Data Centre Contract Job Trends in England

Data Center
UK > England

The table below looks at the prevalence of the term Data Centre in contract job vacancies in England. Included is a benchmarking guide to the contractor rates offered in vacancies that cited Data Centre over the 6 months leading up to 28 June 2026, comparing them to the same period in the previous two years.

6 months to
28 Jun 2026		 Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 107 129 105
Rank change year-on-year +22 -24 -11
Contract jobs citing Data Centre 1,002 564 804
As % of all contract jobs in England 2.30% 2.21% 2.15%
As % of the Miscellaneous category 7.01% 6.38% 7.03%
Number of daily rates quoted 609 376 569
10th Percentile £318 £301 £320
25th Percentile £405 £413 £425
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £520 £538
Median % change year-on-year -3.85% -3.26% -2.27%
75th Percentile £612 £610 £625
90th Percentile £738 £688 £700
UK median daily rate £500 £500 £538
% change year-on-year - -6.98% -2.27%
Number of hourly rates quoted 61 17 43
10th Percentile £16.01 £24.66 £12.08
25th Percentile £18.07 £25.04 £21.66
Median hourly rate £25.00 £25.15 £24.87
Median % change year-on-year -0.60% +1.13% +14.77%
75th Percentile £35.22 £43.75 £40.00
90th Percentile £73.75 £66.25 £41.00
UK median hourly rate £21.00 £25.15 £23.80
% change year-on-year -16.50% +5.67% +13.43%

All Generic Skills
England

Data Centre falls under the General and Transferable Skills category. For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all contract job vacancies requiring generic IT skills in England.

Contract vacancies with a requirement for generic IT skills 14,291 8,837 11,433
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in England 32.86% 34.70% 30.61%
Number of daily rates quoted 8,903 5,651 7,356
10th Percentile £313 £305 £280
25th Percentile £415 £408 £413
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £525 £525 £550
Median % change year-on-year - -4.55% -2.65%
75th Percentile £638 £660 £675
90th Percentile £750 £788 £820
UK median daily rate £520 £525 £539
% change year-on-year -0.95% -2.51% -2.09%
Number of hourly rates quoted 779 421 844
10th Percentile £16.01 £15.84 £12.24
25th Percentile £21.14 £19.00 £15.39
Median hourly rate £43.96 £33.00 £37.50
Median % change year-on-year +33.21% -12.00% +56.94%
75th Percentile £70.00 £60.00 £63.75
90th Percentile £87.16 £81.00 £72.50
UK median hourly rate £42.71 £31.63 £36.00
% change year-on-year +35.04% -12.15% +60.00%

Data Centre
Job Vacancy Trend in England

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

Data Centre job vacancy trend in England

Data Centre
Daily Rate Trend in England

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in England citing Data Centre.

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in England citing Data Centre

Data Centre
Daily Rate Histogram in England

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing Data Centre in England over the 6 months to 28 June 2026.

Daily rate histogram for Data Centre in England

Data Centre
Hourly Rate Trend in England

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in England citing Data Centre.

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in England citing Data Centre

Data Centre
Hourly Rate Histogram in England

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing Data Centre in England over the 6 months to 28 June 2026.

Hourly rate histogram for Data Centre in England

Data Centre
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 Data Centre within the England region over the 6 months to 28 June 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 +13 364 £550 +4.27% 173
North of England +18 245 £475 +5.44% 38
South East +5 212 £475 +5.56% 86
Yorkshire 0 130 £365 -16.57% 18
North West +1 91 £500 -4.76% 17
Midlands -52 58 £466 -13.32% 25
West Midlands -47 53 £474 -11.81% 18
South West -33 49 £495 -10.00% 23
East of England -12 38 £500 +66.67% 25
North East -7 30 £625 +468.18% 3
East Midlands -19 4 £363 -29.70% 7
Data Centre
UK

