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 17 June 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
17 Jun 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 367 234 297
Rank change year-on-year -133 +63 -43
Contract jobs citing Open Source 291 344 321
As % of all contract jobs in the UK 0.58% 1.16% 0.74%
As % of the Processes & Methodologies category 0.68% 1.27% 0.87%
Number of daily rates quoted 141 202 214
10th Percentile £410 £400 £358
25th Percentile £485 £449 £450
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £550 £525 £570
Median % change year-on-year +4.76% -7.89% -5.00%
75th Percentile £650 £600 £675
90th Percentile £775 £725 £775
UK excluding London median daily rate £500 £478 £585
% change year-on-year +4.71% -18.38% +1.74%
Number of hourly rates quoted 1 0 14
10th Percentile - - £20.12
25th Percentile - - £21.25
Median hourly rate £85.00 - £26.97
75th Percentile - - £57.50
90th Percentile - - £72.90
UK excluding London median hourly rate - - £37.62

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 42,679 27,009 37,072
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the UK 84.81% 91.00% 85.05%
Number of daily rates quoted 26,607 17,137 23,609
10th Percentile £325 £300 £300
25th Percentile £413 £406 £413
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £513 £508 £525
Median % change year-on-year +0.99% -3.33% -4.55%
75th Percentile £619 £625 £638
90th Percentile £725 £738 £750
UK excluding London median daily rate £500 £475 £500
% change year-on-year +5.26% -5.00% -
Number of hourly rates quoted 2,567 1,242 2,598
10th Percentile £14.82 £14.20 £12.75
25th Percentile £20.09 £17.87 £16.03
Median hourly rate £43.96 £26.27 £37.34
Median % change year-on-year +67.37% -29.66% +6.69%
75th Percentile £68.00 £55.25 £61.30
90th Percentile £81.25 £73.75 £72.50
UK excluding London median hourly rate £44.50 £25.15 £38.12
% change year-on-year +76.94% -34.02% +17.29%

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 17 June 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
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 17 June 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 -156 221 £550 - 787
London -117 118 £600 - 165
UK excluding London -109 107 £500 +4.71% 866
Work from Home -95 106 £550 -4.35% 859
North of England -74 22 £500 +7.82% 161
Scotland -25 20 £675 +28.57% 108
South West -15 18 £538 +9.14% 68
West Midlands -45 18 £472 -5.60% 49
Midlands -55 18 £472 -5.60% 101
South East -62 17 £430 -14.10% 174
East of England -21 13 £550 +52.49% 142
Yorkshire -52 11 £506 - 56
North West -45 10 £415 -10.27% 69

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 17 (5.84%) Confluence
2 8 (2.75%) Apache
2 8 (2.75%) Appian
2 8 (2.75%) SharePoint
3 5 (1.72%) SAS
4 4 (1.37%) nginx
5 3 (1.03%) Apache Airflow
5 3 (1.03%) OpenStack
6 2 (0.69%) Apache Spark
7 1 (0.34%) Apache Pulsar
7 1 (0.34%) Apache Superset
Applications
1 3 (1.03%) Chatbot
Cloud Services
1 141 (48.45%) AWS
2 85 (29.21%) Azure
3 48 (16.49%) GCP
4 42 (14.43%) GitHub
5 32 (11.00%) Amazon S3
6 25 (8.59%) Amazon CloudWatch
6 25 (8.59%) Serverless
7 22 (7.56%) Amazon EC2
8 20 (6.87%) Azure AI
8 20 (6.87%) GitHub Actions
9 17 (5.84%) AWS Lambda
10 14 (4.81%) Anthropic Claude
11 13 (4.47%) Azure DevOps
11 13 (4.47%) Google Gemini
11 13 (4.47%) Route 53
12 12 (4.12%) Amazon SQS
12 12 (4.12%) Vertex AI
13 11 (3.78%) AWS KMS
14 10 (3.44%) Azure Cognitive Services
15 9 (3.09%) Amazon Bedrock
