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 11 March 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
11 Mar 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 133 115 129
Rank change year-on-year -18 +14 -3
Contract jobs citing DNS 728 596 696
As % of all contract jobs in England 2.01% 2.41% 1.83%
As % of the Communications & Networking category 20.09% 17.90% 12.98%
Number of daily rates quoted 461 406 458
10th Percentile £238 £250 £198
25th Percentile £401 £386 £311
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £515 £525 £456
Median % change year-on-year -1.90% +15.07% -13.10%
75th Percentile £613 £606 £573
90th Percentile £688 £675 £650
UK median daily rate £511 £525 £465
% change year-on-year -2.62% +12.90% -11.43%
Number of hourly rates quoted 32 9 24
10th Percentile £12.74 £17.26 £20.98
25th Percentile £20.56 £23.59 £25.00
Median hourly rate £33.50 £80.68 £40.00
Median % change year-on-year -58.48% +101.69% -4.48%
75th Percentile £74.26 £81.35 £42.19
90th Percentile £75.00 £82.48 £65.25
UK median hourly rate £33.50 £54.50 £40.00
% change year-on-year -38.53% +36.25% -4.48%

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 3,624 3,329 5,363
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in England 9.98% 13.49% 14.08%
Number of daily rates quoted 2,331 2,037 3,223
10th Percentile £205 £210 £205
25th Percentile £367 £363 £338
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £500 £475
Median % change year-on-year - +5.26% -9.52%
75th Percentile £588 £600 £600
90th Percentile £675 £675 £700
UK median daily rate £481 £500 £475
% change year-on-year -3.75% +5.26% -9.09%
Number of hourly rates quoted 166 112 378
10th Percentile £15.50 £15.01 £14.26
25th Percentile £20.37 £21.46 £19.59
Median hourly rate £40.02 £35.00 £40.00
Median % change year-on-year +14.34% -12.50% +110.53%
75th Percentile £65.75 £65.00 £65.00
90th Percentile £76.25 £75.00 £73.12
UK median hourly rate £40.02 £35.00 £40.00
% change year-on-year +14.34% -12.50% +110.53%

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 11 March 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 11 March 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 11 March 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 -25 230 £519 -1.23% 64
North of England -11 203 £450 -5.26% 75
South East +8 150 £525 -3.67% 88
North West +18 132 £569 +20.37% 42
Midlands +7 103 £375 -18.03% 30
West Midlands +15 98 £375 -11.76% 18
Yorkshire -38 73 £447 -14.95% 24
South West -34 53 £693 +26.60% 25
East of England -29 38 £475 +5.56% 34
North East -21 6 £411 +21.70% 10
East Midlands -40 4 £325 -42.73% 12
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 91 (12.50%) Microsoft Exchange
2 48 (6.59%) SharePoint
3 25 (3.43%) Skype for Business
4 14 (1.92%) Confluence
5 11 (1.51%) nginx
6 5 (0.69%) Apache
6 5 (0.69%) IIS
7 3 (0.41%) Exchange Server 2010
8 2 (0.27%) Exchange Server 2013
