Unix Contract Job Trends

Unix
UK

The table below provides summary statistics and contractor rates for jobs requiring Unix skills. It covers contract job vacancies from the 6 months leading up to 16 March 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
16 Mar 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 225 137 142
Rank change year-on-year -88 +5 -61
Contract jobs citing Unix 518 601 750
As % of all contract jobs in the UK 1.20% 2.03% 1.69%
As % of the Operating Systems category 10.87% 14.18% 12.46%
Number of daily rates quoted 341 351 509
10th Percentile £256 £350 £330
25th Percentile £392 £417 £420
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £451 £518 £550
Median % change year-on-year -12.95% -5.91% -
75th Percentile £565 £631 £650
90th Percentile £725 £738 £800
UK excluding London median daily rate £429 £474 £500
% change year-on-year -9.45% -5.25% -7.41%
Number of hourly rates quoted 13 9 22
10th Percentile - £39.60 £22.01
25th Percentile £21.50 £40.50 £24.54
Median hourly rate £27.88 £52.50 £40.00
Median % change year-on-year -46.90% +31.25% -38.22%
75th Percentile £53.00 £55.00 £52.50
90th Percentile £53.95 £67.25 £67.25
UK excluding London median hourly rate £22.00 £52.75 £40.00
% change year-on-year -58.29% +31.88% -30.43%

All Operating Systems
UK

Unix falls under the Operating Systems category. For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all contract job vacancies requiring operating system skills.

Contract vacancies with a requirement for operating system skills 4,764 4,238 6,018
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the UK 11.05% 14.34% 13.53%
Number of daily rates quoted 3,121 2,782 4,023
10th Percentile £180 £200 £181
25th Percentile £281 £317 £280
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £447 £475 £453
Median % change year-on-year -5.89% +4.86% -12.25%
75th Percentile £565 £600 £588
90th Percentile £658 £699 £700
UK excluding London median daily rate £413 £450 £430
% change year-on-year -8.33% +4.65% -9.47%
Number of hourly rates quoted 352 157 403
10th Percentile £15.00 £16.60 £13.29
25th Percentile £17.69 £18.51 £15.50
Median hourly rate £22.80 £28.00 £22.50
Median % change year-on-year -18.58% +24.44% -15.09%
75th Percentile £60.00 £63.75 £59.75
90th Percentile £70.00 £68.75 £70.00
UK excluding London median hourly rate £22.50 £24.66 £22.50
% change year-on-year -8.76% +9.60% -13.46%

Unix
Job Vacancy Trend

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

Unix job vacancy trend in the UK

Unix
Daily Rate Trend

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

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in the UK citing Unix

Unix
Daily Rate Histogram

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing Unix over the 6 months to 16 March 2026.

Daily rate histogram for Unix in the UK

Unix
Hourly Rate Trend

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

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in the UK citing Unix

Unix
Hourly Rate Histogram

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing Unix over the 6 months to 16 March 2026.

Hourly rate histogram for Unix in the UK

Unix
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 Unix within the UK over the 6 months to 16 March 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 -61 448 £460 -12.38% 91
UK excluding London -84 269 £429 -9.45% 70
London -51 207 £539 -4.22% 40
Work from Home -86 149 £450 -9.18% 55
North of England -45 86 £464 -11.67% 21
Midlands -26 70 £439 -4.67% 12
South East -35 69 £320 -32.63% 22
North West -12 67 £467 -11.05% 13
West Midlands -27 66 £439 -5.60% 8
Scotland -40 30 £411 -10.11% 3
Yorkshire -70 18 £460 -16.36% 4
South West -35 8 £700 +27.27% 2
Wales -4 5 £265 +62.04% 2
East Midlands -32 4 £478 +13.02% 4
East of England -43 3 £440 -2.22% 5
North East -12 2 £563 - 4

