Kafka Job Trends in the UK excluding London

Apache Kafka
UK > UK excluding London

The table below provides summary statistics and salary benchmarking for jobs advertised in the UK excluding London requiring Kafka skills. It covers permanent job vacancies from the 6 months leading up to 11 October 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
11 Oct 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 425 202 373
Rank change year-on-year -223 +171 -91
Permanent jobs citing Kafka 270 478 265
As % of all permanent jobs in the UK excluding London 0.31% 1.38% 0.52%
As % of the Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards category 3.73% 10.37% 2.71%
Number of salaries quoted 199 102 170
10th Percentile £51,250 £45,000 -
25th Percentile £61,250 £52,500 £42,500
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £72,500 £70,000 £55,000
Median % change year-on-year +3.57% +27.27% -22.07%
75th Percentile £85,000 £89,688 £65,000
90th Percentile £97,500 £97,500 £85,000
UK median annual salary £75,000 £86,750 £70,000
% change year-on-year -13.54% +23.93% -15.15%

All Software Libraries and Frameworks
UK excluding London

Kafka falls under the Software Libraries and Frameworks category. For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all permanent job vacancies requiring technical specification, industry standards, software libraries and framework skills in the UK excluding London.

Permanent vacancies with a requirement for technical specification, industry standards, software libraries and framework skills 7,238 4,609 9,761
As % of all permanent jobs advertised in the UK excluding London 8.35% 13.34% 19.14%
Number of salaries quoted 5,514 2,768 5,675
10th Percentile £40,000 £32,500 £35,850
25th Percentile £47,500 £43,750 £45,000
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £60,000 £60,000 £57,500
Median % change year-on-year - +4.35% -3.40%
75th Percentile £76,250 £73,750 £70,000
90th Percentile £93,750 £85,000 £82,500
UK median annual salary £67,500 £69,192 £65,000
% change year-on-year -2.45% +6.45% -3.70%

Kafka
Job Vacancy Trend in the UK excluding London

Historical trend showing the proportion of permanent IT job postings citing Kafka relative to all permanent IT jobs advertised in the UK excluding London.

Kafka job vacancy trend in the UK excluding London

Kafka
Salary Trend in the UK excluding London

Salary distribution trend for jobs in the UK excluding London citing Kafka.

Salary distribution trend for jobs in the UK excluding London citing Kafka

Kafka
Salary Histogram in the UK excluding London

Salary distribution for jobs citing Kafka in the UK excluding London over the 6 months to 11 October 2026.

Salary histogram for Kafka in the UK excluding London

Kafka
Job Locations in the UK excluding London

The table below looks at the demand and provides a guide to the median salaries quoted in IT jobs citing Kafka within the UK excluding London region over the 6 months to 11 October 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
Permanent
IT Job Ads
Median Salary
Past 6 Months
Median Salary
% Change
on Same Period
Last Year
Live
Jobs
North of England -117 94 £67,500 -3.57% 122
North West -77 66 £75,000 +7.14% 81
South East -51 51 £70,000 - 45
South West -64 40 £85,000 +6.25% 26
Midlands -86 32 £85,000 +25.93% 24
West Midlands -45 31 £85,000 +51.11% 18
Wales -46 29 £70,000 -22.22% 8
North East -48 25 £60,000 +26.32% 13
East of England -41 23 £72,500 +1.40% 21
Scotland -78 13 £50,000 -16.67% 51
Yorkshire -46 9 £66,805 -10.93% 28
East Midlands -70 1 £71,500 +5.93% 6
Northern Ireland -76 1 - - 44
Kafka
UK

