DNS Contract Job Trends in England

Domain Name System (DNS)
UK > England

The table below provides summary statistics and contractor rates for jobs advertised in England requiring DNS skills. It covers contract job vacancies from the 6 months leading up to 9 October 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
9 Oct 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 146 124 147
Rank change year-on-year -22 +23 -14
Contract jobs citing DNS 897 644 553
As % of all contract jobs in England 1.94% 2.29% 1.71%
As % of the Communications & Networking category 20.87% 19.58% 14.08%
Number of daily rates quoted 572 405 334
10th Percentile £294 £219 £250
25th Percentile £413 £380 £351
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £510 £500 £500
Median % change year-on-year +2.00% - -
75th Percentile £600 £600 £598
90th Percentile £656 £653 £675
UK median daily rate £501 £500 £488
% change year-on-year +0.25% +2.56% -2.50%
Number of hourly rates quoted 50 32 10
10th Percentile £26.00 £15.50 £17.88
25th Percentile £31.25 £29.00 £23.28
Median hourly rate £62.00 £45.00 £23.99
Median % change year-on-year +37.78% +87.58% -40.03%
75th Percentile £82.25 £76.59 £28.83
90th Percentile £98.82 £89.17 £48.88
UK median hourly rate £62.00 £45.00 £23.99
% change year-on-year +37.78% +87.58% -40.03%

All Communications and Computer Networking Skills
England

DNS falls under the Communications and Computer Networking category. For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all contract job vacancies requiring communications or computer networking skills in England.

Contract vacancies with a requirement for communications or computer networking skills 4,298 3,289 3,927
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in England 9.30% 11.71% 12.13%
Number of daily rates quoted 2,537 2,090 2,254
10th Percentile £261 £216 £237
25th Percentile £400 £358 £375
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £485 £500
Median % change year-on-year +3.09% -3.00% -
75th Percentile £600 £588 £608
90th Percentile £688 £688 £688
UK median daily rate £500 £475 £500
% change year-on-year +5.26% -5.00% -
Number of hourly rates quoted 391 172 160
10th Percentile £16.01 £15.50 £16.30
25th Percentile £21.33 £20.00 £26.25
Median hourly rate £38.72 £34.00 £57.43
Median % change year-on-year +13.88% -40.79% +1.66%
75th Percentile £68.75 £65.00 £67.14
90th Percentile £92.53 £75.00 £75.00
UK median hourly rate £32.50 £35.00 £49.00
% change year-on-year -7.14% -28.57% -13.26%

DNS
Job Vacancy Trend in England

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

DNS job vacancy trend in England

DNS
Daily Rate Trend in England

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in England citing DNS.

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in England citing DNS

DNS
Daily Rate Histogram in England

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing DNS in England over the 6 months to 9 October 2026.

Daily rate histogram for DNS in England

DNS
Hourly Rate Trend in England

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in England citing DNS.

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in England citing DNS

DNS
Hourly Rate Histogram in England

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing DNS in England over the 6 months to 9 October 2026.

Hourly rate histogram for DNS in England

DNS
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 DNS within the England region over the 6 months to 9 October 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 -43 317 £500 -4.76% 418
North of England +9 198 £500 +11.48% 110
South East +1 173 £538 +7.50% 140
North West +4 122 £500 +11.48% 69
Midlands -47 99 £450 - 69
South West +5 96 £588 +2.17% 83
West Midlands -52 83 £450 +2.86% 41
Yorkshire -3 61 £500 - 29
East of England -44 41 £513 -6.82% 41
East Midlands -9 15 £375 -16.67% 28
North East -37 15 £425 +25.00% 14
DNS
UK

