Cyber Essentials Contract Job Trends in England

Cyber Essentials
UK > England

The table below provides summary statistics and contractor rates for jobs advertised in England requiring Cyber Essentials skills. It covers contract job vacancies from the 6 months leading up to 15 May 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
15 May 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 445 413 470
Rank change year-on-year -32 +57 +77
Contract jobs citing Cyber Essentials 143 55 63
As % of all contract jobs in England 0.35% 0.23% 0.17%
As % of the Quality Assurance & Compliance category 2.10% 1.42% 1.21%
Number of daily rates quoted 103 31 45
10th Percentile £333 £325 £274
25th Percentile £463 £441 £400
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £540 £550 £515
Median % change year-on-year -1.82% +6.80% -10.43%
75th Percentile £584 £608 £600
90th Percentile £675 £638 £675
UK median daily rate £540 £550 £500
% change year-on-year -1.82% +10.00% -9.01%
Number of hourly rates quoted 8 2 0
10th Percentile - £70.24 -
25th Percentile £36.00 £72.40 -
Median hourly rate £44.25 £78.40 -
Median % change year-on-year -43.56% - -
75th Percentile £67.84 £82.00 -
90th Percentile - £82.72 -
UK median hourly rate £57.82 £83.20 -
% change year-on-year -30.51% - -

All Quality Assurance and Compliance Skills
England

Cyber Essentials falls under the Quality Assurance and Compliance category. For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all contract job vacancies requiring quality assurance or compliance skills in England.

Contract vacancies with a requirement for quality assurance or compliance skills 6,802 3,880 5,188
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in England 16.70% 16.03% 14.23%
Number of daily rates quoted 4,430 2,507 3,329
10th Percentile £343 £266 £300
25th Percentile £413 £400 £406
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £513 £525
Median % change year-on-year -2.44% -2.38% -
75th Percentile £603 £630 £638
90th Percentile £700 £738 £750
UK median daily rate £500 £500 £513
% change year-on-year - -2.44% -2.38%
Number of hourly rates quoted 428 154 349
10th Percentile £14.02 £18.15 £10.95
25th Percentile £18.50 £22.75 £13.18
Median hourly rate £33.98 £38.03 £22.50
Median % change year-on-year -10.65% +69.02% -43.75%
75th Percentile £65.00 £65.00 £45.00
90th Percentile £79.60 £78.61 £68.75
UK median hourly rate £36.00 £35.00 £21.12
% change year-on-year +2.86% +65.76% -39.67%

Cyber Essentials
Job Vacancy Trend in England

Historical trend showing the proportion of contract IT job postings citing Cyber Essentials relative to all contract IT jobs advertised in England.

Cyber Essentials job vacancy trend in England

Cyber Essentials
Daily Rate Trend in England

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in England citing Cyber Essentials.

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in England citing Cyber Essentials

Cyber Essentials
Daily Rate Histogram in England

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing Cyber Essentials in England over the 6 months to 15 May 2026.

Daily rate histogram for Cyber Essentials in England

Cyber Essentials
Hourly Rate Trend in England

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in England citing Cyber Essentials.

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in England citing Cyber Essentials

Cyber Essentials
Hourly Rate Histogram in England

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing Cyber Essentials in England over the 6 months to 15 May 2026.

Hourly rate histogram for Cyber Essentials in England

Cyber Essentials
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 Cyber Essentials within the England region over the 6 months to 15 May 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 -29 55 £550 +15.79% 30
South East -24 49 £525 -13.58% 42
East of England -19 14 £475 -5.00% 15
North of England -58 9 £540 -6.09% 21
South West -27 8 £538 -10.42% 10
North West -28 6 £558 +147.78% 10
West Midlands -60 6 £540 +66.15% 9
Midlands -69 6 £540 +66.15% 15
Yorkshire -56 3 £540 -6.09% 9
Cyber Essentials
UK

