Kafka Contract Job Trends

Apache Kafka
UK

The table below provides summary statistics and contractor rates for jobs requiring Kafka skills. It covers contract job vacancies from the 6 months leading up to 28 May 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
28 May 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 140 112 154
Rank change year-on-year -28 +42 -16
Contract jobs citing Kafka 935 704 671
As % of all contract jobs in the UK 1.91% 2.46% 1.57%
As % of the Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards category 9.77% 10.82% 7.48%
Number of daily rates quoted 560 461 499
10th Percentile £375 £400 £400
25th Percentile £425 £458 £463
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £528 £550 £545
Median % change year-on-year -4.09% +0.92% -16.15%
75th Percentile £650 £706 £675
90th Percentile £800 £825 £767
UK excluding London median daily rate £470 £470 £495
% change year-on-year - -5.05% -10.00%
Number of hourly rates quoted 17 3 7
10th Percentile £50.05 £47.14 £22.34
25th Percentile £64.00 £58.98 £24.88
Median hourly rate £70.00 £78.70 £28.00
Median % change year-on-year -11.05% +181.07% -64.10%
75th Percentile £90.00 £86.23 £37.63
90th Percentile £92.00 £90.74 £51.65
UK excluding London median hourly rate £70.00 £78.70 £28.00
% change year-on-year -11.05% +181.07% -64.10%

All Software Libraries and Frameworks
UK

Kafka falls under the Software Libraries and Frameworks category. For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all contract job vacancies requiring technical specification, industry standards, software libraries and framework skills.

Contract vacancies with a requirement for technical specification, industry standards, software libraries and framework skills 9,574 6,506 8,968
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the UK 19.60% 22.71% 20.98%
Number of daily rates quoted 6,287 4,465 6,239
10th Percentile £363 £363 £350
25th Percentile £420 £414 £425
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £525 £525 £535
Median % change year-on-year - -1.87% -2.73%
75th Percentile £625 £638 £650
90th Percentile £738 £775 £775
UK excluding London median daily rate £500 £475 £500
% change year-on-year +5.26% -5.00% -
Number of hourly rates quoted 281 105 250
10th Percentile £31.03 £28.13 £21.68
25th Percentile £51.25 £39.25 £43.00
Median hourly rate £65.00 £62.50 £47.50
Median % change year-on-year +4.00% +31.58% -26.92%
75th Percentile £73.00 £68.75 £65.95
90th Percentile £81.00 £81.22 £74.55
UK excluding London median hourly rate £65.00 £65.00 £48.43
% change year-on-year - +34.21% -25.49%

Kafka
Job Vacancy Trend

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

Kafka job vacancy trend in the UK

Kafka
Daily Rate Trend

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

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

Kafka
Daily Rate Histogram

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing Kafka over the 6 months to 28 May 2026.

Daily rate histogram for Kafka in the UK

Kafka
Hourly Rate Trend

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

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

Kafka
Hourly Rate Histogram

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing Kafka over the 6 months to 28 May 2026.

Hourly rate histogram for Kafka in the UK

Kafka
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 Kafka within the UK over the 6 months to 28 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 -23 808 £550 -0.90% 202
London -19 510 £600 -7.69% 129
UK excluding London -30 302 £470 - 100
Work from Home -22 285 £600 +2.39% 82
North of England -36 134 £455 -9.00% 26
Yorkshire -18 71 £463 -15.91% 5
South East -33 52 £488 +8.33% 29
North West -43 52 £447 -10.60% 18
Scotland -9 44 £450 -4.76% 4
Midlands -47 42 £495 +34.88% 8
South West -5 29 £513 -6.82% 17
West Midlands -49 24 £514 -6.55% 5
North East -16 20 £450 -2.70% 3
East Midlands -22 18 £407 +14.40% 3
East of England -22 15 £550 +71.14% 3
Wales -15 1 £250 - 2

