Unix Contracts

Unix
UK

The table below provides summary statistics for contract job vacancies requiring Unix skills. It includes a benchmarking guide to the contractor rates offered in vacancies that cited Unix over the 6 months leading up to 22 May 2025, comparing them to the same period in the previous two years.

6 months to
22 May 2025
Same period 2024 Same period 2023
Rank 157 140 85
Rank change year-on-year -17 -55 +25
Contract jobs citing Unix 518 732 1,583
As % of all contract jobs advertised in the UK 1.79% 1.72% 2.79%
As % of the Operating Systems category 12.91% 12.88% 17.28%
Number of daily rates quoted 308 496 1,089
10th Percentile £360 £334 £413
25th Percentile £414 £413 £500
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £480 £545 £550
Median % change year-on-year -11.93% -0.91% -
75th Percentile £600 £650 £663
90th Percentile £688 £800 £737
UK excluding London median daily rate £465 £450 £540
% change year-on-year +3.33% -16.67% +9.09%
Number of hourly rates quoted 6 18 24
10th Percentile £43.87 £22.23 £48.79
25th Percentile £52.19 £27.85 £53.44
Median hourly rate £55.00 £40.00 £59.57
Median % change year-on-year +37.50% -32.85% -8.35%
75th Percentile £66.25 £46.56 £73.72
90th Percentile £73.13 £66.88 £75.00
UK excluding London median hourly rate £55.00 £40.00 £58.05
% change year-on-year +37.50% -31.09% -10.70%

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 4,012 5,685 9,163
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the UK 13.90% 13.39% 16.16%
Number of daily rates quoted 2,636 3,850 6,392
10th Percentile £200 £185 £190
25th Percentile £313 £300 £334
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £465 £465 £500
Median % change year-on-year - -7.00% -
75th Percentile £588 £588 £638
90th Percentile £688 £700 £719
UK excluding London median daily rate £447 £450 £470
% change year-on-year -0.67% -4.26% +10.59%
Number of hourly rates quoted 170 393 403
10th Percentile £15.32 £12.75 £14.05
25th Percentile £17.44 £15.50 £17.74
Median hourly rate £22.00 £22.15 £39.60
Median % change year-on-year -0.68% -44.07% +76.00%
75th Percentile £56.88 £60.75 £64.25
90th Percentile £68.00 £70.00 £75.00
UK excluding London median hourly rate £20.47 £22.50 £30.00
% change year-on-year -9.02% -25.00% +50.00%

Unix
Job Vacancy Trend

Job postings citing Unix as a proportion of all IT jobs advertised.

Job vacancy trend for Unix in the UK

Unix
Contractor Daily Rate Trend

3-month moving average daily rate quoted in jobs citing Unix.

Daily rate trend for Unix in the UK

Unix
Daily Rate Histogram

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing Unix over the 6 months to 22 May 2025.

Daily rate histogram for Unix in the UK

Unix
Contractor Hourly Rate Trend

3-month moving average hourly rates quoted in jobs citing Unix.

Hourly rate trend for Unix in the UK

Unix
Hourly Rate Histogram

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing Unix over the 6 months to 22 May 2025.

Hourly rate histogram for Unix in the UK

Unix
Top 17 Contract 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 22 May 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 -34 379 £492 -10.55% 485
UK excluding London +30 275 £465 +3.33% 277
London -50 200 £500 -16.67% 308
Work from Home +6 177 £473 -11.35% 256
Scotland +30 103 £473 +18.13% 34
North of England +30 62 £450 -4.26% 49
South East -4 53 £525 +23.53% 92
North West +25 35 £447 -14.45% 21
Midlands -1 27 £460 -14.18% 34
Yorkshire +10 26 £525 +23.53% 19
West Midlands -6 21 £460 -14.18% 25
East of England +24 14 £450 -2.70% 36
Northern Ireland - 9 £325 - 15
South West +19 7 £365 -25.13% 16
East Midlands +10 6 £401 -19.90% 9
North East +1 1 £375 - 9
Wales -4 1 £167 -75.61% 6