Data Centre
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 23 (2.30%) Confluence
2 17 (1.70%) SharePoint
3 11 (1.10%) Microsoft Exchange
4 10 (1.00%) CICS
5 5 (0.50%) Apache
5 5 (0.50%) CloudStack
5 5 (0.50%) OpenStack
6 4 (0.40%) WebLogic
7 3 (0.30%) nginx
7 3 (0.30%) Tomcat
8 1 (0.100%) IIS
Applications
1 13 (1.30%) Microsoft Excel
1 13 (1.30%) Microsoft PowerPoint
2 10 (1.00%) Microsoft Office
2 10 (1.00%) MS Visio
3 9 (0.90%) Microsoft Project
4 5 (0.50%) AutoCAD
5 3 (0.30%) Adobe Illustrator
5 3 (0.30%) Spreadsheet
6 2 (0.20%) EPLAN
Business Applications
1 3 (0.30%) Salesforce CRM
2 2 (0.20%) Oracle Procure-to-Pay
2 2 (0.20%) Primavera
2 2 (0.20%) Remedy ITSM
3 1 (0.100%) DELMIA
Cloud Services
1 213 (21.26%) Azure
2 184 (18.36%) AWS
3 54 (5.39%) GCP
4 40 (3.99%) IaaS
5 35 (3.49%) Microsoft 365
5 35 (3.49%) SaaS
6 34 (3.39%) GitHub
7 30 (2.99%) OCI
8 21 (2.10%) Entra ID
8 21 (2.10%) PaaS
8 21 (2.10%) Virtual Private Cloud
9 13 (1.30%) OneDrive
9 13 (1.30%) OpenShift
10 12 (1.20%) Power Platform
11 11 (1.10%) Azure DevOps
11 11 (1.10%) Azure ExpressRoute
12 9 (0.90%) Amazon EKS
12 9 (0.90%) Azure Sentinel
13 8 (0.80%) Amazon GuardDuty
13 8 (0.80%) GitHub Actions
Communications & Networking
1 269 (26.85%) Firewall
2 179 (17.86%) WAN
3 169 (16.87%) BGP
4 127 (12.67%) OSPF
5 111 (11.08%) DNS
6 106 (10.58%) VXLAN
7 102 (10.18%) LAN
8 101 (10.08%) SAN
9 93 (9.28%) VPN
10 91 (9.08%) Network Security
10 91 (9.08%) VLAN
11 86 (8.58%) Structured Cabling
12 78 (7.78%) DHCP
13 73 (7.29%) SD-WAN
14 70 (6.99%) Ethernet VPN
15 58 (5.79%) BIG-IP
16 54 (5.39%) TCP/IP
17 43 (4.29%) NX-OS
18 42 (4.19%) F5 BIG-IP LTM
18 42 (4.19%) NAS
Database & Business Intelligence
1 9 (0.90%) DataStage
1 9 (0.90%) SQL Server
2 7 (0.70%) Power BI
3 6 (0.60%) Big Data
3 6 (0.60%) PostgreSQL
4 4 (0.40%) Amazon RDS
4 4 (0.40%) Elasticsearch
4 4 (0.40%) Geospatial Data
4 4 (0.40%) MongoDB
4 4 (0.40%) Oracle Reports
4 4 (0.40%) SAP Data Services
5 3 (0.30%) Db2
5 3 (0.30%) GIS
5 3 (0.30%) Oracle Database
6 2 (0.20%) Azure SQL Database
6 2 (0.20%) Data Lake
6 2 (0.20%) Data Warehouse
6 2 (0.20%) Oracle Database 12c
7 1 (0.100%) Oracle Exadata
7 1 (0.100%) Tableau
Development Applications
1 64 (6.39%) JIRA
2 36 (3.59%) GitLab
3 29 (2.89%) Git
3 29 (2.89%) Jenkins
4 4 (0.40%) Atlassian Bamboo
4 4 (0.40%) Eclipse
4 4 (0.40%) Maven
4 4 (0.40%) ScriptRunner
4 4 (0.40%) Sonatype Nexus
4 4 (0.40%) Subversion
5 3 (0.30%) Zephyr
6 2 (0.20%) MSI
7 1 (0.100%) AppScan
7 1 (0.100%) Bitbucket
7 1 (0.100%) Burp Suite
7 1 (0.100%) Claude Code
7 1 (0.100%) Metasploit
General
1 255 (25.45%) Social Skills
2 141 (14.07%) Finance
3 106 (10.58%) Analytical Skills
4 68 (6.79%) Public Sector
5 55 (5.49%) Documentation Skills
6 45 (4.49%) Banking
7 39 (3.89%) Telecoms
8 29 (2.89%) Legal
9 24 (2.40%) Influencing Skills
10 23 (2.30%) Retail
11 17 (1.70%) Inclusion and Diversity
11 17 (1.70%) Manufacturing
12 10 (1.00%) Military
12 10 (1.00%) Organisational Skills