Unix
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 26 (5.02%) WebLogic
2 25 (4.83%) Apache
3 23 (4.44%) Confluence
4 16 (3.09%) Tuxedo
5 15 (2.90%) SharePoint
6 12 (2.32%) Apache Spark
7 11 (2.12%) SAS
8 9 (1.74%) JBoss
9 8 (1.54%) CICS
10 6 (1.16%) Oracle SOA Suite
11 5 (0.97%) NetWeaver
11 5 (0.97%) Tomcat
12 4 (0.77%) Adobe Experience Manager
12 4 (0.77%) Apache Airflow
12 4 (0.77%) nginx
12 4 (0.77%) Oracle Workflow
13 3 (0.58%) WebSphere
14 2 (0.39%) IBM HTTP Server
14 2 (0.39%) Microsoft Exchange
14 2 (0.39%) Oracle Spatial
Applications
1 12 (2.32%) Microsoft Office
2 10 (1.93%) Microsoft Excel
3 4 (0.77%) Microsoft PowerPoint
4 2 (0.39%) Microsoft Project
5 1 (0.19%) MS Visio
Business Applications
1 6 (1.16%) Oracle EBS
1 6 (1.16%) Oracle EBS R12
2 5 (0.97%) Oracle 11i
2 5 (0.97%) SAP S/4HANA
3 4 (0.77%) Oracle Procure-to-Pay
4 3 (0.58%) Oracle BRM
4 3 (0.58%) Summit
5 2 (0.39%) ION MarketView
5 2 (0.39%) Kondor
5 2 (0.39%) Oracle Applications
5 2 (0.39%) Oracle ERP
6 1 (0.19%) Oracle Assets
6 1 (0.19%) Oracle BPM
6 1 (0.19%) Oracle Cash Management
6 1 (0.19%) Oracle CRM
6 1 (0.19%) Oracle Payables
6 1 (0.19%) Oracle Receivables
Cloud Services
1 103 (19.88%) AWS
2 75 (14.48%) Azure
3 26 (5.02%) GitHub
4 18 (3.47%) GCP
5 16 (3.09%) SaaS
6 14 (2.70%) AWS CloudFormation
7 12 (2.32%) Serverless
8 11 (2.12%) Amazon S3
8 11 (2.12%) Azure DevOps
8 11 (2.12%) Sauce Labs
9 10 (1.93%) AWS Lambda
10 9 (1.74%) Amazon CloudWatch
10 9 (1.74%) Azure Data Factory
10 9 (1.74%) OpenShift
11 8 (1.54%) Amazon EC2
11 8 (1.54%) Cloud Computing
11 8 (1.54%) Entra ID
11 8 (1.54%) GitHub Actions
11 8 (1.54%) Power Platform
12 7 (1.35%) Azure Synapse Analytics
Communications & Networking
1 34 (6.56%) Firewall
2 18 (3.47%) DNS
3 15 (2.90%) SSH
3 15 (2.90%) Wireless
4 14 (2.70%) TCP/IP
5 13 (2.51%) SAN
6 12 (2.32%) HTTP
7 11 (2.12%) Network Security
8 8 (1.54%) InfiniBand
8 8 (1.54%) NAS
9 7 (1.35%) Ethernet
9 7 (1.35%) NetScaler
10 6 (1.16%) VPN
11 5 (0.97%) Ethernet VPN
11 5 (0.97%) FTP
11 5 (0.97%) SSL
12 4 (0.77%) DHCP
12 4 (0.77%) FIX Connectivity
12 4 (0.77%) MPLS
12 4 (0.77%) RTP
Database & Business Intelligence
1 49 (9.46%) MySQL
2 43 (8.30%) Relational Database
3 41 (7.92%) MongoDB
3 41 (7.92%) SQL Server
4 39 (7.53%) Oracle Database
5 28 (5.41%) PostgreSQL
6 20 (3.86%) NoSQL
7 17 (3.28%) KDB
7 17 (3.28%) Kdb+
8 14 (2.70%) Big Data
8 14 (2.70%) Elasticsearch
9 12 (2.32%) Data Warehouse
9 12 (2.32%) Metadata
10 11 (2.12%) Data Lake
10 11 (2.12%) Hadoop
11 10 (1.93%) Tick Data
12 9 (1.74%) DataStage
12 9 (1.74%) DB2
13 8 (1.54%) Pentaho
14 7 (1.35%) RDBMS
Development Applications
1 44 (8.49%) Jenkins
2 43 (8.30%) Git
3 39 (7.53%) JIRA
4 37 (7.14%) GitLab
5 19 (3.67%) Eclipse
6 18 (3.47%) JUnit
7 13 (2.51%) Selenium
8 12 (2.32%) Bitbucket
8 12 (2.32%) Mockito
8 12 (2.32%) Xcode
9 11 (2.12%) Android Studio
9 11 (2.12%) Browser DevTools
9 11 (2.12%) MSI
10 8 (1.54%) IntelliJ
11 7 (1.35%) Maven
12 5 (0.97%) SoapUI
12 5 (0.97%) Toad
13 4 (0.77%) Ant
