Open Source Contract Job Trends

Open Source
UK

The table below provides summary statistics and contractor rates for jobs requiring Open Source skills. It covers contract job vacancies from the 6 months leading up to 19 April 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
19 Apr 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 311 264 266
Rank change year-on-year -47 +2 -11
Contract jobs citing Open Source 341 286 365
As % of all contract jobs in the UK 0.74% 0.97% 0.83%
As % of the Processes & Methodologies category 0.87% 1.07% 0.97%
Number of daily rates quoted 161 204 236
10th Percentile £350 £400 £375
25th Percentile £450 £456 £475
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £550 £575 £578
Median % change year-on-year -4.35% -0.43% -3.75%
75th Percentile £650 £675 £675
90th Percentile £788 £838 £759
UK excluding London median daily rate £475 £473 £595
% change year-on-year +0.53% -20.59% +8.18%
Number of hourly rates quoted 2 1 6
10th Percentile £19.85 - £25.99
25th Percentile £26.75 - £32.61
Median hourly rate £39.00 £95.00 £63.47
Median % change year-on-year -58.95% +49.69% -15.38%
75th Percentile £51.75 - £72.90
90th Percentile £58.95 - £75.82
UK excluding London median hourly rate £15.50 - £71.93

All Process & Methodology Skills
UK

Open Source falls under the Processes and Methodologies category. For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all contract job vacancies requiring process or methodology skills.

Contract vacancies with a requirement for process or methodology skills 39,218 26,699 37,767
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the UK 84.91% 90.74% 86.40%
Number of daily rates quoted 24,782 17,291 24,442
10th Percentile £316 £306 £300
25th Percentile £413 £413 £413
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £523 £525
Median % change year-on-year -4.31% -0.48% -4.55%
75th Percentile £613 £630 £638
90th Percentile £725 £738 £750
UK excluding London median daily rate £485 £483 £500
% change year-on-year +0.41% -3.40% -
Number of hourly rates quoted 2,336 1,037 2,416
10th Percentile £14.93 £14.84 £12.75
25th Percentile £19.74 £18.51 £15.91
Median hourly rate £37.50 £30.00 £35.00
Median % change year-on-year +25.00% -14.29% -2.78%
75th Percentile £65.33 £62.50 £58.69
90th Percentile £78.13 £75.00 £71.81
UK excluding London median hourly rate £40.00 £28.88 £35.00
% change year-on-year +38.53% -17.50% -

Open Source
Job Vacancy Trend

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

Open Source job vacancy trend in the UK

Open Source
Daily Rate Trend

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

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in the UK citing Open Source

Open Source
Daily Rate Histogram

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing Open Source over the 6 months to 19 April 2026.

Daily rate histogram for Open Source in the UK

Open Source
Hourly Rate Trend

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

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in the UK citing Open Source

Open Source
Hourly Rate Histogram

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing Open Source over the 6 months to 19 April 2026.

Hourly rate histogram for Open Source in the UK

Open Source
Top 13 Contract Job Locations

The table below looks at the demand and provides a guide to the median contractor rates quoted in IT jobs citing Open Source within the UK over the 6 months to 19 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 -68 276 £550 -8.33% 140
London -53 150 £600 -2.04% 71
Work from Home -53 119 £550 -8.33% 58
UK excluding London -80 118 £475 +0.53% 78
North of England -67 31 £450 -3.23% 16
South West -11 20 £365 -40.16% 16
North West -38 20 £450 -2.96% 8
South East -41 20 £400 -20.00% 18
Scotland -5 19 £663 +33.17% 4
West Midlands -50 18 £475 +12.56% 7
Midlands -63 18 £475 +12.56% 7
East of England -29 10 £550 +37.50% 17
Yorkshire -50 10 £475 - 6

