DevOps Contract Job Trends in the West Midlands

DevOps
England > West Midlands

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

6 months to
16 Jan 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 7 27 29
Rank change year-on-year +20 +2 -3
Contract jobs citing DevOps 317 96 102
As % of all contract jobs in the West Midlands 13.54% 6.08% 5.86%
As % of the Processes & Methodologies category 15.81% 6.98% 6.82%
Number of daily rates quoted 232 63 81
10th Percentile £413 £353 £350
25th Percentile £475 £419 £400
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £525 £525 £500
Median % change year-on-year - +5.00% -9.09%
75th Percentile £600 £612 £575
90th Percentile £700 £725 £690
England median daily rate £525 £575 £575
% change year-on-year -8.70% - -4.17%
Number of hourly rates quoted 2 1 1
10th Percentile £73.45 - -
25th Percentile £74.88 £56.25 -
Median hourly rate £78.50 £57.50 £55.00
Median % change year-on-year +36.52% +4.55% -
75th Percentile £80.88 £58.75 -
90th Percentile £81.55 - -
England median hourly rate £47.50 £67.50 £65.00
% change year-on-year -29.63% +3.85% -0.92%

All Process & Methodology Skills
West Midlands

DevOps falls under the Processes and Methodologies category. For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all contract job vacancies requiring process or methodology skills in the West Midlands.

Contract vacancies with a requirement for process or methodology skills 2,005 1,375 1,496
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the West Midlands 85.65% 87.03% 85.88%
Number of daily rates quoted 1,272 859 989
10th Percentile £263 £219 £275
25th Percentile £404 £400 £400
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £515 £500
Median % change year-on-year -2.91% +3.00% -
75th Percentile £588 £611 £600
90th Percentile £675 £715 £688
England median daily rate £500 £525 £538
% change year-on-year -4.76% -2.33% -2.27%
Number of hourly rates quoted 88 46 63
10th Percentile £14.00 £14.70 £15.07
25th Percentile £16.22 £16.38 £18.13
Median hourly rate £20.25 £21.59 £28.42
Median % change year-on-year -6.21% -24.03% +64.11%
75th Percentile £25.67 £33.70 £50.63
90th Percentile £35.60 £52.50 £68.50
England median hourly rate £25.15 £35.00 £42.50
% change year-on-year -28.14% -17.65% +21.43%

DevOps
Job Vacancy Trend in the West Midlands

Historical trend showing the proportion of contract IT job postings citing DevOps relative to all contract IT jobs advertised in the West Midlands.

DevOps job vacancy trend in the West Midlands

DevOps
Daily Rate Trend in the West Midlands

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in the West Midlands citing DevOps.

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in the West Midlands citing DevOps

DevOps
Daily Rate Histogram in the West Midlands

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing DevOps in the West Midlands over the 6 months to 16 January 2026.

Daily rate histogram for DevOps in the West Midlands

DevOps
Hourly Rate Trend in the West Midlands

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in the West Midlands citing DevOps.

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in the West Midlands citing DevOps

DevOps
Contract Job Locations in the West Midlands

The table below looks at the demand and provides a guide to the median contractor rates quoted in IT jobs citing DevOps within the West Midlands region over the 6 months to 16 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
Birmingham +20 107 £525 +5.00% 36
Shropshire +12 103 £513 +4.69% 10
Worcestershire +6 45 £625 +8.70% 6
Herefordshire -1 36 £650 +6.21% 1
Warwickshire +3 33 £463 -22.92% 6
Coventry -12 7 £400 -27.27% 6
Solihull +4 6 £588 +70.29%
Staffordshire +6 2 £463 +32.14% 6
Wolverhampton - 2 - - 3
DevOps
England

