Public Cloud Contract Job Trends

Public Cloud
UK

The table below looks at the prevalence of the term Public Cloud in contract job vacancies. Included is a benchmarking guide to the contractor rates offered in vacancies that cited Public Cloud over the 6 months leading up to 23 November 2025, comparing them to the same period in the previous two years.

6 months to
23 Nov 2025
Same period 2024 Same period 2023
Rank 351 236 264
Rank change year-on-year -115 +28 -59
Contract jobs citing Public Cloud 247 359 437
As % of all contract jobs in the UK 0.69% 0.97% 0.94%
As % of the Miscellaneous category 1.93% 3.13% 2.95%
Number of daily rates quoted 162 228 304
10th Percentile £406 £423 £406
25th Percentile £450 £499 £500
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £550 £577 £575
Median % change year-on-year -4.72% +0.39% -4.17%
75th Percentile £675 £675 £690
90th Percentile £775 £782 £760
UK excluding London median daily rate £525 £563 £582
% change year-on-year -6.71% -3.31% +1.22%
Number of hourly rates quoted 1 4 5
10th Percentile - £45.70 £66.00
25th Percentile £42.50 £49.75 -
Median hourly rate £45.00 £56.00 £78.00
Median % change year-on-year -19.64% -28.21% +44.44%
75th Percentile £47.50 £62.88 -
90th Percentile - £71.65 -
UK excluding London median hourly rate - £66.50 £78.00
% change year-on-year - -14.74% +92.59%

All Generic Skills
UK

Public Cloud falls under the General and Transferable Skills category. For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all contract job vacancies requiring generic IT skills.

Contract vacancies with a requirement for generic IT skills 12,786 11,474 14,820
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the UK 35.78% 31.06% 31.89%
Number of daily rates quoted 7,907 6,764 9,953
10th Percentile £275 £285 £275
25th Percentile £406 £410 £419
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £510 £538 £550
Median % change year-on-year -5.12% -2.27% -
75th Percentile £638 £663 £668
90th Percentile £738 £788 £770
UK excluding London median daily rate £475 £500 £500
% change year-on-year -5.00% - -
Number of hourly rates quoted 683 387 497
10th Percentile £13.50 £16.99 £16.81
25th Percentile £18.23 £22.50 £21.00
Median hourly rate £27.21 £35.00 £44.50
Median % change year-on-year -22.26% -21.35% +34.85%
75th Percentile £55.00 £68.75 £65.00
90th Percentile £74.26 £75.16 £77.50
UK excluding London median hourly rate £27.21 £35.00 £46.18
% change year-on-year -22.26% -24.21% +74.26%

Public Cloud
Job Vacancy Trend

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

Public Cloud job vacancy trend in the UK

Public Cloud
Daily Rate Trend

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

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in the UK citing Public Cloud

Public Cloud
Daily Rate Histogram

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing Public Cloud over the 6 months to 23 November 2025.

Daily rate histogram for Public Cloud in the UK

Public Cloud
Hourly Rate Trend

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

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in the UK citing Public Cloud

Public Cloud
Top 16 Contract Job Locations

The table below looks at the demand and provides a guide to the median contractor rates quoted in IT jobs citing Public Cloud within the UK over the 6 months to 23 November 2025. 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 -112 196 £550 -4.35% 95
UK excluding London -42 143 £525 -6.71% 86
London -58 80 £602 +0.33% 24
North of England -13 64 £475 -6.40% 18
Work from Home -51 60 £588 +1.29% 57
Yorkshire +5 50 £488 -7.14% 8
Scotland +13 32 £500 -12.17% 6
Midlands -20 22 £530 +6.00% 9
West Midlands -8 16 £530 +6.00% 5
North West -34 13 £450 -10.00% 7
South West +2 12 £650 +13.04% 6
South East -53 12 £525 -14.29% 42
East of England -19 9 £413 -31.25% 2
East Midlands -10 6 £631 +28.78% 3
Wales +1 3 £214 -65.82% 5
North East -4 2 - - 3

