F5 Contract Job Trends

F5
UK

The table below provides summary statistics for contract job vacancies requiring knowledge or experience of F5 products and/or services. It includes a benchmarking guide to contractor rates offered in vacancies that cited F5 over the 6 months leading up to 21 April 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 F5 Networks, Inc.

6 months to
21 Apr 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 331 335 315
Rank change year-on-year +4 -20 +59
Contract jobs citing F5 309 189 289
As % of all contract jobs in the UK 0.67% 0.64% 0.67%
As % of the Vendors category 1.57% 1.35% 1.57%
Number of daily rates quoted 129 111 189
10th Percentile £328 £382 £396
25th Percentile £400 £419 £432
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £475 £525 £500
Median % change year-on-year -9.52% +5.00% -4.76%
75th Percentile £550 £600 £584
90th Percentile £675 £650 £675
UK excluding London median daily rate £495 £542 £500
% change year-on-year -8.71% +8.45% -
Number of hourly rates quoted 3 0 1
10th Percentile £42.05 - -
25th Percentile £43.11 - £58.50
Median hourly rate £48.72 - £63.00
75th Percentile £62.29 - £67.50
90th Percentile £68.11 - -
UK excluding London median hourly rate £48.72 - £63.00
% change year-on-year - - -19.95%

All Vendors
UK

F5 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.

Contract vacancies with a requirement for knowledge or experience of vendor products and services 19,678 13,954 18,446
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the UK 42.52% 47.39% 42.47%
Number of daily rates quoted 12,581 8,788 11,487
10th Percentile £313 £295 £260
25th Percentile £413 £406 £403
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £513 £518
Median % change year-on-year -2.44% -0.97% -1.43%
75th Percentile £600 £615 £630
90th Percentile £700 £713 £738
UK excluding London median daily rate £492 £500 £500
% change year-on-year -1.60% - -
Number of hourly rates quoted 988 539 1,075
10th Percentile £15.00 £14.99 £12.01
25th Percentile £18.50 £18.51 £14.36
Median hourly rate £30.00 £27.99 £22.50
Median % change year-on-year +7.18% +24.40% -48.70%
75th Percentile £60.00 £60.00 £57.33
90th Percentile £78.34 £77.50 £70.00
UK excluding London median hourly rate £26.47 £24.66 £21.46
% change year-on-year +7.34% +14.91% -46.35%

F5
Job Vacancy Trend

Historical trend showing the proportion of contract IT job postings citing F5 relative to all contract IT jobs advertised.

F5 job vacancy trend in the UK

F5
Daily Rate Trend

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in the UK citing F5.

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in the UK citing F5

F5
Daily Rate Histogram

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing F5 over the 6 months to 21 April 2026.

Daily rate histogram for F5 in the UK

F5
Hourly Rate Trend

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in the UK citing F5.

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in the UK citing F5

F5
Hourly Rate Histogram

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing F5 over the 6 months to 21 April 2026.

Hourly rate histogram for F5 in the UK

F5
Top 14 Contract Job Locations

The table below looks at the demand and provides a guide to the median contractor rates quoted in IT jobs citing F5 within the UK over the 6 months to 21 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
England -6 273 £493 -10.00% 44
UK excluding London +2 209 £495 -8.71% 46
North of England +20 94 £490 -4.39% 18
North West +27 78 £545 +14.74% 10
Midlands -18 70 £340 -41.53% 3
West Midlands -4 69 £340 -38.29% 3
London -59 65 £470 -2.08% 6
South East -22 61 £525 +6.33% 9
Work from Home -33 59 £480 +1.05% 17
Yorkshire -49 19 £480 -12.73% 2
Scotland +8 16 £413 -5.71% 3
South West -43 13 £465 -7.00% 8
East of England -32 2 £530 +13.98% 3
East Midlands -43 1 - -