DevOps
Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities in the West Midlands 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 73 (23.03%) SAS
2 35 (11.04%) Confluence
3 11 (3.47%) Apache
3 11 (3.47%) nginx
3 11 (3.47%) OpenStack
3 11 (3.47%) WebLogic
4 8 (2.52%) Apache Airflow
4 8 (2.52%) JBoss
4 8 (2.52%) SharePoint
5 4 (1.26%) Oracle Workflow
6 2 (0.63%) Adobe Experience Manager
7 1 (0.32%) CICS
7 1 (0.32%) CMS
7 1 (0.32%) IIS
7 1 (0.32%) Tuxedo
Applications
1 11 (3.47%) Microsoft Excel
2 9 (2.84%) Mozilla Thunderbird
3 8 (2.52%) Microsoft Project
4 3 (0.95%) Microsoft Office
4 3 (0.95%) Microsoft PowerPoint
5 1 (0.32%) Adobe Creative Suite
5 1 (0.32%) Moqups
5 1 (0.32%) MS Visio
5 1 (0.32%) Revit
Business Applications
1 4 (1.26%) Dynamics CRM
2 2 (0.63%) ResourceLink
2 2 (0.63%) Workday HCM
3 1 (0.32%) Maximo
3 1 (0.32%) SAP S/4HANA
3 1 (0.32%) VisionPLUS
Cloud Services
1 140 (44.16%) Azure
2 109 (34.38%) AWS
3 52 (16.40%) Azure DevOps
4 51 (16.09%) GitHub
5 48 (15.14%) GCP
6 41 (12.93%) Serverless
7 27 (8.52%) GitHub Actions
8 26 (8.20%) Azure Data Factory
8 26 (8.20%) OpenShift
9 20 (6.31%) Amazon S3
10 19 (5.99%) Amazon EC2
10 19 (5.99%) Amazon ELB
10 19 (5.99%) AWS KMS
10 19 (5.99%) Virtual Private Cloud
11 18 (5.68%) Amazon CloudWatch
11 18 (5.68%) Microsoft 365
12 14 (4.42%) Azure Key Vault
13 13 (4.10%) Power Platform
14 12 (3.79%) Azure AKS
14 12 (3.79%) Azure Synapse Analytics
Communications & Networking
1 25 (7.89%) Firewall
2 18 (5.68%) DNS
3 14 (4.42%) FTP
3 14 (4.42%) HTTP
3 14 (4.42%) SMTP
3 14 (4.42%) SSH
4 9 (2.84%) IMAP
4 9 (2.84%) OpenLDAP
5 6 (1.89%) VPN
6 5 (1.58%) SSL
7 4 (1.26%) TCP/IP
8 3 (0.95%) Network Security
9 1 (0.32%) Kerberos
9 1 (0.32%) LAN
9 1 (0.32%) SD-WAN
9 1 (0.32%) SMS
9 1 (0.32%) WAN
Database & Business Intelligence
1 51 (16.09%) PostgreSQL
2 38 (11.99%) Pentaho
3 27 (8.52%) Elasticsearch
4 22 (6.94%) SAS Enterprise Guide
5 17 (5.36%) Oracle Database
6 16 (5.05%) NoSQL
7 15 (4.73%) Amazon RDS
8 12 (3.79%) SAS Visual Analytics
9 11 (3.47%) Relational Database
10 9 (2.84%) Amazon Aurora
10 9 (2.84%) Data Warehouse
11 8 (2.52%) MongoDB
11 8 (2.52%) Redis
12 7 (2.21%) Power BI
13 6 (1.89%) MySQL
14 5 (1.58%) Data Mining
15 4 (1.26%) SAS Data Integration Studio
16 3 (0.95%) Data Lake
17 2 (0.63%) Azure SQL Database
18 1 (0.32%) Apache Hive
Development Applications
1 106 (33.44%) Jenkins
2 103 (32.49%) Git
3 83 (26.18%) JIRA
4 53 (16.72%) GitLab
5 31 (9.78%) Selenium
6 27 (8.52%) JUnit
7 17 (5.36%) SonarQube
8 14 (4.42%) Vagrant
9 10 (3.15%) Liquibase
10 9 (2.84%) CircleCI
11 8 (2.52%) Eclipse
11 8 (2.52%) IntelliJ
12 6 (1.89%) Artifactory
12 6 (1.89%) Bitbucket
12 6 (1.89%) Cypress.io
13 5 (1.58%) Gradle
13 5 (1.58%) Maven
13 5 (1.58%) Snyk