Unix
Co-occurring Skills and Capabilities by Category

The follow tables expand on the table above by listing co-occurrences grouped by category. The same employment type, locality and period is covered with up to 20 co-occurrences shown in each of the following categories:

Application Platforms
1 23 (4.44%) Confluence
2 15 (2.90%) Apache
3 14 (2.70%) Apache Spark
4 13 (2.51%) Oracle Workflow
5 11 (2.12%) WebSphere
6 9 (1.74%) Microsoft Exchange
7 8 (1.54%) Tomcat
7 8 (1.54%) WebLogic
8 7 (1.35%) nginx
8 7 (1.35%) SAS
8 7 (1.35%) SharePoint
9 6 (1.16%) NetWeaver
10 5 (0.97%) Apache Airflow
10 5 (0.97%) JBoss
10 5 (0.97%) Oracle SOA Suite
11 4 (0.77%) CMS
11 4 (0.77%) Drupal
11 4 (0.77%) WordPress
12 3 (0.58%) CICS
12 3 (0.58%) OpenStack
Applications
1 14 (2.70%) MS Visio
2 12 (2.32%) Microsoft Excel
3 11 (2.12%) Microsoft Office
4 3 (0.58%) Microsoft Project
5 1 (0.19%) Microsoft PowerPoint
Business Applications
1 13 (2.51%) Kondor
2 12 (2.32%) Oracle EBS
3 10 (1.93%) Oracle EBS R12
4 6 (1.16%) Oracle Assets
4 6 (1.16%) Oracle Payables
4 6 (1.16%) SAP IBP
5 5 (0.97%) Oracle Applications
6 4 (0.77%) Oracle General Ledger
7 3 (0.58%) Oracle 11i
7 3 (0.58%) Oracle ERP
8 2 (0.39%) Actimize
8 2 (0.39%) Fidessa
8 2 (0.39%) Oracle BPM
8 2 (0.39%) Oracle Cash Management
8 2 (0.39%) Oracle E-Business Tax
8 2 (0.39%) Oracle Internet Expenses
8 2 (0.39%) Oracle iProcurement
8 2 (0.39%) Oracle Receivables
8 2 (0.39%) Oracle Subledger Accounting
8 2 (0.39%) Remedy ITSM
Cloud Services
1 99 (19.11%) AWS
2 81 (15.64%) Azure
3 34 (6.56%) GCP
4 21 (4.05%) Entra ID
5 19 (3.67%) OpenShift
6 18 (3.47%) AWS CloudFormation
7 17 (3.28%) Cloud Computing
8 14 (2.70%) Amazon S3
8 14 (2.70%) GitHub
9 13 (2.51%) Serverless
10 12 (2.32%) AWS Lambda
11 10 (1.93%) Azure DevOps
12 9 (1.74%) Amazon CloudWatch
13 8 (1.54%) IaaS
14 7 (1.35%) Cohesity
14 7 (1.35%) Virtual Private Cloud
15 6 (1.16%) Amazon EC2
15 6 (1.16%) Amazon EKS
16 5 (0.97%) OneDrive
16 5 (0.97%) Snowflake
Communications & Networking
1 44 (8.49%) SAN
2 29 (5.60%) VPN
3 23 (4.44%) DNS
4 22 (4.25%) LAN
5 20 (3.86%) Firewall
5 20 (3.86%) TCP/IP
6 19 (3.67%) WAN
6 19 (3.67%) Wireshark
7 18 (3.47%) HTTP
7 18 (3.47%) MPLS
8 16 (3.09%) ATM
8 16 (3.09%) Ethernet
8 16 (3.09%) Frame Relay
8 16 (3.09%) GPRS
8 16 (3.09%) GSM
8 16 (3.09%) LTE
8 16 (3.09%) NAS
8 16 (3.09%) SDH
8 16 (3.09%) UMTS
9 13 (2.51%) SSL
Database & Business Intelligence
