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 30 April 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
30 Apr 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 279 254 230
Rank change year-on-year -25 -24 +71
Contract jobs citing IBM 429 304 457
As % of all contract jobs in the UK 0.91% 1.04% 1.05%
As % of the Vendors category 2.17% 2.19% 2.47%
Number of daily rates quoted 243 172 261
10th Percentile £307 £360 £384
25th Percentile £378 £408 £425
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £475 £500 £525
Median % change year-on-year -5.00% -4.76% -
75th Percentile £581 £626 £650
90th Percentile £700 £718 £750
UK excluding London median daily rate £426 £460 £472
% change year-on-year -7.50% -2.54% -5.60%
Number of hourly rates quoted 51 10 31
10th Percentile £25.77 - £57.50
25th Percentile £65.00 - £65.00
Median hourly rate £70.00 £24.18 £70.00
Median % change year-on-year +189.50% -65.46% +3.70%
75th Percentile £88.00 £28.10 -
90th Percentile - £80.25 -
UK excluding London median hourly rate £88.00 £24.18 £70.00
% change year-on-year +263.94% -65.46% +40.00%

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 19,815 13,870 18,498
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the UK 42.00% 47.46% 42.43%
Number of daily rates quoted 12,654 8,704 11,485
10th Percentile £313 £289 £263
25th Percentile £413 £406 £404
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £515 £518
Median % change year-on-year -2.91% -0.48% -1.43%
75th Percentile £600 £619 £627
90th Percentile £700 £713 £738
UK excluding London median daily rate £490 £500 £500
% change year-on-year -2.00% - -
Number of hourly rates quoted 992 558 1,082
10th Percentile £15.25 £14.99 £12.00
25th Percentile £18.50 £18.13 £14.40
Median hourly rate £30.50 £27.13 £22.50
Median % change year-on-year +12.44% +20.56% -49.44%
75th Percentile £60.00 £57.50 £57.50
90th Percentile £78.75 £75.00 £70.00
UK excluding London median hourly rate £27.00 £24.19 £21.50
% change year-on-year +11.64% +12.49% -46.25%

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 30 April 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 30 April 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 30 April 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 -17 377 £459 -8.20% 70
UK excluding London -32 228 £426 -7.50% 54
London -17 151 £488 -11.36% 20
Work from Home -25 122 £495 -1.00% 33
North of England -59 70 £475 +11.76% 11
South East -38 43 £500 +177.78% 13
North West -22 40 £459 +15.33% 4
Midlands -45 40 £400 -14.44% 9
South West -1 39 £375 -37.50% 15
West Midlands -39 35 £400 -13.04% 6
Yorkshire -51 29 £500 -2.44% 6
East of England -25 19 £425 -15.00% 5
Scotland -14 16 £550 +12.36% 4
East Midlands -25 4 £837 +74.27% 3
Wales -12 1 - -
North East -22 1 £375 -10.45% 1

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 28 (6.53%) WebSphere
2 21 (4.90%) CICS
3 19 (4.43%) Confluence
4 13 (3.03%) WebLogic
5 12 (2.80%) Tomcat
6 11 (2.56%) nginx
6 11 (2.56%) Oracle SOA Suite
7 7 (1.63%) SharePoint
