LinkedIn Open to Work: how to turn it on and whether you should

01

What Open to Work does

Open to Work attaches your job preferences to your profile and marks you as available. It does not apply to anything. What changes is how you appear to people who are looking for candidates.

Recruiters who use LinkedIn Recruiter see “Open to work” on your profile card in their search results, and can point at it to read the preferences you chose to share. LinkedIn’s help pages for recruiters also describe an Open to work option under Spotlights, at the top of the search results, that narrows a search to candidates who have turned the setting on. If you choose the public option, anyone who sees your profile photo sees the frame around it.

The setting is a signal that sits on top of your profile. A recruiter still has to find you with a search for a title or skill, so the profile underneath does most of the work.

02

How to turn on Open to Work

On a computer:

1. Click the Me icon at the top of your LinkedIn homepage.
2. Click View profile.
3. Click the Open to button.
4. Click Finding a new job.
5. Fill in the pop-up window: job titles, location types, locations, start date and employment types. Then choose who can see that you are open.
6. Click Save.

On mobile:

1. Tap your profile photo.
2. Tap your profile photo again to open your profile.
3. Tap the Open to button in your introduction card.
4. Tap Finding a new job.
5. Fill in the same preferences and choose who can see them.
6. Tap Save.

What you type into the preferences affects which searches and recommendations you match, so treat each field as a choice.

03

Who can see your Open to Work status

LinkedIn gives you three choices.

“Recruiters only” has limits you should know before relying on it. LinkedIn says it takes steps to prevent LinkedIn Recruiter users who work at your company from seeing your shared career interests, but that it cannot guarantee complete privacy. It works out which company to hide you from by using the position on your profile marked “I am currently working here,” so make sure that entry is accurate. And recruiters outside your company, including agencies your employer may work with, can still see the status and could mention it to someone you know. LinkedIn’s help for recruiters adds that a recruiter who already has you in a project pipeline is notified when you become open to work.

04

Should you use the public photo frame?

No public data settles whether the frame helps or hurts, and recruiters disagree about it. What you can reason about is who sees each option.

The recruiters-only setting reaches people who use LinkedIn Recruiter. Many of the people who could hire or refer you do not: hiring managers, founders of small companies, former colleagues, friends. The public frame is the only version of the signal they can see. Its cost is that everyone else sees it too, including your manager and your clients.

• You are unemployed, or leaving openly. The public setting is reasonable. Nobody needs to be kept in the dark, and your network can only help if it knows.
• You are employed and your search is confidential. Use recruiters only.
• Your role depends on how clients or a board see you. Use recruiters only and rely on direct conversations.
• You are only curious about the market. Use visible only to you.

If you go public, pair the frame with a short post that says what you are looking for. The frame says you are available. The post tells people what to send you.

I'm looking for my next [target title] role.

For the past [number] years I've [what you do, in one line], most recently at [company], where I [one concrete result].

I'm looking for [type of role] in [location or remote], ideally with a team working on [area or problem].

If you know of an opening or someone I should talk to, I'd be grateful for an introduction. Happy to share my resume.

If a layoff is the reason for your search, the guide on how to explain a layoff has wording for your profile and for interviews.

05

How to change or turn off Open to Work

1. Go to your profile.
2. Select the Edit icon in the Open to Work box.
3. Change your preferences or your visibility setting and select Save. To switch the feature off, select Delete.

Turn it off when you accept an offer. Update it when your target changes, or when a confidential search becomes a public one.

LinkedIn may also turn it off for you. It says that if it notices you have stopped responding to InMails from recruiters, it will email you to confirm that you are still open to work, and that it removes the feature automatically if it does not receive confirmation. Answering recruiter messages, even with a polite no, keeps the status in place.

06

Make the signal worth something

Open to Work brings attention to your profile. Whether that attention turns into a conversation depends on what people find there.

1. Match your headline and skills to the titles you entered. A recruiter who filters for open candidates still searches by title and skill. These LinkedIn headline examples and LinkedIn profile tips show what to put where.
2. Rewrite the first lines of your About section so they say what you do and what you want next. See how to write a LinkedIn About section.
3. Consider sharing your resume data. In the Jobs tab, open Preferences, then Resumes and application data, and switch on Share resume data with recruiters. LinkedIn says your profile then appears when recruiters search for skills and experience found in resumes you saved over the past two years, and that recruiters do not get the full resume unless you provide it.
4. Do not wait for inbound messages. The setting is one channel. Messaging recruiters who fill roles like yours, and the other steps in getting recruiters to notice you, work alongside it.

FAQ

Frequently asked questions