Open Source
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 15 (4.40%) Apache
2 11 (3.23%) Confluence
3 9 (2.64%) Apache Spark
4 8 (2.35%) Appian
5 6 (1.76%) JBoss
5 6 (1.76%) WebLogic
6 5 (1.47%) OpenStack
6 5 (1.47%) SharePoint
7 4 (1.17%) Apache Airflow
7 4 (1.17%) nginx
8 3 (0.88%) Adobe Experience Manager
9 2 (0.59%) Liferay
9 2 (0.59%) Tomcat
10 1 (0.29%) Apache Superset
Applications
1 3 (0.88%) Chatbot
Business Applications
1 2 (0.59%) Oracle EBS
1 2 (0.59%) Oracle EBS R12
2 1 (0.29%) Magento
2 1 (0.29%) Shopify
Cloud Services
1 170 (49.85%) AWS
2 80 (23.46%) Azure
3 44 (12.90%) GitHub
4 42 (12.32%) GCP
5 31 (9.09%) Amazon S3
6 26 (7.62%) Serverless
7 20 (5.87%) Amazon EC2
7 20 (5.87%) Azure AI
7 20 (5.87%) GitHub Actions
8 14 (4.11%) Google Gemini
9 13 (3.81%) Anthropic Claude
9 13 (3.81%) AWS Lambda
9 13 (3.81%) Azure DevOps
10 12 (3.52%) Amazon CloudWatch
11 11 (3.23%) Amazon SageMaker
11 11 (3.23%) Route 53
12 10 (2.93%) Amazon SQS
12 10 (2.93%) Azure Cognitive Services
12 10 (2.93%) Azure Data Factory
13 9 (2.64%) Vertex AI
Communications & Networking
1 14 (4.11%) Firewall
2 7 (2.05%) Reverse Proxy
3 6 (1.76%) DNS
3 6 (1.76%) WAN
4 5 (1.47%) DHCP
5 3 (0.88%) VLAN
6 2 (0.59%) NaaS
6 2 (0.59%) SSH
6 2 (0.59%) TCP/IP
7 1 (0.29%) HTTPS
7 1 (0.29%) InfiniBand
7 1 (0.29%) Internet
7 1 (0.29%) Intrusion Detection
7 1 (0.29%) iSCSI
7 1 (0.29%) LAN
7 1 (0.29%) LTE
7 1 (0.29%) NAS
7 1 (0.29%) Network Security
7 1 (0.29%) SAN
7 1 (0.29%) SSL
Database & Business Intelligence
1 54 (15.84%) Apache Cassandra
2 51 (14.96%) PostgreSQL
3 17 (4.99%) MongoDB
4 16 (4.69%) SQL Server
5 15 (4.40%) BigQuery
5 15 (4.40%) DynamoDB
6 13 (3.81%) NoSQL
6 13 (3.81%) Pinecone
7 12 (3.52%) Amazon RDS
8 9 (2.64%) Amazon Aurora
9 8 (2.35%) Metadata
9 8 (2.35%) Redis
10 7 (2.05%) Amazon QuickSight
10 7 (2.05%) Big Data
10 7 (2.05%) Relational Database
11 6 (1.76%) Flink
11 6 (1.76%) RDBMS
12 5 (1.47%) Amazon Redshift
12 5 (1.47%) Weaviate
13 4 (1.17%) Data Hub
Development Applications
1 59 (17.30%) Git
2 28 (8.21%) GitLab
3 27 (7.92%) Jenkins
4 26 (7.62%) JUnit
5 17 (4.99%) SonarQube
6 16 (4.69%) JIRA
7 12 (3.52%) IntelliJ
8 11 (3.23%) MLflow
9 9 (2.64%) Bitbucket Server
9 9 (2.64%) DbUnit
9 9 (2.64%) jMock
9 9 (2.64%) Maven
9 9 (2.64%) Mockito
10 7 (2.05%) Sonatype Nexus
11 6 (1.76%) CircleCI
11 6 (1.76%) Gradle
12 5 (1.47%) Artifactory
12 5 (1.47%) Selenium
13 4 (1.17%) Cypress.io
13 4 (1.17%) PowerDesigner
General
1 65 (19.06%) Finance
1 65 (19.06%) Social Skills
2 49 (14.37%) Public Sector
3 27 (7.92%) Banking
4 26 (7.62%) Analytical Skills
5 14 (4.11%) Legal
6 10 (2.93%) Front Office
7 8 (2.35%) Retail
8 6 (1.76%) Documentation Skills
8 6 (1.76%) Publishing
9 5 (1.47%) Influencing Skills