8 6 (1.40%) WebSphere Application Server
9 5 (1.17%) Anypoint
9 5 (1.17%) Apache
9 5 (1.17%) JBoss
10 3 (0.70%) Apache Airflow
10 3 (0.70%) Apache Spark
10 3 (0.70%) ArcGIS
10 3 (0.70%) CMS
10 3 (0.70%) MQSeries
11 2 (0.47%) IBM HTTP Server
11 2 (0.47%) IIS
11 2 (0.47%) WebSphere Portal
Applications
1 6 (1.40%) Microsoft Excel
1 6 (1.40%) MS Visio
2 2 (0.47%) PlantUML
3 1 (0.23%) Microsoft Office
3 1 (0.23%) Microsoft Project
3 1 (0.23%) Windchill
Business Applications
1 26 (6.06%) Maximo
2 9 (2.10%) IBM Planning Analytics
3 8 (1.86%) SAP S/4HANA
4 7 (1.63%) BusinessWorks
4 7 (1.63%) Temenos T24
5 4 (0.93%) SAP QM
6 3 (0.70%) Oracle 11i
6 3 (0.70%) SAP EWM
6 3 (0.70%) SAP PM
6 3 (0.70%) SAP PP
6 3 (0.70%) SAP R/3
6 3 (0.70%) SAP WM
7 2 (0.47%) Oracle Payables
7 2 (0.47%) Oracle Procure-to-Pay
7 2 (0.47%) Oracle Subledger Accounting
7 2 (0.47%) Teamcenter
8 1 (0.23%) MetaTrader
8 1 (0.23%) Oracle FAH
8 1 (0.23%) SAP AFS
8 1 (0.23%) Sparx Enterprise Architect
Cloud Services
1 79 (18.41%) AWS
2 61 (14.22%) Azure
3 21 (4.90%) OpenShift
4 15 (3.50%) GitHub
5 12 (2.80%) GCP
6 11 (2.56%) Azure DevOps
7 10 (2.33%) IBM Watson
8 8 (1.86%) Azure Sentinel
8 8 (1.86%) GitHub Copilot
8 8 (1.86%) SaaS
9 7 (1.63%) AWS CloudFormation
9 7 (1.63%) Azure AKS
9 7 (1.63%) Azure API Management
9 7 (1.63%) Azure Monitor
10 6 (1.40%) AWS Lambda
10 6 (1.40%) Azure ExpressRoute
10 6 (1.40%) ChatGPT
10 6 (1.40%) Datadog
10 6 (1.40%) Power Platform
10 6 (1.40%) Serverless
Communications & Networking
1 20 (4.66%) Firewall
2 16 (3.73%) HTTP
3 15 (3.50%) SAN
4 14 (3.26%) SNMP
5 12 (2.80%) VSAN
6 9 (2.10%) TCP/IP
7 8 (1.86%) Fibre Channel
7 8 (1.86%) HTTPS
7 8 (1.86%) VPN
8 7 (1.63%) NAS
9 6 (1.40%) APPN
9 6 (1.40%) SNA
10 5 (1.17%) DNS
10 5 (1.17%) iSCSI
11 4 (0.93%) LAN
12 3 (0.70%) MPLS
12 3 (0.70%) WAN
13 2 (0.47%) DWDM
13 2 (0.47%) Network Security
13 2 (0.47%) Wireshark
Database & Business Intelligence
1 46 (10.72%) DB2
2 28 (6.53%) DataStage
3 21 (4.90%) SQL Server
4 19 (4.43%) Relational Database
5 14 (3.26%) Data Warehouse
6 13 (3.03%) Oracle Database
7 10 (2.33%) Metadata
8 9 (2.10%) Big Data
8 9 (2.10%) Oracle Reports
8 9 (2.10%) PostgreSQL
9 8 (1.86%) Elasticsearch
9 8 (1.86%) GIS
10 6 (1.40%) MongoDB
10 6 (1.40%) Power BI
11 5 (1.17%) NoSQL
12 4 (0.93%) Amazon Aurora
13 3 (0.70%) Apache Hive
13 3 (0.70%) DynamoDB
13 3 (0.70%) IBM InfoSphere
13 3 (0.70%) SQL Server Integration Services
Development Applications
1 40 (9.32%) Rational DOORS
2 32 (7.46%) JIRA
3 16 (3.73%) Git
4 13 (3.03%) Jenkins
5 11 (2.56%) GitLab
6 8 (1.86%) Ant
6 8 (1.86%) PVCS
7 6 (1.40%) IBM UrbanCode
7 6 (1.40%) SoapUI
8 5 (1.17%) JUnit
8 5 (1.17%) Liquibase
9 4 (0.93%) PowerDesigner
9 4 (0.93%) Selenium
10 3 (0.70%) Cucumber
11 2 (0.47%) Artifactory
11 2 (0.47%) Introscope
11 2 (0.47%) JMeter
11 2 (0.47%) Rational Rhapsody
11 2 (0.47%) REST Assured
11 2 (0.47%) Sonatype Nexus
General
1 100 (23.31%) Finance
2 95 (22.14%) Social Skills
3 73 (17.02%) Banking
4 34 (7.93%) Public Sector
5 33 (7.69%) Analytical Skills
