But pay growth stayed strong, with the increase in basic pay hitting a record high excluding the pandemic period, keeping pressure on the Bank of England to continue raising borrowing costs despite the economic slowdown.
With finance minister Jeremy Hunt set to raise taxes and cut spending on Thursday to fix the public finances, potentially deepening an expected recession, the jobless rate rose to 3.6%, pushed up by a rate of 3.8% in September alone.
Economists polled by Reuters had expected the unemployment rate to remain at 3.5%.
The number of people in employment fell by 52,000 in the July-to-September period, the Office for National Statistics said, a bigger decline than the median forecast in the Reuters poll for a 25,000 drop.
Read more at Reuters
