Kubernetes Contracts with Hybrid/Remote/WFH Options

Kubernetes (k8s)
UK > Work from Home

The table below provides summary statistics for remote or hybrid contract work requiring Kubernetes skills. It includes a benchmarking guide to the contractor rates offered in vacancies that cited Kubernetes over the 6 months leading up to 1 May 2025, comparing them to the same period in the previous two years.

6 months to
1 May 2025
Same period 2024 Same period 2023
Rank 31 52 31
Rank change year-on-year +21 -21 -6
Contract jobs citing Kubernetes 608 567 1,661
As % of all contract jobs with a WFH option 6.14% 3.70% 6.42%
As % of the Systems Management category 39.63% 34.43% 38.69%
Number of daily rates quoted 437 436 1,227
10th Percentile £409 £405 £462
25th Percentile £475 £475 £511
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £570 £575 £600
Median % change year-on-year -0.87% -4.17% -
75th Percentile £688 £671 £700
90th Percentile £838 £719 £775
UK median daily rate £550 £550 £600
% change year-on-year - -8.33% -
Number of hourly rates quoted 3 2 15
10th Percentile £25.50 £55.13 £51.31
25th Percentile £25.88 £55.31 £61.25
Median hourly rate £26.50 £56.25 £66.00
Median % change year-on-year -52.89% -14.77% -1.31%
75th Percentile £43.25 £57.81 £70.75
90th Percentile £53.30 £58.38 £87.00
UK median hourly rate £60.00 £62.00 £70.00
% change year-on-year -3.23% -11.43% +32.36%

All Systems Management Skills
Work from Home

Kubernetes falls under the Systems Management category. For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all contract job vacancies with remote or hybrid options requiring systems management skills.

Contract vacancies with a requirement for systems management skills 1,534 1,647 4,293
As % of all contract jobs with a WFH option 15.49% 10.73% 16.60%
Number of daily rates quoted 1,114 1,220 3,179
10th Percentile £386 £356 £400
25th Percentile £440 £450 £470
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £533 £530 £550
Median % change year-on-year +0.47% -3.64% -2.22%
75th Percentile £626 £631 £675
90th Percentile £788 £700 £750
UK median daily rate £525 £515 £563
% change year-on-year +1.90% -8.41% -0.44%
Number of hourly rates quoted 14 23 73
10th Percentile £16.10 £21.73 £26.55
25th Percentile £25.50 £38.58 £55.00
Median hourly rate £40.88 £47.50 £66.00
Median % change year-on-year -13.95% -28.03% +65.00%
75th Percentile £64.69 £58.13 £77.50
90th Percentile £71.38 £67.25 £87.50
UK median hourly rate £26.45 £30.00 £57.50
% change year-on-year -11.83% -47.83% +155.56%

Kubernetes
Trend for Jobs with a WFH Option

Job vacancies with remote working options citing Kubernetes as a proportion of all IT jobs advertised.

Kubernetes trend for jobs with Hybrid/Remote/WFH options

Kubernetes
Daily Rate Trend for Jobs with a WFH Option

3-month moving average daily rate quoted in job vacancies with remote working options citing Kubernetes.

Kubernetes daily rate for jobs with a WFH option

Kubernetes
Daily Rate Histogram for Jobs with a WFH Option

Daily rate distribution for jobs with remote working options citing Kubernetes over the 6 months to 1 May 2025.

Kubernetes daily rate histogram for jobs with a WFH option

Kubernetes
Hourly Rate Trend for Jobs with a WFH Option

3-month moving average hourly rate quoted in job vacancies with remote working options citing Kubernetes.

Kubernetes hourly rate for jobs with a WFH option

Kubernetes
Hourly Rate Histogram for Jobs with a WFH Option

Hourly rate distribution for jobs with remote working options citing Kubernetes over the 6 months to 1 May 2025.

