IBM Contract Job Trends

IBM
UK

The table below provides summary statistics for contract job vacancies requiring knowledge or experience of IBM products and/or services. It includes a benchmarking guide to contractor rates offered in vacancies that cited IBM over the 6 months leading up to 4 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 the International Business Machines Corporation.

6 months to
4 Jan 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 276 226 204
Rank change year-on-year -50 -22 +96
Contract jobs citing IBM 341 361 515
As % of all contract jobs in the UK 0.93% 1.11% 1.20%
As % of the Vendors category 1.99% 2.44% 2.69%
Number of daily rates quoted 214 170 312
10th Percentile £314 £317 £411
25th Percentile £402 £413 £450
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £475 £500 £550
Median % change year-on-year -5.00% -9.09% +2.33%
75th Percentile £580 £608 £663
90th Percentile £702 £685 £769
UK excluding London median daily rate £450 £450 £525
% change year-on-year - -14.29% +5.00%
Number of hourly rates quoted 15 24 17
10th Percentile £36.59 - £63.50
25th Percentile £63.13 £24.18 £65.00
Median hourly rate £70.00 £62.50 £70.00
Median % change year-on-year +12.00% -10.71% +68.16%
75th Percentile - £68.75 -
90th Percentile £73.60 £69.63 £74.00
UK excluding London median hourly rate £70.00 £62.50 £70.00
% change year-on-year +12.00% -10.71% +72.52%

All Vendors
UK

IBM 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 17,142 14,815 19,122
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the UK 46.58% 45.72% 44.46%
Number of daily rates quoted 10,996 8,792 12,126
10th Percentile £300 £284 £252
25th Percentile £410 £409 £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 £703 £714 £725
UK excluding London median daily rate £495 £500 £500
% change year-on-year -1.00% - -
Number of hourly rates quoted 807 433 661
10th Percentile £15.00 £15.52 £14.16
25th Percentile £17.96 £19.00 £18.93
Median hourly rate £23.83 £27.35 £44.50
Median % change year-on-year -12.89% -38.54% +66.48%
75th Percentile £46.50 £60.00 £63.75
90th Percentile £74.26 £79.50 £76.75
UK excluding London median hourly rate £21.50 £25.00 £45.88
% change year-on-year -14.00% -45.51% +95.09%

IBM
Job Vacancy Trend

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

IBM job vacancy trend in the UK

IBM
Daily Rate Trend

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

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

IBM
Daily Rate Histogram

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing IBM over the 6 months to 4 January 2026.

Daily rate histogram for IBM in the UK

IBM
Hourly Rate Trend

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

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

IBM
Hourly Rate Histogram

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing IBM over the 6 months to 4 January 2026.

Hourly rate histogram for IBM in the UK

IBM
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 IBM within the UK over the 6 months to 4 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 -52 306 £475 -5.00% 155
UK excluding London -43 196 £450 - 146
London -32 108 £525 - 27
Work from Home -16 98 £500 - 120
Midlands -11 54 £401 -11.87% 23
North of England -54 54 £453 -7.55% 22
West Midlands -3 53 £402 -10.67% 15
North West -12 38 £453 +19.84% 11
South East -41 29 £525 +25.00% 42
East of England +6 28 £425 - 29
South West -26 20 £700 +16.67% 26
Yorkshire -62 16 £463 -20.60% 9
Scotland -2 13 £430 -4.50% 9
Northern Ireland - 2 £350 - 1
East Midlands -31 1 £385 -19.79% 7

