How Long Should You Stay at a Job?

Written by Coursera Staff • Updated on

Your career journey is uniquely yours. Learn more about how to identify the right moment to make your next career move.

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Whether it’s pursuing new challenges or taking on different roles, your career path is uniquely yours to shape. You get to decide the best way for you to navigate any given situation—including deciding when it’s time to move on from a job.

Conventional guidance suggests that you should stay at a job for at least two years. However, as long as you aren’t bound by a contract, you are free to move at your own pace. If you don’t feel able to move closer to your goals in your current role, you might consider exploring new opportunities to reach your full potential at work.

Discover how long employees typically stay at a job and find guidance on determining whether it’s time for you to consider pursuing something new.

How long do people stay in a job?

According to the US Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS), as of January 2024, the median amount of time employees had been with their current employers was 3.9 years, a decrease from 4.1 years in January 2022 [1].

It’s worth breaking this statistic down further, as the amount of time employees tend to stay with their employers changes depending on factors such as age, industry, and occupation.

Average tenure by age

According to BLS data, older employees tend to remain with their current employers much longer than younger employees. Consider the following full breakdown of median tenure by age [2]:

AgeMedian tenure in years (January 2024)
16–17 years0.7
18–19 years0.9
20–24 years1.4
25–34 years2.7
35–44 years4.6
45–54 years7.0
55–64 years9.6
65 years and older9.8

Looking at the data this way, it appears that younger employees tend to change jobs more frequently than older employees, who are more likely to have established their positions within their company and may hold leadership roles.

In fact, employees with management occupations had the highest median tenure, 5.7 years, according to the BLS. Younger employees, on the other hand, tend to have stronger representation in service occupations—jobs in health care support, food service, or personal care, for example—which had the lowest median tenure of 2.7 years [1].

Still, when you look at these numbers, remember that the median is a midpoint, meaning that just as many 25 to 34-year-olds have been with their current employer for less than 2.7 years as have been there longer. This brings to mind a more recent trend, job hopping.

Is job hopping bad?

Job hopping is a career advancement strategy that involves changing jobs frequently to accelerate professional growth. Many employees, particularly in the younger generations, have found success leveling up at work by moving to a new company every year or so, as opposed to waiting for a promotion at their current company.

Traditionally, employers have interpreted a job history made up of a collection of roles held for short periods of time as an indication that a worker was unable to hold a job. Hiring costs are high, so companies tend to prefer to hire employees who are likely to stay with their company for a longer period.

Recently, however, it’s become more common for workers to embrace this strategy if they see career growth opportunities elsewhere. According to a recent survey from Career Sidekick, 62 percent of respondents left at least one job within the first year. The survey also found that, on average, individuals change their jobs every 2.73 years, with 42 percent making the switch every one to two years [3]. (It’s worth noting that Career Sidekick did not collect age data from their participants, but if we compare the 2.73 average tenure to the BLS data, it may be reasonable to suspect that their surveyed audience skewed closer to that 25- to 34-year-old demographic.)

Career Sidekick also found that the three most common reasons for leaving a job are [3]:

  1. Finding a new, better opportunity

  2. Leaving a toxic work environment

  3. Lack of growth opportunities in their current role

In this sense, job hopping may be off-putting to some employers, but it also comes with growth potential that you may not find by staying with your current employer.

How early is too early to quit a job?

The decision to leave a job is ultimately a personal one, influenced by individual factors. Take time to assess if your current role supports both your well-being and career advancement goals. According to a 2022 survey by The Muse, Gen Z and millennial candidates are driving a generational shift, viewing the employer-employee relationship as a “two-way street.” In fact, 41 percent of respondents expressed a willingness to quit a new job within two to six months in response to “shift shock” or job strain [4].

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Questions to ask before leaving your job

Conventional guidance and average tenures aside, determining how long you should stay at your job requires some self-reflection. Many factors can influence your decision to leave a job. Your decision to stay or leave isn’t only a reflection of you—it’s also a reflection of your employer and their ability and willingness to support their employees’ growth.

With your career goals in mind, ask yourself the following questions as you consider what’s the right next step for you:

  • What are the benefits of staying in your current job?

    • Can you live without those benefits?

  • What are the benefits of leaving your current job?

    • Can you continue growing without those benefits?

  • Did you accomplish the things you wanted to accomplish in this role? At this company?

    • Are you able to identify opportunities to accomplish any unmet goals if you remain in your current position?

  • What do you hope to achieve by leaving your job?

    • Is there a path for you to achieve that goal while remaining at your current job?

  • What would you do if you weren't working?

    • Can you do those things while continuing to work?

Take the next step in your career journey on Coursera

The decision of when to quit your job often boils down to how close you are to achieving your career goals. Continue exploring your career options with Coursera. Strengthen your idea of your dream job with Kennesaw State University’s Career Discovery Specialization. Or build job-ready skills to launch your career as a data analyst, project manager, cybersecurity analyst, and other in-demand roles by earning a Professional Certificate from industry leaders like Google, Meta, and Microsoft.

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Article sources

1

US Bureau of Labor Statistics. “Employee Tenure in 2022, https://www.bls.gov/news.release/pdf/tenure.pdf.” Accessed February 19, 2025.

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Updated on
Written by:
Coursera Staff

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