DNS
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 98 (10.93%) Microsoft Exchange
2 82 (9.14%) SharePoint
3 26 (2.90%) Confluence
4 15 (1.67%) nginx
5 13 (1.45%) Apache
6 12 (1.34%) IIS
7 8 (0.89%) Skype for Business
8 6 (0.67%) Tomcat
9 5 (0.56%) OpenStack
10 4 (0.45%) Exchange Server 2013
11 2 (0.22%) Apache Spark
12 1 (0.11%) SharePoint Server
12 1 (0.11%) Traefik
Applications
1 23 (2.56%) Microsoft Office
2 11 (1.23%) Microsoft Excel
3 8 (0.89%) MS Visio
4 3 (0.33%) Microsoft PowerPoint
5 2 (0.22%) Adobe Creative Suite
5 2 (0.22%) Houdini
5 2 (0.22%) NUKE
5 2 (0.22%) Spreadsheet
6 1 (0.11%) Microsoft Project
6 1 (0.11%) Mozilla Thunderbird
Business Applications
1 15 (1.67%) Remedy ITSM
2 1 (0.11%) Oracle EBS
2 1 (0.11%) Oracle ERP
2 1 (0.11%) Oracle Retail
2 1 (0.11%) Sparx Enterprise Architect
Cloud Services
1 384 (42.81%) Azure
2 185 (20.62%) AWS
2 185 (20.62%) Microsoft 365
3 180 (20.07%) Entra ID
4 74 (8.25%) GCP
4 74 (8.25%) GitHub
5 49 (5.46%) IaaS
6 46 (5.13%) Azure Monitor
6 46 (5.13%) OneDrive
7 44 (4.91%) Azure DevOps
7 44 (4.91%) GitHub Actions
8 34 (3.79%) SaaS
9 31 (3.46%) Azure ExpressRoute
10 26 (2.90%) PaaS
11 25 (2.79%) Virtual Private Cloud
12 24 (2.68%) AWS CloudFormation
13 23 (2.56%) Azure Sentinel
14 22 (2.45%) Azure Key Vault
14 22 (2.45%) OpenShift
15 20 (2.23%) Azure AKS
Communications & Networking
1 438 (48.83%) DHCP
2 349 (38.91%) Firewall
3 286 (31.88%) TCP/IP
4 269 (29.99%) VPN
5 136 (15.16%) Network Security
6 117 (13.04%) VLAN
7 109 (12.15%) WAN
8 87 (9.70%) SSL
9 84 (9.36%) LAN
10 79 (8.81%) BGP
11 73 (8.14%) Wireless
12 61 (6.80%) Wi-Fi
13 57 (6.35%) BIG-IP
13 57 (6.35%) HTTP
14 56 (6.24%) F5 BIG-IP LTM
15 54 (6.02%) F5 BIG-IP GTM
16 48 (5.35%) SAN
17 43 (4.79%) OSPF
18 41 (4.57%) DMZ
19 38 (4.24%) IPsec
Database & Business Intelligence
1 45 (5.02%) SQL Server
2 14 (1.56%) Amazon RDS
2 14 (1.56%) PostgreSQL
3 12 (1.34%) MySQL
4 10 (1.11%) Data Lake
5 9 (1.00%) Power BI
6 8 (0.89%) MongoDB
6 8 (0.89%) NoSQL
7 7 (0.78%) Elasticsearch
8 6 (0.67%) Big Data
8 6 (0.67%) Redis
9 5 (0.56%) Azure SQL Database
10 4 (0.45%) Db2
11 3 (0.33%) Metadata
12 2 (0.22%) Amazon Aurora
12 2 (0.22%) BigQuery
12 2 (0.22%) DynamoDB
12 2 (0.22%) Flink
12 2 (0.22%) KDB
12 2 (0.22%) Relational Database
Development Applications
1 71 (7.92%) JIRA
2 57 (6.35%) Jenkins
3 50 (5.57%) Git
4 38 (4.24%) GitLab
5 12 (1.34%) Fiddler
6 9 (1.00%) Sonatype Nexus
7 8 (0.89%) Bitbucket
8 5 (0.56%) Artifactory
8 5 (0.56%) Atlassian Bamboo
8 5 (0.56%) Selenium
9 4 (0.45%) Chocolatey
10 3 (0.33%) MSI
11 2 (0.22%) Spinnaker
11 2 (0.22%) SQL Server Management Studio (SSMS)
11 2 (0.22%) Vagrant
12 1 (0.11%) Browser DevTools
12 1 (0.11%) Locust
12 1 (0.11%) Newman
12 1 (0.11%) REST Assured
12 1 (0.11%) TestCafe
General
1 240 (26.76%) Social Skills
2 105 (11.71%) Analytical Skills
3 87 (9.70%) Finance
4 68 (7.58%) Public Sector
5 50 (5.57%) Banking
6 38 (4.24%) Documentation Skills
7 29 (3.23%) Telecoms
8 23 (2.56%) Investment Banking
9 15 (1.67%) Legal
10 12 (1.34%) Aerospace
10 12 (1.34%) Inclusion and Diversity
