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 25 March 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
25 Mar 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 230 134 142
Rank change year-on-year -96 +8 -62
Contract jobs citing Unix 512 594 753
As % of all contract jobs in the UK 1.17% 2.04% 1.70%
As % of the Operating Systems category 10.80% 14.31% 12.60%
Number of daily rates quoted 332 352 506
10th Percentile £259 £356 £332
25th Percentile £393 £423 £421
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £459 £513 £550
Median % change year-on-year -10.49% -6.82% -
75th Percentile £565 £625 £656
90th Percentile £725 £738 £800
UK excluding London median daily rate £429 £475 £500
% change year-on-year -9.68% -5.00% -7.41%
Number of hourly rates quoted 14 10 22
10th Percentile - £40.05 £22.01
25th Percentile £21.50 £40.50 £24.54
Median hourly rate £27.94 £52.75 £40.00
Median % change year-on-year -47.03% +31.88% -30.43%
75th Percentile £53.00 £55.00 £52.50
90th Percentile £53.93 £66.13 £67.25
UK excluding London median hourly rate £22.00 £53.00 £40.00
% change year-on-year -58.49% +32.50% -27.27%

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 4,742 4,152 5,974
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the UK 10.80% 14.28% 13.49%
Number of daily rates quoted 3,110 2,763 3,989
10th Percentile £181 £200 £180
25th Percentile £300 £320 £281
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £450 £475 £459
Median % change year-on-year -5.26% +3.49% -10.87%
75th Percentile £565 £594 £594
90th Percentile £655 £699 £700
UK excluding London median daily rate £420 £450 £436
% change year-on-year -6.67% +3.21% -8.21%
Number of hourly rates quoted 335 159 409
10th Percentile £15.00 £16.63 £12.86
25th Percentile £17.69 £18.51 £15.50
Median hourly rate £22.81 £28.00 £22.00
Median % change year-on-year -18.54% +27.27% -24.14%
75th Percentile £60.75 £63.50 £57.50
90th Percentile £70.00 £68.75 £69.00
UK excluding London median hourly rate £22.50 £24.66 £20.00
% change year-on-year -8.76% +23.30% -24.53%

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 25 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 25 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 25 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 -84 443 £464 -11.67% 90
UK excluding London -103 260 £429 -9.68% 71
London -58 211 £550 -2.22% 39
Work from Home -82 149 £452 -8.78% 47
North of England -62 82 £460 -12.38% 20
South East -28 68 £339 -30.07% 21
Midlands -37 68 £444 -3.59% 12
North West -9 65 £465 -11.43% 10
West Midlands -23 62 £444 -4.52% 8
Scotland -44 29 £414 -11.03% 6
Yorkshire -77 16 £447 -18.73% 7
South West -29 7 £700 +27.27% 3
East Midlands -33 6 £478 +5.18% 4
Wales -7 5 £265 +62.04% 2
East of England -48 3 £440 -2.22% 4
North East -13 1 £625 +11.11% 3

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 23 (4.49%) Confluence
2 22 (4.30%) WebLogic
3 21 (4.10%) Apache
4 16 (3.13%) Tuxedo
