.
    • West of England has 24% of jobs being digital (among the total jobs advertised), while York & North Yorkshire has 15%. This indicates that digital roles are more embedded in the job market in some regions than others.
  • The nations outside England appear less dense in digital skills hubs: but they still host clusters of demand that could drive regional growth if adoption is broadened.
  • There are variations in adoption breadth vs. job volume: the state of skills is not only about the number of jobs but also how widely digital skills are embedded across the business ecosystem. Regions with broad adoption are likely more resilient and better positioned for future economic growth.
  • While many roles exist, in some areas there is more concentration of digital jobs in a limited number of firms: there are regions with alignment between higher levels of digital jobs postings and digital intensity, such as the West of England, or comparatively lower scores across both dimensions, such as in Swansea Bay. In others like Greater Manchester, which has the highest volume of digital job postings, digital intensity is only moderate and actually lower than Cambridgeshire and Peterborough, which has significantly less postings.
  • Regions trailing on both metrics face a double disadvantage:lower overall demand and fewer firms engaged in digital roles. Without targeted interventions, these regions risk lagging in productivity, innovation, and inclusion in the digital economy.
  • The middle is where the gains lie: Regions that are moderately strong on job postings but weak on intensity, such as Ayrshire in Western Scotland, present big opportunity.
  • Supply and demand, not supply or demand: Simply boosting demand for digital roles, through adoption schemes or incentives, may exacerbate supply pressures as firms compete for the same small pool of workers. Equally, focusing only on supply, through expanding digital training opportunities, risks turning some regions into training grounds for talent that quickly migrates to higher-demand hubs or remote employers. The reality is that demand and supply side measures must align to ensure there is talent for roles and roles for talent.
  • Boosting productivity depends on the volume of digital jobs, breadth of adoption, and effective training ecosystems: Regions with many digital job postings but few firms hiring risk skills bottlenecks, while those with a broader spread of digital roles but limited job volume may struggle to retain talent. The strongest productivity gains are likely to occur where digital roles are both numerous and widely distributed across firms and where robust training systems continuously supply the needed skills.

Demand

Data on the demand of digital skills across the UK

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Supply

Data on the supply of digital skills across the UK

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