Public Cloud
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 6 (2.43%) Confluence
1 6 (2.43%) OpenStack
2 4 (1.62%) SAS
3 3 (1.21%) Apache Airflow
4 2 (0.81%) nginx
5 1 (0.40%) Apache
5 1 (0.40%) Apache Solr
5 1 (0.40%) Apache Spark
5 1 (0.40%) SharePoint
Applications
1 7 (2.83%) Microsoft Excel
2 5 (2.02%) Weka
3 3 (1.21%) Microsoft PowerPoint
4 1 (0.40%) Adobe Premiere
4 1 (0.40%) Camtasia
Business Applications
1 29 (11.74%) SAP S/4HANA
2 7 (2.83%) SAP ERP
3 4 (1.62%) SAP FI
4 3 (1.21%) SAP CO
4 3 (1.21%) SAP FI/CO
5 1 (0.40%) Cloudability
5 1 (0.40%) SAP GRC
Cloud Services
1 141 (57.09%) AWS
2 101 (40.89%) Azure
3 90 (36.44%) GCP
4 38 (15.38%) Serverless
5 37 (14.98%) GitHub
6 24 (9.72%) GitHub Actions
7 17 (6.88%) Azure DevOps
8 14 (5.67%) SaaS
9 11 (4.45%) SuccessFactors
10 9 (3.64%) AWS KMS
11 8 (3.24%) Power Platform
12 7 (2.83%) Entra ID
12 7 (2.83%) Google Kubernetes Engine
12 7 (2.83%) IaaS
13 6 (2.43%) Cloud Computing
13 6 (2.43%) OCI
13 6 (2.43%) PaaS
14 5 (2.02%) Azure ExpressRoute
14 5 (2.02%) GitHub Copilot
14 5 (2.02%) Microsoft 365
Communications & Networking
1 26 (10.53%) Firewall
2 17 (6.88%) WAN
3 15 (6.07%) Network Security
3 15 (6.07%) VPN
4 9 (3.64%) TCP/IP
5 7 (2.83%) SD-WAN
5 7 (2.83%) VLAN
6 5 (2.02%) DNS
6 5 (2.02%) Internet
7 4 (1.62%) Cisco Nexus
7 4 (1.62%) LAN
8 3 (1.21%) BGP
8 3 (1.21%) Kerberos
8 3 (1.21%) OSPF
8 3 (1.21%) VXLAN
9 2 (0.81%) DMZ
9 2 (0.81%) Ethernet VPN
9 2 (0.81%) Junos
9 2 (0.81%) SAN
9 2 (0.81%) VSAN
Database & Business Intelligence
1 43 (17.41%) NoSQL
2 16 (6.48%) PostgreSQL
3 12 (4.86%) MongoDB
4 8 (3.24%) Power BI
5 7 (2.83%) Data Warehouse
6 6 (2.43%) Relational Database
7 4 (1.62%) BigQuery
7 4 (1.62%) Data Mining
7 4 (1.62%) Oracle Database
7 4 (1.62%) SQL Server
8 3 (1.21%) Amazon Redshift
8 3 (1.21%) MySQL
9 2 (0.81%) Apache Cassandra
9 2 (0.81%) RDBMS
9 2 (0.81%) Redis
9 2 (0.81%) SAP HANA
10 1 (0.40%) Amazon Aurora
10 1 (0.40%) Big Data
10 1 (0.40%) Data Lake
10 1 (0.40%) DynamoDB
Development Applications
1 53 (21.46%) Jenkins
2 46 (18.62%) GitLab
3 30 (12.15%) Liquibase
4 25 (10.12%) JIRA
5 20 (8.10%) Git
6 11 (4.45%) Bitbucket
7 9 (3.64%) IntelliJ
7 9 (3.64%) Visual Studio Code
8 8 (3.24%) PyCharm
8 8 (3.24%) Visual Studio
9 5 (2.02%) CircleCI
10 4 (1.62%) TeamCity
11 3 (1.21%) Postman
11 3 (1.21%) Vite
12 2 (0.81%) Cypress.io
12 2 (0.81%) JUnit
12 2 (0.81%) Mocha
12 2 (0.81%) SonarQube
12 2 (0.81%) Sonatype Nexus
12 2 (0.81%) webpack
General
1 105 (42.51%) Finance
2 84 (34.01%) Social Skills
3 49 (19.84%) Banking
4 39 (15.79%) Public Sector
5 28 (11.34%) Analytical Skills
5 28 (11.34%) Financial Institution
6 14 (5.67%) Local Government
7 12 (4.86%) Presentation Skills
8 10 (4.05%) Inclusion and Diversity
9 9 (3.64%) Influencing Skills