Communications & Networking
1 9 (3.09%) Firewall
2 7 (2.41%) Reverse Proxy
3 6 (2.06%) SNMP
4 5 (1.72%) DNS
4 5 (1.72%) WAN
5 3 (1.03%) Intrusion Detection
5 3 (1.03%) Network Security
6 2 (0.69%) DHCP
6 2 (0.69%) NaaS
7 1 (0.34%) 5G
7 1 (0.34%) HTTPS
7 1 (0.34%) LTE
7 1 (0.34%) MQTT
7 1 (0.34%) NAS
7 1 (0.34%) NGFW
7 1 (0.34%) SAN
7 1 (0.34%) SSH
7 1 (0.34%) SSL
Database & Business Intelligence
1 46 (15.81%) PostgreSQL
2 30 (10.31%) Apache Cassandra
3 20 (6.87%) Amazon RDS
4 17 (5.84%) DynamoDB
5 15 (5.15%) BigQuery
6 14 (4.81%) MongoDB
7 11 (3.78%) Amazon Aurora
7 11 (3.78%) Pinecone
7 11 (3.78%) SQL Server
8 9 (3.09%) Amazon Athena
8 9 (3.09%) Amazon Redshift
9 8 (2.75%) Data Warehouse
9 8 (2.75%) NoSQL
9 8 (2.75%) Relational Database
10 7 (2.41%) Amazon QuickSight
11 6 (2.06%) Big Data
11 6 (2.06%) Data Lake
11 6 (2.06%) Metadata
12 5 (1.72%) Apache Iceberg
12 5 (1.72%) RDBMS
Development Applications
1 60 (20.62%) Git
2 33 (11.34%) GitLab
3 26 (8.93%) JUnit
4 25 (8.59%) Jenkins
5 18 (6.19%) JIRA
5 18 (6.19%) SonarQube
6 14 (4.81%) Sonatype Nexus
7 11 (3.78%) Bitbucket Server
7 11 (3.78%) DbUnit
7 11 (3.78%) jMock
7 11 (3.78%) Maven
7 11 (3.78%) MLflow
7 11 (3.78%) Mockito
8 8 (2.75%) CircleCI
8 8 (2.75%) Gradle
8 8 (2.75%) IntelliJ
9 5 (1.72%) Artifactory
9 5 (1.72%) PowerDesigner
10 2 (0.69%) Cypress.io
10 2 (0.69%) Liquibase
General
1 67 (23.02%) Social Skills
2 61 (20.96%) Finance
3 45 (15.46%) Public Sector
4 22 (7.56%) Legal
5 21 (7.22%) Analytical Skills
6 20 (6.87%) Banking
7 11 (3.78%) Law
8 8 (2.75%) Retail
9 6 (2.06%) Inclusion and Diversity
9 6 (2.06%) Military
10 5 (1.72%) Documentation Skills
10 5 (1.72%) Front Office
11 3 (1.03%) Presentation Skills
11 3 (1.03%) Telecoms
12 2 (0.69%) Billing
12 2 (0.69%) Marketing
12 2 (0.69%) Police
12 2 (0.69%) Publishing
13 1 (0.34%) Electronics
13 1 (0.34%) Manufacturing
Job Titles
1 72 (24.74%) Developer
2 57 (19.59%) Architect
3 53 (18.21%) Senior
4 30 (10.31%) Senior Developer
5 29 (9.97%) Solutions Architect
6 28 (9.62%) Artificial Intelligence Engineer
7 27 (9.28%) Software Engineer
8 24 (8.25%) AWS Architect
9 22 (7.56%) Data Engineer
10 16 (5.50%) AWS Solution Architect
10 16 (5.50%) Cloud Engineer
11 14 (4.81%) Consultant
11 14 (4.81%) Java Developer
12 13 (4.47%) Lead
13 12 (4.12%) Senior Data Engineer
14 11 (3.78%) Android Developer
14 11 (3.78%) Python Developer
15 10 (3.44%) AWS Engineer
15 10 (3.44%) Cloud Architect
15 10 (3.44%) GCP Engineer
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 66 (22.68%) Kafka
2 46 (15.81%) REST
3 31 (10.65%) gRPC
3 31 (10.65%) RESTful
4 28 (9.62%) React
5 24 (8.25%) Spring
5 24 (8.25%) Spring Boot
6 23 (7.90%) Node.js
7 22 (7.56%) Web Services
8 21 (7.22%) AngularJS
9 20 (6.87%) LangChain
10 17 (5.84%) Android Jetpack
10 17 (5.84%) Jetpack Compose
11 16 (5.50%) .NET
11 16 (5.50%) Hugging Face
11 16 (5.50%) PyTorch
11 16 (5.50%) TensorFlow
12 15 (5.15%) OpenTelemetry
13 13 (4.47%) SOAP
14 12 (4.12%) Django
Miscellaneous
1 53 (18.21%) Distributed Systems
2 48 (16.49%) Cloud Native
3 17 (5.84%) AI Agents
4 16 (5.50%) Product Ownership
5 10 (3.44%) Legacy Systems
6 9 (3.09%) Enterprise Software
6 9 (3.09%) Mobile App
7 8 (2.75%) Data Protection Act
7 8 (2.75%) Low-Code
7 8 (2.75%) Virtual Team
8 7 (2.41%) Legacy Code
9 6 (2.06%) Data Centre
9 6 (2.06%) Management Information System
9 6 (2.06%) Onboarding
9 6 (2.06%) Self-Motivation
10 5 (1.72%) Cyber Threat
10 5 (1.72%) Security Posture
