GitLab Contract Job Trends

GitLab
UK

The table below provides summary statistics and contractor rates for jobs requiring GitLab skills. It covers contract job vacancies from the 6 months leading up to 21 February 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
21 Feb 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 116 136 242
Rank change year-on-year +20 +106 -52
Contract jobs citing GitLab 968 600 446
As % of all contract jobs in the UK 2.36% 1.95% 1.00%
As % of the Development Applications category 17.06% 14.41% 8.27%
Number of daily rates quoted 722 405 333
10th Percentile £381 £361 £405
25th Percentile £416 £431 £475
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £550 £550
Median % change year-on-year -9.09% - -8.33%
75th Percentile £575 £650 £645
90th Percentile £665 £725 £738
UK excluding London median daily rate £492 £500 £521
% change year-on-year -1.60% -4.03% -3.52%
Number of hourly rates quoted 25 4 3
10th Percentile £39.53 £64.33 £43.75
25th Percentile £52.50 £70.83 £49.38
Median hourly rate £55.00 £79.72 £60.00
Median % change year-on-year -31.01% +32.87% +14.29%
75th Percentile £65.00 £89.38 £69.38
90th Percentile £82.60 £92.75 £74.25
UK excluding London median hourly rate £55.00 £79.72 £67.50
% change year-on-year -31.01% +18.10% +28.57%

All Development Application Skills
UK

GitLab falls under the Development Applications category. For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all contract job vacancies requiring development application skills.

Contract vacancies with a requirement for development application skills 5,674 4,164 5,390
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the UK 13.85% 13.55% 12.07%
Number of daily rates quoted 3,875 2,683 3,736
10th Percentile £344 £327 £363
25th Percentile £405 £406 £425
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £500 £525
Median % change year-on-year - -4.76% -4.55%
75th Percentile £588 £620 £630
90th Percentile £688 £725 £715
UK excluding London median daily rate £475 £475 £500
% change year-on-year - -5.00% -4.76%
Number of hourly rates quoted 152 64 212
10th Percentile £35.40 £26.33 £37.75
25th Percentile £52.50 £50.44 £47.96
Median hourly rate £65.00 £62.50 £65.00
Median % change year-on-year +4.00% -3.85% +5.69%
75th Percentile £70.00 £71.25 £75.06
90th Percentile £83.00 £79.54 £84.36
UK excluding London median hourly rate £65.00 £62.50 £65.00
% change year-on-year +4.00% -3.85% +4.00%

GitLab
Job Vacancy Trend

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

GitLab job vacancy trend in the UK

GitLab
Daily Rate Trend

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

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

GitLab
Daily Rate Histogram

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing GitLab over the 6 months to 21 February 2026.

Daily rate histogram for GitLab in the UK

GitLab
Hourly Rate Trend

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

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

GitLab
Hourly Rate Histogram

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing GitLab over the 6 months to 21 February 2026.

Hourly rate histogram for GitLab in the UK

GitLab
Top 17 Contract Job Locations

The table below looks at the demand and provides a guide to the median contractor rates quoted in IT jobs citing GitLab within the UK over the 6 months to 21 February 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 +12 800 £500 -10.71% 213
UK excluding London +38 492 £492 -1.60% 158
London -16 326 £525 -8.70% 74
Work from Home +11 261 £475 -9.70% 106
North of England +8 237 £488 -5.34% 39
North West +7 112 £435 -8.42% 20
Midlands +23 105 £492 +3.20% 21
West Midlands +18 95 £500 +3.52% 18
Yorkshire -2 93 £500 -21.57% 13
South East -18 51 £500 -13.04% 60
South West +7 47 £525 -16.00% 20
Scotland +19 41 £425 -0.87% 1
North East -11 39 £500 -3.85% 6
East of England -7 20 £485 -1.77% 17
East Midlands -17 10 £401 +28.94% 3
Northern Ireland +1 6 - -
Wales -1 5 £435 -16.35% 4

