Systems Administrator Contract Job Trends

System Administrator (Sysadmin)
UK

The median System Administrator (Sysadmin) daily rate in the UK is £515, according to job vacancies posted in the 6 months leading up to 26 January 2026.

The table below compares current contractor rates and summary statistics with the previous two years.

6 months to
26 Jan 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 485 388 378
Rank change year-on-year -97 -10 +193
Contract jobs requiring a Systems Administrator 103 150 236
As % of all contract jobs in the UK 0.27% 0.48% 0.53%
As % of the Job Titles category 0.30% 0.52% 0.57%
Number of daily rates quoted 54 57 126
10th Percentile £315 £193 £248
25th Percentile £425 £326 £325
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £515 £430 £500
Median % change year-on-year +19.77% -14.00% +25.00%
75th Percentile £554 £588 £575
90th Percentile £614 £650 £600
UK excluding London median daily rate £525 £430 £550
% change year-on-year +22.09% -21.82% +37.50%
Number of hourly rates quoted 11 7 32
10th Percentile £13.50 £21.05 £11.77
25th Percentile £17.50 £21.38 £17.50
Median hourly rate £18.00 £23.00 £48.40
Median % change year-on-year -21.74% -52.48% -40.52%
75th Percentile £18.50 £57.62 £59.95
90th Percentile - - £61.60
UK excluding London median hourly rate £13.50 £56.75 £48.40
% change year-on-year -76.21% +17.24% -40.52%

All Contract IT Job Roles
UK

For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all contract IT job vacancies. Most job vacancies include a discernible job title that can be normalized. As such, the figures in the second row provide an indication of the number of contract jobs in our overall sample.

Contract vacancies in the UK with a recognized job title 34,502 29,046 41,229
% of contract IT jobs with a recognized job title 91.46% 92.85% 93.07%
Number of daily rates quoted 21,791 17,729 27,311
10th Percentile £300 £291 £275
25th Percentile £406 £409 £413
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £525 £525
Median % change year-on-year -4.76% - -4.55%
75th Percentile £618 £638 £638
90th Percentile £720 £738 £738
UK excluding London median daily rate £478 £480 £495
% change year-on-year -0.52% -3.03% -1.00%
Number of hourly rates quoted 2,057 865 2,093
10th Percentile £14.41 £15.95 £13.29
25th Percentile £18.50 £21.25 £17.25
Median hourly rate £28.88 £32.50 £37.50
Median % change year-on-year -11.14% -13.33% +8.49%
75th Percentile £61.18 £62.50 £62.50
90th Percentile £70.00 £74.26 £73.95
UK excluding London median hourly rate £27.50 £31.50 £40.00
% change year-on-year -12.70% -21.25% +33.33%

Systems Administrator
Job Vacancy Trend

Historical trend showing the proportion of contract IT job postings featuring 'Systems Administrator' in the job title relative to all contract IT jobs advertised.

Systems Administrator job vacancy trend in the UK

Systems Administrator
Daily Rate Trend

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for Systems Administrator job vacancies in the UK.

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for Systems Administrator job vacancies in the UK

Systems Administrator
Daily Rate Histogram

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing Systems Administrator over the 6 months to 26 January 2026.

Daily rate histogram for Systems Administrator in the UK

Systems Administrator
Hourly Rate Trend

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for Systems Administrator job vacancies in the UK.

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for Systems Administrator job vacancies in the UK

Systems Administrator
Hourly Rate Histogram

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing Systems Administrator over the 6 months to 26 January 2026.

Hourly rate histogram for Systems Administrator in the UK

Systems Administrator
Top 15 Contract Job Locations

The table below looks at the demand and provides a guide to the median contractor rates quoted in IT jobs citing Systems Administrator within the UK over the 6 months to 26 January 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 -116 82 £515 +9.87% 55
UK excluding London -112 50 £525 +22.09% 51
London -2 38 £475 +16.92% 8
Work from Home -14 31 £500 +21.21% 15
South West -34 17 £600 +4.35% 3
East of England -12 9 £450 +4.65% 6
East Midlands -21 6 £475 -11.30% 5
Midlands -49 6 £475 -9.52% 10
South East -55 6 £475 +29.25% 18
North of England -58 5 £525 +10.53% 13
Northern Ireland -4 3 £375 +25.00%
Yorkshire -51 3 £525 +10.53% 6
Scotland 0 2 £275 +42.12% 4
Wales -3 2 - -
North West -23 2 £678 - 5

Systems Administrator Skill Set
Top 30 Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities

For the 6 months to 26 January 2026, Systems Administrator contract job roles required the following skills and capabilities in order of popularity. The figures indicate the absolute number of co-occurrences and as a proportion of all contract job ads featuring Systems Administrator in the job title.

