Kubernetes Contract Job Trends in the South East

Kubernetes (k8s)
England > South East

The table below provides summary statistics and contractor rates for jobs advertised in the South East requiring Kubernetes skills. It covers contract job vacancies from the 6 months leading up to 1 April 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
1 Apr 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 55 51 84
Rank change year-on-year -4 +33 -27
Contract jobs citing Kubernetes 189 113 137
As % of all contract jobs in the South East 3.43% 3.84% 2.43%
As % of the Systems Management category 26.92% 28.25% 19.49%
Number of daily rates quoted 141 71 93
10th Percentile £360 £394 £413
25th Percentile £413 £409 £475
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £550 £550
Median % change year-on-year -9.09% - -
75th Percentile £550 £613 £615
90th Percentile £625 £675 £668
England median daily rate £525 £575 £550
% change year-on-year -8.70% +4.55% -12.00%
Number of hourly rates quoted 16 0 2
10th Percentile £43.13 - £37.70
25th Percentile £58.75 - £39.13
Median hourly rate £65.00 - £43.00
75th Percentile £72.50 - £46.63
90th Percentile £84.00 - £47.90
England median hourly rate £65.00 £60.00 £60.00
% change year-on-year +8.33% - -14.29%

All Systems Management Skills
South East

Kubernetes falls under the Systems Management category. For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all contract job vacancies requiring systems management skills in the South East.

Contract vacancies with a requirement for systems management skills 702 400 703
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the South East 12.73% 13.58% 12.47%
Number of daily rates quoted 518 290 499
10th Percentile £260 £312 £205
25th Percentile £393 £409 £338
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £500 £475
Median % change year-on-year - +5.26% -9.52%
75th Percentile £575 £600 £588
90th Percentile £688 £661 £650
England median daily rate £500 £525 £525
% change year-on-year -4.76% - -8.70%
Number of hourly rates quoted 25 3 21
10th Percentile £21.40 £13.59 £14.00
25th Percentile £40.00 £15.99 £24.00
Median hourly rate £60.00 £19.97 £38.50
Median % change year-on-year +200.45% -48.13% -34.47%
75th Percentile £70.00 £23.99 £50.00
90th Percentile £81.20 £26.39 £68.63
England median hourly rate £55.00 £26.50 £27.88
% change year-on-year +107.55% -4.96% -50.43%

Kubernetes
Job Vacancy Trend in the South East

Historical trend showing the proportion of contract IT job postings citing Kubernetes relative to all contract IT jobs advertised in the South East.

Kubernetes job vacancy trend in the South East

Kubernetes
Daily Rate Trend in the South East

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in the South East citing Kubernetes.

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in the South East citing Kubernetes

Kubernetes
Daily Rate Histogram in the South East

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing Kubernetes in the South East over the 6 months to 1 April 2026.

Daily rate histogram for Kubernetes in the South East

Kubernetes
Hourly Rate Trend in the South East

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in the South East citing Kubernetes.

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in the South East citing Kubernetes

Kubernetes
Hourly Rate Histogram in the South East

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing Kubernetes in the South East over the 6 months to 1 April 2026.

Hourly rate histogram for Kubernetes in the South East

Kubernetes
Contract Job Locations in the South East

The table below looks at the demand and provides a guide to the median contractor rates quoted in IT jobs citing Kubernetes within the South East region over the 6 months to 1 April 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
Hampshire +6 81 £500 -13.04% 21
Thames Valley -29 76 £475 -3.80% 41
Berkshire -21 61 £475 -2.56% 23
Surrey +5 20 £513 +46.43% 12
Buckinghamshire -18 12 £426 -13.72% 4
West Sussex -12 7 £300 - 3
Oxfordshire -14 3 £600 +9.09% 14
Middlesex - 3 £509 - 2
East Sussex -1 1 - - 2
Home Counties - 1 - -
Kubernetes
England

