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 2 January 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
2 Jan 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 138 121 117
Rank change year-on-year -17 -4 +15
Contract jobs citing DNS 649 585 780
As % of all contract jobs in England 2.05% 2.10% 2.14%
As % of the Communications & Networking category 19.18% 16.41% 15.28%
Number of daily rates quoted 403 366 505
10th Percentile £219 £223 £211
25th Percentile £400 £330 £363
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £525 £475 £485
Median % change year-on-year +10.53% -2.06% -7.62%
75th Percentile £609 £595 £593
90th Percentile £688 £711 £650
UK median daily rate £525 £475 £488
% change year-on-year +10.53% -2.56% -7.14%
Number of hourly rates quoted 35 6 15
10th Percentile £15.50 £15.40 £25.40
25th Percentile £25.70 £19.65 £31.25
Median hourly rate £57.50 £23.90 £55.00
Median % change year-on-year +140.64% -56.55% +109.52%
75th Percentile £77.50 £28.83 £67.25
90th Percentile £85.60 £40.00 £74.80
UK median hourly rate £57.50 £23.59 £55.70
% change year-on-year +143.75% -57.65% +112.19%

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 3,384 3,565 5,105
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in England 10.68% 12.80% 13.98%
Number of daily rates quoted 2,196 2,083 3,164
10th Percentile £205 £220 £206
25th Percentile £356 £375 £360
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £490 £500 £500
Median % change year-on-year -2.00% - -1.96%
75th Percentile £588 £600 £600
90th Percentile £678 £685 £700
UK median daily rate £475 £500 £500
% change year-on-year -5.00% - -
Number of hourly rates quoted 166 105 315
10th Percentile £15.50 £14.99 £18.71
25th Percentile £20.04 £20.30 £23.81
Median hourly rate £36.75 £35.00 £56.49
Median % change year-on-year +5.00% -38.04% +50.64%
75th Percentile £65.00 £62.50 £65.98
90th Percentile £76.25 £72.75 £75.93
UK median hourly rate £36.00 £35.00 £56.49
% change year-on-year +2.86% -38.04% +68.63%

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 2 January 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 2 January 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 2 January 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 -5 217 £550 +4.76% 97
North of England -16 136 £470 +17.50% 75
Midlands +20 118 £400 -1.23% 42
South East -3 115 £500 +9.59% 125
West Midlands +31 114 £400 -5.88% 26
North West -8 92 £500 +5.26% 42
South West -17 62 £575 +12.20% 32
Yorkshire -36 51 £447 +43.04% 28
East of England -21 38 £363 +28.32% 46
North East -14 7 £575 +283.33% 7
East Midlands -36 4 £275 -26.67% 16
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 86 (13.25%) Microsoft Exchange
2 70 (10.79%) SharePoint
3 32 (4.93%) Skype for Business
4 21 (3.24%) Confluence
5 11 (1.69%) nginx
5 11 (1.69%) SharePoint Server
6 10 (1.54%) Exchange Server 2010
7 9 (1.39%) Exchange Server 2013
8 8 (1.23%) IIS
9 7 (1.08%) Exchange Server 2003