IBM
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 26 (7.62%) Confluence
2 24 (7.04%) WebSphere
3 14 (4.11%) Apache
4 12 (3.52%) IIS
4 12 (3.52%) JBoss
4 12 (3.52%) SharePoint
4 12 (3.52%) WebSphere Application Server
5 11 (3.23%) CICS
6 10 (2.93%) iPlanet
6 10 (2.93%) MQSeries
6 10 (2.93%) Oracle SOA Suite
7 9 (2.64%) ArcGIS
8 7 (2.05%) WebLogic
9 4 (1.17%) Anypoint
9 4 (1.17%) FileNet
10 3 (0.88%) SAS
11 2 (0.59%) nginx
11 2 (0.59%) Tomcat
Applications
1 11 (3.23%) Microsoft Office
2 9 (2.64%) MS Visio
3 7 (2.05%) Microsoft Excel
4 1 (0.29%) Chatbot
4 1 (0.29%) Microsoft PowerPoint
4 1 (0.29%) Microsoft Project
Business Applications
1 40 (11.73%) Maximo
2 7 (2.05%) BusinessWorks
3 6 (1.76%) IBM Planning Analytics
4 4 (1.17%) Oracle 11i
5 3 (0.88%) SAP EWM
5 3 (0.88%) SAP PM
5 3 (0.88%) SAP PP
5 3 (0.88%) SAP QM
5 3 (0.88%) SAP S/4HANA
5 3 (0.88%) SAP WM
6 2 (0.59%) Oracle Procure-to-Pay
6 2 (0.59%) Oracle Subledger Accounting
6 2 (0.59%) Sparx Enterprise Architect
7 1 (0.29%) Cognos Controller
7 1 (0.29%) Oracle General Ledger
7 1 (0.29%) Oracle Payables
7 1 (0.29%) Oracle Receivables
7 1 (0.29%) Temenos T24
7 1 (0.29%) TIBCO BusinessEvents
7 1 (0.29%) TRIRIGA
Cloud Services
1 93 (27.27%) AWS
2 64 (18.77%) Azure
3 32 (9.38%) OpenShift
4 16 (4.69%) AWS CloudFormation
5 14 (4.11%) Datadog
5 14 (4.11%) GCP
6 12 (3.52%) AWS Lambda
6 12 (3.52%) Serverless
7 10 (2.93%) Azure Sentinel
8 9 (2.64%) Azure API Management
9 8 (2.35%) Azure AKS
9 8 (2.35%) Azure ExpressRoute
9 8 (2.35%) Azure Monitor
9 8 (2.35%) OCI
9 8 (2.35%) Power Platform
10 7 (2.05%) Amazon S3
11 6 (1.76%) Amazon CloudWatch
11 6 (1.76%) SaaS
12 5 (1.47%) Amazon ECS
12 5 (1.47%) Azure DevOps
Communications & Networking
1 16 (4.69%) HTTPS
2 14 (4.11%) VSAN
3 12 (3.52%) SAN
3 12 (3.52%) SSH
4 11 (3.23%) VPN
5 10 (2.93%) Kerberos
6 7 (2.05%) Fibre Channel
7 6 (1.76%) iSCSI
7 6 (1.76%) NAS
8 5 (1.47%) HTTP
9 4 (1.17%) Network Security
9 4 (1.17%) TCP/IP
10 3 (0.88%) Firewall
10 3 (0.88%) LAN
10 3 (0.88%) SNA
10 3 (0.88%) WAN
11 2 (0.59%) APPN
11 2 (0.59%) DNS
11 2 (0.59%) DWDM
11 2 (0.59%) SSL
Database & Business Intelligence
1 26 (7.62%) DB2
2 23 (6.74%) Oracle Database
3 21 (6.16%) SQL Server
4 14 (4.11%) DataStage
4 14 (4.11%) Relational Database
5 13 (3.81%) PostgreSQL
6 12 (3.52%) Amazon RDS
7 9 (2.64%) Oracle Reports
8 8 (2.35%) Data Warehouse
8 8 (2.35%) GIS
8 8 (2.35%) NoSQL
9 7 (2.05%) Amazon Redshift
10 6 (1.76%) Couchbase
10 6 (1.76%) Metadata
11 5 (1.47%) Amazon Athena
11 5 (1.47%) DynamoDB
11 5 (1.47%) IBM InfoSphere
11 5 (1.47%) Power BI
12 4 (1.17%) Oracle Database 10g
13 3 (0.88%) Cognos Report Studio
Development Applications
1 44 (12.90%) JIRA
2 25 (7.33%) Git
3 20 (5.87%) Jenkins
3 20 (5.87%) Rational DOORS
4 15 (4.40%) GitLab
5 10 (2.93%) Bitbucket Server
5 10 (2.93%) CA Release Automation
6 9 (2.64%) Sonatype Nexus
7 8 (2.35%) PVCS
8 6 (1.76%) SoapUI
9 5 (1.47%) ERwin
10 4 (1.17%) Ant
10 4 (1.17%) Bitbucket
10 4 (1.17%) JUnit
11 3 (0.88%) IBM UrbanCode
12 2 (0.59%) PowerDesigner
12 2 (0.59%) Rational Rhapsody
12 2 (0.59%) Selenium