10 12 (1.34%) Police
11 11 (1.23%) Local Government
11 11 (1.23%) Military
12 9 (1.00%) Front Office
13 8 (0.89%) Manufacturing
14 7 (0.78%) Influencing Skills
14 7 (0.78%) Law
14 7 (0.78%) Organisational Skills
14 7 (0.78%) Pharmaceutical
Job Titles
1 173 (19.29%) Infrastructure Engineer
2 146 (16.28%) Network Engineer
3 116 (12.93%) Senior
4 98 (10.93%) Support Engineer
5 79 (8.81%) Cloud Engineer
6 65 (7.25%) Architect
7 49 (5.46%) IT Support
8 45 (5.02%) Azure Engineer
9 44 (4.91%) IT Engineer
10 43 (4.79%) Platform Engineer
10 43 (4.79%) Senior Infrastructure Engineer
11 42 (4.68%) DevOps Engineer
12 41 (4.57%) Security Engineer
13 35 (3.90%) Analyst
14 34 (3.79%) Senior Network Engineer
15 33 (3.68%) IT Support Engineer
16 30 (3.34%) Administrator
17 29 (3.23%) Network Security Engineer
18 28 (3.12%) Cisco Engineer
19 26 (2.90%) Cisco Network Engineer
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 208 (23.19%) Terraform
2 33 (3.68%) 802.1X
3 29 (3.23%) ARM Templates
4 27 (3.01%) SAML
5 25 (2.79%) LDAP
5 25 (2.79%) OAuth
5 25 (2.79%) REST
6 19 (2.12%) OpenID
7 16 (1.78%) Kafka
8 13 (1.45%) YAML
9 12 (1.34%) Elastic Stack
10 11 (1.23%) JSON
11 10 (1.11%) CSS
12 9 (1.00%) .NET
13 7 (0.78%) Jinja
13 7 (0.78%) Software Packaging
14 6 (0.67%) Flask
14 6 (0.67%) Pandas
14 6 (0.67%) pytest
14 6 (0.67%) RESTful
Miscellaneous
1 124 (13.82%) Data Centre
2 95 (10.59%) PKI
3 78 (8.70%) Onboarding
4 73 (8.14%) Hybrid Cloud
5 54 (6.02%) Management Information System
6 34 (3.79%) Cloud Native
7 28 (3.12%) Replication
8 27 (3.01%) Public Cloud
9 26 (2.90%) Distributed Denial-of-Service
10 22 (2.45%) Linux Command Line
11 21 (2.34%) Clustering
12 17 (1.90%) Self-Motivation
13 16 (1.78%) Driving Licence
14 15 (1.67%) Enterprise Software
15 14 (1.56%) Cyber Threat
16 12 (1.34%) ARM Cortex
16 12 (1.34%) Security Posture
17 11 (1.23%) Distributed Systems
17 11 (1.23%) Enterprise Cloud
18 10 (1.11%) CMDB
Operating Systems
1 452 (50.39%) Windows
2 253 (28.21%) Windows Server
3 208 (23.19%) Linux
4 58 (6.47%) Windows 10
5 42 (4.68%) Windows Server 2019
6 38 (4.24%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
7 32 (3.57%) Mac OS
8 29 (3.23%) Unix
9 23 (2.56%) Ubuntu
9 23 (2.56%) Windows Server 2012
10 21 (2.34%) Apple iOS
11 19 (2.12%) Android
11 19 (2.12%) CentOS
12 14 (1.56%) VMS
13 12 (1.34%) Windows 7
13 12 (1.34%) Windows Server 2016
14 7 (0.78%) Rocky
14 7 (0.78%) Windows Server 2008
15 4 (0.45%) AIX
15 4 (0.45%) OpenVMS
Processes & Methodologies
1 238 (26.53%) Infrastructure Engineering
2 202 (22.52%) Infrastructure as Code
3 201 (22.41%) Problem-Solving
4 182 (20.29%) ITIL
5 155 (17.28%) CI/CD
6 154 (17.17%) Load Balancing
7 152 (16.95%) DevOps
8 139 (15.50%) Migration
9 113 (12.60%) ITSM
10 105 (11.71%) Continuous Improvement
11 104 (11.59%) Cybersecurity
12 99 (11.04%) Technical Leadership
13 96 (10.70%) Agile
14 92 (10.26%) High Availability
15 86 (9.59%) Observability
16 84 (9.36%) Disaster Recovery
17 81 (9.03%) Platform Engineering
17 81 (9.03%) Project Delivery