Kubernetes hourly rate histogram for jobs with a WFH option

Kubernetes
Co-occurring Skills and Capabilities with WFH Options 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 49 (8.06%) Apache Spark
2 46 (7.57%) Apache
3 31 (5.10%) Apache Airflow
4 22 (3.62%) Confluence
5 18 (2.96%) nginx
6 10 (1.64%) OpenStack
7 5 (0.82%) Traefik
8 4 (0.66%) Jupyter
9 3 (0.49%) Camunda
9 3 (0.49%) JBoss
10 2 (0.33%) Microsoft Exchange
10 2 (0.33%) Umbraco
11 1 (0.16%) BizTalk Server
11 1 (0.16%) CMS
11 1 (0.16%) DataSynapse
11 1 (0.16%) IBM Domino
11 1 (0.16%) MQSeries
11 1 (0.16%) SharePoint
11 1 (0.16%) WebLogic
Applications
1 2 (0.33%) Weka
2 1 (0.16%) InVision
2 1 (0.16%) MS Visio
2 1 (0.16%) Notion
2 1 (0.16%) Sketch
2 1 (0.16%) Trello
Business Applications
1 2 (0.33%) Endur
1 2 (0.33%) Oracle EBS
1 2 (0.33%) Payment Gateway
2 1 (0.16%) Distributed Ledger
2 1 (0.16%) Oracle EBS R12
2 1 (0.16%) SAP HCM
2 1 (0.16%) SAP IBP
2 1 (0.16%) SAP S/4HANA
2 1 (0.16%) Siebel CRM
Cloud Services
1 328 (53.95%) AWS
2 214 (35.20%) Azure
3 94 (15.46%) Serverless
4 82 (13.49%) GCP
5 75 (12.34%) GitHub
6 73 (12.01%) Azure DevOps
7 72 (11.84%) AWS Lambda
8 69 (11.35%) AWS CloudFormation
9 62 (10.20%) Amazon ECS
10 56 (9.21%) OpenShift
11 55 (9.05%) Azure AKS
12 45 (7.40%) Amazon EKS
13 42 (6.91%) Amazon EC2
13 42 (6.91%) GitHub Actions
14 38 (6.25%) Amazon S3
15 31 (5.10%) dbt
16 23 (3.78%) Amazon CloudWatch
17 21 (3.45%) Cloud Computing
17 21 (3.45%) Virtual Private Cloud
18 20 (3.29%) Entra ID
Communications & Networking
1 36 (5.92%) HTTP
2 35 (5.76%) DNS
3 33 (5.43%) TCP/IP
4 30 (4.93%) Firewall
5 11 (1.81%) Network Security
5 11 (1.81%) VPN
6 7 (1.15%) Internet
7 6 (0.99%) SSL
8 5 (0.82%) DHCP
9 4 (0.66%) Kerberos
9 4 (0.66%) OpenLDAP
9 4 (0.66%) Reverse Proxy
10 3 (0.49%) SAN
10 3 (0.49%) SSH
10 3 (0.49%) Wireless
11 2 (0.33%) 3GPP
11 2 (0.33%) FTP
11 2 (0.33%) HTTPS
11 2 (0.33%) NAS
11 2 (0.33%) SMTP
Database & Business Intelligence
1 62 (10.20%) PostgreSQL
2 36 (5.92%) Amazon RDS
3 34 (5.59%) Apache Iceberg
4 33 (5.43%) MongoDB
5 31 (5.10%) Elasticsearch
6 30 (4.93%) NoSQL
7 29 (4.77%) Amazon Athena
8 28 (4.61%) Apache Arrow
8 28 (4.61%) Apache Ignite
8 28 (4.61%) Dremio
9 24 (3.95%) SQL Server
10 23 (3.78%) Hadoop
11 21 (3.45%) Redis
12 20 (3.29%) Data Warehouse
12 20 (3.29%) MySQL
12 20 (3.29%) Relational Database
13 17 (2.80%) Amazon Redshift
14 14 (2.30%) Big Data
14 14 (2.30%) Data Lake
15 13 (2.14%) Amazon Aurora
Development Applications
1 161 (26.48%) Jenkins
2 114 (18.75%) GitLab
3 81 (13.32%) Git
4 54 (8.88%) JIRA
5 34 (5.59%) Artifactory
6 19 (3.13%) SonarQube
7 15 (2.47%) Cucumber
7 15 (2.47%) JUnit
8 13 (2.14%) Maven
9 12 (1.97%) REST Assured
10 9 (1.48%) Bitbucket
11 8 (1.32%) Selenium
12 7 (1.15%) CircleCI
12 7 (1.15%) Cypress.io
12 7 (1.15%) webpack
13 6 (0.99%) Jasmine
13 6 (0.99%) MLflow
13 6 (0.99%) Mockito
13 6 (0.99%) Postman
14 5 (0.82%) Team Foundation Server
General
1 113 (18.59%) Social Skills
2 98 (16.12%) Finance
3 77 (12.66%) Banking
