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 20 May 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
20 May 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 340 249 289
Rank change year-on-year -91 +40 -28
Contract jobs citing Open Source 303 313 328
As % of all contract jobs in the UK 0.63% 1.07% 0.77%
As % of the Processes & Methodologies category 0.75% 1.18% 0.89%
Number of daily rates quoted 143 201 216
10th Percentile £402 £400 £363
25th Percentile £466 £450 £450
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £550 £550 £570
Median % change year-on-year - -3.51% -5.00%
75th Percentile £641 £638 £675
90th Percentile £785 £838 £775
UK excluding London median daily rate £500 £470 £585
% change year-on-year +6.38% -19.66% +0.69%
Number of hourly rates quoted 1 1 8
10th Percentile - - -
25th Percentile £61.25 - £25.99
Median hourly rate £62.50 £95.00 £55.00
Median % change year-on-year -34.21% +72.73% -33.33%
75th Percentile £63.75 - £72.90
90th Percentile - - £74.65
UK excluding London median hourly rate - - £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 40,582 26,548 36,652
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the UK 84.29% 91.02% 86.13%
Number of daily rates quoted 25,477 17,040 23,631
10th Percentile £325 £305 £300
25th Percentile £413 £409 £413
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £510 £514 £525
Median % change year-on-year -0.88% -2.10% -4.55%
75th Percentile £613 £625 £638
90th Percentile £725 £738 £750
UK excluding London median daily rate £495 £475 £500
% change year-on-year +4.21% -5.00% -
Number of hourly rates quoted 2,387 1,106 2,443
10th Percentile £14.82 £14.35 £12.75
25th Percentile £19.80 £18.13 £16.00
Median hourly rate £42.50 £28.17 £36.05
Median % change year-on-year +50.90% -21.86% +0.13%
75th Percentile £67.50 £60.00 £60.00
90th Percentile £79.70 £75.00 £72.50
UK excluding London median hourly rate £45.00 £25.15 £37.50
% change year-on-year +78.93% -32.93% +7.14%

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 20 May 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 20 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 -125 238 £550 -4.35% 202
London -94 124 £600 - 114
UK excluding London -77 113 £500 +6.38% 104
Work from Home -70 112 £550 -8.33% 92
North of England -64 27 £463 -0.54% 18
West Midlands -39 20 £475 +4.11% 4
Midlands -59 20 £475 +4.11% 8
South West -23 19 £550 +34.15% 19
Scotland -19 18 £675 +28.57% 4
South East -64 17 £400 -20.00% 33
North West -40 16 £450 -2.70% 13
East of England -25 13 £550 +37.50% 18
Yorkshire -53 10 £485 - 5

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 (5.61%) Confluence
