Finding apprenticeship employers near you

Where you live makes a big difference to which apprenticeships are realistic. Here’s how to work out which employers are near you, and what to do if the options are thin.

Start with our city pages

We’ve built city pages that list the employers we’ve researched with apprentices in each city, plus official local apprenticeship numbers:

England	Scotland	Wales	Northern Ireland
London, Manchester, Birmingham, Leeds, Bristol, Sheffield, Cambridge	Glasgow, Edinburgh	Cardiff	Belfast

We only add a city once we’ve confirmed enough employers with apprentices there, so more will follow.

Check each employer’s locations

Every employer profile says where its apprentices are based. Some recruit almost everywhere:

• BT Group’s September 2024 apprentice roles were spread across 11 cities, from Belfast to Ipswich.
• Tesco and Aldi have store apprenticeships across the country.
• Lloyds Banking Group has apprentices in offices including Birmingham, Bristol, Cardiff, Edinburgh, Leeds, London and Manchester.

Check the commuting rules

Lots of employers set limits on how far you can live from work:

Employer	Rule
NIE Networks	Within 30 miles of a team location
Barratt Redrow	Within 45 minutes of site by public transport, or 1 hour by car
Lidl GB	Within an hour’s commute of your store
United Utilities	Choose a location you can commute to every day

If there’s nothing close by

The government’s apprenticeship site suggests:

• Looking further away, if you can travel.
• Trying a different area of work or a lower level. It’s okay to start at Level 2 in a new industry.
• Contacting local companies directly to ask if they take on apprentices.
• Getting in touch with the Apprenticeship Ambassador Network, which has regional networks.

Some employers help with costs: easyJet supports accommodation during its first nine months of training, and Barratt Redrow pays for its residential college blocks. Others, like Arup, say they don’t help with relocation, so always ask.

When you’ve found employers you like, our guide to researching an employer shows what to check next.