Record Employment as Canaries Outpace National Job Growth
The Canary Islands created 26,586 jobs during the past year, a 2.8% increase in social security registrations. This growth rate was four-tenths of a percentage point higher than the increase recorded across Spain as a whole, where the number of workers registered with Social Security grew by 506,451. There are now more people in work in the Islands than ever before (967,275), with 10,051 fewer unemployed than at the start of last year.
Health and Education Lead the Way
The primary drivers of this job creation were the health, education, and hospitality sectors, in that order. Public and private healthcare and social care activities led employment creation last year, with 5,431 new jobs. Education followed with 3,767 new positions. Finding this duo at the forefront, without overlooking that teaching also has a strong presence in the private productive sector, highlights the importance of the public sector in the sustained growth of the Archipelago’s labour market.
Tourism Sector Shows Signs of Peaking
One must look to third place to find hospitality. The accommodation, restaurant, and leisure sector contributed 3,278 new jobs, with a further 2,439 from commerce underpinning the translation of strong tourist activity into employment. The Christmas season alone generated 2,814 job offers in the autonomous community’s shops in December. However, the last month of the year, despite containing several long weekend opportunities and the Christmas holidays, generated only 316 positions.
What explains this lukewarm contribution? The increase in staffing had already been accounted for because it was brought forward to November – with 1,458 additions – when the high tourist season began. Even though this anticipation is true, the performance is also not immune to the contraction already glimpsed in accommodation activity. A landing predicted to be soft but which, according to the Survey of Tourist Movements at Borders (Frontur), already cost the destination 24% of German visitors in November. Germany is the second-largest market supplying clients to the Islands’ accommodation sector.
The chapter on hiring also highlights that the Canaries’ main economic activity is very close to its ceiling. In twelve months, employment contracts signed in industry grew by 7.27%; in commerce, by 5.43%, to give two examples. And in hospitality? Only 0.86%.
Gender Gap and Long-Term Unemployment Remain Key Challenges
On the other hand, one of the pending tasks facing the employment policies developed by the Government of the Canary Islands is to reduce the gender gap reflected in the registered unemployment lists. Women make up 57% of the 146,293 people still waiting for an opportunity to join a job. At least in the last month of the recently ended year, they were the ones who benefited from the entire reduction in unemployment. A total of 775 Canarian women left the status of unemployed, while men, on the contrary, added 419 individuals. That balance reduced the registered unemployment lists in the Archipelago by just a quarter of a percentage point (-0.24%) – 356 people. The Islands begin a new year with the second-lowest volume of job seekers in history.
“Without a doubt, we are facing excellent news for Canarian families. Having reached the second-best unemployment figures in our recent history demonstrates the effectiveness of the employment policies we have implemented throughout this legislature,” said the Canary Islands Government’s Minister of Employment, Jéssica de León.
Among the minister’s main concerns is long-term unemployment. It is one of the segments where it is most difficult to achieve improvements. There are 66,722 citizens of the autonomous community who have been registered with job centres for more than a year. This group represents 45% of the total unemployed, although throughout 2025 the number was successfully reduced by 7.85%.
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