Top Websites for Finding the Best Internships
Landing an internship is a crucial step for students and recent graduates to gain practical knowledge and bridge the gap between academic learning and the professional world. With countless opportunities available online, navigating the internship search can be overwhelming. This article explores some of the best websites to find internships, catering to various interests, industries, and locations, and provides tips on how to make the most of your search.
Why Internships Matter
Internships are essential for building practical knowledge, especially in fields like tech. University classes and bootcamps often focus on theoretical and historical aspects, leaving graduates without the real-life experience needed for entry-level positions. An internship helps to overcome this weakness and close the gap between education and career. In tech, we study the history of a field, the tools we can use, and some field applications. But, university classes are never enough to build a real-life experience that will help you launch a career once you graduate.
With the rise of remote work, many companies now hire interns worldwide, offering flexibility and broader opportunities. Remote work is one of the vital advantages of tech.
General Internship Search Websites
These websites offer a wide range of internship opportunities across various industries and locations.
WayUp
WayUp is a destination for early career professionals who want to explore internships and get noticed by employers. WayUp constantly has great job postings and recruiters working on your side. Furthermore, many employers reach out to you directly in order to gauge interest in a position, and every now and again, an offer to apply hits my inbox that I am so excited at the thought of applying! WayUp is a great platform. I feel like you’re really committed to connecting users such as myself to as many job offerings as you can find. And you have wonderful employers that are reaching out every day trying to connect. I’ve never used a platform like WayUp before to apply for roles. I was pleasantly surprised by how simple the process was! Also, it felt a lot less intimidating and was less hassle than your traditional college career fair. I also really like the fact that WayUp recommends jobs to apply for that are aligned with your interests and previous experience. The platform aims to simplify the job search process. It helps you get hired in just a few clicks.
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Here’s how it works:
- Tell us about yourself: Create a free profile on WayUp to showcase your best self and get discovered by top employers. The jobs will literally come to you.
- Get applying: The job matchmaker will show you jobs that match your vibe and interests. Search by company, industry, or location to find your perfect fit.
- It’s time to celebrate: You just got hired!
WayUp also offers Virtual Info Sessions to connect qualified candidates with companies.
Internships.com
Internships.com claims to be the World’s Largest Internship Marketplace and boasts tens of thousands of internship listings with companies across the US. Internships.com is a wonderful resource. They have scrolling internship listings, info on how to get prepared, and other regularly updated materials. You can choose your major or location and related internships appear in the results. It is also a good option if you’re considering in-person internships. If you head to internships.com, you can start browsing positions right away without the need to create a profile first.
LinkedIn is a powerful professional networking platform that also features a robust job search function. Many companies post internships on their LinkedIn pages.
Indeed
Indeed.com includes all the job listings culled from major job boards, newspapers, associations, and company career pages. The user-friendly site makes it very easy to spend hours looking at jobs and internships.
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Glassdoor
Glassdoor for Students is a great resource for starting your new career.
Handshake
Handshake.com is the leading early-career job platform used by over 1,400 universities and millions of students.
Experience.com
Formerly known as MonsterTrak.com, or even JobTRAK (founded 1987), this site focuses on the up-and-coming workforce and is a great place to look for internships. The search fields are easy to fill out and can be made detailed for your personal interest. You can enter your specific major or location, or simply search by keyword. It also has advice particular to internships, whether it be listing the benefits of internships, or how to make your internship into a part- or full-time job. Once you create an account, you can store and send out your resume and cover letter to various interests. Experience.com created one of the first web-based college recruiting platforms and has become an important bridge to close the gap between college and the working world. Alumni from hundreds of universities and Fortune 500 companies post their openings on experience to recruit students! Experience connects you to these alumni that have just gone through what many college students are going through now. Not only can they serve as a connection to the work world, but also as a mentor. Experience has utilized the industry insiders, experts, and alumni to share their experience and advice. Once you create an account and sign in you are connected to many resources that will make you feel comfortable and become successful in job-search process.