6 29 (6.76%) Aerospace
7 12 (2.80%) Documentation Skills
7 12 (2.80%) Influencing Skills
8 11 (2.56%) Retail
9 9 (2.10%) Investment Banking
9 9 (2.10%) Legal
10 8 (1.86%) Electronics
11 7 (1.63%) Inclusion and Diversity
12 6 (1.40%) Aviation
12 6 (1.40%) Front Office
12 6 (1.40%) Law
12 6 (1.40%) Presentation Skills
13 5 (1.17%) Financial Institution
14 4 (0.93%) Manufacturing
15 3 (0.70%) Pharmaceutical
Job Titles
1 51 (11.89%) Developer
2 48 (11.19%) Architect
3 42 (9.79%) Analyst
4 26 (6.06%) Delivery Manager
4 26 (6.06%) Product Delivery Manager
4 26 (6.06%) Product Manager
5 22 (5.13%) Consultant
5 22 (5.13%) Software Engineer
6 21 (4.90%) Senior
6 21 (4.90%) Storage Analyst
6 21 (4.90%) Systems Delivery Manager
6 21 (4.90%) Systems Manager
7 20 (4.66%) Data Engineer
7 20 (4.66%) Solutions Architect
8 18 (4.20%) Infrastructure Analyst
9 16 (3.73%) Lead
10 12 (2.80%) Management Consultant
11 11 (2.56%) Administrator
11 11 (2.56%) DevOps Engineer
11 11 (2.56%) z/OS Engineer
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 41 (9.56%) Middleware
2 30 (6.99%) REST
3 29 (6.76%) XML
4 23 (5.36%) Kafka
5 21 (4.90%) Flash
6 18 (4.20%) SOAP
7 15 (3.50%) JMS
7 15 (3.50%) JSON
8 14 (3.26%) XSLT
9 10 (2.33%) Web Services
10 8 (1.86%) ARM Templates
10 8 (1.86%) J2EE
10 8 (1.86%) Spring
10 8 (1.86%) Spring Boot
10 8 (1.86%) WSDL
10 8 (1.86%) XSD
11 7 (1.63%) scikit-learn
11 7 (1.63%) TIBCO EMS
11 7 (1.63%) WebSphere MQ
11 7 (1.63%) ZeroMQ
Miscellaneous
1 75 (17.48%) Mainframe
2 31 (7.23%) Linux Command Line
3 30 (6.99%) Data Centre
4 29 (6.76%) Data Structures
5 28 (6.53%) Product Ownership
6 27 (6.29%) Replication
7 19 (4.43%) Legacy Systems
8 17 (3.96%) Clustering
8 17 (3.96%) VSAM
9 14 (3.26%) Algorithms
10 13 (3.03%) SWIFT Messaging Network
11 11 (2.56%) Cloud Native
11 11 (2.56%) Data Protection Act
11 11 (2.56%) Hybrid Cloud
12 10 (2.33%) BYOD
12 10 (2.33%) Enterprise Software
12 10 (2.33%) IBM Mainframe
12 10 (2.33%) Legacy Applications
13 8 (1.86%) DataPower
13 8 (1.86%) Management Information System
Operating Systems
1 95 (22.14%) Linux
2 55 (12.82%) Windows
3 51 (11.89%) zOS
4 43 (10.02%) AIX
5 39 (9.09%) Unix
6 20 (4.66%) Solaris
7 18 (4.20%) Windows Server
8 17 (3.96%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
9 10 (2.33%) Windows Server 2008
9 10 (2.33%) Windows Server 2016
10 9 (2.10%) Windows Server 2019
11 4 (0.93%) MVS
12 3 (0.70%) Windows 10
12 3 (0.70%) Windows 7
12 3 (0.70%) Windows Server 2003
13 2 (0.47%) Oracle Linux
13 2 (0.47%) SUSE Linux Enterprise Server
14 1 (0.23%) Android
14 1 (0.23%) Apple iOS
14 1 (0.23%) Mac OS
Processes & Methodologies
1 96 (22.38%) Agile
2 64 (14.92%) Migration
3 55 (12.82%) CI/CD
4 52 (12.12%) Problem-Solving
5 46 (10.72%) Continuous Improvement
6 45 (10.49%) DevOps
7 44 (10.26%) Roadmaps
8 41 (9.56%) Stakeholder Engagement
9 40 (9.32%) ETL
10 38 (8.86%) UML
11 35 (8.16%) Stakeholder Management
12 34 (7.93%) Computer Science
13 31 (7.23%) Performance Tuning
13 31 (7.23%) Test Automation
14 30 (6.99%) Workflow