1 32 (31.07%) Security Cleared
2 28 (27.18%) Linux
3 26 (25.24%) Windows
4 22 (21.36%) DV Cleared
5 21 (20.39%) Microsoft
6 18 (17.48%) Microsoft 365
7 16 (15.53%) Change Management
8 15 (14.56%) Continuous Improvement
8 15 (14.56%) SC Cleared
8 15 (14.56%) Security Patching
9 14 (13.59%) Network Management
9 14 (13.59%) Network Security
10 12 (11.65%) Active Directory
10 12 (11.65%) Microsoft Excel
11 11 (10.68%) Red Hat
11 11 (10.68%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
11 11 (10.68%) SharePoint
12 10 (9.71%) DNS
12 10 (9.71%) Firewall
12 10 (9.71%) Problem-Solving
12 10 (9.71%) Unix
13 9 (8.74%) Azure
13 9 (8.74%) Microsoft PowerPoint
13 9 (8.74%) Oracle
13 9 (8.74%) PowerShell
13 9 (8.74%) VMware
14 8 (7.77%) Dell
14 8 (7.77%) Knowledge Management
14 8 (7.77%) Stakeholder Engagement
14 8 (7.77%) Time Management

Systems Administrator Skill Set
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 11 (10.68%) SharePoint
2 4 (3.88%) Microsoft Exchange
Applications
1 12 (11.65%) Microsoft Excel
2 9 (8.74%) Microsoft PowerPoint
3 1 (0.97%) Microsoft Office
3 1 (0.97%) S-PLUS
3 1 (0.97%) Spreadsheet
Business Applications
1 2 (1.94%) Dynamics CRM
2 1 (0.97%) iTrent
2 1 (0.97%) Magento
2 1 (0.97%) Sage 200
2 1 (0.97%) SAP S/4HANA
2 1 (0.97%) Shopify
2 1 (0.97%) Workday HCM
Cloud Services
1 18 (17.48%) Microsoft 365
2 9 (8.74%) Azure
3 6 (5.83%) AWS
3 6 (5.83%) Entra ID
3 6 (5.83%) IaaS
4 5 (4.85%) GCP
4 5 (4.85%) SaaS
5 4 (3.88%) Power Platform
6 3 (2.91%) PaaS
7 2 (1.94%) Dynamics 365
8 1 (0.97%) Amazon EC2
8 1 (0.97%) Amazon S3
8 1 (0.97%) SuccessFactors
Communications & Networking
1 14 (13.59%) Network Security
2 10 (9.71%) DNS
2 10 (9.71%) Firewall
3 7 (6.80%) DHCP
4 4 (3.88%) SAN
4 4 (3.88%) VPN
5 3 (2.91%) Wireless
6 2 (1.94%) VLAN
7 1 (0.97%) LAN
7 1 (0.97%) SSL
Database & Business Intelligence
1 7 (6.80%) Oracle Database
2 4 (3.88%) Power BI
3 2 (1.94%) BusinessObjects Business Intelligence
4 1 (0.97%) MySQL
4 1 (0.97%) PostgreSQL
Development Applications
1 2 (1.94%) Git
General
1 24 (23.30%) Social Skills
2 19 (18.45%) Finance
3 13 (12.62%) Banking
3 13 (12.62%) Public Sector
4 8 (7.77%) Legal
5 7 (6.80%) Analytical Skills
6 4 (3.88%) Fire and Rescue
6 4 (3.88%) Telecoms
7 3 (2.91%) Aerospace
7 3 (2.91%) Local Government
8 2 (1.94%) Documentation Skills
8 2 (1.94%) Financial Institution
8 2 (1.94%) Military
9 1 (0.97%) Electronics
9 1 (0.97%) German Language
9 1 (0.97%) Investment Banking
9 1 (0.97%) Manufacturing
9 1 (0.97%) Marketing
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 1 (0.97%) IDoc
Miscellaneous
1 14 (13.59%) PKI
2 9 (8.74%) Onboarding
3 5 (4.85%) Data Centre
