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 28 August 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
28 Aug 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 371 317 248
Rank change year-on-year -54 -69 +147
Contract jobs citing F5 331 247 364
As % of all contract jobs in the UK 0.62% 0.76% 0.94%
As % of the Vendors category 1.48% 1.60% 2.14%
Number of daily rates quoted 155 136 245
10th Percentile £380 £378 £371
25th Percentile £413 £413 £450
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £488 £525
Median % change year-on-year +2.56% -7.14% -
75th Percentile £594 £613 £588
90th Percentile £683 £650 £650
UK excluding London median daily rate £503 £490 £550
% change year-on-year +2.66% -11.00% +12.24%
Number of hourly rates quoted 0 1 3
Median hourly rate - £66.50 £23.80
Median % change year-on-year - +179.41% -67.17%
UK excluding London median hourly rate - £66.50 -

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 22,439 15,440 16,993
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the UK 41.74% 47.20% 43.82%
Number of daily rates quoted 13,832 9,435 10,465
10th Percentile £313 £275 £285
25th Percentile £413 £400 £413
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £510 £500 £525
Median % change year-on-year +2.00% -4.76% -
75th Percentile £611 £613 £625
90th Percentile £700 £700 £725
UK excluding London median daily rate £500 £475 £500
% change year-on-year +5.26% -5.00% -
Number of hourly rates quoted 1,162 795 772
10th Percentile £14.36 £14.66 £13.02
25th Percentile £17.25 £17.30 £15.62
Median hourly rate £29.96 £25.15 £27.86
Median % change year-on-year +19.13% -9.73% -35.21%
75th Percentile £65.00 £45.14 £61.60
90th Percentile £82.95 £67.80 £70.00
UK excluding London median hourly rate £28.13 £21.24 £26.00
% change year-on-year +32.42% -18.31% -34.67%

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 28 August 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
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 28 August 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 -53 293 £520 +6.35% 42
UK excluding London -29 226 £503 +2.66% 20
North of England -9 118 £534 +10.65% 4
Work from Home -24 92 £550 +22.22% 16
North West +9 87 £575 +21.05% 4
Midlands -10 74 £581 +32.05% 3
West Midlands -16 74 £581 +32.05% 3
London -104 70 £525 +10.53% 24
South East -37 46 £415 -22.79% 7
Yorkshire -51 24 £475 -2.96%
Scotland -4 20 £419 -20.24% 1
South West -32 19 £495 -13.91% 5
North East -27 13 £650 +18.18%
East of England -17 5 £530 +24.71%

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 6 (1.81%) SharePoint
2 5 (1.51%) nginx
2 5 (1.51%) OpenStack
3 3 (0.91%) Apache
3 3 (0.91%) IIS
3 3 (0.91%) Microsoft Exchange
3 3 (0.91%) Tomcat
4 2 (0.60%) Confluence
5 1 (0.30%) CMS
Applications
1 8 (2.42%) Microsoft Excel
1 8 (2.42%) Microsoft PowerPoint
1 8 (2.42%) MS Visio
2 5 (1.51%) Microsoft Office
Cloud Services
1 60 (18.13%) Azure
2 51 (15.41%) AWS
3 23 (6.95%) OCI
4 19 (5.74%) GitHub
5 15 (4.53%) SaaS
6 10 (3.02%) IaaS
7 9 (2.72%) GCP
8 8 (2.42%) Azure ExpressRoute
9 7 (2.11%) Virtual Private Cloud
10 6 (1.81%) Cloudflare
10 6 (1.81%) OpenShift
11 4 (1.21%) Entra ID
