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London vacation schemes
Join the global private client law firm in London
The best way to get a feel for the firm and the type of work we do is to come and work with us for a week on one of our vacation schemes.
We have up to 20 places in total and offer two dates for our vacation scheme in our London office.
The 2026 vacation scheme dates are as follows:
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Monday, 9 March - Wednesday, 18 March 2026
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Monday, 15 June - Wednesday, 24 June 2026
Candidates on the vacation scheme receive £700 per week and benefit from free meals and snacks in the firm’s café.
The final day of the vacation scheme will be an assessment centre for our 2028 training contract.
Join us
Applications for our 2026 Vacation Schemes are now open! All applications must be made via our online careers portal. The deadline for applications is Friday, 9 January 2026.
You must have the right to work for the duration of the programme (35 hours a week) in the UK. We are unable to sponsor visas for the vacation scheme. If you hold a Tier 4 visa, you will need to confirm that the dates of the vacation scheme are outside of term-time.
Our requirements
To join us, you’ll have a strong academic record but beyond that you will have the diversity of interests and confidence to work with our client base. We are the largest law firm in the world focused on the needs of individuals and have spent the last decade growing this international platform – the ability to work globally with all sorts of different people is vital. Languages aren’t essential but they are very useful here. In particular for our clients Russian, Italian, French, Spanish,Arabic, Mandarin and Japanese are useful.In terms of specific requirements, we welcome applications from all degree disciplines and from applicants at all stages of their careers – in fact, previous roles help bring the maturity required to work with our clients. You’ll have, or be on track to have, a 2:1 degree or higher and a minimum of AAB at A-Level (or the equivalent if educated outside the UK). Please note that undergraduate applicants must be in their penultimate or final year of a law degree or their final year of a non-law degree.
The interview process
The first stage in the process is to complete the online application form. Please note that you are only able to apply to either the vacation scheme or training contract each year. We do not accept duplicate applications and your first application is the one that will be considered. Please ensure that you complete your application in full including all your academic record.
We are proud to use the Rare Contextual Recruitment (CRS). We encourage you to complete the Rare form as this allows us to understand each candidate's achievements in the context in which they have been gained. The CRS is a screen-in not screen-out tool.
Following submission of your online application it will be reviewed by a member of our team. Please note that we do not use AI to screen applications.
Successful candidates will then be invited to take our online Cappfinity strengths based assessment. This comprises situational judgment, critical thinking and numerical reasoning questions. The scenarios have been designed to give you an insight into the type of work we undertake at Withers. The assessment is untimed. You will have one week to complete the assessment from the date and time that you receive the invite. Please check your junk/spam email regularly as we are unable to extend the deadline.
Following the online assessment, applications will be reviewed again, and successful candidates will be invited to complete a proof-reading assessment.Interviews for the vacation schemes take place online via Teams. The interview consists of a 50-minute interview with HR and a partner.
Candidates who speak a foreign language fluently may be asked to demonstrate this skill at interview.
Whilst we appreciate that you will have used online resources to prepare for the interview, we want to get to know you during the interview and therefore we discourage you from reading notes or using AI during the interview. We value authenticity and there are no trick questions, we are interested in how you think.
Successful candidates following the online interview will be offered a place on the vacation scheme.
Those who have gained the most from the experience in the past and have impressed us might have shown one or more of the following traits:
- Being genuinely interested in the people you are working with and the work you are presented with.
- Demonstrating a willingness to learn.
- Asking relevant questions.
- Being able to use common sense.
- Enthusiastic.
- Behaving professionally – from dressing appropriately to talking to people in the office.
- Having a good work ethic – i.e. being tenacious, willing to go the extra mile, dedicated to the job in hand.
FAQs
Do you assess me whilst I am on the placement? If so, what do I need to do on placement to impress you?
Yes, we do assess you on placement, but we are not assessing your every move! We ask each of your supervisors to give us some feedback at the end of the time that you spend with them. We ask them to assess you against the skills we look for in our trainees – which include team working and organisational skills. There will also be activities that you undertake during the vacation scheme in groups. The last day of the vacation scheme will be the assessment centre where you will be assessed for a 2028 training contract.
What is the deadline for submitting applications?
Applications close on 7 January 2026. We review applications on a rolling basis starting a month after applications open and send out invitations to the Cappfinity assessment on a rolling basis. Whilst we would not fill our places before the closing date, it may be useful to know that we do start to schedule interviews before the deadline, therefore we encourage you to apply as soon as you feel ready as we will be inviting to assessment on a rolling basis and interview invites may be issued before the deadline.
Candidate centre
To make an application or to continue an application already in progress, register with or log in to our careers centre here.
SPEAK TO ME
Jaya Louvre
Hi. I'm Jaya, global head of talent acquisition and diversity, and I'm on hand to help you with any questions you may have.
EMAIL JAYA