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 20 August 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

 6 months to
20 Aug 2026		 Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 457 388 353
Rank change year-on-year -69 -35 +36
Contract jobs citing Firmware 170 110 166
As % of all contract jobs in England 0.37% 0.40% 0.50%
As % of the System Software category 3.69% 3.34% 4.29%
Number of daily rates quoted 83 49 79
10th Percentile £250 £196 £204
25th Percentile £358 £325 £311
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £440 £425 £450
Median % change year-on-year +3.53% -5.56% -5.26%
75th Percentile £538 £525 £528
90th Percentile £626 £588 £575
UK median daily rate £425 £407 £450
% change year-on-year +4.55% -9.67% -7.69%
Number of hourly rates quoted 33 28 40
10th Percentile £12.76 £51.72 £20.50
25th Percentile £42.50 £55.88 £50.98
Median hourly rate £65.00 £81.75 £57.50
Median % change year-on-year -20.49% +42.17% +2.22%
75th Percentile £75.00 £90.38 £70.00
90th Percentile - £91.50 -
UK median hourly rate £62.50 £81.75 £57.38
% change year-on-year -23.55% +42.48% +2.00%

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 4,606 3,296 3,867
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in England 10.09% 11.94% 11.66%
Number of daily rates quoted 3,044 2,129 2,671
10th Percentile £213 £225 £225
25th Percentile £397 £378 £388
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £500 £515
Median % change year-on-year - -2.95% -1.87%
75th Percentile £600 £600 £608
90th Percentile £682 £688 £688
UK median daily rate £500 £500 £500
% change year-on-year - - -2.44%
Number of hourly rates quoted 190 93 128
10th Percentile £16.00 £15.01 £14.06
25th Percentile £29.00 £23.00 £15.70
Median hourly rate £60.17 £40.00 £24.18
Median % change year-on-year +50.41% +65.43% -37.28%
75th Percentile £74.20 £81.00 £63.75
90th Percentile £89.78 £91.50 £74.68
UK median hourly rate £55.00 £33.64 £24.18
% change year-on-year +63.52% +39.10% -49.75%

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 20 August 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 20 August 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 20 August 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 -12 52 £365 -16.57% 35
Midlands -29 40 £413 -28.26% 37
North West -12 32 £410 -6.29% 18
London -80 31 £450 +12.43% 26
South East -38 30 £600 +33.33% 66
West Midlands -33 29 £413 -28.26% 21
East of England -27 25 £425 - 55
Yorkshire - 19 £365 - 6
East Midlands -12 11 £500 +27.55% 15
South West -38 5 £425 -3.41% 46
North East - 1 - - 12
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 (3.53%) Microsoft Exchange
2 1 (0.59%) SharePoint
Applications
1 5 (2.94%) Simulink
2 1 (0.59%) Adobe After Effects
2 1 (0.59%) Adobe Creative Suite
2 1 (0.59%) Blender
2 1 (0.59%) Microsoft Excel
2 1 (0.59%) Microsoft Office
2 1 (0.59%) OrCAD
Business Applications
1 1 (0.59%) Remedy ITSM
Cloud Services
1 31 (18.24%) Azure
2 10 (5.88%) AWS
2 10 (5.88%) Entra ID
3 9 (5.29%) Microsoft 365
4 5 (2.94%) Azure ExpressRoute
5 4 (2.35%) Azure DevOps
6 3 (1.76%) Azure Monitor
6 3 (1.76%) Azure Stack
7 2 (1.18%) AWS IoT
7 2 (1.18%) GitHub
7 2 (1.18%) GitHub Copilot
7 2 (1.18%) IaaS