2 9 (2.97%) Apache
3 8 (2.64%) Appian
3 8 (2.64%) SharePoint
4 5 (1.65%) SAS
5 4 (1.32%) Apache Airflow
5 4 (1.32%) nginx
5 4 (1.32%) OpenStack
6 3 (0.99%) Adobe Experience Manager
6 3 (0.99%) Apache Spark
7 2 (0.66%) Liferay
7 2 (0.66%) WebLogic
8 1 (0.33%) Apache Superset
Applications
1 3 (0.99%) Chatbot
Business Applications
1 2 (0.66%) Oracle EBS
1 2 (0.66%) Oracle EBS R12
Cloud Services
1 158 (52.15%) AWS
2 84 (27.72%) Azure
3 42 (13.86%) GitHub
4 41 (13.53%) GCP
5 37 (12.21%) Amazon S3
6 29 (9.57%) Serverless
7 24 (7.92%) Amazon CloudWatch
8 22 (7.26%) Amazon EC2
9 20 (6.60%) Azure AI
10 18 (5.94%) GitHub Actions
11 17 (5.61%) AWS Lambda
12 14 (4.62%) Google Gemini
13 13 (4.29%) Azure DevOps
13 13 (4.29%) Route 53
14 12 (3.96%) Amazon SQS
15 11 (3.63%) Anthropic Claude
15 11 (3.63%) AWS KMS
16 10 (3.30%) Azure Cognitive Services
17 9 (2.97%) Azure Data Factory
17 9 (2.97%) Vertex AI
Communications & Networking
1 12 (3.96%) Firewall
2 7 (2.31%) Reverse Proxy
3 6 (1.98%) SNMP
3 6 (1.98%) WAN
4 5 (1.65%) DNS
5 3 (0.99%) DHCP
5 3 (0.99%) Intrusion Detection
5 3 (0.99%) Network Security
6 2 (0.66%) NaaS
6 2 (0.66%) SSH
6 2 (0.66%) TCP/IP
6 2 (0.66%) VLAN
7 1 (0.33%) HTTPS
7 1 (0.33%) iSCSI
7 1 (0.33%) Kerberos
7 1 (0.33%) LAN
7 1 (0.33%) LTE
7 1 (0.33%) NGFW
7 1 (0.33%) SAN
7 1 (0.33%) SSL
Database & Business Intelligence
1 49 (16.17%) PostgreSQL
2 40 (13.20%) Apache Cassandra
3 22 (7.26%) DynamoDB
4 19 (6.27%) Amazon RDS
5 15 (4.95%) BigQuery
5 15 (4.95%) SQL Server
6 13 (4.29%) MongoDB
7 12 (3.96%) Pinecone
8 11 (3.63%) Amazon Aurora
9 10 (3.30%) NoSQL
10 9 (2.97%) Amazon Athena
10 9 (2.97%) Amazon Redshift
10 9 (2.97%) Data Warehouse
11 7 (2.31%) Amazon QuickSight
12 6 (1.98%) Data Lake
12 6 (1.98%) Metadata
12 6 (1.98%) Redis
12 6 (1.98%) Relational Database
13 5 (1.65%) Big Data
13 5 (1.65%) RDBMS
Development Applications
1 60 (19.80%) Git
2 30 (9.90%) GitLab
3 26 (8.58%) Jenkins
4 24 (7.92%) JUnit
5 20 (6.60%) JIRA
6 18 (5.94%) SonarQube
7 12 (3.96%) Sonatype Nexus
8 11 (3.63%) Bitbucket Server
8 11 (3.63%) DbUnit
8 11 (3.63%) jMock
8 11 (3.63%) Maven
8 11 (3.63%) MLflow
8 11 (3.63%) Mockito
9 8 (2.64%) IntelliJ
10 6 (1.98%) CircleCI
10 6 (1.98%) Gradle
11 5 (1.65%) Artifactory
12 4 (1.32%) PowerDesigner
13 3 (0.99%) Cucumber
13 3 (0.99%) Jasmine
General
1 67 (22.11%) Social Skills
2 60 (19.80%) Finance
3 48 (15.84%) Public Sector
4 23 (7.59%) Analytical Skills
5 19 (6.27%) Legal
6 18 (5.94%) Banking
7 8 (2.64%) Retail
8 7 (2.31%) Law
9 6 (1.98%) Front Office
9 6 (1.98%) Military
10 5 (1.65%) Documentation Skills
11 3 (0.99%) Inclusion and Diversity
11 3 (0.99%) Presentation Skills
11 3 (0.99%) Publishing
