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Craft and related trades workers · code 7221

Blacksmiths, hammersmiths and forging press workers

AI can read the blueprint. Shaping hot metal on an anvil is still muscle and eye.

Measuring and inspecting parts is mostly out of AI's reach. It barely touches six of the seven tasks, including reading work orders, drawing wire and running forging presses.

What they actually do (and what else they get called)

Blacksmiths, hammersmiths and forging press workers hammer and forge bars, rods, ingots and plates of iron, steel or other metals, and draw wire to make and repair various kinds of tools, metal articles, pieces of equipment, and agricultural and related implements. Tasks include - (a) heating metal in forge furnaces and manufacturing and repairing articles by drawing, bending, cutting, hammering metal on an anvil, punching, shearing, joining and hardening or tempering; (b) shaping heated metal into forgings on power hammers equipped with open dies; (c) operating closed-die drop hammers to forge metal articles; (d) operating a power-press machine equipped with closed dies to forge metal articles; (e) drawing wire; (f) reading work orders or blueprints to determine specified tolerances and sequences of operations for machine setup; (g) measuring and inspecting machine parts to ensure conformity with product specifications. Examples of the occupations classified here: - Blacksmith - Drop hammer worker - Forging press worker - Hammersmith Some related occupations classified elsewhere: - Casting machine operator - 7223 - Machine tool operator - 7223

  • drop forging hammer worker
  • hydraulic forging press worker
  • blacksmith
  • mechanical forging press worker

Job titles from the EU's ESCO list. Search for any of them on the jobs page and you'll end up here.

83 / 100

Strongly holds up against AI

Most of this job still needs an actual human. AI would mostly be making the tea.

Not the odds you keep your job. It's how much of the everyday work still needs a person, out of 100.

← Robot's turf Human's turf →

The ILO's official verdict: Not Exposed

89 of 427 for holding up against AI

Why this score?

The ILO rated each of this job's 7 tasks for how much of it AI could do. They average 16.6 out of 100, so it holds up at 100 − 16.6 = 83.4.

That's the whole sum. No black box, no secret sauce: you can check it against the ILO's study. ILO group “Not Exposed”: None of this job's tasks scored high enough to count.

from the source Working Paper 140, Generative AI and Jobs 2025 index data 0.8-observed-use

Pinch of salt: this number is probably too rosy

It only asks what AI software could do, and this job is 60 out of 100 hands-on. A chatbot can't do that part. A robot might, one day, and nobody measures how close that is.

Man v Bot · compare

Who holds up better?

Blacksmiths, hammersmiths and forging press workers 83

v

Go on, try your partner's job. Or your sibling's. We won't tell.

Man v Bot

Where the bot helps, and where the human wins

Bot

What AI takes

The routine stuff. You may not miss it.

  • Reading work orders and specifications.
  • Measuring and inspecting parts.
  • Machine settings for presses.

Man

What people still do better

Judgement, trust and skilled hands. Hard to download.

  • Shaping hot metal by hand.
  • Judging heat by colour.
  • Custom and repair work.

Both

What's arriving

New work that only exists because the AI does.

  • Heritage and architectural metalwork.
  • Supervising automated forging presses.
  • Selling custom work online.

Written by a human, from the ILO's task ratings below. Yes, we see the irony. Read it as one person's take.

Meet your two rivals

They're not the same machine. AI software can only reach the parts of a job done on a screen or in words. A chatbot can't climb a ladder. A robot might, one day, if it doesn't fall off.

The AI

Lives in a screen. Never had to fix a boiler.

Threat level: Low

18 could do without you

It could take over very little of the work on its own. It could help with 52 of 100.

The robot

The wildcard. Has hands, still working out stairs.

How much it matters here: Higher

60 how hands-on

Most of this job needs hands, a body or turning up. That's robot territory, and nobody measures how far robots have got well enough to give you a number. We won't make one up.

So could a robot do the physical part?

More fine handwork, and more time in cramped or awkward spots, than a typical hands-on job. That is exactly what machines find hardest: they do best in tidy, predictable places.

Robots hate fiddly work in awkward spaces. On that measure, this job scores 41 out of 100. The higher it is, the longer the robot waits.

60 How
hands-on
41 How fiddly
and cramped

Kind of hands-on work Hands-on, fiddly work in tight spaces

The small print

They aren't a robot score, and nothing on this page is. Nobody measures how far robots have got well enough to put a number on it. These are the closest thing we have: how hands-on the job is, and how much fiddly, cramped work it takes, which is what Frey and Osborne found hardest for machines.

From O*NET, matched to one US job .

finger skill 42.9 · hand skill 42.9 · cramped spaces 37.3 · averaged · rule: hands-on 50+ · fiddly 39.4+

estimated O*NET 31.0 BLS occupational crosswalk chain ISCO-08 to 2010 SOC (Aug 2012, rev. Jun 2015); 2010 to 2018 SOC (Nov 2017); O*NET-SOC 2019 taxonomy data 0.8-observed-use measures chosen by Frey & Osborne (2017) · the grouping is a sorting, not a measurement

The job, task by task

Every job is really a bundle of tasks. Here's this one unpacked, with how much of each AI could do, out of 100. The score is the average, and averages can hide a lot.

AI's favourite task here scores 26, against an average of 17. The bigger the gap, the more lopsided the job: some of it wide open to AI, some of it barely touched.

  1. 26

    Measuring and inspecting machine parts to ensure conformance to product specifications.

    Low
  2. 20

    Reading work orders or blueprints to determine specified tolerances and sequences of operations for machine setup

    Very Low
  3. 15

    Shaping heated metal into forgings on power hammer equipped with open dies

    Very Low
  4. 15

    Operating closed-die drop hammer to forge metal articles

    Very Low
  5. 14

    Heating metal in forge furnace and manufacturing and repairing articles by drawing, bending, cutting, hammering metal on an anvil, punching, shearing, joining and hardening or tempering

    Very Low
  6. 13

    Drawing wire

    Very Low
  7. 13

    Operating a power-press machine equipped with closed dies to forge metal articles

    Very Low

7 tasks · the High to Very Low labels are the ILO's

from the source Working Paper 140, Generative AI and Jobs 2025 index data 0.8-observed-use

Sidekick or replacement?

A tool that makes you faster is a very different thing from one that does the task while you watch. Jobs and Skills Australia measured the two separately, which is handy.

AI helps you
52
AI does it for you
18

Sidekick wins, by 34 points.

How good a match is this?

One Australian job matches, but only partly: not everyone in it does this job. Treat the numbers as a rough guide.

estimated Our Gen AI Transition (Gen AI Capacity Study) September 2025 detailed data release data 0.8-observed-use matched to Australian jobs 3221

So, should blacksmiths and forge workers be worried?

Short answer: not really. Put the kettle on.

No. The most exposed task is measuring and inspecting parts, rated Low; forging and hammering rate Very Low. Industrial forging is increasingly automated; hand forging, repairs and custom work stay a craft.

Worth remembering: we score tasks, not jobs. When AI takes on a task, the job usually reshuffles around it rather than vanishing.

Where this job could lead

None of the new jobs we've written up start from here yet. Could be you're the first. See the jobs AI is creating →

How are the neighbours doing?

There are 65 jobs in the “Craft and related trades workers” family, averaging 84. This one is below the family average.

Pit this against any other job →