DevOps Contract Job Trends in the South West

DevOps
England > South West

The table below provides summary statistics and contractor rates for jobs advertised in the South West requiring DevOps skills. It covers contract job vacancies from the 6 months leading up to 16 May 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
16 May 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 11 27 19
Rank change year-on-year +16 -8 -10
Contract jobs citing DevOps 289 106 230
As % of all contract jobs in the South West 8.64% 6.32% 7.31%
As % of the Processes & Methodologies category 11.02% 6.97% 8.80%
Number of daily rates quoted 172 81 154
10th Percentile £371 £384 £400
25th Percentile £413 £463 £481
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £525 £550 £550
Median % change year-on-year -4.55% - -8.33%
75th Percentile £610 £638 £630
90th Percentile £650 £700 £698
England median daily rate £525 £545 £550
% change year-on-year -3.67% -0.91% -8.33%
Number of hourly rates quoted 7 3 25
10th Percentile £68.10 - -
25th Percentile £79.50 £66.25 -
Median hourly rate £89.00 £67.50 £70.00
Median % change year-on-year +31.85% -3.57% +6.87%
75th Percentile £100.63 £75.86 £85.00
90th Percentile £102.80 £80.12 -
England median hourly rate £67.50 £68.75 £65.00
% change year-on-year -1.82% +5.77% -0.76%

All Process & Methodology Skills
South West

DevOps falls under the Processes and Methodologies category. For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all contract job vacancies requiring process or methodology skills in the South West.

Contract vacancies with a requirement for process or methodology skills 2,622 1,520 2,615
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the South West 78.41% 90.64% 83.12%
Number of daily rates quoted 1,433 949 1,666
10th Percentile £319 £230 £220
25th Percentile £413 £400 £405
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £520 £515 £525
Median % change year-on-year +0.97% -1.90% -4.55%
75th Percentile £613 £623 £625
90th Percentile £713 £688 £700
England median daily rate £513 £525 £525
% change year-on-year -2.38% - -4.55%
Number of hourly rates quoted 454 154 342
10th Percentile £16.62 £18.29 £13.87
25th Percentile £25.89 £18.87 £29.75
Median hourly rate £57.50 £60.00 £55.00
Median % change year-on-year -4.17% +9.09% -8.33%
75th Percentile £65.00 £68.00 £70.00
90th Percentile £70.00 £70.00 £77.50
England median hourly rate £47.00 £29.00 £36.50
% change year-on-year +62.07% -20.55% -2.14%

DevOps
Job Vacancy Trend in the South West

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

DevOps job vacancy trend in the South West

DevOps
Daily Rate Trend in the South West

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in the South West citing DevOps.

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in the South West citing DevOps

DevOps
Daily Rate Histogram in the South West

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing DevOps in the South West over the 6 months to 16 May 2026.

Daily rate histogram for DevOps in the South West

DevOps
Hourly Rate Trend in the South West

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in the South West citing DevOps.

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in the South West citing DevOps

DevOps
Hourly Rate Histogram in the South West

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing DevOps in the South West over the 6 months to 16 May 2026.

Hourly rate histogram for DevOps in the South West

DevOps
Contract Job Locations in the South West

The table below looks at the demand and provides a guide to the median contractor rates quoted in IT jobs citing DevOps within the South West region over the 6 months to 16 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
Bristol +10 90 £550 +0.92% 43
Wiltshire +26 73 £500 -16.67% 10
Gloucestershire +12 55 £575 -6.50% 37
Somerset +8 38 £475 -24.00% 11
Dorset +4 14 £350 +6.87% 7
Devon -15 12 £605 +15.24% 5
Cornwall -9 1 £505 -1.46% 1
DevOps
England

