The Netherlands has around 20,000 IT architects, from enterprise architect to data architect. Against them stand 637 open vacancies right now. Architects stay with an employer three years on average, against 1.8 years for the average Dutch professional, and 10% changed role. By our estimate that puts about five hundred architects on the move each quarter, fewer than the number of open vacancies. CBS figures for the wider occupational group, 183,000 systems analysts and ICT advisers, show the same pattern: an older, settled group. Our conclusion: you rarely find an architect through a job ad. Whoever is looking for one has to reach the architects who are not moving.
Anyone looking for an enterprise architect, solution architect or data architect is searching in an occupation Statistics Netherlands (CBS) does not count separately. So this analysis looks from two sides. LinkedIn Talent Insights counts the architects themselves; CBS counts the wider occupational group they belong to, systems analysts and ICT advisers.
The counts come from LinkedIn and CBS; the flow estimates and the conclusions are ours and are marked as such.
What LinkedIn shows
In September 2026 LinkedIn Talent Insights counts 15,284 professionals in the Netherlands with a current IT architect title. The selection covers sixteen standardised titles, including enterprise architect, solution architect, data architect, information architect, security architect, integration architect, domain architect, cloud architect and software architect. Nine in ten are men.
| Measure | IT architects | All of the Netherlands |
|---|---|---|
| Professionals on LinkedIn | 15,284 | 8,982,575 |
| Open vacancies | 637 | 264,161 |
| Role changes | 10% | 10% |
| Average tenure | 3 years | 1.8 years |
The largest employers are Rabobank (461 architects), ASML (452), the Dutch Tax Administration (209), ABN AMRO (189) and Tata Consultancy Services (171). Attrition at those five is 3% to 6%. Architects stay more than one and a half times as long as the average Dutch professional.
LinkedIn only counts people with a profile and a standardised title. A broader keyword search in LinkedIn Recruiter returns more than 27,000 profiles, including former architects. We therefore estimate the real group at around 20,000. Apply the 10% to that and about two thousand architects change each year, some five hundred per quarter. That too is our estimate. Meanwhile 637 architect vacancies are open. So there are more open vacancies than architects moving in a quarter.
The wider group according to CBS
CBS counts architects in the occupational group of systems analysts and ICT advisers. The number working in that group grew from 80,000 in 2013 to 183,000 in the second quarter of 2026. Of those, 161,000 are employees, 133,000 of them on a permanent contract. The other 22,000 are self-employed.
| Year | Systems analysts and ICT advisers |
|---|---|
| 2013 | 80,000 |
| 2019 | 120,000 |
| 2024 | 165,000 |
| 2026 (Q2) | 183,000 |
In this group 46% are 45 or older: 84,000 of 183,000. Among software and application developers it is 28%. That difference shapes the market, because the chance that someone changes employer falls sharply with age.
| Age | Changes employer per quarter |
|---|---|
| 15 to 25 | 8.5% |
| 25 to 45 | 4.3% |
| 45 and older | 1.6% |
| All employees | 4.0% |
Architect is rarely a first job. It is a role that follows years as a developer, analyst or consultant, and so a role that sits mostly in the older half of the group. For architects the switching rate is therefore probably closer to 1.6% than to the national average of 4.0%. The three-year tenure on LinkedIn points the same way.
The flow in the wider group
Apply the switching rate per age group to the 161,000 employees in the group and roughly five thousand people move each quarter. This is our estimate, not a CBS figure. At the national average of 4.0% it would be over six thousand; the age profile takes more than a thousand off.
Inside that flow sits a smaller core: people who switch and get a permanent contract straight away. In this group that is, by our estimate, about nine hundred per quarter, spread across every employer, sector and region in the Netherlands. For architects alone it is a fraction of that: about five hundred per quarter on the LinkedIn figures.
