The license just posted, or it's about to. Offers cluster here. So does the paradox: you need experience to get a job, and a job to get experience. It reads like a locked market. Most of the board never stated a requirement.
How high the bar is
1,709 of 14,094 active nursing postings state an experience bar. Of those, 771 ask for exactly one year. Another 586 ask for two. Three or more years covers about a fifth, mostly flight, cath lab, and other roles that were never first jobs.
When a posting asks for years
When a posting states a bar, the most common one ends on your first work anniversary.
The bar isn't the unit
School folklore says some units are closed to new grads. The board doesn't agree. Every major unit posts both welcomes and bars at once.
ICU welcomes in 31 postings and bars in 60. ER welcomes in 44 and bars in 60. Med surg is nearly even: 47 welcomes, 43 bars. Psych is 43 and 42. OR welcomes in 25 and bars in 59. The employer decides, not the unit name.
If ICU is the goal, the path new grads take into ICU usually runs through a residency, not through two years of med surg you didn't want. Med surg first is a debate you'll hear. Route it by your goal, not by a rule.
Reading the requirements line
Preferred is a wish.
"One year preferred" is an invitation to apply with a cover note.
Check what the years bind.
Postings attach experience to a sign-on or a PRN track, two sentences from a new-grad line in the same posting.
A range bars at its floor.
"1-2 years required" is a one-year bar.
When an application turns into a phone screen, Interview Studio runs the questions new grads get. Nurses who just cleared this stretch are in I passed.
Next: ask how many weeks before you sign.
Notes
- Distribution of stated experience bars by years required, and welcomed-versus-gated counts by unit: Nursing Mastery job corpus, read 14 August 2026. Active nursing postings, n=14,094; postings stating a bar, n=1,709.
- "Preferred" is not counted as a bar. A stated range is counted at its floor.
- Live openings appear in the open-roles module below, drawn from the same corpus.