10 5 (2.02%) Law
10 5 (2.02%) Manufacturing
11 4 (1.62%) Police
12 3 (1.21%) Documentation Skills
12 3 (1.21%) Organisational Skills
12 3 (1.21%) Publishing
13 2 (0.81%) Billing
13 2 (0.81%) Investment Banking
13 2 (0.81%) Marketing
13 2 (0.81%) Telecoms
Job Titles
1 46 (18.62%) Architect
2 44 (17.81%) Senior
3 32 (12.96%) Cloud Engineer
4 25 (10.12%) DevOps Engineer
4 25 (10.12%) Software Engineer
5 23 (9.31%) Developer
6 19 (7.69%) AWS Engineer
6 19 (7.69%) GCP Engineer
7 17 (6.88%) Senior Software Engineer
8 16 (6.48%) Analyst
9 12 (4.86%) Java Developer
9 12 (4.86%) Python Engineer
9 12 (4.86%) Solutions Architect
10 10 (4.05%) AWS Software Engineer
10 10 (4.05%) Consultant
10 10 (4.05%) Security Architect
11 9 (3.64%) AWS DevOps
11 9 (3.64%) Lead
11 9 (3.64%) SAP Manager
11 9 (3.64%) Technical Architect
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 49 (19.84%) REST
2 39 (15.79%) RESTful
3 36 (14.57%) Elastic Stack
4 13 (5.26%) Spring Boot
5 11 (4.45%) React
5 11 (4.45%) Spring
6 8 (3.24%) Kafka
7 6 (2.43%) AngularJS
8 5 (2.02%) GraphQL
8 5 (2.02%) Web Services
9 4 (1.62%) CSS
9 4 (1.62%) HTML
9 4 (1.62%) Jest
9 4 (1.62%) JSON
9 4 (1.62%) Middleware
9 4 (1.62%) Node.js
9 4 (1.62%) SAP Fiori
10 3 (1.21%) NumPy
10 3 (1.21%) OAuth
10 3 (1.21%) Oracle Fusion
Miscellaneous
1 53 (21.46%) Cloud Native
2 33 (13.36%) Distributed Systems
3 24 (9.72%) Data Centre
4 15 (6.07%) Hybrid Cloud
5 12 (4.86%) Private Cloud
5 12 (4.86%) Product Ownership
6 8 (3.24%) Legacy Systems
7 7 (2.83%) Data Protection Act
7 7 (2.83%) Security Posture
8 6 (2.43%) Cloud Security Posture
8 6 (2.43%) Enterprise Software
8 6 (2.43%) Mainframe
8 6 (2.43%) Replication
9 5 (2.02%) Distributed Applications
9 5 (2.02%) Grid Computing
10 4 (1.62%) PKI
10 4 (1.62%) Virtual Team
11 3 (1.21%) Data Structures
11 3 (1.21%) Management Information System
11 3 (1.21%) Self-Motivation
Operating Systems
1 63 (25.51%) Linux
2 28 (11.34%) Windows
3 8 (3.24%) Windows Server
4 4 (1.62%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
5 3 (1.21%) Unix
5 3 (1.21%) Windows Server 2016
5 3 (1.21%) Windows Server 2019
6 2 (0.81%) VMS
7 1 (0.40%) CentOS
7 1 (0.40%) Ubuntu
7 1 (0.40%) Windows 10
Processes & Methodologies
1 104 (42.11%) Agile
2 103 (41.70%) DevOps
3 101 (40.89%) CI/CD
4 81 (32.79%) Infrastructure as Code
5 56 (22.67%) Containerisation
6 51 (20.65%) Microservices
7 45 (18.22%) Software Engineering
8 42 (17.00%) Computer Science
9 40 (16.19%) High Availability
10 39 (15.79%) Cost Optimisation
11 37 (14.98%) Continuous Integration
12 35 (14.17%) Continuous Delivery
13 34 (13.77%) Cybersecurity
14 33 (13.36%) Infrastructure Automation
14 33 (13.36%) Problem-Solving
14 33 (13.36%) SDLC
14 33 (13.36%) Test Automation