9 5 (1.47%) Investment Banking
9 5 (1.47%) Military
10 4 (1.17%) Financial Institution
11 3 (0.88%) Inclusion and Diversity
11 3 (0.88%) Law
11 3 (0.88%) Marketing
11 3 (0.88%) Presentation Skills
11 3 (0.88%) Telecoms
12 2 (0.59%) Police
Job Titles
1 103 (30.21%) Developer
2 69 (20.23%) Senior
3 61 (17.89%) Architect
4 43 (12.61%) Senior Developer
5 37 (10.85%) Software Engineer
6 29 (8.50%) Artificial Intelligence Engineer
7 28 (8.21%) Solutions Architect
8 21 (6.16%) AWS Architect
9 17 (4.99%) Data Engineer
10 15 (4.40%) Cloud Engineer
10 15 (4.40%) Python Developer
11 14 (4.11%) Android Developer
11 14 (4.11%) AWS Solution Architect
12 13 (3.81%) Java Developer
13 11 (3.23%) Artificial Intelligence Architect
13 11 (3.23%) Lead
14 10 (2.93%) Automation Engineer
14 10 (2.93%) Cloud Architect
14 10 (2.93%) Consultant
14 10 (2.93%) GCP Engineer
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 95 (27.86%) Kafka
2 59 (17.30%) gRPC
3 51 (14.96%) REST
4 34 (9.97%) React
5 31 (9.09%) RESTful
5 31 (9.09%) Spring
6 30 (8.80%) Node.js
7 27 (7.92%) Spring Boot
8 25 (7.33%) LangChain
9 24 (7.04%) AngularJS
9 24 (7.04%) Web Services
10 21 (6.16%) .NET
11 18 (5.28%) PyTorch
12 17 (4.99%) Hugging Face
13 16 (4.69%) TensorFlow
14 14 (4.11%) Android Jetpack
14 14 (4.11%) Jetpack Compose
14 14 (4.11%) SOAP
15 13 (3.81%) Hibernate
15 13 (3.81%) HTML
Miscellaneous
1 74 (21.70%) Distributed Systems
2 35 (10.26%) Cloud Native
3 21 (6.16%) Product Ownership
4 12 (3.52%) AI Agents
5 10 (2.93%) Legacy Systems
6 9 (2.64%) Enterprise Software
6 9 (2.64%) Legacy Code
7 8 (2.35%) Low-Code
7 8 (2.35%) Onboarding
8 7 (2.05%) Data Protection Act
8 7 (2.05%) Distributed Computing
9 6 (1.76%) Data Centre
9 6 (1.76%) Foreign Exchange (FX)
9 6 (1.76%) Mobile App
9 6 (1.76%) Virtual Team
10 5 (1.47%) Fat Client
10 5 (1.47%) PKI
10 5 (1.47%) Self-Motivation
10 5 (1.47%) Thin Client
11 4 (1.17%) Hedge funds
Operating Systems
1 48 (14.08%) Linux
2 23 (6.74%) Android
3 12 (3.52%) Windows
4 9 (2.64%) Unix
5 6 (1.76%) Apple iOS
5 6 (1.76%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
6 5 (1.47%) Windows 7
7 4 (1.17%) Ubuntu
8 3 (0.88%) Debian
8 3 (0.88%) Rocky
9 2 (0.59%) VMS
9 2 (0.59%) Windows Server
10 1 (0.29%) CentOS
Processes & Methodologies
1 105 (30.79%) Software Engineering
2 98 (28.74%) Microservices
3 93 (27.27%) CI/CD
4 88 (25.81%) AI
5 73 (21.41%) Agile
6 66 (19.35%) DevOps
7 65 (19.06%) Containerisation
8 62 (18.18%) LLM
9 51 (14.96%) Infrastructure as Code
9 51 (14.96%) Machine Learning
10 50 (14.66%) Problem-Solving
11 47 (13.78%) Generative AI
12 44 (12.90%) Stakeholder Management
13 40 (11.73%) Data Pipeline
14 36 (10.56%) Retrieval-Augmented Generation
15 33 (9.68%) Observability
