You do not necessarily need fluent Polish to find a job in Poland.
International companies, business-services centres, technology employers and organisations working across multiple countries recruit for roles where English is the main working language. But there is an important catch: a job advert written in English does not automatically mean Polish is unnecessary.
Finding the right opportunities therefore depends less on searching for the word “English” and more on identifying employers and positions where English is genuinely the working language.
Your nationality and residence status also matter. EU, EEA and Swiss citizens generally have free access to the Polish labour market, while many other foreign nationals need appropriate permission to work. EURES Poland guidance
At a glance
- It is possible to find English-speaking work in Poland without fluent Polish.
- Your strongest prospects are usually with international employers and teams working across borders.
- Warsaw, Kraków and Wrocław are particularly large international business hubs, with substantial markets also in the Tricity, Katowice, Łódź and Poznań.
- Search for the job function first, then check the actual language requirements.
- “English required” may mean English plus Polish, not English instead of Polish.
- Other foreign languages can be a significant advantage.
- Use several job platforms rather than relying on one.
- Check your right to work before assuming an employer can simply hire you.
1. Start with the kind of job you can realistically do in English
The biggest mistake is searching simply for “English-speaking jobs in Poland.”
That produces a mixture of genuinely international positions, jobs teaching English and roles where English is only one requirement alongside Polish.
Instead, start with your actual profession or skill.
- financial analyst
- accounts payable specialist
- software developer
- data analyst
- customer support specialist
- procurement specialist
- recruiter
- HR specialist
- project manager
- sales development representative
- supply-chain specialist
- engineer
Then combine the role with terms such as:
- English
- English only
- English-speaking
- with English
- international
- EMEA
- global
Current Polish job-board searches illustrate why this matters. A broad search for “English” on Pracuj.pl produces a very large number of results, many of which are Polish-language jobs where English is simply one requested skill. A much narrower “English only” search produces far fewer vacancies.
The lesson is simple: read the language requirements in the advert rather than assuming the language of the advert tells you the language of the job.
2. Target international employers
For an English-speaking foreigner, the employer is often as important as the job title.
A Polish company serving mainly Polish customers may reasonably require Polish even if parts of the business operate in English.
A multinational company running teams across Europe may use English internally even though the office is in Poland.
Look particularly at employers with:
- international headquarters or ownership;
- regional EMEA teams;
- shared-service or global-business-service operations;
- international technology teams;
- foreign customers;
- multinational workforces;
- central European or global functions based in Poland.
Poland has a particularly large business services sector, encompassing operations such as finance, IT, HR, procurement, analytics and other international corporate functions. ABSL’s current sector data puts employment across Polish business-services centres at about 488,700 people, with more than 2,000 centres operating in the country.
That does not mean every role in the sector is available without Polish, but it makes these employers an important place to look.
3. Look hardest in Poland’s biggest international employment hubs
English-language professional jobs exist across Poland, but they are not spread evenly.
For office-based international work, the strongest starting points are usually:
- Warsaw
- Kraków
- Wrocław
- Gdańsk and the wider Tricity
- Katowice and the Upper Silesian metropolitan area
- Łódź
- Poznań
Warsaw alone had more than 111,000 people working in business-services centres in 2025, according to ABSL, with most centres in the capital owned by foreign companies. Kraków also had roughly 108,000 sector employees at the end of the first quarter of 2025.
Current English-speaking job searches also show Warsaw, Kraków, Wrocław and Gdańsk among the most prominent locations.
That does not mean you should automatically move to Warsaw. It means widening your search geographically can make a substantial difference if your current city has few international employers.
Remote and hybrid work can widen the market further, but always check whether “remote” means remote anywhere in Poland, rather than remote from another country.
4. Use the main Polish job platforms
Do not rely on a single website.
EURES, the EU employment network, currently points jobseekers in Poland towards public employment services, recruitment agencies and a broad range of commercial job portals.
Pracuj.pl
One of Poland’s largest general employment portals. It is particularly useful for corporate and professional roles and allows searches by job title, employer, location and keywords. Try several searches rather than only “English”.
LinkedIn Jobs
Particularly useful for international corporations, technology, management, specialist roles, start-ups and scale-ups, and international remote or hybrid teams.