GitLab
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 62 (6.40%) Confluence
2 35 (3.62%) SAS
3 29 (3.00%) Apache Airflow
4 24 (2.48%) Apache
5 18 (1.86%) nginx
5 18 (1.86%) OpenStack
6 17 (1.76%) Apache Spark
7 5 (0.52%) Appian
8 4 (0.41%) Microsoft Exchange
9 3 (0.31%) CMS
9 3 (0.31%) Ethereum
9 3 (0.31%) Hyperledger
10 2 (0.21%) SharePoint
11 1 (0.10%) Adobe Experience Manager
11 1 (0.10%) CICS
11 1 (0.10%) Cloud Foundry
11 1 (0.10%) Documentum
11 1 (0.10%) FileNet
11 1 (0.10%) Jupyter
11 1 (0.10%) Luigi
Applications
1 3 (0.31%) Adobe XD
2 1 (0.10%) Chatbot
2 1 (0.10%) Microsoft Excel
Business Applications
1 3 (0.31%) Oracle Applications
1 3 (0.31%) SAP BRIM
2 2 (0.21%) SAP S/4HANA
3 1 (0.10%) Actimize
3 1 (0.10%) Aladdin
3 1 (0.10%) Oracle EBS
3 1 (0.10%) SAP BPC
3 1 (0.10%) SAP CO
3 1 (0.10%) SAP FS
Cloud Services
1 590 (60.95%) AWS
2 273 (28.20%) GitHub
3 270 (27.89%) Azure
4 185 (19.11%) GitHub Actions
5 179 (18.49%) GCP
6 166 (17.15%) Serverless
7 135 (13.95%) Amazon S3
8 125 (12.91%) Amazon EKS
9 119 (12.29%) AWS Lambda
10 116 (11.98%) Amazon CloudWatch
10 116 (11.98%) Amazon EC2
11 112 (11.57%) AWS CloudFormation
12 94 (9.71%) Azure DevOps
13 93 (9.61%) OpenShift
14 84 (8.68%) Virtual Private Cloud
15 80 (8.26%) Amazon ECS
16 33 (3.41%) Azure AKS
17 26 (2.69%) Datadog
18 23 (2.38%) Route 53
19 22 (2.27%) Entra ID
Communications & Networking
1 61 (6.30%) Firewall
2 44 (4.55%) DNS
3 40 (4.13%) VPN
4 31 (3.20%) TCP/IP
5 24 (2.48%) Network Security
6 14 (1.45%) SSL
7 7 (0.72%) Reverse Proxy
8 6 (0.62%) Kerberos
8 6 (0.62%) WAN
9 5 (0.52%) HTTP
9 5 (0.52%) Multicast
9 5 (0.52%) SD-WAN
10 4 (0.41%) SAN
10 4 (0.41%) VSAN
11 3 (0.31%) BGP
11 3 (0.31%) DHCP
11 3 (0.31%) Ethernet VPN
11 3 (0.31%) FTP
11 3 (0.31%) NAS
11 3 (0.31%) VXLAN
Database & Business Intelligence
1 100 (10.33%) PostgreSQL
2 78 (8.06%) MongoDB
3 76 (7.85%) NoSQL
4 70 (7.23%) Amazon RDS
5 32 (3.31%) Data Lake
6 31 (3.20%) Relational Database
7 28 (2.89%) DynamoDB
8 26 (2.69%) MySQL
9 24 (2.48%) Amazon Athena
9 24 (2.48%) Data Warehouse
9 24 (2.48%) Redis
10 21 (2.17%) Big Data
11 20 (2.07%) SQL Server
12 17 (1.76%) Oracle Database
13 16 (1.65%) Power BI
14 15 (1.55%) Apache Cassandra
15 12 (1.24%) Delta Lake
16 11 (1.14%) BigQuery
16 11 (1.14%) DocumentDB
16 11 (1.14%) Spark SQL
Development Applications
1 476 (49.17%) Jenkins
2 231 (23.86%) Git
3 135 (13.95%) JIRA
4 103 (10.64%) Selenium
5 75 (7.75%) JUnit
6 72 (7.44%) Cucumber
7 50 (5.17%) Postman
8 38 (3.93%) JMeter
8 38 (3.93%) REST Assured
9 34 (3.51%) Bitbucket
10 33 (3.41%) Maven
11 32 (3.31%) Artifactory
11 32 (3.31%) Gatling
12 31 (3.20%) SonarQube
13 28 (2.89%) Cypress.io
14 27 (2.79%) Gradle
15 26 (2.69%) CircleCI
15 26 (2.69%) Sonatype Nexus
16 24 (2.48%) Liquibase
17 22 (2.27%) Mockito
General
1 251 (25.93%) Social Skills
2 159 (16.43%) Finance
3 146 (15.08%) Public Sector
4 106 (10.95%) Banking
5 72 (7.44%) Analytical Skills
6 25 (2.58%) Financial Institution