13 5 (1.58%) Sonatype Nexus
13 5 (1.58%) webpack
General
1 122 (38.49%) Social Skills
2 55 (17.35%) Public Sector
3 43 (13.56%) Analytical Skills
4 42 (13.25%) Finance
5 16 (5.05%) Banking
6 15 (4.73%) Documentation Skills
7 10 (3.15%) Financial Institution
7 10 (3.15%) Presentation Skills
8 9 (2.84%) Influencing Skills
9 4 (1.26%) Telecoms
10 2 (0.63%) Inclusion and Diversity
10 2 (0.63%) Marketing
10 2 (0.63%) Military
10 2 (0.63%) Organisational Skills
11 1 (0.32%) Digital Healthcare
11 1 (0.32%) Manufacturing
Job Titles
1 49 (15.46%) DevOps Engineer
2 43 (13.56%) Senior
3 41 (12.93%) Developer
4 34 (10.73%) Data Engineer
5 24 (7.57%) AWS Engineer
6 17 (5.36%) AWS DevOps
6 17 (5.36%) AWS DevOps Engineer
6 17 (5.36%) Cloud Engineer
7 16 (5.05%) Analyst
7 16 (5.05%) Architect
8 15 (4.73%) Platform Engineer
9 14 (4.42%) Cloud Platform Engineer
9 14 (4.42%) Software Engineer
9 14 (4.42%) Test Specialist
10 13 (4.10%) Business Analyst
10 13 (4.10%) Senior DevOps
10 13 (4.10%) Senior DevOps Engineer
10 13 (4.10%) Site Engineer
10 13 (4.10%) Site Reliability Engineer
10 13 (4.10%) Splunk Engineer
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 58 (18.30%) REST
2 37 (11.67%) Elastic Stack
3 20 (6.31%) YAML
4 18 (5.68%) RESTful
5 17 (5.36%) HTML
6 16 (5.05%) JSON
6 16 (5.05%) pytest
7 15 (4.73%) Kafka
8 13 (4.10%) .NET
8 13 (4.10%) Keycloak
8 13 (4.10%) Middleware
9 11 (3.47%) FastAPI
9 11 (3.47%) Flask
9 11 (3.47%) Play Framework
10 10 (3.15%) LDAP
10 10 (3.15%) Node.js
10 10 (3.15%) SOAP
10 10 (3.15%) XML
11 9 (2.84%) HTML5
12 8 (2.52%) WebSockets
Miscellaneous
1 40 (12.62%) Cloud Native
2 16 (5.05%) Distributed Systems
3 15 (4.73%) Management Information System
4 14 (4.42%) Public Cloud
4 14 (4.42%) Replication
5 12 (3.79%) Hybrid Cloud
5 12 (3.79%) Onboarding
6 11 (3.47%) Enterprise Software
7 9 (2.84%) Product Ownership
8 5 (1.58%) Cyber Threat
8 5 (1.58%) Private Cloud
9 3 (0.95%) Client/Server
9 3 (0.95%) Data Protection Act
9 3 (0.95%) Legacy Systems
10 2 (0.63%) CMDB
10 2 (0.63%) Data Centre
10 2 (0.63%) IoT
10 2 (0.63%) Legacy Applications
10 2 (0.63%) Security Posture
11 1 (0.32%) Mobile App
Operating Systems
1 60 (18.93%) Linux
2 28 (8.83%) Windows
3 24 (7.57%) Unix
4 14 (4.42%) Amazon Linux
4 14 (4.42%) VMS
5 9 (2.84%) Ubuntu
6 4 (1.26%) Windows Server
7 3 (0.95%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
8 1 (0.32%) Android
8 1 (0.32%) Apple iOS
8 1 (0.32%) zOS
Processes & Methodologies
1 201 (63.41%) CI/CD
2 150 (47.32%) Agile
3 111 (35.02%) Containerisation
4 108 (34.07%) Problem-Solving
5 93 (29.34%) Analytics
6 78 (24.61%) Test Automation
7 74 (23.34%) Data Pipeline
8 72 (22.71%) Scrum
9 64 (20.19%) Infrastructure as Code
10 62 (19.56%) Change Management
11 61 (19.24%) Data Modelling
