Firmware Contract Job Trends in England

Firmware
UK > England

The table below provides summary statistics and contractor rates for jobs advertised in England requiring Firmware skills. It covers contract job vacancies from the 6 months leading up to 26 May 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
26 May 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 447 405 343
Rank change year-on-year -42 -62 +128
Contract jobs citing Firmware 151 71 196
As % of all contract jobs in England 0.36% 0.30% 0.54%
As % of the System Software category 3.58% 2.34% 4.87%
Number of daily rates quoted 77 35 118
10th Percentile £300 £200 £205
25th Percentile £358 £326 £266
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £425 £440 £400
Median % change year-on-year -3.41% +10.00% -12.33%
75th Percentile £563 £547 £539
90th Percentile £713 £660 £575
UK median daily rate £425 £425 £413
% change year-on-year - +3.03% -15.38%
Number of hourly rates quoted 22 17 49
10th Percentile £43.25 £38.50 £23.44
25th Percentile £60.00 £51.06 £50.75
Median hourly rate £68.25 £61.50 £62.50
Median % change year-on-year +10.98% -1.60% +11.11%
75th Percentile £75.00 £88.00 £70.00
90th Percentile - £89.80 £90.00
UK median hourly rate £66.50 £62.00 £62.50
% change year-on-year +7.26% -0.80% +11.11%

All System Software Skills
England

Firmware falls under the System Software category. For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all contract job vacancies requiring system software skills in England.

Contract vacancies with a requirement for system software skills 4,220 3,039 4,026
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in England 10.17% 12.77% 11.02%
Number of daily rates quoted 2,838 2,083 2,826
10th Percentile £213 £213 £200
25th Percentile £400 £381 £350
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £520 £500
Median % change year-on-year -3.85% +4.00% -4.76%
75th Percentile £600 £623 £608
90th Percentile £688 £700 £688
UK median daily rate £500 £502 £500
% change year-on-year -0.35% +0.35% -4.76%
Number of hourly rates quoted 166 68 205
10th Percentile £17.46 £14.99 £14.06
25th Percentile £25.79 £18.13 £14.48
Median hourly rate £52.75 £28.46 £22.00
Median % change year-on-year +85.38% +29.34% -57.80%
75th Percentile £72.28 £63.00 £58.69
90th Percentile £79.00 £88.00 £76.80
UK median hourly rate £51.75 £28.41 £22.50
% change year-on-year +82.15% +26.27% -58.76%

Firmware
Job Vacancy Trend in England

Historical trend showing the proportion of contract IT job postings citing Firmware relative to all contract IT jobs advertised in England.

Firmware job vacancy trend in England

Firmware
Daily Rate Trend in England

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in England citing Firmware.

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in England citing Firmware

Firmware
Daily Rate Histogram in England

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing Firmware in England over the 6 months to 26 May 2026.

Daily rate histogram for Firmware in England

Firmware
Hourly Rate Trend in England

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in England citing Firmware.

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in England citing Firmware

Firmware
Hourly Rate Histogram in England

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing Firmware in England over the 6 months to 26 May 2026.

Hourly rate histogram for Firmware in England

Firmware
Contract Job Locations in England

The table below looks at the demand and provides a guide to the median contractor rates quoted in IT jobs citing Firmware within the England region over the 6 months to 26 May 2026. The 'Rank Change' column provides an indication of the change in demand within each location based on the same 6 month period last year.

Location Rank Change
on Same Period
Last Year
Matching
Contract
IT Job Ads
Median
Daily Rate
Past 6 Months
Median Daily Rate
% Change
on Same Period
Last Year
Live
Jobs
North of England -33 48 £365 -18.89% 23
London -57 33 £431 +7.81% 23
Midlands -39 29 £413 - 18
North West -15 28 £450 -7.69% 16
South East -52 27 £600 +26.32% 76
West Midlands -39 26 £413 - 5
Yorkshire - 19 £365 - 4
East of England -31 18 £425 -22.73% 52
South West -21 11 £475 +61.02% 34
East Midlands -28 3 £175 - 13
North East -22 1 - - 3
Firmware
UK

Firmware
Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities in England by Category

The following tables expand on the one above by listing co-occurrences grouped by category. They cover the same employment type, locality and period, with up to 20 co-occurrences shown in each category:

