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 2 October 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
2 Oct 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 268 243 216
Rank change year-on-year -25 -27 +7
Contract jobs citing IBM 531 361 447
As % of all contract jobs in the UK 0.97% 1.09% 1.17%
As % of the Vendors category 2.32% 2.29% 2.64%
Number of daily rates quoted 338 239 215
10th Percentile £350 £350 £337
25th Percentile £425 £415 £405
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £545 £475
Median % change year-on-year -8.26% +14.74% -9.52%
75th Percentile £600 £649 £606
90th Percentile £675 £688 £739
UK excluding London median daily rate £500 £475 £450
% change year-on-year +5.26% +5.56% -14.29%
Number of hourly rates quoted 17 8 27
10th Percentile £28.82 £25.04 £46.18
25th Percentile £57.50 £25.12 £61.25
Median hourly rate £65.00 £41.33 £70.00
Median % change year-on-year +57.29% -40.96% +7.69%
75th Percentile £70.00 £71.75 -
90th Percentile - £73.25 -
UK excluding London median hourly rate £63.75 £63.75 £70.00
% change year-on-year - -8.93% +7.69%

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 22,868 15,778 16,957
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the UK 41.65% 47.64% 44.53%
Number of daily rates quoted 13,862 9,705 10,012
10th Percentile £310 £275 £285
25th Percentile £413 £404 £413
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £513 £500 £525
Median % change year-on-year +2.50% -4.76% -
75th Percentile £619 £613 £626
90th Percentile £710 £700 £725
UK excluding London median daily rate £500 £485 £500
% change year-on-year +3.09% -3.00% -
Number of hourly rates quoted 1,358 820 628
10th Percentile £13.97 £14.75 £14.78
25th Percentile £16.35 £17.69 £15.70
Median hourly rate £25.28 £25.15 £31.25
Median % change year-on-year +0.53% -19.52% -26.90%
75th Percentile £57.50 £41.11 £64.63
90th Percentile £77.73 £68.00 £70.00
UK excluding London median hourly rate £24.19 £21.30 £29.77
% change year-on-year +13.57% -28.45% -29.95%

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 2 October 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 2 October 2026.

Hourly rate histogram for IBM in the UK

IBM
Top 16 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 2 October 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 -29 454 £500 -8.68% 373
UK excluding London -60 248 £500 +5.26% 246
London +5 209 £505 -17.04% 146
Work from Home -63 129 £545 -9.17% 194
North of England -45 98 £514 +14.11% 68
Yorkshire +11 63 £514 +8.77% 30
South East -66 34 £460 -16.36% 40
North West -70 33 £468 +4.00% 30
Scotland -21 30 £575 +33.10% 29
Midlands -65 30 £500 +13.77% 39
South West -22 29 £550 -8.33% 32
West Midlands -39 27 £500 -13.04% 17
East of England -16 25 £625 +13.64% 23
Wales -11 3 £600 -5.14% 9
East Midlands -28 2 - - 22
North East - 1 £475 - 8

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 38 (7.16%) Confluence
2 36 (6.78%) WebSphere
3 26 (4.90%) CICS
4 18 (3.39%) SharePoint