F5
Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities 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 8 (2.59%) SharePoint
2 6 (1.94%) Confluence
3 1 (0.32%) CMS
3 1 (0.32%) nginx
Applications
1 22 (7.12%) MS Visio
2 8 (2.59%) Microsoft PowerPoint
3 5 (1.62%) Microsoft Excel
4 4 (1.29%) Microsoft Office
Cloud Services
1 31 (10.03%) Azure
2 30 (9.71%) AWS
3 11 (3.56%) GCP
4 8 (2.59%) Virtual Private Cloud
5 7 (2.27%) Microsoft 365
6 5 (1.62%) Azure ExpressRoute
6 5 (1.62%) Nutanix
6 5 (1.62%) OpenShift
7 3 (0.97%) Amazon S3
7 3 (0.97%) Entra ID
7 3 (0.97%) GitHub
8 2 (0.65%) Amazon OpenSearch
8 2 (0.65%) AWS Direct Connect
8 2 (0.65%) Mimecast
9 1 (0.32%) Azure DevOps
9 1 (0.32%) Azure Monitor
9 1 (0.32%) CloudBees
9 1 (0.32%) GitHub Actions
9 1 (0.32%) Google Ads
9 1 (0.32%) Google Kubernetes Engine
Communications & Networking
1 157 (50.81%) Firewall
2 145 (46.93%) DNS
3 123 (39.81%) BGP
4 108 (34.95%) BIG-IP
5 100 (32.36%) WAN
6 91 (29.45%) F5 BIG-IP LTM
7 87 (28.16%) LAN
8 84 (27.18%) VPN
9 83 (26.86%) OSPF
10 78 (25.24%) Network Security
11 64 (20.71%) TCP/IP
12 60 (19.42%) F5 BIG-IP GTM
13 54 (17.48%) SSL
14 52 (16.83%) VXLAN
15 51 (16.50%) Multicast
16 45 (14.56%) Cisco Nexus
16 45 (14.56%) DHCP
16 45 (14.56%) HTTP
17 40 (12.94%) Wireshark
18 39 (12.62%) Cisco ASA
Database & Business Intelligence
1 2 (0.65%) Elasticsearch
1 2 (0.65%) SQL Server
Development Applications
1 27 (8.74%) Fiddler
2 17 (5.50%) JIRA
3 8 (2.59%) Git
4 4 (1.29%) Sonatype Nexus
5 3 (0.97%) GitLab
6 2 (0.65%) Jenkins
General
1 52 (16.83%) Social Skills
2 49 (15.86%) Banking
3 42 (13.59%) Finance
4 36 (11.65%) Investment Banking
5 20 (6.47%) Public Sector
6 19 (6.15%) Analytical Skills
7 15 (4.85%) Financial Institution
8 12 (3.88%) Telecoms
9 8 (2.59%) Military
10 6 (1.94%) Documentation Skills
10 6 (1.94%) Influencing Skills
11 5 (1.62%) Retail
12 4 (1.29%) Presentation Skills
13 2 (0.65%) Organisational Skills
14 1 (0.32%) Billing
14 1 (0.32%) Inclusion and Diversity
Job Titles
1 165 (53.40%) Network Engineer
2 46 (14.89%) Security Engineer
3 44 (14.24%) Senior
4 43 (13.92%) Network Security Engineer
5 42 (13.59%) Architect
6 40 (12.94%) Web Engineer
7 34 (11.00%) Cisco Engineer
7 34 (11.00%) Cisco Network Engineer
8 31 (10.03%) Data Network Engineer
9 28 (9.06%) Data Engineer
10 27 (8.74%) Senior Network Engineer
11 26 (8.41%) Cisco Security Engineer
12 23 (7.44%) IP Network Engineer
13 22 (7.12%) Network Architect
14 18 (5.83%) Blue Coat Engineer
14 18 (5.83%) Network Specialist
15 16 (5.18%) Infrastructure Engineer
16 13 (4.21%) Firewall Specialist
17 11 (3.56%) Design Engineer
17 11 (3.56%) Solutions Architect
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 29 (9.39%) 802.1X
2 9 (2.91%) JSON
2 9 (2.91%) LDAP
3 8 (2.59%) SAML
4 6 (1.94%) NETCONF
4 6 (1.94%) YANG
5 5 (1.62%) OpenConfig
6 4 (1.29%) RESTCONF
6 4 (1.29%) VML
7 3 (0.97%) REST
8 2 (0.65%) XML
8 2 (0.65%) YAML
9 1 (0.32%) Elastic Stack
Miscellaneous
1 80 (25.89%) Data Centre
2 27 (8.74%) PKI
3 23 (7.44%) Clustering
4 21 (6.80%) Management Information System
5 16 (5.18%) Public Cloud
6 12 (3.88%) Data Protection Act
7 9 (2.91%) Hybrid Cloud
8 6 (1.94%) Private Cloud
9 5 (1.62%) Algorithms
9 5 (1.62%) Self-Motivation
10 4 (1.29%) Analytical Mindset
10 4 (1.29%) Onboarding
11 3 (0.97%) Distributed Architecture
11 3 (0.97%) Distributed Denial-of-Service
11 3 (0.97%) iSeries
