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 11 June 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
11 Jun 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 218 167 131
Rank change year-on-year -51 -36 -45
Contract jobs citing Unix 586 496 756
As % of all contract jobs in the UK 1.17% 1.69% 1.73%
As % of the Operating Systems category 12.27% 12.10% 12.86%
Number of daily rates quoted 345 301 513
10th Percentile £303 £358 £331
25th Percentile £400 £408 £410
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £469 £475 £525
Median % change year-on-year -1.26% -9.52% -4.55%
75th Percentile £552 £597 £638
90th Percentile £654 £650 £800
UK excluding London median daily rate £459 £467 £450
% change year-on-year -1.71% +3.78% -16.67%
Number of hourly rates quoted 26 6 21
10th Percentile £21.50 £43.87 £22.30
25th Percentile £31.86 £52.19 £23.80
Median hourly rate £52.50 £55.00 £40.00
Median % change year-on-year -4.55% +37.50% -32.85%
75th Percentile £53.75 £66.25 -
90th Percentile £55.00 £73.13 £65.00
UK excluding London median hourly rate £47.54 £55.00 £40.00
% change year-on-year -13.56% +37.50% -31.73%

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 4,775 4,100 5,877
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the UK 9.57% 13.96% 13.47%
Number of daily rates quoted 3,039 2,690 3,912
10th Percentile £188 £200 £185
25th Percentile £315 £313 £309
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £460 £465 £470
Median % change year-on-year -1.08% -1.12% -5.95%
75th Percentile £575 £585 £588
90th Percentile £650 £675 £700
UK excluding London median daily rate £450 £450 £450
% change year-on-year - - -2.70%
Number of hourly rates quoted 341 194 409
10th Percentile £14.50 £15.15 £12.75
25th Percentile £19.00 £17.33 £15.50
Median hourly rate £31.00 £21.95 £22.52
Median % change year-on-year +41.23% -2.53% -50.02%
75th Percentile £63.75 £41.25 £62.50
90th Percentile £70.00 £68.00 £70.00
UK excluding London median hourly rate £28.74 £18.87 £24.18
% change year-on-year +52.31% -21.96% -40.43%

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 11 June 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 11 June 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 11 June 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 -42 501 £469 -1.26% 86
UK excluding London -43 351 £459 -1.71% 62
London -73 185 £559 +11.88% 36
Work from Home -31 171 £469 +4.22% 55
North of England -33 115 £475 +6.26% 20
South East -14 107 £392 -28.73% 19
North West +5 88 £479 +14.68% 17
Midlands -12 85 £459 +0.88% 2
West Midlands -3 80 £459 -0.22% 2
Scotland -50 39 £425 -10.53% 4
Yorkshire -56 22 £461 -11.08% 2
North East -24 5 £480 +28.00% 1
South West -28 5 £600 +11.63% 11
East of England -31 5 £300 -33.33% 5
East Midlands -30 4 £494 +26.28%
Wales - 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 32 (5.46%) Confluence
2 25 (4.27%) SAS