15 32 (12.96%) Cryptography
15 32 (12.96%) Root Cause Analysis
16 31 (12.55%) Change Management
Programming Languages
1 85 (34.41%) Python
2 56 (22.67%) Java
3 48 (19.43%) Go
4 18 (7.29%) TypeScript
5 14 (5.67%) SQL
6 9 (3.64%) C#
7 7 (2.83%) Bash
7 7 (2.83%) JavaScript
8 5 (2.02%) Kotlin
8 5 (2.02%) PowerShell
9 1 (0.40%) ABAP
9 1 (0.40%) Bicep
9 1 (0.40%) C++
9 1 (0.40%) DAML
9 1 (0.40%) Groovy
9 1 (0.40%) Perl
9 1 (0.40%) PL/SQL
9 1 (0.40%) Ruby
9 1 (0.40%) Scala
9 1 (0.40%) T-SQL
Qualifications
1 53 (21.46%) Security Cleared
2 51 (20.65%) Degree
3 39 (15.79%) Computer Science Degree
4 35 (14.17%) SC Cleared
5 33 (13.36%) Master's Degree
6 24 (9.72%) AWS Certification
7 14 (5.67%) Azure Certification
8 9 (3.64%) AWS Certified Solutions Architect
9 7 (2.83%) Cisco Certification
9 7 (2.83%) DV Cleared
10 6 (2.43%) BPSS Clearance
10 6 (2.43%) CISSP
10 6 (2.43%) ISTQB
11 5 (2.02%) (ISC)2 CCSP
11 5 (2.02%) CCSP
12 4 (1.62%) AWS Certified Developer
12 4 (1.62%) AWS Certified DevOps Engineer
13 3 (1.21%) SAP Certification
14 2 (0.81%) PMI Certification
14 2 (0.81%) VMware Certified Professional (VCP)
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 13 (5.26%) ISO/IEC 27001
2 8 (3.24%) GDPR
3 7 (2.83%) NIST
3 7 (2.83%) QA
4 6 (2.43%) ISO/IEC 27002 (supersedes ISO/IEC 17799)
4 6 (2.43%) NCSC
4 6 (2.43%) PCI DSS
5 5 (2.02%) ISO/IEC 27005
5 5 (2.02%) PSD2
6 4 (1.62%) Data Quality
7 3 (1.21%) SLA
8 2 (0.81%) Accessibility
8 2 (0.81%) WCAG
9 1 (0.40%) GAMP
9 1 (0.40%) HIPAA
9 1 (0.40%) Sarbanes-Oxley
System Software
1 61 (24.70%) Docker
2 10 (4.05%) VMware Infrastructure
3 7 (2.83%) Hyper-V
4 6 (2.43%) VMware NSX
5 5 (2.02%) Active Directory
5 5 (2.02%) GPFS
5 5 (2.02%) Lustre
5 5 (2.02%) Slurm Workload Manager
5 5 (2.02%) Virtual Machines
6 4 (1.62%) vSphere
7 2 (0.81%) Firmware
8 1 (0.40%) Ceph
8 1 (0.40%) IAG
8 1 (0.40%) KVM
8 1 (0.40%) QEMU
Systems Management
1 92 (37.25%) Terraform
2 88 (35.63%) Kubernetes
3 61 (24.70%) Ansible
4 44 (17.81%) Grafana
5 43 (17.41%) Prometheus
6 4 (1.62%) Istio
7 3 (1.21%) Kubeflow
7 3 (1.21%) vCenter Server
8 2 (0.81%) HAProxy
8 2 (0.81%) Puppet
8 2 (0.81%) vMotion
9 1 (0.40%) Cisco CUCM
9 1 (0.40%) Consul
9 1 (0.40%) Data Guard
9 1 (0.40%) Demisto
9 1 (0.40%) Microsoft Intune
9 1 (0.40%) Oracle Enterprise Manager
9 1 (0.40%) Oracle RMAN
9 1 (0.40%) Salt
Vendors
1 37 (14.98%) Splunk
2 34 (13.77%) SAP
3 32 (12.96%) Microsoft
4 26 (10.53%) Google
5 18 (7.29%) Oracle
5 18 (7.29%) VMware
6 14 (5.67%) Cisco
7 8 (3.24%) Palo Alto
8 6 (2.43%) ServiceNow
9 5 (2.02%) Ariba
9 5 (2.02%) Aruba
10 4 (1.62%) Juniper
10 4 (1.62%) NetApp
11 3 (1.21%) F5
11 3 (1.21%) Fortinet
11 3 (1.21%) Mercator
11 3 (1.21%) Veeam
12 2 (0.81%) Brocade
12 2 (0.81%) Dell
12 2 (0.81%) Salesforce