18 80 (8.92%) Root Cause Analysis
19 78 (8.70%) Change Management
Programming Languages
1 246 (27.42%) PowerShell
2 182 (20.29%) Python
3 121 (13.49%) Bash
4 66 (7.36%) SQL
5 50 (5.57%) Bicep
6 19 (2.12%) Shell Script
7 18 (2.01%) ActionScript
8 16 (1.78%) Java
9 12 (1.34%) Go
10 11 (1.23%) JavaScript
11 10 (1.11%) VBScript
12 8 (0.89%) Perl
13 6 (0.67%) C#
13 6 (0.67%) Groovy
13 6 (0.67%) VB
14 5 (0.56%) Kusto Query Language
15 4 (0.45%) C++
15 4 (0.45%) Kotlin
15 4 (0.45%) VBA
16 3 (0.33%) Lisp
Qualifications
1 344 (38.35%) Security Cleared
2 189 (21.07%) SC Cleared
3 153 (17.06%) DV Cleared
4 73 (8.14%) Cisco Certification
4 73 (8.14%) Degree
5 64 (7.13%) CCNP
6 53 (5.91%) Azure Certification
7 47 (5.24%) Microsoft Certification
8 35 (3.90%) CCNA
9 25 (2.79%) Network+ Certification
10 23 (2.56%) AWS Certification
11 22 (2.45%) Computer Science Degree
12 17 (1.90%) CCIE
12 17 (1.90%) VMware Certified Professional (VCP)
13 15 (1.67%) VCAP
14 14 (1.56%) ITIL Foundation Certificate
15 12 (1.34%) BPSS Clearance
16 11 (1.23%) A+ Certification
17 10 (1.11%) CISSP
18 9 (1.00%) ITIL Certification
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 34 (3.79%) SLA
2 18 (2.01%) NIST
2 18 (2.01%) QA
3 14 (1.56%) NCSC
4 11 (1.23%) ISO/IEC 27001
5 6 (0.67%) Cyber Essentials
6 5 (0.56%) NIST 800
7 4 (0.45%) HMG Security Policy Framework
8 3 (0.33%) Data Quality
8 3 (0.33%) GDPR
8 3 (0.33%) JSP 440
8 3 (0.33%) PCI DSS
8 3 (0.33%) SOC 2
9 2 (0.22%) Cyber Essentials PLUS
9 2 (0.22%) Government Security Classifications
9 2 (0.22%) HIPAA
9 2 (0.22%) Sarbanes-Oxley
10 1 (0.11%) GLBA
System Software
1 418 (46.60%) Active Directory
2 256 (28.54%) VMware Infrastructure
3 108 (12.04%) Hyper-V
4 84 (9.36%) VMware ESXi
5 80 (8.92%) vSphere
6 64 (7.13%) Docker
6 64 (7.13%) VMware NSX
7 42 (4.68%) Virtual Machines
8 38 (4.24%) Virtual Desktop
9 17 (1.90%) Firmware
10 16 (1.78%) vCloud
11 14 (1.56%) NFS
12 12 (1.34%) Virtual Servers
13 10 (1.11%) BitLocker
14 7 (0.78%) Postfix
15 6 (0.67%) VMware Workstation
16 5 (0.56%) Dovecot
16 5 (0.56%) Microsoft App-V
16 5 (0.56%) Microsoft Virtual Server
17 4 (0.45%) VirtualBox
Systems Management
1 138 (15.38%) Ansible
2 115 (12.82%) Microsoft Intune
3 108 (12.04%) Kubernetes
4 84 (9.36%) SCCM
5 62 (6.91%) Grafana
6 61 (6.80%) vCenter Server
7 51 (5.69%) Prometheus
8 48 (5.35%) Single Sign-On
9 38 (4.24%) SCOM
10 27 (3.01%) WSUS
11 17 (1.90%) FortiGate
12 16 (1.78%) Jamf Pro
12 16 (1.78%) Puppet
12 16 (1.78%) VxRail
13 15 (1.67%) Packer
14 14 (1.56%) NetBackup
15 13 (1.45%) Istio
15 13 (1.45%) Progress Chef
16 10 (1.11%) Nessus
16 10 (1.11%) systemd
Vendors
1 382 (42.59%) Microsoft
2 312 (34.78%) VMware
3 160 (17.84%) Cisco
4 119 (13.27%) F5
5 83 (9.25%) ServiceNow
6 52 (5.80%) Palo Alto
7 49 (5.46%) Google
8 45 (5.02%) SolarWinds
9 40 (4.46%) Citrix
10 39 (4.35%) Juniper
11 38 (4.24%) Infoblox
12 34 (3.79%) Splunk
13 32 (3.57%) CheckPoint
14 31 (3.46%) Dynatrace
14 31 (3.46%) NetApp
14 31 (3.46%) Red Hat
15 30 (3.34%) Fortinet
16 26 (2.90%) Veeam
17 24 (2.68%) Zscaler
18 21 (2.34%) Blue Coat