Linux Contract Job Trends

Linux
UK

The table below provides summary statistics and contractor rates for jobs requiring Linux skills. It covers contract job vacancies from the 6 months leading up to 18 May 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
18 May 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 51 31 34
Rank change year-on-year -20 +3 -8
Contract jobs citing Linux 1,892 1,720 2,168
As % of all contract jobs in the UK 3.95% 5.85% 5.09%
As % of the Operating Systems category 40.56% 41.97% 38.25%
Number of daily rates quoted 1,175 1,087 1,429
10th Percentile £335 £375 £325
25th Percentile £407 £440 £425
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £538 £550
Median % change year-on-year -6.98% -2.27% -5.98%
75th Percentile £611 £638 £645
90th Percentile £691 £738 £750
UK excluding London median daily rate £490 £525 £538
% change year-on-year -6.67% -2.33% -0.09%
Number of hourly rates quoted 120 43 110
10th Percentile £33.36 £41.40 £36.58
25th Percentile £43.81 £55.00 £53.13
Median hourly rate £62.50 £65.00 £63.75
Median % change year-on-year -3.85% +1.96% -1.92%
75th Percentile £68.00 £68.00 £70.00
90th Percentile £74.71 - -
UK excluding London median hourly rate £62.50 £65.00 £65.00
% change year-on-year -3.85% - -

All Operating Systems
UK

Linux falls under the Operating Systems category. For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all contract job vacancies requiring operating system skills.

Contract vacancies with a requirement for operating system skills 4,665 4,098 5,668
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the UK 9.73% 13.94% 13.30%
Number of daily rates quoted 3,001 2,692 3,828
10th Percentile £185 £200 £185
25th Percentile £313 £313 £300
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £456 £467 £470
Median % change year-on-year -2.15% -0.74% -6.00%
75th Percentile £575 £588 £588
90th Percentile £658 £688 £700
UK excluding London median daily rate £448 £448 £450
% change year-on-year +0.11% -0.56% -4.76%
Number of hourly rates quoted 323 178 392
10th Percentile £15.68 £15.25 £12.75
25th Percentile £19.25 £17.53 £15.44
Median hourly rate £47.50 £22.53 £22.00
Median % change year-on-year +110.83% +2.41% -42.86%
75th Percentile £67.25 £56.88 £60.75
90th Percentile £75.00 £68.00 £70.00
UK excluding London median hourly rate £42.71 £21.90 £22.50
% change year-on-year +95.00% -2.67% -23.21%

Linux
Job Vacancy Trend

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

Linux job vacancy trend in the UK

Linux
Daily Rate Trend

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

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

Linux
Daily Rate Histogram

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing Linux over the 6 months to 18 May 2026.

Daily rate histogram for Linux in the UK

Linux
Hourly Rate Trend

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

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

Linux
Hourly Rate Histogram

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing Linux over the 6 months to 18 May 2026.

Hourly rate histogram for Linux in the UK

Linux
Top 17 Contract Job Locations

The table below looks at the demand and provides a guide to the median contractor rates quoted in IT jobs citing Linux within the UK over the 6 months to 18 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 -20 1,579 £513 -6.82% 806
UK excluding London -13 1,137 £490 -6.67% 658
London -48 537 £550 -4.35% 213
Work from Home -27 478 £500 -4.76% 421
South East -1 323 £500 -9.09% 230
North of England -12 278 £475 -9.52% 106
South West -7 159 £550 -8.33% 123
Midlands -7 156 £525 +5.00% 66
Yorkshire -21 148 £463 -14.90% 35
West Midlands -2 137 £501 -6.80% 29
North West -18 117 £484 -3.20% 53
Scotland -19 93 £463 -1.07% 28
East of England -11 90 £475 - 95
Wales +5 28 £465 -20.65% 16
East Midlands -28 17 £528 +16.06% 37
Northern Ireland +10 15 £425 +30.77% 6
North East -19 13 £480 -8.57% 20