5 14 (2.73%) SharePoint
6 12 (2.34%) Apache Spark
7 11 (2.15%) SAS
8 8 (1.56%) CICS
9 6 (1.17%) NetWeaver
10 5 (0.98%) JBoss
10 5 (0.98%) Oracle SOA Suite
10 5 (0.98%) Tomcat
11 4 (0.78%) Adobe Experience Manager
11 4 (0.78%) Apache Airflow
11 4 (0.78%) nginx
11 4 (0.78%) Oracle Workflow
11 4 (0.78%) WebSphere
12 3 (0.59%) IBM HTTP Server
12 3 (0.59%) WebSphere Application Server
13 2 (0.39%) Oracle Spatial
Applications
1 12 (2.34%) Microsoft Office
2 10 (1.95%) Microsoft Excel
3 4 (0.78%) Microsoft PowerPoint
4 2 (0.39%) Microsoft Project
5 1 (0.20%) MS Visio
Business Applications
1 6 (1.17%) SAP S/4HANA
2 5 (0.98%) Oracle 11i
2 5 (0.98%) Oracle EBS
2 5 (0.98%) Oracle EBS R12
2 5 (0.98%) Summit
3 3 (0.59%) Oracle BRM
3 3 (0.59%) Oracle Procure-to-Pay
4 2 (0.39%) ION MarketView
4 2 (0.39%) Oracle ERP
5 1 (0.20%) Kondor
5 1 (0.20%) Oracle Applications
5 1 (0.20%) Oracle Assets
5 1 (0.20%) Oracle Cash Management
5 1 (0.20%) Oracle CRM
5 1 (0.20%) Oracle Payables
5 1 (0.20%) Oracle Receivables
Cloud Services
1 98 (19.14%) AWS
2 75 (14.65%) Azure
3 28 (5.47%) GitHub
4 15 (2.93%) GCP
4 15 (2.93%) Serverless
5 14 (2.73%) SaaS
6 13 (2.54%) AWS CloudFormation
7 12 (2.34%) Amazon S3
7 12 (2.34%) AWS Lambda
7 12 (2.34%) Azure DevOps
8 11 (2.15%) GitHub Actions
9 9 (1.76%) Amazon CloudWatch
9 9 (1.76%) Amazon EC2
9 9 (1.76%) Azure Data Factory
9 9 (1.76%) Entra ID
9 9 (1.76%) OpenShift
9 9 (1.76%) Sauce Labs
10 8 (1.56%) Power Platform
11 7 (1.37%) Azure Synapse Analytics
11 7 (1.37%) Snowflake
Communications & Networking
1 33 (6.45%) Firewall
2 16 (3.13%) DNS
3 15 (2.93%) SSH
4 14 (2.73%) SAN
5 13 (2.54%) HTTP
5 13 (2.54%) TCP/IP
5 13 (2.54%) Wireless
6 11 (2.15%) Network Security
7 8 (1.56%) InfiniBand
7 8 (1.56%) NAS
8 7 (1.37%) Ethernet
8 7 (1.37%) NetScaler
9 6 (1.17%) SSL
9 6 (1.17%) VPN
10 5 (0.98%) Ethernet VPN
10 5 (0.98%) FTP
10 5 (0.98%) RTP
11 4 (0.78%) FIX Connectivity
11 4 (0.78%) MPLS
12 3 (0.59%) iSCSI
Database & Business Intelligence
1 47 (9.18%) MySQL
2 46 (8.98%) SQL Server
3 44 (8.59%) Relational Database
4 37 (7.23%) Oracle Database
5 35 (6.84%) MongoDB
6 26 (5.08%) PostgreSQL
7 19 (3.71%) NoSQL
8 18 (3.52%) KDB
8 18 (3.52%) Kdb+
9 14 (2.73%) Big Data
9 14 (2.73%) Metadata
10 12 (2.34%) Data Warehouse
11 11 (2.15%) Elasticsearch
11 11 (2.15%) Tick Data
12 10 (1.95%) Data Lake
12 10 (1.95%) Hadoop
13 9 (1.76%) DataStage
13 9 (1.76%) DB2
13 9 (1.76%) RDBMS
14 8 (1.56%) Sybase ASE
Development Applications
1 48 (9.38%) Jenkins
2 42 (8.20%) Git
3 39 (7.62%) JIRA
4 36 (7.03%) GitLab
5 13 (2.54%) Bitbucket
5 13 (2.54%) Eclipse
6 12 (2.34%) JUnit
7 11 (2.15%) MSI
8 10 (1.95%) Mockito
9 9 (1.76%) Android Studio
9 9 (1.76%) Browser DevTools
9 9 (1.76%) Maven
9 9 (1.76%) Selenium
9 9 (1.76%) Xcode
10 8 (1.56%) Sonatype Nexus
11 5 (0.98%) Toad
12 4 (0.78%) Ant
12 4 (0.78%) Artifactory
12 4 (0.78%) IntelliJ
12 4 (0.78%) ScriptRunner
General
1 140 (27.34%) Finance
2 133 (25.98%) Social Skills