CareerBuilder
CareerBuilder is the United States’ largest online job site putting over 1.6 million jobs in front of seekers. There are also many job search tools to make the search for an internship, part/full time job easier. You can search jobs by categories, by location, even by industry or company. CareerBuilder even offers a career test to give a job seeker an idea of what position may suit them best. Upon visiting their site, you will already be shown thousands of jobs in different categories relative to where you live! CareerBuilder also has a function called Job Alert.
Simply Hired
Simply Hired is a powerful job-search engine that you can use to find all different roles, even those outside of tech. It is also a great option if you’re looking for internships, especially a remote one.
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Niche Internship Websites
These websites cater to specific industries, interests, or locations, offering more targeted opportunities.
For Tech Internships
- Capital Placement: Capital Placement helps students and graduates find remote internships with companies around the world. They’ve been supporting young professionals since 2012 and work with over 1,500 organisations across more than 20 industries, giving you access to roles in areas like marketing, business, tech, finance and more. Their team guides you through each step from preparing your application to securing a guaranteed remote placement, and they’re rated 4.9 on Trustpilot based on strong student feedback.
- InternMatch: Since 2009, InternMatch.com has been solely focused on internships. It’s their niche. Find internships by location or business field. You can also browse internships by a number of other criteria. It hosts a large directory of information. One particular topic they address is international internships.
For Environmental Internships
- JobsThatMatter: This site lists specifically jobs and internships that have the environment first in mind. The organization is called The Fund, and gets results that make our country better. In recent years, The Fund has helped build several environmental groups into major political players. If you are passionate about our environment and want do your part to better it, this is the site for you. JobsThatMatter offer summer internships as well as part/full time jobs all serving the environment. Such projects and partners include the Sierra Club, the Human Rights Campaign, and Environment California. Past partners include Defenders of Wildlife, Save the Children, and Greenpeace, USA. The site offers links to these highlighted partners to give you an idea of what they’re all about.
For Non-Profit Internships
- Idealist: IdeaList is the premier database of employment, internship and volunteer opportunities for the common good. The search function on ideaList is very well executed, and there is a tab specifically for internships (with the number of opportunities listed as well). You can then select areas of focus, skills, keywords and geographic areas to further target your search. Job postings are filtered for quality, so you can be sure that the opportunities listed there are legitimate. Idealist.org lets you browse internships from over 129,000 nonprofit and community organisations in over 180 countries.
For Adventurous Souls
- CoolWorks: CoolWorks.com is the ultimate job finder for adventurous souls. It's the best place where to look for internship opportunities in places ranging from national parks to ski resorts, dude ranches to retreat centers and everything in between.
- AbsoluteInternship: AbsoluteInternship.com attracts adventurous college students and post-graduates.
For Media Internships
- MediaBistro: MediaBistro.com is for those looking to launch a career in the media.
For International Internships
- Go Abroad: Go Abroad is a great place to search for internships in different regions of the globe. You can search by interest, country, or city. The search results list available internships and internship programs.
Other Useful Resources
- Craigslist: Craigslist is a central network of online communities, featuring free classified advertisements such as jobs, internships, housing, personals, services, etc. Craigslist has more than 2 million new job postings each month. When you first visit craigslist, you narrow down your search by picking your location down to the city. There is a column on the page entitled jobs, with category titles, such as accounting, government, engineering, etc. A great component of this site is that the jobs you search for are arranged by when they were posted (by day and time!). You can check out the new jobs posted everyday and be one of the first to apply. You need not create an account. Another useful feature of craigslist is the ability to place your own ad. You can create an ad describing the service or type of internship you are looking to do, and it will become part of this enormous network in minutes, free of charge!
- FindSpark: FindSpark is an online and offline community dedicated to setting up every young professional for career success.
- JobMonkey: JobMonkeyJobs.com is a job board that focuses on cool full-time and seasonal jobs. On the Job Board, there is a section dedicated entirely to internship listings. You can also easily search the site by location, keyword, and industry. The job board allows you to apply for jobs directly from the job listings after you set up a profile.
- amber+ internship services: amber+ internship services connects students with valuable opportunities to gain real-world experience and enhance their skills. Their esteemed partners offer exclusive discounts on training and skill development courses to their members.
Tips for a Successful Internship Search
- Define Your Goals: First, write down your goals and everything you want out of a work placement. Based on your living expenses, a paid internship might be the only option. For others, though, finding a position that allows them to hone a specific skill will be a priority. At the end of the day, it’s all about knowing what you want.
