Eurobarómetro Ranks Portugal Third in the EU SME Recruiting-Difficulty Read at 35% — Tied With Luxembourg and Behind Malta's 38% and Cyprus's 39%, the 1-17 December 2025 Survey Sizes 15% of PT Firms Hiring Outside the Bloc and 18% Inside

The European Commission published a fresh Eurobarómetro on small-and-medium-enterprise recruiting on Monday 1 June, and Portugal lands in third place across the bloc on the most acute measure: 35% of Portuguese SMEs surveyed report 'much difficulty' recruiting workers with the required skills. The only EU member states printing worse are Cyprus at 39% and Malta at 38%, and Portugal sits tied with Luxembourg at 35%.

The survey ran between 1 and 17 December 2025, telephoning 12,900 SMEs (up to 249 employees) across the bloc — 500 of them in Portugal. The release lands the same week as the 3 June greve geral, the 5 June ECB decision, and the BdP's April 2026 statistics, and it sharpens the labour-market read at the back of the European Commission's broader Competitiveness Compass.

The Cross-Border Hiring Layer

The Portuguese SME response to the recruiting bottleneck is meaningfully more international than the EU mean. In the last two years, 15% of Portuguese firms tried to recruit outside the EU and 18% inside the EU — both among the highest readings in the bloc, against an EU average where only about one in seven SMEs (14%) attempted any extra-EU hire. The remaining 71% of Portuguese firms reported no attempt to recruit abroad at all.

Among those that did not look outside the EU, the explanations split three ways. The plurality — 55% — said they had no operational need. 8% said the administrative and immigration procedures were 'too complex', and another 8% said they lacked the information to navigate the process. That 16% combined-friction figure is the Portuguese policy lever: AIMA's backlog, the documentary chain for non-EU work permits and the absence of an SME-targeted information service all map onto it cleanly.

What the Hires Were For

Among Portuguese firms that did successfully hire from outside the EU, the occupational profile splits sharply toward physical and technical trades. 18% were hiring construction workers — the single largest category and a direct reflection of the BdP's mortgage-book lift and the wider RJUE / RGEU procedural reset that has the Portuguese building sector running its capacity ceiling. 12% were hiring industrial or mechanical engineers, and 9% were hiring IT workers.

The experience of the cross-border hire was mixed: 44% of Portuguese firms found the process 'relatively easy', 28% called it 'very difficult', and 21% said it was 'difficult'. Of those who reported obstacles, finding suitable candidates (23%) edged out HR-capacity gaps (18%) as the leading frustration.

What This Means for Expats

• If you are an EU citizen with construction, engineering or IT skills: The 18%-EU-recruiting figure makes Portuguese SME demand for your profile measurably higher than the EU mean. Lisbon, Porto and Aveiro labour markets carry the deepest demand.
• If you are a non-EU national: 15% of Portuguese SMEs actively try to recruit outside the bloc — a strong signal that Visto de Trabalho and CPLP-track applications will find willing employers, particularly in construction and industrial engineering.
• If you run an SME: The 8% / 8% friction split inside Portugal — too-complex procedures versus too-little information — means an investment in dedicated HR-procedural capacity, however small, materially shifts your hiring funnel.
• Policy signal: Commission VP Roxana Mînzatu's accompanying communication explicitly names SME hiring support as a policy priority. Expect the AIMA backlog and the visto-de-trabalho documentary chain to climb the Lisbon agenda this autumn.

The Eurobarómetro is the second consecutive bloc-wide read placing Portugal at the top of the EU recruiting-friction table, and it pairs with last week's IEFP April-2026 unemployment print at 5.9% and the BdP's wage-pressure flag in the May Financial Stability Report — the labour-market arithmetic is no longer ambiguous.