Kubernetes
Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities in the South East 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 9 (4.76%) Apache Spark
2 4 (2.12%) Apache
3 3 (1.59%) Confluence
3 3 (1.59%) IIS
4 2 (1.06%) Apache Pulsar
5 1 (0.53%) Microsoft Exchange
5 1 (0.53%) OpenStack
5 1 (0.53%) SAS
Applications
1 2 (1.06%) CPLEX
2 1 (0.53%) Microsoft Excel
2 1 (0.53%) Microsoft Office
Business Applications
1 1 (0.53%) Payment Gateway
Cloud Services
1 104 (55.03%) AWS
2 87 (46.03%) Azure
3 64 (33.86%) OpenShift
4 44 (23.28%) GitHub
5 41 (21.69%) GCP
6 28 (14.81%) GitHub Actions
7 17 (8.99%) Azure DevOps
8 15 (7.94%) AWS CloudFormation
9 14 (7.41%) Serverless
10 12 (6.35%) Azure AKS
11 11 (5.82%) Amazon EKS
12 10 (5.29%) Amazon S3
13 9 (4.76%) AWS Lambda
13 9 (4.76%) Datadog
14 8 (4.23%) Amazon CloudWatch
14 8 (4.23%) Cloud Computing
15 7 (3.70%) Amazon ECR
16 6 (3.17%) IaaS
17 5 (2.65%) Amazon EC2
17 5 (2.65%) Entra ID
Communications & Networking
1 13 (6.88%) DNS
2 11 (5.82%) Firewall
3 5 (2.65%) TCP/IP
4 4 (2.12%) DHCP
4 4 (2.12%) HTTP
5 3 (1.59%) Kerberos
5 3 (1.59%) VPN
6 1 (0.53%) Internet
6 1 (0.53%) iSCSI
6 1 (0.53%) MQTT
6 1 (0.53%) Remote Desktop
6 1 (0.53%) Reverse Proxy
6 1 (0.53%) SAN
6 1 (0.53%) SNMP
Database & Business Intelligence
1 34 (17.99%) PostgreSQL
2 20 (10.58%) NoSQL
3 13 (6.88%) MongoDB
4 10 (5.29%) Redis
4 10 (5.29%) Relational Database
5 9 (4.76%) Big Data
5 9 (4.76%) DynamoDB
6 6 (3.17%) HBase
7 4 (2.12%) Data Warehouse
7 4 (2.12%) SQL Server
8 2 (1.06%) BigQuery
8 2 (1.06%) Couchbase
8 2 (1.06%) Elasticsearch
9 1 (0.53%) Amazon Athena
9 1 (0.53%) Amazon Aurora
9 1 (0.53%) Amazon QuickSight
9 1 (0.53%) Amazon RDS
9 1 (0.53%) Amazon Redshift
9 1 (0.53%) Apache Cassandra
9 1 (0.53%) DocumentDB
Development Applications
1 43 (22.75%) Jenkins
2 32 (16.93%) GitLab
3 30 (15.87%) Git
4 15 (7.94%) Artifactory
5 12 (6.35%) JUnit
5 12 (6.35%) SonarQube
6 11 (5.82%) Sonatype Nexus
7 10 (5.29%) Cucumber
8 9 (4.76%) Gradle
9 6 (3.17%) JMeter
9 6 (3.17%) Maven
10 3 (1.59%) Bitbucket
10 3 (1.59%) Jaeger
10 3 (1.59%) JIRA
11 2 (1.06%) Gatling
11 2 (1.06%) NUnit
11 2 (1.06%) Selenium
12 1 (0.53%) LoadRunner
12 1 (0.53%) MLflow
12 1 (0.53%) Postman
General
1 55 (29.10%) Social Skills
2 20 (10.58%) Public Sector
3 17 (8.99%) Finance
4 11 (5.82%) Analytical Skills
5 4 (2.12%) Aerospace
6 3 (1.59%) Banking
6 3 (1.59%) Inclusion and Diversity
6 3 (1.59%) Military
7 2 (1.06%) Billing
7 2 (1.06%) Documentation Skills
7 2 (1.06%) Financial Institution
