Open Shortest Path First (OSPF)
UK

The table below provides summary statistics for permanent job vacancies requiring OSPF skills. It includes a benchmarking guide to the annual salaries offered in vacancies that cited OSPF over the 6 months leading up to 1 April 2025, comparing them to the same period in the previous two years.

6 months to
1 Apr 2025
Same period 2024 Same period 2023
Rank 434 551 648
Rank change year-on-year +117 +97 +91
Permanent jobs citing OSPF 253 324 374
As % of all permanent jobs advertised in the UK 0.50% 0.35% 0.34%
As % of the Communications & Networking category 3.62% 2.62% 2.27%
Number of salaries quoted 222 269 269
10th Percentile £32,500 £37,500 £40,700
25th Percentile £44,099 £46,250 £45,000
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £54,094 £50,000 £55,000
Median % change year-on-year +8.19% -9.09% -
75th Percentile £72,188 £63,750 £78,750
90th Percentile £84,875 £82,500 £85,000
UK excluding London median annual salary £53,000 £48,500 £45,000
% change year-on-year +9.28% +7.78% -14.29%

All Communications and Computer Networking Skills
UK

OSPF falls under the Communications and Computer Networking category. For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all permanent job vacancies requiring communications or computer networking skills.

Permanent vacancies with a requirement for communications or computer networking skills 6,993 12,378 16,454
As % of all permanent jobs advertised in the UK 13.85% 13.41% 14.86%
Number of salaries quoted 4,009 9,380 8,747
10th Percentile £23,746 £26,250 £27,750
25th Percentile £32,500 £32,500 £36,250
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £50,000 £48,500 £51,500
Median % change year-on-year +3.09% -5.83% -1.90%
75th Percentile £68,750 £63,750 £71,250
90th Percentile £86,250 £78,750 £88,750
UK excluding London median annual salary £45,000 £43,500 £45,000
% change year-on-year +3.45% -3.33% -

OSPF
Job Vacancy Trend

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

Job vacancy trend for OSPF in the UK

OSPF
Salary Trend

3-month moving average salary quoted in jobs citing OSPF.

Salary trend for OSPF in the UK

OSPF
Salary Histogram

Salary distribution for jobs citing OSPF over the 6 months to 1 April 2025.

Salary histogram for OSPF in the UK

OSPF
Top 15 Job Locations

The table below looks at the demand and provides a guide to the median salaries quoted in IT jobs citing OSPF within the UK over the 6 months to 1 April 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
Permanent
IT Job Ads
Median Salary
Past 6 Months
Median Salary
% Change
on Same Period
Last Year
Live
Jobs
England +93 245 £53,000 +6.00% 226
UK excluding London +136 168 £53,000 +9.28% 152
South East +125 94 £53,000 +0.95% 43
London +94 77 £72,500 +3.57% 100
Work from Home +87 54 £56,121 +12.24% 70
North of England +45 24 £55,000 +29.41% 41
Midlands +22 24 £35,000 -27.84% 23
West Midlands +6 24 £35,000 -27.84% 12
South West +90 16 £56,121 +15.71% 12
Yorkshire +61 13 £44,700 -12.78% 9
North West -1 10 £57,500 +43.75% 29
East of England +62 8 £47,000 -24.80% 13
Scotland +105 1 £67,500 +3.85% 10
Wales +46 1 £37,733 -18.85% 6
North East +32 1 £28,000 -55.20% 3