7 2 (1.18%) Nutanix
7 2 (1.18%) OCI
7 2 (1.18%) PaaS
7 2 (1.18%) SaaS
8 1 (0.59%) Figma
8 1 (0.59%) Google Workspace
8 1 (0.59%) OneDrive
8 1 (0.59%) Virtual Private Cloud
Communications & Networking
1 25 (14.71%) DNS
2 24 (14.12%) Firewall
3 21 (12.35%) SAN
4 18 (10.59%) SSL
4 18 (10.59%) Wireshark
5 17 (10.00%) TCP/IP
6 16 (9.41%) F5 BIG-IP GTM
6 16 (9.41%) F5 BIG-IP LTM
6 16 (9.41%) WAN
7 15 (8.82%) BIG-IP
7 15 (8.82%) HTTP
7 15 (8.82%) VLAN
8 13 (7.65%) Wireless
9 12 (7.06%) Software-Defined Radio
10 11 (6.47%) DHCP
10 11 (6.47%) LAN
10 11 (6.47%) SD-WAN
11 10 (5.88%) Wi-Fi
12 8 (4.71%) BGP
12 8 (4.71%) VPN
Database & Business Intelligence
1 2 (1.18%) SQL Server Reporting Services
2 1 (0.59%) Oracle Database
Development Applications
1 15 (8.82%) Fiddler
2 10 (5.88%) JIRA
3 6 (3.53%) Git
4 3 (1.76%) Team Foundation Server
5 2 (1.18%) Rational DOORS
5 2 (1.18%) Rational Rhapsody
5 2 (1.18%) VectorCAST
6 1 (0.59%) Ranorex
6 1 (0.59%) Sonatype Nexus
General
1 35 (20.59%) Social Skills
2 16 (9.41%) Analytical Skills
3 15 (8.82%) Banking
3 15 (8.82%) Investment Banking
4 14 (8.24%) Electronics
5 11 (6.47%) Aerospace
6 5 (2.94%) Manufacturing
6 5 (2.94%) Retail
7 4 (2.35%) Law
8 3 (1.76%) Documentation Skills
8 3 (1.76%) Inclusion and Diversity
8 3 (1.76%) Legal
9 2 (1.18%) Finance
9 2 (1.18%) Organisational Skills
10 1 (0.59%) Automotive
10 1 (0.59%) Games
10 1 (0.59%) Local Government
10 1 (0.59%) Mandarin Language
10 1 (0.59%) Telecoms
10 1 (0.59%) Wearables
Job Titles
1 30 (17.65%) Network Engineer
2 17 (10.00%) Embedded Engineer
2 17 (10.00%) Software Engineer
3 15 (8.82%) Blue Coat Engineer
3 15 (8.82%) IP Network Engineer
3 15 (8.82%) Web Engineer
4 14 (8.24%) Lead
5 13 (7.65%) Senior
6 11 (6.47%) Administrator
7 10 (5.88%) Data Centre Engineer
8 9 (5.29%) Embedded Software Engineer
9 8 (4.71%) Developer
9 8 (4.71%) Infrastructure Engineer
10 6 (3.53%) Analyst
10 6 (3.53%) FPGA Engineer
10 6 (3.53%) SAN Administrator
10 6 (3.53%) SAN Storage Administrator
10 6 (3.53%) Storage Administrator
10 6 (3.53%) Storage and Backup Administrator
10 6 (3.53%) Systems Engineer
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 13 (7.65%) Redfish
2 10 (5.88%) Yocto
3 8 (4.71%) Terraform
4 3 (1.76%) .NET
4 3 (1.76%) Flutter
4 3 (1.76%) OpenTelemetry
4 3 (1.76%) REST
5 2 (1.18%) 802.1X
6 1 (0.59%) Framer.js
6 1 (0.59%) JSON
6 1 (0.59%) Middleware
6 1 (0.59%) PyQt
6 1 (0.59%) Streamlit
6 1 (0.59%) WPF
6 1 (0.59%) YAML
Miscellaneous
1 32 (18.82%) Data Centre
2 30 (17.65%) Embedded Systems
3 15 (8.82%) Management Information System
3 15 (8.82%) RISC-V
4 14 (8.24%) Device Driver
5 13 (7.65%) Clustering
5 13 (7.65%) FPGA
6 9 (5.29%) IoT
6 9 (5.29%) Verilog
7 8 (4.71%) MicroBlaze
7 8 (4.71%) Replication
7 8 (4.71%) VHDL
8 7 (4.12%) Onboarding
9 6 (3.53%) Driving Licence
9 6 (3.53%) Enterprise Storage
9 6 (3.53%) PCIe
10 5 (2.94%) EPoS
10 5 (2.94%) Linux Command Line
11 4 (2.35%) Analytical Mindset
11 4 (2.35%) PKI
Operating Systems
1 37 (21.76%) Linux
2 36 (21.18%) Windows
3 14 (8.24%) Embedded Linux
4 11 (6.47%) AIX
5 9 (5.29%) Windows Server
6 7 (4.12%) Unix
7 6 (3.53%) Android
8 5 (2.94%) VMS
9 3 (1.76%) Apple iOS
9 3 (1.76%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
