China's top graduates pivot to manufacturing and energy
Mar 10th 2026
Tsinghua data show elite students increasingly choosing manufacturing and energy jobs as advanced manufacturing becomes more high tech and tech sector hiring cools.
- Tsinghua University reports a 19.1% year on year rise in 2025 graduates entering manufacturing and energy.
- The share of Tsinghua graduates joining those sectors has increased for six consecutive years.
- Top employers for the class of 2025 include Huawei, BYD, State Grid Corporation of China and China National Nuclear Corporation.
- A MyCOS Institute analysis shows the share of Chinese graduates entering manufacturing rose from 17.9% in 2020 to 22.5% in 2024.
- Experts say advanced manufacturing now demands engineering, data science and systems integration skills, raising its appeal to elite graduates.
- Tech hiring has cooled, with Alibaba shrinking from about 250,000 employees in March 2022 to about 124,000 in March 2025 and Baidu down 21.1% to 35,900 at the end of 2024.
- Youth unemployment for people aged 16 to 24 was 16.5% in December, highlighting a tough job market for new graduates.
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