DevOps
Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities in the South 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 12 (4.15%) Confluence
2 11 (3.81%) Apache Spark
3 8 (2.77%) IIS
3 8 (2.77%) SharePoint
4 7 (2.42%) Apache
5 6 (2.08%) Mattermost
6 5 (1.73%) Apache Airflow
7 1 (0.35%) Oracle Workflow
7 1 (0.35%) Tomcat
Applications
1 3 (1.04%) Microsoft Excel
2 1 (0.35%) InDesign
2 1 (0.35%) Microsoft Office
2 1 (0.35%) Microsoft PowerPoint
2 1 (0.35%) MS Visio
2 1 (0.35%) Spreadsheet
2 1 (0.35%) Trello
Business Applications
1 7 (2.42%) Maximo
2 6 (2.08%) NEC Housing
2 6 (2.08%) Remedy ITSM
3 4 (1.38%) Payment Gateway
4 1 (0.35%) SAP Hybris
4 1 (0.35%) Unit4 Business World
Cloud Services
1 124 (42.91%) Azure
2 82 (28.37%) AWS
3 69 (23.88%) Azure DevOps
4 44 (15.22%) GCP
5 30 (10.38%) GitHub
6 17 (5.88%) Serverless
7 14 (4.84%) AWS CloudFormation
7 14 (4.84%) GitHub Actions
8 12 (4.15%) Entra ID
8 12 (4.15%) SaaS
9 11 (3.81%) Amazon EKS
9 11 (3.81%) Azure Monitor
10 10 (3.46%) Azure AKS
10 10 (3.46%) Azure Key Vault
10 10 (3.46%) Google Kubernetes Engine
11 9 (3.11%) Azure Data Factory
11 9 (3.11%) OpenShift
12 8 (2.77%) Amazon S3
12 8 (2.77%) AWS Lambda
12 8 (2.77%) IaaS
Communications & Networking
1 11 (3.81%) DNS
1 11 (3.81%) VPN
2 10 (3.46%) Firewall
3 3 (1.04%) 3GPP
3 3 (1.04%) HTTP
3 3 (1.04%) TETRA
4 2 (0.69%) DHCP
4 2 (0.69%) LAN
4 2 (0.69%) Network Security
4 2 (0.69%) WAN
5 1 (0.35%) AMQP
5 1 (0.35%) NAS
5 1 (0.35%) SAN
5 1 (0.35%) SMTP
5 1 (0.35%) VXLAN
Database & Business Intelligence
1 10 (3.46%) NoSQL
1 10 (3.46%) Relational Database
1 10 (3.46%) SQL Server
2 9 (3.11%) PostgreSQL
3 7 (2.42%) Elasticsearch
3 7 (2.42%) MongoDB
3 7 (2.42%) SAP HANA
4 6 (2.08%) Flink
5 5 (1.73%) Data Warehouse
5 5 (1.73%) Power BI
6 4 (1.38%) Amazon RDS
6 4 (1.38%) Redis
7 3 (1.04%) Azure SQL Database
7 3 (1.04%) Power Query
8 2 (0.69%) Amazon Redshift
8 2 (0.69%) Big Data
8 2 (0.69%) Data Lake
8 2 (0.69%) Oracle Database
9 1 (0.35%) BigQuery
9 1 (0.35%) InfluxDB
Development Applications
1 28 (9.69%) Git
1 28 (9.69%) JIRA
2 25 (8.65%) GitLab
3 23 (7.96%) Jenkins
4 12 (4.15%) Gatling
4 12 (4.15%) LoadRunner
5 11 (3.81%) JMeter
6 7 (2.42%) Cucumber
6 7 (2.42%) REST Assured
7 6 (2.08%) Postman
8 4 (1.38%) Artifactory
8 4 (1.38%) IntelliJ
9 3 (1.04%) SonarQube
9 3 (1.04%) Sonatype Nexus
10 2 (0.69%) AdminStudio
10 2 (0.69%) InstallShield
10 2 (0.69%) JUnit
11 1 (0.35%) MSI
11 1 (0.35%) Oracle APEX
11 1 (0.35%) Visual Studio
General
1 61 (21.11%) Social Skills
2 21 (7.27%) Public Sector
3 20 (6.92%) Finance
4 19 (6.57%) Analytical Skills
5 10 (3.46%) Legal
6 7 (2.42%) Military
