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 29 May 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
29 May 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 298 237 218
Rank change year-on-year -61 -19 +70
Contract jobs citing IBM 407 320 471
As % of all contract jobs in the UK 0.83% 1.11% 1.10%
As % of the Vendors category 2.03% 2.33% 2.60%
Number of daily rates quoted 230 208 267
10th Percentile £312 £359 £369
25th Percentile £400 £406 £419
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £488 £500 £500
Median % change year-on-year -2.50% - -4.76%
75th Percentile £586 £652 £650
90th Percentile £689 £701 £750
UK excluding London median daily rate £459 £455 £475
% change year-on-year +0.88% -4.21% -5.00%
Number of hourly rates quoted 50 2 36
10th Percentile £25.77 £40.32 £55.00
25th Percentile £56.56 £63.80 £65.00
Median hourly rate £70.00 £103.57 £70.00
Median % change year-on-year -32.41% +47.95% +3.70%
75th Percentile £88.00 £143.95 -
90th Percentile - £167.81 -
UK excluding London median hourly rate £88.00 £103.57 £70.00
% change year-on-year -15.03% +47.95% +1.82%

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 20,015 13,731 18,117
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the UK 40.92% 47.75% 42.30%
Number of daily rates quoted 12,616 8,533 11,332
10th Percentile £313 £281 £263
25th Percentile £413 £405 £405
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £510 £514
Median % change year-on-year -1.96% -0.73% -2.14%
75th Percentile £600 £615 £625
90th Percentile £700 £713 £738
UK excluding London median daily rate £493 £490 £500
% change year-on-year +0.66% -2.00% -
Number of hourly rates quoted 1,035 582 1,113
10th Percentile £15.25 £14.84 £12.04
25th Percentile £18.50 £17.30 £14.48
Median hourly rate £32.50 £25.77 £22.50
Median % change year-on-year +26.12% +14.53% -47.06%
75th Percentile £58.75 £56.00 £57.50
90th Percentile £76.06 £70.00 £70.00
UK excluding London median hourly rate £29.50 £22.50 £21.48
% change year-on-year +31.11% +4.75% -45.69%

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 29 May 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 29 May 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 29 May 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 -55 357 £475 -5.00% 37
UK excluding London -36 240 £459 +0.88% 30
London -78 126 £505 -15.91% 15
Work from Home -38 114 £505 -0.34% 21
North of England -44 84 £489 +14.94% 2
South West +2 43 £426 -27.18% 5
North West -18 42 £459 +14.18% 2
Yorkshire -37 41 £514 +14.22%
South East -40 39 £400 -11.11% 12
Midlands -48 36 £402 -10.67% 6
West Midlands -46 31 £402 -12.61% 4
Scotland -13 19 £550 +15.30% 3
East of England -16 18 £425 -19.05% 2
East Midlands -31 4 £837 +99.17% 2
Wales -13 1 - -
North East -30 1 £375 -10.45%

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 (6.88%) WebSphere
2 20 (4.91%) Confluence
3 19 (4.67%) CICS
4 14 (3.44%) Tomcat
5 12 (2.95%) nginx
6 10 (2.46%) SharePoint
7 8 (1.97%) WebLogic
8 6 (1.47%) Oracle SOA Suite
