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 1 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
1 Jan 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 334 295 357
Rank change year-on-year -39 +62 +35
Contract jobs citing F5 273 265 252
As % of all contract jobs in the UK 0.74% 0.80% 0.59%
As % of the Vendors category 1.57% 1.74% 1.31%
Number of daily rates quoted 134 156 162
10th Percentile £350 £400 £400
25th Percentile £413 £450 £450
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £513 £538
Median % change year-on-year -2.44% -4.65% +1.42%
75th Percentile £625 £588 £626
90th Percentile £709 £641 £700
UK excluding London median daily rate £495 £525 £500
% change year-on-year -5.71% +5.00% -4.76%
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 17,375 15,197 19,164
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the UK 46.83% 45.82% 44.60%
Number of daily rates quoted 11,120 9,035 12,152
10th Percentile £300 £284 £252
25th Percentile £409 £410 £406
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £525 £525
Median % change year-on-year -4.76% - -2.33%
75th Percentile £613 £625 £638
90th Percentile £704 £716 £725
UK excluding London median daily rate £492 £500 £500
% change year-on-year -1.60% - -
Number of hourly rates quoted 823 448 662
10th Percentile £15.00 £15.58 £14.25
25th Percentile £17.97 £18.51 £19.25
Median hourly rate £23.83 £27.24 £45.94
Median % change year-on-year -12.53% -40.71% +76.69%
75th Percentile £44.94 £60.19 £65.00
90th Percentile £74.26 £75.55 £77.50
UK excluding London median hourly rate £21.50 £25.00 £46.18
% change year-on-year -14.00% -45.86% +102.88%

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 1 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 1 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 1 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 -30 246 £500 -2.44% 37
UK excluding London -30 188 £495 -5.71% 36
North of England -9 99 £550 +12.24% 7
Work from Home -5 79 £500 +2.04% 15
Midlands +6 72 £390 -38.61% 6
West Midlands +31 71 £390 -32.94% 6
North West -2 69 £500 +2.04% 4
London -21 65 £600 +26.32% 7
Yorkshire -24 43 £575 +15.00% 3
South East -50 27 £500 -4.76% 8
Scotland +24 19 £500 -4.76% 2
South West -23 8 £520 +8.05% 2
East of England -20 2 - - 12
North East -9 1 £550 -
East Midlands -39 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 10 (3.66%) Confluence
1 10 (3.66%) OpenStack
2 5 (1.83%) SharePoint
3 2 (0.73%) CICS
3 2 (0.73%) Tomcat
3 2 (0.73%) WebSphere
4 1 (0.37%) WebSphere Application Server
Applications
1 12 (4.40%) MS Visio
2 5 (1.83%) Microsoft PowerPoint
3 2 (0.73%) Microsoft Excel
3 2 (0.73%) Microsoft Office
Cloud Services
1 98 (35.90%) AWS
2 52 (19.05%) Azure
3 48 (17.58%) GCP
4 31 (11.36%) Akamai
5 29 (10.62%) Virtual Private Cloud
6 25 (9.16%) Amazon CloudWatch
7 24 (8.79%) Amazon ELB
8 23 (8.42%) Amazon EC2
8 23 (8.42%) Amazon S3
9 9 (3.30%) OpenShift
10 6 (2.20%) OCI
11 5 (1.83%) Azure ExpressRoute
12 4 (1.47%) Cloudflare
13 3 (1.10%) GitHub
13 3 (1.10%) Microsoft 365
13 3 (1.10%) Mimecast
14 2 (0.73%) Apigee
14 2 (0.73%) AWS CloudTrail