3 65 (12.70%) Banking
4 62 (12.11%) Analytical Skills
5 46 (8.98%) Public Sector
6 24 (4.69%) Front Office
7 22 (4.30%) Investment Banking
8 16 (3.13%) Documentation Skills
8 16 (3.13%) Influencing Skills
9 9 (1.76%) Financial Institution
10 7 (1.37%) Telecoms
11 6 (1.17%) Advertising
11 6 (1.17%) Inclusion and Diversity
12 5 (0.98%) Legal
13 4 (0.78%) Law
13 4 (0.78%) Retail
14 3 (0.59%) Billing
14 3 (0.59%) Manufacturing
14 3 (0.59%) Military
15 2 (0.39%) Organisational Skills
Job Titles
1 93 (18.16%) Developer
2 74 (14.45%) Senior
3 46 (8.98%) Analyst
4 35 (6.84%) Java Developer
5 33 (6.45%) Support Engineer
5 33 (6.45%) Unix Engineer
6 26 (5.08%) Linux Engineer
6 26 (5.08%) Technical Support
7 25 (4.88%) DBA
7 25 (4.88%) Site Reliability Engineer
8 22 (4.30%) Data Engineer
8 22 (4.30%) Oracle DBA
9 21 (4.10%) DevOps Engineer
9 21 (4.10%) Site Engineer
10 19 (3.71%) Administrator
10 19 (3.71%) Software Engineer
11 18 (3.52%) Unix Linux Engineer
12 17 (3.32%) Senior Developer
13 16 (3.13%) Kafka Engineer
13 16 (3.13%) Senior Linux Engineer
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 57 (11.13%) Kafka
2 32 (6.25%) REST
3 28 (5.47%) XML
4 25 (4.88%) Middleware
5 20 (3.91%) React
6 19 (3.71%) SOAP
7 18 (3.52%) JSON
8 15 (2.93%) Elastic Stack
9 14 (2.73%) AngularJS
9 14 (2.73%) CSS
9 14 (2.73%) Spring
10 13 (2.54%) Oracle GoldenGate
11 10 (1.95%) FIX Protocol
11 10 (1.95%) HTML
11 10 (1.95%) JAX-RS
11 10 (1.95%) RESTful
12 9 (1.76%) ActiveMQ
12 9 (1.76%) Ajax
12 9 (1.76%) GraphQL
12 9 (1.76%) Spring Boot
Miscellaneous
1 28 (5.47%) Management Information System
2 23 (4.49%) Cloud Native
3 22 (4.30%) Onboarding
4 18 (3.52%) Foreign Exchange (FX)
4 18 (3.52%) Linux Command Line
5 16 (3.13%) Data Centre
5 16 (3.13%) Fixed Income
6 15 (2.93%) Legacy Systems
7 13 (2.54%) Derivative
8 12 (2.34%) Equities
9 11 (2.15%) Greenfield Project
10 10 (1.95%) Security Posture
11 9 (1.76%) Algorithms
11 9 (1.76%) Mainframe
11 9 (1.76%) Mobile App
12 8 (1.56%) BYOD
12 8 (1.56%) Enterprise Cloud
12 8 (1.56%) Enterprise Software
12 8 (1.56%) Public Cloud
12 8 (1.56%) VSAM
Operating Systems
1 332 (64.84%) Linux
2 160 (31.25%) Windows
3 30 (5.86%) Windows Server
4 26 (5.08%) Solaris
5 23 (4.49%) AIX
6 22 (4.30%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
7 11 (2.15%) Mac OS X
8 9 (1.76%) Android
9 4 (0.78%) Mac OS
10 3 (0.59%) Oracle Linux
10 3 (0.59%) VMS
11 2 (0.39%) CentOS
11 2 (0.39%) SUSE Linux Enterprise Server
12 1 (0.20%) OpenVMS
12 1 (0.20%) Rocky
12 1 (0.20%) Ubuntu
12 1 (0.20%) Windows 10
12 1 (0.20%) Windows 7
12 1 (0.20%) Windows Server 2003
12 1 (0.20%) Windows Server 2008
Processes & Methodologies
1 132 (25.78%) Agile
2 103 (20.12%) Problem-Solving
3 93 (18.16%) DevOps
4 81 (15.82%) CI/CD
5 58 (11.33%) Migration
6 55 (10.74%) Observability
7 53 (10.35%) Computer Science
7 53 (10.35%) ITIL
8 47 (9.18%) Incident Response
8 47 (9.18%) Software Engineering
9 46 (8.98%) Performance Tuning
