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 22 January 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
22 Jan 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 330 313 329
Rank change year-on-year -17 +16 +48
Contract jobs citing F5 283 235 271
As % of all contract jobs in the UK 0.75% 0.74% 0.63%
As % of the Vendors category 1.63% 1.62% 1.43%
Number of daily rates quoted 134 132 180
10th Percentile £335 £400 £389
25th Percentile £400 £450 £437
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £519 £510
Median % change year-on-year -3.61% +1.72% -3.77%
75th Percentile £615 £588 £620
90th Percentile £709 £649 £700
UK excluding London median daily rate £498 £525 £500
% change year-on-year -5.24% +5.00% -1.96%
Number of hourly rates quoted 2 1 7
10th Percentile £46.95 - £64.65
25th Percentile £50.08 £21.25 £68.75
Median hourly rate £57.61 £22.50 £72.50
Median % change year-on-year +156.04% -68.97% +271.79%
75th Percentile £63.58 £23.75 £76.88
90th Percentile £65.78 - £77.50
UK excluding London median hourly rate £57.61 £22.50 £72.50
% change year-on-year +156.04% -68.97% -7.88%

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 17,349 14,541 18,977
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the UK 45.90% 45.87% 44.02%
Number of daily rates quoted 11,193 8,605 11,952
10th Percentile £300 £285 £253
25th Percentile £410 £409 £405
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £525 £525
Median % change year-on-year -4.76% - -2.78%
75th Percentile £613 £625 £638
90th Percentile £700 £713 £725
UK excluding London median daily rate £495 £500 £500
% change year-on-year -1.00% - -
Number of hourly rates quoted 819 432 804
10th Percentile £15.00 £15.62 £13.15
25th Percentile £17.93 £20.00 £16.25
Median hourly rate £23.83 £27.50 £35.00
Median % change year-on-year -13.36% -21.43% +11.01%
75th Percentile £48.75 £61.50 £60.00
90th Percentile £73.75 £80.00 £72.50
UK excluding London median hourly rate £21.50 £25.00 £35.00
% change year-on-year -14.00% -28.57% +35.11%

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 22 January 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 22 January 2026.

Hourly rate histogram for F5 in the UK

F5
Top 15 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 22 January 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 -16 250 £500 -2.44% 47
UK excluding London -32 191 £498 -5.24% 48
North of England -9 100 £575 +17.35% 7
Work from Home +9 84 £513 +4.59% 32
Midlands -2 76 £380 -37.70% 5
West Midlands +21 75 £380 -31.03% 5
North West +8 73 £500 +2.04% 4
London -15 64 £550 +12.82% 8
Yorkshire -25 38 £638 +27.50% 2
South East -62 26 £500 -2.44% 17
Scotland +16 20 £500 -4.76% 5
South West -27 8 £520 +4.00% 3
East of England -21 2 - - 9
North East -15 1 £550 - 1
East Midlands -40 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 12 (4.24%) Confluence
2 10 (3.53%) OpenStack
3 8 (2.83%) SharePoint
4 2 (0.71%) CICS
4 2 (0.71%) Tomcat
4 2 (0.71%) WebSphere
5 1 (0.35%) nginx
5 1 (0.35%) WebSphere Application Server
Applications
1 19 (6.71%) MS Visio
2 7 (2.47%) Microsoft PowerPoint
3 3 (1.06%) Microsoft Excel
4 2 (0.71%) Microsoft Office
Cloud Services
1 100 (35.34%) AWS
2 54 (19.08%) Azure
3 48 (16.96%) GCP
4 29 (10.25%) Akamai
4 29 (10.25%) Virtual Private Cloud
