Open Shortest Path First (OSPF)
UK

The table below provides summary statistics and salary benchmarking for jobs requiring OSPF skills. It covers permanent job vacancies from the 6 months leading up to 28 July 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
28 Jul 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 600 466 547
Rank change year-on-year -134 +81 -59
Permanent jobs citing OSPF 178 207 298
As % of all permanent jobs in the UK 0.18% 0.42% 0.34%
As % of the Communications & Networking category 2.42% 2.85% 2.80%
Number of salaries quoted 136 142 221
10th Percentile £48,250 £32,570 £37,500
25th Percentile £61,761 £42,500 £45,000
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £73,750 £55,000 £55,000
Median % change year-on-year +34.09% - -
75th Percentile £83,125 £72,500 £68,750
90th Percentile £91,250 £85,000 £87,500
UK excluding London median annual salary £70,000 £52,250 £50,000
% change year-on-year +33.97% +4.50% -4.76%

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 7,341 7,263 10,633
As % of all permanent jobs advertised in the UK 7.22% 14.73% 12.06%
Number of salaries quoted 4,730 4,166 7,117
10th Percentile £28,000 £25,087 £26,750
25th Percentile £32,500 £30,000 £33,500
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £47,500 £42,500 £48,839
Median % change year-on-year +11.76% -12.98% -5.30%
75th Percentile £70,000 £63,750 £63,750
90th Percentile £86,500 £82,500 £78,750
UK excluding London median annual salary £42,500 £37,500 £45,000
% change year-on-year +13.33% -16.67% -

OSPF
Job Vacancy Trend

Historical trend showing the proportion of permanent IT job postings citing OSPF relative to all permanent IT jobs advertised.

OSPF job vacancy trend in the UK

OSPF
Salary Trend

Salary distribution trend for jobs in the UK citing OSPF.

Salary distribution trend for jobs in the UK citing OSPF

OSPF
Salary Histogram

Salary distribution for jobs citing OSPF over the 6 months to 28 July 2026.

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 28 July 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
England -85 170 £75,000 +36.36% 50
London -58 84 £80,000 +23.08% 20
UK excluding London -96 84 £70,000 +33.97% 32
Work from Home -32 49 £78,000 +20.00% 13
Midlands -12 26 £73,750 +110.71% 4
North of England -36 26 £70,000 +16.67% 10
West Midlands +6 24 £75,000 +114.29% 4
South East -38 21 £52,500 +10.53% 7
North West +9 14 £70,000 +16.67% 5
Yorkshire -49 7 £72,788 -2.95% 5
Scotland +12 5 £50,500 -25.19%
South West -62 5 £62,500 +12.49% 4
North East - 5 £65,576 -
East Midlands - 2 £53,750 -
East of England -18 1 - - 7