11 3 (0.97%) Virtual Team
12 2 (0.65%) CESG
12 2 (0.65%) Cyber Threat
12 2 (0.65%) Enterprise Software
12 2 (0.65%) Enterprise Storage
Operating Systems
1 46 (14.89%) Windows
2 23 (7.44%) Linux
3 9 (2.91%) Unix
4 8 (2.59%) Windows Server
5 7 (2.27%) Windows Server 2012
5 7 (2.27%) Windows Server 2019
6 4 (1.29%) CatOS
7 3 (0.97%) Windows Server 2016
8 1 (0.32%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
Processes & Methodologies
1 158 (51.13%) Load Balancing
2 56 (18.12%) High Availability
3 48 (15.53%) Problem-Solving
4 41 (13.27%) Migration
5 32 (10.36%) Observability
6 31 (10.03%) Change Management
7 30 (9.71%) Roadmaps
8 27 (8.74%) Data Loss Prevention
8 27 (8.74%) Malware Detection/Protection
9 26 (8.41%) ITIL
9 26 (8.41%) Stakeholder Management
10 25 (8.09%) Identity Access Management
10 25 (8.09%) Project Delivery
11 24 (7.77%) Network Design
12 20 (6.47%) Infrastructure Engineering
13 19 (6.15%) Technical Leadership
14 18 (5.83%) Data Protection
14 18 (5.83%) Mentoring
14 18 (5.83%) Network Management
15 17 (5.50%) Cybersecurity
Programming Languages
1 55 (17.80%) Python
2 8 (2.59%) Bash
3 5 (1.62%) JavaScript
3 5 (1.62%) PowerShell
3 5 (1.62%) VBA
4 4 (1.29%) ActionScript
5 3 (0.97%) SQL
6 2 (0.65%) C++
7 1 (0.32%) Kusto Query Language
7 1 (0.32%) Lisp
7 1 (0.32%) Shell Script
Qualifications
1 74 (23.95%) Security Cleared
2 71 (22.98%) Cisco Certification
3 39 (12.62%) CCNP
4 38 (12.30%) SC Cleared
5 27 (8.74%) DV Cleared
6 24 (7.77%) CCIE
7 12 (3.88%) CCNA
7 12 (3.88%) JNCIP
8 11 (3.56%) Degree
8 11 (3.56%) JNCIS
9 9 (2.91%) JNCIE
10 8 (2.59%) JNCIA
11 6 (1.94%) CCIE Security
12 4 (1.29%) (ISC)2 CCSP
12 4 (1.29%) AWS Certification
12 4 (1.29%) CCSP
12 4 (1.29%) CISSP
12 4 (1.29%) Computer Science Degree
13 3 (0.97%) CCDP
13 3 (0.97%) CCSE
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 8 (2.59%) NIST
2 6 (1.94%) ISO/IEC 27001
2 6 (1.94%) PCI DSS
3 5 (1.62%) GDPR
3 5 (1.62%) JSP 440
3 5 (1.62%) SLA
4 4 (1.29%) Disclosure Scotland
4 4 (1.29%) QA
5 3 (0.97%) NCSC
6 2 (0.65%) RMADS
System Software
1 56 (18.12%) VMware Infrastructure
2 35 (11.33%) VMware NSX
3 18 (5.83%) Firmware
4 17 (5.50%) Active Directory
5 7 (2.27%) vSphere
6 6 (1.94%) Docker
7 5 (1.62%) Virtual Servers
8 4 (1.29%) Virtual Desktop
8 4 (1.29%) VMware ESXi
9 2 (0.65%) KVM
9 2 (0.65%) ProxySG
10 1 (0.32%) IAG
10 1 (0.32%) RHEV
10 1 (0.32%) Xen
10 1 (0.32%) XenApp
10 1 (0.32%) XenDesktop
Systems Management
1 56 (18.12%) Ansible
2 50 (16.18%) FortiGate
3 21 (6.80%) Terraform
4 13 (4.21%) Prometheus
5 11 (3.56%) Grafana
5 11 (3.56%) Single Sign-On
6 7 (2.27%) Kubernetes
6 7 (2.27%) Microsoft Intune
6 7 (2.27%) SCCM
7 5 (1.62%) Salt
8 4 (1.29%) Active Directory Federation Services
8 4 (1.29%) Nagios
9 2 (0.65%) Argo
9 2 (0.65%) Red Hat Satellite
10 1 (0.32%) Backup Exec
10 1 (0.32%) NetBackup
10 1 (0.32%) Norton AntiVirus
10 1 (0.32%) Puppet
10 1 (0.32%) SCOM
10 1 (0.32%) WhatsUp Gold
Vendors
1 192 (62.14%) Cisco
2 90 (29.13%) Palo Alto
3 72 (23.30%) VMware
4 65 (21.04%) Juniper
5 53 (17.15%) CheckPoint
6 39 (12.62%) Fortinet
7 35 (11.33%) SolarWinds
8 33 (10.68%) Blue Coat
9 31 (10.03%) McAfee
10 29 (9.39%) Splunk
11 24 (7.77%) Arista
12 22 (7.12%) Extreme Networks
12 22 (7.12%) Microsoft
13 19 (6.15%) NetApp
14 18 (5.83%) ServiceNow
15 17 (5.50%) Infoblox
16 16 (5.18%) Aruba
17 15 (4.85%) Meraki
18 13 (4.21%) Zscaler
19 6 (1.94%) BigPanda