UK agencies buy two different services from job boards: adverts that bring applicants in and CV databases that let consultants approach people. Choose which your desk needs before comparing subscriptions, and check audience overlap before paying for several brands. Prices and agency eligibility were checked October 16, 2026; confirm the terms in your quote.
A sensible UK starting mix
- Every job: your own careers page, plus a search of your database before spending.
- Temp, hourly and volume roles: sponsored Indeed with screening questions, plus Find a job where eligible.
- Professional perm roles: LinkedIn plus one of Reed, Totaljobs or CV-Library. Test two of them against each other for a quarter rather than running all three.
- Specialist desks: the sector board, and CV search for skill sets you fill every month.
- Review quarterly on cost per qualified applicant and cost per placement. Our weekly KPI scorecard uses the same stage definitions.
Setting up the rest of the stack? Our guides to recruitment agency software and what recruitment software costs a small agency cover the tools behind the adverts.
Advert or CV database?
UK boards sell two different things: adverts, which bring applicants to you, and CV database access, which lets you go to them. Most agencies buy both without deciding which the desk actually needs.
Before you buy either, search the CVs you already hold. Most established agencies have thousands of candidates on file who applied, were screened or were placed in the last few years.
Longlist’s recruiting database parses every CV you upload or receive into a searchable record, with keyword search and filters for tags, skills, job titles and locations. Our guide to candidate sourcing for agencies covers how to work your own database first, and Boolean search applies to Reed CV Search and CV-Library as much as to LinkedIn.
Who owns what
Many UK boards share an owner, a sales team and sometimes an audience. Buying three logos from the same group isn’t three independent channels.
The general UK boards
Indeed UK
Website ↗- Best for
- Volume, temp, hourly and mid-level roles anywhere in the UK
- Pricing
- Sponsored jobs charged per started application; no free posting for agencies
For volume roles, make the title, pay and shift pattern specific enough for candidates to judge the fit before applying.
The agency rule: Indeed’s UK terms (updated September 2026) say sponsorship is required “for jobs posted by a staffing agency, recruitment process outsourcer, or other recruitment-based company” (Indeed UK legal). The three free posts a month are for direct employers.
How you pay: Sponsored Jobs in the UK are on pay per started application, and Indeed’s help centre says campaigns are enrolled automatically and can’t switch back to pay per click (Indeed). You set the budget; billing is monthly or when spend reaches £500. CV search is sold separately as Smart Sourcing, on subscription.
Glassdoor is now part of Indeed. Recruit announced in July 2025 that Glassdoor’s operations would fold into Indeed; the brand continues, mostly as an employer-reviews site.
Because you pay per started application, screening questions and a clear first two lines save real money. Put the pay, the location and the working pattern up front, and ask two knockout questions such as right to work and a must-have qualification.
Reed.co.uk
Website ↗- Best for
- Broad UK reach for office, professional and public sector roles; CV search by the day
- Pricing
- Premium job from £89 + VAT (new-customer offer); CV Search from £175 + VAT a day (October 2026)
Reed is one of the few big UK boards that publishes its prices. As listed in October 2026 (Reed post a job):
- Premium job credit: £89 + VAT as a new-customer offer, live for up to six weeks and usable any time within 12 months.
- Boosts: Bronze at £225 + VAT for 10 days, Silver at £599 + VAT for 20 days.
- CV Search: £175 + VAT for a day, £250 + VAT for a week (£99 + VAT for new customers), £625 + VAT for a month (Reed CV Search).
The agency catch: Reed’s monthly plans (Starter, Growth and Scale) are for direct employers only (Reed plans). Agencies buy single adverts and CV search.
Totaljobs
Website ↗- Best for
- Mid-level professional, sales, office and technical roles across the UK
- Pricing
- Pro advert £220 for 30 days; new-customer discounts available (October 2026)
Totaljobs is the lead UK brand of the Stepstone Group. Its single-advert list prices in October 2026 (Totaljobs):
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| Advert | List price | Runs for |
|---|---|---|
| Pro | £220 | 30 days |
| Pro Plus | £275 | 30 days |
| Pro Ultimate | £352 | 60 days |
| Pro Campus | £49 | 30 days |
New customers were offered substantial discounts on each. Totaljobs says adverts are also distributed to up to 450 partner job boards. The page doesn’t state whether prices include VAT, so check at checkout. Annual “All Jobs” subscriptions and CV search are quoted on request.
The group brands: Jobsite, CWJobs (IT and tech), Caterer.com (hospitality), Milkround (graduates), CityJobs, RetailChoice and JustEngineers were all still live in October 2026. Recruiter sales for several of the smaller brands have been folded into Totaljobs, so ask your account manager which sites your advert actually reaches.
CV-Library
Website ↗- Best for
- UK-wide adverts and CV database access
One of the UK’s larger independent boards, founded and still owned by Lee Biggins, and an acquirer itself (Brilliant Jobs in 2022, Onrec). It sells job adverts and CV database access.
We couldn’t verify current prices or the CV database size from CV-Library’s own site in October 2026, so ask for a quote and a trial search on your actual roles before committing. Run the same Boolean search you’d use on Reed CV Search and compare the relevant, recently updated CVs each returns.