Linux
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 76 (4.02%) Confluence
2 47 (2.48%) Apache
3 29 (1.53%) nginx
4 27 (1.43%) Microsoft Exchange
5 20 (1.06%) Apache Airflow
5 20 (1.06%) Apache Spark
6 17 (0.90%) Tomcat
6 17 (0.90%) WebLogic
7 14 (0.74%) SAS
8 13 (0.69%) OpenStack
9 11 (0.58%) CICS
9 11 (0.58%) WebSphere
10 9 (0.48%) NetWeaver
11 8 (0.42%) Oracle SOA Suite
11 8 (0.42%) TPMS
12 7 (0.37%) JBoss
13 6 (0.32%) WebSphere Application Server
14 4 (0.21%) Adobe Experience Manager
14 4 (0.21%) CMS
14 4 (0.21%) SharePoint
Applications
1 20 (1.06%) Microsoft Office
2 10 (0.53%) Microsoft Excel
3 4 (0.21%) Microsoft Project
3 4 (0.21%) MS Visio
4 3 (0.16%) Simulink
5 2 (0.11%) Spreadsheet
6 1 (0.053%) Adobe Illustrator
6 1 (0.053%) InDesign
6 1 (0.053%) Photoshop
6 1 (0.053%) Weka
Business Applications
1 12 (0.63%) SAP S/4HANA
2 6 (0.32%) Remedy ITSM
3 4 (0.21%) Oracle Procure-to-Pay
4 3 (0.16%) Actimize
4 3 (0.16%) Oracle EBS
5 2 (0.11%) BusinessWorks
5 2 (0.11%) Oracle General Ledger
5 2 (0.11%) Oracle Subledger Accounting
6 1 (0.053%) Cloudability
6 1 (0.053%) FLEXCUBE
6 1 (0.053%) Odoo
6 1 (0.053%) Oracle 11i
6 1 (0.053%) Oracle Applications
6 1 (0.053%) Oracle EBS R12
6 1 (0.053%) Oracle FAH
6 1 (0.053%) Oracle Payables
6 1 (0.053%) Oracle Receivables
6 1 (0.053%) Shopify
Cloud Services
1 530 (28.01%) AWS
2 380 (20.08%) Azure
3 167 (8.83%) GitHub
4 122 (6.45%) OpenShift
5 109 (5.76%) GCP
6 95 (5.02%) GitHub Actions
7 81 (4.28%) Amazon EC2
8 79 (4.18%) Amazon S3
9 70 (3.70%) Azure DevOps
10 69 (3.65%) AWS CloudFormation
11 68 (3.59%) Amazon EKS
12 66 (3.49%) Serverless
13 55 (2.91%) Amazon CloudWatch
13 55 (2.91%) AWS Lambda
14 45 (2.38%) IaaS
15 43 (2.27%) Amazon ECS
16 42 (2.22%) Entra ID
16 42 (2.22%) Microsoft 365
17 40 (2.11%) PaaS
18 37 (1.96%) SaaS
Communications & Networking
1 175 (9.25%) Firewall
2 133 (7.03%) DNS
3 98 (5.18%) TCP/IP
4 73 (3.86%) VPN
5 62 (3.28%) SAN
6 58 (3.07%) Network Security
7 48 (2.54%) WAN
8 45 (2.38%) DHCP
9 41 (2.17%) LAN
10 37 (1.96%) VSAN
11 36 (1.90%) SNMP
12 35 (1.85%) SSH
13 31 (1.64%) HTTP
14 29 (1.53%) SSL
15 24 (1.27%) NAS
16 22 (1.16%) Ethernet
17 19 (1.00%) Wireless
18 18 (0.95%) BGP
18 18 (0.95%) Kerberos
19 17 (0.90%) VLAN
Database & Business Intelligence
1 115 (6.08%) PostgreSQL
2 110 (5.81%) SQL Server
3 73 (3.86%) MySQL
4 66 (3.49%) Oracle Database
4 66 (3.49%) Relational Database
5 63 (3.33%) MongoDB
6 50 (2.64%) Amazon RDS
7 43 (2.27%) Elasticsearch
8 35 (1.85%) Amazon Aurora
9 28 (1.48%) NoSQL
10 22 (1.16%) DynamoDB
11 20 (1.06%) SAP HANA
12 19 (1.00%) Big Data
12 19 (1.00%) Data Warehouse
12 19 (1.00%) KDB
13 16 (0.85%) DB2
13 16 (0.85%) Kdb+
14 12 (0.63%) Data Lake
14 12 (0.63%) Sybase ASE
15 11 (0.58%) Power BI
Development Applications
1 199 (10.52%) Jenkins
2 168 (8.88%) Git
3 167 (8.83%) GitLab
4 135 (7.14%) JIRA
5 31 (1.64%) Maven
6 24 (1.27%) Mockito
6 24 (1.27%) SonarQube
7 23 (1.22%) Eclipse
8 19 (1.00%) Bitbucket
8 19 (1.00%) JUnit
8 19 (1.00%) Sonatype Nexus
9 15 (0.79%) Artifactory
10 14 (0.74%) Rational Rhapsody
11 13 (0.69%) Jaeger
11 13 (0.69%) Visual Studio
12 11 (0.58%) DbUnit
12 11 (0.58%) jMock
13 10 (0.53%) Cucumber
14 9 (0.48%) Atlassian Bamboo