Search LinkedIn Jobs in Poland
ePraca
ePraca is Poland’s public job-offer database operated through the public employment services. EURES specifically identifies it as a source of vacancies published by Poland’s district employment services. It may not be your primary source for English-only corporate roles, but it is worth knowing about and is an official alternative to commercial platforms.
EURES
If you are an EU or EFTA national moving to Poland, EURES is especially useful. It combines job listings with information about labour mobility, living and working conditions, CV support and access to EURES advisers.
Other Polish job portals
EURES’ current Poland guide also lists services including:
- Jobs.pl
- Praca.pl
- Indeed
- OLX Praca
- RocketJobs
- LinguaJob
- Aplikuj.pl
Different sectors gravitate towards different platforms, so use two or three that match your profession rather than creating profiles everywhere.
5. Search employers directly
Job portals are only one route.
Make a list of 20–30 employers that genuinely fit your background and check their own careers pages regularly.
This works particularly well with:
- global banks;
- consulting firms;
- international manufacturers;
- technology companies;
- shared-service centres;
- international logistics companies;
- pharmaceutical and medical companies;
- large consumer brands;
- gaming and software companies.
EURES explicitly recommends direct approaches to employers as one of the normal ways of finding work in Poland.
A company’s own career site can also give you a clearer picture of its working language than a generic job-board search.
6. Do not confuse “English required” with “no Polish required”
This is one of the most important distinctions.
You may see an advert saying “English: B2/C1 required” but further down it also asks for “Polish: fluent/native”. That is not an English-only role.
Likewise, an advert written completely in English may still concern Polish customers, Polish sales, Polish employment law, local HR, Polish public authorities, or a role requiring Polish documentation.
Before applying, look specifically for sections labelled Requirements, Qualifications, Languages, What you’ll need, or Must have.
If Polish is described as essential, assume it is essential unless the employer says otherwise.
7. Another foreign language can be a major advantage
If you speak another language in addition to English, search for it explicitly.
International service centres in Poland regularly recruit people to serve customers or business units in particular European markets.
Current vacancies include roles combining English with languages such as German, Czech, Finnish and Estonian.
Search for combinations such as German English Poland; French English Kraków; Dutch customer service Poland; Nordic language Warsaw; Italian finance Poland.
A less common European language can sometimes be more commercially useful than perfect Polish for a specific international role.
Do not describe yourself simply as an “English speaker” if your other languages are professionally usable.
8. Adapt your CV for the Polish market — but keep it simple
For most international professional roles, an English CV is appropriate when the vacancy itself is in English.
EURES advises jobseekers in Poland to keep a CV concise — generally one or two pages — and to include relevant professional experience, education, qualifications and additional skills.
For an English-speaking role, your CV should make the following immediately obvious:
- your current location;
- whether you already live in Poland;
- your professional experience;
- your key technical or sector skills;
- the languages you speak and their approximate level;
- whether you have the right to work in Poland without sponsorship, if that is relevant;
- your availability.
Do not bury your language skills at the bottom.
Example: Languages — English: native; German: C1; Polish: A2.
Should you translate your CV into Polish?
Not automatically.
If the entire vacancy and recruitment process are in English, an English CV normally makes sense.
If the advert is in Polish or the role involves Polish-speaking clients, submitting only an English CV is unlikely to solve the underlying language requirement.
Apply in the language the employer appears to use for the recruitment process unless instructed otherwise.
9. Be clear about your right to work
Recruiters need to know whether hiring you requires additional immigration formalities.
EU and EFTA nationals can work in Poland without obtaining a work permit.
Free access to the labour market also applies to some other foreign nationals depending on their status. For many other third-country nationals, however, lawful employment requires both an appropriate basis of stay and the required work authorisation unless an exemption applies.
If you already have unrestricted labour-market access, saying so briefly can remove uncertainty.
Examples: “EU citizen — no work permit required” or “Permanent residence in Poland — unrestricted labour-market access”, where factually correct.
If you require an employer to obtain work authorisation, do not hide it. Target employers that are accustomed to international recruitment instead.
10. Check whether your profession is regulated
For most ordinary private-sector jobs, the employer decides whether your qualifications are suitable.
Some professions are different.
A regulated profession is one where Polish law requires specified qualifications or professional authorisation before you can practise.
Examples can include certain healthcare, education, construction and other regulated professions.