One vacancy per mover
CBS does not count vacancies at the level of this occupational group, but it does for the wider group of ICT specialists: 55,400 new vacancies in 2025. Systems analysts and ICT advisers make up 35% of that group. Pro rata, and that is our estimate, this group sees almost five thousand new vacancies per quarter.
| Year | New vacancies, ICT specialists |
|---|---|
| 2018 | 52,100 |
| 2019 | 59,100 |
| 2021 | 74,900 |
| 2022 | 76,300 |
| 2024 | 55,900 |
| 2025 | 55,400 |
So for every person who moves, about one vacancy opens. And only one in six movers lands directly in a permanent role. For architects the ratio is sharper: 637 open vacancies against about five hundred movers per quarter.
What the figures do not show
LinkedIn only counts people with a profile and a standardised title, so 15,284 is a floor. LinkedIn gives no period for the 10% role changes; we read it as an annual figure, and a new role with the same employer may be included. Open vacancies are a snapshot, not a quarterly flow. CBS does not count architects separately. The occupational group also includes systems analysts and ICT advisers who are not architects; the statistics do not publish the share of architects. The switching rates per age group are national figures across all occupations, and we approximated the age profile of employees with that of the whole working group, self-employed included.
The vacancy figures per occupation run to 2025, cover the wider group of ICT specialists and count new vacancies, not unique positions. CBS rounds occupational counts to thousands. Every estimate in this analysis that is not a direct CBS or LinkedIn value is marked as an estimate.
Our conclusion
There are not 20,000 available architects. By our estimate about five hundred move each quarter, they stay three years on average, and 637 vacancies are open. The wider CBS group confirms the picture: older, more settled and with a thin flow.
The market for an architect is the group that does not move. An experienced architect with a permanent contract and a good position does not answer a job ad. You reach them by approaching them directly, with a concrete offer and a reason to move now.
- Size an architect vacancy on the flow, not the stock: about five hundred architects per quarter, nationally, shared by every employer.
- Factor in age: above 45, 1.6% switch per quarter, less than half the average.
- Speed wins the flow: whoever moves has several options within weeks.
- You win the stock by approaching people, not by advertising.
Method
The architect figures come from LinkedIn Talent Insights via LinkedIn Recruiter, retrieved 29 September 2026: sixteen standardised current job titles (enterprise, solution, senior solution, lead solution, ICT, cloud, chief, technical, software, data, information, security, integration, domain, business and enterprise solutions architect) with current location Netherlands. The estimate of around 20,000 lies between the 15,284 with a standardised title and the more than 27,000 profiles from a broader keyword search in LinkedIn Recruiter. About five hundred per quarter is 10% of 20,000, divided by four.
Occupational counts come from CBS StatLine table 86320NED (employed labour force by occupation, BRC 2014), retrieved 29 September 2026: occupation 0813 systems analysts and ICT advisers (183,000 in Q2 2026, of whom 161,000 employees, 133,000 on a permanent contract, 22,000 self-employed and 84,000 aged 45 or older; 80,000 in 2013) and for comparison occupation 0814 software and application developers (229,000, of whom 65,000 aged 45 or older). Switching figures come from table 85390NED, second quarter 2026: 320,000 of 8,032,000 employees changed employer, 47,000 directly into a permanent contract, with the breakdown by age. Vacancies come from table 85081NED, annual figures 2018 to 2025.
The flow estimates are by Pearson & Partners. The 161,000 employees are split by the age profile of the whole group (8,000 under 25, 91,000 aged 25 to 45, 84,000 aged 45 or older) and each age group is multiplied by the national switching rate for that group (8.5%, 4.3% and 1.6%); that gives roughly five thousand per quarter. For direct moves into a permanent contract we used, per age group, the national share of employees who switched and landed directly in a permanent contract; that gives about nine hundred. The vacancy estimate is a quarter of 55,400 times the group’s share of ICT specialists (183,000 of 516,000). These are derived orders of magnitude, not CBS figures. All tables are licensed CC BY 4.0.
Sources
- CBS StatLine, 86320NED, Employed labour force; occupation (Q2 2026)
- CBS StatLine, 85390NED, Employees; change of employer (Q2 2026)
- CBS StatLine, 85081NED, New vacancies; occupational classification ROA-CBS 2014 (2018 to 2025)
- LinkedIn Talent Insights via LinkedIn Recruiter, retrieved 29 September 2026