Kosovo’s Tech Talent: A Young Workforce, a Growing IT Sector, and the Gap Between Them
Kosovo is young, almost fully online, and home to an IT sector that sells most of its work abroad. Yet the same sector reports that finding skilled people is getting harder, while many young Kosovars are outside work and education altogether. When we opened TechBox+ Academy in Kosovo, this gap is what we had in mind. Here is what the latest data says.
A young, connected country
At the start of 2025, the median age in Kosovo was 32.6, one of the youngest populations in Europe, and 96.6% of people were using the internet, according to DataReportal’s Digital 2025 report. The European Training Foundation describes Kosovo as a “youthful society,” with one in four people aged 15–24 in 2024.
Sources: DataReportal (first two), STIKK Kosovo IT Barometer 2025 (third).
An IT sector that works for the world
The Kosovo IT Barometer 2025, published by STIKK, the Kosovo ICT Association, surveyed 102 ICT companies in mid-2025. Its picture of the sector:
- It is new. 46% of the companies surveyed were founded between 2020 and 2025, and most are micro or small firms.
- It exports. Three-quarters of companies exported during 2025. The United States is the leading destination, followed by Germany, Switzerland, and the United Kingdom.
- It builds software and websites. Software development, web development, and IT support are the most common services.
- It pays more each year. Salaries rose across every job function compared with the previous edition.
- It is concentrated. 76% of the companies surveyed are based in Prishtina.
The gap: companies can’t hire, and young people can’t get in
The same report finds that nine in ten companies had difficulty hiring skilled staff, and the share of companies that find hiring easy has halved since the previous edition. Shortages have spread from a few technical specialisms to security, design, and marketing roles too. Only 30% of companies collaborate with educational institutions.
On the other side of that gap are young people. The European Training Foundation’s 2025 report on Kosovo shows how far youth employment still trails the EU:
| Indicator (2024) | Kosovo | EU average |
|---|---|---|
| Employment rate, ages 15–24 | 19.4% | 35.0% |
| Unemployment rate, ages 15–24 | 19.5% | 14.9% |
| Not in employment, education or training (NEET), ages 15–29 | 31.4% | 11.0% |
Source: European Training Foundation, Key Developments in Education, Skills and Employment: Kosovo 2025 (Labour Force Survey data).
Almost one in three young people aged 15–29 is neither working nor studying, about three times the EU benchmark. Emigration adds to the pressure: the ETF report cites an estimated emigrant stock of 22.6% of the population in 2023, with Germany and Switzerland among the main destinations.
AI is changing the entry point
One finding stands out for anyone training young people. Nearly half of the companies in the IT Barometer say AI has already reduced their need for certain roles, and the effect falls overwhelmingly on intern and junior positions, the jobs that have traditionally been the way into the industry. Every company surveyed now uses AI tools, mostly for code generation, debugging, and documentation.
STIKK’s recommendation is direct: training should shift away from routine coding toward people who can “direct, evaluate, and correct AI-generated output.” The report also recommends widening the sector beyond one city, since most companies are in Prishtina.
What this means for training
Put together, the data points to a few practical lessons for anyone teaching tech skills in Kosovo:
- Start early and start concrete. With so many young people outside education and work, a first hands-on experience of building something real matters more than another theory course.
- Teach judgment, not only syntax. If AI handles more routine code, new developers need to understand what good work looks like so they can check and improve what tools produce.
- Reach beyond the capital. Talent exists across Kosovo, but most of the industry sits in one city.
- Connect training to real companies. With only 30% of companies working with education, closer links between trainers and employers are one of the clearest gaps to close.
Where TechBox+ Academy fits
TechBox+ Academy, supported by the TechBox+ Foundation, opened in Kosovo with its first youth training, “Create Your First Website.” Building a website is a natural first step: it is concrete, the result is visible, and it is the same kind of work, websites and web applications, that Kosovo’s IT companies deliver for clients abroad.
To ask about upcoming trainings, contact us or email info@techboxplus.com.
Sources
- STIKK – Kosovo ICT Association, Kosovo IT Barometer 2025 (survey of 102 ICT companies, June–August 2025).
- European Training Foundation, Key Developments in Education, Skills and Employment: Kosovo 2025 (completed December 2025).
- DataReportal, Digital 2025: Kosovo (figures for January 2025).