Initial jobless claims edge down to 194,000 in week ending Oct. 24, Labor Department says

Seasonally adjusted initial claims for state unemployment benefits were 194,000 in the week ending Oct. 24, down 1,000 from the week before, the U.S. Department of Labor said in its weekly report released Thursday, Oct. 29, 2026. The number is an advance estimate. The department revised the prior week's figure up by 1,000, from the 194,000 it first reported last week to 195,000.¹

The 4-week moving average of initial claims was 196,750, a decrease of 1,250 from the prior week's revised average of 198,000.¹

Reuters reported that economists it polled had expected 199,000 claims. It noted that the level was close to the 189,000 reached in mid-July, which Reuters described as the lowest since 1969.²

Continuing claims

Seasonally adjusted insured unemployment, or people continuing to claim state benefits, was 1,701,000 in the week ending Oct. 17, an advance figure 21,000 below the prior week's revised level of 1,722,000, the department said. That prior week was revised down by 6,000. The 4-week moving average of insured unemployment was 1,710,000, up 500.¹

The seasonally adjusted insured unemployment rate held at 1.1% for the week ending Oct. 17.¹

Unadjusted figures

Unadjusted, states reported 178,851 initial claims in the week ending Oct. 24, up 5,648, or 3.3%, from the week before. Seasonal factors had expected an increase of 6,040, or 3.5%, the department said. In the comparable week of 2025 there were 203,012 initial claims.¹

Unadjusted insured unemployment was 1,490,071 in the week ending Oct. 17, up 14,007, or 0.9%, compared with an expected seasonal increase of 32,725, or 2.2%. A year earlier the figure was 1,708,691.¹

Continued weeks claimed under all programs totaled 1,500,078 in the week ending Oct. 10, up 14,467 from the previous week. No state was triggered on for the Extended Benefits program that week.¹

Federal workers and veterans

Former federal civilian employees filed 442 initial claims in the week ending Oct. 17, down 113 from the week before; the release lists 10,064 for the same week a year earlier. Newly discharged veterans filed 387 initial claims, down 40. In the week ending Oct. 10, continued weeks claimed were 4,934 for former federal workers, down 100, and 5,875 for veterans, up 1,057.¹

State changes

In the department's state figures for the week ending Oct. 17, not seasonally adjusted, Michigan was the only state with an increase of more than 1,000 initial claims, up 1,906; the state attributed it to layoffs in manufacturing. The next-largest increases were in Kentucky (471), South Carolina (419), Wyoming (63) and Vermont (58).¹

The largest decreases, with the reasons states gave:¹

• Ohio, down 4,478: fewer layoffs in manufacturing.
• Tennessee, down 2,635: no comment given.
• California, down 1,930: no comment given.
• New York, down 1,554: fewer layoffs in health care and social assistance, finance and insurance, and construction.
• Pennsylvania, down 1,532: fewer layoffs in professional, scientific and technical services; health care and social assistance; administrative and support and waste management and remediation services; and finance and insurance.

Among the states the release lists with the highest insured unemployment rates in the week ending Oct. 10, not seasonally adjusted, were New Jersey (2.0), Washington (1.8), California and Massachusetts (1.7 each), Puerto Rico (1.6), Nevada, Oregon and Rhode Island (1.5 each) and New York (1.4).¹

What the records do not show

• The figures for the weeks ending Oct. 24 and Oct. 17 are advance numbers, which the department revises in later reports.¹
• State explanations name industries only; the release does not identify employers or count layoffs.¹
• The economists' forecast comes from a Reuters poll as reported by Reuters; SignalData did not see the poll itself.²