Virtual Machines Contract Job Trends in England

Virtual Machine (VM)
UK > England

The table below provides summary statistics and contractor rates for jobs advertised in England requiring Virtual Machines skills. It covers contract job vacancies from the 6 months leading up to 17 July 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

 6 months to
17 Jul 2026		 Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 350 339 308
Rank change year-on-year -11 -31 +21
Contract jobs citing Virtual Machines 295 162 269
As % of all contract jobs in England 0.66% 0.60% 0.74%
As % of the System Software category 6.56% 4.93% 6.53%
Number of daily rates quoted 200 114 193
10th Percentile £358 £350 £334
25th Percentile £422 £413 £425
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £498 £501 £550
Median % change year-on-year -0.42% -9.00% +4.76%
75th Percentile £575 £606 £608
90th Percentile £650 £750 £670
UK median daily rate £497 £500 £535
% change year-on-year -0.64% -6.54% +1.90%
Number of hourly rates quoted 2 6 24
10th Percentile - - -
25th Percentile - £33.25 £14.06
Median hourly rate £26.00 £34.50 £14.63
Median % change year-on-year -24.64% +135.90% -77.84%
75th Percentile - £57.31 £15.19
90th Percentile - £65.25 -
UK median hourly rate £26.00 £34.50 £14.63
% change year-on-year -24.64% +135.90% -77.84%

All System Software Skills
England

Virtual Machines 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 4,498 3,286 4,118
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in England 10.04% 12.08% 11.39%
Number of daily rates quoted 2,980 2,152 2,851
10th Percentile £213 £215 £213
25th Percentile £400 £375 £376
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £500 £508
Median % change year-on-year - -1.48% -3.33%
75th Percentile £600 £600 £608
90th Percentile £675 £700 £688
UK median daily rate £500 £500 £500
% change year-on-year - - -3.85%
Number of hourly rates quoted 182 87 185
10th Percentile £16.00 £15.13 £14.06
25th Percentile £25.81 £22.50 £14.48
Median hourly rate £55.00 £34.50 £22.15
Median % change year-on-year +59.42% +55.76% -50.64%
75th Percentile £74.00 £79.35 £58.49
90th Percentile £84.88 £90.38 £70.00
UK median hourly rate £51.00 £33.39 £23.80
% change year-on-year +52.76% +40.27% -52.40%

Virtual Machines
Job Vacancy Trend in England

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

Virtual Machines job vacancy trend in England

Virtual Machines
Daily Rate Trend in England

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in England citing Virtual Machines.

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in England citing Virtual Machines

Virtual Machines
Daily Rate Histogram in England

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing Virtual Machines in England over the 6 months to 17 July 2026.

Daily rate histogram for Virtual Machines in England

Virtual Machines
Hourly Rate Trend in England

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in England citing Virtual Machines.

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in England citing Virtual Machines

Virtual Machines
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 Virtual Machines within the England region over the 6 months to 17 July 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
London -64 109 £525 -4.55% 17
North of England 0 101 £483 +17.09% 11
Yorkshire +1 57 £500 +13.06% 4
South East -31 48 £475 -17.39% 18
North West -16 42 £463 +23.17% 7
Midlands -58 18 £450 -7.22% 2
South West -27 16 £540 +20.00% 4
West Midlands -63 12 £425 -7.61% 2
East Midlands -13 4 £500 -4.76%
East of England -22 4 £425 -19.12% 4
North East -37 2 £400 +10.34%
Virtual Machines
UK