Application Platforms
1 6 (3.97%) Microsoft Exchange
2 5 (3.31%) Confluence
3 2 (1.32%) Apache Airflow
4 1 (0.66%) SharePoint
Applications
1 6 (3.97%) Simulink
2 1 (0.66%) Adobe After Effects
2 1 (0.66%) Adobe Creative Suite
2 1 (0.66%) Blender
2 1 (0.66%) Microsoft Excel
2 1 (0.66%) OrCAD
Cloud Services
1 27 (17.88%) Azure
2 11 (7.28%) Entra ID
3 7 (4.64%) AWS
4 6 (3.97%) Microsoft 365
5 5 (3.31%) Azure ExpressRoute
5 5 (3.31%) GitHub
6 4 (2.65%) Azure DevOps
7 3 (1.99%) Azure Monitor
7 3 (1.99%) Azure Stack
8 2 (1.32%) AWS IoT
9 1 (0.66%) AWS Direct Connect
9 1 (0.66%) Cohesity
9 1 (0.66%) Figma
9 1 (0.66%) Google Workspace
9 1 (0.66%) IaaS
9 1 (0.66%) OneDrive
9 1 (0.66%) PaaS
9 1 (0.66%) Rubrik
9 1 (0.66%) SaaS
9 1 (0.66%) Virtual Private Cloud
Communications & Networking
1 25 (16.56%) DNS
2 19 (12.58%) Firewall
2 19 (12.58%) SAN
2 19 (12.58%) SSL
2 19 (12.58%) Wireshark
3 18 (11.92%) BIG-IP
3 18 (11.92%) F5 BIG-IP GTM
3 18 (11.92%) F5 BIG-IP LTM
3 18 (11.92%) HTTP
3 18 (11.92%) TCP/IP
4 13 (8.61%) Ethernet
5 11 (7.28%) VLAN
6 10 (6.62%) WAN
7 9 (5.96%) SD-WAN
7 9 (5.96%) Software-Defined Radio
7 9 (5.96%) Wireless
8 7 (4.64%) DHCP
9 6 (3.97%) VPN
10 5 (3.31%) LAN
10 5 (3.31%) OSPF
Database & Business Intelligence
1 2 (1.32%) SQL Server Reporting Services
Development Applications
1 18 (11.92%) Fiddler
2 15 (9.93%) JIRA
3 3 (1.99%) Git
3 3 (1.99%) Rational DOORS
3 3 (1.99%) Rational Rhapsody
4 2 (1.32%) MSTest
4 2 (1.32%) Team Foundation Server
4 2 (1.32%) VectorCAST
4 2 (1.32%) Visual Studio
5 1 (0.66%) Sonatype Nexus
General
1 33 (21.85%) Social Skills
2 18 (11.92%) Banking
2 18 (11.92%) Investment Banking
3 13 (8.61%) Electronics
4 11 (7.28%) Aerospace
5 8 (5.30%) Analytical Skills
6 2 (1.32%) Documentation Skills
6 2 (1.32%) Finance
6 2 (1.32%) Games
6 2 (1.32%) Inclusion and Diversity
6 2 (1.32%) Manufacturing
6 2 (1.32%) Organisational Skills
7 1 (0.66%) Law
7 1 (0.66%) Local Government
7 1 (0.66%) Mandarin Language
7 1 (0.66%) Wearables
Job Titles
1 31 (20.53%) Network Engineer
2 18 (11.92%) Blue Coat Engineer
2 18 (11.92%) IP Network Engineer
2 18 (11.92%) Web Engineer
3 17 (11.26%) Embedded Engineer
4 16 (10.60%) Software Engineer
5 14 (9.27%) Senior
6 11 (7.28%) Data Centre Engineer
7 10 (6.62%) Embedded Software Engineer
8 9 (5.96%) Administrator
8 9 (5.96%) Lead
9 6 (3.97%) Firmware Engineer
9 6 (3.97%) FPGA Engineer
9 6 (3.97%) Storage Engineer
10 5 (3.31%) Desktop Engineer
10 5 (3.31%) Technical Leader
11 4 (2.65%) Architect
11 4 (2.65%) SAN Administrator
11 4 (2.65%) Storage Administrator
11 4 (2.65%) Systems Engineer
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 12 (7.95%) Redfish
2 6 (3.97%) Yocto
3 3 (1.99%) .NET
3 3 (1.99%) OpenTelemetry
4 2 (1.32%) 802.1X
4 2 (1.32%) Unity (Game Engine)
4 2 (1.32%) Unreal Engine
5 1 (0.66%) Framer.js
5 1 (0.66%) JSON
5 1 (0.66%) Microsoft Graph
5 1 (0.66%) REST
5 1 (0.66%) WPF
5 1 (0.66%) YAML
Miscellaneous
1 31 (20.53%) Data Centre
2 25 (16.56%) Embedded Systems
3 19 (12.58%) Management Information System
4 18 (11.92%) FPGA
5 10 (6.62%) VHDL
6 9 (5.96%) PCIe
6 9 (5.96%) Verilog
7 7 (4.64%) Clustering
7 7 (4.64%) Device Driver
7 7 (4.64%) Onboarding
7 7 (4.64%) Replication
8 6 (3.97%) MicroBlaze
8 6 (3.97%) RISC-V
9 5 (3.31%) Enterprise Storage
9 5 (3.31%) Linux Command Line
9 5 (3.31%) Security Posture
10 4 (2.65%) Analytical Mindset