5 15 (2.82%) Tomcat
6 13 (2.45%) nginx
7 10 (1.88%) Camunda
8 9 (1.69%) WebLogic
9 8 (1.51%) Apache
9 8 (1.51%) SAS
10 7 (1.32%) Oracle SOA Suite
11 6 (1.13%) JBoss
11 6 (1.13%) WebSphere Application Server
12 5 (0.94%) IBM Transformation Extender
13 3 (0.56%) ArcGIS
13 3 (0.56%) IIS
13 3 (0.56%) MQSeries
13 3 (0.56%) Oracle HTTP Server
13 3 (0.56%) WebLogic Portal
13 3 (0.56%) WebSphere Portal
Applications
1 11 (2.07%) Microsoft Excel
2 7 (1.32%) Microsoft Office
2 7 (1.32%) Windchill
3 2 (0.38%) Spreadsheet
4 1 (0.19%) Chatbot
Business Applications
1 30 (5.65%) Maximo
2 18 (3.39%) IBM Planning Analytics
3 7 (1.32%) Teamcenter
4 4 (0.75%) Cognos Controller
4 4 (0.75%) Temenos T24
5 3 (0.56%) IBM Operational Decision Manager
6 2 (0.38%) SAP S/4HANA
6 2 (0.38%) Sparx Enterprise Architect
7 1 (0.19%) Actimize
7 1 (0.19%) Dynamics CRM
7 1 (0.19%) HFM
7 1 (0.19%) Misys Equation
7 1 (0.19%) Misys Midas
7 1 (0.19%) Remedy ITSM
7 1 (0.19%) SAP QM
Cloud Services
1 90 (16.95%) Azure
2 83 (15.63%) AWS
3 40 (7.53%) GCP
4 36 (6.78%) GitHub
5 24 (4.52%) OpenShift
6 13 (2.45%) GitHub Actions
6 13 (2.45%) GitHub Copilot
7 12 (2.26%) Anthropic Claude
8 11 (2.07%) Azure DevOps
9 10 (1.88%) ChatGPT
9 10 (1.88%) IBM Watson
9 10 (1.88%) Power Platform
10 9 (1.69%) Azure Service Bus
10 9 (1.69%) Boomi
10 9 (1.69%) Entra ID
10 9 (1.69%) iPaaS
11 8 (1.51%) Microsoft Copilot
12 7 (1.32%) Amazon S3
12 7 (1.32%) IBM Blueworks
13 6 (1.13%) Azure Data Factory
Communications & Networking
1 24 (4.52%) HTTP
2 21 (3.95%) SSL
3 12 (2.26%) SAN
4 10 (1.88%) Network Security
5 9 (1.69%) Firewall
6 8 (1.51%) TCP/IP
7 7 (1.32%) SNMP
8 6 (1.13%) DNS
8 6 (1.13%) Internet
8 6 (1.13%) SSH
8 6 (1.13%) Wireshark
9 5 (0.94%) VSAN
10 4 (0.75%) Fibre Channel
10 4 (0.75%) NAS
11 3 (0.56%) Cisco Nexus
11 3 (0.56%) iSCSI
12 2 (0.38%) BGP
12 2 (0.38%) DMZ
12 2 (0.38%) OSPF
12 2 (0.38%) VPN
Database & Business Intelligence
1 50 (9.42%) Db2
2 34 (6.40%) Relational Database
3 31 (5.84%) DataStage
4 29 (5.46%) SQL Server
5 20 (3.77%) Data Warehouse
6 18 (3.39%) Oracle Database
7 15 (2.82%) MongoDB
8 13 (2.45%) Metadata
9 10 (1.88%) Tableau
10 8 (1.51%) Elasticsearch
10 8 (1.51%) PostgreSQL
10 8 (1.51%) Power BI
11 7 (1.32%) GIS
11 7 (1.32%) NoSQL
12 5 (0.94%) Big Data
12 5 (0.94%) Data Lake
12 5 (0.94%) IBM InfoSphere
13 3 (0.56%) Enterprise Data Warehouse
13 3 (0.56%) RDBMS
14 2 (0.38%) Snowflake Schema
Development Applications
1 63 (11.86%) JIRA
2 45 (8.47%) Jenkins
3 34 (6.40%) Git
4 24 (4.52%) GitLab
5 21 (3.95%) Rational DOORS
6 19 (3.58%) JMeter
7 16 (3.01%) LoadRunner
7 16 (3.01%) SonarQube
8 15 (2.82%) Postman
8 15 (2.82%) SoapUI
9 12 (2.26%) Gradle
10 11 (2.07%) IBM UrbanCode
11 10 (1.88%) eggPlant
11 10 (1.88%) JUnit
11 10 (1.88%) Maven
11 10 (1.88%) REST Assured
11 10 (1.88%) Selenium
11 10 (1.88%) Sonatype Nexus
12 9 (1.69%) Bitbucket Server
12 9 (1.69%) Rational Rhapsody
General
1 205 (38.61%) Finance
2 139 (26.18%) Social Skills
3 138 (25.99%) Banking
4 73 (13.75%) Analytical Skills