1 40 (7.72%) Relational Database
2 35 (6.76%) SQL Server
3 24 (4.63%) Oracle Database
4 23 (4.44%) DB2
4 23 (4.44%) RDBMS
5 21 (4.05%) MongoDB
6 17 (3.28%) Oracle Reports
7 15 (2.90%) Data Warehouse
8 14 (2.70%) Big Data
8 14 (2.70%) PostgreSQL
9 12 (2.32%) MySQL
10 10 (1.93%) Hadoop
10 10 (1.93%) Metadata
11 9 (1.74%) BigQuery
12 8 (1.54%) KDB
13 7 (1.35%) Apache Hive
13 7 (1.35%) MS Access
13 7 (1.35%) Oracle Database 10g
14 6 (1.16%) Oracle Database 11g
14 6 (1.16%) SAP BW
Development Applications
1 76 (14.67%) Jenkins
2 70 (13.51%) Git
3 41 (7.92%) JIRA
4 27 (5.21%) GitLab
5 19 (3.67%) JUnit
6 18 (3.47%) Subversion
7 16 (3.09%) Maven
8 15 (2.90%) Bitbucket
9 14 (2.70%) Toad
10 13 (2.51%) Atlassian Bamboo
11 9 (1.74%) Ant
11 9 (1.74%) Bitbucket Server
12 8 (1.54%) Oracle Forms
13 7 (1.35%) SonarQube
13 7 (1.35%) TeamCity
14 6 (1.16%) SoapUI
14 6 (1.16%) Sonatype Nexus
15 5 (0.97%) Gradle
15 5 (0.97%) Jasmine
15 5 (0.97%) Mockito
General
1 189 (36.49%) Social Skills
2 124 (23.94%) Finance
3 75 (14.48%) Banking
4 72 (13.90%) Analytical Skills
5 27 (5.21%) Public Sector
6 26 (5.02%) Front Office
7 20 (3.86%) Telecoms
8 16 (3.09%) Investment Banking
9 12 (2.32%) Financial Institution
10 10 (1.93%) Organisational Skills
11 8 (1.54%) General Ledger
12 7 (1.35%) Inclusion and Diversity
13 6 (1.16%) Legal
13 6 (1.16%) Retail Banking
14 5 (0.97%) Documentation Skills
14 5 (0.97%) Influencing Skills
14 5 (0.97%) Wholesale Banking
15 4 (0.77%) Law
15 4 (0.77%) Military
16 3 (0.58%) Automotive
Job Titles
1 96 (18.53%) Developer
2 52 (10.04%) Analyst
3 47 (9.07%) Senior
4 38 (7.34%) Java Developer
5 30 (5.79%) Linux Engineer
6 29 (5.60%) Architect
7 25 (4.83%) Consultant
8 24 (4.63%) Applications Support
9 23 (4.44%) Administrator
9 23 (4.44%) DevOps Engineer
10 22 (4.25%) Network Engineer
11 21 (4.05%) Unix Engineer
12 20 (3.86%) Support Engineer
13 19 (3.67%) Infrastructure Engineer
13 19 (3.67%) Technical Analyst
14 17 (3.28%) Test Engineer
15 16 (3.09%) Lead
15 16 (3.09%) Python Engineer
16 15 (2.90%) Data Engineer
16 15 (2.90%) IP Engineer
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 36 (6.95%) Web Services
2 34 (6.56%) Kafka
3 32 (6.18%) Middleware
4 24 (4.63%) SOAP
5 22 (4.25%) XML
6 21 (4.05%) Spring
7 19 (3.67%) AngularJS
7 19 (3.67%) HTML
8 18 (3.47%) RESTful
9 17 (3.28%) REST
10 15 (2.90%) CSS
10 15 (2.90%) J2EE
11 14 (2.70%) .NET
11 14 (2.70%) Spring Boot
