The percentage of newly minted J.D.s who found legal work increased for the fifth straight year in 2018, according to new employment data from the American Bar Association.

The latest figures, released Monday, show that 78.6 percent of the class of 2018 had secured full-time, long-term jobs that either require bar passage, or for which a law degree offers an advantage within 10 months of graduation—up from 75.3 percent the previous year.

But as in previous years, some of that gain was fueled by fewer law graduates competing for jobs and not by a significant increase in the number of entry-level legal jobs. The actual number of the bar-required and J.D.-advantage jobs increased by 714, or slightly less than 3 percent. Yet the total number of J.D. graduates in 2018 fell by 583, or nearly 2 percent. Thus, the combination of both factors yielded relatively strong outcomes for the 2018 graduating class.