Cyber Essentials
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 12 (8.39%) SharePoint
2 8 (5.59%) Microsoft Exchange
3 3 (2.10%) Confluence
4 1 (0.70%) Anypoint
Applications
1 8 (5.59%) Microsoft Office
2 4 (2.80%) Microsoft Excel
3 1 (0.70%) AutoCAD
3 1 (0.70%) Microsoft PowerPoint
Business Applications
1 1 (0.70%) Oracle ERP
Cloud Services
1 64 (44.76%) Azure
2 57 (39.86%) Microsoft 365
3 30 (20.98%) Entra ID
4 26 (18.18%) Microsoft Purview
5 18 (12.59%) Mimecast
6 15 (10.49%) AWS
7 9 (6.29%) IaaS
7 9 (6.29%) PaaS
8 8 (5.59%) Amazon GuardDuty
8 8 (5.59%) AWS Control Tower
8 8 (5.59%) SaaS
9 7 (4.90%) AWS CloudTrail
9 7 (4.90%) Azure Sentinel
10 6 (4.20%) AWS CloudFormation
10 6 (4.20%) AWS KMS
10 6 (4.20%) Virtual Private Cloud
11 3 (2.10%) GitHub
11 3 (2.10%) OCI
12 2 (1.40%) Azure AKS
12 2 (1.40%) OneDrive
Communications & Networking
1 20 (13.99%) Firewall
2 18 (12.59%) VPN
3 14 (9.79%) Network Security
4 6 (4.20%) DHCP
4 6 (4.20%) DNS
5 5 (3.50%) VSAN
6 4 (2.80%) BGP
6 4 (2.80%) Cisco ASA
6 4 (2.80%) Cisco IOS
6 4 (2.80%) MPLS
6 4 (2.80%) TACACS
7 3 (2.10%) VLAN
7 3 (2.10%) Wi-Fi
7 3 (2.10%) Wireless
8 1 (0.70%) HTTP
8 1 (0.70%) Intrusion Detection
8 1 (0.70%) LAN
8 1 (0.70%) SAN
8 1 (0.70%) WAN
Database & Business Intelligence
1 3 (2.10%) Metadata
2 1 (0.70%) Amazon RDS
2 1 (0.70%) DynamoDB
2 1 (0.70%) MongoDB
2 1 (0.70%) SQL Server
Development Applications
1 1 (0.70%) MSI
General
1 59 (41.26%) Social Skills
2 26 (18.18%) Finance
3 25 (17.48%) Public Sector
4 11 (7.69%) Analytical Skills
5 7 (4.90%) Aerospace
6 5 (3.50%) Influencing Skills
6 5 (3.50%) Organisational Skills
7 4 (2.80%) Inclusion and Diversity
8 3 (2.10%) Legal
8 3 (2.10%) Local Government
9 1 (0.70%) Documentation Skills
9 1 (0.70%) Military
Job Titles
1 26 (18.18%) Security Engineer
2 24 (16.78%) Architect
3 18 (12.59%) Senior
4 16 (11.19%) Cybersecurity Engineer
5 15 (10.49%) Analyst
6 14 (9.79%) Security Specialist
7 13 (9.09%) Cybersecurity Specialist
8 11 (7.69%) Infrastructure Engineer
8 11 (7.69%) Security Analyst
9 10 (6.99%) Technical Architect
10 7 (4.90%) Lead
11 6 (4.20%) Cloud Architect
11 6 (4.20%) Project Manager
11 6 (4.20%) Security Manager
12 5 (3.50%) 3rd Line Support
12 5 (3.50%) Information Analyst
12 5 (3.50%) Information Security Analyst
12 5 (3.50%) Infrastructure Security Engineer
13 4 (2.80%) Infrastructure Project Manager
13 4 (2.80%) Solutions Architect
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 4 (2.80%) LDAP
2 3 (2.10%) OAuth
2 3 (2.10%) Oracle Fusion
3 2 (1.40%) Microsoft Graph
4 1 (0.70%) .NET
4 1 (0.70%) JSON
4 1 (0.70%) JWT
4 1 (0.70%) Middleware
4 1 (0.70%) Node.js
4 1 (0.70%) OAuth2
4 1 (0.70%) OpenAPI
4 1 (0.70%) RAML
4 1 (0.70%) React
4 1 (0.70%) RESTful
4 1 (0.70%) Software Packaging
4 1 (0.70%) STL
4 1 (0.70%) Swagger
4 1 (0.70%) XML
4 1 (0.70%) XML Schema
4 1 (0.70%) YAML
Miscellaneous
1 19 (13.29%) Operational Technology
2 11 (7.69%) Onboarding
2 11 (7.69%) SCADA
3 9 (6.29%) Hybrid Cloud
3 9 (6.29%) PKI
4 7 (4.90%) Cyber Defence
5 6 (4.20%) Driving Licence
6 5 (3.50%) BYOD
6 5 (3.50%) Cloud Native
6 5 (3.50%) Management Information System
6 5 (3.50%) Public Cloud
7 4 (2.80%) Analytical Mindset
7 4 (2.80%) NHS
7 4 (2.80%) Security Operations Centre
