Kyivruns on a handful of strong industries. If you’re job-hunting or weighing a move, here’s where the opportunities (and the big-name employers) are.
Top industries & employers
IT services & product
EPAM, SoftServe, GlobalLogic, Ciklum, Luxoft, Genesis, MacPaw, Grammarly's Kyiv office
Ukraine's biggest export sector after agriculture and the reason most foreign professionals are here. The Diia City regime (Law No. 1667-IX, 2021) gives registered IT companies a distinct tax and labour framework, and Kyiv holds the bulk of its residents.
Defence technology
The Brave1 cluster, a dense drone and electronic-warfare startup scene, Ukrainian Armor
The fastest-growing sector in the country and the one that did not exist at this scale in 2021. Brave1 is the state-backed defence-tech cluster; hundreds of small manufacturers now sit around it. Export controls and security clearance make hiring foreigners genuinely complicated here.
Agriculture & agritech
Kernel, MHP, Astarta, Nibulon (Kyiv head offices)
The grain, sunflower oil and poultry businesses that make Ukraine a top-five world exporter run their head offices, trading desks and agritech arms from Kyiv, even though the assets sit in the oblasts.
Banking & fintech
monobank, PrivatBank, Raiffeisen Bank Ukraine, Oschadbank, the National Bank of Ukraine
Ukraine's retail banking is unusually advanced — monobank is a card-only bank with millions of users — and the NBU's wartime capital controls make treasury and compliance work a live speciality rather than a back-office one.
Reconstruction, IFIs & the humanitarian sector
EBRD, IFC, UN agencies, the Red Cross movement, large international NGOs
The largest concentration of internationally-hired staff in the country. Most are on international technical assistance or NGO employment residence grounds rather than ordinary work permits, and the NGO salary floor for a work permit is half the standard one.
Media, film & creative
Suspilne (public broadcaster), a large documentary and post-production scene, design studios
Accredited foreign correspondents get a residence treatment nobody else does — during martial law and for 30 days after, they are not subject to the ordinary limits on temporary stay.
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