4 60 (9.87%) Analytical Skills
5 53 (8.72%) Public Sector
6 45 (7.40%) Investment Banking
7 42 (6.91%) Front Office
8 18 (2.96%) Organisational Skills
9 10 (1.64%) Telecoms
10 7 (1.15%) Presentation Skills
10 7 (1.15%) Retail
11 6 (0.99%) Inclusion and Diversity
12 5 (0.82%) Financial Institution
12 5 (0.82%) Law
13 4 (0.66%) Police
14 3 (0.49%) Electronics
14 3 (0.49%) Games
14 3 (0.49%) Legal
14 3 (0.49%) Manufacturing
14 3 (0.49%) Pharmaceutical
Job Titles
1 186 (30.59%) DevOps Engineer
2 143 (23.52%) Developer
3 110 (18.09%) Senior
4 85 (13.98%) AWS Engineer
5 73 (12.01%) AWS DevOps
6 71 (11.68%) AWS DevOps Engineer
7 57 (9.38%) Senior DevOps
8 54 (8.88%) Senior DevOps Engineer
9 53 (8.72%) Python Engineer
10 51 (8.39%) Python Developer
11 42 (6.91%) Architect
12 41 (6.74%) Lead
13 40 (6.58%) Data Engineer
14 37 (6.09%) Software Engineer
15 33 (5.43%) Azure Engineer
15 33 (5.43%) Java Developer
16 28 (4.61%) Cloud Engineer
17 26 (4.28%) Azure DevOps Engineer
18 25 (4.11%) Senior Developer
19 24 (3.95%) Kubernetes Engineer
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 106 (17.43%) Kafka
2 72 (11.84%) .NET
3 55 (9.05%) React
4 47 (7.73%) RESTful
5 41 (6.74%) Spring
6 39 (6.41%) Elastic Stack
7 37 (6.09%) REST
8 34 (5.59%) Node.js
8 34 (5.59%) Spring Boot
9 33 (5.43%) J2EE
10 32 (5.26%) FastAPI
11 28 (4.61%) OAuth
11 28 (4.61%) PySpark
12 27 (4.44%) AngularJS
13 26 (4.28%) Django
14 23 (3.78%) ARM Templates
15 20 (3.29%) OpenTelemetry
16 18 (2.96%) OpenID
16 18 (2.96%) Swagger
17 17 (2.80%) .NET Core
Miscellaneous
1 49 (8.06%) Cloud Native
2 32 (5.26%) Enterprise Software
3 22 (3.62%) Distributed Systems
4 12 (1.97%) PKI
4 12 (1.97%) Public Cloud
5 11 (1.81%) Product Ownership
6 10 (1.64%) Hybrid Cloud
7 7 (1.15%) Replication
8 6 (0.99%) Algorithms
8 6 (0.99%) Data Centre
8 6 (0.99%) Distributed Denial-of-Service
8 6 (0.99%) Security Posture
9 5 (0.82%) Private Cloud
10 4 (0.66%) Data Structures
10 4 (0.66%) Greenfield Project
10 4 (0.66%) Legacy Systems
10 4 (0.66%) Management Information System
10 4 (0.66%) Mobile App
10 4 (0.66%) Virtual Team
11 3 (0.49%) Distributed Computing
Operating Systems
1 150 (24.67%) Linux
2 44 (7.24%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
3 37 (6.09%) Windows
4 29 (4.77%) Unix
5 10 (1.64%) CentOS
6 7 (1.15%) Windows Server
7 6 (0.99%) SUSE
7 6 (0.99%) Ubuntu
7 6 (0.99%) VMS
8 4 (0.66%) AIX
9 2 (0.33%) Solaris
9 2 (0.33%) Windows Server 2019
10 1 (0.16%) Amazon Linux
10 1 (0.16%) Android
10 1 (0.16%) Oracle Linux
10 1 (0.16%) Windows 10
10 1 (0.16%) Windows Server 2016
Processes & Methodologies
1 371 (61.02%) CI/CD
2 357 (58.72%) DevOps
3 234 (38.49%) Containerisation
4 209 (34.38%) Agile
5 164 (26.97%) Infrastructure as Code
6 141 (23.19%) Microservices
7 117 (19.24%) Software Engineering
8 95 (15.63%) Problem-Solving
9 71 (11.68%) Continuous Integration
10 70 (11.51%) Test Automation
11 69 (11.35%) SDLC
12 68 (11.18%) Site Reliability Engineering
13 65 (10.69%) Full-Stack Development
14 59 (9.70%) Artificial Intelligence