14 9 (0.48%) Selenium
General
1 385 (20.35%) Social Skills
2 253 (13.37%) Finance
3 193 (10.20%) Public Sector
4 145 (7.66%) Analytical Skills
5 109 (5.76%) Banking
6 77 (4.07%) Documentation Skills
7 45 (2.38%) Military
8 26 (1.37%) Financial Institution
9 24 (1.27%) Telecoms
10 23 (1.22%) Aerospace
10 23 (1.22%) Front Office
11 21 (1.11%) Investment Banking
11 21 (1.11%) Retail
12 19 (1.00%) Presentation Skills
13 18 (0.95%) Law
14 17 (0.90%) Influencing Skills
15 15 (0.79%) Legal
15 15 (0.79%) Manufacturing
16 14 (0.74%) Inclusion and Diversity
17 11 (0.58%) Organisational Skills
Job Titles
1 238 (12.58%) Senior
2 203 (10.73%) Developer
3 175 (9.25%) DevOps Engineer
4 159 (8.40%) Linux Engineer
5 137 (7.24%) Software Engineer
6 119 (6.29%) Infrastructure Engineer
7 110 (5.81%) Architect
8 107 (5.66%) Analyst
9 95 (5.02%) Lead
10 80 (4.23%) Administrator
11 76 (4.02%) Java Developer
12 70 (3.70%) Site Reliability Engineer
13 65 (3.44%) AWS Engineer
14 61 (3.22%) Platform Engineer
15 60 (3.17%) Site Engineer
16 52 (2.75%) Consultant
16 52 (2.75%) Security Engineer
17 47 (2.48%) AWS DevOps
18 45 (2.38%) Embedded Engineer
19 44 (2.33%) Senior Developer
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 100 (5.29%) Kafka
2 85 (4.49%) REST
3 79 (4.18%) Elastic Stack
4 70 (3.70%) Middleware
5 53 (2.80%) LDAP
6 50 (2.64%) Node.js
7 46 (2.43%) Spring Boot
8 45 (2.38%) Spring
9 40 (2.11%) Web Services
10 37 (1.96%) .NET
10 37 (1.96%) RESTful
11 32 (1.69%) YAML
12 29 (1.53%) XML
13 27 (1.43%) JSON
14 26 (1.37%) AngularJS
15 24 (1.27%) React
16 23 (1.22%) ActiveMQ
16 23 (1.22%) Flash
17 22 (1.16%) CSS
18 21 (1.11%) SOAP
Miscellaneous
1 145 (7.66%) Data Centre
2 105 (5.55%) Cloud Native
3 79 (4.18%) Linux Command Line
4 72 (3.81%) Onboarding
5 67 (3.54%) Management Information System
6 65 (3.44%) Distributed Systems
7 64 (3.38%) PKI
8 57 (3.01%) Replication
9 48 (2.54%) Hybrid Cloud
9 48 (2.54%) Public Cloud
10 43 (2.27%) Legacy Systems
11 34 (1.80%) Security Posture
12 33 (1.74%) Product Ownership
13 32 (1.69%) Data Protection Act
14 31 (1.64%) Enterprise Storage
15 30 (1.59%) Security Operations Centre
16 29 (1.53%) Embedded Systems
17 25 (1.32%) Operational Technology
18 23 (1.22%) Clustering
19 21 (1.11%) SCADA
Operating Systems
1 721 (38.11%) Windows
2 372 (19.66%) Unix
3 276 (14.59%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
4 175 (9.25%) Windows Server
5 87 (4.60%) Ubuntu
6 51 (2.70%) AIX
7 40 (2.11%) CentOS
8 38 (2.01%) Solaris
9 34 (1.80%) Embedded Linux
10 31 (1.64%) VMS
11 29 (1.53%) Android
12 23 (1.22%) Windows Server 2016
13 22 (1.16%) Windows Server 2019
14 21 (1.11%) Debian
14 21 (1.11%) Mac OS
15 13 (0.69%) Mac OS X
15 13 (0.69%) SUSE
16 10 (0.53%) Oracle Linux
16 10 (0.53%) Windows 10
16 10 (0.53%) Windows Server 2008
Processes & Methodologies
1 532 (28.12%) CI/CD
2 440 (23.26%) DevOps
3 355 (18.76%) Agile
4 303 (16.01%) Problem-Solving
5 283 (14.96%) Infrastructure as Code
6 254 (13.42%) Containerisation
7 214 (11.31%) Software Engineering
8 180 (9.51%) Observability
9 179 (9.46%) Migration
10 177 (9.36%) Infrastructure Engineering
11 150 (7.93%) High Availability
12 148 (7.82%) Performance Tuning
13 147 (7.77%) SIEM