8 6 (1.47%) WebSphere Application Server
9 5 (1.23%) Anypoint
9 5 (1.23%) Apache
10 4 (0.98%) IIS
10 4 (0.98%) JBoss
10 4 (0.98%) SAS
11 3 (0.74%) Apache Airflow
11 3 (0.74%) Apache Spark
11 3 (0.74%) Camunda
11 3 (0.74%) CMS
12 2 (0.49%) IBM HTTP Server
12 2 (0.49%) WebSphere Portal
Applications
1 2 (0.49%) Microsoft Excel
1 2 (0.49%) Microsoft Office
1 2 (0.49%) MS Visio
1 2 (0.49%) PlantUML
2 1 (0.25%) Windchill
Business Applications
1 20 (4.91%) Maximo
2 9 (2.21%) IBM Planning Analytics
3 7 (1.72%) Temenos T24
4 5 (1.23%) SAP S/4HANA
5 3 (0.74%) SAP R/3
6 2 (0.49%) BusinessWorks
6 2 (0.49%) Oracle Payables
6 2 (0.49%) Oracle Procure-to-Pay
6 2 (0.49%) Oracle Subledger Accounting
6 2 (0.49%) Teamcenter
7 1 (0.25%) Cognos Controller
7 1 (0.25%) Dynamics CRM
7 1 (0.25%) IBM Operational Decision Manager
7 1 (0.25%) MetaTrader
7 1 (0.25%) Oracle FAH
7 1 (0.25%) Oracle General Ledger
7 1 (0.25%) Oracle Receivables
7 1 (0.25%) SAP AFS
7 1 (0.25%) SAP QM
7 1 (0.25%) Sparx Enterprise Architect
Cloud Services
1 71 (17.44%) AWS
2 53 (13.02%) Azure
3 23 (5.65%) OpenShift
4 21 (5.16%) GitHub
5 12 (2.95%) Azure DevOps
6 11 (2.70%) GitHub Copilot
7 10 (2.46%) GCP
8 9 (2.21%) ChatGPT
9 8 (1.97%) IBM Watson
10 7 (1.72%) Anthropic Claude
10 7 (1.72%) SaaS
11 6 (1.47%) AWS CloudFormation
11 6 (1.47%) Azure AKS
11 6 (1.47%) Azure Monitor
11 6 (1.47%) Azure Sentinel
12 5 (1.23%) Amazon S3
12 5 (1.23%) Azure ExpressRoute
12 5 (1.23%) Vertex AI
13 4 (0.98%) IBM Cloud
13 4 (0.98%) Power Platform
Communications & Networking
1 19 (4.67%) Firewall
2 17 (4.18%) SAN
3 16 (3.93%) SNMP
4 12 (2.95%) HTTP
5 11 (2.70%) Fibre Channel
6 10 (2.46%) VSAN
7 9 (2.21%) NAS
7 9 (2.21%) TCP/IP
8 7 (1.72%) DNS
8 7 (1.72%) SSL
8 7 (1.72%) VPN
9 5 (1.23%) HTTPS
9 5 (1.23%) iSCSI
10 4 (0.98%) APPN
10 4 (0.98%) LAN
10 4 (0.98%) Network Security
10 4 (0.98%) SNA
11 3 (0.74%) MPLS
11 3 (0.74%) WAN
12 2 (0.49%) Cisco Nexus
Database & Business Intelligence
1 41 (10.07%) DB2
2 22 (5.41%) DataStage
3 20 (4.91%) SQL Server
4 17 (4.18%) Relational Database
5 12 (2.95%) Data Warehouse
6 10 (2.46%) Metadata
6 10 (2.46%) MongoDB
7 9 (2.21%) PostgreSQL
8 8 (1.97%) Elasticsearch
8 8 (1.97%) Oracle Database
9 7 (1.72%) Big Data
9 7 (1.72%) NoSQL
9 7 (1.72%) Oracle Reports
10 6 (1.47%) GIS
11 4 (0.98%) Power BI
12 3 (0.74%) Amazon Aurora
12 3 (0.74%) Amazon Redshift
12 3 (0.74%) Apache Hive
13 2 (0.49%) SQL Server Integration Services
13 2 (0.49%) Star Schema
Development Applications
1 41 (10.07%) Rational DOORS
2 28 (6.88%) JIRA
3 15 (3.69%) Jenkins
4 13 (3.19%) Git
5 9 (2.21%) GitLab
5 9 (2.21%) Rational Rhapsody
6 5 (1.23%) Ant
6 5 (1.23%) Liquibase
6 5 (1.23%) PVCS
7 4 (0.98%) IBM UrbanCode
7 4 (0.98%) JMeter
7 4 (0.98%) PowerDesigner
8 3 (0.74%) Cucumber
8 3 (0.74%) JUnit
8 3 (0.74%) REST Assured
8 3 (0.74%) Sonatype Nexus
9 2 (0.49%) Artifactory
9 2 (0.49%) Eclipse
9 2 (0.49%) Introscope
9 2 (0.49%) Visual Studio
General
1 98 (24.08%) Finance
2 86 (21.13%) Social Skills
3 71 (17.44%) Banking
4 34 (8.35%) Analytical Skills