8 2 (0.27%) SharePoint Server
8 2 (0.27%) WordPress
9 1 (0.14%) IBM HTTP Server
9 1 (0.14%) Oracle HTTP Server
9 1 (0.14%) Traefik
9 1 (0.14%) WebSphere
9 1 (0.14%) WebSphere Application Server
9 1 (0.14%) WebSphere Portal
Applications
1 29 (3.98%) Microsoft Office
2 16 (2.20%) MS Visio
3 1 (0.14%) Microsoft Excel
3 1 (0.14%) Microsoft PowerPoint
3 1 (0.14%) Spreadsheet
Business Applications
1 2 (0.27%) SystmOne
2 1 (0.14%) Cloudability
2 1 (0.14%) Remedy ITSM
Cloud Services
1 251 (34.48%) Azure
2 132 (18.13%) AWS
3 124 (17.03%) Entra ID
3 124 (17.03%) Microsoft 365
4 69 (9.48%) GCP
5 55 (7.55%) GitHub
6 40 (5.49%) IaaS
7 35 (4.81%) AWS CloudFormation
7 35 (4.81%) Virtual Private Cloud
8 29 (3.98%) Serverless
9 28 (3.85%) Amazon S3
10 27 (3.71%) AWS Lambda
10 27 (3.71%) Route 53
10 27 (3.71%) SaaS
11 26 (3.57%) Amazon EC2
12 25 (3.43%) PaaS
13 24 (3.30%) Amazon CloudWatch
14 23 (3.16%) OpenShift
15 22 (3.02%) Amazon EKS
16 20 (2.75%) Amazon ECS
Communications & Networking
1 323 (44.37%) DHCP
2 217 (29.81%) Firewall
3 204 (28.02%) TCP/IP
4 169 (23.21%) VPN
5 95 (13.05%) WAN
6 87 (11.95%) LAN
7 77 (10.58%) Network Security
7 77 (10.58%) SSL
8 68 (9.34%) BIG-IP
9 67 (9.20%) HTTP
10 64 (8.79%) BGP
10 64 (8.79%) VLAN
11 50 (6.87%) F5 BIG-IP LTM
11 50 (6.87%) Wi-Fi
12 40 (5.49%) F5 BIG-IP GTM
13 39 (5.36%) DMZ
13 39 (5.36%) Wireshark
14 37 (5.08%) OSPF
15 36 (4.95%) Kerberos
16 31 (4.26%) Wireless
Database & Business Intelligence
1 20 (2.75%) SQL Server
2 15 (2.06%) Elasticsearch
3 13 (1.79%) Amazon RDS
4 12 (1.65%) PostgreSQL
5 7 (0.96%) DynamoDB
5 7 (0.96%) MongoDB
6 6 (0.82%) Amazon Aurora
6 6 (0.82%) Redis
7 5 (0.69%) Azure SQL Database
7 5 (0.69%) Data Hub
7 5 (0.69%) MySQL
8 4 (0.55%) DocumentDB
8 4 (0.55%) NoSQL
8 4 (0.55%) Relational Database
9 3 (0.41%) BigQuery
9 3 (0.41%) Power BI
10 1 (0.14%) Apache Cassandra
10 1 (0.14%) CouchDB
10 1 (0.14%) Electronic Patient Records
10 1 (0.14%) Oracle Reports
Development Applications
1 59 (8.10%) Jenkins
2 35 (4.81%) JIRA
3 33 (4.53%) GitLab
4 31 (4.26%) Fiddler
5 29 (3.98%) Git
6 8 (1.10%) Bitbucket
7 7 (0.96%) SonarQube
7 7 (0.96%) Terragrunt
8 6 (0.82%) Browser DevTools
9 5 (0.69%) Chocolatey
10 4 (0.55%) CircleCI
11 2 (0.27%) Sonatype Nexus
11 2 (0.27%) Subversion
12 1 (0.14%) Artifactory
12 1 (0.14%) Atlassian Bamboo
12 1 (0.14%) Introscope
12 1 (0.14%) MSI
12 1 (0.14%) Octopus Deploy
12 1 (0.14%) TeamCity
12 1 (0.14%) Travis CI
General
1 189 (25.96%) Social Skills
2 94 (12.91%) Analytical Skills
3 69 (9.48%) Banking
4 57 (7.83%) Finance
5 50 (6.87%) Public Sector
6 47 (6.46%) Investment Banking
7 44 (6.04%) Documentation Skills
8 21 (2.88%) Legal
9 16 (2.20%) Military
10 13 (1.79%) Telecoms
11 9 (1.24%) Organisational Skills
12 7 (0.96%) Influencing Skills
13 6 (0.82%) Financial Institution
13 6 (0.82%) Presentation Skills
14 5 (0.69%) Law
15 4 (0.55%) Inclusion and Diversity
15 4 (0.55%) Local Government
16 3 (0.41%) Aerospace