11 3 (0.99%) Telecoms
12 2 (0.66%) Billing
12 2 (0.66%) Marketing
12 2 (0.66%) Police
13 1 (0.33%) Influencing Skills
13 1 (0.33%) Organisational Skills
Job Titles
1 80 (26.40%) Developer
2 58 (19.14%) Senior
3 57 (18.81%) Architect
4 33 (10.89%) Software Engineer
5 32 (10.56%) Senior Developer
6 30 (9.90%) Solutions Architect
7 27 (8.91%) Artificial Intelligence Engineer
8 22 (7.26%) AWS Architect
8 22 (7.26%) Data Engineer
9 15 (4.95%) AWS Solution Architect
9 15 (4.95%) Cloud Engineer
10 14 (4.62%) Consultant
10 14 (4.62%) Java Developer
11 12 (3.96%) Python Developer
11 12 (3.96%) Senior Data Engineer
12 10 (3.30%) Android Developer
12 10 (3.30%) AWS Engineer
12 10 (3.30%) Cloud Architect
12 10 (3.30%) GCP Engineer
12 10 (3.30%) Lead
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 74 (24.42%) Kafka
2 44 (14.52%) REST
3 42 (13.86%) gRPC
4 33 (10.89%) RESTful
5 29 (9.57%) Node.js
5 29 (9.57%) Spring
5 29 (9.57%) Spring Boot
6 27 (8.91%) React
7 26 (8.58%) AngularJS
8 24 (7.92%) Web Services
9 21 (6.93%) .NET
9 21 (6.93%) LangChain
10 16 (5.28%) Hugging Face
10 16 (5.28%) PyTorch
11 15 (4.95%) OpenTelemetry
12 14 (4.62%) Android Jetpack
12 14 (4.62%) Jetpack Compose
12 14 (4.62%) TensorFlow
13 12 (3.96%) Django
13 12 (3.96%) SOAP
Miscellaneous
1 61 (20.13%) Distributed Systems
2 43 (14.19%) Cloud Native
3 21 (6.93%) Product Ownership
4 10 (3.30%) Legacy Systems
5 9 (2.97%) Legacy Code
5 9 (2.97%) Onboarding
6 8 (2.64%) AI Agents
6 8 (2.64%) Low-Code
7 7 (2.31%) Data Protection Act
8 6 (1.98%) Enterprise Software
8 6 (1.98%) Virtual Team
9 5 (1.65%) Cyber Threat
9 5 (1.65%) Data Centre
9 5 (1.65%) Mobile App
10 4 (1.32%) Management Information System
10 4 (1.32%) Self-Motivation
11 3 (0.99%) Clustering
11 3 (0.99%) Foreign Exchange (FX)
11 3 (0.99%) PKI
11 3 (0.99%) Thin Client
Operating Systems
1 52 (17.16%) Linux
2 16 (5.28%) Android
3 9 (2.97%) Windows
4 6 (1.98%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
5 5 (1.65%) Unix
6 4 (1.32%) Debian
6 4 (1.32%) Rocky
6 4 (1.32%) Ubuntu
7 3 (0.99%) Apple iOS
7 3 (0.99%) Windows 7
8 2 (0.66%) VMS
8 2 (0.66%) Windows Server
Processes & Methodologies
1 89 (29.37%) CI/CD
2 84 (27.72%) Software Engineering
3 82 (27.06%) Microservices
4 77 (25.41%) AI
5 72 (23.76%) Agile
6 67 (22.11%) DevOps
7 63 (20.79%) Containerisation
8 53 (17.49%) LLM
9 49 (16.17%) Stakeholder Management
10 42 (13.86%) Data Pipeline
10 42 (13.86%) Infrastructure as Code
10 42 (13.86%) Machine Learning
11 41 (13.53%) Generative AI
12 38 (12.54%) Observability
13 36 (11.88%) Problem-Solving
14 34 (11.22%) Retrieval-Augmented Generation
15 30 (9.90%) TDD
16 28 (9.24%) Continuous Integration