Kafka
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
1 134 (14.33%) Apache Spark
2 69 (7.38%) Apache
3 50 (5.35%) Apache Airflow
4 17 (1.82%) Confluence
5 7 (0.75%) Camunda
6 6 (0.64%) Ethereum
6 6 (0.64%) Hyperledger
7 5 (0.53%) WebSphere
8 4 (0.43%) Apache Pulsar
8 4 (0.43%) Microsoft Exchange
9 3 (0.32%) MQSeries
10 2 (0.21%) IBM HTTP Server
10 2 (0.21%) OpenStack
10 2 (0.21%) Oracle HTTP Server
10 2 (0.21%) Oracle SOA Suite
10 2 (0.21%) Palantir Foundry
10 2 (0.21%) WebLogic
10 2 (0.21%) WebSphere Application Server
10 2 (0.21%) WebSphere Portal
11 1 (0.11%) JBoss
Applications
1 4 (0.43%) CPLEX
2 2 (0.21%) PlantUML
3 1 (0.11%) Chatbot
3 1 (0.11%) Maya
Business Applications
1 3 (0.32%) Bloomberg AIM
1 3 (0.32%) Fidessa
1 3 (0.32%) Payment Gateway
2 2 (0.21%) Oracle Procure-to-Pay
2 2 (0.21%) Shopify
2 2 (0.21%) Sparx Enterprise Architect
3 1 (0.11%) Aladdin
3 1 (0.11%) Dynamics CRM
3 1 (0.11%) Endur
3 1 (0.11%) Oracle 11i
3 1 (0.11%) R3 Corda
3 1 (0.11%) SAP BRIM
Cloud Services
1 552 (59.04%) AWS
2 266 (28.45%) Azure
3 161 (17.22%) GCP
4 145 (15.51%) GitHub
5 122 (13.05%) Serverless
6 103 (11.02%) GitHub Actions
7 98 (10.48%) Amazon S3
8 92 (9.84%) AWS Lambda
9 69 (7.38%) Amazon EKS
10 65 (6.95%) OpenShift
11 64 (6.84%) Power Platform
12 61 (6.52%) Azure DevOps
13 51 (5.45%) AWS CloudFormation
14 48 (5.13%) Snowflake
15 45 (4.81%) Amazon ECS
16 44 (4.71%) Amazon CloudWatch
17 42 (4.49%) Amazon SQS
18 39 (4.17%) dbt
19 38 (4.06%) Amazon Kinesis
20 34 (3.64%) Azure Synapse Analytics
Communications & Networking
1 18 (1.93%) Firewall
2 13 (1.39%) HTTP
3 10 (1.07%) DNS
4 9 (0.96%) SSL
5 7 (0.75%) Network Security
6 6 (0.64%) SMS
7 5 (0.53%) NAS
7 5 (0.53%) SAN
7 5 (0.53%) TCP/IP
8 3 (0.32%) MQTT
9 2 (0.21%) FTP
9 2 (0.21%) NaaS
9 2 (0.21%) OpenVPN
9 2 (0.21%) Reverse Proxy
9 2 (0.21%) SSH
9 2 (0.21%) WAN
10 1 (0.11%) 4G
10 1 (0.11%) Broadband
10 1 (0.11%) Kerberos
10 1 (0.11%) MIMO
Database & Business Intelligence
1 192 (20.53%) PostgreSQL
2 150 (16.04%) MongoDB
3 127 (13.58%) NoSQL
4 84 (8.98%) Relational Database
5 63 (6.74%) Big Data
6 55 (5.88%) Data Lake
6 55 (5.88%) Data Warehouse
7 53 (5.67%) SQL Server
8 52 (5.56%) Power BI
9 51 (5.45%) Apache Cassandra
10 50 (5.35%) Redis
11 48 (5.13%) Elasticsearch
12 39 (4.17%) Flink
13 38 (4.06%) DynamoDB
14 37 (3.96%) Amazon Athena
15 36 (3.85%) MySQL
16 35 (3.74%) Hadoop
17 30 (3.21%) Amazon Redshift
17 30 (3.21%) BigQuery
18 29 (3.10%) Amazon RDS
Development Applications
1 145 (15.51%) Jenkins
2 132 (14.12%) GitLab
3 130 (13.90%) Git
4 63 (6.74%) JUnit
5 56 (5.99%) JIRA
6 44 (4.71%) Mockito
7 30 (3.21%) Selenium
8 28 (2.99%) Gradle
9 24 (2.57%) REST Assured
10 21 (2.25%) Cucumber
11 20 (2.14%) Gatling
12 16 (1.71%) Liquibase
13 15 (1.60%) Postman
13 15 (1.60%) Serenity BDD
14 14 (1.50%) Maven
15 11 (1.18%) SonarQube
16 10 (1.07%) Jaeger
17 7 (0.75%) JMeter
17 7 (0.75%) Snyk
18 6 (0.64%) Artifactory
General
1 252 (26.95%) Finance