10 4 (2.65%) IoT
11 3 (1.99%) Algorithms
11 3 (1.99%) PKI
Operating Systems
1 35 (23.18%) Linux
2 34 (22.52%) Windows
3 8 (5.30%) Embedded Linux
4 7 (4.64%) AIX
5 5 (3.31%) FreeRTOS
5 5 (3.31%) VMS
6 4 (2.65%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
7 3 (1.99%) SUSE
7 3 (1.99%) Unix
7 3 (1.99%) Windows Server
8 2 (1.32%) Android
8 2 (1.32%) VxWorks
9 1 (0.66%) Data ONTAP
9 1 (0.66%) Mac OS
Processes & Methodologies
1 22 (14.57%) Software Engineering
2 21 (13.91%) Validation
3 20 (13.25%) Load Balancing
4 19 (12.58%) Data Centre Operations
5 18 (11.92%) Data Loss Prevention
5 18 (11.92%) Malware Detection/Protection
6 17 (11.26%) Problem-Solving
6 17 (11.26%) Runbook
7 14 (9.27%) Capacity Planning
8 13 (8.61%) Migration
8 13 (8.61%) Test Automation
9 12 (7.95%) Computer Science
9 12 (7.95%) High Availability
9 12 (7.95%) ITIL
9 12 (7.95%) Systems Engineering
10 11 (7.28%) Customer Requirements
10 11 (7.28%) ITSM
11 10 (6.62%) Agile
11 10 (6.62%) Asset Management
11 10 (6.62%) Disaster Recovery
Programming Languages
1 27 (17.88%) Python
2 19 (12.58%) C
2 19 (12.58%) PowerShell
3 17 (11.26%) C++
4 11 (7.28%) Bash
5 9 (5.96%) MATLAB
6 8 (5.30%) C#
6 8 (5.30%) SystemVerilog
7 5 (3.31%) Embedded C++
8 3 (1.99%) Ada
8 3 (1.99%) Embedded C
8 3 (1.99%) Perl
9 2 (1.32%) Java
9 2 (1.32%) Tcl
9 2 (1.32%) VB.NET
10 1 (0.66%) VB
Qualifications
1 35 (23.18%) Security Cleared
2 26 (17.22%) SC Cleared
3 21 (13.91%) Degree
4 8 (5.30%) Computer Science Degree
5 7 (4.64%) DV Cleared
6 5 (3.31%) Cisco Certification
7 4 (2.65%) CCNP
7 4 (2.65%) CEH
7 4 (2.65%) CISSP
7 4 (2.65%) CompTIA Security+
8 3 (1.99%) Azure Certification
8 3 (1.99%) CCIE
9 2 (1.32%) CCNA
9 2 (1.32%) HNC
9 2 (1.32%) HND
9 2 (1.32%) ISTQB
9 2 (1.32%) Microsoft Certification
10 1 (0.66%) JNCIA
10 1 (0.66%) JNCIS
10 1 (0.66%) MCSE
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 9 (5.96%) DO-254
2 6 (3.97%) DO-178B
3 4 (2.65%) Def Stans
3 4 (2.65%) MISRA
3 4 (2.65%) NIST
4 3 (1.99%) QA
5 1 (0.66%) Accessibility
5 1 (0.66%) GDPR
5 1 (0.66%) PCI DSS
5 1 (0.66%) SLA
System Software
1 33 (21.85%) VMware Infrastructure
2 21 (13.91%) Embedded Firmware
3 16 (10.60%) Active Directory
4 9 (5.96%) Virtual Machines
5 8 (5.30%) Hyper-V
6 5 (3.31%) VMware ESXi
7 4 (2.65%) Docker
7 4 (2.65%) KVM
7 4 (2.65%) vSphere
8 3 (1.99%) BitLocker
8 3 (1.99%) PowerHA
9 2 (1.32%) Ceph
9 2 (1.32%) Lustre
9 2 (1.32%) Slurm Workload Manager
10 1 (0.66%) NFS
10 1 (0.66%) VMware NSX
Systems Management
1 11 (7.28%) Dell DRAC
2 7 (4.64%) Ansible
3 5 (3.31%) FortiGate
3 5 (3.31%) Terraform
4 4 (2.65%) Kubernetes
4 4 (2.65%) Microsoft Intune
4 4 (2.65%) Prometheus
4 4 (2.65%) Tivoli Storage Manager
4 4 (2.65%) vCenter Server
5 3 (1.99%) Failover Clustering
5 3 (1.99%) Microsoft Clustering
5 3 (1.99%) SCCM
5 3 (1.99%) VxRail
6 2 (1.32%) Grafana
6 2 (1.32%) HP ALM
6 2 (1.32%) HP Quality Center
7 1 (0.66%) PaperCut
7 1 (0.66%) Podman
7 1 (0.66%) Single Sign-On
7 1 (0.66%) SnapMirror
Vendors
1 37 (24.50%) VMware
2 24 (15.89%) Cisco
3 23 (15.23%) NetApp
4 18 (11.92%) Blue Coat
4 18 (11.92%) F5
4 18 (11.92%) McAfee
5 15 (9.93%) Microsoft
6 11 (7.28%) Dell
7 9 (5.96%) EMC
7 9 (5.96%) IBM
7 9 (5.96%) Xilinx
8 8 (5.30%) Microsemi
9 7 (4.64%) Altera
9 7 (4.64%) ServiceNow
10 6 (3.97%) Fortinet
11 5 (3.31%) Brocade
11 5 (3.31%) HP
11 5 (3.31%) Juniper
11 5 (3.31%) Palo Alto
12 4 (2.65%) Siemens