Cloud Engineer Contract Job Trends in England

Cloud Engineer
UK > England

The median Cloud Engineer daily rate in England is £525, according to job vacancies posted in the 6 months leading up to 26 August 2026.

The table below compares current contractor rates and summary statistics with the previous two years.

 6 months to
26 Aug 2026		 Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 200 306 309
Rank change year-on-year +106 +3 -33
Contract jobs requiring a Cloud Engineer 642 221 216
As % of all contract jobs in England 1.41% 0.80% 0.65%
As % of the Job Titles category 1.52% 0.88% 0.70%
Number of daily rates quoted 421 167 142
10th Percentile £408 £402 £373
25th Percentile £462 £449 £450
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £525 £500 £550
Median % change year-on-year +5.00% -9.09% -
75th Percentile £615 £575 £634
90th Percentile £688 £638 £675
UK median daily rate £520 £500 £550
% change year-on-year +4.00% -9.09% -
Number of hourly rates quoted 25 6 0
10th Percentile - £29.00 -
25th Percentile £23.20 £29.25 -
Median hourly rate £77.00 £37.50 -
Median % change year-on-year +105.33% - -
75th Percentile £81.25 £58.75 -
90th Percentile - £86.25 -
UK median hourly rate £77.00 £37.50 -
% change year-on-year +105.33% - -

All Contract IT Job Roles
England

For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all contract IT job vacancies in England. Most job vacancies include a discernible job title that can be normalized. As such, the figures in the second row provide an indication of the number of contract jobs in our overall sample.

Contract vacancies in England with a recognized job title 42,222 25,226 30,892
% of contract IT jobs with a recognized job title 92.43% 91.56% 92.99%
Number of daily rates quoted 25,437 16,285 19,969
10th Percentile £325 £280 £300
25th Percentile £425 £400 £413
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £525 £508 £525
Median % change year-on-year +3.45% -3.33% -4.55%
75th Percentile £630 £625 £638
90th Percentile £738 £738 £750
UK median daily rate £525 £500 £525
% change year-on-year +5.00% -4.76% -1.87%
Number of hourly rates quoted 3,228 1,378 1,700
10th Percentile £15.10 £13.68 £14.16
25th Percentile £21.15 £17.44 £20.50
Median hourly rate £42.50 £25.15 £45.00
Median % change year-on-year +68.99% -44.11% +2.60%
75th Percentile £68.00 £55.00 £66.61
90th Percentile £80.00 £73.07 £75.00
UK median hourly rate £41.74 £25.15 £43.00
% change year-on-year +65.94% -41.51% -1.44%

Cloud Engineer
Job Vacancy Trend in England

Historical trend showing the proportion of contract IT job postings featuring 'Cloud Engineer' in the job title relative to all contract IT jobs advertised in England.

Cloud Engineer job vacancy trend in England

Cloud Engineer
Daily Rate Trend in England

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for Cloud Engineer job vacancies in England.

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for Cloud Engineer job vacancies in England

Cloud Engineer
Daily Rate Histogram in England

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing Cloud Engineer in England over the 6 months to 26 August 2026.

Daily rate histogram for Cloud Engineer in England

Cloud Engineer
Hourly Rate Trend in England

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for Cloud Engineer job vacancies in England.

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for Cloud Engineer job vacancies in England

Cloud Engineer
Hourly Rate Histogram in England

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing Cloud Engineer in England over the 6 months to 26 August 2026.

Hourly rate histogram for Cloud Engineer in England

Cloud Engineer
Contract Job Locations in England

The table below looks at the demand and provides a guide to the median contractor rates quoted in IT jobs citing Cloud Engineer within the England region over the 6 months to 26 August 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
Contract
IT Job Ads		 Median
Daily Rate
Past 6 Months		 Median Daily Rate
% Change
on Same Period
Last Year		 Live
Jobs
London +52 300 £525 - 31
South East +11 118 £538 +7.50% 17
North of England +8 118 £513 +13.89% 47
North West +1 70 £533 +18.44% 27
Midlands +2 64 £500 +5.26% 11
Yorkshire -4 41 £467 -6.62% 17
West Midlands -29 32 £525 -2.78% 8
East Midlands +9 31 £450 -5.26% 3
East of England -6 20 £488 +0.52% 3
South West -37 14 £625 +13.64% 29
North East -40 7 £525 +10.53% 3
Cloud Engineer
UK

Cloud Engineer Skill Set
Top 30 Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities in England

For the 6 months to 26 August 2026, Cloud Engineer contract job roles required the following skills and capabilities in order of popularity. The figures indicate the absolute number of co-occurrences and as a proportion of all contract job ads across the England region featuring Cloud Engineer in the job title.