16 3 (0.41%) Manufacturing
17 2 (0.27%) Advertising
Job Titles
1 123 (16.90%) Network Engineer
2 109 (14.97%) Architect
3 62 (8.52%) Analyst
4 61 (8.38%) Infrastructure Engineer
4 61 (8.38%) Senior
5 59 (8.10%) Support Engineer
6 49 (6.73%) Security Engineer
7 43 (5.91%) Web Engineer
8 38 (5.22%) IT Support
9 29 (3.98%) Network Security Engineer
9 29 (3.98%) Platform Engineer
10 28 (3.85%) Lead
11 27 (3.71%) IT Engineer
12 25 (3.43%) Cisco Engineer
12 25 (3.43%) Cisco Network Engineer
13 23 (3.16%) Azure Engineer
14 21 (2.88%) IT Support Engineer
15 20 (2.75%) DevOps Engineer
16 19 (2.61%) Data Engineer
16 19 (2.61%) Infrastructure Architect
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 63 (8.65%) LDAP
2 45 (6.18%) SAML
3 38 (5.22%) OAuth
4 30 (4.12%) OpenID
5 28 (3.85%) 802.1X
6 20 (2.75%) OAuth2
7 18 (2.47%) OpenTelemetry
8 11 (1.51%) Kafka
9 9 (1.24%) REST
10 8 (1.10%) Elastic Stack
11 7 (0.96%) XMPP
12 6 (0.82%) ARM Templates
12 6 (0.82%) JSON
12 6 (0.82%) Microsoft Graph
13 5 (0.69%) AWS CDK
13 5 (0.69%) RESTful
14 4 (0.55%) Hibernate
14 4 (0.55%) JPA
14 4 (0.55%) Middleware
14 4 (0.55%) Spring
Miscellaneous
1 63 (8.65%) Data Centre
1 63 (8.65%) PKI
2 49 (6.73%) Replication
3 38 (5.22%) Cloud Native
4 37 (5.08%) Management Information System
5 31 (4.26%) Onboarding
6 28 (3.85%) Clustering
7 26 (3.57%) Public Cloud
8 20 (2.75%) Distributed Denial-of-Service
8 20 (2.75%) Hybrid Cloud
9 19 (2.61%) Enterprise Software
10 15 (2.06%) Analytical Mindset
10 15 (2.06%) Cyber Threat
11 14 (1.92%) Cyberattack
11 14 (1.92%) Security Operations Centre
12 13 (1.79%) Legacy Systems
12 13 (1.79%) Self-Motivation
13 12 (1.65%) NHS
13 12 (1.65%) Product Ownership
14 11 (1.51%) Private Cloud
Operating Systems
1 330 (45.33%) Windows
2 176 (24.18%) Windows Server
3 104 (14.29%) Linux
4 47 (6.46%) Windows 10
5 25 (3.43%) Windows Server 2019
6 19 (2.61%) Unix
7 18 (2.47%) Android
8 15 (2.06%) Windows Server 2012
9 14 (1.92%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
10 13 (1.79%) Apple iOS
11 12 (1.65%) Windows Server 2016
12 11 (1.51%) Windows 7
13 10 (1.37%) Mac OS
14 7 (0.96%) CentOS
15 6 (0.82%) Windows Server 2003
16 5 (0.69%) VMS
17 4 (0.55%) CatOS
18 3 (0.41%) Amazon Linux
18 3 (0.41%) Windows Server 2008
19 2 (0.27%) Ubuntu
Processes & Methodologies
1 168 (23.08%) Problem-Solving
2 163 (22.39%) Load Balancing
3 109 (14.97%) Migration
4 102 (14.01%) ITIL
5 100 (13.74%) CI/CD
6 98 (13.46%) DevOps
7 92 (12.64%) Infrastructure as Code
8 91 (12.50%) High Availability
9 84 (11.54%) Infrastructure Engineering
10 69 (9.48%) Identity Access Management
11 64 (8.79%) Disaster Recovery
12 60 (8.24%) Cybersecurity
13 59 (8.10%) RBAC
14 55 (7.55%) ITSM
15 54 (7.42%) Observability
15 54 (7.42%) Service Management
16 51 (7.01%) Change Management
17 50 (6.87%) Continuous Improvement
17 50 (6.87%) Incident Response
18 48 (6.59%) Containerisation
Programming Languages
1 205 (28.16%) PowerShell