Virtual Machines
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 5 (1.69%) SharePoint
2 4 (1.36%) Confluence
3 3 (1.02%) Microsoft Exchange
3 3 (1.02%) Palantir Foundry
4 2 (0.68%) Apache
4 2 (0.68%) CMS
4 2 (0.68%) Umbraco
5 1 (0.34%) Apache Airflow
5 1 (0.34%) ArcGIS
5 1 (0.34%) IIS
5 1 (0.34%) nginx
5 1 (0.34%) OpenStack
5 1 (0.34%) WebLogic
Applications
1 5 (1.69%) Adobe Illustrator
1 5 (1.69%) Photoshop
2 2 (0.68%) Chatbot
2 2 (0.68%) InDesign
3 1 (0.34%) Microsoft Excel
3 1 (0.34%) Microsoft Office
3 1 (0.34%) MS Visio
Business Applications
1 2 (0.68%) Remedy ITSM
2 1 (0.34%) Teamcenter
Cloud Services
1 127 (43.05%) Azure
2 41 (13.90%) AWS
3 36 (12.20%) Entra ID
4 35 (11.86%) OpenShift
5 31 (10.51%) Azure Monitor
6 29 (9.83%) Azure DevOps
7 23 (7.80%) GitHub
8 22 (7.46%) Azure AKS
9 16 (5.42%) GCP
9 16 (5.42%) GitHub Actions
10 14 (4.75%) Serverless
11 13 (4.41%) Microsoft 365
12 12 (4.07%) Azure Key Vault
12 12 (4.07%) Azure Storage
12 12 (4.07%) IaaS
13 10 (3.39%) Azure ExpressRoute
13 10 (3.39%) Azure Functions
13 10 (3.39%) Power Platform
14 9 (3.05%) Azure Logic Apps
15 8 (2.71%) Nutanix
Communications & Networking
1 42 (14.24%) DNS
2 38 (12.88%) Firewall
3 26 (8.81%) VPN
4 21 (7.12%) Network Security
5 20 (6.78%) DHCP
6 19 (6.44%) VLAN
7 18 (6.10%) SSL
8 16 (5.42%) VSAN
8 16 (5.42%) WAN
9 10 (3.39%) SD-WAN
10 8 (2.71%) FTP
10 8 (2.71%) SAN
11 7 (2.37%) LAN
12 6 (2.03%) TCP/IP
13 5 (1.69%) SSH
13 5 (1.69%) Wi-Fi
14 4 (1.36%) HTTPS
15 3 (1.02%) Cisco Nexus
15 3 (1.02%) Reverse Proxy
16 2 (0.68%) NAS
Database & Business Intelligence
1 31 (10.51%) SQL Server
2 11 (3.73%) Azure SQL Database
3 10 (3.39%) PostgreSQL
3 10 (3.39%) Power BI
4 7 (2.37%) Data Lake
5 6 (2.03%) Db2
6 5 (1.69%) SQL Server Integration Services
7 4 (1.36%) MySQL
8 3 (1.02%) Data Warehouse
8 3 (1.02%) Oracle Database
9 2 (0.68%) Relational Database
10 1 (0.34%) Amazon QuickSight
10 1 (0.34%) Neo4j
10 1 (0.34%) Oracle Exadata
10 1 (0.34%) Oracle Reports
10 1 (0.34%) Power Query
Development Applications
1 17 (5.76%) Git
2 14 (4.75%) Jenkins
3 9 (3.05%) GitLab
4 6 (2.03%) JIRA
5 3 (1.02%) Selenium
6 2 (0.68%) JMeter
6 2 (0.68%) Postman
6 2 (0.68%) Sonatype Nexus
6 2 (0.68%) Team Foundation Server
6 2 (0.68%) Terragrunt
7 1 (0.34%) SQL Server Management Studio (SSMS)
7 1 (0.34%) Visual Studio
General
1 42 (14.24%) Social Skills
2 31 (10.51%) Finance
3 14 (4.75%) Banking
4 13 (4.41%) Analytical Skills
4 13 (4.41%) Legal
5 8 (2.71%) Public Sector
6 7 (2.37%) Inclusion and Diversity
6 7 (2.37%) Retail
7 6 (2.03%) Front Office
8 5 (1.69%) Documentation Skills
9 4 (1.36%) Manufacturing
9 4 (1.36%) Marketing
10 2 (0.68%) Law
10 2 (0.68%) Pharmaceutical
10 2 (0.68%) Publishing
11 1 (0.34%) Advertising