4 3 (2.91%) Clustering
5 2 (1.94%) Analytical Mindset
5 2 (1.94%) Data Structures
5 2 (1.94%) Enterprise Software
5 2 (1.94%) Hedge funds
5 2 (1.94%) Legacy Systems
6 1 (0.97%) Enterprise Storage
6 1 (0.97%) Management Information System
Operating Systems
1 28 (27.18%) Linux
2 26 (25.24%) Windows
3 11 (10.68%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
4 10 (9.71%) Unix
5 5 (4.85%) Windows Server
6 4 (3.88%) Ubuntu
7 2 (1.94%) Debian
7 2 (1.94%) Solaris
7 2 (1.94%) Windows Server 2016
7 2 (1.94%) Windows Server 2019
8 1 (0.97%) Mac OS
Processes & Methodologies
1 16 (15.53%) Change Management
2 15 (14.56%) Continuous Improvement
2 15 (14.56%) Security Patching
3 14 (13.59%) Network Management
4 10 (9.71%) Problem-Solving
5 8 (7.77%) Knowledge Management
5 8 (7.77%) Stakeholder Engagement
5 8 (7.77%) Time Management
6 6 (5.83%) Data Management
6 6 (5.83%) Infrastructure as Code
6 6 (5.83%) ITIL
7 5 (4.85%) Business Intelligence
7 5 (4.85%) ERP
7 5 (4.85%) High Availability
7 5 (4.85%) Root Cause Analysis
8 4 (3.88%) Data Cleansing
8 4 (3.88%) Disaster Recovery
8 4 (3.88%) Performance Management
8 4 (3.88%) Performance Optimisation
8 4 (3.88%) Performance Tuning
Programming Languages
1 9 (8.74%) PowerShell
2 5 (4.85%) Bash
2 5 (4.85%) SQL
3 3 (2.91%) Python
4 2 (1.94%) Shell Script
5 1 (0.97%) Perl
Qualifications
1 32 (31.07%) Security Cleared
2 22 (21.36%) DV Cleared
3 15 (14.56%) SC Cleared
4 6 (5.83%) BPSS Clearance
5 2 (1.94%) Cisco Certification
6 1 (0.97%) ITIL Foundation Certificate
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 3 (2.91%) Data Quality
1 3 (2.91%) ISO/IEC 27001
2 2 (1.94%) NIST
2 2 (1.94%) QA
3 1 (0.97%) GDPR
3 1 (0.97%) GRC
3 1 (0.97%) PMO
System Software
1 12 (11.65%) Active Directory
2 6 (5.83%) VMware Infrastructure
3 5 (4.85%) Hyper-V
4 2 (1.94%) QEMU
4 2 (1.94%) Slurm Workload Manager
4 2 (1.94%) VMware ESXi
5 1 (0.97%) GPFS
5 1 (0.97%) Virtual Machines
Systems Management
1 5 (4.85%) Ansible
2 4 (3.88%) Microsoft Intune
3 3 (2.91%) EMC NetWorker
3 3 (2.91%) EMC VPLEX
3 3 (2.91%) SCCM
3 3 (2.91%) Single Sign-On
3 3 (2.91%) Terraform
4 2 (1.94%) Grafana
4 2 (1.94%) Podman
4 2 (1.94%) Prometheus
5 1 (0.97%) BladeLogic
5 1 (0.97%) Failover Clustering
5 1 (0.97%) Jamf Pro
5 1 (0.97%) Progress Chef
Vendors
1 21 (20.39%) Microsoft
2 11 (10.68%) Red Hat
3 9 (8.74%) Oracle
3 9 (8.74%) VMware
4 8 (7.77%) Dell
5 5 (4.85%) Cisco
5 5 (4.85%) Palo Alto
6 4 (3.88%) Fortinet
6 4 (3.88%) Google
6 4 (3.88%) SAP
6 4 (3.88%) ServiceNow
7 3 (2.91%) Brocade
7 3 (2.91%) EMC
7 3 (2.91%) Isilon
8 2 (1.94%) HP
8 2 (1.94%) IFS
8 2 (1.94%) Intel
8 2 (1.94%) NetApp
8 2 (1.94%) NVIDIA
8 2 (1.94%) Trend Micro