VMware Contract Job Trends in the North West

VMware
England > North West

The table below provides summary statistics for contract job vacancies advertised in the North West requiring knowledge or experience of VMware products and/or services. It includes a benchmarking guide to contractor rates offered in vacancies that cited VMware over the 6 months leading up to 6 February 2026, comparing them to the same period in the previous two years.

The figures below represent the IT contractor job market in general and are not representative of contractor rates within VMware, Inc.

6 months to
6 Feb 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 56 40 55
Rank change year-on-year -16 +15 -24
Contract jobs citing VMware 104 95 92
As % of all contract jobs in the North West 3.94% 4.51% 3.21%
As % of the Vendors category 8.26% 8.94% 7.35%
Number of daily rates quoted 44 46 67
10th Percentile £315 £356 £229
25th Percentile £410 £413 £363
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £458 £505 £425
Median % change year-on-year -9.31% +18.82% -0.70%
75th Percentile £550 £556 £510
90th Percentile £575 £656 £610
England median daily rate £525 £525 £493
% change year-on-year - +6.60% -4.37%
Number of hourly rates quoted 2 3 6
10th Percentile £66.60 £70.66 £37.63
25th Percentile £67.88 £71.35 £38.38
Median hourly rate £70.38 £75.40 £44.97
Median % change year-on-year -6.65% +67.67% -13.74%
75th Percentile £72.51 £83.18 £46.18
90th Percentile £73.56 £84.74 £46.53
England median hourly rate £70.00 £65.00 £60.00
% change year-on-year +7.69% +8.33% -7.69%

All Vendors
North West

VMware falls under the Vendor Products and Services category. For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all contract job vacancies requiring knowledge or experience of all vendor products and services in the North West.

Contract vacancies with a requirement for knowledge or experience of vendor products and services 1,259 1,063 1,251
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the North West 47.65% 50.47% 43.63%
Number of daily rates quoted 819 630 788
10th Percentile £211 £287 £263
25th Percentile £358 £400 £400
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £460 £500 £500
Median % change year-on-year -8.00% - +5.26%
75th Percentile £580 £575 £585
90th Percentile £688 £675 £683
England median daily rate £501 £525 £525
% change year-on-year -4.67% - -2.78%
Number of hourly rates quoted 76 46 116
10th Percentile £15.50 £16.00 £12.00
25th Percentile £19.75 £24.05 £14.50
Median hourly rate £29.60 £32.50 £19.54
Median % change year-on-year -8.92% +66.33% -30.71%
75th Percentile £57.67 £56.55 £42.59
90th Percentile £74.26 £86.00 £46.18
England median hourly rate £23.75 £30.41 £30.00
% change year-on-year -21.89% +1.35% -6.12%

VMware
Job Vacancy Trend in the North West

Historical trend showing the proportion of contract IT job postings citing VMware relative to all contract IT jobs advertised in the North West.

VMware job vacancy trend in the North West

VMware
Daily Rate Trend in the North West

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in the North West citing VMware.

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in the North West citing VMware

VMware
Daily Rate Histogram in the North West

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing VMware in the North West over the 6 months to 6 February 2026.

Daily rate histogram for VMware in the North West

VMware
Hourly Rate Trend in the North West

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in the North West citing VMware.

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in the North West citing VMware

VMware
Contract Job Locations in the North West

The table below looks at the demand and provides a guide to the median contractor rates quoted in IT jobs citing VMware within the North West region over the 6 months to 6 February 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
Merseyside +11 33 £238 -47.22%
Cheshire -9 26 £495 +20.00% 5
Manchester -33 21 £494 -3.19% 19
Cumbria -6 13 £456 -13.14% 1
Lancashire -9 8 £550 +4.76% 14
VMware
England