13 4 (0.77%) Cucumber
13 4 (0.77%) Subversion
General
1 139 (26.83%) Finance
1 139 (26.83%) Social Skills
2 61 (11.78%) Analytical Skills
3 57 (11.00%) Banking
4 45 (8.69%) Public Sector
5 22 (4.25%) Front Office
6 20 (3.86%) Influencing Skills
7 17 (3.28%) Investment Banking
8 16 (3.09%) Documentation Skills
9 9 (1.74%) Financial Institution
10 7 (1.35%) Telecoms
11 6 (1.16%) Advertising
11 6 (1.16%) Inclusion and Diversity
12 5 (0.97%) Law
12 5 (0.97%) Legal
13 4 (0.77%) Manufacturing
13 4 (0.77%) Retail
14 3 (0.58%) Billing
14 3 (0.58%) Military
14 3 (0.58%) Organisational Skills
Job Titles
1 94 (18.15%) Developer
2 70 (13.51%) Senior
3 44 (8.49%) Analyst
4 36 (6.95%) Java Developer
5 35 (6.76%) Support Engineer
6 33 (6.37%) Unix Engineer
7 28 (5.41%) Technical Support
8 26 (5.02%) Linux Engineer
8 26 (5.02%) Site Reliability Engineer
9 23 (4.44%) Data Engineer
9 23 (4.44%) DBA
10 22 (4.25%) Oracle DBA
10 22 (4.25%) Site Engineer
11 21 (4.05%) DevOps Engineer
11 21 (4.05%) Software Engineer
12 19 (3.67%) Kafka Engineer
13 18 (3.47%) Administrator
13 18 (3.47%) Lead
13 18 (3.47%) Unix Linux Engineer
14 16 (3.09%) Senior Unix Engineer
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 62 (11.97%) Kafka
2 38 (7.34%) REST
3 30 (5.79%) XML
4 25 (4.83%) Middleware
4 25 (4.83%) SOAP
5 24 (4.63%) React
6 23 (4.44%) JSON
7 20 (3.86%) Spring
8 19 (3.67%) CSS
9 18 (3.47%) AngularJS
10 17 (3.28%) HTML
11 14 (2.70%) Elastic Stack
12 13 (2.51%) HTML5
12 13 (2.51%) J2EE
12 13 (2.51%) Oracle GoldenGate
13 11 (2.12%) ActiveMQ
13 11 (2.12%) Ajax
13 11 (2.12%) GraphQL
13 11 (2.12%) JAX-RS
14 10 (1.93%) Spring Boot
Miscellaneous
1 28 (5.41%) Management Information System
2 21 (4.05%) Cloud Native
3 20 (3.86%) Linux Command Line
4 19 (3.67%) Onboarding
5 18 (3.47%) Foreign Exchange (FX)
6 16 (3.09%) Data Centre
7 15 (2.90%) Legacy Systems
8 12 (2.32%) Equities
8 12 (2.32%) Fixed Income
9 11 (2.12%) Algorithms
9 11 (2.12%) Derivative
9 11 (2.12%) Greenfield Project
9 11 (2.12%) Mobile App
10 10 (1.93%) Security Posture
11 9 (1.74%) Mainframe
11 9 (1.74%) Public Cloud
12 8 (1.54%) BYOD
12 8 (1.54%) Enterprise Cloud
12 8 (1.54%) VSAM
13 7 (1.35%) Tandem
Operating Systems
1 331 (63.90%) Linux
2 157 (30.31%) Windows
3 28 (5.41%) Windows Server
4 23 (4.44%) AIX
4 23 (4.44%) Solaris
5 20 (3.86%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
6 13 (2.51%) Mac OS X
7 11 (2.12%) Android
8 7 (1.35%) Mac OS
9 6 (1.16%) CentOS
10 3 (0.58%) Ubuntu
11 2 (0.39%) VMS
12 1 (0.19%) OpenVMS
12 1 (0.19%) Oracle Linux
12 1 (0.19%) SUSE Linux Enterprise Server
12 1 (0.19%) Windows 10
12 1 (0.19%) Windows 7
12 1 (0.19%) Windows Server 2003
12 1 (0.19%) Windows Server 2008
Processes & Methodologies
1 143 (27.61%) Agile
2 109 (21.04%) Problem-Solving
3 92 (17.76%) DevOps
4 84 (16.22%) CI/CD
5 57 (11.00%) Migration
6 56 (10.81%) Observability
7 55 (10.62%) Computer Science
8 53 (10.23%) Software Engineering
9 52 (10.04%) ITIL
10 48 (9.27%) Incident Response
11 47 (9.07%) Microservices