3 18 (3.07%) Apache
4 16 (2.73%) Apache Spark
5 14 (2.39%) Apache Airflow
6 11 (1.88%) WebLogic
7 10 (1.71%) CICS
8 8 (1.37%) Tuxedo
9 7 (1.19%) NetWeaver
10 6 (1.02%) OpenStack
10 6 (1.02%) SharePoint
11 4 (0.68%) Adobe Experience Manager
11 4 (0.68%) Oracle SOA Suite
12 3 (0.51%) IBM HTTP Server
12 3 (0.51%) Tomcat
12 3 (0.51%) WebSphere
12 3 (0.51%) WebSphere Application Server
13 2 (0.34%) ArcGIS
13 2 (0.34%) Oracle HTTP Server
13 2 (0.34%) WebSphere Portal
Applications
1 7 (1.19%) Microsoft Excel
1 7 (1.19%) Notepad++
2 4 (0.68%) Microsoft Office
Business Applications
1 8 (1.37%) SAP S/4HANA
2 6 (1.02%) Summit
3 2 (0.34%) FLEXCUBE
3 2 (0.34%) Oracle EBS
3 2 (0.34%) Oracle Procure-to-Pay
4 1 (0.17%) Oracle Applications
4 1 (0.17%) Oracle ERP
4 1 (0.17%) Teamcenter
Cloud Services
1 110 (18.77%) AWS
2 71 (12.12%) Azure
3 31 (5.29%) GitHub
4 25 (4.27%) GCP
5 23 (3.92%) AWS Lambda
5 23 (3.92%) Entra ID
5 23 (3.92%) GitHub Actions
6 22 (3.75%) Serverless
7 20 (3.41%) Amazon S3
7 20 (3.41%) OpenShift
8 15 (2.56%) IaaS
8 15 (2.56%) PaaS
8 15 (2.56%) Power Platform
9 12 (2.05%) SaaS
10 11 (1.88%) Azure DevOps
11 10 (1.71%) Snowflake
12 9 (1.54%) Amazon EC2
13 8 (1.37%) Azure Data Factory
14 7 (1.19%) Amazon ECS
14 7 (1.19%) Microsoft 365
Communications & Networking
1 30 (5.12%) Firewall
2 27 (4.61%) DNS
3 20 (3.41%) SAN
4 15 (2.56%) TCP/IP
5 14 (2.39%) NAS
6 10 (1.71%) SSH
7 9 (1.54%) HTTP
7 9 (1.54%) Wireless
8 8 (1.37%) Wireshark
9 7 (1.19%) 5G
9 7 (1.19%) Ethernet
9 7 (1.19%) FTP
9 7 (1.19%) InfiniBand
9 7 (1.19%) NetScaler
9 7 (1.19%) PuTTY
9 7 (1.19%) SSL
9 7 (1.19%) VPN
9 7 (1.19%) WinSCP
10 6 (1.02%) Diameter Protocol
10 6 (1.02%) VoWiFi
Database & Business Intelligence
1 69 (11.77%) SQL Server
2 42 (7.17%) Relational Database
3 37 (6.31%) MySQL
4 36 (6.14%) Oracle Database
5 32 (5.46%) MongoDB
6 31 (5.29%) PostgreSQL
7 20 (3.41%) Data Warehouse
8 19 (3.24%) Metadata
9 16 (2.73%) Big Data
9 16 (2.73%) BusinessObjects
9 16 (2.73%) DataStage
10 15 (2.56%) Db2
10 15 (2.56%) KDB
10 15 (2.56%) Power BI
11 14 (2.39%) Amazon Aurora
11 14 (2.39%) NoSQL
12 13 (2.22%) Kdb+
13 11 (1.88%) Data Lake
13 11 (1.88%) Sybase ASE
14 10 (1.71%) Oracle Database 11g
Development Applications
1 61 (10.41%) Jenkins
2 54 (9.22%) GitLab
3 49 (8.36%) JIRA
4 48 (8.19%) Git
5 22 (3.75%) Artifactory
6 11 (1.88%) Mockito
7 9 (1.54%) Bitbucket
8 8 (1.37%) Maven
8 8 (1.37%) Sonatype Nexus
9 5 (0.85%) JUnit
10 4 (0.68%) Android Studio
10 4 (0.68%) Browser DevTools
10 4 (0.68%) CA Gen
10 4 (0.68%) Eclipse
10 4 (0.68%) MSI
10 4 (0.68%) SonarQube
10 4 (0.68%) Xcode
11 3 (0.51%) CircleCI
11 3 (0.51%) Introscope
11 3 (0.51%) REST Assured
General
1 148 (25.26%) Finance
2 122 (20.82%) Social Skills
3 92 (15.70%) Banking
4 74 (12.63%) Analytical Skills
5 57 (9.73%) Public Sector
6 26 (4.44%) Investment Banking
7 24 (4.10%) Documentation Skills
8 21 (3.58%) Front Office
9 10 (1.71%) Influencing Skills