11 1 (0.34%) Aerospace
11 1 (0.34%) Influencing Skills
Job Titles
1 33 (11.19%) Infrastructure Engineer
2 32 (10.85%) DevOps Engineer
3 30 (10.17%) Azure Engineer
4 25 (8.47%) Cloud Engineer
5 22 (7.46%) Senior
6 19 (6.44%) Lead
7 16 (5.42%) Analyst
8 14 (4.75%) Architect
8 14 (4.75%) Wintel Engineer
9 10 (3.39%) Administrator
9 10 (3.39%) VMware Engineer
10 9 (3.05%) Azure Infrastructure Engineer
10 9 (3.05%) Cloud Infrastructure Engineer
10 9 (3.05%) Linux Engineer
10 9 (3.05%) Technical Specialist
11 8 (2.71%) Azure DevOps Engineer
12 7 (2.37%) DBA
12 7 (2.37%) Migration Engineer
12 7 (2.37%) Solutions Architect
12 7 (2.37%) Storage Engineer
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 11 (3.73%) ARM Templates
2 8 (2.71%) REST
3 7 (2.37%) YAML
4 5 (1.69%) Middleware
5 3 (1.02%) Elastic Stack
5 3 (1.02%) JSON
6 2 (0.68%) Hugging Face
6 2 (0.68%) PySpark
6 2 (0.68%) SOAP
7 1 (0.34%) .NET
7 1 (0.34%) cloud-init
7 1 (0.34%) Java SE
7 1 (0.34%) Lambda Expressions
7 1 (0.34%) LangChain
7 1 (0.34%) LDAP
7 1 (0.34%) Microsoft Graph
7 1 (0.34%) PyTorch
7 1 (0.34%) Software Packaging
7 1 (0.34%) SpaCy
7 1 (0.34%) vLLM
Miscellaneous
1 31 (10.51%) Replication
2 23 (7.80%) Clustering
3 21 (7.12%) Data Centre
4 17 (5.76%) Hybrid Cloud
4 17 (5.76%) Linux Command Line
5 10 (3.39%) Cloud Native
6 9 (3.05%) Product Ownership
7 8 (2.71%) Onboarding
8 7 (2.37%) Mainframe
9 6 (2.03%) Fixed Income
9 6 (2.03%) Market Risk
9 6 (2.03%) Operational Technology
9 6 (2.03%) Public Cloud
10 5 (1.69%) Enterprise Storage
10 5 (1.69%) FlexPod
10 5 (1.69%) PKI
10 5 (1.69%) Security Posture
10 5 (1.69%) Self-Motivation
11 3 (1.02%) IBM XIV
11 3 (1.02%) Private Cloud
Operating Systems
1 101 (34.24%) Windows
2 84 (28.47%) Linux
3 56 (18.98%) Windows Server
4 34 (11.53%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
5 24 (8.14%) VMS
6 11 (3.73%) Unix
7 9 (3.05%) AIX
8 7 (2.37%) CoreOS
8 7 (2.37%) Ubuntu
9 6 (2.03%) Data ONTAP
10 4 (1.36%) SUSE
10 4 (1.36%) Windows Server 2019
11 3 (1.02%) Apple iOS
11 3 (1.02%) Windows Server 2012
11 3 (1.02%) Windows Server 2016
12 1 (0.34%) Solaris
Processes & Methodologies
1 72 (24.41%) DevOps
2 71 (24.07%) CI/CD
3 63 (21.36%) Migration
4 48 (16.27%) Infrastructure as Code
5 47 (15.93%) Infrastructure Engineering
6 45 (15.25%) High Availability
7 43 (14.58%) Disaster Recovery
8 41 (13.90%) Performance Tuning
9 35 (11.86%) Network Virtualisation
10 31 (10.51%) Continuous Improvement
11 29 (9.83%) Capacity Planning
11 29 (9.83%) Problem-Solving
12 27 (9.15%) Validation
12 27 (9.15%) Vulnerability Management
13 26 (8.81%) RBAC
14 23 (7.80%) Vulnerability Remediation
15 22 (7.46%) Analytics
15 22 (7.46%) Platform Engineering
16 21 (7.12%) Change Management