12 46 (8.88%) Containerisation
12 46 (8.88%) OO
13 45 (8.69%) Infrastructure as Code
14 44 (8.49%) Data Modelling
14 44 (8.49%) Performance Tuning
15 41 (7.92%) Continuous Improvement
16 40 (7.72%) Site Reliability Engineering
17 39 (7.53%) Change Management
18 38 (7.34%) TDD
Programming Languages
1 201 (38.80%) SQL
2 183 (35.33%) Python
3 135 (26.06%) Java
4 93 (17.95%) Shell Script
5 64 (12.36%) Bash
5 64 (12.36%) Perl
6 39 (7.53%) JavaScript
7 38 (7.34%) C++
8 36 (6.95%) PowerShell
9 33 (6.37%) PL/SQL
10 26 (5.02%) C#
11 24 (4.63%) Korn
12 13 (2.51%) Scala
13 10 (1.93%) PHP
14 9 (1.74%) Go
15 8 (1.54%) COBOL
16 3 (0.58%) C
16 3 (0.58%) HiveQL
17 2 (0.39%) C-shell
17 2 (0.39%) TypeScript
Qualifications
1 126 (24.32%) Security Cleared
2 97 (18.73%) SC Cleared
3 75 (14.48%) Degree
4 41 (7.92%) Computer Science Degree
5 20 (3.86%) BPSS Clearance
6 8 (1.54%) CISSP
7 6 (1.16%) ITIL Foundation Certificate
7 6 (1.16%) Microsoft Certification
7 6 (1.16%) OSCP
8 5 (0.97%) CompTIA Security+
8 5 (0.97%) DV Cleared
8 5 (0.97%) GPEN
8 5 (0.97%) GWAPT
8 5 (0.97%) ISTQB
8 5 (0.97%) ISTQB Foundation Certification
8 5 (0.97%) MCSA
8 5 (0.97%) MCSE
9 4 (0.77%) PMI Certification
10 3 (0.58%) ITIL Certification
10 3 (0.58%) RHCE
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 18 (3.47%) SLA
2 16 (3.09%) QA
3 13 (2.51%) Data Quality
4 9 (1.74%) NIST
5 7 (1.35%) ISO/IEC 27001
6 3 (0.58%) FATCA
6 3 (0.58%) GMP
6 3 (0.58%) SEPA
7 2 (0.39%) GDPR
7 2 (0.39%) ISO 15022
7 2 (0.39%) ISO 20022
7 2 (0.39%) NCSC
7 2 (0.39%) PCI DSS
8 1 (0.19%) Disclosure Scotland
8 1 (0.19%) NIST 800
8 1 (0.19%) Sarbanes-Oxley
System Software
1 69 (13.32%) Docker
2 16 (3.09%) Active Directory
3 14 (2.70%) Oracle RAC
4 11 (2.12%) VMware Infrastructure
5 9 (1.74%) KVM
6 6 (1.16%) Hyper-V
6 6 (1.16%) NFS
6 6 (1.16%) Virtual Machines
7 5 (0.97%) GPFS
8 4 (0.77%) HDFS
9 3 (0.58%) Firmware
9 3 (0.58%) PowerHA
9 3 (0.58%) VMware NSX
10 2 (0.39%) Postfix
10 2 (0.39%) SRDF
10 2 (0.39%) Varnish
10 2 (0.39%) VMware ESXi
10 2 (0.39%) vSphere
11 1 (0.19%) Samba
11 1 (0.19%) Sendmail
Systems Management
1 72 (13.90%) Kubernetes
2 63 (12.16%) Ansible
3 49 (9.46%) Terraform
4 39 (7.53%) Grafana
5 28 (5.41%) Puppet
6 23 (4.44%) Prometheus
7 16 (3.09%) Oracle RMAN
8 15 (2.90%) Oracle Enterprise Manager
9 12 (2.32%) Kibana
10 8 (1.54%) Progress Chef
11 7 (1.35%) NetBackup
12 6 (1.16%) Control-M
12 6 (1.16%) IBM BigFix
12 6 (1.16%) Red Hat Satellite
12 6 (1.16%) vCenter Server
13 5 (0.97%) CASB
13 5 (0.97%) Dell DRAC
13 5 (0.97%) Nessus
13 5 (0.97%) Salt
13 5 (0.97%) SCCM
Vendors
1 164 (31.66%) Oracle
2 62 (11.97%) Splunk
3 54 (10.42%) Microsoft
4 42 (8.11%) IBM
5 31 (5.98%) ServiceNow
6 20 (3.86%) VMware
7 16 (3.09%) Cisco
7 16 (3.09%) Red Hat
8 12 (2.32%) CyberArk
9 11 (2.12%) Talend
10 10 (1.93%) Informatica
10 10 (1.93%) Remedy
11 9 (1.74%) Fujitsu
12 8 (1.54%) Aruba
12 8 (1.54%) Dell
12 8 (1.54%) Sybase
12 8 (1.54%) Veritas
12 8 (1.54%) webMethods
13 7 (1.35%) Ab Initio
13 7 (1.35%) CheckPoint