- Best for
- Professional, technical and senior roles; employer brand
- Pricing
- Promoted jobs and job slots; Recruiter Lite by subscription
LinkedIn allows one free job at a time, active for up to 14 days with a typical cap of 10–30 applications (LinkedIn Help). For agencies, that’s mostly academic: “generic and staffing companies can’t post a free job with a Recruiter Lite account” (LinkedIn Help). Budget for promoted jobs or job slots, and use Recruiter Lite’s 30 InMails a month for the candidates who won’t apply.
Adzuna
Website ↗- Best for
- Extra reach for roles already on your careers page or other boards
A UK-founded job search engine that aggregates listings from boards and career sites. It has been growing by acquisition, including the Trovit and Mitula jobs businesses in March 2026 (Onrec). We couldn’t confirm its current paid posting options for agencies in October 2026; treat it as a reach multiplier rather than a primary board.
Gone or closing: Monster UK and Guardian Jobs
- Monster UK. In October 2026, monster.co.uk redirected to monster.com. The US parent, CareerBuilder + Monster, filed for Chapter 11 in June 2025 and sold the job boards to Bold. Any UK guide still quoting Monster UK subscription prices is out of date.
- Guardian Jobs. The Guardian announced on 2 September 2026 that vacancies are “at their lowest level in five years” and it would close Guardian Jobs, delivering active campaigns in full. If you relied on it for charity, education, media or public sector roles, move that budget to CharityJob, jobs.ac.uk or LinkedIn.
Niche UK boards by sector
Niche boards win when the qualified audience is small. A board with fewer applicants but a higher share of people you’d actually call is cheaper per placement once you count screening time.
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| Sector | UK boards to test | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| IT and tech (perm) | CWJobs, Technojobs, Welcome to the Jungle (formerly Otta) | CWJobs is part of the Stepstone Group |
| IT and engineering contract | JobServe | IT, engineering and healthcare jobs; part of the Aspire Media Group |
| Financial services | eFinancialCareers | City and international finance roles |
| Hospitality and catering | Caterer.com | Stepstone Group brand |
| Graduates | Milkround | Stepstone Group brand |
| Charity and not-for-profit | CharityJob | Worth testing now Guardian Jobs is closing |
| Higher education and research | jobs.ac.uk | Academic, research and university professional services |
| Construction | constructionjobs.co.uk | Trades and site management |
| Purpose-driven roles | Escape the City | Career changers and mission-led employers |
| Local and hourly | Gumtree Jobs | Local roles; screen carefully |
We checked that each board was live in October 2026. Niche boards change packages often and rarely publish prices, so ask for a rate card and whether agency adverts are labelled differently from direct-employer ones.
Free public job services
The government services are free, but they’re built for employers hiring directly and each has eligibility rules.
- Find a job (DWP) covers England, Scotland and Wales, with a separate service for Northern Ireland. Check the terms for agency use before you post.
- Teaching Vacancies (DfE) is free for state-funded schools and trusts in England, and its terms say listings must not include supply teacher roles. Education agencies will need other channels.
- NHS Jobs is the NHS’s own recruitment service for eligible health organisations’ vacancies.
For the rest of the free options, including Google for Jobs, read our guide to free job boards.
CV databases and UK GDPR
Downloading a CV from a board’s database makes you the controller of that data. The ICO’s guidance on finding candidates says:
- You must give candidates privacy information within one month of obtaining their data.
- Searching recruitment-focused platforms may be reasonable, but avoid candidates’ personal social media.
- Direct messages to candidates are direct marketing under PECR, so the e-privacy rules apply as well as UK GDPR.
The ICO’s wider recruitment and selection guidance is being finalised after the Data (Use and Access) Act 2025, so check it again before you update your privacy notice.
- Your privacy notice explains that you source CVs from job board databases, and why
- Candidates downloaded from a CV database get your privacy information within one month
- You record where each CV came from and when
- Outreach messages offer an easy way to opt out, and opt-outs are honoured
- You delete or refresh CVs on a schedule instead of keeping them forever
- Consent, where you rely on it, is recorded with a date and an expiry
Longlist’s UK recruitment software tracks GDPR consent on the candidate record: send consent requests, record allowed or denied, and flag consent that expires within 30 days.
Where your UK job board spend should land
Every board’s applicants parsed into one searchable database, with GDPR consent tracking, branded CV packs, fees in GBP and monthly billing with no 12-month contract. Free data migration.
Multiposting in the UK
If your desk posts several adverts a week across three or more paid boards, a multiposter will save hours and give you applicant counts by board in one place. The main UK options in October 2026:
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| Tool | Notes |
|---|---|
| Broadbean | Owned by Veritone since 2023 |
| idibu | Multiposting used by agencies and staffing firms |
| LogicMelon | UK-based multiposter (Logic Enterprises Ltd) |
A multiposter makes it easy to send every job to every board. Resist that. Choose boards per role type, and review the board-level results each quarter. The source-quality scorecard in our main job boards guide shows how.
Longlist’s careers page covers the free side: branded job pages with Google for Jobs markup, open jobs sent to a Careerjet feed, and an apply-by-email address per job for Indeed applications, so those applicants are parsed into the same pipeline. It pairs with direct posting or one of the multiposters above for paid boards.