5 25 (8.83%) Amazon CloudWatch
6 24 (8.48%) Amazon ELB
6 24 (8.48%) Amazon S3
7 23 (8.13%) Amazon EC2
8 10 (3.53%) OpenShift
9 6 (2.12%) OCI
10 5 (1.77%) Azure ExpressRoute
11 4 (1.41%) Cloudflare
11 4 (1.41%) Microsoft 365
11 4 (1.41%) Mimecast
12 3 (1.06%) GitHub
13 2 (0.71%) Entra ID
13 2 (0.71%) PaaS
13 2 (0.71%) SaaS
13 2 (0.71%) VULTR
Communications & Networking
1 155 (54.77%) Firewall
2 121 (42.76%) DNS
3 86 (30.39%) Network Security
4 83 (29.33%) SSL
5 77 (27.21%) TCP/IP
6 75 (26.50%) VPN
7 68 (24.03%) F5 BIG-IP LTM
8 65 (22.97%) WAN
9 58 (20.49%) F5 BIG-IP GTM
10 56 (19.79%) BIG-IP
11 55 (19.43%) BGP
12 51 (18.02%) Wireshark
13 48 (16.96%) HTTP
14 44 (15.55%) LAN
15 39 (13.78%) Wireless
16 38 (13.43%) OSPF
17 35 (12.37%) DMZ
18 28 (9.89%) MPLS
19 25 (8.83%) IPsec
19 25 (8.83%) SD-WAN
Database & Business Intelligence
1 2 (0.71%) NoSQL
1 2 (0.71%) PostgreSQL
1 2 (0.71%) SQL Server
2 1 (0.35%) Elasticsearch
Development Applications
1 32 (11.31%) Git
2 31 (10.95%) Jenkins
3 25 (8.83%) Fiddler
4 21 (7.42%) GitLab
5 14 (4.95%) JIRA
6 2 (0.71%) Rational DOORS
6 2 (0.71%) Robot Framework
6 2 (0.71%) Sonatype Nexus
General
1 69 (24.38%) Social Skills
2 45 (15.90%) Banking
3 35 (12.37%) Analytical Skills
4 33 (11.66%) Investment Banking
5 32 (11.31%) Finance
6 29 (10.25%) Public Sector
7 20 (7.07%) Documentation Skills
7 20 (7.07%) Telecoms
8 10 (3.53%) Retail
9 7 (2.47%) Military
10 6 (2.12%) Influencing Skills
10 6 (2.12%) Legal
10 6 (2.12%) Presentation Skills
11 5 (1.77%) Financial Institution
12 4 (1.41%) Retail Banking
13 2 (0.71%) Organisational Skills
14 1 (0.35%) Billing
14 1 (0.35%) Inclusion and Diversity
Job Titles
1 106 (37.46%) Network Engineer
2 35 (12.37%) Senior
3 32 (11.31%) Architect
4 30 (10.60%) Security Engineer
5 27 (9.54%) Web Engineer
6 22 (7.77%) Infrastructure Engineer
7 18 (6.36%) Network Security Engineer
8 16 (5.65%) Network Architect
9 14 (4.95%) Operations Engineer
9 14 (4.95%) Solutions Architect
10 13 (4.59%) DevOps Engineer
10 13 (4.59%) Junior
11 12 (4.24%) Blue Coat Engineer
11 12 (4.24%) IP Network Engineer
11 12 (4.24%) Junior Network Engineer
11 12 (4.24%) Senior DevOps
11 12 (4.24%) Senior DevOps Engineer
12 11 (3.89%) Cisco Engineer
13 10 (3.53%) Senior Infrastructure Engineer
13 10 (3.53%) Senior Network Engineer
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 12 (4.24%) 802.1X
2 9 (3.18%) LDAP
3 6 (2.12%) JSON
3 6 (2.12%) REST
3 6 (2.12%) SAML
4 5 (1.77%) XML
5 4 (1.41%) NETCONF
5 4 (1.41%) VML
5 4 (1.41%) YANG
6 3 (1.06%) OpenConfig
6 3 (1.06%) SOAP
7 2 (0.71%) AngularJS
7 2 (0.71%) Middleware
7 2 (0.71%) Regular Expression
7 2 (0.71%) RESTCONF
8 1 (0.35%) RESTful
Miscellaneous
1 54 (19.08%) Data Centre
2 30 (10.60%) Management Information System
3 21 (7.42%) Security Posture
4 12 (4.24%) Data Protection Act
5 10 (3.53%) Cloud Native
6 9 (3.18%) Hybrid Cloud
7 8 (2.83%) Onboarding
7 8 (2.83%) Private Cloud
8 6 (2.12%) Legacy Systems
9 4 (1.41%) Public Cloud
9 4 (1.41%) Self-Motivation
10 3 (1.06%) Distributed Architecture
10 3 (1.06%) PKI
11 2 (0.71%) Algorithms
11 2 (0.71%) Analytical Mindset
11 2 (0.71%) CESG
11 2 (0.71%) Clustering
11 2 (0.71%) Linux Command Line
11 2 (0.71%) Mainframe
11 2 (0.71%) Replication
Operating Systems
1 22 (7.77%) Linux