OSPF
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 7 (2.77%) Microsoft Exchange
2 1 (0.40%) IIS
2 1 (0.40%) Office Communications Server
Applications
1 19 (7.51%) Microsoft Excel
1 19 (7.51%) Microsoft Office
2 10 (3.95%) MS Visio
Cloud Services
1 65 (25.69%) Azure
2 44 (17.39%) AWS
3 19 (7.51%) Google Workspace
4 10 (3.95%) Microsoft 365
5 6 (2.37%) Cloud Computing
5 6 (2.37%) GCP
5 6 (2.37%) SaaS
6 4 (1.58%) AWS CloudFormation
6 4 (1.58%) Virtual Private Cloud
7 2 (0.79%) AWS Lambda
7 2 (0.79%) Cloudflare
7 2 (0.79%) Entra ID
7 2 (0.79%) IaaS
7 2 (0.79%) Serverless
8 1 (0.40%) Azure Sentinel
8 1 (0.40%) OpenShift
Communications & Networking
1 242 (95.65%) BGP
2 180 (71.15%) Firewall
3 107 (42.29%) WAN
4 100 (39.53%) EIGRP
5 88 (34.78%) TCP/IP
6 85 (33.60%) Network Security
7 80 (31.62%) MPLS
8 76 (30.04%) VPN
9 75 (29.64%) LAN
10 53 (20.95%) VLAN
11 44 (17.39%) SD-WAN
12 41 (16.21%) WLAN
13 39 (15.42%) IPsec
14 38 (15.02%) DNS
14 38 (15.02%) Wireless
15 37 (14.62%) DHCP
16 36 (14.23%) Cisco ASA
17 28 (11.07%) Cisco ISE
18 25 (9.88%) Cisco Firepower
19 21 (8.30%) Cisco Nexus
Database & Business Intelligence
1 1 (0.40%) SQL Server
Development Applications
1 7 (2.77%) Sonatype Nexus
General
1 67 (26.48%) Social Skills
2 21 (8.30%) Retail
3 19 (7.51%) Automotive
4 17 (6.72%) Finance
5 14 (5.53%) Analytical Skills
5 14 (5.53%) Banking
6 12 (4.74%) Telecoms
7 9 (3.56%) Police
8 8 (3.16%) Documentation Skills
9 6 (2.37%) Local Government
9 6 (2.37%) Presentation Skills
10 5 (1.98%) Advertising
10 5 (1.98%) Mandarin Language
11 2 (0.79%) Inclusion and Diversity
11 2 (0.79%) Manufacturing
11 2 (0.79%) Public Sector
12 1 (0.40%) Aviation
12 1 (0.40%) Financial Institution
12 1 (0.40%) Investment Banking
Job Titles
1 156 (61.66%) Network Engineer
2 44 (17.39%) Senior
3 35 (13.83%) Senior Network Engineer
4 27 (10.67%) Network Security Engineer
4 27 (10.67%) Security Engineer
5 24 (9.49%) IT Engineer
6 21 (8.30%) DV Cleared Network Engineer
7 19 (7.51%) Systems Engineer
8 17 (6.72%) Cisco Engineer
8 17 (6.72%) Cisco Network Engineer
9 16 (6.32%) NOC Engineer
10 15 (5.93%) 3rd Line Engineer
10 15 (5.93%) 3rd Line Network Engineer
11 13 (5.14%) Junior
12 12 (4.74%) SC Cleared Network Engineer
13 11 (4.35%) Lead
14 10 (3.95%) Cloud Engineer
15 8 (3.16%) 1st Line Engineer
15 8 (3.16%) Designer
15 8 (3.16%) Network Designer
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 22 (8.70%) 802.1X
2 4 (1.58%) JSON
2 4 (1.58%) YAML
3 3 (1.19%) REST
4 1 (0.40%) .NET
Miscellaneous
1 42 (16.60%) Data Centre
2 25 (9.88%) Management Information System
3 19 (7.51%) Smartphone
4 9 (3.56%) Public Cloud
5 7 (2.77%) Driving Licence
6 6 (2.37%) Cyber Threat
6 6 (2.37%) Reinsurance
7 5 (1.98%) IoT
8 4 (1.58%) PMI
9 2 (0.79%) Hybrid Cloud
9 2 (0.79%) PKI
9 2 (0.79%) Self-Motivation
10 1 (0.40%) Clustering
10 1 (0.40%) Cyber Security Posture
10 1 (0.40%) Distributed Denial-of-Service
10 1 (0.40%) e-Learning