12 11 (2.12%) cloud-init
12 11 (2.12%) HTML5
12 11 (2.12%) jQuery
12 11 (2.12%) JSON
13 10 (1.93%) Node.js
14 9 (1.74%) LDAP
Miscellaneous
1 32 (6.18%) Management Information System
2 23 (4.44%) Data Protection Act
3 22 (4.25%) Foreign Exchange (FX)
4 21 (4.05%) Data Centre
4 21 (4.05%) Self-Motivation
5 17 (3.28%) Equities
5 17 (3.28%) Onboarding
6 16 (3.09%) Derivative
6 16 (3.09%) Virtual Team
7 15 (2.90%) Distributed Systems
8 14 (2.70%) Algorithms
9 13 (2.51%) FPGA
9 13 (2.51%) SWIFT Messaging Network
9 13 (2.51%) Verilog
10 11 (2.12%) Cloud Native
11 10 (1.93%) Fixed Income
11 10 (1.93%) Mainframe
12 9 (1.74%) Equity Derivative
13 8 (1.54%) Clustering
13 8 (1.54%) Replication
Operating Systems
1 337 (65.06%) Linux
2 128 (24.71%) Windows
3 42 (8.11%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
4 38 (7.34%) Windows Server
5 25 (4.83%) AIX
6 20 (3.86%) Solaris
7 19 (3.67%) CentOS
8 5 (0.97%) HPUX
8 5 (0.97%) Mac OS
8 5 (0.97%) Mac OS X
8 5 (0.97%) Ubuntu
9 4 (0.77%) CatOS
9 4 (0.77%) Windows Server 2012
9 4 (0.77%) Windows Server 2016
9 4 (0.77%) Windows Server 2019
10 3 (0.58%) Oracle Linux
11 2 (0.39%) Amazon Linux
11 2 (0.39%) Data ONTAP
11 2 (0.39%) Embedded Linux
11 2 (0.39%) Rocky
Processes & Methodologies
1 121 (23.36%) Problem-Solving
2 102 (19.69%) Agile
3 79 (15.25%) CI/CD
4 73 (14.09%) DevOps
5 52 (10.04%) High Availability
6 48 (9.27%) Software Engineering
7 45 (8.69%) ITIL
8 44 (8.49%) Test Automation
9 38 (7.34%) Performance Tuning
10 37 (7.14%) Migration
10 37 (7.14%) OO
11 35 (6.76%) SDLC
12 34 (6.56%) Data Protection
12 34 (6.56%) Task Automation
13 32 (6.18%) Microservices
14 31 (5.98%) Problem Management
15 30 (5.79%) Infrastructure as Code
15 30 (5.79%) Storage Management
16 28 (5.41%) Containerisation
16 28 (5.41%) Observability
Programming Languages
1 198 (38.22%) Python
2 182 (35.14%) SQL
3 112 (21.62%) Java
4 91 (17.57%) Shell Script
5 61 (11.78%) Perl
6 46 (8.88%) Bash
7 38 (7.34%) PL/SQL
8 30 (5.79%) JavaScript
9 20 (3.86%) C
10 18 (3.47%) PowerShell
11 17 (3.28%) Tcl
12 13 (2.51%) ActionScript
12 13 (2.51%) ActionScript 2.0
12 13 (2.51%) Go
12 13 (2.51%) SystemVerilog
13 12 (2.32%) C++
14 10 (1.93%) C#
14 10 (1.93%) Groovy
15 9 (1.74%) PHP
15 9 (1.74%) Scala
Qualifications
1 46 (8.88%) Security Cleared
2 40 (7.72%) SC Cleared
3 32 (6.18%) Degree
4 22 (4.25%) CCNP
4 22 (4.25%) Cisco Certification
4 22 (4.25%) ISTQB
5 19 (3.67%) ISEB