Kafka
Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities in the UK excluding London 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 27 (10.00%) Apache Spark
2 19 (7.04%) Apache
3 9 (3.33%) Apache Airflow
4 7 (2.59%) WebLogic
5 5 (1.85%) OpenStack
6 3 (1.11%) Anypoint
6 3 (1.11%) BizTalk Server
6 3 (1.11%) Confluence
7 2 (0.74%) ArcGIS
7 2 (0.74%) JBoss
Business Applications
1 1 (0.37%) Academy Revenues and Benefits
1 1 (0.37%) Sparx Enterprise Architect
Cloud Services
1 170 (62.96%) AWS
2 129 (47.78%) Azure
3 56 (20.74%) GCP
4 42 (15.56%) Serverless
5 39 (14.44%) GitHub
6 37 (13.70%) Amazon SQS
6 37 (13.70%) AWS CloudFormation
7 34 (12.59%) Amazon S3
8 29 (10.74%) AWS Lambda
9 25 (9.26%) Amazon ECS
10 21 (7.78%) Azure Service Bus
11 20 (7.41%) Azure Data Factory
12 18 (6.67%) Amazon CloudWatch
13 17 (6.30%) Amazon EKS
14 13 (4.81%) Amazon EventBridge
15 12 (4.44%) GitHub Actions
15 12 (4.44%) GitHub Copilot
16 10 (3.70%) AWS KMS
17 8 (2.96%) Azure DevOps
17 8 (2.96%) Datadog
Communications & Networking
1 31 (11.48%) MQTT
2 6 (2.22%) Internet
3 5 (1.85%) Network Security
4 3 (1.11%) 4G
4 3 (1.11%) 5G
4 3 (1.11%) DNS
5 2 (0.74%) HTTP
5 2 (0.74%) SSH
5 2 (0.74%) TCP/IP
6 1 (0.37%) ATM
6 1 (0.37%) Bluetooth
6 1 (0.37%) LAN
6 1 (0.37%) UWB
6 1 (0.37%) WAN
Database & Business Intelligence
1 67 (24.81%) MongoDB
2 56 (20.74%) PostgreSQL
3 42 (15.56%) NoSQL
4 33 (12.22%) MySQL
5 16 (5.93%) Elasticsearch
6 15 (5.56%) Big Data
7 14 (5.19%) Data Lake
7 14 (5.19%) Redis
7 14 (5.19%) SQL Server
8 13 (4.81%) Flink
8 13 (4.81%) Relational Database
9 9 (3.33%) Data Warehouse
10 8 (2.96%) Amazon RDS
10 8 (2.96%) Amazon Redshift
11 6 (2.22%) DocumentDB
11 6 (2.22%) Power BI
12 5 (1.85%) Amazon Athena
12 5 (1.85%) DynamoDB
13 3 (1.11%) ClickHouse
13 3 (1.11%) Power Query
Development Applications
1 64 (23.70%) Git
2 42 (15.56%) GitLab
3 27 (10.00%) Jenkins
4 8 (2.96%) JUnit
5 6 (2.22%) Cucumber
5 6 (2.22%) JIRA
6 5 (1.85%) Mockito
6 5 (1.85%) Selenium
7 4 (1.48%) Atlassian Bamboo
7 4 (1.48%) Bitbucket
7 4 (1.48%) Gatling
8 3 (1.11%) JMeter
8 3 (1.11%) Postman
8 3 (1.11%) SonarQube
9 2 (0.74%) Claude Code
9 2 (0.74%) minitest
9 2 (0.74%) RSpec
10 1 (0.37%) Artifactory
10 1 (0.37%) Karma Test Runner
10 1 (0.37%) Maven
General
1 50 (18.52%) Public Sector
2 43 (15.93%) Social Skills
3 38 (14.07%) Analytical Skills
4 24 (8.89%) Inclusion and Diversity
5 20 (7.41%) Finance
6 19 (7.04%) Banking
7 12 (4.44%) Publishing
8 6 (2.22%) Law
9 4 (1.48%) Advertising
9 4 (1.48%) Games
9 4 (1.48%) Marketing
10 3 (1.11%) Aerospace
10 3 (1.11%) iGaming
10 3 (1.11%) Telecoms
11 2 (0.74%) Aviation
11 2 (0.74%) Manufacturing
12 1 (0.37%) Italian Language
12 1 (0.37%) Japanese Language
12 1 (0.37%) Military
12 1 (0.37%) Tech for Good
Job Titles
1 89 (32.96%) Developer
2 84 (31.11%) Senior
3 50 (18.52%) Data Engineer
4 43 (15.93%) Java Developer
5 42 (15.56%) Lead
6 37 (13.70%) Software Engineer
7 32 (11.85%) Senior Developer
8 25 (9.26%) Architect
9 22 (8.15%) Senior Data Engineer
10 20 (7.41%) Python Engineer
11 18 (6.67%) Kafka Engineer
12 15 (5.56%) Java Engineer
12 15 (5.56%) Python Developer
13 14 (5.19%) Azure Data Engineer
13 14 (5.19%) Azure Engineer
14 13 (4.81%) Elasticsearch Engineer
14 13 (4.81%) Python Data Engineer
14 13 (4.81%) Senior Python Developer
15 12 (4.44%) DevOps Engineer
15 12 (4.44%) Senior Software Engineer
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 95 (35.19%) Spring
2 89 (32.96%) Spring Boot
3 77 (28.52%) Terraform
4 68 (25.19%) RabbitMQ
4 68 (25.19%) RESTful
5 55 (20.37%) REST
