MVS Contract Job Trends

IBM MVS
UK

The table below provides summary statistics and contractor rates for jobs requiring MVS skills. It covers contract job vacancies from the 6 months leading up to 9 April 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
9 Apr 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 636 515 573
Rank change year-on-year -121 +58 +161
Contract jobs citing MVS 4 10 16
As % of all contract jobs in the UK 0.009% 0.034% 0.036%
As % of the Operating Systems category 0.083% 0.24% 0.27%
Number of daily rates quoted 3 4 4
10th Percentile £423 £382 -
25th Percentile £457 £394 £413
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £514 £400 £425
Median % change year-on-year +28.50% -5.88% -43.33%
75th Percentile £650 £423 £491
90th Percentile £680 £466 £586
UK excluding London median daily rate £514 - £600

All Operating Systems
UK

MVS 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 4,794 4,107 5,963
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the UK 10.47% 14.05% 13.55%
Number of daily rates quoted 3,134 2,739 3,991
10th Percentile £181 £200 £181
25th Percentile £300 £325 £290
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £450 £475 £463
Median % change year-on-year -5.26% +2.70% -9.76%
75th Percentile £570 £600 £594
90th Percentile £657 £699 £700
UK excluding London median daily rate £425 £450 £448
% change year-on-year -5.56% +0.56% -5.79%
Number of hourly rates quoted 338 173 408
10th Percentile £15.50 £16.63 £12.75
25th Percentile £19.00 £18.13 £15.50
Median hourly rate £25.52 £24.66 £22.00
Median % change year-on-year +3.47% +12.09% -24.91%
75th Percentile £65.00 £63.75 £57.50
90th Percentile £75.00 £68.14 £68.63
UK excluding London median hourly rate £25.21 £24.42 £20.00
% change year-on-year +3.21% +22.10% -24.53%

MVS
Job Vacancy Trend

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

MVS job vacancy trend in the UK

MVS
Daily Rate Trend

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

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

MVS
Daily Rate Histogram

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing MVS over the 6 months to 9 April 2026.

Daily rate histogram for MVS in the UK

MVS
Hourly Rate Trend

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

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

MVS
Top 9 Contract Job Locations

The table below looks at the demand and provides a guide to the median contractor rates quoted in IT jobs citing MVS within the UK over the 6 months to 9 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
UK excluding London -97 4 £514 - 1
England -127 4 £514 +28.50% 1
Work from Home -34 2 £607 +40.92%
North of England - 2 £607 -
South East -56 1 - -
Yorkshire - 1 £514 -
East Midlands - 1 £500 - 1
Midlands - 1 £500 - 1
North West - 1 £700 -

MVS
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 1 (25.00%) SAS
Applications
1 1 (25.00%) Microsoft Office
Database & Business Intelligence
1 1 (25.00%) DB2
1 1 (25.00%) Relational Database
General
1 3 (75.00%) Finance
2 1 (25.00%) Banking
2 1 (25.00%) Social Skills
Job Titles
1 1 (25.00%) Administrator
1 1 (25.00%) Automation Engineer
1 1 (25.00%) DB2 Specialist
1 1 (25.00%) Designer
1 1 (25.00%) Mainframe Systems Engineer
1 1 (25.00%) Service Designer
1 1 (25.00%) Systems Engineer
1 1 (25.00%) Technical Specialist
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 1 (25.00%) ISPF
1 1 (25.00%) REST
Miscellaneous
1 3 (75.00%) Mainframe
2 2 (50.00%) IBM Mainframe
Operating Systems
1 2 (50.00%) zOS
2 1 (25.00%) Windows
2 1 (25.00%) Windows Server
Processes & Methodologies
1 2 (50.00%) ITIL
2 1 (25.00%) Agile
2 1 (25.00%) API Integration
2 1 (25.00%) Architectural Design
2 1 (25.00%) Computer Science
2 1 (25.00%) Data Pipeline
2 1 (25.00%) Disaster Recovery
2 1 (25.00%) Functional Testing
2 1 (25.00%) Performance Tuning
2 1 (25.00%) Problem-Solving
2 1 (25.00%) Roadmaps
2 1 (25.00%) Root Cause Analysis
2 1 (25.00%) Service Design
2 1 (25.00%) Stakeholder Management
2 1 (25.00%) Target Operating Model
2 1 (25.00%) Technical Leadership
2 1 (25.00%) Web Development
2 1 (25.00%) Workshop Facilitation
Programming Languages
1 3 (75.00%) REXX
2 2 (50.00%) JCL
3 1 (25.00%) CLIST
Qualifications
1 2 (50.00%) Degree
2 1 (25.00%) Computer Science Degree
System Software
1 1 (25.00%) ACF2
1 1 (25.00%) Job Entry Subsystem
1 1 (25.00%) RACF
Systems Management
1 1 (25.00%) Control-M
Vendors
1 2 (50.00%) IBM
2 1 (25.00%) BMC
2 1 (25.00%) Broadcom
2 1 (25.00%) CyberArk
2 1 (25.00%) Microsoft
2 1 (25.00%) ServiceNow
2 1 (25.00%) Splunk