14 2 (0.73%) AWS Direct Connect
14 2 (0.73%) VULTR
Communications & Networking
1 153 (56.04%) Firewall
2 113 (41.39%) DNS
3 83 (30.40%) Network Security
4 77 (28.21%) SSL
5 71 (26.01%) TCP/IP
6 67 (24.54%) VPN
7 64 (23.44%) F5 BIG-IP LTM
8 57 (20.88%) WAN
9 53 (19.41%) F5 BIG-IP GTM
10 49 (17.95%) BGP
11 47 (17.22%) Wireshark
12 41 (15.02%) HTTP
13 39 (14.29%) BIG-IP
14 36 (13.19%) LAN
14 36 (13.19%) Wireless
15 35 (12.82%) DMZ
15 35 (12.82%) OSPF
16 27 (9.89%) MPLS
17 23 (8.42%) Cisco Nexus
18 21 (7.69%) SD-WAN
Database & Business Intelligence
1 2 (0.73%) NoSQL
1 2 (0.73%) PostgreSQL
1 2 (0.73%) SQL Server
Development Applications
1 34 (12.45%) Git
1 34 (12.45%) Jenkins
2 22 (8.06%) Fiddler
2 22 (8.06%) GitLab
3 11 (4.03%) JIRA
4 5 (1.83%) Sonatype Nexus
5 4 (1.47%) Robot Framework
6 2 (0.73%) Rational DOORS
General
1 75 (27.47%) Social Skills
2 45 (16.48%) Banking
3 37 (13.55%) Analytical Skills
4 33 (12.09%) Investment Banking
5 30 (10.99%) Finance
6 29 (10.62%) Public Sector
7 21 (7.69%) Documentation Skills
8 20 (7.33%) Telecoms
9 10 (3.66%) Retail
10 7 (2.56%) Financial Institution
10 7 (2.56%) Military
11 6 (2.20%) Influencing Skills
11 6 (2.20%) Legal
11 6 (2.20%) Presentation Skills
12 4 (1.47%) Retail Banking
13 3 (1.10%) Organisational Skills
14 1 (0.37%) Inclusion and Diversity
Job Titles
1 96 (35.16%) Network Engineer
2 34 (12.45%) Senior
3 31 (11.36%) Architect
4 26 (9.52%) Security Engineer
5 23 (8.42%) Infrastructure Engineer
6 22 (8.06%) Web Engineer
7 18 (6.59%) Network Architect
8 16 (5.86%) Operations Engineer
9 14 (5.13%) Network Security Engineer
9 14 (5.13%) Solutions Architect
10 12 (4.40%) Automation Engineer
10 12 (4.40%) DevOps Engineer
10 12 (4.40%) Senior DevOps
10 12 (4.40%) Senior DevOps Engineer
11 11 (4.03%) Blue Coat Engineer
11 11 (4.03%) IP Network Engineer
12 10 (3.66%) Designer
12 10 (3.66%) Junior
12 10 (3.66%) Junior Network Engineer
12 10 (3.66%) Senior Infrastructure Engineer
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 13 (4.76%) 802.1X
2 6 (2.20%) JSON
2 6 (2.20%) LDAP
2 6 (2.20%) REST
3 5 (1.83%) Middleware
3 5 (1.83%) XML
4 4 (1.47%) NETCONF
4 4 (1.47%) VML
4 4 (1.47%) YANG
5 3 (1.10%) OpenConfig
5 3 (1.10%) SAML
5 3 (1.10%) SOAP
6 2 (0.73%) AngularJS
6 2 (0.73%) Regular Expression
6 2 (0.73%) RESTCONF
7 1 (0.37%) RESTful
Miscellaneous
1 54 (19.78%) Data Centre
2 34 (12.45%) Management Information System
3 20 (7.33%) Security Posture
4 13 (4.76%) Data Protection Act
5 10 (3.66%) Cloud Native
6 9 (3.30%) Hybrid Cloud
7 8 (2.93%) Onboarding
7 8 (2.93%) Private Cloud
8 6 (2.20%) Legacy Systems
9 3 (1.10%) Distributed Architecture
9 3 (1.10%) Public Cloud
9 3 (1.10%) Self-Motivation
10 2 (0.73%) Analytical Mindset
10 2 (0.73%) Clustering
10 2 (0.73%) Distributed Denial-of-Service
10 2 (0.73%) Linux Command Line
10 2 (0.73%) Mainframe
10 2 (0.73%) PKI
10 2 (0.73%) Replication
10 2 (0.73%) Virtual Team
Operating Systems
1 24 (8.79%) Linux
1 24 (8.79%) Windows
2 11 (4.03%) Unix
3 8 (2.93%) Windows Server
4 3 (1.10%) Windows Server 2012
4 3 (1.10%) Windows Server 2019
5 2 (0.73%) CatOS
5 2 (0.73%) Solaris
5 2 (0.73%) VMS