5 27 (5.08%) Legal
6 21 (3.95%) Retail
7 19 (3.58%) Public Sector
8 16 (3.01%) Manufacturing
9 11 (2.07%) Military
10 10 (1.88%) Documentation Skills
11 8 (1.51%) Presentation Skills
12 7 (1.32%) Investment Banking
12 7 (1.32%) Spanish Language
13 6 (1.13%) Aerospace
13 6 (1.13%) Front Office
13 6 (1.13%) Influencing Skills
14 5 (0.94%) Law
15 4 (0.75%) Financial Institution
15 4 (0.75%) Organisational Skills
16 2 (0.38%) Inclusion and Diversity
Job Titles
1 86 (16.20%) Developer
2 55 (10.36%) Architect
3 50 (9.42%) Analyst
4 43 (8.10%) Senior
5 37 (6.97%) Lead
6 26 (4.90%) Administrator
6 26 (4.90%) Solutions Architect
7 23 (4.33%) Consultant
8 21 (3.95%) Infrastructure Engineer
9 18 (3.39%) Automation Engineer
10 17 (3.20%) Java Developer
11 16 (3.01%) DataStage Developer
11 16 (3.01%) Middleware Engineer
12 15 (2.82%) Applications Support
12 15 (2.82%) Business Analyst
13 14 (2.64%) CICS Engineer
14 13 (2.45%) Applications Manager
14 13 (2.45%) Applications Support Manager
14 13 (2.45%) Support Manager
14 13 (2.45%) Test Engineer
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 96 (18.08%) Middleware
2 61 (11.49%) Kafka
3 47 (8.85%) REST
3 47 (8.85%) XML
4 41 (7.72%) JSON
5 31 (5.84%) SOAP
6 29 (5.46%) Spring Boot
7 28 (5.27%) ISPF
8 21 (3.95%) HTML
8 21 (3.95%) Spring
9 17 (3.20%) .NET
10 16 (3.01%) RabbitMQ
11 15 (2.82%) Terraform
12 14 (2.64%) OAuth
13 13 (2.45%) SAML
13 13 (2.45%) Web Services
14 12 (2.26%) GraphQL
14 12 (2.26%) Swagger
15 11 (2.07%) CSS
15 11 (2.07%) EDI
Miscellaneous
1 111 (20.90%) Mainframe
2 29 (5.46%) Clustering
3 24 (4.52%) Data Centre
3 24 (4.52%) Replication
4 22 (4.14%) Enterprise Software
5 21 (3.95%) Cloud Native
6 20 (3.77%) AS400
7 19 (3.58%) Hybrid Cloud
8 16 (3.01%) Data Structures
8 16 (3.01%) Distributed Systems
9 14 (2.64%) iSeries
9 14 (2.64%) Onboarding
10 13 (2.45%) Legacy Systems
11 12 (2.26%) Data Protection Act
11 12 (2.26%) Legacy Applications
11 12 (2.26%) Product Ownership
12 11 (2.07%) IBM Mainframe
12 11 (2.07%) SWIFT Messaging Network
13 10 (1.88%) Management Information System
13 10 (1.88%) VSAM
Operating Systems
1 94 (17.70%) Linux
2 84 (15.82%) zOS
3 58 (10.92%) Unix
4 33 (6.21%) Windows
5 19 (3.58%) AIX
5 19 (3.58%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
6 9 (1.69%) Solaris
6 9 (1.69%) SUSE
6 9 (1.69%) Windows Server
7 7 (1.32%) MVS
8 5 (0.94%) Windows Server 2008
9 4 (0.75%) Windows Server 2019
10 2 (0.38%) Windows Server 2016
11 1 (0.19%) Data ONTAP
11 1 (0.19%) Mac OS
11 1 (0.19%) OpenVMS
11 1 (0.19%) VMS
11 1 (0.19%) Windows Server 2012
Processes & Methodologies
1 98 (18.46%) CI/CD
2 92 (17.33%) Agile
3 86 (16.20%) Migration
3 86 (16.20%) Stakeholder Management
4 69 (12.99%) DevOps
5 68 (12.81%) Test Automation
6 66 (12.43%) ITIL
7 65 (12.24%) Problem-Solving
8 61 (11.49%) Continuous Improvement
9 52 (9.79%) Validation
10 49 (9.23%) Performance Tuning
11 48 (9.04%) ETL
12 46 (8.66%) Change Management
12 46 (8.66%) Roadmaps
13 45 (8.47%) Root Cause Analysis
