Job Openings and Labor Turnover Survey (JOLTS)

What JOLTS measures

The Job Openings and Labor Turnover Survey, almost always called JOLTS (pronounced “jolts”), measures the churn underneath the labor market. Where the jobs report tells you the net change in employment, JOLTS shows the flows that produce it: how many positions employers are trying to fill, how many people are hired, and how many leave.

It produces monthly national estimates of:

• Job openings: positions that are open on the last business day of the month and that the employer is actively recruiting for.
• Hires: additions to the payroll during the month.
• Separations, broken into:
  • Quits: people leaving voluntarily.
  • Layoffs and discharges: separations initiated by the employer.
  • Other separations, such as retirements and deaths.

Each is reported as a level and as a rate, a percentage of employment (or, for openings, of employment plus openings).

Who publishes it and when

The U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) publishes JOLTS monthly at 10:00 AM Eastern Time. It runs with a longer lag than the jobs report: data for a given month typically come out about five weeks after that month ends, so JOLTS describes a month whose payroll figures are already known. The survey and its release schedule are on the BLS JOLTS page.

The numbers traders watch

• Job openings. The headline figure. A large stock of openings relative to the number of unemployed people is read as a sign of a tight labor market, where employers compete for workers.
• Openings per unemployed person. Not published by BLS as a headline, but widely calculated by combining JOLTS with the unemployment count from the jobs report.
• The quits rate. Often considered the most informative series. Workers tend to quit when they are confident they can find another job, so a high quits rate is associated with a strong labor market and, historically, faster wage growth. A falling quits rate suggests workers are more cautious.
• Layoffs and discharges. A direct measure of job losses, which can confirm or contradict the weekly jobless claims data.
• The hires rate. A low hiring rate combined with low layoffs describes a labor market where few people lose jobs but those looking for work struggle to find one.

How markets commonly react

JOLTS usually moves markets less than the jobs report or CPI, but it can matter when the Federal Reserve is focused on whether the labor market is overheating or cooling. Openings well above forecast are commonly read as a sign of persistent labor demand and potential wage pressure, which tends to nudge Treasury yields higher. A sharp drop in openings or quits is read as cooling. The reaction is often modest and short lived, and it depends on whether the data line up with other labor reports released the same week.

Limitations and revisions

JOLTS comes from a smaller survey of employers than the payroll survey, and its estimates carry a fair amount of sampling error. Month-to-month moves in openings can be large and partly reversed later, so trends over several months are more meaningful than any single print.

The most recent month in each release is marked preliminary and is revised the following month. Annual revisions also update the historical series.

A further subtlety: a job opening is not a job. Employers can advertise positions they are in no hurry to fill. Openings tell you about stated demand for workers, not about hiring that actually happens; that is what the hires figure is for.

Common misreadings

• Treating openings as unfilled jobs that will become hires. Many openings are never filled, and some are posted continuously.
• Comparing JOLTS with the same week’s jobs report as if they cover the same month. JOLTS is usually about a month older.
• Overreacting to one month. Sampling error and revisions make single-month moves unreliable.

Frequently asked questions

What time is the JOLTS report released?

At 10:00 AM Eastern Time on the scheduled release date, after the stock market opens.

Why is JOLTS a month behind the jobs report?

The survey takes longer to collect and process. JOLTS data for a month typically arrive about five weeks after the month ends, while the jobs report covers the month just finished.

What does the quits rate tell you?

How willing workers are to leave their jobs voluntarily. A high quits rate usually reflects confidence about finding other work; a low one suggests caution.

Is JOLTS revised?

Yes. The latest month is preliminary and is revised in the next release, and annual revisions update the historical series.

Explainer updated November 13, 2026.