On January 7, 2025, LinkedIn News UK published its “Job trends 2025: The 25 fastest-growing jobs in the UK” list, where the role of interpreter comes in at #22. LinkedIn calls the list “Jobs on the Rise” and considers them indicators of areas of career opportunity based on data collected over the previous three years.
Mentioning both spoken and sign language interpreters, the ranking cites interpreting, translation, and consecutive interpretation as the typical skills required for these professionals. Interpreters are most in demand in translation and localization, museums, historical sites, zoos, and interestingly, transportation equipment manufacturing.
The LinkedIn data points to London, Manchester, and Glasgow as the top UK locations where interpreters are being hired. The average experience required is 2.2 years, with most interpreters working remotely (73%) or in hybrid positions (8%). The rest can be assumed to work on-site, but this figure is not included in the list.
In the UK and elsewhere, most interpreters work as public service interpreters, a minority working as conference interpreters. As the name implies, public service interpreters work at public institutions, including the National Health Service (NHS), the Courts and Tribunals System, and Border Force and Immigration Enforcement.
Interpreting is one of the UK government’s regulated professions. “Interpreter” appears in the government list under “Chartered Linguist,” which is a broad definition for different linguistic professions accepted by the organizations that uphold the Chartered Institute of Linguists (CIOL)’s standards, including the National Register of Public Service Interpreters (NRPSI).
Contrasting with the optimistic LinkedIn ranking of interpreting as an area of opportunity is the at times contentious environment in the UK’s public service interpreting sector, especially over the past two years. In that timeframe, the NRPSI, for example, has sent numerous official communications to the Ministry of Justice about its policies as interpreters continue to protest work conditions and pay schedules in several cities.
Slator has covered the evolution of UK public services interpreting in the same period in multiple articles, including the re-examination of court interpreter qualifications, revamped credentials, legal inquiries into current contracts and future tenders, who’s responsible for paying interpreter fees, and discussions on the use of AI or lack thereof during government sessions.