16 31 (9.09%) TDD
16 31 (9.09%) Test Automation
17 30 (8.80%) Computer Science
18 28 (8.21%) Continuous Integration
Programming Languages
1 145 (42.52%) Python
2 75 (21.99%) Java
3 72 (21.11%) Go
4 52 (15.25%) SQL
5 27 (7.92%) TypeScript
6 24 (7.04%) C#
6 24 (7.04%) JavaScript
7 19 (5.57%) Kotlin
8 17 (4.99%) Bash
9 11 (3.23%) Ruby
10 10 (2.93%) Scala
11 7 (2.05%) PowerShell
12 6 (1.76%) PL/SQL
12 6 (1.76%) Shell Script
13 4 (1.17%) C++
13 4 (1.17%) Delphi
13 4 (1.17%) PHP
14 2 (0.59%) Kusto Query Language
15 1 (0.29%) F#
15 1 (0.29%) Groovy
Qualifications
1 85 (24.93%) Security Cleared
2 61 (17.89%) SC Cleared
3 33 (9.68%) Degree
4 15 (4.40%) Computer Science Degree
5 14 (4.11%) BPSS Clearance
6 12 (3.52%) DV Cleared
7 9 (2.64%) Master's Degree
8 6 (1.76%) PhD
9 5 (1.47%) AWS Certification
9 5 (1.47%) Azure Certification
10 2 (0.59%) AWS Certified Solutions Architect
11 1 (0.29%) ISEB
11 1 (0.29%) Microsoft Certified Professional
11 1 (0.29%) MPhil
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 19 (5.57%) QA
2 13 (3.81%) Accessibility
3 11 (3.23%) Data Quality
4 7 (2.05%) WCAG
5 4 (1.17%) NIST
6 3 (0.88%) ISO/IEC 27001
7 2 (0.59%) GDPR
8 1 (0.29%) GPG for Computer-Based Electronic Evidence
8 1 (0.29%) GRC
8 1 (0.29%) HIPAA
8 1 (0.29%) ISO/IEC 17025
8 1 (0.29%) ISO/IEC 27002 (supersedes ISO/IEC 17799)
8 1 (0.29%) ISO/IEC 42001
8 1 (0.29%) ISO17020
8 1 (0.29%) PCI DSS
8 1 (0.29%) SLA
8 1 (0.29%) SOC 2
System Software
1 123 (36.07%) Docker
2 13 (3.81%) Active Directory
3 8 (2.35%) Postfix
4 5 (1.47%) Ceph
4 5 (1.47%) Virtual Machines
5 4 (1.17%) Oracle RAC
6 3 (0.88%) ISA Server
6 3 (0.88%) KVM
7 2 (0.59%) Oracle Clusterware
8 1 (0.29%) Hyper-V
8 1 (0.29%) iptables
8 1 (0.29%) Lustre
8 1 (0.29%) NFS
8 1 (0.29%) QEMU
8 1 (0.29%) Samba
8 1 (0.29%) Slurm Workload Manager
8 1 (0.29%) Squid
8 1 (0.29%) VMware Infrastructure
Systems Management
1 111 (32.55%) Kubernetes
2 38 (11.14%) Terraform
3 31 (9.09%) Grafana
4 30 (8.80%) Prometheus
5 14 (4.11%) Ansible
6 10 (2.93%) Istio
7 8 (2.35%) Puppet
8 6 (1.76%) Argo
9 5 (1.47%) WMI
10 4 (1.17%) Data Guard
10 4 (1.17%) Oracle RMAN
10 4 (1.17%) Salt
11 2 (0.59%) Amdocs OSS
11 2 (0.59%) HAProxy
11 2 (0.59%) Knative
11 2 (0.59%) Rancher
12 1 (0.29%) CASB
12 1 (0.29%) MOM
12 1 (0.29%) SELinux
Vendors
1 31 (9.09%) Google
2 26 (7.62%) OpenAI
3 25 (7.33%) Microsoft
4 11 (3.23%) Atlassian
5 9 (2.64%) Dynatrace
5 9 (2.64%) Jaspersoft
5 9 (2.64%) UiPath
6 8 (2.35%) Automation Anywhere
6 8 (2.35%) Splunk
7 7 (2.05%) Checkmarx
7 7 (2.05%) Oracle
7 7 (2.05%) VMware
8 5 (1.47%) Confluent
8 5 (1.47%) Databricks
8 5 (1.47%) Red Hat
9 4 (1.17%) Cloudera
9 4 (1.17%) IBM
9 4 (1.17%) ServiceNow
9 4 (1.17%) webMethods
9 4 (1.17%) Xamarin