Hybrid/Remote Virtual Machines Job Trends

Virtual Machine (VM)
UK > Work from Home

The table below provides summary statistics and salary benchmarking for remote or hybrid work requiring Virtual Machines skills. It covers permanent job vacancies from the 6 months leading up to 8 October 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
8 Oct 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 380 359 327
Rank change year-on-year -21 -32 +5
Permanent jobs citing Virtual Machines 80 60 160
As % of all permanent jobs with remote/hybrid work options 0.32% 0.36% 0.73%
As % of the System Software category 4.33% 3.18% 5.71%
Number of salaries quoted 50 34 112
10th Percentile £36,250 £41,500 £39,550
25th Percentile £46,250 £49,000 £51,250
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £60,000 £65,000 £65,000
Median % change year-on-year -7.69% - -
75th Percentile £74,750 £85,000 £85,000
90th Percentile £92,500 £95,325 £94,500
UK median annual salary £49,250 £57,500 £60,918
% change year-on-year -14.35% -5.61% -4.44%

All System Software Skills
Work from Home

Virtual Machines falls under the System Software category. For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all permanent job vacancies with remote or hybrid options requiring system software skills.

Permanent vacancies with a requirement for system software skills 1,847 1,884 2,802
As % of all permanent jobs with a WFH option 7.45% 11.22% 12.81%
Number of salaries quoted 1,369 991 1,675
10th Percentile £31,250 £28,500 £31,250
25th Percentile £42,500 £36,250 £41,250
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £60,000 £52,500 £57,500
Median % change year-on-year +14.29% -8.70% -4.17%
75th Percentile £73,750 £71,250 £73,750
90th Percentile £87,500 £85,000 £89,500
UK median annual salary £55,000 £50,000 £55,000
% change year-on-year +10.00% -9.09% -

Virtual Machines
Job Vacancy Trend for Remote/Hybrid Jobs

Historical trend showing the proportion of permanent IT job postings citing Virtual Machines and offering remote or hybrid work options relative to all permanent IT jobs advertised.

Virtual Machines job vacancy trend for remote/hybrid jobs

Virtual Machines
Salary Trend for Remote/Hybrid Jobs

Salary distribution trend for jobs with remote/hybrid work options citing Virtual Machines.

Salary distribution trend for jobs with remote/hybrid work options citing Virtual Machines

Virtual Machines
Salary Histogram for Remote/Hybrid Jobs

Salary distribution for jobs with remote/hybrid work options citing Virtual Machines over the 6 months to 8 October 2026.