5 32 (7.86%) Public Sector
6 29 (7.13%) Aerospace
7 16 (3.93%) Legal
8 12 (2.95%) Influencing Skills
8 12 (2.95%) Retail
9 8 (1.97%) Front Office
9 8 (1.97%) Investment Banking
10 7 (1.72%) Documentation Skills
10 7 (1.72%) Inclusion and Diversity
11 6 (1.47%) Law
11 6 (1.47%) Military
12 5 (1.23%) Aviation
12 5 (1.23%) Electronics
13 4 (0.98%) Financial Institution
14 3 (0.74%) Telecoms
15 2 (0.49%) Back Office
Job Titles
1 40 (9.83%) Architect
2 39 (9.58%) Analyst
3 31 (7.62%) Developer
4 26 (6.39%) Delivery Manager
4 26 (6.39%) Product Delivery Manager
4 26 (6.39%) Product Manager
5 24 (5.90%) Consultant
6 21 (5.16%) Software Engineer
6 21 (5.16%) Systems Delivery Manager
6 21 (5.16%) Systems Manager
7 19 (4.67%) Senior
8 18 (4.42%) Storage Analyst
9 16 (3.93%) Administrator
10 15 (3.69%) Data Engineer
10 15 (3.69%) Lead
11 14 (3.44%) Infrastructure Analyst
12 13 (3.19%) Management Consultant
13 12 (2.95%) Systems Engineer
14 11 (2.70%) DevOps Engineer
14 11 (2.70%) Solutions Architect
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 43 (10.57%) Middleware
2 33 (8.11%) REST
3 22 (5.41%) Flash
4 17 (4.18%) Kafka
5 11 (2.70%) ISPF
5 11 (2.70%) JSON
5 11 (2.70%) XML
6 10 (2.46%) Spring
6 10 (2.46%) Spring Boot
7 9 (2.21%) WebSphere MQ
8 7 (1.72%) EJB
8 7 (1.72%) JMS
8 7 (1.72%) RabbitMQ
8 7 (1.72%) SOAP
8 7 (1.72%) ZeroMQ
9 6 (1.47%) ARM Templates
9 6 (1.47%) JDBC
9 6 (1.47%) OpenLayers
9 6 (1.47%) PyTorch
9 6 (1.47%) scikit-learn
Miscellaneous
1 78 (19.16%) Mainframe
2 36 (8.85%) Data Centre
3 31 (7.62%) Replication
4 29 (7.13%) Linux Command Line
5 27 (6.63%) Data Structures
5 27 (6.63%) Product Ownership
6 21 (5.16%) Clustering
7 14 (3.44%) VSAM
8 13 (3.19%) Algorithms
9 12 (2.95%) SWIFT Messaging Network
10 11 (2.70%) Cloud Native
10 11 (2.70%) Legacy Systems
11 10 (2.46%) BYOD
11 10 (2.46%) Data Protection Act
11 10 (2.46%) Hybrid Cloud
11 10 (2.46%) IBM Mainframe
11 10 (2.46%) Legacy Applications
12 9 (2.21%) Onboarding
13 8 (1.97%) Derivative
13 8 (1.97%) Enterprise Software
Operating Systems
1 94 (23.10%) Linux
2 53 (13.02%) zOS
3 49 (12.04%) Windows
4 41 (10.07%) AIX
5 38 (9.34%) Unix
6 22 (5.41%) Solaris
7 20 (4.91%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
8 19 (4.67%) Windows Server
9 11 (2.70%) Windows Server 2008
9 11 (2.70%) Windows Server 2019
10 8 (1.97%) Windows Server 2016
11 5 (1.23%) MVS
12 2 (0.49%) Oracle Linux
12 2 (0.49%) SUSE Linux Enterprise Server
12 2 (0.49%) VMS
13 1 (0.25%) Apple iOS
13 1 (0.25%) Mac OS
13 1 (0.25%) Windows 10
13 1 (0.25%) Windows 7
13 1 (0.25%) Windows Server 2012
Processes & Methodologies
1 85 (20.88%) Agile
2 57 (14.00%) CI/CD
3 53 (13.02%) Migration
4 48 (11.79%) Continuous Improvement
4 48 (11.79%) DevOps
5 46 (11.30%) Stakeholder Engagement
6 42 (10.32%) Problem-Solving
6 42 (10.32%) Roadmaps
7 36 (8.85%) Model-Based Systems Engineering
8 35 (8.60%) Workflow
9 34 (8.35%) ETL
9 34 (8.35%) Systems Engineering
10 33 (8.11%) Computer Science
10 33 (8.11%) ITIL
11 32 (7.86%) Configuration Management