7 5 (1.73%) Aerospace
7 5 (1.73%) Banking
7 5 (1.73%) Documentation Skills
8 4 (1.38%) Back Office
8 4 (1.38%) Organisational Skills
9 2 (0.69%) Local Government
10 1 (0.35%) Manufacturing
10 1 (0.35%) Marketing
10 1 (0.35%) Publishing
10 1 (0.35%) Retail
Job Titles
1 96 (33.22%) DevOps Engineer
2 28 (9.69%) Developer
3 26 (9.00%) Senior
4 23 (7.96%) GCP Engineer
5 19 (6.57%) Analyst
6 17 (5.88%) Architect
6 17 (5.88%) Infrastructure Engineer
6 17 (5.88%) Site Engineer
6 17 (5.88%) Site Reliability Engineer
7 16 (5.54%) Azure Engineer
8 15 (5.19%) Data Engineer
9 13 (4.50%) Cloud Engineer
9 13 (4.50%) GCP DevOps
9 13 (4.50%) GCP DevOps Engineer
9 13 (4.50%) Lead
10 12 (4.15%) Azure DevOps Engineer
10 12 (4.15%) Java Developer
10 12 (4.15%) Performance Engineer
11 10 (3.46%) Backend Developer
12 9 (3.11%) Tester
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 23 (7.96%) Kafka
2 18 (6.23%) .NET
3 15 (5.19%) REST
3 15 (5.19%) Spring Boot
4 14 (4.84%) Spring
5 13 (4.50%) Playwright
6 12 (4.15%) React
6 12 (4.15%) RESTful
7 11 (3.81%) .NET Framework
8 8 (2.77%) RabbitMQ
9 7 (2.42%) Apache NiFi
9 7 (2.42%) ARM Templates
9 7 (2.42%) Node.js
10 5 (1.73%) Flask
10 5 (1.73%) GraphQL
10 5 (1.73%) Java Concurrency
10 5 (1.73%) Keycloak
11 4 (1.38%) Elastic Stack
11 4 (1.38%) gRPC
11 4 (1.38%) WebSockets
Miscellaneous
1 36 (12.46%) Cloud Native
2 19 (6.57%) Enterprise Software
3 14 (4.84%) Legacy Systems
4 13 (4.50%) Product Ownership
5 12 (4.15%) Hybrid Cloud
6 8 (2.77%) Public Cloud
7 6 (2.08%) Distributed Systems
8 5 (1.73%) Legacy Code
8 5 (1.73%) Management Information System
8 5 (1.73%) Self-Motivation
9 4 (1.38%) Mobile App
9 4 (1.38%) Wiki
10 3 (1.04%) Data Protection Act
10 3 (1.04%) EPoS
10 3 (1.04%) Legacy Applications
10 3 (1.04%) Replication
11 2 (0.69%) Clustering
11 2 (0.69%) Distributed Computing
11 2 (0.69%) Linux Command Line
11 2 (0.69%) PKI
Operating Systems
1 42 (14.53%) Linux
2 31 (10.73%) Windows
3 12 (4.15%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
4 11 (3.81%) Windows Server
5 3 (1.04%) Ubuntu
5 3 (1.04%) Unix
6 2 (0.69%) Windows 10
Processes & Methodologies
1 128 (44.29%) CI/CD
2 87 (30.10%) Agile
3 56 (19.38%) Infrastructure as Code
4 53 (18.34%) Continuous Improvement
5 52 (17.99%) Containerisation
6 39 (13.49%) Problem-Solving
7 32 (11.07%) Site Reliability Engineering
8 31 (10.73%) ITIL
8 31 (10.73%) Microservices
9 28 (9.69%) Analytics
9 28 (9.69%) Infrastructure Engineering
10 27 (9.34%) Test Automation
11 24 (8.30%) Data Engineering
12 22 (7.61%) High Availability
12 22 (7.61%) Migration
12 22 (7.61%) Observability
13 21 (7.27%) Data Modelling