7 21 (2.17%) Documentation Skills
8 15 (1.55%) Military
9 14 (1.45%) Telecoms
10 11 (1.14%) Aerospace
10 11 (1.14%) Investment Banking
11 10 (1.03%) Influencing Skills
11 10 (1.03%) Retail
12 8 (0.83%) Retail Banking
13 7 (0.72%) Inclusion and Diversity
14 6 (0.62%) Games
15 5 (0.52%) Presentation Skills
16 3 (0.31%) Corporate Banking
16 3 (0.31%) Marketing
16 3 (0.31%) Organisational Skills
Job Titles
1 233 (24.07%) DevOps Engineer
2 191 (19.73%) Developer
3 151 (15.60%) Senior
4 104 (10.74%) AWS Engineer
5 78 (8.06%) AWS DevOps
6 73 (7.54%) Lead
7 65 (6.71%) AWS DevOps Engineer
8 58 (5.99%) Java Developer
9 57 (5.89%) Software Engineer
10 54 (5.58%) Data Engineer
11 50 (5.17%) Test Engineer
12 49 (5.06%) Cloud Engineer
13 48 (4.96%) Architect
14 47 (4.86%) Senior DevOps
14 47 (4.86%) Senior DevOps Engineer
15 37 (3.82%) Platform Engineer
16 32 (3.31%) GCP Engineer
17 30 (3.10%) Senior Developer
18 29 (3.00%) Full-Stack Developer
19 26 (2.69%) Test Automation Engineer
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 157 (16.22%) REST
2 138 (14.26%) Kafka
3 128 (13.22%) Spring
4 114 (11.78%) Spring Boot
5 105 (10.85%) Elastic Stack
6 100 (10.33%) RESTful
7 97 (10.02%) Node.js
8 69 (7.13%) React
9 61 (6.30%) Playwright
10 42 (4.34%) PySpark
11 38 (3.93%) HTML
12 35 (3.62%) pytest
13 34 (3.51%) OpenTelemetry
14 33 (3.41%) RabbitMQ
15 30 (3.10%) Jest
15 30 (3.10%) JSON
15 30 (3.10%) OpenID
16 29 (3.00%) LDAP
17 28 (2.89%) CSS
17 28 (2.89%) YAML
Miscellaneous
1 153 (15.81%) Cloud Native
2 79 (8.16%) Distributed Systems
3 50 (5.17%) Public Cloud
4 48 (4.96%) Product Ownership
5 29 (3.00%) Onboarding
6 16 (1.65%) Data Centre
7 15 (1.55%) Private Cloud
8 14 (1.45%) Hybrid Cloud
9 11 (1.14%) Enterprise Software
9 11 (1.14%) Linux Command Line
10 10 (1.03%) Legacy Systems
10 10 (1.03%) PKI
11 9 (0.93%) Management Information System
11 9 (0.93%) Security Posture
12 8 (0.83%) Data Protection Act
12 8 (0.83%) Virtual Team
13 7 (0.72%) Algorithms
13 7 (0.72%) Mainframe
13 7 (0.72%) NHS
13 7 (0.72%) Synthetic Data
Operating Systems
1 203 (20.97%) Linux
2 61 (6.30%) Windows
3 33 (3.41%) Unix
4 30 (3.10%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
5 17 (1.76%) Windows Server
6 11 (1.14%) Apple iOS
7 10 (1.03%) Android
7 10 (1.03%) CentOS
8 8 (0.83%) VMS
9 5 (0.52%) Ubuntu
10 3 (0.31%) Solaris
10 3 (0.31%) Windows Server 2016
10 3 (0.31%) Windows Server 2019
10 3 (0.31%) zOS
11 2 (0.21%) Debian
11 2 (0.21%) Rocky
12 1 (0.10%) Amazon Linux
12 1 (0.10%) Windows 10
Processes & Methodologies
1 771 (79.65%) CI/CD
2 592 (61.16%) DevOps
3 376 (38.84%) Infrastructure as Code
4 366 (37.81%) Agile
5 348 (35.95%) Containerisation
6 285 (29.44%) Test Automation
7 205 (21.18%) Microservices
8 176 (18.18%) Problem-Solving
9 166 (17.15%) Observability
10 133 (13.74%) Software Engineering
11 120 (12.40%) Scrum
12 115 (11.88%) Continuous Improvement
13 101 (10.43%) Analytics
14 86 (8.88%) Platform Engineering
15 81 (8.37%) DevSecOps