7 4 (2.80%) Security Posture
8 3 (2.10%) Data Centre
8 3 (2.10%) Taxonomies
9 2 (1.40%) Cyber Threat
9 2 (1.40%) Cybercrime
9 2 (1.40%) Mobile App
Operating Systems
1 28 (19.58%) Linux
2 25 (17.48%) Windows
3 11 (7.69%) Windows Server
4 7 (4.90%) Unix
5 6 (4.20%) Ubuntu
6 3 (2.10%) Windows 10
7 2 (1.40%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
7 2 (1.40%) Windows Server 2012
8 1 (0.70%) Android
8 1 (0.70%) Apple iOS
8 1 (0.70%) VMS
Processes & Methodologies
1 78 (54.55%) Cybersecurity
2 34 (23.78%) Data Loss Prevention
3 30 (20.98%) Information Security
4 26 (18.18%) Risk Management
5 22 (15.38%) ITSM
6 21 (14.69%) SIEM
7 20 (13.99%) Stakeholder Engagement
8 19 (13.29%) CI/CD
8 19 (13.29%) ITIL
8 19 (13.29%) Migration
8 19 (13.29%) Vulnerability Management
9 17 (11.89%) Risk Register
9 17 (11.89%) Zero Trust
10 16 (11.19%) Change Control
10 16 (11.19%) RBAC
10 16 (11.19%) Roadmaps
11 15 (10.49%) Infrastructure Engineering
12 14 (9.79%) Incident Response
12 14 (9.79%) Risk Assessment
12 14 (9.79%) Security Architecture
Programming Languages
1 16 (11.19%) PowerShell
2 10 (6.99%) Python
3 5 (3.50%) Bash
3 5 (3.50%) Kusto Query Language
4 4 (2.80%) PHP
5 3 (2.10%) SQL
6 1 (0.70%) C#
6 1 (0.70%) T-SQL
Qualifications
1 51 (35.66%) Security Cleared
2 48 (33.57%) SC Cleared
3 20 (13.99%) CISSP
4 15 (10.49%) Degree
5 14 (9.79%) CISM
6 12 (8.39%) Cisco Certification
7 10 (6.99%) DV Cleared
7 10 (6.99%) GIAC
8 8 (5.59%) CRISC
8 8 (5.59%) SSCP
9 7 (4.90%) (ISC)2 CCSP
9 7 (4.90%) CESG Certified Professional
9 7 (4.90%) GSEC
10 6 (4.20%) AWS Certification
10 6 (4.20%) AWS Certified Solutions Architect
10 6 (4.20%) CompTIA Security+
10 6 (4.20%) Microsoft Certification
11 5 (3.50%) CCNA
11 5 (3.50%) SANS
12 4 (2.80%) APMG
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 73 (51.05%) ISO/IEC 27001
2 53 (37.06%) Cyber Essentials PLUS
3 52 (36.36%) NIST
4 33 (23.08%) NCSC
5 23 (16.08%) GDPR
6 11 (7.69%) GRC
6 11 (7.69%) ISO 31000
6 11 (7.69%) PCI DSS
7 10 (6.99%) NIST 800
8 7 (4.90%) Def Stans
8 7 (4.90%) ISO/IEC 27002 (supersedes ISO/IEC 17799)
9 6 (4.20%) IASME
10 4 (2.80%) HMG Security Policy Framework
10 4 (2.80%) SLA
11 3 (2.10%) ISO 22301
11 3 (2.10%) ISO/IEC 27005
12 2 (1.40%) COBIT
13 1 (0.70%) PMO
System Software
1 17 (11.89%) Active Directory
2 15 (10.49%) VMware Infrastructure
3 6 (4.20%) Virtual Desktop
4 5 (3.50%) Hyper-V
4 5 (3.50%) VMware NSX
5 4 (2.80%) VMware ESXi
6 3 (2.10%) Docker
6 3 (2.10%) Virtual Machines
Systems Management
1 20 (13.99%) Microsoft Intune
2 11 (7.69%) Kubernetes
2 11 (7.69%) Terraform
3 7 (4.90%) AirWatch
4 4 (2.80%) vCenter Server
5 3 (2.10%) Ansible
5 3 (2.10%) Podman
5 3 (2.10%) SCOM
6 2 (1.40%) Nessus
6 2 (1.40%) Single Sign-On
7 1 (0.70%) CASB
7 1 (0.70%) Grafana
7 1 (0.70%) RSA Archer
Vendors
1 68 (47.55%) Microsoft
2 23 (16.08%) VMware
3 22 (15.38%) Cisco
4 17 (11.89%) CrowdStrike
5 14 (9.79%) Netskope
6 13 (9.09%) CyberArk
7 11 (7.69%) ServiceNow
8 9 (6.29%) Palo Alto
9 6 (4.20%) Citrix
9 6 (4.20%) CloudEndure
10 5 (3.50%) Barracuda Networks
11 3 (2.10%) Atlassian
11 3 (2.10%) Oracle
11 3 (2.10%) Tenable
12 2 (1.40%) Qualys
12 2 (1.40%) Snow
12 2 (1.40%) Sophos
13 1 (0.70%) Apple
13 1 (0.70%) Juniper
13 1 (0.70%) SAP