13 21 (7.27%) Decision-Making
13 21 (7.27%) Root Cause Analysis
13 21 (7.27%) Service Management
Programming Languages
1 71 (24.57%) Python
2 55 (19.03%) SQL
3 33 (11.42%) Java
4 26 (9.00%) Bash
5 23 (7.96%) PowerShell
6 18 (6.23%) JavaScript
7 17 (5.88%) Go
8 12 (4.15%) C#
9 10 (3.46%) Bicep
10 8 (2.77%) PL/SQL
11 6 (2.08%) TypeScript
12 5 (1.73%) Apex Code
13 4 (1.38%) T-SQL
14 3 (1.04%) Data Analysis Expressions
15 2 (0.69%) Groovy
16 1 (0.35%) C++
16 1 (0.35%) Kotlin
16 1 (0.35%) Scala
16 1 (0.35%) Shell Script
16 1 (0.35%) SOQL
Qualifications
1 129 (44.64%) Security Cleared
2 96 (33.22%) SC Cleared
3 39 (13.49%) DV Cleared
4 17 (5.88%) Degree
5 14 (4.84%) Azure Certification
6 7 (2.42%) AWS Certification
6 7 (2.42%) Computer Science Degree
7 6 (2.08%) ISTQB
7 6 (2.08%) ISTQB Foundation Certification
7 6 (2.08%) Microsoft Certification
7 6 (2.08%) TOGAF Certification
8 5 (1.73%) CISM
8 5 (1.73%) CISSP
8 5 (1.73%) ISO 27001 Lead Implementer
9 4 (1.38%) Master's Degree
10 3 (1.04%) AWS Certified Cloud Practitioner
10 3 (1.04%) AWS Certified DevOps Engineer
10 3 (1.04%) AWS Certified Solutions Architect
11 2 (0.69%) BPSS Clearance
12 1 (0.35%) IIBA
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 25 (8.65%) QA
2 12 (4.15%) ISO/IEC 27001
3 8 (2.77%) Data Quality
4 7 (2.42%) GDPR
4 7 (2.42%) NIST
5 5 (1.73%) NIST 800
6 4 (1.38%) NCSC
6 4 (1.38%) PCI DSS
6 4 (1.38%) SLA
7 3 (1.04%) Accessibility
7 3 (1.04%) PMO
8 2 (0.69%) WCAG
9 1 (0.35%) Cyber Essentials
9 1 (0.35%) JSP 440
System Software
1 56 (19.38%) Docker
2 14 (4.84%) Active Directory
3 6 (2.08%) Corosync
4 4 (1.38%) VMware Infrastructure
5 2 (0.69%) Hyper-V
6 1 (0.35%) Virtual Machines
6 1 (0.35%) VMware ESXi
Systems Management
1 100 (34.60%) Kubernetes
2 77 (26.64%) Terraform
3 38 (13.15%) Ansible
4 19 (6.57%) Prometheus
5 15 (5.19%) Grafana
6 10 (3.46%) Argo
7 7 (2.42%) Failover Clustering
7 7 (2.42%) Pacemaker
8 4 (1.38%) Istio
9 3 (1.04%) Nagios
9 3 (1.04%) Nessus
9 3 (1.04%) Packer
9 3 (1.04%) Single Sign-On
10 2 (0.69%) Active Directory Federation Services
10 2 (0.69%) Microsoft Intune
10 2 (0.69%) Progress Chef
10 2 (0.69%) SCCM
11 1 (0.35%) logstash
11 1 (0.35%) Puppet
11 1 (0.35%) VxRail
Vendors
1 40 (13.84%) Microsoft
2 24 (8.30%) Google
3 22 (7.61%) Red Hat
4 15 (5.19%) Dynatrace
5 14 (4.84%) Databricks
6 13 (4.50%) Splunk
7 11 (3.81%) AppDynamics
7 11 (3.81%) New Relic
8 10 (3.46%) Oracle
9 9 (3.11%) Salesforce
9 9 (3.11%) SAP
9 9 (3.11%) VMware
10 7 (2.42%) IBM
11 6 (2.08%) Atlassian
11 6 (2.08%) NEC
11 6 (2.08%) Remedy
12 4 (1.38%) Conga
12 4 (1.38%) GoCardless
12 4 (1.38%) InterSystems
13 3 (1.04%) Cisco