13 8 (0.80%) Law
13 8 (0.80%) Marketing
14 6 (0.60%) Aerospace
14 6 (0.60%) Financial Institution
14 6 (0.60%) Investment Banking
14 6 (0.60%) Presentation Skills
Job Titles
1 150 (14.97%) Network Engineer
2 139 (13.87%) Architect
3 114 (11.38%) Senior
4 97 (9.68%) Infrastructure Engineer
5 88 (8.78%) Data Centre Engineer
6 66 (6.59%) Project Manager
7 53 (5.29%) Lead
8 51 (5.09%) Network Architect
9 42 (4.19%) IT Engineer
10 40 (3.99%) Field Engineer
11 36 (3.59%) Field Service Engineer
12 35 (3.49%) Infrastructure Manager
13 33 (3.29%) Data Centre Manager
14 30 (2.99%) Senior Infrastructure Engineer
15 29 (2.89%) Analyst
16 28 (2.79%) Solutions Architect
16 28 (2.79%) Support Engineer
17 25 (2.50%) IT Support
17 25 (2.50%) SC Cleared Network Engineer
18 24 (2.40%) Administrator
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 34 (3.39%) Middleware
2 31 (3.09%) 802.1X
3 11 (1.10%) LDAP
4 10 (1.00%) Redfish
5 8 (0.80%) REST
6 7 (0.70%) Elastic Stack
6 7 (0.70%) Spring
7 5 (0.50%) Jinja
7 5 (0.50%) Kafka
7 5 (0.50%) NETCONF
7 5 (0.50%) XML
8 4 (0.40%) GeoJSON
8 4 (0.40%) OpenConfig
8 4 (0.40%) RESTCONF
8 4 (0.40%) RESTful
8 4 (0.40%) Spring Boot
8 4 (0.40%) YAML
8 4 (0.40%) YANG
9 3 (0.30%) OpenLayers
9 3 (0.30%) RFC 2544
Miscellaneous
1 69 (6.89%) Hybrid Cloud
2 43 (4.29%) Analytical Mindset
3 36 (3.59%) Cloud Native
4 31 (3.09%) Clustering
4 31 (3.09%) PKI
5 28 (2.79%) Enterprise Storage
5 28 (2.79%) Private Cloud
6 27 (2.69%) Fibre Optics
6 27 (2.69%) Onboarding
7 19 (1.90%) Driving Licence
7 19 (1.90%) Management Information System
7 19 (1.90%) Replication
8 16 (1.60%) Public Cloud
9 15 (1.50%) CMDB
10 13 (1.30%) Data Protection Act
10 13 (1.30%) Mainframe
11 10 (1.00%) SCADA
12 9 (0.90%) BYOD
12 9 (0.90%) Security Posture
12 9 (0.90%) VSAM
Operating Systems
1 132 (13.17%) Windows
2 106 (10.58%) Linux
3 36 (3.59%) Windows Server
4 29 (2.89%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
5 28 (2.79%) Unix
6 22 (2.20%) AIX
7 17 (1.70%) Solaris
8 10 (1.00%) Apple iOS
8 10 (1.00%) Mac OS
9 9 (0.90%) CentOS
10 6 (0.60%) Ubuntu
10 6 (0.60%) Windows Server 2019
11 5 (0.50%) HPUX
11 5 (0.50%) Oracle Linux
11 5 (0.50%) SUSE
11 5 (0.50%) VMS
12 4 (0.40%) Data ONTAP
13 3 (0.30%) Windows Server 2008
14 2 (0.20%) Windows Server 2012
14 2 (0.20%) zOS
Processes & Methodologies
1 181 (18.06%) Migration
2 168 (16.77%) Problem-Solving
3 124 (12.38%) Infrastructure Engineering
4 112 (11.18%) Stakeholder Management
5 104 (10.38%) ITIL
6 93 (9.28%) Infrastructure as Code
7 92 (9.18%) CI/CD
7 92 (9.18%) High Availability
8 83 (8.28%) Continuous Improvement
9 79 (7.88%) Roadmaps
10 76 (7.58%) Agile
11 74 (7.39%) Change Management
12 72 (7.19%) Load Balancing
13 70 (6.99%) Project Delivery
14 69 (6.89%) Validation
15 67 (6.69%) Zero Trust
16 66 (6.59%) DevOps
16 66 (6.59%) Project Management
17 61 (6.09%) ITSM
17 61 (6.09%) Network Design
Programming Languages
1 132 (13.17%) Python
2 38 (3.79%) PowerShell