9 3 (1.76%) SUSE
10 2 (1.18%) VxWorks
10 2 (1.18%) Windows 7
11 1 (0.59%) Data ONTAP
11 1 (0.59%) Oracle Linux
11 1 (0.59%) Windows 10
11 1 (0.59%) Windows Server 2016
11 1 (0.59%) Windows Server 2019
Processes & Methodologies
1 28 (16.47%) Software Engineering
2 24 (14.12%) Capacity Planning
3 23 (13.53%) Data Centre Operations
4 22 (12.94%) ITIL
5 21 (12.35%) Problem-Solving
6 19 (11.18%) Migration
6 19 (11.18%) Validation
7 17 (10.00%) Load Balancing
8 15 (8.82%) Data Loss Prevention
8 15 (8.82%) Disaster Recovery
8 15 (8.82%) Malware Detection/Protection
8 15 (8.82%) Runbook
9 14 (8.24%) High Availability
9 14 (8.24%) Test Automation
10 13 (7.65%) Agile
10 13 (7.65%) Performance Tuning
10 13 (7.65%) Signal Processing
11 12 (7.06%) Asset Management
12 11 (6.47%) Inventory Management
12 11 (6.47%) Project Delivery
Programming Languages
1 31 (18.24%) C++
2 29 (17.06%) C
3 27 (15.88%) Python
4 19 (11.18%) PowerShell
5 9 (5.29%) Ada
6 8 (4.71%) SystemVerilog
7 7 (4.12%) Bash
7 7 (4.12%) C#
7 7 (4.12%) MATLAB
7 7 (4.12%) Perl
8 5 (2.94%) Java
9 4 (2.35%) Embedded C
9 4 (2.35%) Embedded C++
10 3 (1.76%) Kotlin
10 3 (1.76%) Swift
11 2 (1.18%) VB.NET
12 1 (0.59%) Rust
12 1 (0.59%) Tcl
12 1 (0.59%) VB
Qualifications
1 31 (18.24%) Security Cleared
2 25 (14.71%) Degree
2 25 (14.71%) SC Cleared
3 11 (6.47%) Cisco Certification
4 7 (4.12%) ITIL Certification
5 6 (3.53%) CCNA
5 6 (3.53%) CCNP
6 5 (2.94%) CISSP
7 4 (2.35%) Azure Certification
7 4 (2.35%) CEH
7 4 (2.35%) CompTIA Security+
7 4 (2.35%) Computer Science Degree
8 3 (1.76%) CCIE
8 3 (1.76%) DV Cleared
8 3 (1.76%) Master's Degree
8 3 (1.76%) Microsoft Certification
9 2 (1.18%) MCSE
10 1 (0.59%) HNC
10 1 (0.59%) HND
10 1 (0.59%) MCSA
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 9 (5.29%) DO-178B
1 9 (5.29%) DO-254
2 8 (4.71%) Def Stans
3 7 (4.12%) MISRA
4 6 (3.53%) QA
5 5 (2.94%) NIST
6 3 (1.76%) SLA
7 2 (1.18%) GDPR
8 1 (0.59%) Accessibility
8 1 (0.59%) Cyber Essentials
8 1 (0.59%) ISO/IEC 27001
8 1 (0.59%) JTAG
8 1 (0.59%) PCI DSS
System Software
1 31 (18.24%) VMware Infrastructure
2 26 (15.29%) Embedded Firmware
3 19 (11.18%) Active Directory
4 10 (5.88%) VMware ESXi
5 8 (4.71%) vSphere
6 7 (4.12%) PowerHA
7 5 (2.94%) Virtual Machines
8 4 (2.35%) BitLocker
8 4 (2.35%) Hyper-V
9 2 (1.18%) Virtual Desktop
10 1 (0.59%) Docker
10 1 (0.59%) NFS
10 1 (0.59%) VMware Server
Systems Management
1 13 (7.65%) Dell DRAC
2 8 (4.71%) Ansible
2 8 (4.71%) Tivoli Storage Manager
3 7 (4.12%) vCenter Server
4 6 (3.53%) FortiGate
4 6 (3.53%) Microsoft Intune
5 4 (2.35%) SCCM
6 3 (1.76%) Failover Clustering
6 3 (1.76%) Microsoft Clustering
6 3 (1.76%) Prometheus
6 3 (1.76%) VxRail
7 2 (1.18%) vMotion
8 1 (0.59%) Grafana
8 1 (0.59%) Kubernetes
8 1 (0.59%) Single Sign-On
8 1 (0.59%) SnapMirror
Vendors
1 35 (20.59%) VMware
2 33 (19.41%) Cisco
3 18 (10.59%) F5
4 17 (10.00%) Microsoft
5 16 (9.41%) McAfee
5 16 (9.41%) NetApp
6 15 (8.82%) Blue Coat
7 12 (7.06%) IBM
8 11 (6.47%) Dell
9 9 (5.29%) Fortinet
9 9 (5.29%) Xilinx
10 8 (4.71%) Meraki
10 8 (4.71%) Microsemi
10 8 (4.71%) ServiceNow
11 7 (4.12%) Juniper
11 7 (4.12%) Palo Alto
12 6 (3.53%) Altera
12 6 (3.53%) EMC
12 6 (3.53%) HP
13 5 (2.94%) Infoblox
248 Firmware jobs in England