11 3 (1.03%) Clustering
11 3 (1.03%) Cyber Kill Chain
12 2 (0.69%) CMDB
Operating Systems
1 46 (15.81%) Linux
2 19 (6.53%) Android
3 4 (1.37%) Debian
3 4 (1.37%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
3 4 (1.37%) Rocky
3 4 (1.37%) Ubuntu
3 4 (1.37%) Unix
4 3 (1.03%) Apple iOS
4 3 (1.03%) Windows
5 1 (0.34%) VMS
5 1 (0.34%) Windows 7
Processes & Methodologies
1 99 (34.02%) CI/CD
2 84 (28.87%) AI
3 74 (25.43%) Software Engineering
4 73 (25.09%) Microservices
5 70 (24.05%) Agile
6 68 (23.37%) DevOps
7 61 (20.96%) Containerisation
8 60 (20.62%) LLM
9 51 (17.53%) Stakeholder Management
10 47 (16.15%) Infrastructure as Code
11 43 (14.78%) Machine Learning
12 41 (14.09%) Generative AI
12 41 (14.09%) Observability
13 38 (13.06%) Data Pipeline
14 36 (12.37%) Retrieval-Augmented Generation
15 33 (11.34%) Event-Driven
16 32 (11.00%) Problem-Solving
17 27 (9.28%) Event-Driven Architecture
17 27 (9.28%) Prompt Engineering
18 26 (8.93%) Continuous Integration
Programming Languages
1 129 (44.33%) Python
2 53 (18.21%) Java
3 42 (14.43%) SQL
4 41 (14.09%) Go
5 21 (7.22%) JavaScript
6 18 (6.19%) Bash
6 18 (6.19%) Kotlin
6 18 (6.19%) TypeScript
7 16 (5.50%) C#
8 6 (2.06%) Shell Script
9 5 (1.72%) C++
9 5 (1.72%) PowerShell
10 4 (1.37%) PL/SQL
10 4 (1.37%) Ruby
11 3 (1.03%) Scala
12 2 (0.69%) Kusto Query Language
13 1 (0.34%) Bicep
13 1 (0.34%) Groovy
13 1 (0.34%) Rust
13 1 (0.34%) Swift
Qualifications
1 83 (28.52%) Security Cleared
2 67 (23.02%) SC Cleared
3 30 (10.31%) Degree
4 15 (5.15%) Computer Science Degree
5 13 (4.47%) BPSS Clearance
6 8 (2.75%) DV Cleared
7 7 (2.41%) AWS Certification
8 5 (1.72%) Azure Certification
9 4 (1.37%) AWS Certified Solutions Architect
10 3 (1.03%) CISM
10 3 (1.03%) CISSP
11 2 (0.69%) AWS Certified DevOps Engineer
11 2 (0.69%) Master's Degree
11 2 (0.69%) PhD
12 1 (0.34%) CEH
12 1 (0.34%) GCIA
12 1 (0.34%) GIAC
12 1 (0.34%) ISEB
12 1 (0.34%) MPhil
12 1 (0.34%) SSCP
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 16 (5.50%) QA
2 12 (4.12%) Accessibility
3 10 (3.44%) Data Quality
4 6 (2.06%) WCAG
5 4 (1.37%) NIST
6 3 (1.03%) ISO/IEC 27001
7 2 (0.69%) Disclosure Scotland
7 2 (0.69%) GRC
8 1 (0.34%) Actionable Recommendations
8 1 (0.34%) GDPR
8 1 (0.34%) HIPAA
8 1 (0.34%) ISO/IEC 27002 (supersedes ISO/IEC 17799)
8 1 (0.34%) ISO/IEC 42001
8 1 (0.34%) PCI DSS
8 1 (0.34%) SOC 2
System Software
1 97 (33.33%) Docker
2 9 (3.09%) Postfix
3 7 (2.41%) Active Directory
4 4 (1.37%) Virtual Machines
5 2 (0.69%) Ceph
5 2 (0.69%) Oracle RAC
5 2 (0.69%) Slurm Workload Manager
6 1 (0.34%) Hyper-V
6 1 (0.34%) Squid
6 1 (0.34%) VMware Infrastructure
Systems Management
1 89 (30.58%) Kubernetes
2 44 (15.12%) Terraform
3 33 (11.34%) Grafana
4 28 (9.62%) Prometheus
5 17 (5.84%) Ansible
6 10 (3.44%) Istio
7 6 (2.06%) Argo
8 4 (1.37%) Puppet
8 4 (1.37%) Salt
9 2 (0.69%) Amdocs OSS
9 2 (0.69%) Data Guard
9 2 (0.69%) Oracle RMAN
9 2 (0.69%) Rancher
10 1 (0.34%) CASB
10 1 (0.34%) Control-M
10 1 (0.34%) HAProxy
10 1 (0.34%) MOM
10 1 (0.34%) QRadar
10 1 (0.34%) WMI
Vendors
1 31 (10.65%) Google
1 31 (10.65%) OpenAI
2 24 (8.25%) Microsoft
3 18 (6.19%) Dynatrace
4 12 (4.12%) Oracle
5 11 (3.78%) Atlassian
5 11 (3.78%) Jaspersoft
5 11 (3.78%) Splunk
6 8 (2.75%) Automation Anywhere
6 8 (2.75%) UiPath
7 7 (2.41%) Checkmarx
8 5 (1.72%) Black Duck
8 5 (1.72%) Cribl.io
8 5 (1.72%) Denodo
8 5 (1.72%) IBM
8 5 (1.72%) Informatica
8 5 (1.72%) ServiceNow
9 4 (1.37%) Fortinet
10 3 (1.03%) Sonatype
10 3 (1.03%) VMware