17 20 (6.78%) ITIL
Programming Languages
1 85 (28.81%) PowerShell
2 66 (22.37%) Python
3 46 (15.59%) SQL
4 43 (14.58%) Bash
5 7 (2.37%) Bicep
5 7 (2.37%) C#
6 6 (2.03%) C
7 5 (1.69%) Shell Script
8 4 (1.36%) PL/SQL
8 4 (1.36%) T-SQL
9 3 (1.02%) Java
9 3 (1.02%) Korn
10 1 (0.34%) Cypher
10 1 (0.34%) Data Analysis Expressions
10 1 (0.34%) Go
10 1 (0.34%) Groovy
10 1 (0.34%) JavaScript
10 1 (0.34%) Kotlin
10 1 (0.34%) RPG
10 1 (0.34%) VBA
Qualifications
1 78 (26.44%) Security Cleared
2 62 (21.02%) SC Cleared
3 20 (6.78%) VMware Certified Professional (VCP)
4 19 (6.44%) Microsoft Certification
5 15 (5.08%) Azure Certification
5 15 (5.08%) VCAP
6 14 (4.75%) Degree
6 14 (4.75%) MCSA
6 14 (4.75%) MCSE
7 7 (2.37%) BPSS Clearance
8 6 (2.03%) Cisco Certification
8 6 (2.03%) DV Cleared
8 6 (2.03%) ISTQB
8 6 (2.03%) OCP
8 6 (2.03%) Oracle Certification
9 5 (1.69%) CCNA
9 5 (1.69%) ISTQB Advanced Certification
10 4 (1.36%) CISSP
10 4 (1.36%) ITIL Foundation Certificate
11 3 (1.02%) PMP
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 11 (3.73%) QA
2 3 (1.02%) SLA
3 2 (0.68%) GMP
3 2 (0.68%) GxP
3 2 (0.68%) ISO/IEC 27001
3 2 (0.68%) NIST
3 2 (0.68%) PCI DSS
4 1 (0.34%) Accessibility
4 1 (0.34%) Cyber Essentials
4 1 (0.34%) Data Quality
4 1 (0.34%) GDPR
4 1 (0.34%) HIPAA
4 1 (0.34%) SOC 2
4 1 (0.34%) WCAG
System Software
1 91 (30.85%) VMware Infrastructure
2 52 (17.63%) vSphere
3 43 (14.58%) Active Directory
3 43 (14.58%) VMware ESXi
4 28 (9.49%) Hyper-V
5 25 (8.47%) Docker
6 18 (6.10%) KVM
7 11 (3.73%) VMware NSX
8 9 (3.05%) NFS
9 8 (2.71%) Firmware
10 7 (2.37%) Ceph
10 7 (2.37%) Virtual Desktop
11 3 (1.02%) EMC RecoverPoint
11 3 (1.02%) VMware Workstation
12 2 (0.68%) Veritas Volume Manager
13 1 (0.34%) BitLocker
13 1 (0.34%) Oracle RAC
Systems Management
1 61 (20.68%) Terraform
2 57 (19.32%) Ansible
3 51 (17.29%) Kubernetes
4 38 (12.88%) vCenter Server
5 15 (5.08%) PowerCLI
6 12 (4.07%) Grafana
7 9 (3.05%) Prometheus
8 8 (2.71%) SCCM
8 8 (2.71%) SCOM
9 6 (2.03%) IBM BigFix
9 6 (2.03%) Microsoft Intune
9 6 (2.03%) SnapMirror
9 6 (2.03%) VxRail
10 5 (1.69%) Podman
10 5 (1.69%) vMotion
11 4 (1.36%) Argo
11 4 (1.36%) Avamar
11 4 (1.36%) Failover Clustering
11 4 (1.36%) Microsoft Clustering
11 4 (1.36%) Proxmox
Vendors
1 96 (32.54%) VMware
2 85 (28.81%) Microsoft
3 35 (11.86%) Cisco
4 19 (6.44%) Oracle
5 18 (6.10%) ServiceNow
6 16 (5.42%) IBM
6 16 (5.42%) Red Hat
7 15 (5.08%) NetApp
8 12 (4.07%) Google
9 11 (3.73%) Dell
9 11 (3.73%) Veeam
10 10 (3.39%) Qualys
11 9 (3.05%) CyberArk
12 8 (2.71%) Databricks
13 7 (2.37%) SolarWinds
13 7 (2.37%) Tenable
14 6 (2.03%) Palo Alto
15 5 (1.69%) Commvault
15 5 (1.69%) Meraki
15 5 (1.69%) Splunk
51 Virtual Machines jobs in England