7 2 (1.06%) Organisational Skills
8 1 (0.53%) Advertising
8 1 (0.53%) Automotive
8 1 (0.53%) Presentation Skills
8 1 (0.53%) Telecoms
Job Titles
1 41 (21.69%) Developer
2 35 (18.52%) Java Developer
3 25 (13.23%) DevOps Engineer
4 22 (11.64%) Senior
5 20 (10.58%) Architect
5 20 (10.58%) Platform Engineer
6 14 (7.41%) Site Reliability Engineer
7 12 (6.35%) Site Engineer
7 12 (6.35%) Software Engineer
8 10 (5.29%) AWS DevOps
9 9 (4.76%) Infrastructure Engineer
9 9 (4.76%) Senior Developer
10 8 (4.23%) Azure Engineer
10 8 (4.23%) Java Engineer
10 8 (4.23%) Senior Java Developer
11 7 (3.70%) Analyst
11 7 (3.70%) Lead
11 7 (3.70%) Security Analyst
12 6 (3.17%) AWS Developer
12 6 (3.17%) AWS Engineer
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 39 (20.63%) Kafka
2 26 (13.76%) Spring
3 25 (13.23%) Spring Boot
4 23 (12.17%) AngularJS
5 16 (8.47%) Elastic Stack
5 16 (8.47%) Loki
6 13 (6.88%) REST
7 12 (6.35%) Quarkus
7 12 (6.35%) React
8 11 (5.82%) Keycloak
9 9 (4.76%) .NET
9 9 (4.76%) RESTful
10 8 (4.23%) RabbitMQ
11 6 (3.17%) JSON
11 6 (3.17%) OpenTelemetry
12 5 (2.65%) Middleware
12 5 (2.65%) YAML
13 4 (2.12%) Hibernate
13 4 (2.12%) Node.js
13 4 (2.12%) OpenAPI
Miscellaneous
1 35 (18.52%) Cloud Native
2 20 (10.58%) Distributed Systems
3 8 (4.23%) Hybrid Cloud
3 8 (4.23%) Virtual Team
4 7 (3.70%) Enterprise Software
5 6 (3.17%) Onboarding
6 4 (2.12%) Algorithms
6 4 (2.12%) Data Structures
6 4 (2.12%) PKI
7 3 (1.59%) Management Information System
7 3 (1.59%) Security Posture
8 2 (1.06%) Distributed Architecture
8 2 (1.06%) Public Cloud
8 2 (1.06%) Self-Motivation
8 2 (1.06%) TM Forum
9 1 (0.53%) Analytical Mindset
9 1 (0.53%) Data Protection Act
9 1 (0.53%) EMV
9 1 (0.53%) Legacy Applications
9 1 (0.53%) Product Ownership
Operating Systems
1 57 (30.16%) Linux
2 14 (7.41%) Windows
3 12 (6.35%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
4 4 (2.12%) Windows Server
5 3 (1.59%) Ubuntu
6 2 (1.06%) Unix
6 2 (1.06%) VMS
7 1 (0.53%) CentOS
7 1 (0.53%) Windows Server 2016
Processes & Methodologies
1 140 (74.07%) CI/CD
2 88 (46.56%) DevOps
3 82 (43.39%) Containerisation
4 67 (35.45%) Infrastructure as Code
5 64 (33.86%) Agile
6 50 (26.46%) Observability
7 41 (21.69%) Platform Engineering
8 38 (20.11%) Microservices
8 38 (20.11%) Site Reliability Engineering
9 33 (17.46%) DevSecOps
10 31 (16.40%) Software Engineering
11 30 (15.87%) Problem-Solving
12 24 (12.70%) Scrum
13 22 (11.64%) Test Automation
14 19 (10.05%) High Availability
15 18 (9.52%) GitOps
16 16 (8.47%) Cybersecurity