9 7 (1.08%) Exchange Server 2007
9 7 (1.08%) Office Communications Server
10 5 (0.77%) Apache
11 3 (0.46%) OpenStack
11 3 (0.46%) Tomcat
12 2 (0.31%) Apache Airflow
12 2 (0.31%) Apache Spark
12 2 (0.31%) Cloud Foundry
12 2 (0.31%) Oracle HTTP Server
12 2 (0.31%) WordPress
Applications
1 44 (6.78%) Microsoft Office
2 10 (1.54%) Mozilla Thunderbird
2 10 (1.54%) MS Visio
3 4 (0.62%) Microsoft Excel
4 3 (0.46%) Spreadsheet
5 2 (0.31%) Windchill
6 1 (0.15%) Microsoft PowerPoint
Business Applications
1 2 (0.31%) Remedy ITSM
1 2 (0.31%) SystmOne
1 2 (0.31%) Teamcenter
2 1 (0.15%) Eikon
2 1 (0.15%) Eze OMS
2 1 (0.15%) Fidessa
Cloud Services
1 213 (32.82%) Azure
2 163 (25.12%) AWS
3 138 (21.26%) Microsoft 365
4 88 (13.56%) Entra ID
5 68 (10.48%) Virtual Private Cloud
6 57 (8.78%) Amazon CloudWatch
7 56 (8.63%) Amazon S3
8 52 (8.01%) Amazon EC2
9 48 (7.40%) GitHub
10 44 (6.78%) GCP
11 41 (6.32%) Amazon ELB
12 32 (4.93%) Amazon ECS
12 32 (4.93%) AWS CloudFormation
13 30 (4.62%) IaaS
14 28 (4.31%) SaaS
15 27 (4.16%) Serverless
16 25 (3.85%) AWS Lambda
17 24 (3.70%) GitHub Actions
18 22 (3.39%) AWS KMS
19 18 (2.77%) Azure Monitor
Communications & Networking
1 274 (42.22%) DHCP
2 218 (33.59%) TCP/IP
3 215 (33.13%) Firewall
4 162 (24.96%) VPN
5 96 (14.79%) Network Security
5 96 (14.79%) SSL
6 75 (11.56%) HTTP
7 70 (10.79%) WAN
8 58 (8.94%) LAN
9 57 (8.78%) VLAN
10 49 (7.55%) SMTP
11 44 (6.78%) F5 BIG-IP LTM
12 41 (6.32%) F5 BIG-IP GTM
13 39 (6.01%) Wireless
14 37 (5.70%) FTP
15 35 (5.39%) DMZ
16 34 (5.24%) BGP
16 34 (5.24%) Wi-Fi
17 33 (5.08%) Wireshark
18 29 (4.47%) BIG-IP
Database & Business Intelligence
1 31 (4.78%) Amazon RDS
2 26 (4.01%) PostgreSQL
3 21 (3.24%) SQL Server
4 16 (2.47%) Amazon Aurora
5 10 (1.54%) MongoDB
6 6 (0.92%) DynamoDB
6 6 (0.92%) MySQL
7 5 (0.77%) BigQuery
7 5 (0.77%) Data Hub
7 5 (0.77%) NoSQL
7 5 (0.77%) Redis
8 4 (0.62%) Big Data
8 4 (0.62%) Elasticsearch
8 4 (0.62%) Relational Database
9 3 (0.46%) DocumentDB
10 2 (0.31%) Delta Lake
10 2 (0.31%) Hadoop
10 2 (0.31%) Parquet
10 2 (0.31%) Power BI
11 1 (0.15%) CouchDB
Development Applications
1 85 (13.10%) Jenkins
2 67 (10.32%) Git
3 49 (7.55%) GitLab
4 40 (6.16%) JIRA
5 22 (3.39%) Fiddler
6 16 (2.47%) Vagrant
7 8 (1.23%) Terragrunt
8 5 (0.77%) Subversion
9 4 (0.62%) CircleCI
9 4 (0.62%) TeamCity
10 3 (0.46%) Visual Studio Code
11 2 (0.31%) Browser DevTools
11 2 (0.31%) MLflow
11 2 (0.31%) Poetry
11 2 (0.31%) PyCharm
11 2 (0.31%) SonarQube
11 2 (0.31%) Vite
11 2 (0.31%) webpack
12 1 (0.15%) Atlassian Bamboo
12 1 (0.15%) Octopus Deploy
General
1 203 (31.28%) Social Skills
2 108 (16.64%) Analytical Skills
3 73 (11.25%) Public Sector
4 53 (8.17%) Banking
5 46 (7.09%) Finance
6 40 (6.16%) Investment Banking
7 36 (5.55%) Documentation Skills
8 18 (2.77%) Presentation Skills
9 16 (2.47%) Telecoms
10 15 (2.31%) Legal
11 10 (1.54%) Organisational Skills
12 9 (1.39%) Law
12 9 (1.39%) Military
13 7 (1.08%) Aerospace
13 7 (1.08%) Influencing Skills
