Future NHS Workforce Solution · Updated September 2026
The national platform will include an optional recruitment module. That much is confirmed. What has not been published is what the recruitment functionality will actually do, or when your organisation will get it. Early adopters deploy in Q3 2027, with full deployment running between Q1 2028 and Q1 2030. That leaves most trusts two to four years of hiring to do before anything changes.
This page sets out what is known, what is not and what it means if you have a recruitment decision in front of you now. Where the programme has not published detail, we say so rather than filling the gap.
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The programme
In October 2025 the NHS Business Services Authority awarded a 15 year contract to Infosys to build the Future NHS Workforce Solution, valued at £1.2bn, or £1.4bn including VAT. It replaces the Electronic Staff Record (ESR), which holds the records of and pays around 1.9 million NHS staff in England and Wales, roughly 5% of the UK workforce, processing £55bn of payroll a year.
It is a large and welcome piece of work. ESR runs on ageing technology and the software beneath it is due to be decommissioned in 2035. Something had to replace it and a single connected platform across the employment lifecycle is a sensible ambition.
Scope
Seven functional domains have been identified. Three of them are new rather than improved versions of what ESR already does.
The remaining four domains are improved versions of capability ESR already provides.
Key finding
Talent acquisition is one of seven domains in the Future NHS Workforce Solution and one of three that are genuinely new. ESR has never had recruitment functionality. But the entire published specification for it runs to two short lists and no date has been published for when the recruitment domain arrives as distinct from HR and payroll migration.
Where we come into this
Jobtrain is an applicant tracking and onboarding platform built for the NHS, and a modern alternative to NHS Jobs and Trac. It is available today and integrated with NHS Jobs, ESR and the other NHS systems and tools your teams already rely on.
More than 30 NHS organisations and trusts use Jobtrain, including the whole of NHS Scotland.
We’re seeing true transformation happening in real-time and Jobtrain is allowing us to do that.
The flexibility of the system, the customisation, it’s all been transformational.
The published specification
The left-hand column is the entire published specification for the recruitment element, drawn from the contract award notice and the NHSBSA briefing pack. The right-hand column is everything that determines whether a recruitment system actually works in an NHS trust.
Published and confirmed in writing
Not yet published. Design work is ongoing
None of that is a criticism. A programme at this stage would not be expected to have published it and design work is still running with more than 400 people involved. But it does mean that anyone telling you today what the recruitment functionality will be like is guessing, and that includes us.
This is the part most people have not been told and it is the part that changes the decision about whether to review and change your current recruitment platform or wait.
The timeline
NHSBSA has published a deployment timeline for the platform as a whole. Early adopters go first in Q3 2027 and full NHS deployment runs from Q1 2028 to Q1 2030 in four waves. No separate date has been published for the recruitment element.
Meanwhile
The key question facing trusts today
Can we afford to wait for the new optional recruitment module, when we need to deliver cost reductions and efficiency gains today?
This is where Jobtrain’s recruitment and onboarding software for the NHS delivers today, not in 2030.
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The cost of waiting
If the recruitment system you have today is already causing you challenges and inefficiencies, waiting several years for a new one is going to cost your trust significantly. The gap is not a gap. It is several thousand appointments.
| If you hire | 3 years to your FWS wave | 4 years to your FWS wave |
|---|---|---|
| 500 a year | 1,500 appointments | 2,000 appointments |
| 1,000 a year | 3,000 appointments | 4,000 appointments |
| 2,000 a year | 6,000 appointments | 8,000 appointments |
| 4,000 a year | 12,000 appointments | 16,000 appointments |
Our calculator shows how much time and spend you could save with Jobtrain, and where the gains come from. Built for HR, recruitment and talent leaders who need fast, reliable figures for a business case.
Talk to us about how Jobtrain is transforming recruitment capability across the NHS today.
Your questions
Waiting for the Future NHS Workforce Solution before changing your recruitment system depends on two things: when your current contract ends and which wave your organisation is in. Early adopters deploy from Q3 2027 and full NHS deployment runs between Q1 2028 and Q1 2030, so most organisations are two to four years away. If your contract expires before your wave arrives, waiting is not available to you. If it does not, the question is how many people you will hire in the interim and whether your current process can carry that volume.
Yes. The Future NHS Workforce Solution will include an optional recruitment module. Talent acquisition is one of seven functional domains and one of three that are new rather than carried over from ESR. The published scope covers demand identification, talent sourcing, job marketing, vacancy posting, candidate assessment, applicant tracking and management, onboarding and metrics. What has not been published is the detail of how any of it will work.
NHSBSA has published that early adopters of the Future NHS Workforce Solution will be the first to deploy in Q3 2027, with full NHS deployment between Q1 2028 and Q1 2030. No date has been published for the recruitment domain separately from wider migration, so trusts should ask NHSBSA directly which wave they are in and when recruitment specifically arrives.
No position has been published on locally procured recruitment systems such as Trac, and none on the future of NHS Jobs. Whether they will be displaced or coexist with the national platform is not yet known.
Buying a recruitment system now does not have to mean wasted investment later, as long as the payback period is shorter than the wait for the national platform. It also depends on what you count as the investment. A documented recruitment process, accurate structured data and hiring managers trained in a modern digital process all sit inside NHSBSA’s foundational readiness pillars, so they migrate with you rather than being written off.
The full cohort of NHS organisations who will adopt the Future NHS Workforce Solution has not been published by name. It represents around 10% of the NHS workforce across England and Wales. Hywel Dda University Health Board has confirmed in its own board papers that it was identified as an early adopter for NHS Wales, where over 90% of organisations volunteered to be considered.
No. The Future NHS Workforce Solution replaces ESR, which covers England and Wales. NHS Scotland does not use ESR and has no FWS migration wave, so the programme does not change recruitment system decisions for Scottish health boards.
The Future NHS Workforce Solution is being delivered by Infosys under a 15 year contract awarded by NHSBSA in October 2025 and valued at £1.2bn, or £1.4bn including VAT. Infosys took over the running of the existing ESR service from 1 September 2026, while designing and building the new platform in parallel. ESR support ends in 2035.
Jobtrain is an applicant tracking and onboarding platform for the NHS that is available today, integrated with NHS Jobs and ESR, and used by more than 30 NHS organisations including the whole of NHS Scotland. The Future NHS Workforce Solution is a national workforce platform replacing ESR, with an optional recruitment module that no trust will see before Q3 2027 at the earliest.
Sources: NHSBSA Future NHS Workforce Solution Transformation Programme. Find a Tender award notice 2025/S 000-071542. NHSBSA delivery phase briefing pack, February 2026, published via Hywel Dda University Health Board committee papers, 17 February 2026. NHS England Provider Workforce Returns. Reviewed monthly. Information correct as at September 2026.