14 43 (8.10%) Stakeholder Engagement
15 42 (7.91%) Scrum
16 41 (7.72%) AI
17 39 (7.34%) Performance Optimisation
18 35 (6.59%) Computer Science
Programming Languages
1 116 (21.85%) SQL
2 94 (17.70%) Python
3 87 (16.38%) Java
4 46 (8.66%) JavaScript
5 26 (4.90%) JCL
6 21 (3.95%) PL/SQL
6 21 (3.95%) PowerShell
7 20 (3.77%) Shell Script
8 18 (3.39%) Bash
8 18 (3.39%) COBOL
9 17 (3.20%) REXX
10 15 (2.82%) C++
11 14 (2.64%) C#
12 11 (2.07%) C
13 9 (1.69%) Perl
14 8 (1.51%) TypeScript
15 7 (1.32%) Assembly Language
15 7 (1.32%) CLIST
15 7 (1.32%) RPG
16 6 (1.13%) Search Processing Language
Qualifications
1 103 (19.40%) Security Cleared
2 83 (15.63%) SC Cleared
3 46 (8.66%) Degree
4 26 (4.90%) Computer Science Degree
5 13 (2.45%) BPSS Clearance
6 7 (1.32%) AWS Certification
6 7 (1.32%) CISSP
6 7 (1.32%) DV Cleared
7 6 (1.13%) ISTQB
7 6 (1.13%) PMI Certification
7 6 (1.13%) PMP
8 4 (0.75%) Azure Certification
8 4 (0.75%) ITIL Foundation Certificate
9 3 (0.56%) ACCA
9 3 (0.56%) CIMA
9 3 (0.56%) ISEB
9 3 (0.56%) ISTQB Foundation Certification
10 2 (0.38%) CISA
10 2 (0.38%) Cisco Certification
10 2 (0.38%) CISM
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 33 (6.21%) Data Quality
2 16 (3.01%) QA
3 10 (1.88%) ISO 20022
4 8 (1.51%) ISO 15022
5 7 (1.32%) NIST
6 6 (1.13%) GDPR
7 5 (0.94%) Actionable Recommendations
7 5 (0.94%) SLA
8 3 (0.56%) ISO/IEC 19770
8 3 (0.56%) SEPA
9 2 (0.38%) GAAP
9 2 (0.38%) GRC
9 2 (0.38%) IFRS
9 2 (0.38%) ISO/IEC 27001
9 2 (0.38%) PMO
10 1 (0.19%) Accessibility
10 1 (0.19%) DO-254
10 1 (0.19%) ISO 26262
10 1 (0.19%) MIL-STD-1553
10 1 (0.19%) TARGET2
System Software
1 43 (8.10%) Docker
2 30 (5.65%) RACF
3 22 (4.14%) VMware Infrastructure
4 15 (2.82%) NFS
5 14 (2.64%) Time Sharing Option
6 12 (2.26%) GPFS
7 11 (2.07%) VMware ESXi
8 10 (1.88%) Virtual Machines
9 9 (1.69%) vSphere
10 8 (1.51%) Firmware
11 7 (1.32%) ACF2
12 6 (1.13%) Active Directory
13 4 (0.75%) Oracle RAC
13 4 (0.75%) PowerHA
14 1 (0.19%) DFS Replication
14 1 (0.19%) EMC RecoverPoint
14 1 (0.19%) Hyper-V
14 1 (0.19%) RHEV
14 1 (0.19%) SRDF
14 1 (0.19%) VMware NSX
Systems Management
1 39 (7.34%) Kubernetes
2 28 (5.27%) Ansible
3 25 (4.71%) OMEGAMON
4 18 (3.39%) Tivoli
5 11 (2.07%) Grafana
5 11 (2.07%) Tivoli Monitoring
5 11 (2.07%) Tivoli Storage Manager
6 9 (1.69%) Netcool
7 8 (1.51%) Control-M
8 7 (1.32%) Nagios
8 7 (1.32%) ZABBIX
9 6 (1.13%) HP Fortify
9 6 (1.13%) vRealize
10 5 (0.94%) QRadar
11 4 (0.75%) CA Endevor
11 4 (0.75%) OpenView
11 4 (0.75%) Tivoli NetView
11 4 (0.75%) VxRail
12 3 (0.56%) HP ALM
12 3 (0.56%) Single Sign-On
Vendors
1 117 (22.03%) Oracle
2 62 (11.68%) Microsoft
3 39 (7.34%) SAP
4 31 (5.84%) Google
4 31 (5.84%) VMware
5 27 (5.08%) ServiceNow
5 27 (5.08%) Splunk
6 19 (3.58%) Broadcom
6 19 (3.58%) Red Hat
7 18 (3.39%) Cisco
7 18 (3.39%) Dynatrace
8 15 (2.82%) Siemens
9 13 (2.45%) Cognos
9 13 (2.45%) Databricks
10 12 (2.26%) Dell
10 12 (2.26%) EMC
11 11 (2.07%) Informatica
11 11 (2.07%) New Relic
11 11 (2.07%) Sybase
11 11 (2.07%) TIBCO