15 81 (8.37%) TDD
16 79 (8.16%) Data Pipeline
17 77 (7.95%) Infrastructure Automation
18 75 (7.75%) Test Strategy
19 69 (7.13%) Migration
Programming Languages
1 430 (44.42%) Python
2 289 (29.86%) Java
3 163 (16.84%) Bash
4 161 (16.63%) SQL
5 112 (11.57%) JavaScript
6 88 (9.09%) Go
7 86 (8.88%) TypeScript
8 79 (8.16%) PowerShell
9 49 (5.06%) Shell Script
10 19 (1.96%) C#
11 18 (1.86%) Ruby
12 16 (1.65%) Kotlin
13 12 (1.24%) PL/SQL
14 10 (1.03%) Perl
15 9 (0.93%) Groovy
15 9 (0.93%) Rust
15 9 (0.93%) Scala
16 8 (0.83%) Bicep
17 7 (0.72%) C++
17 7 (0.72%) Korn
Qualifications
1 353 (36.47%) Security Cleared
2 287 (29.65%) SC Cleared
3 64 (6.61%) Degree
4 56 (5.79%) Computer Science Degree
5 49 (5.06%) BPSS Clearance
6 42 (4.34%) AWS Certification
7 32 (3.31%) Master's Degree
8 30 (3.10%) DV Cleared
9 21 (2.17%) AWS Certified Solutions Architect
10 14 (1.45%) CISSP
11 13 (1.34%) AWS Certified DevOps Engineer
11 13 (1.34%) CISM
12 9 (0.93%) Oracle Certification
13 8 (0.83%) OCA
14 7 (0.72%) AWS Certified Developer
15 6 (0.62%) Azure Certification
16 5 (0.52%) Microsoft Certification
17 4 (0.41%) ISTQB
18 3 (0.31%) AWS Certified SysOps Administrator
18 3 (0.31%) ITIL Certification
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 122 (12.60%) QA
2 61 (6.30%) Accessibility
3 24 (2.48%) Data Quality
4 22 (2.27%) WCAG
5 20 (2.07%) GDPR
5 20 (2.07%) NIST
6 17 (1.76%) ISO/IEC 27001
7 14 (1.45%) Sarbanes-Oxley
7 14 (1.45%) SLA
8 11 (1.14%) NCSC
9 6 (0.62%) PCI DSS
10 4 (0.41%) Def Stans
11 2 (0.21%) HL7
12 1 (0.10%) Disclosure Scotland
12 1 (0.10%) IEC 61508
12 1 (0.10%) ISO 20022
12 1 (0.10%) JSP 440
12 1 (0.10%) NIST 800
12 1 (0.10%) SOC 2
12 1 (0.10%) Software Quality Assurance
System Software
1 426 (44.01%) Docker
2 24 (2.48%) Active Directory
3 13 (1.34%) Virtual Machines
3 13 (1.34%) VMware Infrastructure
4 8 (0.83%) Virtual Servers
5 4 (0.41%) Active Directory Lightweight Directory Services
6 3 (0.31%) VMware NSX
6 3 (0.31%) vSphere
7 2 (0.21%) HDFS
7 2 (0.21%) Hyper-V
8 1 (0.10%) Squid
8 1 (0.10%) VMware ESXi
Systems Management
1 507 (52.38%) Kubernetes
2 458 (47.31%) Terraform
3 240 (24.79%) Grafana
4 227 (23.45%) Ansible
5 193 (19.94%) Prometheus
6 51 (5.27%) Argo
7 20 (2.07%) Podman
8 18 (1.86%) Istio
8 18 (1.86%) Puppet
9 17 (1.76%) Kibana
9 17 (1.76%) Progress Chef
10 14 (1.45%) Packer
11 12 (1.24%) Fluentd
12 9 (0.93%) Red Hat Satellite
13 8 (0.83%) Karpenter
14 7 (0.72%) Check_MK
14 7 (0.72%) Sysdig
15 6 (0.62%) linkerd
15 6 (0.62%) Nagios
16 5 (0.52%) Single Sign-On
Vendors
1 104 (10.74%) Splunk
2 74 (7.64%) Microsoft
3 67 (6.92%) Oracle
4 48 (4.96%) Google
5 47 (4.86%) Red Hat
6 34 (3.51%) VMware
7 30 (3.10%) ServiceNow
8 25 (2.58%) Databricks
9 20 (2.07%) Dynatrace
10 17 (1.76%) Salesforce
11 16 (1.65%) F5
12 15 (1.55%) Atlassian
12 15 (1.55%) CheckPoint
12 15 (1.55%) Palo Alto
13 14 (1.45%) Cribl.io
13 14 (1.45%) Veracode
14 13 (1.34%) Cisco
15 12 (1.24%) Informatica
16 11 (1.14%) IBM
17 9 (0.93%) Talend