15 29 (6.76%) Model-Based Systems Engineering
16 28 (6.53%) Programme Management
16 28 (6.53%) Scaled Agile Framework
17 27 (6.29%) Analytics
17 27 (6.29%) Change Control
Programming Languages
1 82 (19.11%) SQL
2 66 (15.38%) Python
3 47 (10.96%) Java
4 30 (6.99%) PowerShell
5 21 (4.90%) COBOL
5 21 (4.90%) JCL
5 21 (4.90%) PL/SQL
6 17 (3.96%) REXX
7 16 (3.73%) Bash
7 16 (3.73%) C
8 14 (3.26%) C++
9 13 (3.03%) Perl
10 12 (2.80%) Search Processing Language
11 11 (2.56%) Shell Script
12 10 (2.33%) Ada
12 10 (2.33%) MATLAB
13 8 (1.86%) Bicep
13 8 (1.86%) XPath
14 7 (1.63%) CLIST
14 7 (1.63%) Korn
Qualifications
1 129 (30.07%) Security Cleared
2 78 (18.18%) SC Cleared
3 39 (9.09%) Degree
4 18 (4.20%) BPSS Clearance
5 14 (3.26%) DV Cleared
6 13 (3.03%) Azure Certification
7 11 (2.56%) CISSP
8 10 (2.33%) CISM
9 8 (1.86%) AWS Certification
9 8 (1.86%) Computer Science Degree
10 7 (1.63%) IBM Certification
11 6 (1.40%) ISO 27001 Lead Implementer
11 6 (1.40%) Master's Degree
11 6 (1.40%) Microsoft Certification
12 5 (1.17%) ISTQB
13 4 (0.93%) ITIL Certification
14 3 (0.70%) CEH
14 3 (0.70%) Cisco Certification
15 2 (0.47%) CISMP
15 2 (0.47%) GCIH
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 26 (6.06%) Data Quality
2 14 (3.26%) QA
3 11 (2.56%) SLA
4 9 (2.10%) ISO/IEC 27001
5 8 (1.86%) NIST
6 6 (1.40%) NIST 800
6 6 (1.40%) SEPA
7 5 (1.17%) ISO 20022
8 4 (0.93%) GDPR
9 3 (0.70%) Sarbanes-Oxley
10 2 (0.47%) Accessibility
10 2 (0.47%) GRC
10 2 (0.47%) ISO 15022
10 2 (0.47%) NCSC
10 2 (0.47%) PCI DSS
11 1 (0.23%) Basel III
11 1 (0.23%) Def Stans
11 1 (0.23%) GAAP
11 1 (0.23%) IEC 61508
11 1 (0.23%) IFRS 17
System Software
1 40 (9.32%) VMware Infrastructure
2 29 (6.76%) NFS
3 23 (5.36%) Docker
4 22 (5.13%) GPFS
4 22 (5.13%) VMware ESXi
5 20 (4.66%) vSphere
6 18 (4.20%) Virtual Machines
7 9 (2.10%) RACF
8 7 (1.63%) Firmware
8 7 (1.63%) Hyper-V
9 6 (1.40%) KVM
9 6 (1.40%) Oracle RAC
9 6 (1.40%) Time Sharing Option
10 4 (0.93%) Job Entry Subsystem
11 3 (0.70%) PowerHA
11 3 (0.70%) VMware NSX
12 2 (0.47%) ACF2
12 2 (0.47%) EMC RecoverPoint
12 2 (0.47%) Tivoli Workload Scheduler
13 1 (0.23%) Lustre
Systems Management
1 30 (6.99%) Ansible
2 28 (6.53%) Terraform
3 26 (6.06%) Kubernetes
4 20 (4.66%) vRealize
5 18 (4.20%) Tivoli
6 15 (3.50%) Nagios
6 15 (3.50%) ZABBIX
7 14 (3.26%) Netcool
8 13 (3.03%) OpenView
8 13 (3.03%) Tivoli Monitoring
9 11 (2.56%) Tivoli Storage Manager
9 11 (2.56%) VxRail
10 8 (1.86%) IBM BigFix
11 7 (1.63%) TIBCO Hawk
11 7 (1.63%) Tivoli NetView
12 6 (1.40%) Oracle RMAN
12 6 (1.40%) vCenter Server
13 3 (0.70%) Grafana
13 3 (0.70%) OMEGAMON
13 3 (0.70%) zSecure
Vendors
1 77 (17.95%) Oracle
2 52 (12.12%) VMware
3 36 (8.39%) Cisco
4 34 (7.93%) ServiceNow
5 30 (6.99%) HP
6 28 (6.53%) Microsoft
7 26 (6.06%) SAP
8 22 (5.13%) Dell
9 21 (4.90%) BMC
9 21 (4.90%) Red Hat
9 21 (4.90%) Splunk
10 20 (4.66%) SolarWinds
11 15 (3.50%) Google
12 12 (2.80%) Broadcom
12 12 (2.80%) EMC
13 10 (2.33%) Brocade
13 10 (2.33%) MathWorks
13 10 (2.33%) NetApp
14 8 (1.86%) ANSYS
14 8 (1.86%) Informatica