Lightcast — formerly known as Emsi Burning Glass — is one of the most widely used labour market intelligence platforms in higher education and workforce development. It aggregates job posting data, skills taxonomies, and regional employment trends to help universities, governments, and employers understand labour market demand.
But Lightcast isn’t the right fit for every use case. Organisations tracking individual alumni or member career outcomes, those needing global coverage beyond North America and the UK, or those looking for salary benchmarking and professional membership analytics often find Lightcast limited.
This guide covers the best alternatives to Lightcast available in 2026 — including what each platform does well, who it’s best for, and how they compare on key features.
Quick answer: The best Lightcast alternatives in 2026 are Cturtle, EMSI (now part of Lightcast), LinkedIn Talent Insights, Burning Glass Technologies (merged into Lightcast), and Faethm — each with different strengths depending on your use case.
What is Lightcast?
Lightcast (formerly Emsi Burning Glass) is a labour market analytics platform that aggregates job postings, skills data, and employment trends to provide regional and national workforce intelligence. It’s widely used by US and UK universities to understand graduate employment outcomes, align curriculum with employer demand, and support careers and employability reporting.
Lightcast’s primary strength is its job posting database and skills taxonomy — making it useful for understanding what employers are asking for, and how regional labour markets are shifting.
Why organisations look for Lightcast alternatives
Lightcast is a powerful platform — but several limitations lead organisations to seek alternatives:
- Primarily US and UK focused — coverage in Asia-Pacific, Southeast Asia, the Middle East, and Latin America is much weaker
- Job postings, not individual outcomes — Lightcast analyses aggregate labour market demand, not individual alumni or member career outcomes
- No alumni tracking — it doesn’t tell you where your specific graduates or members are actually working
- No salary benchmarking at individual level — aggregate salary data without the ability to benchmark your alumni or members specifically
- Not designed for membership organisations — built for higher education and workforce agencies, not professional bodies
- Cost — enterprise pricing that can be prohibitive for smaller institutions and organisations
The best alternatives to Lightcast in 2026
1. Cturtle — Best for alumni & member outcome tracking with global coverage
Cturtle is a global talent intelligence platform that tracks over 22 million public professional profiles across 180+ countries. Unlike Lightcast, which analyses aggregate labour market demand, Cturtle tracks actual individual alumni and member career outcomes — where they work, what they earn, and how their careers progress over time.
Cturtle’s AlumniPro platform provides interactive dashboards covering employment outcomes, salary benchmarking, education pathways, ESG impact, board memberships, skills mapping, and advanced segmentation. For organisations that need to understand what their specific alumni or members are actually doing — rather than what employers are generally asking for — Cturtle is a direct and more capable alternative.
Best for: Universities tracking individual alumni outcomes, professional membership bodies, government talent and migration agencies, and any organisation that needs actual career outcome data rather than aggregate job posting analysis.
| Feature | Cturtle | Lightcast |
|---|---|---|
| Individual alumni / member tracking | ✓ Core feature | ✗ |
| Global coverage (180+ countries) | ✓ Strong | ~ US/UK focus |
| Salary benchmarking (individual level) | ✓ | ~ Aggregate only |
| Labour market & skills trends | ✓ | ✓ Core feature |
| Job posting analysis | ~ Limited | ✓ Core feature |
| Membership organisation support | ✓ | ✗ |
| Government skills classification mapping | ✓ | ✓ |
| ESG & diversity indicators | ✓ | ✗ |
| CRM integration | ✓ Raiser’s Edge, Blackbaud | ~ Limited |
| Interactive dashboard | ✓ | ✓ |
| AI matching platform | ✓ TalentMatch | ✗ |
| Pricing from | US$14,999 | Enterprise custom |
2. LinkedIn Talent Insights — Best for talent flow and employer intelligence
LinkedIn Talent Insights provides workforce analytics based on LinkedIn’s professional network. It’s useful for understanding talent flows between companies and industries, benchmarking talent pools, and informing hiring strategy. It’s stronger than Lightcast for global coverage and individual-level signals, but doesn’t provide alumni tracking or CRM integration.
3. Faethm by Pearson — Best for workforce automation and future skills forecasting
Faethm (acquired by Pearson) provides AI-powered workforce intelligence focused on automation risk, future skills, and workforce transformation. It’s a good alternative for organisations focused on long-term workforce planning and skills forecasting rather than current alumni outcome tracking.
4. SEEK Labour Market Insights — Best for Australia and New Zealand
SEEK’s Labour Market Insights tool provides job posting and salary data across Australia and New Zealand. It’s free to access and useful for institutions and organisations focused specifically on the ANZ market, though it lacks global coverage and alumni tracking capabilities.
5. OECD Education at a Glance & ILO data — Best for policy and research
For government and public-interest stakeholders focused on macro-level labour market trends, OECD and ILO datasets provide comprehensive global workforce data at no cost. These are useful for policy research but lack the individual-level alumni and member tracking that platforms like Cturtle provide.
Lightcast vs Cturtle: which is right for your organisation?
The core difference between Lightcast and Cturtle comes down to what you’re trying to measure:
- Use Lightcast if you need aggregate labour market intelligence — what skills employers are demanding, how regional job markets are evolving, and how curriculum aligns with employer needs in the US or UK
- Use Cturtle if you need individual alumni or member outcome data — where your specific graduates or members work, what they earn, how their careers progress, and how to benchmark them against peers globally
Many organisations use both: Lightcast for aggregate market intelligence and curriculum alignment, and Cturtle for individual alumni and member outcome tracking and CRM enrichment.
Frequently asked questions
Summary
Lightcast is a leading platform for aggregate labour market intelligence in the US and UK — but it’s not designed for individual alumni tracking, membership organisation analytics, or global talent intelligence beyond English-speaking markets.
For organisations that need to track where their specific alumni or members are working, what they earn, and how their careers evolve globally, Cturtle’s AlumniPro platform is a more capable and better-suited alternative — with broader geographic coverage, individual-level outcome data, and support for universities, membership bodies, and governments alike.
Explore Cturtle’s live AlumniPro demo to see how it compares, or contact us for a tailored assessment of how Cturtle can serve your specific needs.