5 19 (3.67%) ISTQB Foundation Certification
6 10 (1.93%) AWS Certification
7 8 (1.54%) Computer Science Degree
8 5 (0.97%) AWS Certified DevOps Engineer
8 5 (0.97%) VMware Certified Professional (VCP)
9 4 (0.77%) CCSE
9 4 (0.77%) MCSE
9 4 (0.77%) Microsoft Certification
10 3 (0.58%) AWS Certified Developer
10 3 (0.58%) AWS Certified Solutions Architect
10 3 (0.58%) AWS Certified SysOps Administrator
11 2 (0.39%) CCIE
11 2 (0.39%) IBM Certification
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 18 (3.47%) QA
2 11 (2.12%) Accessibility
3 9 (1.74%) Data Quality
3 9 (1.74%) Disclosure Scotland
4 8 (1.54%) SLA
5 6 (1.16%) MiFID
6 5 (0.97%) Basel III
6 5 (0.97%) WCAG
7 4 (0.77%) Cyber Essentials
7 4 (0.77%) Cyber Essentials PLUS
7 4 (0.77%) GDPR
7 4 (0.77%) NCSC
7 4 (0.77%) SEPA
8 2 (0.39%) GMP
8 2 (0.39%) HL7
8 2 (0.39%) ISO 20022
8 2 (0.39%) PCI DSS
8 2 (0.39%) Sarbanes-Oxley
9 1 (0.19%) EMIR
9 1 (0.19%) IEC 61508
System Software
1 45 (8.69%) Docker
2 42 (8.11%) VMware Infrastructure
3 35 (6.76%) Active Directory
4 13 (2.51%) Veritas Cluster Server
5 12 (2.32%) Virtual Machines
6 8 (1.54%) RACF
6 8 (1.54%) VMware ESXi
7 7 (1.35%) NFS
8 6 (1.16%) vSphere
9 5 (0.97%) Oracle RAC
10 4 (0.77%) Apache ZooKeeper
10 4 (0.77%) HDFS
10 4 (0.77%) KVM
10 4 (0.77%) VMware NSX
11 3 (0.58%) Hyper-V
11 3 (0.58%) Virtual Servers
12 2 (0.39%) GPFS
12 2 (0.39%) Veritas File System
12 2 (0.39%) Veritas Volume Manager
13 1 (0.19%) BitLocker
Systems Management
1 67 (12.93%) Kubernetes
2 52 (10.04%) Ansible
3 47 (9.07%) Terraform
4 21 (4.05%) Grafana
5 19 (3.67%) Puppet
6 18 (3.47%) Prometheus
7 16 (3.09%) Progress Chef
8 14 (2.70%) Oracle RMAN
9 12 (2.32%) NetBackup
9 12 (2.32%) Packer
10 9 (1.74%) Control-M
11 7 (1.35%) Istio
11 7 (1.35%) PowerCLI
11 7 (1.35%) Tivoli
11 7 (1.35%) vRealize Orchestrator
12 6 (1.16%) ZABBIX
13 5 (0.97%) HAProxy
13 5 (0.97%) Oracle Enterprise Manager
13 5 (0.97%) Red Hat Satellite
13 5 (0.97%) Tivoli Storage Manager
Vendors
1 106 (20.46%) Oracle
2 60 (11.58%) Microsoft
3 54 (10.42%) VMware
4 45 (8.69%) IBM
5 39 (7.53%) Splunk
6 38 (7.34%) Veritas
7 31 (5.98%) Red Hat
8 28 (5.41%) Cisco
8 28 (5.41%) Sybase
9 21 (4.05%) CyberArk
9 21 (4.05%) Juniper
10 14 (2.70%) Google
11 13 (2.51%) AppDynamics
11 13 (2.51%) Xilinx
12 12 (2.32%) Citrix
13 11 (2.12%) Bloomberg
13 11 (2.12%) IBM Sterling
13 11 (2.12%) SAP
14 10 (1.93%) Dynatrace
14 10 (1.93%) Informatica