2 166 (17.75%) Social Skills
3 123 (13.16%) Banking
4 80 (8.56%) Public Sector
5 76 (8.13%) Analytical Skills
6 46 (4.92%) Front Office
7 35 (3.74%) Investment Banking
8 27 (2.89%) Documentation Skills
9 25 (2.67%) Financial Institution
10 13 (1.39%) Law
10 13 (1.39%) Retail
11 12 (1.28%) Marketing
12 11 (1.18%) Influencing Skills
13 10 (1.07%) Telecoms
14 9 (0.96%) Publishing
15 7 (0.75%) Automotive
15 7 (0.75%) Corporate Banking
15 7 (0.75%) Inclusion and Diversity
15 7 (0.75%) Military
16 5 (0.53%) Retail Banking
Job Titles
1 305 (32.62%) Developer
2 203 (21.71%) Senior
3 159 (17.01%) Data Engineer
4 151 (16.15%) Java Developer
5 119 (12.73%) Lead
6 109 (11.66%) Architect
7 92 (9.84%) Senior Developer
7 92 (9.84%) Software Engineer
8 67 (7.17%) Java Engineer
9 51 (5.45%) AWS Architect
9 51 (5.45%) Senior Java Developer
10 48 (5.13%) DevOps Engineer
11 42 (4.49%) Full-Stack Developer
12 39 (4.17%) Solutions Architect
13 34 (3.64%) Senior Data Engineer
14 33 (3.53%) Developer/Software Engineer
14 33 (3.53%) Principal Engineer
15 31 (3.32%) Data Architect
15 31 (3.32%) Full-Stack Engineer
15 31 (3.32%) Kafka Engineer
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 225 (24.06%) Spring
2 209 (22.35%) Spring Boot
3 130 (13.90%) REST
4 117 (12.51%) RESTful
5 116 (12.41%) React
6 100 (10.70%) Node.js
7 86 (9.20%) RabbitMQ
8 58 (6.20%) GraphQL
8 58 (6.20%) OpenTelemetry
9 56 (5.99%) gRPC
10 48 (5.13%) JSON
11 44 (4.71%) Middleware
12 42 (4.49%) Apache Avro
13 41 (4.39%) PySpark
14 40 (4.28%) Redux
15 39 (4.17%) AngularJS
15 39 (4.17%) OAuth
16 35 (3.74%) Swagger
17 34 (3.64%) OAuth2
17 34 (3.64%) OpenAPI
Miscellaneous
1 166 (17.75%) Distributed Systems
2 158 (16.90%) Cloud Native
3 42 (4.49%) Management Information System
4 40 (4.28%) Fixed Income
5 32 (3.42%) Product Ownership
6 24 (2.57%) Data Structures
7 20 (2.14%) Onboarding
8 18 (1.93%) Legacy Systems
9 16 (1.71%) Equities
9 16 (1.71%) Hybrid Cloud
10 15 (1.60%) Derivative
10 15 (1.60%) Enterprise Software
11 14 (1.50%) Algorithms
11 14 (1.50%) Clustering
12 12 (1.28%) Foreign Exchange (FX)
13 11 (1.18%) Data Protection Act
13 11 (1.18%) Hedge funds
13 11 (1.18%) SWIFT Messaging Network
14 10 (1.07%) CMDB
15 9 (0.96%) Public Cloud
Operating Systems
1 93 (9.95%) Linux
2 55 (5.88%) Unix
3 32 (3.42%) Windows
4 8 (0.86%) Mac OS X
5 6 (0.64%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
5 6 (0.64%) Ubuntu
6 3 (0.32%) VMS
6 3 (0.32%) zOS
7 2 (0.21%) Debian
7 2 (0.21%) Mac OS
7 2 (0.21%) Oracle Linux
7 2 (0.21%) SUSE Linux Enterprise Server
8 1 (0.11%) AIX
8 1 (0.11%) Android
8 1 (0.11%) Apple iOS
8 1 (0.11%) CentOS
8 1 (0.11%) Windows Server
Processes & Methodologies
1 427 (45.67%) CI/CD
2 349 (37.33%) Microservices
3 295 (31.55%) Agile
4 283 (30.27%) DevOps
5 253 (27.06%) Event-Driven
6 218 (23.32%) Observability
7 199 (21.28%) Containerisation
8 191 (20.43%) Software Engineering
9 171 (18.29%) Data Pipeline
