Free careers websites for UK 16–18s, checked one by one

The services, with what each one is free for

Checked against each provider's own pages on 16 October 2026. Where a claim came only from a third-party directory, we say so instead of repeating it as fact.

1. 1.National Careers Service

   Checked 16 October 2026

   The government's careers information service, run for the Department for Education.

   Free for what: Public advice is readable without an account or payment, and GOV.UK says a National Careers Service callback costs nothing.

   Best for: Checking what a job actually pays and what you need to get into it.

   What you get

   • Job profiles for hundreds of occupations, each with typical pay, entry routes and what the work involves.
   • Course search for further education, with a link out to apprenticeship searching in England.
   • Advice pages on CVs, interviews and applying, readable without signing in.

   What to watch out for

   • It is not a job board. It points you at apprenticeship searching rather than listing live vacancies itself.
   • Adviser access is not the same for everyone: the current help page directs under-18s still in education to their school, college or local authority, and 18-plus users in England to DWP advisers.
   • It is an England service, so readers in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland are pointed to separate services.

   Sources: Careers advice; Who can get advice (about us page); Free callback (GOV.UK).

2. 2.Find an apprenticeship (GOV.UK)

   Checked 16 October 2026

   The official service for searching and applying for apprenticeships in England.

   Free for what: No training fees and no tuition costs — the employer pays for the training. You may need an apprenticeship account to apply.

   Best for: Finding a real apprenticeship vacancy and applying to the employer directly.

   What you get

   • Live apprenticeship vacancies in England, searchable by location and subject.
   • Confirmation on the official information site that apprentices can start at 16 and must not be in full- or part-time education.
   • Vacancy listings that name the employer, so you can research the company before applying.

   What to watch out for

   • England only — Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland run separate application routes.
   • You are searching employer vacancies, not a curated list of roles chosen for your age or grades.
   • The number of live vacancies changes daily and is not published as a total.

   Sources: Apply for an apprenticeship (GOV.UK); Is an apprenticeship right for you (apprenticeships.gov.uk); Vacancy search service.

3. 3.Not Going To Uni

   Checked 16 October 2026

   A UK platform for apprenticeships, traineeships, college courses, gap years and entry-level jobs.

   Free for what: The provider states "100% Free to Use" and offers a free student profile for recommendations and tracking.

   Best for: Browsing alternatives to university in one place, including courses and gap-year options.

   What you get

   • A searchable opportunities board; the search page stated 426+ live opportunities when we checked.
   • A free student profile that suggests opportunities and lets you save and track applications.
   • Listings that include apprenticeships, traineeships, college courses, gap years and work experience.

   What to watch out for

   • The 426+ figure is the site's own snapshot of opportunities, not a count of paid jobs suitable for every 16-year-old — some listings are courses or qualifications.
   • Free use of the platform does not mean every advertised course or gap-year experience is free.
   • Whether every application requires a profile was not stated on the pages we checked.

   Sources: Opportunities search; Careers leaders hub (free-to-use statement).

4. 4.Youth Employment UK

   Checked 16 October 2026

   A charity programme that builds employability skills, plus a separate public opportunity finder.

   Free for what: The provider says Young Professional courses are completely free and you create an account to start.

   Best for: 14 to 24-year-olds who want structured skills building, not just a list of vacancies.

   What you get

   • Young Professional, described by the provider as a free personal-development programme for all 14–24-year-olds in the UK, whether in education, work, training or unemployed.
   • A separate public Opportunity Finder listing entry-level jobs, apprenticeships, work experience and events.
   • A recognised award that some employers value on an application.

   What to watch out for

   • You need to create an account to start the courses.
   • Some listed opportunities have narrower age limits than the programme itself — one internship we saw explicitly targeted 18–25s.
   • No overall vacancy total is published, so treat it as a browsable list rather than a complete market.

   Sources: Young Professional courses; Young Professional information for employers; Opportunity Finder.

5. 5.ShineThis is us

   Checked 16 October 2026

   This site. A free careers platform for 16 to 24-year-olds in the UK.

   Free for what: Free for young people. We are not neutral here — we run this page, so read the other entries too.

   Best for: Matching your strengths to careers and then seeing live roles you can apply for.

   What you get

   • A free strengths and interests quiz that maps to careers and routes, with a step-by-step plan.
   • A live board of entry-level roles and apprenticeships, with London and UK-wide roles shown first.
   • A CV builder, a free downloadable CV template for your first CV, and weekly job alerts.

   What to watch out for

   • Our board is a curated feed, not the whole market — the official Find an apprenticeship service and large job boards list more vacancies than any single curated board.
   • Our school and college dashboard is a paid product for institutions; only the tools for young people are free.

   Sources: Shine opportunities board; Free first CV template; Free careers quiz.

6. 6.Indeed UK

   Checked 16 October 2026

   The largest job board in the UK, aggregating vacancies from employers and other sites.

   Free for what: The provider offers a free standard jobseeker account for saving jobs and tracking applications.

   Best for: Casting the widest net when you already know the kind of role you want.

   What you get

   • Search by location, salary, industry, job title and experience level, plus email alerts.
   • Employer reviews and salary exploration tools alongside the listings.
   • An application route through the employer's own site or an Indeed CV.

   What to watch out for

   • It is built for all jobseekers, not for 16–18s, so nothing filters out roles you cannot legally take at your age.
   • We could not verify from the provider that every listed role is open to under-18s.
   • Listings are aggregated from many sources, so quality and accuracy vary — always check the original employer posting.

   Sources: Guide to using Indeed's job search.

7. 7.Unifrog

   Checked 16 October 2026

   A guidance platform for comparing courses, apprenticeships and applications, used in schools.