1 326 (50.78%) Azure
2 261 (40.65%) Terraform
3 225 (35.05%) AWS
4 220 (34.27%) Infrastructure as Code
5 214 (33.33%) CI/CD
6 179 (27.88%) Security Cleared
7 172 (26.79%) DevOps
8 153 (23.83%) Cloud Security
9 151 (23.52%) Kubernetes
10 149 (23.21%) Python
11 147 (22.90%) PowerShell
12 142 (22.12%) Infrastructure Engineering
12 142 (22.12%) Microsoft
13 132 (20.56%) SC Cleared
14 128 (19.94%) GCP
15 116 (18.07%) Platform Engineering
16 103 (16.04%) Windows
17 81 (12.62%) Google
18 77 (11.99%) AI
18 77 (11.99%) Entra ID
19 75 (11.68%) Agile
20 73 (11.37%) Migration
21 72 (11.21%) Firewall
22 71 (11.06%) DNS
22 71 (11.06%) GitHub
23 70 (10.90%) Bash
24 69 (10.75%) Active Directory
25 66 (10.28%) Observability
26 65 (10.12%) Linux
27 64 (9.97%) Bicep

Cloud Engineer Skill Set
Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities in England 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 13 (2.02%) Microsoft Exchange
2 9 (1.40%) Apache
3 6 (0.93%) Confluence
4 5 (0.78%) Apache Airflow
4 5 (0.78%) SharePoint
5 3 (0.47%) IIS
5 3 (0.47%) nginx
5 3 (0.47%) Tomcat
6 2 (0.31%) CloudStack
6 2 (0.31%) OpenStack
7 1 (0.16%) Apache Pulsar
Applications
1 1 (0.16%) Chatbot
Business Applications
1 2 (0.31%) Aladdin
Cloud Services
1 326 (50.78%) Azure
2 225 (35.05%) AWS
3 128 (19.94%) GCP
4 77 (11.99%) Entra ID
5 71 (11.06%) GitHub
6 51 (7.94%) Azure DevOps
7 50 (7.79%) Serverless
8 47 (7.32%) GitHub Actions
9 43 (6.70%) IaaS
10 39 (6.07%) Azure AKS
11 38 (5.92%) AWS CloudFormation
12 37 (5.76%) AWS Lambda
13 36 (5.61%) Google Kubernetes Engine
14 35 (5.45%) Azure Monitor
15 31 (4.83%) PaaS
16 30 (4.67%) Amazon EC2
16 30 (4.67%) Amazon EKS
16 30 (4.67%) Microsoft 365
17 27 (4.21%) SaaS
18 25 (3.89%) Amazon S3
Communications & Networking
1 72 (11.21%) Firewall
2 71 (11.06%) DNS
3 36 (5.61%) Network Security
4 31 (4.83%) VPN
5 17 (2.65%) WAN
6 16 (2.49%) DHCP
7 14 (2.18%) TCP/IP
8 12 (1.87%) Internet
9 6 (0.93%) SD-WAN
10 5 (0.78%) LAN
10 5 (0.78%) SSL
10 5 (0.78%) VLAN
11 4 (0.62%) BGP
11 4 (0.62%) SAN
11 4 (0.62%) SMTP
12 3 (0.47%) IPv4
12 3 (0.47%) Kerberos
12 3 (0.47%) OSPF
12 3 (0.47%) Reverse Proxy
12 3 (0.47%) Wireless
Database & Business Intelligence
1 25 (3.89%) SQL Server
2 15 (2.34%) Amazon RDS
3 11 (1.71%) PostgreSQL
4 10 (1.56%) BigQuery
5 8 (1.25%) Oracle Exadata
6 6 (0.93%) Data Lake
7 5 (0.78%) Amazon Athena
7 5 (0.78%) Azure SQL Database
7 5 (0.78%) DynamoDB
7 5 (0.78%) Oracle Database
8 3 (0.47%) Flink
8 3 (0.47%) Looker
8 3 (0.47%) MySQL
8 3 (0.47%) Oracle Database 12c
9 2 (0.31%) Amazon QuickSight
9 2 (0.31%) Amazon Redshift
9 2 (0.31%) Big Data
9 2 (0.31%) Metadata
9 2 (0.31%) NoSQL
10 1 (0.16%) Delta Lake
Development Applications
1 45 (7.01%) GitLab
2 33 (5.14%) Jenkins
3 27 (4.21%) Git
4 11 (1.71%) JIRA
5 7 (1.09%) Artifactory
6 3 (0.47%) Selenium
7 2 (0.31%) Bitbucket
7 2 (0.31%) Claude Code