14 5 (0.77%) Marketing
15 4 (0.62%) Inclusion and Diversity
16 3 (0.46%) Financial Institution
16 3 (0.46%) Front Office
16 3 (0.46%) Local Government
Job Titles
1 87 (13.41%) Network Engineer
2 73 (11.25%) Support Engineer
3 70 (10.79%) Architect
4 65 (10.02%) Analyst
4 65 (10.02%) Senior
5 64 (9.86%) Infrastructure Engineer
6 47 (7.24%) Platform Engineer
7 45 (6.93%) DevOps Engineer
8 40 (6.16%) IT Support
9 34 (5.24%) Security Engineer
10 33 (5.08%) AWS Engineer
11 26 (4.01%) 2nd Line Support
12 25 (3.85%) Cloud Platform Engineer
13 23 (3.54%) AWS DevOps
13 23 (3.54%) AWS DevOps Engineer
13 23 (3.54%) Lead
13 23 (3.54%) Operations Engineer
13 23 (3.54%) Senior Infrastructure Engineer
13 23 (3.54%) SOC Analyst
14 22 (3.39%) Web Engineer
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 43 (6.63%) LDAP
2 22 (3.39%) SAML
3 19 (2.93%) OAuth
4 18 (2.77%) OpenID
5 17 (2.62%) OAuth2
6 12 (1.85%) 802.1X
6 12 (1.85%) Elastic Stack
6 12 (1.85%) Kafka
7 10 (1.54%) Middleware
8 9 (1.39%) REST
9 7 (1.08%) AngularJS
9 7 (1.08%) React
10 6 (0.92%) cloud-init
10 6 (0.92%) Keycloak
10 6 (0.92%) OpenTelemetry
10 6 (0.92%) YAML
11 5 (0.77%) Flask
11 5 (0.77%) JSON
12 4 (0.62%) WCF
12 4 (0.62%) XMPP
Miscellaneous
1 52 (8.01%) Management Information System
2 51 (7.86%) Replication
3 50 (7.70%) PKI
4 46 (7.09%) Data Centre
5 29 (4.47%) Analytical Mindset
5 29 (4.47%) Onboarding
6 22 (3.39%) Enterprise Software
7 20 (3.08%) Cyberattack
8 19 (2.93%) Security Operations Centre
9 17 (2.62%) Cloud Native
9 17 (2.62%) Cyber Threat
10 15 (2.31%) Hybrid Cloud
11 13 (2.00%) CSOC
12 11 (1.69%) Public Cloud
12 11 (1.69%) Self-Motivation
13 10 (1.54%) Clustering
13 10 (1.54%) Private Cloud
13 10 (1.54%) Video Conferencing
14 7 (1.08%) NHS
14 7 (1.08%) SCADA
Operating Systems
1 324 (49.92%) Windows
2 146 (22.50%) Windows Server
3 142 (21.88%) Linux
4 60 (9.24%) Windows 10
5 27 (4.16%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
6 24 (3.70%) VMS
7 23 (3.54%) Windows Server 2019
8 22 (3.39%) Unix
8 22 (3.39%) Windows Server 2016
9 19 (2.93%) Amazon Linux
10 18 (2.77%) Windows Server 2012
11 17 (2.62%) Android
12 15 (2.31%) Ubuntu
13 13 (2.00%) CentOS
14 12 (1.85%) Apple iOS
14 12 (1.85%) Mac OS
15 11 (1.69%) Windows Server 2003
16 7 (1.08%) Windows 7
17 5 (0.77%) Solaris
18 3 (0.46%) Windows Server 2008
Processes & Methodologies
1 149 (22.96%) Problem-Solving
2 120 (18.49%) ITIL
3 117 (18.03%) DevOps
4 115 (17.72%) CI/CD
5 106 (16.33%) Load Balancing
6 94 (14.48%) Infrastructure as Code
7 87 (13.41%) Infrastructure Engineering
8 71 (10.94%) Change Management
9 69 (10.63%) Cybersecurity
10 64 (9.86%) Migration
11 63 (9.71%) High Availability
11 63 (9.71%) Incident Response
12 56 (8.63%) Root Cause Analysis
13 53 (8.17%) Platform Engineering
14 52 (8.01%) Continuous Improvement
14 52 (8.01%) Disaster Recovery
14 52 (8.01%) Service Management
15 49 (7.55%) SIEM
16 45 (6.93%) Containerisation
17 44 (6.78%) Agile
Programming Languages