Virtual Machines salary histogram for jobs with remote/hybrid work options

Virtual Machines
Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities in Remote/Hybrid Jobs 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 11 (13.75%) IIS
2 6 (7.50%) Microsoft Exchange
2 6 (7.50%) SharePoint
3 5 (6.25%) nginx
4 2 (2.50%) Confluence
Applications
1 3 (3.75%) Microsoft Office
2 1 (1.25%) Microsoft Project
Cloud Services
1 46 (57.50%) Azure
2 27 (33.75%) Entra ID
3 24 (30.00%) Serverless
4 18 (22.50%) Microsoft 365
5 16 (20.00%) Azure Monitor
6 15 (18.75%) AWS
7 13 (16.25%) Azure DevOps
8 10 (12.50%) Azure AKS
9 9 (11.25%) IaaS
10 8 (10.00%) Azure ExpressRoute
11 7 (8.75%) Azure Key Vault
11 7 (8.75%) Azure Pipelines
12 6 (7.50%) Azure Functions
12 6 (7.50%) Azure Storage
12 6 (7.50%) Cloudflare
12 6 (7.50%) GCP
12 6 (7.50%) GitHub
12 6 (7.50%) PaaS
12 6 (7.50%) SaaS
13 5 (6.25%) Azure Cosmos DB
Communications & Networking
1 24 (30.00%) Firewall
2 19 (23.75%) DNS
3 18 (22.50%) TCP/IP
4 17 (21.25%) VPN
5 14 (17.50%) DHCP
6 8 (10.00%) VLAN
7 6 (7.50%) Network Security
8 4 (5.00%) Wireless
9 3 (3.75%) HTTP
10 2 (2.50%) WAN
11 1 (1.25%) BGP
11 1 (1.25%) FCoE
11 1 (1.25%) Fibre Channel
11 1 (1.25%) iSCSI
11 1 (1.25%) LAN
11 1 (1.25%) NX-OS
11 1 (1.25%) Remote Desktop
11 1 (1.25%) SNMP
11 1 (1.25%) Software-Defined Networking
11 1 (1.25%) TETRA
Database & Business Intelligence
1 14 (17.50%) SQL Server
2 9 (11.25%) Azure SQL Database
3 2 (2.50%) Big Data
3 2 (2.50%) MySQL
Development Applications
1 18 (22.50%) Snyk
2 6 (7.50%) Jenkins
3 5 (6.25%) Octopus Deploy
4 4 (5.00%) Git
4 4 (5.00%) TeamCity
5 2 (2.50%) GitLab
5 2 (2.50%) Terragrunt
6 1 (1.25%) JIRA
General
1 21 (26.25%) Inclusion and Diversity
1 21 (26.25%) Social Skills
2 11 (13.75%) Analytical Skills
3 7 (8.75%) Law
4 6 (7.50%) Finance
5 5 (6.25%) Banking
6 4 (5.00%) Public Sector
6 4 (5.00%) Retail
7 2 (2.50%) Back Office
7 2 (2.50%) Documentation Skills
7 2 (2.50%) Police
8 1 (1.25%) Advertising
8 1 (1.25%) Automotive
Job Titles
1 34 (42.50%) Senior
2 22 (27.50%) Architect
3 21 (26.25%) Cloud Architect
3 21 (26.25%) Senior Architect
3 21 (26.25%) Senior Cloud Architect
4 18 (22.50%) Cloud Security Architect
4 18 (22.50%) Security Architect
4 18 (22.50%) Senior Security Architect
5 15 (18.75%) Azure Engineer
6 14 (17.50%) Support Engineer
7 11 (13.75%) Cloud Engineer
8 10 (12.50%) IT Engineer
8 10 (12.50%) IT Support
8 10 (12.50%) IT Support Engineer
9 9 (11.25%) DevOps Engineer
10 8 (10.00%) 3rd Line Engineer
10 8 (10.00%) 3rd Line Support
10 8 (10.00%) 3rd Line Support Engineer
10 8 (10.00%) Analyst
10 8 (10.00%) Technical Engineer
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 20 (25.00%) Terraform
2 9 (11.25%) ARM Templates
3 7 (8.75%) .NET
4 6 (7.50%) LDAP
4 6 (7.50%) Middleware
5 5 (6.25%) Loki
6 4 (5.00%) COM
6 4 (5.00%) DCOM
7 2 (2.50%) JSON
7 2 (2.50%) Regular Expression
8 1 (1.25%) REST
8 1 (1.25%) SAML
Miscellaneous
1 22 (27.50%) Data Centre
2 8 (10.00%) Cloud Native
3 7 (8.75%) PKI
4 6 (7.50%) Hybrid Cloud
5 5 (6.25%) Management Information System
6 4 (5.00%) Mobile App
6 4 (5.00%) Self-Motivation
6 4 (5.00%) Smartcard
7 2 (2.50%) Cloud Security Posture
7 2 (2.50%) Clustering
7 2 (2.50%) CSOC
7 2 (2.50%) Cyber Threat