6 35 (12.96%) Node.js
7 34 (12.59%) Hibernate
8 32 (11.85%) JPA
8 32 (11.85%) React
9 27 (10.00%) FastAPI
10 24 (8.89%) OpenAPI
10 24 (8.89%) Swagger
11 18 (6.67%) .NET
12 16 (5.93%) Keycloak
13 14 (5.19%) PySpark
14 10 (3.70%) Apache NiFi
15 9 (3.33%) AngularJS
15 9 (3.33%) Elastic Stack
16 8 (2.96%) Ruby on Rails
Miscellaneous
1 86 (31.85%) Cloud Native
2 59 (21.85%) Distributed Systems
3 41 (15.19%) Product Ownership
4 26 (9.63%) Enterprise Software
5 20 (7.41%) Hybrid Cloud
5 20 (7.41%) Self-Motivation
6 16 (5.93%) Virtual Team
7 12 (4.44%) Media Streaming
7 12 (4.44%) Podcast
8 11 (4.07%) IoT
9 8 (2.96%) Distributed Computing
9 8 (2.96%) Legacy Systems
9 8 (2.96%) Onboarding
10 7 (2.59%) Greenfield Project
11 6 (2.22%) Data Structures
11 6 (2.22%) Mainframe
11 6 (2.22%) Robotics
12 5 (1.85%) AI Agents
12 5 (1.85%) Algorithms
12 5 (1.85%) Public Cloud
Operating Systems
1 27 (10.00%) Linux
2 5 (1.85%) Windows
3 1 (0.37%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
3 1 (0.37%) Unix
Processes & Methodologies
1 156 (57.78%) CI/CD
2 145 (53.70%) Agile
3 133 (49.26%) DevOps
4 123 (45.56%) Microservices
5 113 (41.85%) Event-Driven
6 93 (34.44%) Containerisation
7 92 (34.07%) Software Engineering
8 88 (32.59%) Mentoring
9 82 (30.37%) Infrastructure as Code
10 74 (27.41%) Observability
11 72 (26.67%) Problem-Solving
12 65 (24.07%) AI
13 61 (22.59%) Scrum
14 57 (21.11%) Continuous Improvement
15 56 (20.74%) Roadmaps
16 54 (20.00%) Technical Leadership
17 51 (18.89%) Data Pipeline
18 50 (18.52%) Analytics
19 49 (18.15%) API Design
20 47 (17.41%) Test Automation
Programming Languages
1 138 (51.11%) Java
2 115 (42.59%) Python
3 60 (22.22%) SQL
4 43 (15.93%) TypeScript
5 34 (12.59%) JavaScript
6 23 (8.52%) Go
7 13 (4.81%) C#
8 11 (4.07%) PowerShell
9 10 (3.70%) Scala
10 9 (3.33%) Rust
11 8 (2.96%) Bash
11 8 (2.96%) Kotlin
11 8 (2.96%) Ruby
12 6 (2.22%) Groovy
12 6 (2.22%) PHP
13 4 (1.48%) Shell Script
14 3 (1.11%) Data Analysis Expressions
14 3 (1.11%) DataWeave
14 3 (1.11%) T-SQL
15 2 (0.74%) C++
Qualifications
1 81 (30.00%) Security Cleared
2 63 (23.33%) SC Cleared
3 26 (9.63%) Degree
4 21 (7.78%) Azure Certification
4 21 (7.78%) DV Cleared
5 17 (6.30%) Computer Science Degree
6 10 (3.70%) AWS Certification
7 7 (2.59%) BPSS Clearance
8 5 (1.85%) Master's Degree
9 4 (1.48%) MBA
10 3 (1.11%) AWS Certified Solutions Architect
11 2 (0.74%) TOGAF Certification
12 1 (0.37%) HND
12 1 (0.37%) ISTQB
12 1 (0.37%) ISTQB Foundation Certification
12 1 (0.37%) OCP
12 1 (0.37%) Oracle Certification
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 33 (12.22%) QA
2 20 (7.41%) Data Quality
3 7 (2.59%) Accessibility
4 6 (2.22%) WCAG
5 3 (1.11%) GDPR
5 3 (1.11%) NIST
5 3 (1.11%) NIST 800
6 2 (0.74%) SOC 2
7 1 (0.37%) California Consumer Privacy Act
7 1 (0.37%) HIPAA
7 1 (0.37%) PCI DSS
7 1 (0.37%) PSD2
System Software
1 126 (46.67%) Docker
2 1 (0.37%) Hyper-V
Systems Management
1 142 (52.59%) Kubernetes
2 30 (11.11%) Grafana
3 26 (9.63%) Prometheus
4 16 (5.93%) Ansible
5 7 (2.59%) Argo
6 5 (1.85%) Podman
6 5 (1.85%) Puppet
7 4 (1.48%) Kibana
8 1 (0.37%) Single Sign-On
Vendors
1 25 (9.26%) Splunk
2 22 (8.15%) Databricks
3 19 (7.04%) Microsoft
4 14 (5.19%) Dynatrace
5 13 (4.81%) Oracle
6 10 (3.70%) Atlassian
7 9 (3.33%) Google
8 7 (2.59%) OpenAI
9 6 (2.22%) Confluent
9 6 (2.22%) MuleSoft
10 4 (1.48%) Adobe
10 4 (1.48%) HubSpot
10 4 (1.48%) Informatica
10 4 (1.48%) NVIDIA
11 3 (1.11%) Tenable
11 3 (1.11%) webMethods
12 2 (0.74%) Sparx
12 2 (0.74%) VMware
12 2 (0.74%) YouTube
13 1 (0.37%) AppDynamics