13 1 (0.29%) ClearCase
13 1 (0.29%) Visual Studio
General
1 96 (28.15%) Social Skills
2 87 (25.51%) Finance
3 50 (14.66%) Banking
4 36 (10.56%) Analytical Skills
5 23 (6.74%) Public Sector
6 17 (4.99%) Documentation Skills
7 13 (3.81%) Presentation Skills
8 10 (2.93%) Electronics
9 8 (2.35%) Private Banking
10 7 (2.05%) Aerospace
10 7 (2.05%) Financial Institution
11 5 (1.47%) Law
12 4 (1.17%) Legal
12 4 (1.17%) Telecoms
13 3 (0.88%) Aviation
13 3 (0.88%) International Banking
13 3 (0.88%) Investment Banking
13 3 (0.88%) Manufacturing
13 3 (0.88%) Pharmaceutical
13 3 (0.88%) Police
Job Titles
1 66 (19.35%) Developer
2 62 (18.18%) Analyst
3 36 (10.56%) Architect
4 24 (7.04%) Solutions Architect
5 23 (6.74%) Infrastructure Analyst
6 21 (6.16%) Senior
7 16 (4.69%) Data Engineer
7 16 (4.69%) Software Engineer
7 16 (4.69%) Storage Analyst
8 13 (3.81%) DevOps Engineer
9 12 (3.52%) Consultant
9 12 (3.52%) Lead
9 12 (3.52%) webMethods Developer
10 10 (2.93%) Platform Engineer
11 9 (2.64%) Storage Engineer
12 8 (2.35%) Azure Engineer
12 8 (2.35%) C++ Software Engineer
12 8 (2.35%) Programmer
12 8 (2.35%) Systems Programmer
12 8 (2.35%) z/OS Systems Programmer
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 41 (12.02%) XML
2 27 (7.92%) Kafka
3 24 (7.04%) SOAP
4 19 (5.57%) JMS
4 19 (5.57%) JSON
5 17 (4.99%) Flash
5 17 (4.99%) Middleware
6 16 (4.69%) OAuth
7 14 (4.11%) XSLT
8 12 (3.52%) LDAP
8 12 (3.52%) OpenID
9 11 (3.23%) SAML
9 11 (3.23%) Web Services
10 9 (2.64%) ARM Templates
11 8 (2.35%) WSDL
11 8 (2.35%) XSD
12 7 (2.05%) EDI
12 7 (2.05%) J2EE
12 7 (2.05%) OC4J
12 7 (2.05%) TIBCO EMS
Miscellaneous
1 40 (11.73%) Mainframe
2 32 (9.38%) Replication
3 30 (8.80%) Linux Command Line
4 22 (6.45%) Legacy Systems
5 13 (3.81%) Data Centre
6 12 (3.52%) AS400
6 12 (3.52%) Tandem
7 10 (2.93%) Hybrid Cloud
7 10 (2.93%) IBM Mainframe
8 9 (2.64%) DataPower
8 9 (2.64%) Enterprise Software
9 8 (2.35%) Cloud Native
9 8 (2.35%) Data Protection Act
9 8 (2.35%) Onboarding
10 7 (2.05%) Enterprise Storage
11 6 (1.76%) CMDB
11 6 (1.76%) iSeries
11 6 (1.76%) Management Information System
11 6 (1.76%) VSAM
12 5 (1.47%) SWIFT Messaging Network
Operating Systems
1 71 (20.82%) Linux
2 53 (15.54%) Windows
3 39 (11.44%) Unix
4 27 (7.92%) zOS
5 12 (3.52%) AIX
6 11 (3.23%) Windows Server
7 6 (1.76%) Windows 10
7 6 (1.76%) Windows 7
7 6 (1.76%) Windows Server 2003
7 6 (1.76%) Windows Server 2016
8 5 (1.47%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
9 3 (0.88%) MVS
10 2 (0.59%) Solaris
10 2 (0.59%) VMS
11 1 (0.29%) SUSE Linux Enterprise Server
11 1 (0.29%) VME
11 1 (0.29%) Windows Server 2008
Processes & Methodologies
1 71 (20.82%) Agile
2 57 (16.72%) Migration
2 57 (16.72%) Problem-Solving
3 53 (15.54%) DevOps
4 47 (13.78%) Stakeholder Management
5 44 (12.90%) CI/CD
6 35 (10.26%) ITIL
7 32 (9.38%) Asset Management
8 29 (8.50%) Performance Tuning
9 28 (8.21%) Data Protection
10 25 (7.33%) Stakeholder Engagement
11 24 (7.04%) Computer Science
11 24 (7.04%) ETL
12 23 (6.74%) Roadmaps
13 22 (6.45%) Analytics
13 22 (6.45%) Data Modelling