14 139 (7.35%) Continuous Improvement
15 135 (7.14%) Computer Science
15 135 (7.14%) Platform Engineering
16 134 (7.08%) Root Cause Analysis
17 133 (7.03%) Microservices
18 132 (6.98%) Incident Response
19 131 (6.92%) Cybersecurity
Programming Languages
1 628 (33.19%) Python
2 329 (17.39%) SQL
3 263 (13.90%) Bash
4 260 (13.74%) Java
5 259 (13.69%) PowerShell
6 160 (8.46%) Shell Script
7 124 (6.55%) C++
8 105 (5.55%) JavaScript
9 68 (3.59%) Perl
10 61 (3.22%) C#
11 56 (2.96%) C
12 48 (2.54%) Go
13 43 (2.27%) PL/SQL
14 30 (1.59%) Ruby
15 27 (1.43%) TypeScript
16 23 (1.22%) PHP
16 23 (1.22%) Rust
17 21 (1.11%) Ada
17 21 (1.11%) MATLAB
18 19 (1.00%) Search Processing Language
Qualifications
1 741 (39.16%) Security Cleared
2 539 (28.49%) SC Cleared
3 216 (11.42%) DV Cleared
4 178 (9.41%) Degree
5 80 (4.23%) BPSS Clearance
6 79 (4.18%) Computer Science Degree
7 53 (2.80%) Cisco Certification
8 48 (2.54%) AWS Certification
9 44 (2.33%) CISSP
10 42 (2.22%) CompTIA Security+
11 36 (1.90%) RHCE
12 30 (1.59%) Azure Certification
13 25 (1.32%) CCNA
14 23 (1.22%) CCNP
15 19 (1.00%) Oracle Certification
16 18 (0.95%) Microsoft Certification
16 18 (0.95%) OCP
17 17 (0.90%) CompTIA CySA+
18 16 (0.85%) AWS Certified Solutions Architect
19 15 (0.79%) CISM
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 81 (4.28%) NIST
2 70 (3.70%) ISO/IEC 27001
3 53 (2.80%) QA
4 47 (2.48%) SLA
5 31 (1.64%) GDPR
6 30 (1.59%) Cyber Essentials
7 24 (1.27%) NCSC
8 18 (0.95%) PCI DSS
9 11 (0.58%) Disclosure Scotland
9 11 (0.58%) Sarbanes-Oxley
10 10 (0.53%) Data Quality
10 10 (0.53%) HIPAA
11 9 (0.48%) GRC
12 8 (0.42%) GLBA
12 8 (0.42%) NIST 800
13 7 (0.37%) Accessibility
14 6 (0.32%) ISO 31000
15 5 (0.26%) California Consumer Privacy Act
15 5 (0.26%) DICOM
15 5 (0.26%) SOC 2
System Software
1 314 (16.60%) Docker
2 223 (11.79%) VMware Infrastructure
3 188 (9.94%) Active Directory
4 79 (4.18%) Virtual Machines
5 71 (3.75%) Hyper-V
6 70 (3.70%) vSphere
7 65 (3.44%) VMware ESXi
8 50 (2.64%) NFS
9 42 (2.22%) VMware NSX
10 38 (2.01%) Firmware
11 27 (1.43%) KVM
12 26 (1.37%) GPFS
13 19 (1.00%) Oracle RAC
14 17 (0.90%) Postfix
15 15 (0.79%) Slurm Workload Manager
16 12 (0.63%) Ceph
17 9 (0.48%) Microsoft App-V
18 7 (0.37%) BitLocker
18 7 (0.37%) Embedded Firmware
18 7 (0.37%) Lustre
Systems Management
1 395 (20.88%) Kubernetes
2 384 (20.30%) Ansible
3 354 (18.71%) Terraform
4 178 (9.41%) Grafana
5 145 (7.66%) Prometheus
6 72 (3.81%) Puppet
7 44 (2.33%) Progress Chef
8 43 (2.27%) vCenter Server
9 33 (1.74%) Oracle RMAN
10 31 (1.64%) vRealize
11 30 (1.59%) Podman
12 29 (1.53%) Kibana
12 29 (1.53%) Red Hat Satellite
13 24 (1.27%) Nagios
13 24 (1.27%) ZABBIX
14 22 (1.16%) Argo
14 22 (1.16%) Data Guard
15 21 (1.11%) Packer
16 20 (1.06%) Single Sign-On
16 20 (1.06%) Tivoli
Vendors
1 308 (16.28%) VMware
2 259 (13.69%) Microsoft
3 257 (13.58%) Oracle
4 218 (11.52%) Red Hat
5 190 (10.04%) Splunk
6 117 (6.18%) Cisco
7 95 (5.02%) IBM
8 81 (4.28%) ServiceNow
9 50 (2.64%) Palo Alto
10 45 (2.38%) CyberArk
11 40 (2.11%) Dell
12 35 (1.85%) HP
12 35 (1.85%) SolarWinds
13 34 (1.80%) Google
14 32 (1.69%) NVIDIA
15 31 (1.64%) F5
16 29 (1.53%) Citrix
16 29 (1.53%) SAP
17 28 (1.48%) BeyondTrust
18 25 (1.32%) NetApp