NAWA — Poland’s National Agency for Academic Exchange — explains that if a profession is not regulated, recognition of foreign qualifications is generally a matter for the employer. If it is regulated, formal recognition may be required.
Check this before spending weeks applying for jobs for which your foreign qualification cannot yet be used professionally.
Check recognition of foreign qualifications through NAWA
11. Recruitment agencies can help — but check who you are dealing with
Recruitment agencies are common in Poland, particularly for specialist, temporary and international recruitment.
Legitimate Polish employment agencies should appear in the Krajowy Rejestr Agencji Zatrudnienia (KRAZ) — the National Register of Employment Agencies.
EURES states that agencies operating legally in Poland must be entered in KRAZ. It also notes that agencies generally cannot charge jobseekers fees for finding them employment, apart from narrowly defined actual costs in certain overseas-placement situations.
This gives you a simple check if an unfamiliar recruiter contacts you.
Watch out for
- asks you to pay for access to a job;
- requests money before an interview;
- refuses to identify the actual employer;
- promises guaranteed work permission in exchange for a fee;
- wants copies of sensitive documents before there is a credible recruitment reason;
- offers terms that are substantially different from the written contract.
A recruiter receiving a fee from the employer is normal. A candidate being asked to buy access to an ordinary Polish vacancy is not.
12. Use networking as well as applications
For professional jobs, do not restrict your search to clicking Apply.
Follow companies you would genuinely work for and connect with recruiters specialising in your profession, in-house talent-acquisition teams, people working in your field in Poland, international professional groups, chambers of commerce and industry associations.
A short message works better than a generic request for help.
Example: “I’m a procurement specialist with five years’ experience in international manufacturing, now based in Wrocław and looking for English-language roles. I noticed your company has a European procurement team and wanted to follow its vacancies.”
That gives the recipient a reason to understand where you might fit.
13. Learn enough Polish to widen the market
You can get a job without fluent Polish.
That does not mean learning Polish has no professional value.
The more locally facing the job is, the more likely Polish becomes important. It can matter in local sales, administration, HR, healthcare, education, smaller Polish companies, customer-facing services, management of Polish-speaking teams and regulated professions.
Even moving from no Polish to a practical A2 or B1 level can gradually open opportunities that an English-only search excludes.
For genuinely global positions, however, professional experience may remain more important than Polish proficiency.
Treat Polish as a way of expanding your options, not as a prerequisite for beginning your search.
A practical job-search plan
Step 1: define your target
Choose two or three realistic job titles rather than searching for “anything in English”.
For example: Financial Analyst; Accounts Payable Specialist; Finance Operations Specialist.
Step 2: choose your locations
Start with your current city, but compare the market with Warsaw, Kraków, Wrocław and other large international employment hubs.
Include remote roles where appropriate.
Step 3: build a list of employers
Identify international companies whose operations match your experience.
Follow their careers pages and LinkedIn accounts.
Step 4: create precise searches
Set alerts for combinations such as “data analyst” + English + Kraków rather than simply “English jobs Poland”.
Step 5: make your work status clear
Know whether you need work authorisation before recruiters ask.
Step 6: apply selectively
Ten applications to jobs that genuinely fit your skills and language profile are often more useful than 100 applications to adverts that quietly require fluent Polish.
Step 7: track what happens
Keep a simple record of employer, job, application date, salary if shown, contract type, location, language requirement, response and next step.
After 20–30 serious applications, patterns should begin to appear.
If you are getting no interviews, change the CV or the roles you are targeting.
If you are reaching interviews but not receiving offers, focus on interview preparation rather than sending more applications.
What to do next
- understand the difference between umowa o pracę and umowa zlecenie before accepting an offer;
- check whether the salary quoted is brutto or netto;
- confirm your right to work for that employer;
- research normal salaries for your role;
- understand how ZUS, tax and health insurance work before comparing offers.
Official sources
- European Employment Services — Living and working conditions in Poland: EURES Poland guidance
- European Employment Services — Jobseeker services: EURES jobseeker support
- Office for Foreigners — General rules for working in Poland: Official foreign-worker guidance
- NAWA — Recognition of qualifications for professional purposes: NAWA qualification guidance
- Public Employment Services — ePraca job offers: Search the public employment database
Last checked: 23 September 2026