1 22 (7.77%) Windows
2 10 (3.53%) Unix
3 6 (2.12%) Windows Server
4 4 (1.41%) CatOS
4 4 (1.41%) Windows Server 2012
4 4 (1.41%) Windows Server 2019
5 2 (0.71%) Solaris
5 2 (0.71%) Windows Server 2016
5 2 (0.71%) zOS
6 1 (0.35%) MVS
6 1 (0.35%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
Processes & Methodologies
1 99 (34.98%) Load Balancing
2 50 (17.67%) DevOps
3 45 (15.90%) Incident Response
4 42 (14.84%) CI/CD
5 40 (14.13%) Migration
6 39 (13.78%) DevSecOps
7 36 (12.72%) High Availability
8 34 (12.01%) Change Management
9 33 (11.66%) Problem-Solving
10 30 (10.60%) Infrastructure Engineering
11 28 (9.89%) Infrastructure as Code
12 27 (9.54%) Business Strategy
13 26 (9.19%) Infrastructure Automation
13 26 (9.19%) Stakeholder Management
14 25 (8.83%) Application Security
14 25 (8.83%) OWASP
15 23 (8.13%) ITIL
15 23 (8.13%) Mentoring
15 23 (8.13%) Test Automation
16 22 (7.77%) Cybersecurity
Programming Languages
1 88 (31.10%) Python
2 34 (12.01%) Bash
3 11 (3.89%) Perl
4 6 (2.12%) PowerShell
5 5 (1.77%) Java
5 5 (1.77%) SQL
6 2 (0.71%) JavaScript
6 2 (0.71%) Shell Script
7 1 (0.35%) ActionScript
Qualifications
1 67 (23.67%) Security Cleared
2 52 (18.37%) SC Cleared
3 44 (15.55%) Cisco Certification
4 32 (11.31%) CCNP
5 28 (9.89%) CCIE
6 15 (5.30%) JNCIE
7 10 (3.53%) AWS Certification
7 10 (3.53%) DV Cleared
8 8 (2.83%) CCNA
9 7 (2.47%) JNCIP
10 6 (2.12%) Degree
11 5 (1.77%) CCDP
11 5 (1.77%) CCIE Security
11 5 (1.77%) CCSE
11 5 (1.77%) CISSP
12 4 (1.41%) (ISC)2 CCSP
12 4 (1.41%) CCSP
12 4 (1.41%) JNCIS
13 3 (1.06%) CEH
13 3 (1.06%) GIAC
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 7 (2.47%) NIST
1 7 (2.47%) PCI DSS
2 6 (2.12%) COBIT
2 6 (2.12%) ISO/IEC 27001
3 5 (1.77%) GDPR
4 3 (1.06%) JSP 440
4 3 (1.06%) SLA
5 2 (0.71%) Actionable Recommendations
5 2 (0.71%) Disclosure Scotland
5 2 (0.71%) NCSC
5 2 (0.71%) RMADS
6 1 (0.35%) Accessibility
System Software
1 65 (22.97%) VMware Infrastructure
2 34 (12.01%) VMware NSX
3 31 (10.95%) Docker
4 14 (4.95%) Active Directory
5 13 (4.59%) Firmware
6 9 (3.18%) vSphere
7 3 (1.06%) KVM
7 3 (1.06%) VMware ESXi
8 2 (0.71%) Hyper-V
8 2 (0.71%) ProxySG
8 2 (0.71%) Snort
8 2 (0.71%) Virtual Desktop
8 2 (0.71%) Xen
9 1 (0.35%) NFS
9 1 (0.35%) RHEV
9 1 (0.35%) SRDF
9 1 (0.35%) Veritas Cluster Server
9 1 (0.35%) Virtual Servers
9 1 (0.35%) XenApp
9 1 (0.35%) XenDesktop
Systems Management
1 80 (28.27%) Ansible
2 68 (24.03%) Terraform
3 20 (7.07%) CSIRT
4 14 (4.95%) FortiGate
5 11 (3.89%) Kubernetes
6 8 (2.83%) Single Sign-On
7 4 (1.41%) Microsoft Intune
7 4 (1.41%) Nagios
7 4 (1.41%) Prometheus
7 4 (1.41%) SCCM
8 2 (0.71%) Active Directory Federation Services
8 2 (0.71%) Argo
8 2 (0.71%) Grafana
8 2 (0.71%) Salt
9 1 (0.35%) Podman
9 1 (0.35%) Proxmox
9 1 (0.35%) Puppet
9 1 (0.35%) SCOM
9 1 (0.35%) vCenter Server
9 1 (0.35%) WhatsUp Gold
Vendors
1 112 (39.58%) Cisco
2 85 (30.04%) VMware
3 76 (26.86%) Palo Alto
4 72 (25.44%) CheckPoint
5 47 (16.61%) Blue Coat
6 46 (16.25%) Juniper
7 36 (12.72%) McAfee
8 31 (10.95%) Fortinet
9 23 (8.13%) Splunk
10 21 (7.42%) Zscaler
11 20 (7.07%) Meraki
11 20 (7.07%) NetApp
12 17 (6.01%) SolarWinds
13 16 (5.65%) Microsoft
14 11 (3.89%) Aruba
15 10 (3.53%) ServiceNow
16 9 (3.18%) Oracle
17 8 (2.83%) Infoblox
17 8 (2.83%) Nokia
18 7 (2.47%) Dell