How AI is Being Used in Recruitment and Why Candidates Care More Than Employers Think
AI is now firmly part of the recruitment conversation. You can barely attend an event, sit through a demo or scroll on LinkedIn without hearing about how it is transforming hiring. But there is still a gap between the noise around AI and how candidates are actually experiencing it.
That is one of the more interesting findings from our latest Candidate Experience Report. AI is showing up in recruitment, but not always in ways candidates can clearly identify. In fact, one of the biggest issues is not simply whether AI is being used, but whether candidates believe it is being used. That matters, because trust can be affected just as much by perception as by reality.
When people talk about AI in recruitment, they often bundle lots of different things together. For some employers, it means screening tools, automated communications or interview scheduling. For others, it means content generation, candidate matching or support with assessment. From a candidate’s point of view, though, those distinctions are not always obvious. What they experience is a process that may feel efficient, impersonal, confusing or occasionally all three at once.
That is where the conversation gets more interesting. AI in recruitment is not just about capability. It is about experience.
Candidates are already interacting with technology throughout the hiring journey, but they don’t automatically see that as progress. Our report suggests that confidence in AI-enabled hiring depends less on the technology itself and more on how transparently it is used and whether human judgement still feels present in the process.
This is especially relevant because candidates themselves are already adopting AI at pace. Nearly half of those surveyed said they are using AI during the job application process, and 51% said they have used AI to tailor their CV to a role. So this is not a story about candidates resisting AI full stop. Far from it. Many are embracing it themselves. The tension comes when they feel employers may be using AI in ways that are unclear, overly automated or detached from human decision-making.
That creates a useful challenge for employers. If candidates are comfortable using AI to help them present themselves more effectively, then hiring teams also need to think carefully about how they use AI to improve speed and efficiency without undermining trust. Used well, technology can absolutely reduce friction. It can speed up communication, make processes easier to navigate and improve consistency. Used poorly, it can make the experience feel distant, opaque and transactional.
The bigger point here is that AI should not be treated as a standalone innovation project. It sits inside the broader candidate experience. If the job description is vague, the process is clunky and communication is poor, AI will not rescue the experience. In some cases, it may simply amplify what was already broken.
That is why transparency matters so much. Candidates want to know where AI is involved, how it’s being used and where a person is still making a judgement. The report shows that the biggest trust-builders are human involvement alongside AI decision-making, a clear explanation of how AI is used and transparency around data use and privacy.
For employers, there is a simple lesson in that. AI does not need to be hidden, but it does need to be handled carefully. Candidates are not asking for a fully manual process. They are asking for clarity, fairness and confidence that technology is supporting the process rather than replacing thought.
The organisations that get this right will be the ones that treat AI as part of the overall design of hiring, not just another tool plugged into the funnel.
Our full Candidate Experience Report: Trust, AI and the Future of Hiring explores how candidates are encountering AI in hiring, where trust is being built or lost, and what employers can do to respond.