12 3 (0.91%) Microsoft 365
12 3 (0.91%) Mimecast
12 3 (0.91%) OneDrive
13 1 (0.30%) AWS CloudFormation
13 1 (0.30%) Azure DevOps
13 1 (0.30%) Google Ads
13 1 (0.30%) Route 53
13 1 (0.30%) Serverless
Communications & Networking
1 177 (53.47%) Firewall
2 142 (42.90%) BGP
3 130 (39.27%) DNS
4 119 (35.95%) BIG-IP
5 118 (35.65%) F5 BIG-IP LTM
6 109 (32.93%) VPN
7 101 (30.51%) WAN
8 93 (28.10%) OSPF
9 79 (23.87%) Network Security
10 69 (20.85%) F5 BIG-IP GTM
11 67 (20.24%) LAN
12 64 (19.34%) VXLAN
13 61 (18.43%) TCP/IP
14 54 (16.31%) Cisco Nexus
15 51 (15.41%) Multicast
16 49 (14.80%) SSL
17 48 (14.50%) Wireless
18 45 (13.60%) SD-WAN
18 45 (13.60%) VLAN
19 42 (12.69%) DMZ
Database & Business Intelligence
1 3 (0.91%) MySQL
1 3 (0.91%) SQL Server
2 1 (0.30%) PostgreSQL
Development Applications
1 23 (6.95%) JIRA
2 20 (6.04%) GitLab
3 16 (4.83%) Fiddler
4 11 (3.32%) Jenkins
5 8 (2.42%) Sonatype Nexus
6 4 (1.21%) Git
7 1 (0.30%) MSI
7 1 (0.30%) Robot Framework
7 1 (0.30%) Visual Studio
General
1 52 (15.71%) Social Skills
2 45 (13.60%) Banking
3 42 (12.69%) Finance
4 32 (9.67%) Investment Banking
5 28 (8.46%) Analytical Skills
6 21 (6.34%) Public Sector
7 19 (5.74%) Telecoms
8 8 (2.42%) Legal
9 7 (2.11%) Retail
10 5 (1.51%) Documentation Skills
10 5 (1.51%) Financial Institution
11 3 (0.91%) Influencing Skills
12 2 (0.60%) Military
12 2 (0.60%) Organisational Skills
13 1 (0.30%) Law
13 1 (0.30%) Police
13 1 (0.30%) Publishing
Job Titles
1 176 (53.17%) Network Engineer
2 60 (18.13%) Security Engineer
3 56 (16.92%) Senior
4 52 (15.71%) Network Security Engineer
5 42 (12.69%) Cisco Engineer
6 40 (12.08%) Cisco Network Engineer
7 34 (10.27%) Data Network Engineer
7 34 (10.27%) Infrastructure Engineer
8 31 (9.37%) Architect
9 30 (9.06%) Data Engineer
9 30 (9.06%) Web Engineer
10 29 (8.76%) Cisco Security Engineer
11 25 (7.55%) Senior Network Engineer
12 19 (5.74%) Senior Infrastructure Engineer
13 18 (5.44%) IP Network Engineer
14 17 (5.14%) Network Architect
15 15 (4.53%) Blue Coat Engineer
15 15 (4.53%) Consultant
16 13 (3.93%) SC Cleared Network Engineer
17 12 (3.63%) Network Specialist
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 44 (13.29%) Terraform
2 25 (7.55%) 802.1X
3 9 (2.72%) YAML
4 8 (2.42%) JSON
5 7 (2.11%) SAML
6 5 (1.51%) NETCONF
6 5 (1.51%) OpenConfig
6 5 (1.51%) RESTCONF
6 5 (1.51%) YANG
7 4 (1.21%) LDAP
8 3 (0.91%) LAMP
8 3 (0.91%) LEMP Stack
8 3 (0.91%) REST
9 2 (0.60%) eBPF
10 1 (0.30%) .NET
10 1 (0.30%) .NET Framework
10 1 (0.30%) Bun
10 1 (0.30%) JWT
10 1 (0.30%) OpenID
10 1 (0.30%) React
Miscellaneous
1 102 (30.82%) Data Centre
2 41 (12.39%) Hybrid Cloud
3 22 (6.65%) Management Information System
4 21 (6.34%) Cloud Native
5 15 (4.53%) Data Protection Act
6 12 (3.63%) Onboarding
6 12 (3.63%) PKI
7 10 (3.02%) Clustering
8 8 (2.42%) Private Cloud
8 8 (2.42%) Public Cloud
9 7 (2.11%) Distributed Applications
9 7 (2.11%) Distributed Denial-of-Service
10 5 (1.51%) Analytical Mindset
10 5 (1.51%) Digital Signage
11 3 (0.91%) Algorithms
11 3 (0.91%) Legacy Systems
11 3 (0.91%) Linux Command Line
11 3 (0.91%) Self-Motivation
12 2 (0.60%) Driving Licence
13 1 (0.30%) Distributed Systems
Operating Systems