- Understand Your Field: Is your industry saturated with interns? Are companies constantly looking for new ones or hiring them selectively? Is the interview process lightning fast or rather slow? Which ones are the top companies in the field and what do they have to offer? Understanding your field is essential as it will give you a sense of what to expect of the whole process and the internship itself.
- Network: One of the best way to find an internship is through personal connections and networking. Talk with family, friends, fellow students, coworkers, professors, and past or current employers. Don’t be shy about asking for help! Collect contact information for anyone who may be able to help you find an internship. internship in your field. Even if your contacts don’t work in your industry, they may know someone who does. Although there may not be any available internships at their company right now, they can refer you to their contacts and keep you in mind if something becomes available. Be proactive! on vacation, try to set up informational interviews with employers you’d be interested in.
- Utilize Your College Career Center: Drop by to see if they can provide internship placement assistance. They can give you a hand by looking over your resume or cover letter. Keep an eye open for any on-campus events or nearby internship fairs taking place.
- Tailor Your Application Materials: A surprising number of college students are too lazy to tailor their career documents to the positions they're applying for. Employers will notice the amount of effort you’ve put into your application. In other words, generic resumes and one-size-fits-all cover letters are sure to make zero impression. Be prepared to review each and every document you're sending out. Make sure to tweak your resume if necessary. Let's say, for example, that you're majoring both in English and Management. You’ll want to play up your verbal prowess for a magazine job. Collect any relevant letters of recommendation and references that you can send to the internship coordinator. Make sure to have all of this information ready to go before you start applying.
- Prepare a Pitch: Start with a formal greeting. Then introduce yourself and explain that you’re interested in the internship. Next you'll need to prepare a pitch. Remember that if you are cold calling the company may have a number of questions for you concerning the position.
- Apply Widely: You've probably submitted a handful of college applications during your senior year in high school. Don't put all your eggs into one basket. Apply to a host of opportunities. Remember that the best positions fill up quickly. So if you want to stay ahead of the game, find out when local companies open internship applications and get yours in ASAP.
- Contact Companies Directly: Is there a specific company that you're absolutely dying to intern for? Try your luck by sending in your resume together with expressing your interest in working for them.
- Stay Persistent: Yes, job hunting is exhausting. As overwhelming as it gets, don’t let it break you. Remember to stay on the lookout for new opportunities every day.
- Seek Advice from Those Who Have Succeeded: Perhaps your roommate's older sister had a cool internship at your local marketing hub back when she was still at college. Pick the brains of those who were successful in landing the internships you're hoping to score. Take time to learn what qualities set them apart.
- Don't Rely Solely on Online Postings: Although you might find a range of internship opportunities at your college career center, some companies go about it quite differently and may not list their internship opportunities publicly at all. In fact, Forbes estimated that around 80% of jobs are not posted online. Reach out to your professors, family members, former neighbors and good friends who have already graduated.
- Act Professionally: Maybe you won't get paid for an internship, but that's no excuse for being careless. You'll always need to act professionally, no matter what you do. The first chance to prove you take things seriously regardless of the pay, is your internship interview.
- Be Flexible: As far as internships go, flexibility is essential. Be prepared to work longer hours or different days than you would have otherwise preferred. However, don't let this discourage you. An internship is the first step on your career path.
- Start Small: Let's face the truth. As an intern, you're not going to be working on a lot of glamorous tasks. Don't worry, though. Start small and work your way up. This is the way how employers test your dedication and look for the potential to take on greater responsibilities.
- Brainstorm and Stay Organized: But the Internet is a very big place, and it is easy to get caught up in many other distractions while trying to sift through all of the possibilities. Before you even boot up your computer, you may want to do a quick brainstorm of what you are looking for, including potential keywords, companies that you heard of through word of mouth, and any other information that might be useful. No matter where you begin your search, make sure that you have a pen and paper to jot down notes, jobs of particular interest and keywords that you may not have thought of during your initial brainstorm. Once you’ve started search, create a spreadsheet where you can cut and paste the URL of each program, a brief description of the program, pros and cons, and deadlines.
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