   Free for what: Free to students, but only if their school or college pays for a subscription — the provider's student help page says a school or college must partner first, and independent students cannot obtain even a demo account.

   Best for: Students whose school or college already uses it and has set them up with an account.

   What you get

   • Comparing apprenticeships, university courses and other routes side by side.
   • Recording skills and experiences to build a picture of what you have done.
   • Submitting applications after school, with teachers managing the guidance process.

   What to watch out for

   • There is no open self-sign-up. If your college does not use Unifrog, you cannot simply create an account.
   • Live vacancy coverage behind the account could not be verified from public pages.

   Sources: What is the point of Unifrog (provider blog); Student help: how to get access.

8. 8.Higherin (formerly RateMyApprenticeship)

   Checked 16 October 2026

   Apprenticeship, placement and internship discovery, with reviews from people who did them.

   Free for what: Described as free by a third-party careers directory; we could not find an equally explicit provider-wide free-use statement on Higherin's own pages.

   Best for: Reading what an employer's scheme is actually like before you apply to it.

   What you get

   • Apprenticeship, internship, placement and graduate-role discovery, for ages 14 to 24 and beyond.
   • Reviews written by students and apprentices about employers and schemes.
   • Application tracking and a personalised dashboard once you have an account.

   What to watch out for

   • RateMyPlacement, RateMyApprenticeship and On-Campus-Promotions merged into Higherin in August 2025, so older links and guides may still use the former names.
   • Whether browsing or applying requires registration was not stated clearly on the pages we checked.

   Sources: Higherin home; The merge into Higherin (provider announcement); Third-party directory description (free claim).

9. 9.Careers & Enterprise Company resources

   Checked 16 October 2026

   The national body's resource directory for schools and colleges, built around the Gatsby Benchmarks.

   Free for what: The provider describes its digital products as free, but they are institutional tools for most secondary schools, specialist settings, colleges and training providers in England.

   Best for: Careers leaders and teachers looking for classroom-ready resources, not students job hunting.

   What you get

   • A directory of over 400 resources, readable without a login.
   • Gatsby Benchmark resources supporting the eight-benchmark framework for careers provision.
   • Institutional tools such as Compass+ and Compass for tracking careers provision.

   What to watch out for

   • This is not a student careers website or a job board, and we found no live vacancy listing in the public directory.
   • Access to the institutional products depends on your school or college being in scope in England.

   Sources: Resource directory; Digital products and resources for educators; Gatsby Benchmark resources.

Services we left out, and why

A comparison is only honest if it tells you what it skipped. These came up in the research and did not make the cut because we could not check them properly.

WinterJob

We could not establish an identifiable UK careers service for teenagers under this name, or its reported connection to Adzuna. Rather than describe a service we cannot verify, it is excluded.

Adzuna

A third-party directory describes it as free to search and apply from, but we could not verify first-party terms, age suitability or live entry-level vacancy coverage for 16–18s.

Kerbo

We could not identify a careers platform of this name with free state-school access, and we did not want to guess that it was the same product as something else.

Brightside

Its own pages describe mentoring delivered with partner organisations for ages 13–18, but we could not confirm open self-registration or universal free access for any teenager, so it does not belong in a free-for-anyone list.

How we checked

• We opened each provider's own pages on 16 October 2026 and wrote down what they say about price, sign-up and who the service is for.
• We used a provider's own wording for what is free. Where only a third-party directory called a service free, we labelled it as a third-party claim rather than repeating it.
• We did not turn resource, review or member totals into vacancy counts, and we did not describe a service as covering all four UK nations unless its own page said so.
• We did not test every feature behind a login, so a service may do more than we describe. Our own board is a curated feed and will not list as many vacancies as the official search service or a large job board.
• Pages change. If something below has moved or changed price, tell us at contact@shineai.tech and we will correct it and date the change.

Questions people ask

What is the best free careers website for a 16-year-old in the UK?

Start with the official Find an apprenticeship service if you want a paid training role, the National Careers Service if you want to check what a job pays and how to get into it, and Not Going To Uni or Youth Employment UK if you want to browse alternatives to university. A board like Shine or Indeed is useful for seeing live vacancies, but none of them replaces the others.

Are these sites really free, or is there a catch?

Most are genuinely free to the young person: the National Careers Service is public advice, apprenticeship training is funded by the employer, and Not Going To Uni and Youth Employment UK both state their services are free. The catch to watch is conditional access — Unifrog is only free if your school or college pays for it, and a free platform does not mean every course advertised on it is free.

Do I need to sign up to use them?

It varies. Public advice pages and the National Careers Service job profiles are readable without an account, and the apprenticeship vacancy search can be browsed. Saving jobs, getting recommendations and tracking applications generally needs a free account, and Unifrog needs your school or college to have set you up.

Which site should I use if I am not going to university?

Find an apprenticeship for employer vacancies in England, Not Going To Uni for a wider mix of traineeships, college courses, gap years and entry-level jobs, and Youth Employment UK if you want to build employability skills while you look. Then use a live board to see what is actually hiring near you this week.

Can I rely on the vacancy numbers a site shows?

Treat any total as a snapshot. Vacancy counts change daily, and a site's own number includes whatever it has chosen to list — Not Going To Uni's stated 426+ opportunities, for example, includes courses and qualifications, not only paid jobs. Use the figure to judge how busy a service is, not as a count of jobs you could apply for.

How did you choose the sites on this list?

We only included services we could check against their own pages, and we describe what each one claims rather than what we assume. Where a free claim came only from a third-party directory we say so, and where we could not verify a service at all we left it out and listed the reason below.

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