1 40 (12.08%) Windows
2 38 (11.48%) Linux
3 9 (2.72%) Unix
4 4 (1.21%) Windows Server
5 3 (0.91%) CentOS
5 3 (0.91%) Ubuntu
6 2 (0.60%) Windows Server 2012
6 2 (0.60%) Windows Server 2019
7 1 (0.30%) CatOS
7 1 (0.30%) Check Point GAiA
7 1 (0.30%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
Processes & Methodologies
1 158 (47.73%) Load Balancing
2 53 (16.01%) High Availability
3 52 (15.71%) Infrastructure Engineering
4 46 (13.90%) CI/CD
4 46 (13.90%) Zero Trust
5 45 (13.60%) Migration
6 43 (12.99%) Project Delivery
7 39 (11.78%) Network Design
8 31 (9.37%) Stakeholder Management
9 30 (9.06%) Change Management
10 29 (8.76%) Agile
11 28 (8.46%) Infrastructure as Code
12 27 (8.16%) Network Architecture
13 26 (7.85%) Problem-Solving
14 25 (7.55%) Roadmaps
15 23 (6.95%) DevOps
16 22 (6.65%) ITIL
17 21 (6.34%) Network Management
18 20 (6.04%) Continuous Improvement
18 20 (6.04%) Site Reliability Engineering
Programming Languages
1 85 (25.68%) Python
2 11 (3.32%) ActionScript
2 11 (3.32%) SQL
3 10 (3.02%) JavaScript
4 8 (2.42%) Perl
4 8 (2.42%) PowerShell
5 7 (2.11%) VBA
6 5 (1.51%) Bash
7 4 (1.21%) Shell Script
8 3 (0.91%) Lisp
9 1 (0.30%) C++
9 1 (0.30%) TypeScript
Qualifications
1 80 (24.17%) Security Cleared
2 55 (16.62%) Cisco Certification
2 55 (16.62%) SC Cleared
3 32 (9.67%) CCNP
4 20 (6.04%) CCIE
5 17 (5.14%) DV Cleared
6 15 (4.53%) Degree
7 6 (1.81%) CCNA
8 5 (1.51%) JNCIE
9 4 (1.21%) CCIE Security
9 4 (1.21%) Computer Science Degree
10 3 (0.91%) CEH
10 3 (0.91%) CISSP
10 3 (0.91%) GIAC
10 3 (0.91%) VMware Certified Professional (VCP)
11 2 (0.60%) AWS Certification
11 2 (0.60%) Azure Certification
11 2 (0.60%) BPSS Clearance
11 2 (0.60%) Microsoft Certification
12 1 (0.30%) TOGAF Certification
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 8 (2.42%) QA
2 5 (1.51%) Disclosure Scotland
3 4 (1.21%) NCSC
4 2 (0.60%) GDPR
4 2 (0.60%) ISO/IEC 27001
4 2 (0.60%) NIST
5 1 (0.30%) GRC
5 1 (0.30%) SLA
System Software
1 46 (13.90%) VMware Infrastructure
2 23 (6.95%) VMware NSX
3 18 (5.44%) Firmware
4 15 (4.53%) Active Directory
5 4 (1.21%) Virtual Servers
6 3 (0.91%) Docker
6 3 (0.91%) Dovecot
6 3 (0.91%) Postfix
6 3 (0.91%) vSphere
7 1 (0.30%) ProxySG
7 1 (0.30%) VMware ESXi
Systems Management
1 72 (21.75%) Ansible
2 35 (10.57%) FortiGate
3 8 (2.42%) Cisco Prime
3 8 (2.42%) WMI
4 5 (1.51%) Kubernetes
4 5 (1.51%) Single Sign-On
5 4 (1.21%) Microsoft Intune
6 3 (0.91%) Active Directory Federation Services
6 3 (0.91%) Grafana
6 3 (0.91%) HAProxy
6 3 (0.91%) Prometheus
6 3 (0.91%) vCenter Server
7 2 (0.60%) Avamar
8 1 (0.30%) Istio
8 1 (0.30%) Network Intrusion Detection System
8 1 (0.30%) Progress Chef
8 1 (0.30%) Puppet
8 1 (0.30%) SCCM
8 1 (0.30%) vRealize
Vendors
1 204 (61.63%) Cisco
2 130 (39.27%) Palo Alto
3 70 (21.15%) Fortinet
4 60 (18.13%) VMware
5 51 (15.41%) Juniper
6 43 (12.99%) CheckPoint
7 40 (12.08%) Arista
8 35 (10.57%) SolarWinds
9 30 (9.06%) Aruba
10 27 (8.16%) Microsoft
11 26 (7.85%) Blue Coat
12 23 (6.95%) Infoblox
13 20 (6.04%) Splunk
14 16 (4.83%) Zscaler
15 15 (4.53%) McAfee
15 15 (4.53%) NetApp
16 14 (4.23%) ServiceNow
17 11 (3.32%) Meraki
18 8 (2.42%) Citrix
18 8 (2.42%) Extreme Networks