17 27 (8.91%) Event-Driven
18 26 (8.58%) Prompt Engineering
Programming Languages
1 130 (42.90%) Python
2 55 (18.15%) Java
3 54 (17.82%) Go
4 51 (16.83%) SQL
5 22 (7.26%) C#
6 21 (6.93%) Bash
6 21 (6.93%) JavaScript
6 21 (6.93%) TypeScript
7 15 (4.95%) Kotlin
8 7 (2.31%) PowerShell
8 7 (2.31%) Ruby
9 6 (1.98%) PL/SQL
9 6 (1.98%) Shell Script
10 4 (1.32%) Delphi
10 4 (1.32%) PHP
11 3 (0.99%) C++
12 2 (0.66%) Kusto Query Language
12 2 (0.66%) Scala
13 1 (0.33%) Bicep
13 1 (0.33%) R
Qualifications
1 91 (30.03%) Security Cleared
2 70 (23.10%) SC Cleared
3 26 (8.58%) Degree
4 12 (3.96%) BPSS Clearance
5 11 (3.63%) Computer Science Degree
6 10 (3.30%) DV Cleared
7 5 (1.65%) AWS Certification
7 5 (1.65%) Azure Certification
8 3 (0.99%) CISM
8 3 (0.99%) CISSP
8 3 (0.99%) Master's Degree
8 3 (0.99%) PhD
9 2 (0.66%) AWS Certified Solutions Architect
10 1 (0.33%) CEH
10 1 (0.33%) GCIA
10 1 (0.33%) GIAC
10 1 (0.33%) ISEB
10 1 (0.33%) Microsoft Certified Professional
10 1 (0.33%) MPhil
10 1 (0.33%) SSCP
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 16 (5.28%) QA
2 10 (3.30%) Accessibility
2 10 (3.30%) Data Quality
3 4 (1.32%) NIST
3 4 (1.32%) WCAG
4 3 (0.99%) ISO/IEC 27001
5 1 (0.33%) GDPR
5 1 (0.33%) GRC
5 1 (0.33%) HIPAA
5 1 (0.33%) ISO/IEC 27002 (supersedes ISO/IEC 17799)
5 1 (0.33%) ISO/IEC 42001
5 1 (0.33%) PCI DSS
5 1 (0.33%) SLA
5 1 (0.33%) SOC 2
System Software
1 103 (33.99%) Docker
2 10 (3.30%) Active Directory
3 9 (2.97%) Postfix
4 5 (1.65%) Virtual Machines
5 4 (1.32%) Ceph
5 4 (1.32%) Oracle RAC
6 3 (0.99%) ISA Server
7 2 (0.66%) KVM
7 2 (0.66%) Oracle Clusterware
8 1 (0.33%) Hyper-V
8 1 (0.33%) iptables
8 1 (0.33%) Lustre
8 1 (0.33%) NFS
8 1 (0.33%) Samba
8 1 (0.33%) Slurm Workload Manager
8 1 (0.33%) Squid
8 1 (0.33%) VMware Infrastructure
Systems Management
1 91 (30.03%) Kubernetes
2 40 (13.20%) Terraform
3 36 (11.88%) Grafana
4 29 (9.57%) Prometheus
5 16 (5.28%) Ansible
6 10 (3.30%) Istio
7 6 (1.98%) Argo
8 4 (1.32%) Data Guard
8 4 (1.32%) Oracle RMAN
8 4 (1.32%) Puppet
8 4 (1.32%) Salt
9 3 (0.99%) WMI
10 2 (0.66%) Amdocs OSS
10 2 (0.66%) HAProxy
10 2 (0.66%) Knative
10 2 (0.66%) Rancher
11 1 (0.33%) CASB
11 1 (0.33%) MOM
11 1 (0.33%) QRadar
11 1 (0.33%) SELinux
Vendors
1 28 (9.24%) Google
2 26 (8.58%) OpenAI
3 22 (7.26%) Microsoft
4 18 (5.94%) Dynatrace
5 13 (4.29%) Splunk
6 12 (3.96%) Oracle
7 11 (3.63%) Atlassian
7 11 (3.63%) Jaspersoft
8 9 (2.97%) UiPath
9 8 (2.64%) Automation Anywhere
10 7 (2.31%) Checkmarx
11 5 (1.65%) Cribl.io
11 5 (1.65%) Denodo
11 5 (1.65%) Informatica
11 5 (1.65%) VMware
12 4 (1.32%) Databricks
12 4 (1.32%) Fortinet
12 4 (1.32%) IBM
12 4 (1.32%) ServiceNow
13 3 (0.99%) Sonatype