VMware
Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities in the North West 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 (4.81%) Microsoft Exchange
1 5 (4.81%) SharePoint
2 4 (3.85%) OpenStack
3 3 (2.88%) CICS
4 2 (1.92%) IIS
5 1 (0.96%) SharePoint Server
Cloud Services
1 16 (15.38%) Azure
2 14 (13.46%) AWS
3 10 (9.62%) Microsoft 365
4 9 (8.65%) Entra ID
4 9 (8.65%) GCP
5 5 (4.81%) Nutanix
6 1 (0.96%) Azure Sentinel
6 1 (0.96%) GitHub
6 1 (0.96%) IBM Watson
6 1 (0.96%) Microsoft Purview
6 1 (0.96%) SaaS
Communications & Networking
1 53 (50.96%) DNS
2 35 (33.65%) TCP/IP
3 33 (31.73%) F5 BIG-IP GTM
3 33 (31.73%) F5 BIG-IP LTM
4 26 (25.00%) SSL
5 25 (24.04%) Wireshark
6 24 (23.08%) BIG-IP
6 24 (23.08%) HTTP
7 22 (21.15%) Firewall
8 20 (19.23%) DMZ
9 19 (18.27%) Network Security
10 7 (6.73%) DHCP
11 6 (5.77%) VLAN
11 6 (5.77%) VPN
12 5 (4.81%) WebEx
13 4 (3.85%) NetScaler
13 4 (3.85%) SNMP
14 3 (2.88%) BGP
14 3 (2.88%) SAN
14 3 (2.88%) Software-Defined Networking
Database & Business Intelligence
1 3 (2.88%) DataStage
2 2 (1.92%) SQL Server
Development Applications
1 24 (23.08%) Fiddler
2 1 (0.96%) JIRA
General
1 25 (24.04%) Banking
1 25 (24.04%) Investment Banking
2 20 (19.23%) Social Skills
3 15 (14.42%) Analytical Skills
4 8 (7.69%) Finance
5 7 (6.73%) Public Sector
6 6 (5.77%) Legal
7 3 (2.88%) Influencing Skills
8 1 (0.96%) Advertising
8 1 (0.96%) Documentation Skills
Job Titles
1 33 (31.73%) Network Engineer
2 24 (23.08%) Web Engineer
3 17 (16.35%) Platform Engineer
4 14 (13.46%) Blue Coat Engineer
4 14 (13.46%) IP Network Engineer
5 11 (10.58%) Operations Engineer
6 10 (9.62%) Junior
6 10 (9.62%) Junior Network Engineer
7 9 (8.65%) Wintel Engineer
8 6 (5.77%) Infrastructure Engineer
8 6 (5.77%) Virtualisation Engineer
9 5 (4.81%) Automation Engineer
10 4 (3.85%) Architect
10 4 (3.85%) Infrastructure Services Engineer
10 4 (3.85%) VMware Engineer
11 3 (2.88%) Analyst
11 3 (2.88%) Infrastructure Designer
11 3 (2.88%) IT Support Analyst
11 3 (2.88%) Server Engineer
11 3 (2.88%) Support Analyst
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 5 (4.81%) XMPP
2 4 (3.85%) Middleware
3 1 (0.96%) Django
Miscellaneous
1 25 (24.04%) Management Information System
2 13 (12.50%) Replication
3 11 (10.58%) Data Centre
4 10 (9.62%) Clustering
5 8 (7.69%) Product Ownership
6 7 (6.73%) Private Cloud
7 5 (4.81%) Public Cloud
8 3 (2.88%) BYOD
8 3 (2.88%) Mainframe
8 3 (2.88%) VSAM
9 2 (1.92%) Onboarding
9 2 (1.92%) PKI
10 1 (0.96%) Enterprise Storage
10 1 (0.96%) Hybrid Cloud
10 1 (0.96%) IBM XIV
Operating Systems
1 39 (37.50%) Windows
2 26 (25.00%) Windows Server
3 25 (24.04%) Linux