7 2 (2.50%) Enterprise Software
7 2 (2.50%) Legacy Applications
7 2 (2.50%) Raspberry Pi
7 2 (2.50%) Security Operations Centre
7 2 (2.50%) Security Posture
8 1 (1.25%) Client/Server
8 1 (1.25%) IoT
8 1 (1.25%) Replication
Operating Systems
1 37 (46.25%) Windows
2 21 (26.25%) Windows Server
3 18 (22.50%) Linux
4 2 (2.50%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
4 2 (2.50%) Rocky
4 2 (2.50%) Ubuntu
5 1 (1.25%) Debian
5 1 (1.25%) VMS
5 1 (1.25%) Windows Server 2016
5 1 (1.25%) Windows Server 2019
Processes & Methodologies
1 41 (51.25%) CI/CD
2 31 (38.75%) Cloud Security
3 30 (37.50%) AI
4 26 (32.50%) Cybersecurity
5 24 (30.00%) Security Architecture
6 22 (27.50%) Problem-Solving
7 21 (26.25%) DevOps
7 21 (26.25%) Infrastructure Engineering
8 20 (25.00%) Infrastructure as Code
9 19 (23.75%) DevSecOps
9 19 (23.75%) Disaster Recovery
10 18 (22.50%) Application Security
10 18 (22.50%) Mentoring
10 18 (22.50%) SDLC
10 18 (22.50%) Security Testing
10 18 (22.50%) Threat Modelling
11 17 (21.25%) IT Strategy
11 17 (21.25%) Technology Strategy
12 15 (18.75%) Validation
13 13 (16.25%) High Availability
Programming Languages
1 28 (35.00%) PowerShell
2 18 (22.50%) SQL
3 15 (18.75%) Bicep
4 11 (13.75%) Python
5 9 (11.25%) C#
6 8 (10.00%) Bash
7 4 (5.00%) Go
7 4 (5.00%) Java
8 3 (3.75%) C
9 2 (2.50%) C++
9 2 (2.50%) Shell Script
10 1 (1.25%) Rust
10 1 (1.25%) VBScript
Qualifications
1 13 (16.25%) Degree
2 12 (15.00%) Azure Certification
3 11 (13.75%) Security Cleared
4 6 (7.50%) Microsoft Certification
5 5 (6.25%) CCNA
5 5 (6.25%) Cisco Certification
5 5 (6.25%) SC Cleared
6 4 (5.00%) DV Cleared
7 2 (2.50%) BPSS Clearance
7 2 (2.50%) Computer Science Degree
7 2 (2.50%) DBS Check
7 2 (2.50%) HNC
7 2 (2.50%) HND
7 2 (2.50%) TOGAF Certification
8 1 (1.25%) CompTIA Security+
8 1 (1.25%) ISEB
8 1 (1.25%) ISTQB
8 1 (1.25%) MCSE
8 1 (1.25%) Network+ Certification
8 1 (1.25%) VMware Certified Professional (VCP)
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 18 (22.50%) GRC
2 6 (7.50%) QA
3 4 (5.00%) Cyber Essentials
3 4 (5.00%) NIST
3 4 (5.00%) PCI DSS
4 2 (2.50%) AUTOSAR
4 2 (2.50%) MISRA
4 2 (2.50%) MISRA C
5 1 (1.25%) SLA
5 1 (1.25%) Software Quality Assurance
System Software
1 33 (41.25%) Active Directory
2 24 (30.00%) VMware Infrastructure
3 14 (17.50%) Hyper-V
4 12 (15.00%) Docker
5 7 (8.75%) vSphere
6 4 (5.00%) Virtual Desktop
7 3 (3.75%) VMware ESXi
8 2 (2.50%) NFS
9 1 (1.25%) DFS Replication
9 1 (1.25%) Firmware
9 1 (1.25%) KVM
Systems Management
1 18 (22.50%) Kubernetes
2 11 (13.75%) Microsoft Intune
3 7 (8.75%) Grafana
4 5 (6.25%) Prometheus
5 2 (2.50%) Ansible
5 2 (2.50%) Failover Clustering
5 2 (2.50%) FortiGate
5 2 (2.50%) Microsoft Data Protection Manager
5 2 (2.50%) SCCM
5 2 (2.50%) SCOM
6 1 (1.25%) Packer
6 1 (1.25%) Podman
6 1 (1.25%) Single Sign-On
6 1 (1.25%) WSUS
Vendors
1 43 (53.75%) Microsoft
2 24 (30.00%) VMware
3 22 (27.50%) Palo Alto
4 18 (22.50%) CrowdStrike
4 18 (22.50%) Tenable
5 7 (8.75%) Veeam
6 6 (7.50%) Synology
7 5 (6.25%) Dell
8 4 (5.00%) Acronis
8 4 (5.00%) Cisco
8 4 (5.00%) Fortinet
8 4 (5.00%) Juniper
8 4 (5.00%) Salesforce
8 4 (5.00%) Sophos
8 4 (5.00%) WatchGuard
9 2 (2.50%) Dynatrace
9 2 (2.50%) Meraki
10 1 (1.25%) FIS
10 1 (1.25%) Nasuni
10 1 (1.25%) Zscaler