For university students in Singapore, internships have long been an important way to gain work experience and improve their employment prospects after graduation. But as competition for graduate jobs increases, some students are taking this a step further by pursuing as many internships as possible during their university years.
The practice, known as “intern-maxxing”, is based on a simple assumption: the more internships you complete, the better your chances of landing a good job after graduation.
But does having more internships on your CV actually make you a more attractive candidate to employers? Or would students be better off focusing on fewer, more meaningful internship experiences?
Why Are Students Doing This?
To understand why students are pursuing more internships, it helps to look at the graduate job market in Singapore.
The 2025 Joint Autonomous Universities Graduate Employment Survey, covering close to 20,000 graduates from NUS, NTU, SMU, SIT, SUTD and SUSS, found that close to 89% of graduates in the labour force secured employment within six months of completing their final examinations, down from 91.2% in 2024.
Entry-level hiring in Singapore also declined by 4.43% year on year, according to Graduate’s Guide 2026 data, although this was less severe than the declines of 12.44% for managers and 12.10% for senior professionals.
At the same time, the data show how internships can help students secure employment.
According to SMU’s 2025 Graduate Employment Survey results, 30.9% of its graduates in full-time permanent employment were working or had worked at their internship company, while another 16.4% received offers from their internship companies but chose not to accept them.
Taken together, nearly half of these SMU graduates had received job offers from companies where they interned. This helps explain why students increasingly see internships as an important part of their job search strategy, rather than simply something to include on their CV.
Where More Internships Actually Help
There are situations where completing multiple internships can strengthen your employment prospects.
For students who are still unsure about their career direction, internships offer an opportunity to explore different industries and working environments before deciding what they want to pursue after graduation.
For example, a second-year student who completes a summer internship in consulting and a winter internship in banking may gain a better understanding of which industry suits them. Similarly, interning at both a startup and a large corporation can help students discover the type of working environment they prefer.
These experiences can also be useful during job interviews, where being able to explain why you are interested in a particular career path is more convincing when you can draw on your own experience.
Even within the same industry, internships at different types of companies can be valuable. A student who has worked at both a large multinational corporation and a smaller Singapore firm may gain a better understanding of how different businesses operate, something that classroom learning alone may not provide.
For students who already know which industry they want to enter, internships serve a different purpose. Rather than exploring career options, the focus shifts towards gaining relevant experience and potentially securing a full-time position. This is particularly relevant for large banks, consulting firms and tech companies that use internship programmes as a pipeline for graduate hiring.
A student who performs well during an internship and receives a return offer may already have a full-time job secured before graduation, allowing them to avoid much of the uncertainty that comes with searching for their first job.
When More Internships Don’t Actually Help
While completing multiple internships can be useful, there comes a point when doing another internship may not add much to your employment prospects.
For example, a student who has completed several short internships across unrelated industries may struggle to explain how these experiences have prepared them for a particular role. In contrast, someone with fewer internships but more relevant experience may be able to make a stronger case for why they are suited to the job.
This does not mean that exploring different industries is necessarily a bad thing. What matters is whether students can explain what they have learnt from their internships and how those experiences have helped them make more informed career decisions.
There is also an opportunity cost that the intern-maxxing narrative tends to overlook.
Time spent on another internship is time that could have been spent on other activities that may be equally valuable to prospective employers. These include maintaining good academic performance, participating in meaningful extracurricular activities, pursuing research projects or developing a particular skill or interest that helps you stand out from other applicants.
For students who already have relevant internship experience, another placement may not necessarily be the most productive use of their time.
Not Every Student Has The Same Access To Internships
Another consideration is that not every student has the same opportunity to pursue multiple internships.
For example, unpaid internships may not be financially feasible for students who need to earn an income during their university years. Those who work part-time to cover their living expenses may also find it harder to take on additional internships, particularly during the academic year.
Students from lower-income households may also have less access to family networks that could help them secure internship opportunities, making it more challenging to enter competitive internship programmes.
In this sense, the ability to complete multiple internships is not simply a reflection of a student’s motivation or willingness to gain experience. It may also depend on their financial circumstances and the opportunities available to them.
This is worth recognising when evaluating the growing emphasis on intern-maxxing. Having more internships on a CV does not necessarily mean that a student is more capable or motivated than someone who has completed fewer placements.
More Internships Aren’t Necessarily Better Internships
For those who are still exploring their career options, internships across different industries can help them discover what they enjoy and where they might want to work. For those who already have a clear career direction, gaining relevant experience at a target employer may be more useful.
What matters is what you learn from each experience and how it prepares you for the career you want to pursue.
