People

The cosmopolitan population within Edinburgh, coupled with the high education that you get from the working population, gives us a great location that meets our needs and we see that continuing.

– Les Torrence, Regional Director, SYKES

Edinburgh has a population of over 525,000. The city has grown steadily in recent years, with annual net growth of around 0.5% (2,500 new residents each year). 

Edinburgh's working age population is over 370,000. The city is recognised for its talent, with half of working-age residents educated to degree-level or above - more than any other UK city bar Oxford and Cambridge. Edinburgh is the third biggest graduate city in the UK after London and Birmingham. In 2019, JLL ranked Edinburgh the 15th top city in the world for talent concentration in its Innovation Geographies index. The city performs strongly for talent retention, with Knight Frank finding that over 50% of university graduates remained in the city after qualifying.  In the 2020 Global Talent Competitiveness Index - a ranking of cities by their ability to grow, attract, and retain talent - Edinburgh ranked 2nd in the UK and 45th worldwide.

The availability of talent has driven growth since day one - we've built strong links with universities, we're connected with Edinburgh University and Napier to bring in interns and run programmes. There's a lot of data talent coming out of these local universities, so that drives the growth agenda.

– Barry Muir, Senior Vice President, State Street