University of Bristol graduates are fourth most targeted by top employers

Published by

Peter Davison

The UK’s most successful employers are eager to get University of Bristol graduates on their books, a new report has found.

The Graduate Market in 2023 study found that Bristol alumni are the fourth most targeted by organisations on The Times’ list of Top 100 Graduate Employers.

They include the likes of Google, JP Morgan, the BBC, Dyson, MI5, GCHQ, Atkins, Barclays and Allen & Overy.

Graduates joining these 100 firms can expect a median starting salary of £33,500 – an increase of £1,500 on 2022, the report found. The best-paid graduate jobs are at investment banks, where average starting salaries are £55,000.

The top ten universities targeted by graduate employers in 2022-2023 are Manchester, Nottingham, Birmingham, Bristol, Warwick, Leeds, UCL, Cambridge, Durham and Southampton.

Stuart Johnson, director of the University of Bristol’s careers service, said: “It’s fantastic that, once again, the UK’s biggest and most successful organisations are saying they want to snap up Bristol graduates.

“We are immensely proud of our graduates, who are out there now working hard, using their skills and helping to make these organisations even better.”

As well as finding success with the UK’s top companies, many University of Bristol graduates build thriving businesses.

Over the past year graduate start-ups that have seen impressive growth include PEEQUAL, creator of the UK’s first female urinal; Milbotix, creator of smart socks that help people with dementia and autism; Perceptual Robotics, which uses autonomous drones to inspect wind turbines; and Hybr, a student rentals platform.

The University’s careers service provides extensive support to students, including help getting jobs, access to internships - including some funded by the University - and funding and expertise to start businesses.

The University’s Centre for Innovation and Entrepreneurship offers degrees that combine design, innovation and entrepreneurship, with a focus on creating start-ups that solve real-world problems.

According to the Graduate Market in 2023 report, which is compiled by High Fliers, the number of graduates recruited increased by 14.5 per cent in 2022 – the biggest-ever annual increase.

High Fliers expects graduate vacancies to grow by a further 6.3 per cent in 2023.

On average, employers received 39 applications for each graduate vacancy in 2022, the High Fliers report found.

Peter Davison

Peter Davison is deputy editor of The Business Magazine. He has spent his life in journalism – doing work experience in newsrooms in and around Bristol while still at school, and landing his first job on a local newspaper aged 19. By 28 he was the youngest newspaper editor in the country. An early advocate of online news, he spent the first years of the 2000s telling his bosses that the internet posed both the biggest opportunity and greatest threat to the newspaper industry and the art of journalism. He was right on both counts. Since 2006 he has enjoyed a career as a freelance journalist. He lives in rural Wiltshire with one wife, two children, and three cats.