10 1 (0.40%) Hedge funds
10 1 (0.40%) IPTV
10 1 (0.40%) Legacy Systems
10 1 (0.40%) Security Posture
Operating Systems
1 28 (11.07%) Linux
2 26 (10.28%) Windows
3 21 (8.30%) Windows Server
4 20 (7.91%) Ubuntu
4 20 (7.91%) Windows 10
4 20 (7.91%) Windows Server 2019
5 19 (7.51%) Mac OS X
5 19 (7.51%) Windows Server 2016
Processes & Methodologies
1 44 (17.39%) Network Monitoring
2 37 (14.62%) Network Management
3 35 (13.83%) Network Design
4 34 (13.44%) Problem-Solving
5 23 (9.09%) Computer Science
6 20 (7.91%) High Availability
6 20 (7.91%) Performance Tuning
7 19 (7.51%) Business Case
7 19 (7.51%) Systems Engineering
8 18 (7.11%) ITIL
9 16 (6.32%) Disaster Recovery
10 15 (5.93%) Network Architecture
11 14 (5.53%) Roadmaps
12 13 (5.14%) Business Continuity
12 13 (5.14%) Change Management
12 13 (5.14%) Incident Management
12 13 (5.14%) Project Delivery
13 12 (4.74%) Continuous Improvement
13 12 (4.74%) Infrastructure Engineering
13 12 (4.74%) Vulnerability Assessment
Programming Languages
1 33 (13.04%) PowerShell
2 27 (10.67%) Python
3 24 (9.49%) SQL
4 10 (3.95%) Bash
5 3 (1.19%) C++
6 2 (0.79%) R
7 1 (0.40%) C#
7 1 (0.40%) Java
7 1 (0.40%) JavaScript
Qualifications
1 101 (39.92%) Security Cleared
2 96 (37.94%) Cisco Certification
3 77 (30.43%) DV Cleared
4 70 (27.67%) SC Cleared
5 56 (22.13%) CCNA
6 54 (21.34%) CCNP
7 43 (17.00%) Degree
8 22 (8.70%) Computer Science Degree
9 20 (7.91%) CCIE
10 19 (7.51%) HNC
10 19 (7.51%) HND
10 19 (7.51%) MCSE
10 19 (7.51%) Microsoft Certification
11 6 (2.37%) JNCIA
12 4 (1.58%) ITIL Foundation Certificate
12 4 (1.58%) PMI Certification
13 3 (1.19%) AWS Certification
14 2 (0.79%) CCIE Routing and Switching
14 2 (0.79%) JNCIE
14 2 (0.79%) Network+ Certification
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 7 (2.77%) ISO/IEC 27001
2 5 (1.98%) Cyber Essentials
2 5 (1.98%) Cyber Essentials PLUS
2 5 (1.98%) PCI DSS
2 5 (1.98%) QA
2 5 (1.98%) SLA
3 2 (0.79%) GDPR
System Software
1 27 (10.67%) Active Directory
2 22 (8.70%) VMware Infrastructure
3 14 (5.53%) Hyper-V
4 8 (3.16%) VMware NSX
5 4 (1.58%) Docker
6 3 (1.19%) Firmware
7 1 (0.40%) vSphere
Systems Management
1 44 (17.39%) FortiGate
2 21 (8.30%) Ansible
3 12 (4.74%) Terraform
4 10 (3.95%) Kubernetes
5 8 (3.16%) Microsoft Intune
6 7 (2.77%) WSUS
7 6 (2.37%) Nagios
8 3 (1.19%) Puppet
8 3 (1.19%) ZABBIX
9 1 (0.40%) Cisco CUCM
9 1 (0.40%) Cisco Prime
9 1 (0.40%) Cisco UCCX
9 1 (0.40%) Failover Clustering
9 1 (0.40%) HAProxy
9 1 (0.40%) Jamf Pro
9 1 (0.40%) SCCM
9 1 (0.40%) SolarWinds Orion
Vendors
1 203 (80.24%) Cisco
2 114 (45.06%) Fortinet
3 88 (34.78%) Juniper
4 48 (18.97%) Palo Alto
5 45 (17.79%) Microsoft
6 39 (15.42%) SolarWinds
7 31 (12.25%) CheckPoint
8 29 (11.46%) VMware
9 24 (9.49%) Ubiquiti
10 23 (9.09%) Dell
11 19 (7.51%) Apple
11 19 (7.51%) F5
11 19 (7.51%) Google
12 14 (5.53%) Arista
13 13 (5.14%) Meraki
14 10 (3.95%) Riverbed
15 9 (3.56%) Citrix
16 8 (3.16%) McAfee
17 6 (2.37%) LogicMonitor
18 5 (1.98%) HP