7 2 (0.31%) Cypress.io
7 2 (0.31%) Gatling
7 2 (0.31%) JMeter
7 2 (0.31%) Octopus Deploy
7 2 (0.31%) Robot Framework
7 2 (0.31%) Terragrunt
8 1 (0.16%) Chocolatey
8 1 (0.16%) CircleCI
8 1 (0.16%) Postman
8 1 (0.16%) REST Assured
8 1 (0.16%) Spinnaker
8 1 (0.16%) TestRail
General
1 77 (11.99%) Finance
2 68 (10.59%) Social Skills
3 58 (9.03%) Public Sector
4 28 (4.36%) Analytical Skills
5 24 (3.74%) Banking
6 9 (1.40%) Inclusion and Diversity
7 8 (1.25%) Documentation Skills
8 6 (0.93%) Investment Banking
8 6 (0.93%) Manufacturing
9 5 (0.78%) Law
9 5 (0.78%) Local Government
10 3 (0.47%) Digital Health
10 3 (0.47%) Digital Healthcare
10 3 (0.47%) Front Office
10 3 (0.47%) Italian Language
10 3 (0.47%) Legal
10 3 (0.47%) Marketing
10 3 (0.47%) Military
10 3 (0.47%) Pharmaceutical
10 3 (0.47%) Presentation Skills
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 261 (40.65%) Terraform
2 19 (2.96%) REST
3 13 (2.02%) ARM Templates
4 11 (1.71%) Kafka
4 11 (1.71%) Spring
4 11 (1.71%) Spring Boot
5 10 (1.56%) OAuth
5 10 (1.56%) OAuth2
6 8 (1.25%) YAML
7 6 (0.93%) FastAPI
7 6 (0.93%) Flask
7 6 (0.93%) React
8 5 (0.78%) AWS CDK
8 5 (0.78%) OpenID
9 4 (0.62%) .NET
9 4 (0.62%) Azure Blueprints
9 4 (0.62%) Hugging Face
9 4 (0.62%) Node.js
9 4 (0.62%) PyTorch
9 4 (0.62%) TensorFlow
Miscellaneous
1 104 (16.20%) Cloud Native
2 55 (8.57%) Security Posture
3 33 (5.14%) Hybrid Cloud
4 31 (4.83%) Enterprise Cloud
5 28 (4.36%) Cloud Security Posture
6 18 (2.80%) Management Information System
6 18 (2.80%) Onboarding
7 17 (2.65%) Distributed Systems
8 15 (2.34%) Public Cloud
9 13 (2.02%) Data Centre
9 13 (2.02%) Enterprise Software
10 12 (1.87%) Product Ownership
11 11 (1.71%) Private Cloud
12 8 (1.25%) AI Agents
13 7 (1.09%) Legacy Systems
13 7 (1.09%) Self-Motivation
14 6 (0.93%) Linux Command Line
15 5 (0.78%) PKI
16 4 (0.62%) NHS
16 4 (0.62%) Virtual Team
Operating Systems
1 103 (16.04%) Windows
2 65 (10.12%) Linux
3 54 (8.41%) Windows Server
4 27 (4.21%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
5 10 (1.56%) Windows Server 2019
6 8 (1.25%) Ubuntu
7 3 (0.47%) CentOS
7 3 (0.47%) VMS
8 2 (0.31%) Windows Server 2012
Processes & Methodologies
1 220 (34.27%) Infrastructure as Code
2 214 (33.33%) CI/CD
3 172 (26.79%) DevOps
4 153 (23.83%) Cloud Security
5 142 (22.12%) Infrastructure Engineering
6 116 (18.07%) Platform Engineering
7 77 (11.99%) AI
8 75 (11.68%) Agile
9 73 (11.37%) Migration
10 66 (10.28%) Observability
11 61 (9.50%) Containerisation
12 54 (8.41%) Technical Leadership
13 53 (8.26%) Continuous Improvement
14 52 (8.10%) Software Engineering
15 50 (7.79%) DevSecOps
16 47 (7.32%) Cybersecurity
17 44 (6.85%) Change Management
17 44 (6.85%) Infrastructure Automation
18 42 (6.54%) Deployment Automation
18 42 (6.54%) Problem-Solving
Programming Languages
1 149 (23.21%) Python
2 147 (22.90%) PowerShell