15 58 (9.54%) Machine Learning
16 53 (8.72%) Observability
17 49 (8.06%) Mentoring
18 47 (7.73%) Continuous Improvement
18 47 (7.73%) Platform Engineering
19 46 (7.57%) Infrastructure Automation
Programming Languages
1 321 (52.80%) Python
2 162 (26.64%) Java
3 104 (17.11%) SQL
4 103 (16.94%) Bash
5 84 (13.82%) JavaScript
6 75 (12.34%) C#
7 67 (11.02%) TypeScript
8 63 (10.36%) Go
9 46 (7.57%) PowerShell
10 22 (3.62%) C++
11 19 (3.13%) Bicep
12 17 (2.80%) Shell Script
13 13 (2.14%) Perl
14 11 (1.81%) Groovy
15 9 (1.48%) Kotlin
16 8 (1.32%) Scala
17 6 (0.99%) R
18 5 (0.82%) C
18 5 (0.82%) Ruby
19 4 (0.66%) PL/SQL
Qualifications
1 144 (23.68%) Security Cleared
2 122 (20.07%) SC Cleared
3 39 (6.41%) Degree
4 26 (4.28%) AWS Certification
5 24 (3.95%) Computer Science Degree
6 13 (2.14%) Azure Certification
6 13 (2.14%) DV Cleared
7 10 (1.64%) AWS Certified Solutions Architect
8 8 (1.32%) Master's Degree
9 7 (1.15%) Microsoft Certification
10 5 (0.82%) CISSP
11 4 (0.66%) OCP
11 4 (0.66%) Oracle Certification
12 3 (0.49%) AWS Certified DevOps Engineer
12 3 (0.49%) RHCSA
13 2 (0.33%) BPSS Clearance
13 2 (0.33%) CEH
13 2 (0.33%) IBM Certification
13 2 (0.33%) RHCE
14 1 (0.16%) RHCA
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 21 (3.45%) QA
2 15 (2.47%) Accessibility
3 9 (1.48%) Data Quality
3 9 (1.48%) NCSC
4 6 (0.99%) NIST
5 5 (0.82%) Sarbanes-Oxley
6 3 (0.49%) GDPR
6 3 (0.49%) ISO/IEC 27001
7 2 (0.33%) Cyber Essentials
7 2 (0.33%) Disclosure Scotland
7 2 (0.33%) Government Security Classifications
7 2 (0.33%) HIPAA
7 2 (0.33%) PCI DSS
8 1 (0.16%) California Consumer Privacy Act
8 1 (0.16%) FedRAMP
8 1 (0.16%) Software Quality Assurance
System Software
1 390 (64.14%) Docker
2 16 (2.63%) VMware Infrastructure
3 15 (2.47%) Active Directory
4 9 (1.48%) Virtual Machines
5 5 (0.82%) Apache ZooKeeper
6 3 (0.49%) Hyper-V
7 2 (0.33%) Slurm Workload Manager
7 2 (0.33%) Veritas Cluster Server
8 1 (0.16%) Ceph
8 1 (0.16%) LXC
8 1 (0.16%) NFS
8 1 (0.16%) Platform Symphony
8 1 (0.16%) Samba
8 1 (0.16%) Virtual Desktop
8 1 (0.16%) VMware ESXi
8 1 (0.16%) VMware NSX
8 1 (0.16%) vSphere
Systems Management
1 291 (47.86%) Terraform
2 145 (23.85%) Ansible
3 81 (13.32%) Grafana
4 69 (11.35%) Prometheus
5 32 (5.26%) Progress Chef
6 29 (4.77%) Puppet
7 27 (4.44%) Argo
8 17 (2.80%) Istio
9 13 (2.14%) Consul
9 13 (2.14%) Kibana
10 12 (1.97%) Packer
11 11 (1.81%) Rancher
12 10 (1.64%) ZABBIX
13 8 (1.32%) linkerd
13 8 (1.32%) Single Sign-On
14 7 (1.15%) Jamf Pro
15 5 (0.82%) Docker Swarm
15 5 (0.82%) HAProxy
15 5 (0.82%) Microsoft Intune
15 5 (0.82%) Podman
Vendors
1 36 (5.92%) Splunk
2 35 (5.76%) Google
3 32 (5.26%) Red Hat
4 31 (5.10%) Microsoft
5 23 (3.78%) VMware
6 18 (2.96%) Dynatrace
7 16 (2.63%) Oracle
8 14 (2.30%) SAP
9 11 (1.81%) Databricks
10 10 (1.64%) AppDynamics
11 8 (1.32%) Okta
12 6 (0.99%) IBM
12 6 (0.99%) Qualys
12 6 (0.99%) ServiceNow
13 5 (0.82%) Apple
13 5 (0.82%) ESET
14 4 (0.66%) Cisco
14 4 (0.66%) LogRhythm
14 4 (0.66%) Virgin Media
15 3 (0.49%) Imperva