1 192 (29.58%) PowerShell
2 160 (24.65%) Python
3 75 (11.56%) Bash
4 46 (7.09%) SQL
5 19 (2.93%) Java
5 19 (2.93%) Perl
6 18 (2.77%) Groovy
7 13 (2.00%) Bicep
8 11 (1.69%) Shell Script
9 10 (1.54%) Go
10 8 (1.23%) Kusto Query Language
10 8 (1.23%) Ruby
11 7 (1.08%) Lisp
11 7 (1.08%) VBScript
12 6 (0.92%) VB
13 5 (0.77%) C++
14 4 (0.62%) JavaScript
15 3 (0.46%) C#
15 3 (0.46%) T-SQL
15 3 (0.46%) TypeScript
Qualifications
1 247 (38.06%) Security Cleared
2 175 (26.96%) SC Cleared
3 82 (12.63%) DV Cleared
4 63 (9.71%) Degree
5 61 (9.40%) Microsoft Certification
6 46 (7.09%) Cisco Certification
7 39 (6.01%) Azure Certification
7 39 (6.01%) CCNP
8 23 (3.54%) AWS Certification
9 17 (2.62%) CCNA
9 17 (2.62%) CISSP
9 17 (2.62%) Network+ Certification
10 12 (1.85%) CompTIA Security+
11 11 (1.69%) MCSE
11 11 (1.69%) Server+ Certification
12 9 (1.39%) CCIE
12 9 (1.39%) Computer Science Degree
13 8 (1.23%) BPSS Clearance
13 8 (1.23%) ITIL Certification
13 8 (1.23%) MCSA
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 28 (4.31%) GDPR
2 18 (2.77%) SLA
3 16 (2.47%) ISO/IEC 27001
3 16 (2.47%) NIST
4 10 (1.54%) NCSC
5 8 (1.23%) PCI DSS
6 7 (1.08%) Accessibility
6 7 (1.08%) Cyber Essentials
6 7 (1.08%) Sarbanes-Oxley
7 5 (0.77%) QA
8 4 (0.62%) Data Quality
9 3 (0.46%) HMG Security Policy Framework
10 2 (0.31%) JSP 440
10 2 (0.31%) WCAG
11 1 (0.15%) Cyber Essentials PLUS
11 1 (0.15%) Government Security Classifications
11 1 (0.15%) SOC 2
System Software
1 282 (43.45%) Active Directory
2 167 (25.73%) VMware Infrastructure
3 89 (13.71%) Docker
4 45 (6.93%) Hyper-V
5 41 (6.32%) VMware NSX
6 29 (4.47%) Virtual Machines
7 24 (3.70%) vSphere
8 20 (3.08%) Firmware
9 19 (2.93%) DFS Replication
10 18 (2.77%) VMware ESXi
11 16 (2.47%) Dovecot
11 16 (2.47%) Postfix
12 12 (1.85%) Terminal Services
13 10 (1.54%) Squid
14 9 (1.39%) Virtual Servers
15 8 (1.23%) Virtual Desktop
16 7 (1.08%) BitLocker
16 7 (1.08%) Brightmail
16 7 (1.08%) ISA Server
17 5 (0.77%) Microsoft App-V
Systems Management
1 133 (20.49%) Terraform
2 106 (16.33%) Ansible
3 74 (11.40%) SCCM
4 73 (11.25%) Microsoft Intune
5 60 (9.24%) Kubernetes
6 41 (6.32%) vCenter Server
7 39 (6.01%) Grafana
8 38 (5.86%) Single Sign-On
9 35 (5.39%) Active Directory Federation Services
10 29 (4.47%) Prometheus
11 19 (2.93%) WSUS
12 16 (2.47%) Nessus
13 15 (2.31%) Argo
14 14 (2.16%) FortiGate
15 13 (2.00%) Packer
15 13 (2.00%) Proxmox
16 12 (1.85%) SCOM
17 10 (1.54%) Microsoft Clustering
18 9 (1.39%) Progress Chef
18 9 (1.39%) Puppet
Vendors
1 248 (38.21%) Microsoft
2 203 (31.28%) VMware
3 109 (16.80%) F5
4 96 (14.79%) Cisco
5 72 (11.09%) ServiceNow
6 52 (8.01%) Palo Alto
7 50 (7.70%) CheckPoint
8 47 (7.24%) Splunk
9 38 (5.86%) Blue Coat
10 36 (5.55%) Citrix
11 31 (4.78%) SolarWinds
12 29 (4.47%) Red Hat
13 27 (4.16%) McAfee
14 25 (3.85%) NetApp
15 24 (3.70%) Juniper
15 24 (3.70%) Veeam
16 18 (2.77%) Zscaler
17 17 (2.62%) Fortinet
18 16 (2.47%) Dell
18 16 (2.47%) Google