3 70 (10.90%) Bash
4 64 (9.97%) Bicep
5 60 (9.35%) SQL
6 32 (4.98%) Java
7 18 (2.80%) C#
8 9 (1.40%) Go
8 9 (1.40%) JavaScript
9 8 (1.25%) Shell Script
10 5 (0.78%) TypeScript
11 4 (0.62%) Groovy
12 3 (0.47%) C
12 3 (0.47%) Scala
13 2 (0.31%) Kusto Query Language
14 1 (0.16%) Apex Code
14 1 (0.16%) Data Analysis Expressions
14 1 (0.16%) Perl
14 1 (0.16%) R
14 1 (0.16%) Ruby
Qualifications
1 179 (27.88%) Security Cleared
2 132 (20.56%) SC Cleared
3 64 (9.97%) DV Cleared
4 43 (6.70%) Azure Certification
5 42 (6.54%) AWS Certification
6 29 (4.52%) Degree
7 15 (2.34%) CISSP
7 15 (2.34%) Microsoft Certification
8 12 (1.87%) AWS Certified Solutions Architect
9 7 (1.09%) Cisco Certification
9 7 (1.09%) Computer Science Degree
10 6 (0.93%) CCNP
10 6 (0.93%) CISM
10 6 (0.93%) MCSE
11 4 (0.62%) CCIE
11 4 (0.62%) VMware Certified Professional (VCP)
12 3 (0.47%) AWS Certified DevOps Engineer
12 3 (0.47%) CEH
13 2 (0.31%) CCIE Security
13 2 (0.31%) GSEC
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 14 (2.18%) ISO/IEC 27001
2 11 (1.71%) Data Quality
3 10 (1.56%) QA
4 9 (1.40%) NIST
5 8 (1.25%) NCSC
6 5 (0.78%) GDPR
7 4 (0.62%) Cyber Essentials
8 3 (0.47%) Cyber Essentials PLUS
8 3 (0.47%) SLA
9 2 (0.31%) Disclosure Scotland
9 2 (0.31%) PCI DSS
10 1 (0.16%) Accessibility
10 1 (0.16%) Actionable Recommendations
10 1 (0.16%) Government Security Classifications
10 1 (0.16%) GRC
10 1 (0.16%) SOC 2
10 1 (0.16%) WCAG
System Software
1 69 (10.75%) Active Directory
2 61 (9.50%) Docker
3 40 (6.23%) VMware Infrastructure
4 31 (4.83%) Virtual Machines
5 27 (4.21%) VMware ESXi
6 23 (3.58%) VMware NSX
7 19 (2.96%) Virtual Desktop
8 17 (2.65%) vSphere
9 14 (2.18%) vCloud
10 9 (1.40%) Hyper-V
11 7 (1.09%) Squid
12 4 (0.62%) Firmware
13 3 (0.47%) Ceph
13 3 (0.47%) Dovecot
13 3 (0.47%) NFS
13 3 (0.47%) Postfix
14 2 (0.31%) KVM
14 2 (0.31%) Virtual Servers
Systems Management
1 151 (23.52%) Kubernetes
2 44 (6.85%) Ansible
3 23 (3.58%) vCenter Server
4 22 (3.43%) Microsoft Intune
5 21 (3.27%) SCOM
6 18 (2.80%) Grafana
6 18 (2.80%) Progress Chef
7 17 (2.65%) Prometheus
8 14 (2.18%) Puppet
9 10 (1.56%) Istio
10 8 (1.25%) Packer
10 8 (1.25%) Single Sign-On
11 5 (0.78%) VxRail
12 4 (0.62%) Suricata
13 3 (0.47%) Active Directory Federation Services
13 3 (0.47%) HAProxy
13 3 (0.47%) vRealize
14 2 (0.31%) FortiGate
14 2 (0.31%) Salt
14 2 (0.31%) SELinux
Vendors
1 142 (22.12%) Microsoft
2 81 (12.62%) Google
3 63 (9.81%) VMware
4 30 (4.67%) Oracle
5 16 (2.49%) Red Hat
5 16 (2.49%) Zscaler
6 13 (2.02%) Databricks
7 11 (1.71%) Palo Alto
7 11 (1.71%) Splunk
8 10 (1.56%) OpenAI
8 10 (1.56%) ServiceNow
9 9 (1.40%) Dynatrace
9 9 (1.40%) Salesforce
10 8 (1.25%) Broadcom
10 8 (1.25%) SolarWinds
11 7 (1.09%) Cisco
11 7 (1.09%) CrowdStrike
11 7 (1.09%) New Relic
12 5 (0.78%) CyberArk
12 5 (0.78%) Fortinet
124 Cloud Engineer jobs in England