4 9 (8.65%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
4 9 (8.65%) Windows Server 2019
5 4 (3.85%) Solaris
5 4 (3.85%) Windows Server 2012
6 3 (2.88%) AIX
6 3 (2.88%) Mac OS
6 3 (2.88%) Unix
6 3 (2.88%) Windows 10
7 2 (1.92%) Windows Server 2016
Processes & Methodologies
1 56 (53.85%) Load Balancing
2 25 (24.04%) Data Loss Prevention
3 24 (23.08%) Malware Detection/Protection
4 22 (21.15%) Problem-Solving
5 17 (16.35%) Business Strategy
6 15 (14.42%) Platform Engineering
7 14 (13.46%) Containerisation
7 14 (13.46%) Design Patterns
8 13 (12.50%) High Availability
9 12 (11.54%) DevOps
9 12 (11.54%) Project Delivery
10 11 (10.58%) Disaster Recovery
11 10 (9.62%) Infrastructure Engineering
12 9 (8.65%) Capacity Planning
12 9 (8.65%) Change Management
12 9 (8.65%) Incident Response
12 9 (8.65%) Infrastructure Automation
12 9 (8.65%) Network Virtualisation
13 8 (7.69%) Identity Access Management
13 8 (7.69%) Performance Monitoring
Programming Languages
1 32 (30.77%) Python
2 31 (29.81%) PowerShell
3 23 (22.12%) Bash
4 12 (11.54%) Perl
5 3 (2.88%) COBOL
6 2 (1.92%) SQL
7 1 (0.96%) JavaScript
Qualifications
1 26 (25.00%) Security Cleared
2 23 (22.12%) SC Cleared
3 11 (10.58%) VMware Certified Professional (VCP)
4 10 (9.62%) VCAP
5 8 (7.69%) MCSA
5 8 (7.69%) MCSE
5 8 (7.69%) Microsoft Certification
6 7 (6.73%) CCDP
6 7 (6.73%) CCNA
6 7 (6.73%) CCNP
6 7 (6.73%) Cisco Certification
6 7 (6.73%) Degree
7 1 (0.96%) CISM
7 1 (0.96%) CISSP
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 5 (4.81%) GDPR
2 3 (2.88%) ISO/IEC 27001
3 1 (0.96%) Cyber Essentials
3 1 (0.96%) PCI DSS
System Software
1 69 (66.35%) VMware Infrastructure
2 24 (23.08%) vSphere
3 21 (20.19%) Active Directory
4 18 (17.31%) VMware NSX
5 15 (14.42%) Docker
6 14 (13.46%) Firmware
7 10 (9.62%) VMware ESXi
8 9 (8.65%) Virtual Machines
9 4 (3.85%) Hyper-V
9 4 (3.85%) Virtual Desktop
Systems Management
1 22 (21.15%) Ansible
2 13 (12.50%) Kubernetes
2 13 (12.50%) vCenter Server
3 10 (9.62%) SCCM
4 9 (8.65%) Terraform
5 8 (7.69%) Active Directory Federation Services
5 8 (7.69%) Microsoft Intune
6 1 (0.96%) Red Hat Satellite
6 1 (0.96%) SCOM
6 1 (0.96%) SCOrch
6 1 (0.96%) Single Sign-On
6 1 (0.96%) vRealize
Vendors
1 55 (52.88%) F5
2 28 (26.92%) Blue Coat
2 28 (26.92%) McAfee
3 21 (20.19%) Cisco
4 18 (17.31%) Microsoft
5 17 (16.35%) NetApp
6 13 (12.50%) Citrix
7 9 (8.65%) Red Hat
8 8 (7.69%) Veeam
9 5 (4.81%) Computacenter
9 5 (4.81%) IBM
10 4 (3.85%) Juniper
10 4 (3.85%) Palo Alto
11 3 (2.88%) Dell
11 3 (2.88%) Google
11 3 (2.88%) SolarWinds
12 1 (0.96%) NetScout
12 1 (0.96%) QNAP
12 1 (0.96%) Qualys
12 1 (0.96%) SevOne