9 10 (1.71%) Telecoms
10 9 (1.54%) Financial Institution
10 9 (1.54%) Inclusion and Diversity
11 7 (1.19%) Retail
12 6 (1.02%) Advertising
13 5 (0.85%) Law
13 5 (0.85%) Military
14 2 (0.34%) Billing
14 2 (0.34%) Local Government
14 2 (0.34%) Organisational Skills
15 1 (0.17%) Presentation Skills
Job Titles
1 103 (17.58%) Developer
2 76 (12.97%) Senior
3 64 (10.92%) Data Engineer
4 56 (9.56%) Unix Engineer
5 44 (7.51%) Analyst
6 40 (6.83%) Support Engineer
7 39 (6.66%) Java Developer
8 30 (5.12%) DBA
9 29 (4.95%) Senior Developer
10 23 (3.92%) Administrator
10 23 (3.92%) Oracle DBA
10 23 (3.92%) Python Developer
11 22 (3.75%) Architect
11 22 (3.75%) Site Reliability Engineer
11 22 (3.75%) Technical Support
12 20 (3.41%) Consultant
12 20 (3.41%) Site Engineer
13 17 (2.90%) Linux Engineer
13 17 (2.90%) Software Engineer
14 14 (2.39%) DevOps Engineer
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 55 (9.39%) Kafka
2 35 (5.97%) REST
3 27 (4.61%) RESTful
4 25 (4.27%) Middleware
5 20 (3.41%) Spring
5 20 (3.41%) Spring Boot
6 18 (3.07%) CSS
6 18 (3.07%) XML
7 15 (2.56%) HTML
8 14 (2.39%) Web Services
9 13 (2.22%) Oracle GoldenGate
10 11 (1.88%) JAX-RS
10 11 (1.88%) Pandas
10 11 (1.88%) React
11 10 (1.71%) ActiveMQ
11 10 (1.71%) LDAP
11 10 (1.71%) RabbitMQ
12 9 (1.54%) AngularJS
12 9 (1.54%) Flask
12 9 (1.54%) JSON
Miscellaneous
1 43 (7.34%) Onboarding
2 34 (5.80%) Linux Command Line
3 28 (4.78%) Legacy Systems
4 27 (4.61%) Management Information System
5 24 (4.10%) Data Centre
6 17 (2.90%) Cloud Native
6 17 (2.90%) Derivative
6 17 (2.90%) Mainframe
7 14 (2.39%) Fixed Income
7 14 (2.39%) Replication
8 11 (1.88%) Clustering
8 11 (1.88%) Equities
8 11 (1.88%) Public Cloud
9 10 (1.71%) BYOD
9 10 (1.71%) Virtual Team
9 10 (1.71%) VSAM
10 9 (1.54%) Foreign Exchange (FX)
10 9 (1.54%) Greenfield Project
10 9 (1.54%) Market Risk
11 8 (1.37%) Enterprise Software
Operating Systems
1 381 (65.02%) Linux
2 154 (26.28%) Windows
3 59 (10.07%) Solaris
4 41 (7.00%) Windows Server
5 29 (4.95%) AIX
6 22 (3.75%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
7 12 (2.05%) Mac OS X
8 9 (1.54%) Oracle Linux
9 7 (1.19%) HPUX
10 5 (0.85%) Mac OS
10 5 (0.85%) SUSE
11 4 (0.68%) Android
12 2 (0.34%) SUSE Linux Enterprise Server
12 2 (0.34%) VMS
13 1 (0.17%) CentOS
13 1 (0.17%) OpenVMS
13 1 (0.17%) Rocky
13 1 (0.17%) Ubuntu
13 1 (0.17%) Windows Server 2008
13 1 (0.17%) zOS
Processes & Methodologies
1 127 (21.67%) Agile
2 119 (20.31%) CI/CD
3 104 (17.75%) Problem-Solving
4 96 (16.38%) Migration
5 78 (13.31%) DevOps
6 71 (12.12%) High Availability
7 70 (11.95%) ITIL
8 61 (10.41%) Root Cause Analysis
9 60 (10.24%) Test Automation
10 59 (10.07%) Disaster Recovery
11 57 (9.73%) Observability
12 52 (8.87%) Incident Management
13 50 (8.53%) Performance Tuning
13 50 (8.53%) Runbook
14 49 (8.36%) Data Modelling
15 47 (8.02%) Change Management
16 45 (7.68%) Analytics