14 21 (6.16%) High Availability
14 21 (6.16%) Infrastructure Engineering
15 19 (5.57%) Containerisation
15 19 (5.57%) Incident Response
Programming Languages
1 49 (14.37%) SQL
2 34 (9.97%) Python
3 33 (9.68%) Java
4 22 (6.45%) Shell Script
5 17 (4.99%) JCL
6 12 (3.52%) PL/SQL
6 12 (3.52%) REXX
7 11 (3.23%) C
7 11 (3.23%) Groovy
7 11 (3.23%) JavaScript
8 10 (2.93%) C++
9 9 (2.64%) COBOL
10 8 (2.35%) Bicep
10 8 (2.35%) CLIST
10 8 (2.35%) RPG
10 8 (2.35%) XPath
11 7 (2.05%) Embedded C
11 7 (2.05%) Embedded C++
11 7 (2.05%) Korn
11 7 (2.05%) Perl
Qualifications
1 70 (20.53%) Security Cleared
2 47 (13.78%) SC Cleared
3 32 (9.38%) Degree
4 22 (6.45%) Computer Science Degree
5 17 (4.99%) AWS Certification
6 14 (4.11%) Azure Certification
7 13 (3.81%) DV Cleared
8 11 (3.23%) BPSS Clearance
8 11 (3.23%) CISM
8 11 (3.23%) CISSP
9 9 (2.64%) Microsoft Certification
10 8 (2.35%) ISO 27001 Lead Implementer
11 5 (1.47%) AWS Certified Solutions Architect
11 5 (1.47%) ITIL Foundation Certificate
12 4 (1.17%) PMI Certification
12 4 (1.17%) PMP
13 3 (0.88%) IBM Certification
13 3 (0.88%) ISTQB
13 3 (0.88%) ITIL Certification
13 3 (0.88%) PRINCE2 Certification
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 14 (4.11%) QA
2 10 (2.93%) Data Quality
2 10 (2.93%) ISO/IEC 27001
3 9 (2.64%) NIST
4 8 (2.35%) NIST 800
5 5 (1.47%) GDPR
5 5 (1.47%) ISO 20022
5 5 (1.47%) SLA
6 4 (1.17%) Basel III
6 4 (1.17%) PCI DSS
6 4 (1.17%) Sarbanes-Oxley
6 4 (1.17%) SEPA
7 2 (0.59%) HIPAA
7 2 (0.59%) IFRS
7 2 (0.59%) IFRS 9
7 2 (0.59%) ISO/IEC 19770
8 1 (0.29%) GAAP
8 1 (0.29%) GRC
8 1 (0.29%) IEC 61508
8 1 (0.29%) MiFID
System Software
1 38 (11.14%) VMware Infrastructure
2 28 (8.21%) vSphere
3 22 (6.45%) NFS
4 18 (5.28%) GPFS
5 15 (4.40%) Docker
5 15 (4.40%) VMware ESXi
6 12 (3.52%) Active Directory
7 10 (2.93%) RACF
7 10 (2.93%) Virtual Machines
8 8 (2.35%) Tivoli Directory Server
9 6 (1.76%) Time Sharing Option
10 5 (1.47%) Job Entry Subsystem
11 1 (0.29%) Ceph
11 1 (0.29%) Hyper-V
11 1 (0.29%) KVM
11 1 (0.29%) Lustre
11 1 (0.29%) SRDF
11 1 (0.29%) Veritas Cluster Server
11 1 (0.29%) VMware NSX
11 1 (0.29%) Xen
Systems Management
1 32 (9.38%) Terraform
2 28 (8.21%) Kubernetes
3 27 (7.92%) vRealize
4 14 (4.11%) Ansible
5 13 (3.81%) VxRail
6 10 (2.93%) CA Single Sign-On
6 10 (2.93%) CA Wily
7 9 (2.64%) Progress Chef
8 8 (2.35%) Control-M
8 8 (2.35%) Tivoli
9 7 (2.05%) TIBCO Hawk
10 6 (1.76%) OMEGAMON
10 6 (1.76%) Tivoli Storage Manager
11 5 (1.47%) Single Sign-On
12 4 (1.17%) CA Endevor
12 4 (1.17%) QRadar
13 3 (0.88%) Tivoli NetView
13 3 (0.88%) zSecure
14 2 (0.59%) Argo
14 2 (0.59%) EMC NetWorker
Vendors
1 73 (21.41%) Oracle
2 54 (15.84%) Microsoft
3 40 (11.73%) VMware
4 37 (10.85%) Cisco
5 32 (9.38%) ServiceNow
6 24 (7.04%) AppDynamics
7 21 (6.16%) SAP
8 15 (4.40%) Dell
8 15 (4.40%) HP
9 14 (4.11%) Broadcom
9 14 (4.11%) Commvault
9 14 (4.11%) SolarWinds
10 13 (3.81%) Red Hat
11 12 (3.52%) Google
11 12 (3.52%) Software AG
11 12 (3.52%) Splunk
11 12 (3.52%) webMethods
12 9 (2.64%) Cognos
12 9 (2.64%) IBM Sterling
13 8 (2.35%) EMC