Why Does LinkedIn Keep Showing Jobs in the Wrong Location, Even When You Select Remote or Your City?
Remote roles often still require a state or time zone, recruiters use broad location tags and LinkedIn adds similar jobs. See how to tighten your search.
If you’ve ever set your LinkedIn profile to your city, selected remote in job search, and still ended up seeing listings from random states that don’t match what you asked for, you’re not imagining it. It’s a pretty common frustration.
A lot of job seekers assume LinkedIn will tightly match their profile location, search filters, and job preferences. In reality, LinkedIn job search is often broader than people expect. Sometimes that helps. Sometimes it just wastes your time.
So if you’re wondering, “Why am I still seeing jobs from other states when I clearly asked for remote or local roles?” the short answer is this: LinkedIn’s search system doesn’t always treat location the way job seekers think it should. Employers also label roles inconsistently, and that creates even more noise.
Let’s break it down in a way that’s actually useful.
Why this happens on LinkedIn
There are a few reasons job results can feel off, even when your settings look correct.
- Remote doesn’t always mean location-free. Many employers mark a role as remote, but still only want applicants from a specific state, region, or time zone.
- Recruiters use broad location tags. A job may be posted under one city, a whole metro area, or even a company HQ, even though the actual role is flexible.
- LinkedIn expands search results. Sometimes the platform tries to show “similar” jobs, not just exact matches.
- Your profile location and your search filters are not the same thing. Your profile tells people where you are. Your search tells LinkedIn what you want right now. Those two things don’t always work together cleanly.
- Premium does not fully fix search relevance. Premium adds tools, but it doesn’t guarantee perfect location filtering.
That’s the annoying part. You can do everything “right” and still get messy results.
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What LinkedIn probably means by “remote”
This is where a lot of people get tripped up.
When you see a role marked remote, ask a few follow-up questions:
- Is it remote within one state only?
- Is it remote but tied to a nearby office?
- Is it remote only for people in a certain tax jurisdiction?
- Is it remote but requiring occasional travel to another city?
- Is it actually hybrid and just poorly labeled?
In other words, remote is not always fully remote. Sometimes it means “work from home, but only if you live in Texas.” Sometimes it means “remote in the U.S., except several states.” Sometimes it means “hybrid, but we forgot to label it properly.”
LinkedIn can only work with the way the employer set up the post, and employers are not always precise.
For a broader explanation of how LinkedIn job filters work, LinkedIn’s own help pages are worth checking: LinkedIn Help.
How to get more relevant LinkedIn job results
If the current setup is giving you bad matches, here are the most practical tweaks to try.
1) Use the location field more carefully
If you want only jobs in your city, search using your city name directly in the location filter instead of assuming your profile location will control the results.
Try searches like:
- Your job title + your city
- Your job title + nearby metro area
- Your job title + remote
- Your job title + “hybrid” + your city
Why? Because some companies post jobs under the nearest major city instead of the smaller city where the job actually sits.
2) Don’t rely on just one filter
Use a combination of:
- Location
- On-site/Remote filter
- Date posted
- Experience level
- Industry
The more specific you get, the better chance you have of cutting out junk results.
3) Use keyword exclusions in your search
If certain states or cities keep showing up and wasting your time, exclude them manually when possible. For example, if you keep seeing roles from California or New York that aren’t relevant, add terms that narrow your job title and function instead of leaving the query too broad.
You can also search for wording like:
- “remote within [your state]”
- “remote in [your city/region]”
- “based in [your city]”
4) Read the first few lines of the job description before clicking deep
This sounds small, but it helps. A lot of location restrictions are stated right near the top, like:
- “Applicants must reside in…”
- “Remote in select states only”
- “Must be within commuting distance of…”
That quick scan can save you from wasting 10 minutes on every listing.
5) Set multiple job alerts instead of one broad alert
This is one of the better tweaks for LinkedIn.
Instead of one generic alert, create several smaller ones:
- One for your city
- One for your metro area
- One for remote roles
- One for hybrid roles near you
That gives you more control and often produces cleaner alerts.
Questions worth asking yourself during the search
If LinkedIn keeps giving you poor matches, pause and ask:
- Am I searching too broadly?
- Am I only using the “remote” filter without checking state restrictions?
- Would searching the larger metro area help?
- Should I create separate alerts for local and remote roles?
- Are companies in my field using LinkedIn accurately, or should I search elsewhere too?
That last question matters more than people think. Some industries post very clean LinkedIn jobs. Others are a mess.
Should you use other job platforms too?
Honestly, yes.
LinkedIn is useful, but it shouldn’t be your only source, especially if location accuracy is important to you. It helps to compare results across platforms like:
- Indeed
- Glassdoor Jobs
- ZipRecruiter
- FlexJobs for more remote-focused roles
For people targeting remote jobs, this guide from Indeed is also useful: How to Find Remote Jobs.
If you prefer video explainers, YouTube also has practical walkthroughs on refining LinkedIn job alerts and filters. Here’s a search that surfaces several: LinkedIn job search filters on YouTube.
What to do if you already have Premium and it still feels broken
If you’re paying for Premium and the search experience still feels off, you’re not alone. Premium can help with visibility, applicant insights, and messaging in some cases, but it doesn’t completely solve the problem of inconsistent job tagging.
So instead of expecting Premium to clean up your search automatically, use it for the parts it actually does better:
- Researching companies
- Reviewing applicant insights
- Finding hiring managers or recruiters
- Making a shortlist of target employers
Then use manual search discipline to handle the location problem.
A simple search routine that usually works better
If you want something practical, try this routine for the next week:
- Search your job title in your exact city.
- Search the same title in your nearest major metro.
- Run a separate remote-only search.
- Open only recent jobs from the last 24 hours or 7 days.
- Scan the top lines for state restrictions.
- Save only the truly relevant ones.
- Create separate alerts based on what actually worked.
It’s not perfect, but it usually reduces the “why am I seeing this?” problem.
Final thoughts
If LinkedIn keeps showing jobs in other states when you asked for your city or remote work, the issue is usually a mix of broad platform matching, inconsistent employer labeling, and the reality that remote jobs often still have geographic limits.
So yes, your frustration makes sense.
The best fix is usually not one magic toggle. It’s a smarter setup: tighter searches, multiple alerts, better keyword choices, and cross-checking with other platforms. That tends to get you closer to the jobs that actually fit where you want to work.
If you’re also trying to improve how you show up on LinkedIn while job searching, it helps to think beyond just filters. Your profile, positioning, and visibility all matter. That’s one reason brands and professionals often turn to agencies that understand how LinkedIn behaves in the real world. At EXEED Digitals, we usually support clients with these kinds of LinkedIn concerns, from profile presence to platform strategy and lead generation systems. Our LinkedIn agency services have helped 100s of brands build stronger results on LinkedIn, and that same practical approach is often what makes the platform feel a lot less frustrating.
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