16 16 (8.47%) Infrastructure Engineering
17 15 (7.94%) Analytics
17 15 (7.94%) Unit Testing
Programming Languages
1 82 (43.39%) Python
2 56 (29.63%) Bash
2 56 (29.63%) Java
3 26 (13.76%) PowerShell
4 16 (8.47%) Go
5 15 (7.94%) SQL
6 13 (6.88%) JavaScript
7 9 (4.76%) Bicep
7 9 (4.76%) C#
8 3 (1.59%) TypeScript
9 2 (1.06%) C
9 2 (1.06%) C++
9 2 (1.06%) PHP
9 2 (1.06%) Rust
9 2 (1.06%) Shell Script
10 1 (0.53%) Korn
10 1 (0.53%) Kotlin
Qualifications
1 105 (55.56%) Security Cleared
2 86 (45.50%) SC Cleared
3 12 (6.35%) Degree
3 12 (6.35%) DV Cleared
4 7 (3.70%) Computer Science Degree
4 7 (3.70%) OCP
4 7 (3.70%) Oracle Certification
4 7 (3.70%) RHCE
5 5 (2.65%) AWS Certification
6 4 (2.12%) BPSS Clearance
7 3 (1.59%) AWS Certified Solutions Architect
7 3 (1.59%) Azure Certification
7 3 (1.59%) VMware Certified Professional (VCP)
8 1 (0.53%) ISTQB
8 1 (0.53%) ISTQB Foundation Certification
8 1 (0.53%) Microsoft Certification
8 1 (0.53%) PMI Certification
8 1 (0.53%) PMP
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 16 (8.47%) QA
2 12 (6.35%) NCSC
3 6 (3.17%) PCI DSS
4 5 (2.65%) Cyber Essentials
4 5 (2.65%) Cyber Essentials PLUS
4 5 (2.65%) IASME
4 5 (2.65%) ISO/IEC 27002 (supersedes ISO/IEC 17799)
4 5 (2.65%) NIST
4 5 (2.65%) NIST 800
5 4 (2.12%) GDPR
6 3 (1.59%) Def Stans
6 3 (1.59%) GRC
6 3 (1.59%) JSP 440
7 1 (0.53%) Data Quality
7 1 (0.53%) ISO 20022
7 1 (0.53%) ISO 8583
7 1 (0.53%) ISO/IEC 27001
System Software
1 69 (36.51%) Docker
2 22 (11.64%) VMware Infrastructure
3 15 (7.94%) vSphere
4 6 (3.17%) Active Directory
4 6 (3.17%) Hyper-V
4 6 (3.17%) VMware NSX
5 1 (0.53%) Citrix Hypervisor
Systems Management
1 73 (38.62%) Terraform
2 60 (31.75%) Grafana
3 55 (29.10%) Prometheus
4 54 (28.57%) Ansible
5 39 (20.63%) Argo
6 11 (5.82%) Istio
6 11 (5.82%) Kustomize
7 8 (4.23%) linkerd
7 8 (4.23%) Rancher
8 7 (3.70%) Puppet
8 7 (3.70%) Sysdig
8 7 (3.70%) vCenter Server
9 6 (3.17%) Progress Chef
10 4 (2.12%) Nessus
11 3 (1.59%) Podman
12 2 (1.06%) Packer
12 2 (1.06%) Single Sign-On
13 1 (0.53%) Fluentd
13 1 (0.53%) Kubeflow
13 1 (0.53%) Salt
Vendors
1 46 (24.34%) Red Hat
2 37 (19.58%) VMware
3 20 (10.58%) Splunk
4 13 (6.88%) Microsoft
5 6 (3.17%) Pure Storage
6 5 (2.65%) Dynatrace
6 5 (2.65%) Google
7 4 (2.12%) AppDynamics
7 4 (2.12%) Tenable
8 3 (1.59%) Ab Initio
8 3 (1.59%) Oracle
8 3 (1.59%) Teradata
9 2 (1.06%) Atlassian
9 2 (1.06%) Fortinet
9 2 (1.06%) OpenAI
10 1 (0.53%) Arista
10 1 (0.53%) Databricks
10 1 (0.53%) Dell
10 1 (0.53%) Mavenir
10 1 (0.53%) Virgin Media