OSPF
Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities 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 2 (1.12%) Confluence
Applications
1 14 (7.87%) MS Visio
2 2 (1.12%) Microsoft Excel
Business Applications
1 1 (0.56%) Teamcenter
Cloud Services
1 64 (35.96%) Azure
2 46 (25.84%) AWS
3 19 (10.67%) OpenShift
4 9 (5.06%) GCP
5 7 (3.93%) Datadog
6 6 (3.37%) SaaS
6 6 (3.37%) Virtual Private Cloud
7 5 (2.81%) Azure ExpressRoute
8 4 (2.25%) AWS Direct Connect
8 4 (2.25%) ChatGPT
8 4 (2.25%) Microsoft Copilot
9 3 (1.69%) Azure Monitor
10 2 (1.12%) Cloud Computing
10 2 (1.12%) Route 53
11 1 (0.56%) Cloudflare
11 1 (0.56%) Microsoft 365
11 1 (0.56%) Nutanix
Communications & Networking
1 175 (98.31%) BGP
2 141 (79.21%) Firewall
3 117 (65.73%) VPN
4 113 (63.48%) WAN
5 92 (51.69%) LAN
6 86 (48.31%) Network Security
7 59 (33.15%) VLAN
8 57 (32.02%) SD-WAN
9 50 (28.09%) EIGRP
9 50 (28.09%) Wireless
10 43 (24.16%) TCP/IP
10 43 (24.16%) Wi-Fi
11 39 (21.91%) VXLAN
12 37 (20.79%) DNS
13 36 (20.22%) Cisco ISE
14 33 (18.54%) Cisco ASA
14 33 (18.54%) MPLS
15 29 (16.29%) Cisco Nexus
16 23 (12.92%) Cisco Firepower
17 22 (12.36%) Ethernet VPN
Database & Business Intelligence
1 3 (1.69%) InfluxDB
Development Applications
1 2 (1.12%) Sonatype Nexus
2 1 (0.56%) Git
2 1 (0.56%) GitLab
2 1 (0.56%) JIRA
General
1 66 (37.08%) Social Skills
2 30 (16.85%) Finance
3 21 (11.80%) Analytical Skills
4 17 (9.55%) Telecoms
5 13 (7.30%) Law
6 8 (4.49%) Documentation Skills
7 6 (3.37%) Banking
7 6 (3.37%) Retail Banking
8 5 (2.81%) Public Sector
9 3 (1.69%) Inclusion and Diversity
9 3 (1.69%) Marketing
9 3 (1.69%) Organisational Skills
9 3 (1.69%) Retail
10 2 (1.12%) Manufacturing
11 1 (0.56%) Aerospace
Job Titles
1 129 (72.47%) Network Engineer
2 67 (37.64%) Senior
3 46 (25.84%) Senior Network Engineer
4 25 (14.04%) Network Specialist
5 18 (10.11%) Network Security Specialist
5 18 (10.11%) Security Specialist
6 14 (7.87%) Senior Data Warehouse Specialist
6 14 (7.87%) Senior Network Specialist
7 13 (7.30%) Cisco Engineer
7 13 (7.30%) Cisco Network Engineer
7 13 (7.30%) Senior Network Security Specialist
7 13 (7.30%) Senior Security Specialist
8 8 (4.49%) Infrastructure Engineer
9 7 (3.93%) Consultant
9 7 (3.93%) Network Consultant
10 6 (3.37%) Network Security Engineer
10 6 (3.37%) Security Engineer
11 5 (2.81%) Network Infrastructure Engineer
11 5 (2.81%) SC Cleared Network Engineer
11 5 (2.81%) Senior Infrastructure Engineer
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 16 (8.99%) 802.1X
2 7 (3.93%) gRPC
3 3 (1.69%) ARM Templates
3 3 (1.69%) OpenTelemetry
4 1 (0.56%) Jinja
4 1 (0.56%) LDAP
4 1 (0.56%) REST
4 1 (0.56%) SAML
Miscellaneous
1 81 (45.51%) Data Centre
2 9 (5.06%) PKI
2 9 (5.06%) Security Posture
3 8 (4.49%) Onboarding
4 6 (3.37%) Hybrid Cloud
5 4 (2.25%) Distributed Denial-of-Service
5 4 (2.25%) Driving Licence
5 4 (2.25%) Management Information System
6 3 (1.69%) Life Science
7 2 (1.12%) Linux Command Line
8 1 (0.56%) Cloud Native
8 1 (0.56%) CMDB
8 1 (0.56%) Data Protection Act
8 1 (0.56%) IPTV
8 1 (0.56%) Replication
Operating Systems
1 17 (9.55%) Linux
2 6 (3.37%) Windows
3 2 (1.12%) Windows Server
4 1 (0.56%) Unix
Processes & Methodologies
1 42 (23.60%) Problem-Solving
2 41 (23.03%) Network Monitoring
3 33 (18.54%) Infrastructure as Code
4 30 (16.85%) Load Balancing
5 29 (16.29%) Roadmaps
5 29 (16.29%) Zero Trust
6 24 (13.48%) Network Design
6 24 (13.48%) Stakeholder Engagement
7 23 (12.92%) ITIL
7 23 (12.92%) Network Segmentation
7 23 (12.92%) Project Delivery
8 21 (11.80%) Mentoring
9 20 (11.24%) High Availability
10 18 (10.11%) AI
10 18 (10.11%) Analytics
10 18 (10.11%) Computer Science
10 18 (10.11%) Containerisation
10 18 (10.11%) Kalman Filter
11 17 (9.55%) Continuous Improvement
11 17 (9.55%) Information Security
Programming Languages
1 41 (23.03%) Python
2 7 (3.93%) Bash
3 6 (3.37%) Bicep
4 3 (1.69%) PowerShell
5 1 (0.56%) C
Qualifications
1 103 (57.87%) Cisco Certification
2 94 (52.81%) CCNP
3 26 (14.61%) CCNA
4 25 (14.04%) CCIE
5 21 (11.80%) Security Cleared
6 20 (11.24%) Degree
7 15 (8.43%) Computer Science Degree
8 14 (7.87%) DV Cleared
9 12 (6.74%) CISSP
10 10 (5.62%) SC Cleared
11 5 (2.81%) ITIL Certification
12 4 (2.25%) Azure Certification
12 4 (2.25%) Network+ Certification
13 3 (1.69%) BPSS Clearance
14 2 (1.12%) AWS Certification
14 2 (1.12%) JNCIP
14 2 (1.12%) JNCIS
15 1 (0.56%) CCIE Data Center
15 1 (0.56%) DBS Check
15 1 (0.56%) JNCIE
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 11 (6.18%) SLA
2 8 (4.49%) PMO
3 5 (2.81%) QA
4 4 (2.25%) NIST
4 4 (2.25%) PCI DSS
5 2 (1.12%) ISO/IEC 27001
6 1 (0.56%) Accessibility
6 1 (0.56%) Cyber Essentials
System Software
1 8 (4.49%) ProxySG
1 8 (4.49%) VMware NSX
2 5 (2.81%) Firmware
2 5 (2.81%) VMware Infrastructure
3 3 (1.69%) Docker
4 1 (0.56%) Active Directory
4 1 (0.56%) Hyper-V
4 1 (0.56%) VMware ESXi
Systems Management
1 34 (19.10%) FortiGate
2 29 (16.29%) Ansible
3 19 (10.67%) Kubernetes
3 19 (10.67%) Terraform
4 9 (5.06%) Nagios
5 7 (3.93%) Check_MK
5 7 (3.93%) Grafana
6 6 (3.37%) Prometheus
7 3 (1.69%) ZABBIX
8 2 (1.12%) Cisco Prime
9 1 (0.56%) CASB
9 1 (0.56%) Single Sign-On
Vendors
1 123 (69.10%) Cisco
2 66 (37.08%) Palo Alto
3 54 (30.34%) Fortinet
4 38 (21.35%) SolarWinds
5 25 (14.04%) F5
6 23 (12.92%) Arista
7 19 (10.67%) Meraki
8 18 (10.11%) CheckPoint
8 18 (10.11%) Juniper
8 18 (10.11%) Zscaler
9 15 (8.43%) Aruba
10 13 (7.30%) Infoblox
11 12 (6.74%) Microsoft
11 12 (6.74%) ServiceNow
12 11 (6.18%) VMware
13 8 (4.49%) Blue Coat
13 8 (4.49%) Motorola
14 6 (3.37%) Mellanox
14 6 (3.37%) NVIDIA
15 4 (2.25%) ForeScout