12 29 (7.13%) Stakeholder Management
12 29 (7.13%) UML
13 28 (6.88%) Programme Management
13 28 (6.88%) Requirements Management
13 28 (6.88%) Test Automation
Programming Languages
1 78 (19.16%) SQL
2 70 (17.20%) Python
3 45 (11.06%) Java
4 35 (8.60%) PowerShell
5 20 (4.91%) Bash
5 20 (4.91%) JCL
6 18 (4.42%) PL/SQL
6 18 (4.42%) REXX
7 17 (4.18%) COBOL
8 14 (3.44%) C
8 14 (3.44%) C++
8 14 (3.44%) Search Processing Language
9 10 (2.46%) Ada
9 10 (2.46%) MATLAB
10 8 (1.97%) Bicep
10 8 (1.97%) CLIST
11 7 (1.72%) Assembly Language
11 7 (1.72%) Perl
12 6 (1.47%) JavaScript
12 6 (1.47%) Shell Script
Qualifications
1 123 (30.22%) Security Cleared
2 78 (19.16%) SC Cleared
3 37 (9.09%) Degree
4 13 (3.19%) BPSS Clearance
5 11 (2.70%) Azure Certification
5 11 (2.70%) DV Cleared
6 9 (2.21%) CISSP
7 8 (1.97%) CISM
8 7 (1.72%) AWS Certification
8 7 (1.72%) Computer Science Degree
8 7 (1.72%) IBM Certification
9 5 (1.23%) ISO 27001 Lead Implementer
9 5 (1.23%) Master's Degree
9 5 (1.23%) Microsoft Certification
10 4 (0.98%) ITIL Certification
11 3 (0.74%) CEH
12 2 (0.49%) CISA
12 2 (0.49%) CISMP
12 2 (0.49%) GCIH
12 2 (0.49%) ISTQB
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 27 (6.63%) Data Quality
2 11 (2.70%) SLA
3 10 (2.46%) QA
4 7 (1.72%) ISO/IEC 27001
4 7 (1.72%) NIST
5 5 (1.23%) ISO 20022
5 5 (1.23%) NIST 800
6 4 (0.98%) SEPA
7 3 (0.74%) GDPR
7 3 (0.74%) ISO 15022
8 2 (0.49%) Accessibility
8 2 (0.49%) GRC
8 2 (0.49%) NCSC
8 2 (0.49%) Sarbanes-Oxley
9 1 (0.25%) GAAP
9 1 (0.25%) IFRS
9 1 (0.25%) IFRS 17
9 1 (0.25%) IFRS 9
9 1 (0.25%) ISO/IEC 15288
9 1 (0.25%) WCAG
System Software
1 33 (8.11%) VMware Infrastructure
2 31 (7.62%) NFS
3 25 (6.14%) Docker
4 23 (5.65%) VMware ESXi
5 22 (5.41%) GPFS
6 18 (4.42%) vSphere
7 17 (4.18%) Virtual Machines
8 14 (3.44%) RACF
9 10 (2.46%) Time Sharing Option
10 9 (2.21%) Firmware
11 8 (1.97%) Oracle RAC
12 7 (1.72%) Hyper-V
13 6 (1.47%) KVM
14 3 (0.74%) ACF2
14 3 (0.74%) Job Entry Subsystem
14 3 (0.74%) PowerHA
15 2 (0.49%) EMC RecoverPoint
15 2 (0.49%) Tivoli Workload Scheduler
15 2 (0.49%) VMware NSX
16 1 (0.25%) Active Directory
Systems Management
1 29 (7.13%) Ansible
2 25 (6.14%) Terraform
3 24 (5.90%) Kubernetes
4 21 (5.16%) Tivoli
5 18 (4.42%) vRealize
6 17 (4.18%) Nagios
6 17 (4.18%) ZABBIX
7 16 (3.93%) Netcool
8 14 (3.44%) OpenView
8 14 (3.44%) Tivoli Monitoring
9 13 (3.19%) Tivoli Storage Manager
10 11 (2.70%) OMEGAMON
11 10 (2.46%) VxRail
12 8 (1.97%) IBM BigFix
13 7 (1.72%) Oracle RMAN
14 6 (1.47%) Tivoli NetView
14 6 (1.47%) vCenter Server
15 5 (1.23%) Grafana
16 3 (0.74%) Control-M
17 2 (0.49%) TIBCO Hawk
Vendors
1 73 (17.94%) Oracle
2 50 (12.29%) VMware
3 34 (8.35%) Cisco
4 33 (8.11%) ServiceNow
5 28 (6.88%) HP
6 27 (6.63%) Microsoft
7 26 (6.39%) Splunk
8 21 (5.16%) BMC
8 21 (5.16%) Dell
9 20 (4.91%) Red Hat
10 19 (4.67%) SAP
10 19 (4.67%) SolarWinds
11 14 (3.44%) Broadcom
11 14 (3.44%) Brocade
12 12 (2.95%) Google
13 11 (2.70%) EMC
13 11 (2.70%) NetApp
14 10 (2.46%) MathWorks
15 7 (1.72%) Informatica
15 7 (1.72%) Temenos