Penetration Testing Contracts in the City of London

Penetration Testing
Central London > City of London

The table below provides summary statistics for contract job vacancies advertised in the City of London requiring Penetration Testing skills. It includes a benchmarking guide to the contractor rates offered in vacancies that cited Penetration Testing over the 6 months leading up to 17 May 2025, comparing them to the same period in the previous two years.

6 months to
17 May 2025
Same period 2024 Same period 2023
Rank 105 113 148
Rank change year-on-year +8 +35 +28
Contract jobs citing Penetration Testing 11 11 16
As % of all contract jobs advertised in the City of London 0.63% 0.51% 0.46%
As % of the Processes & Methodologies category 0.67% 0.56% 0.50%
Number of daily rates quoted 9 10 14
10th Percentile £413 £438 £423
25th Percentile £475 £525 £525
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £625 £700 £563
Median % change year-on-year -10.71% +24.44% +2.27%
75th Percentile £700 £725 £666
90th Percentile £725 £748 £808
Central London median daily rate £625 £700 £563
% change year-on-year -10.71% +24.44% +2.27%

All Process and Methodology Skills
City of London

Penetration Testing falls under the Processes and Methodologies category. For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all contract job vacancies requiring process or methodology skills in the City of London.

Contract vacancies with a requirement for process or methodology skills 1,635 1,957 3,205
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the City of London 93.59% 90.48% 91.52%
Number of daily rates quoted 1,027 1,378 2,168
10th Percentile £353 £350 £354
25th Percentile £463 £450 £481
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £575 £565 £600
Median % change year-on-year +1.77% -5.83% +4.35%
75th Percentile £688 £688 £730
90th Percentile £775 £813 £825
Central London median daily rate £564 £550 £600
% change year-on-year +2.50% -8.33% +4.35%
Number of hourly rates quoted 13 12 26
10th Percentile £22.00 £19.95 £14.75
25th Percentile £23.75 £20.22 £17.08
Median hourly rate £28.15 £25.63 £35.00
Median % change year-on-year +9.85% -26.79% -13.58%
75th Percentile £43.75 £40.00 £57.50
90th Percentile £60.75 £41.65 £88.30
Central London median hourly rate £29.07 £27.81 £35.00
% change year-on-year +4.53% -20.54% -14.63%

Penetration Testing
Job Vacancy Trend in the City of London

Job postings citing Penetration Testing as a proportion of all IT jobs advertised in the City of London.

Job vacancy trend for Penetration Testing in the City of London

Penetration Testing
Contractor Daily Rate Trend in the City of London

3-month moving average daily rate quoted in jobs citing Penetration Testing in the City of London.

Daily rate trend for Penetration Testing in the City of London

Penetration Testing
Daily Rate Histogram in the City of London

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing Penetration Testing in the City of London over the 6 months to 17 May 2025.

Daily rate histogram for Penetration Testing in the City of London

Penetration Testing
Co-occurring Skills and Capabilities in the City of London 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:

Business Applications
1 2 (18.18%) Unit4 Business World
Cloud Services
1 7 (63.64%) Azure
2 3 (27.27%) AWS
2 3 (27.27%) SaaS
2 3 (27.27%) Serverless
3 2 (18.18%) Amazon CloudWatch
3 2 (18.18%) Amazon GuardDuty
3 2 (18.18%) Amazon Macie
3 2 (18.18%) AWS CloudTrail
3 2 (18.18%) AWS KMS
4 1 (9.09%) Azure AKS
4 1 (9.09%) Azure Functions
4 1 (9.09%) Azure Sentinel
4 1 (9.09%) GCP
4 1 (9.09%) IaaS
4 1 (9.09%) PaaS
Communications & Networking
1 2 (18.18%) Firewall
1 2 (18.18%) VPN
2 1 (9.09%) Network Security
Database & Business Intelligence
1 1 (9.09%) Oracle Reports
General
1 4 (36.36%) Finance
2 2 (18.18%) Social Skills
3 1 (9.09%) Analytical Skills
3 1 (9.09%) Military
3 1 (9.09%) Public Sector
Job Titles
1 3 (27.27%) Architect
1 3 (27.27%) Security Architect
1 3 (27.27%) Security Manager
2 2 (18.18%) AWS Architect
2 2 (18.18%) AWS Security Architect
2 2 (18.18%) Operational Security Manager
2 2 (18.18%) Operations Manager
2 2 (18.18%) Security Operations Manager
2 2 (18.18%) Security Technical Architect
2 2 (18.18%) Technical Architect
3 1 (9.09%) Analyst
3 1 (9.09%) Cybersecurity Engineer
3 1 (9.09%) IT Manager
3 1 (9.09%) Penetration Tester
3 1 (9.09%) Security Specialist
3 1 (9.09%) Test Analyst
3 1 (9.09%) Test Manager
3 1 (9.09%) Tester
3 1 (9.09%) Vulnerability Management Specialist
3 1 (9.09%) Vulnerability Specialist
Miscellaneous
1 4 (36.36%) Cloud Native
2 1 (9.09%) Management Information System
2 1 (9.09%) Onboarding
2 1 (9.09%) PKI
2 1 (9.09%) Security Posture
Processes & Methodologies
1 6 (54.55%) Cloud Security
2 5 (45.45%) Vulnerability Management
3 4 (36.36%) DevOps
3 4 (36.36%) Incident Response
3 4 (36.36%) Security Testing
4 3 (27.27%) CI/CD
4 3 (27.27%) Cybersecurity
4 3 (27.27%) Data Loss Prevention
4 3 (27.27%) Security Architecture
4 3 (27.27%) SIEM
4 3 (27.27%) Threat Intelligence
5 2 (18.18%) Analytics
5 2 (18.18%) ERP
5 2 (18.18%) Information Security
5 2 (18.18%) Logistics
5 2 (18.18%) Microservices
5 2 (18.18%) Risk Management
5 2 (18.18%) Security Operations
5 2 (18.18%) Threat Modelling
5 2 (18.18%) User Acceptance Testing
Programming Languages
1 2 (18.18%) Python
2 1 (9.09%) Bash
2 1 (9.09%) C++
2 1 (9.09%) Java
2 1 (9.09%) Perl
2 1 (9.09%) PowerShell
Qualifications
1 4 (36.36%) CISSP
1 4 (36.36%) SC Cleared
1 4 (36.36%) Security Cleared
2 3 (27.27%) CEH
3 2 (18.18%) AWS Certification
3 2 (18.18%) AWS Certified DevOps Engineer
3 2 (18.18%) AWS Certified Solutions Architect
3 2 (18.18%) AWS Certified SysOps Administrator
3 2 (18.18%) CISA
3 2 (18.18%) CISM
3 2 (18.18%) Degree
3 2 (18.18%) OSCP
4 1 (9.09%) (ISC)2 CCSP
4 1 (9.09%) CCSP
4 1 (9.09%) Cisco Certification
4 1 (9.09%) Computer Science Degree
4 1 (9.09%) CREST Certified
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 4 (36.36%) ISO/IEC 27001
2 3 (27.27%) NIST
3 1 (9.09%) California Consumer Privacy Act
3 1 (9.09%) GDPR
3 1 (9.09%) HIPAA
3 1 (9.09%) NIST 800
3 1 (9.09%) PCI DSS
3 1 (9.09%) SLA
System Software
1 1 (9.09%) Virtual Machines
Systems Management
1 3 (27.27%) Kubernetes
2 1 (9.09%) Nessus
Vendors
1 4 (36.36%) Microsoft
2 2 (18.18%) Oracle
2 2 (18.18%) SAP
3 1 (9.09%) Google
3 1 (9.09%) Qualys
3 1 (9.09%) Tenable
3 1 (9.09%) Tripwire