What a ghost job is
A listing that stays visible after the company has stopped hiring for it. Sometimes the role was filled and the board never took the copy down. Sometimes it was posted to collect resumes with no opening behind it. Either way, the hours you spend on the application go nowhere.
How the check works
Companies post through an applicant tracking system, and that system is the truth: when a role closes, it leaves the company's own board first. Unlisted reads those boards every few hours and keeps the exact time it last saw each role. The check finds the company, matches the title, and tells you what the board says. The live figures are on the freshness report.
What it cannot tell you
Whether a company that keeps a role posted is actually interviewing. We only see what its board shows. And we do not watch every company yet: when we do not, the tool says so rather than guessing.
The monthly report
Once a month we measure the whole catalog: how long postings stay up, by category, country and applicant tracking system, which employers keep the most open, and how many postings come back after they close. Every table downloads as a CSV.
Read the Ghost Jobs Report