5 2 (0.73%) zOS
6 1 (0.37%) MVS
6 1 (0.37%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
6 1 (0.37%) Windows Server 2016
Processes & Methodologies
1 100 (36.63%) Load Balancing
2 47 (17.22%) DevOps
3 45 (16.48%) Incident Response
4 40 (14.65%) CI/CD
5 39 (14.29%) DevSecOps
6 38 (13.92%) High Availability
7 36 (13.19%) Migration
7 36 (13.19%) Problem-Solving
8 33 (12.09%) Infrastructure Engineering
9 31 (11.36%) Infrastructure Automation
10 30 (10.99%) Business Strategy
10 30 (10.99%) Change Management
11 27 (9.89%) Infrastructure as Code
12 25 (9.16%) Application Security
13 24 (8.79%) OWASP
13 24 (8.79%) Stakeholder Management
13 24 (8.79%) Test Automation
14 22 (8.06%) Cybersecurity
14 22 (8.06%) Mentoring
14 22 (8.06%) Network Design
Programming Languages
1 86 (31.50%) Python
2 32 (11.72%) Bash
3 13 (4.76%) Perl
4 9 (3.30%) PowerShell
5 5 (1.83%) Java
5 5 (1.83%) SQL
6 4 (1.47%) Shell Script
7 2 (0.73%) JavaScript
Qualifications
1 65 (23.81%) Security Cleared
2 51 (18.68%) SC Cleared
3 40 (14.65%) Cisco Certification
4 29 (10.62%) CCNP
5 25 (9.16%) CCIE
6 14 (5.13%) JNCIE
7 10 (3.66%) AWS Certification
8 8 (2.93%) DV Cleared
9 7 (2.56%) CCNA
9 7 (2.56%) Degree
10 6 (2.20%) JNCIP
11 5 (1.83%) CISSP
12 4 (1.47%) (ISC)2 CCSP
12 4 (1.47%) CCDP
12 4 (1.47%) CCIE Security
12 4 (1.47%) CCSE
12 4 (1.47%) CCSP
13 3 (1.10%) Azure Certification
13 3 (1.10%) Computer Science Degree
13 3 (1.10%) GWAPT
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 7 (2.56%) NIST
1 7 (2.56%) PCI DSS
2 6 (2.20%) COBIT
2 6 (2.20%) ISO/IEC 27001
3 5 (1.83%) GDPR
4 3 (1.10%) SLA
5 2 (0.73%) Actionable Recommendations
5 2 (0.73%) Disclosure Scotland
5 2 (0.73%) JSP 440
6 1 (0.37%) Accessibility
6 1 (0.37%) NCSC
6 1 (0.37%) RMADS
System Software
1 66 (24.18%) VMware Infrastructure
2 31 (11.36%) Docker
2 31 (11.36%) VMware NSX
3 13 (4.76%) Active Directory
4 12 (4.40%) Firmware
4 12 (4.40%) vSphere
5 3 (1.10%) KVM
5 3 (1.10%) Virtual Machines
6 2 (0.73%) Hyper-V
6 2 (0.73%) ProxySG
6 2 (0.73%) Snort
6 2 (0.73%) Virtual Desktop
6 2 (0.73%) VMware ESXi
6 2 (0.73%) Xen
7 1 (0.37%) NFS
7 1 (0.37%) RHEV
7 1 (0.37%) SRDF
7 1 (0.37%) Veritas Cluster Server
7 1 (0.37%) XenApp
7 1 (0.37%) XenDesktop
Systems Management
1 81 (29.67%) Ansible
2 67 (24.54%) Terraform
3 20 (7.33%) CSIRT
4 12 (4.40%) FortiGate
5 10 (3.66%) Kubernetes
6 4 (1.47%) Single Sign-On
6 4 (1.47%) vCenter Server
7 3 (1.10%) Microsoft Intune
7 3 (1.10%) Nagios
7 3 (1.10%) SCCM
7 3 (1.10%) vRealize
8 2 (0.73%) Active Directory Federation Services
8 2 (0.73%) Prometheus
9 1 (0.37%) Argo
9 1 (0.37%) Grafana
9 1 (0.37%) Podman
9 1 (0.37%) Proxmox
9 1 (0.37%) Salt
9 1 (0.37%) SCOM
9 1 (0.37%) WhatsUp Gold
Vendors
1 100 (36.63%) Cisco
2 84 (30.77%) VMware
3 74 (27.11%) Palo Alto
4 66 (24.18%) CheckPoint
5 46 (16.85%) Juniper
6 44 (16.12%) Blue Coat
7 33 (12.09%) McAfee
8 31 (11.36%) Fortinet
9 22 (8.06%) Splunk
10 19 (6.96%) Meraki
10 19 (6.96%) NetApp
11 18 (6.59%) Zscaler
12 17 (6.23%) SolarWinds
13 13 (4.76%) Microsoft
14 10 (3.66%) Aruba
15 9 (3.30%) Oracle
16 8 (2.93%) Infoblox
16 8 (2.93%) Nokia
17 6 (2.20%) HP
17 6 (2.20%) Imperva