10 45 (8.79%) Containerisation
11 44 (8.59%) OO
12 43 (8.40%) Data Modelling
12 43 (8.40%) Microservices
13 40 (7.81%) Analytics
13 40 (7.81%) Infrastructure as Code
13 40 (7.81%) Root Cause Analysis
13 40 (7.81%) Site Reliability Engineering
14 38 (7.42%) Change Management
Programming Languages
1 199 (38.87%) SQL
2 183 (35.74%) Python
3 127 (24.80%) Java
4 100 (19.53%) Shell Script
5 62 (12.11%) Bash
6 60 (11.72%) Perl
7 36 (7.03%) PowerShell
8 35 (6.84%) C++
9 34 (6.64%) JavaScript
10 33 (6.45%) PL/SQL
11 27 (5.27%) C#
12 24 (4.69%) Korn
13 10 (1.95%) PHP
14 9 (1.76%) Scala
15 8 (1.56%) COBOL
16 7 (1.37%) Go
17 3 (0.59%) HiveQL
17 3 (0.59%) Jython
18 2 (0.39%) Kusto Query Language
18 2 (0.39%) PromQL
Qualifications
1 124 (24.22%) Security Cleared
2 93 (18.16%) SC Cleared
3 73 (14.26%) Degree
4 39 (7.62%) Computer Science Degree
5 14 (2.73%) BPSS Clearance
6 8 (1.56%) CISSP
7 6 (1.17%) ITIL Foundation Certificate
7 6 (1.17%) Microsoft Certification
7 6 (1.17%) OSCP
8 5 (0.98%) CompTIA Security+
8 5 (0.98%) DV Cleared
8 5 (0.98%) GPEN
8 5 (0.98%) GWAPT
8 5 (0.98%) MCSA
8 5 (0.98%) MCSE
9 4 (0.78%) ISTQB
9 4 (0.78%) ISTQB Foundation Certification
9 4 (0.78%) PMI Certification
10 3 (0.59%) AWS Certification
10 3 (0.59%) ITIL Certification
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 18 (3.52%) SLA
2 16 (3.13%) QA
3 13 (2.54%) Data Quality
4 11 (2.15%) NIST
5 9 (1.76%) ISO/IEC 27001
6 3 (0.59%) FATCA
6 3 (0.59%) NIST 800
6 3 (0.59%) Sarbanes-Oxley
6 3 (0.59%) SEPA
7 2 (0.39%) Disclosure Scotland
7 2 (0.39%) GDPR
7 2 (0.39%) GMP
7 2 (0.39%) ISO 15022
7 2 (0.39%) ISO 20022
7 2 (0.39%) PCI DSS
8 1 (0.20%) NCSC
System Software
1 69 (13.48%) Docker
2 18 (3.52%) Active Directory
3 14 (2.73%) Oracle RAC
4 9 (1.76%) VMware Infrastructure
5 7 (1.37%) KVM
6 6 (1.17%) Hyper-V
6 6 (1.17%) NFS
6 6 (1.17%) Virtual Machines
7 5 (0.98%) GPFS
8 4 (0.78%) HDFS
9 3 (0.59%) Firmware
9 3 (0.59%) GridGain
9 3 (0.59%) PowerHA
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%) VMware NSX
10 2 (0.39%) vSphere
11 1 (0.20%) Lustre
Systems Management
1 72 (14.06%) Kubernetes
2 65 (12.70%) Ansible
3 48 (9.38%) Terraform
4 38 (7.42%) Grafana
5 23 (4.49%) Prometheus
6 22 (4.30%) Puppet
7 16 (3.13%) Oracle RMAN
8 15 (2.93%) Oracle Enterprise Manager
9 11 (2.15%) Kibana
10 7 (1.37%) NetBackup
11 6 (1.17%) Control-M
11 6 (1.17%) IBM BigFix
11 6 (1.17%) Progress Chef
11 6 (1.17%) Red Hat Satellite
11 6 (1.17%) vCenter Server
12 5 (0.98%) CASB
12 5 (0.98%) Dell DRAC
12 5 (0.98%) Nessus
12 5 (0.98%) Salt
13 4 (0.78%) SCCM
Vendors
1 168 (32.81%) Oracle
2 57 (11.13%) Splunk
3 50 (9.77%) Microsoft
4 43 (8.40%) IBM
5 31 (6.05%) ServiceNow
6 17 (3.32%) VMware
7 16 (3.13%) Cisco
7 16 (3.13%) Red Hat
8 14 (2.73%) CyberArk
8 14 (2.73%) Sybase
9 11 (2.15%) Talend
10 10 (1.95%) Informatica
10 10 (1.95%) Remedy
11 9 (1.76%) Fujitsu
12 8 (1.56%) AppDynamics
12 8 (1.56%) Aruba
12 8 (1.56%) Dell
12 8 (1.56%) Veritas
13 7 (1.37%) CheckPoint
13 7 (1.37%) F5