16 45 (7.68%) Microservices
17 44 (7.51%) Computer Science
17 44 (7.51%) Software Engineering
Programming Languages
1 224 (38.23%) SQL
2 221 (37.71%) Python
3 111 (18.94%) Java
4 106 (18.09%) Shell Script
5 67 (11.43%) PL/SQL
6 57 (9.73%) PowerShell
7 55 (9.39%) Bash
8 42 (7.17%) Perl
9 39 (6.66%) JavaScript
10 26 (4.44%) C#
10 26 (4.44%) C++
11 16 (2.73%) Korn
12 12 (2.05%) COBOL
13 8 (1.37%) Scala
14 6 (1.02%) Go
15 4 (0.68%) C
15 4 (0.68%) Kotlin
15 4 (0.68%) Ruby
15 4 (0.68%) T-SQL
16 3 (0.51%) Jython
Qualifications
1 200 (34.13%) Security Cleared
2 169 (28.84%) SC Cleared
3 74 (12.63%) Degree
4 27 (4.61%) BPSS Clearance
5 25 (4.27%) Computer Science Degree
6 18 (3.07%) CISSP
7 10 (1.71%) CompTIA Security+
7 10 (1.71%) DV Cleared
8 8 (1.37%) CISM
9 7 (1.19%) Cisco Certification
10 6 (1.02%) (ISC)2 CCSP
10 6 (1.02%) CESG Certified Professional
10 6 (1.02%) CRISC
10 6 (1.02%) GIAC
10 6 (1.02%) Microsoft Certification
10 6 (1.02%) RHCE
11 5 (0.85%) MCSA
11 5 (0.85%) MCSE
11 5 (0.85%) SANS
12 4 (0.68%) SSCP
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 35 (5.97%) ISO/IEC 27001
2 34 (5.80%) NIST
3 21 (3.58%) SLA
4 19 (3.24%) QA
5 10 (1.71%) Data Quality
6 7 (1.19%) Cyber Essentials
7 6 (1.02%) ISO 31000
8 5 (0.85%) GRC
9 4 (0.68%) ISO 20022
9 4 (0.68%) NIST 800
9 4 (0.68%) Sarbanes-Oxley
10 3 (0.51%) Disclosure Scotland
10 3 (0.51%) FATCA
11 2 (0.34%) GDPR
11 2 (0.34%) GMP
11 2 (0.34%) ISO 15022
11 2 (0.34%) NCSC
11 2 (0.34%) PCI DSS
12 1 (0.17%) MIL-STD-1553
12 1 (0.17%) SEPA
System Software
1 58 (9.90%) Docker
2 40 (6.83%) Active Directory
3 19 (3.24%) Oracle RAC
4 18 (3.07%) VMware Infrastructure
5 16 (2.73%) NFS
6 10 (1.71%) Virtual Machines
7 8 (1.37%) GPFS
8 6 (1.02%) Hyper-V
8 6 (1.02%) KVM
8 6 (1.02%) Postfix
8 6 (1.02%) Varnish
8 6 (1.02%) VMware ESXi
9 5 (0.85%) vSphere
10 4 (0.68%) HDFS
10 4 (0.68%) Sendmail
11 3 (0.51%) Firmware
11 3 (0.51%) GridGain
11 3 (0.51%) PowerHA
11 3 (0.51%) Veritas Volume Manager
12 2 (0.34%) SRDF
Systems Management
1 71 (12.12%) Kubernetes
2 63 (10.75%) Ansible
3 43 (7.34%) Grafana
4 35 (5.97%) Terraform
5 29 (4.95%) Oracle RMAN
6 26 (4.44%) Prometheus
7 13 (2.22%) Oracle Enterprise Manager
8 12 (2.05%) Data Guard
8 12 (2.05%) Kibana
9 11 (1.88%) Puppet
10 10 (1.71%) NetBackup
11 9 (1.54%) Progress Chef
11 9 (1.54%) Single Sign-On
12 6 (1.02%) Control-M
12 6 (1.02%) HAProxy
12 6 (1.02%) IBM BigFix
12 6 (1.02%) Nessus
12 6 (1.02%) Tivoli
12 6 (1.02%) vCenter Server
13 5 (0.85%) Salt
Vendors
1 240 (40.96%) Oracle
2 49 (8.36%) Splunk
3 44 (7.51%) IBM
4 39 (6.66%) Microsoft
5 34 (5.80%) CyberArk
5 34 (5.80%) Talend
6 31 (5.29%) BeyondTrust
7 27 (4.61%) ServiceNow
7 27 (4.61%) VMware
8 25 (4.27%) Informatica
9 21 (3.58%) Cisco
9 21 (3.58%) Denodo
10 19 (3.24%) Sybase
11 16 (2.73%) Red Hat
12 13 (2.22%) Dynatrace
12 13 (2.22%) Veritas
13 12 (2.05%) SAP
14 9 (1.54%) CheckPoint
14 9 (1.54%) F5
15 8 (1.37%) Aruba