2 127 (17.45%) Python
3 60 (8.24%) Bash
4 42 (5.77%) SQL
5 13 (1.79%) JavaScript
5 13 (1.79%) VBScript
6 12 (1.65%) Bicep
7 11 (1.51%) Shell Script
8 10 (1.37%) Java
8 10 (1.37%) VB
9 9 (1.24%) Ruby
10 8 (1.10%) Go
11 7 (0.96%) Lisp
12 6 (0.82%) Perl
13 5 (0.69%) Kusto Query Language
14 2 (0.27%) C
14 2 (0.27%) C#
14 2 (0.27%) T-SQL
14 2 (0.27%) VBA
15 1 (0.14%) PHP
Qualifications
1 254 (34.89%) Security Cleared
2 167 (22.94%) SC Cleared
3 89 (12.23%) DV Cleared
4 58 (7.97%) Cisco Certification
5 48 (6.59%) Microsoft Certification
6 46 (6.32%) Degree
7 38 (5.22%) CCNP
8 26 (3.57%) Azure Certification
9 19 (2.61%) CCNA
10 15 (2.06%) AWS Certification
10 15 (2.06%) CompTIA Security+
10 15 (2.06%) Network+ Certification
11 14 (1.92%) CISSP
12 9 (1.24%) BPSS Clearance
12 9 (1.24%) Computer Science Degree
12 9 (1.24%) MCSE
13 8 (1.10%) CCIE
13 8 (1.10%) ITIL Certification
13 8 (1.10%) MCSA
13 8 (1.10%) VMware Certified Professional (VCP)
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 29 (3.98%) GDPR
2 21 (2.88%) SLA
3 19 (2.61%) ISO/IEC 27001
3 19 (2.61%) NIST
4 17 (2.34%) Sarbanes-Oxley
5 9 (1.24%) NCSC
5 9 (1.24%) PCI DSS
6 8 (1.10%) Cyber Essentials
7 6 (0.82%) QA
8 2 (0.27%) Accessibility
8 2 (0.27%) Data Quality
8 2 (0.27%) HMG Security Policy Framework
8 2 (0.27%) JSP 440
9 1 (0.14%) Actionable Recommendations
9 1 (0.14%) COBIT
9 1 (0.14%) Cyber Essentials PLUS
9 1 (0.14%) Government Security Classifications
9 1 (0.14%) RMADS
System Software
1 318 (43.68%) Active Directory
2 164 (22.53%) VMware Infrastructure
3 56 (7.69%) VMware NSX
4 54 (7.42%) Hyper-V
5 52 (7.14%) Docker
6 43 (5.91%) vSphere
7 25 (3.43%) Firmware
8 24 (3.30%) Virtual Machines
9 17 (2.34%) VMware ESXi
10 15 (2.06%) BitLocker
11 14 (1.92%) Virtual Desktop
12 8 (1.10%) Squid
13 7 (0.96%) Microsoft App-V
14 5 (0.69%) NFS
15 4 (0.55%) Terminal Services
15 4 (0.55%) Virtual Servers
16 3 (0.41%) DFS Replication
16 3 (0.41%) Postfix
16 3 (0.41%) Sendmail
16 3 (0.41%) Varnish
Systems Management
1 133 (18.27%) Terraform
2 113 (15.52%) Ansible
3 89 (12.23%) Microsoft Intune
4 79 (10.85%) Kubernetes
5 71 (9.75%) SCCM
6 68 (9.34%) Single Sign-On
7 60 (8.24%) Active Directory Federation Services
8 41 (5.63%) FortiGate
9 39 (5.36%) vCenter Server
10 34 (4.67%) Grafana
11 22 (3.02%) Argo
12 19 (2.61%) Prometheus
13 14 (1.92%) SCOM
14 11 (1.51%) WSUS
15 10 (1.37%) Puppet
16 8 (1.10%) HAProxy
17 7 (0.96%) Consul
18 6 (0.82%) Nagios
18 6 (0.82%) Nessus
18 6 (0.82%) Packer
Vendors
1 271 (37.23%) Microsoft
2 211 (28.98%) VMware
3 137 (18.82%) F5
4 115 (15.80%) Cisco
5 67 (9.20%) ServiceNow
6 63 (8.65%) Splunk
7 45 (6.18%) Blue Coat
8 42 (5.77%) Citrix
8 42 (5.77%) SolarWinds
9 36 (4.95%) McAfee
10 35 (4.81%) Juniper
11 34 (4.67%) Red Hat
12 31 (4.26%) Palo Alto
13 27 (3.71%) NetApp
14 23 (3.16%) Google
15 20 (2.75%) CheckPoint
15 20 (2.75%) Okta
15 20 (2.75%) Pure Storage
16 19 (2.61%) Infoblox
17 18 (2.47%) Fortinet