10 167 (17.86%) Event-Driven Architecture
11 164 (17.54%) Data Modelling
12 163 (17.43%) Infrastructure as Code
13 150 (16.04%) Analytics
14 148 (15.83%) Problem-Solving
15 145 (15.51%) Data Engineering
16 143 (15.29%) Test Automation
17 139 (14.87%) ETL
18 109 (11.66%) Full-Stack Development
19 101 (10.80%) AI
20 95 (10.16%) Data Governance
Programming Languages
1 424 (45.35%) Java
2 321 (34.33%) Python
3 294 (31.44%) SQL
4 113 (12.09%) TypeScript
5 101 (10.80%) Go
6 90 (9.63%) JavaScript
7 58 (6.20%) C#
8 46 (4.92%) Bash
9 29 (3.10%) Scala
10 21 (2.25%) PowerShell
11 19 (2.03%) Rust
12 16 (1.71%) C++
12 16 (1.71%) Shell Script
13 13 (1.39%) Bicep
14 10 (1.07%) PL/SQL
14 10 (1.07%) Search Processing Language
15 7 (0.75%) Perl
16 6 (0.64%) PHP
17 5 (0.53%) Groovy
17 5 (0.53%) T-SQL
Qualifications
1 205 (21.93%) Security Cleared
2 161 (17.22%) SC Cleared
3 52 (5.56%) Degree
4 26 (2.78%) BPSS Clearance
5 17 (1.82%) AWS Certification
6 16 (1.71%) Computer Science Degree
6 16 (1.71%) DV Cleared
7 14 (1.50%) Azure Certification
8 13 (1.39%) Master's Degree
9 7 (0.75%) AWS Certified Solutions Architect
9 7 (0.75%) SnowPro
10 4 (0.43%) ITIL Certification
11 3 (0.32%) TOGAF Certification
12 2 (0.21%) AWS Certified Developer
12 2 (0.21%) DBS Check
12 2 (0.21%) Microsoft Certification
12 2 (0.21%) Postgraduate
13 1 (0.11%) CISSP
13 1 (0.11%) OCP
13 1 (0.11%) PhD
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 104 (11.12%) Data Quality
2 49 (5.24%) QA
3 41 (4.39%) GDPR
4 30 (3.21%) Accessibility
5 19 (2.03%) ISO 20022
6 10 (1.07%) ISO/IEC 27001
7 9 (0.96%) NIST
8 7 (0.75%) PCI DSS
8 7 (0.75%) SEPA
9 6 (0.64%) NCSC
10 4 (0.43%) SLA
10 4 (0.43%) WCAG
11 3 (0.32%) ISO 8583
12 2 (0.21%) EMIR
12 2 (0.21%) ISO 15022
12 2 (0.21%) MiFID
12 2 (0.21%) PSD2
13 1 (0.11%) Actionable Recommendations
13 1 (0.11%) Basel III
13 1 (0.11%) PMO
System Software
1 323 (34.55%) Docker
2 6 (0.64%) etcd
3 3 (0.32%) Apache ZooKeeper
3 3 (0.32%) VMware Infrastructure
4 2 (0.21%) HDFS
5 1 (0.11%) Apache Flume
5 1 (0.11%) Virtual Machines
Systems Management
1 368 (39.36%) Kubernetes
2 195 (20.86%) Terraform
3 129 (13.80%) Prometheus
4 128 (13.69%) Grafana
5 59 (6.31%) Ansible
6 27 (2.89%) Argo
7 13 (1.39%) Istio
8 11 (1.18%) Kibana
9 9 (0.96%) Kiali
10 7 (0.75%) Fluentd
10 7 (0.75%) linkerd
10 7 (0.75%) Puppet
11 6 (0.64%) Kustomize
11 6 (0.64%) logstash
11 6 (0.64%) Podman
11 6 (0.64%) Rancher
12 3 (0.32%) NetBackup
13 2 (0.21%) CA Wily
13 2 (0.21%) Sysdig
13 2 (0.21%) Tivoli
Vendors
1 90 (9.63%) Databricks
2 77 (8.24%) Splunk
3 67 (7.17%) Oracle
4 43 (4.60%) Microsoft
5 36 (3.85%) Google
6 28 (2.99%) Confluent
7 22 (2.35%) Informatica
8 18 (1.93%) IBM
9 13 (1.39%) Dynatrace
9 13 (1.39%) Red Hat
9 13 (1.39%) Salesforce
10 11 (1.18%) ServiceNow
11 9 (0.96%) Solace
11 9 (0.96%) Talend
12 8 (0.86%) MuleSoft
12 8 (0.86%) VMware
13 7 (0.75%) AppDynamics
13 7 (0.75%) Sybase
14 6 (0.64%) Pega
15 5 (0.53%) Teradata