3 27 (2.69%) SQL
4 22 (2.20%) Bash
5 17 (1.70%) Java
6 15 (1.50%) Shell Script
7 14 (1.40%) Bicep
8 11 (1.10%) COBOL
9 9 (0.90%) ActionScript
9 9 (0.90%) MATLAB
10 8 (0.80%) Perl
11 7 (0.70%) PL/SQL
12 6 (0.60%) JavaScript
13 4 (0.40%) Lisp
14 3 (0.30%) C#
15 2 (0.20%) C++
15 2 (0.20%) JCL
15 2 (0.20%) Korn
15 2 (0.20%) REXX
15 2 (0.20%) VBA
Qualifications
1 279 (27.84%) Security Cleared
2 189 (18.86%) SC Cleared
3 183 (18.26%) Cisco Certification
4 111 (11.08%) CCNP
5 80 (7.98%) DV Cleared
6 78 (7.78%) CCNA
7 67 (6.69%) Degree
8 49 (4.89%) Network+ Certification
9 40 (3.99%) Microsoft Certification
10 34 (3.39%) A+ Certification
10 34 (3.39%) MCSE
11 27 (2.69%) Azure Certification
12 24 (2.40%) AWS Certification
12 24 (2.40%) PMP
13 23 (2.30%) CCIE
14 22 (2.20%) City & Guilds
14 22 (2.20%) PMI Certification
15 20 (2.00%) VMware Certified Professional (VCP)
16 17 (1.70%) BICSI Certification
17 15 (1.50%) CISSP
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 32 (3.19%) SLA
2 23 (2.30%) ISO/IEC 27001
3 22 (2.20%) NIST
4 20 (2.00%) PMO
5 18 (1.80%) QA
6 16 (1.60%) GDPR
7 15 (1.50%) NCSC
8 10 (1.00%) GRC
9 9 (0.90%) PCI DSS
10 6 (0.60%) Actionable Recommendations
11 5 (0.50%) RMADS
12 4 (0.40%) JSP 440
13 3 (0.30%) NIST 800
14 2 (0.20%) Accessibility
14 2 (0.20%) Cyber Essentials
14 2 (0.20%) Data Quality
14 2 (0.20%) Sarbanes-Oxley
14 2 (0.20%) WCAG
15 1 (0.100%) COBIT
15 1 (0.100%) NEBOSH
System Software
1 98 (9.78%) VMware Infrastructure
2 53 (5.29%) Active Directory
3 35 (3.49%) VMware ESXi
4 29 (2.89%) Firmware
5 27 (2.69%) vSphere
6 26 (2.59%) VMware NSX
7 23 (2.30%) Hyper-V
8 22 (2.20%) Virtual Machines
9 14 (1.40%) Docker
10 10 (1.00%) KVM
11 9 (0.90%) NFS
12 6 (0.60%) Microsoft App-V
13 5 (0.50%) SRDF
13 5 (0.50%) Virtual Desktop
14 4 (0.40%) BitLocker
14 4 (0.40%) Terminal Services
14 4 (0.40%) VMware Workstation
15 3 (0.30%) EMC RecoverPoint
15 3 (0.30%) UAG
15 3 (0.30%) Veritas Cluster Server
Systems Management
1 120 (11.98%) Ansible
2 97 (9.68%) Terraform
3 48 (4.79%) FortiGate
4 47 (4.69%) Kubernetes
5 30 (2.99%) Grafana
6 28 (2.79%) Prometheus
7 26 (2.59%) Microsoft Intune
8 15 (1.50%) vCenter Server
9 12 (1.20%) Check_MK
10 11 (1.10%) NetBackup
11 10 (1.00%) Dell DRAC
11 10 (1.00%) Jamf Pro
12 9 (0.90%) Podman
12 9 (0.90%) PowerCLI
12 9 (0.90%) Red Hat Satellite
12 9 (0.90%) SCCM
13 8 (0.80%) vMotion
14 7 (0.70%) Active Directory Federation Services
14 7 (0.70%) Tivoli Storage Manager
15 5 (0.50%) Nagios
Vendors
1 251 (25.05%) Cisco
2 146 (14.57%) VMware
3 117 (11.68%) Palo Alto
4 102 (10.18%) Microsoft
5 100 (9.98%) F5
6 82 (8.18%) Juniper
7 65 (6.49%) Dell
8 63 (6.29%) Arista
8 63 (6.29%) Fortinet
9 50 (4.99%) ServiceNow
10 42 (4.19%) SolarWinds
11 41 (4.09%) Aruba
12 35 (3.49%) IBM
13 33 (3.29%) CheckPoint
14 31 (3.09%) Red Hat
15 30 (2.99%) Google
16 29 (2.89%) Splunk
17 24 (2.40%) Oracle
18 22 (2.20%) Extreme Networks
18 22 (2.20%) HP
347 Data Centre jobs in England