12 59 (18.61%) Continuous Improvement
13 58 (18.30%) ETL
14 56 (17.67%) Stakeholder Management
15 52 (16.40%) Migration
16 49 (15.46%) Deployment Automation
17 48 (15.14%) Data Integration
17 48 (15.14%) Microservices
18 43 (13.56%) Business Intelligence
19 37 (11.67%) Computer Science
Programming Languages
1 125 (39.43%) Python
2 94 (29.65%) SQL
3 43 (13.56%) Go
4 34 (10.73%) PowerShell
5 30 (9.46%) Bash
6 18 (5.68%) JavaScript
7 17 (5.36%) Java
8 15 (4.73%) Groovy
9 12 (3.79%) C#
10 11 (3.47%) Scala
11 8 (2.52%) TypeScript
12 6 (1.89%) VBA
13 5 (1.58%) Bicep
13 5 (1.58%) Perl
14 2 (0.63%) VBScript
15 1 (0.32%) Korn
15 1 (0.32%) Kusto Query Language
15 1 (0.32%) Ruby
15 1 (0.32%) Shell Script
Qualifications
1 168 (53.00%) Security Cleared
2 144 (45.43%) SC Cleared
3 48 (15.14%) Degree
4 36 (11.36%) Computer Science Degree
5 31 (9.78%) Azure Certification
6 30 (9.46%) DV Cleared
7 15 (4.73%) AWS Certification
7 15 (4.73%) Master's Degree
8 9 (2.84%) IIBA
9 6 (1.89%) BPSS Clearance
9 6 (1.89%) Microsoft Certification
10 3 (0.95%) CISSP
11 2 (0.63%) AWS Certified Developer
11 2 (0.63%) AWS Certified DevOps Engineer
11 2 (0.63%) AWS Certified Solutions Architect
11 2 (0.63%) CISM
11 2 (0.63%) PMI Certification
11 2 (0.63%) PMP
12 1 (0.32%) PRINCE2 Certification
12 1 (0.32%) SAFe Agilist
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 34 (10.73%) Data Quality
2 26 (8.20%) QA
3 12 (3.79%) NCSC
4 10 (3.15%) GDPR
5 9 (2.84%) ISO/IEC 27001
6 5 (1.58%) Accessibility
7 4 (1.26%) NIST
8 2 (0.63%) SLA
9 1 (0.32%) Cyber Essentials
9 1 (0.32%) Cyber Essentials PLUS
9 1 (0.32%) ISO 19650
9 1 (0.32%) PMO
System Software
1 174 (54.89%) Docker
2 14 (4.42%) DFS Replication
3 9 (2.84%) Active Directory
3 9 (2.84%) Dovecot
3 9 (2.84%) Postfix
3 9 (2.84%) Squid
4 1 (0.32%) HDFS
4 1 (0.32%) Hyper-V
4 1 (0.32%) Virtual Machines
4 1 (0.32%) VMware Infrastructure
Systems Management
1 150 (47.32%) Kubernetes
2 82 (25.87%) Terraform
3 55 (17.35%) Grafana
4 52 (16.40%) Prometheus
5 50 (15.77%) Ansible
6 26 (8.20%) Puppet
7 15 (4.73%) Kibana
8 9 (2.84%) Nessus
8 9 (2.84%) Proxmox
9 6 (1.89%) Argo
10 5 (1.58%) Podman
10 5 (1.58%) Progress Chef
11 3 (0.95%) Single Sign-On
12 2 (0.63%) HP ALM
12 2 (0.63%) logstash
13 1 (0.32%) CA Endevor
13 1 (0.32%) Docker Swarm
13 1 (0.32%) Microsoft Intune
Vendors
1 61 (19.24%) Microsoft
2 51 (16.09%) Oracle
3 42 (13.25%) Splunk
4 38 (11.99%) Talend
5 37 (11.67%) Denodo
6 26 (8.20%) ServiceNow
7 14 (4.42%) Google
8 9 (2.84%) AppDynamics
8 9 (2.84%) Dynatrace
8 9 (2.84%) Jaspersoft
8 9 (2.84%) SAP
9 8 (2.52%) CyberArk
9 8 (2.52%) webMethods
10 6 (1.89%) VMware
11 5 (1.58%) Red Hat
12 4 (1.26%) CheckPoint
12 4 (1.26%) F5
12 4 (1.26%) Palo Alto
13 3 (0.95%) Adobe
13 3 (0.95%) IBM