MPLS Contracts in England

Multiprotocol Label Switching (MPLS)
UK > England

The table below provides summary statistics for contract job vacancies advertised in England requiring MPLS skills. It includes a benchmarking guide to the contractor rates offered in vacancies that cited MPLS over the 6 months leading up to 1 May 2025, comparing them to the same period in the previous two years.

6 months to
1 May 2025
Same period 2024 Same period 2023
Rank 319 259 461
Rank change year-on-year -60 +202 +11
Contract jobs citing MPLS 169 333 194
As % of all contract jobs advertised in England 0.69% 0.90% 0.38%
As % of the Communications & Networking category 5.32% 6.64% 3.15%
Number of daily rates quoted 96 171 111
10th Percentile £300 £263 £319
25th Percentile £425 £328 £378
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £400 £475
Median % change year-on-year +25.00% -15.79% -2.56%
75th Percentile £556 £578 £600
90th Percentile £629 £638 £688
UK median daily rate £500 £400 £475
% change year-on-year +25.00% -15.79% -5.00%
Number of hourly rates quoted 1 23 12
10th Percentile - £14.00 £13.10
25th Percentile £18.50 £23.72 £29.19
Median hourly rate £19.00 £37.50 £62.00
Median % change year-on-year -49.33% -39.52% +125.45%
75th Percentile £19.50 £40.00 £64.92
90th Percentile - £62.00 £70.00
UK median hourly rate £19.00 £37.50 £62.00
% change year-on-year -49.33% -39.52% +138.46%

All Communications and Computer Networking Skills
England

MPLS 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 3,178 5,012 6,158
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in England 13.05% 13.48% 12.21%
Number of daily rates quoted 1,963 3,022 4,045
10th Percentile £220 £206 £231
25th Percentile £363 £350 £400
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £490 £525
Median % change year-on-year +2.04% -6.67% +5.00%
75th Percentile £600 £600 £650
90th Percentile £675 £700 £738
UK median daily rate £488 £495 £519
% change year-on-year -1.52% -4.53% +3.70%
Number of hourly rates quoted 127 399 439
10th Percentile £13.81 £13.50 £9.80
25th Percentile £15.22 £17.35 £10.63
Median hourly rate £28.00 £40.00 £18.82
Median % change year-on-year -30.00% +112.54% -21.29%
75th Percentile £63.50 £63.75 £60.00
90th Percentile £81.01 £70.00 £75.00
UK median hourly rate £29.00 £40.00 £19.00
% change year-on-year -27.50% +110.53% -32.74%

MPLS
Job Vacancy Trend in England

Job postings citing MPLS as a proportion of all IT jobs advertised in England.

Job vacancy trend for MPLS in England

MPLS
Contractor Daily Rate Trend in England

3-month moving average daily rate quoted in jobs citing MPLS in England.

Daily rate trend for MPLS in England

MPLS
Daily Rate Histogram in England

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing MPLS in England over the 6 months to 1 May 2025.

Daily rate histogram for MPLS in England

MPLS
Contractor Hourly Rate Trend in England

3-month moving average hourly rates quoted in jobs citing MPLS in England.

Hourly rate trend for MPLS in England

MPLS
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 MPLS within the England region over the 6 months to 1 May 2025. 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 -2 81 £500 -4.76% 36
South East +23 47 £450 +20.00% 25
North of England +32 20 £475 +37.68% 9
North West +29 17 £475 +1.12% 6
Midlands -60 13 £313 -10.71% 12
West Midlands -62 13 £313 -10.71% 8
South West +42 10 £525 -23.64% 9
East of England +31 2 £250 - 5
Yorkshire - 2 £200 - 3
North East -1 1 £550 +59.42%
MPLS
UK

MPLS
Co-occurring Skills and Capabilities in England by Category

The follow tables expand on the table above by listing co-occurrences grouped by category. The same employment type, locality and period is covered with up to 20 co-occurrences shown in each of the following categories:

Application Platforms
1 14 (8.28%) Microsoft Exchange
2 1 (0.59%) SharePoint
Applications
1 4 (2.37%) Microsoft Office
1 4 (2.37%) MS Visio
2 1 (0.59%) Microsoft Project
2 1 (0.59%) Trello
Business Applications
1 4 (2.37%) Remedy ITSM
2 2 (1.18%) Teamcenter
Cloud Services
1 57 (33.73%) Azure
2 43 (25.44%) AWS
3 18 (10.65%) Microsoft 365
4 13 (7.69%) Entra ID
4 13 (7.69%) IaaS
5 11 (6.51%) GCP
6 7 (4.14%) Cloudflare
7 1 (0.59%) Akamai
7 1 (0.59%) Azure ExpressRoute
7 1 (0.59%) Cloud Computing
Communications & Networking
1 103 (60.95%) VPN
2 100 (59.17%) WAN
3 93 (55.03%) BGP
4 66 (39.05%) Firewall
5 64 (37.87%) OSPF
6 45 (26.63%) LAN
7 41 (24.26%) SD-WAN
8 32 (18.93%) IPsec
9 30 (17.75%) Network Security
10 29 (17.16%) Ethernet
11 22 (13.02%) DNS
11 22 (13.02%) SDH
12 20 (11.83%) Wireshark
13 18 (10.65%) Internet
13 18 (10.65%) LTE
13 18 (10.65%) Multicast
13 18 (10.65%) SAN
14 16 (9.47%) Frame Relay
14 16 (9.47%) GPRS
14 16 (9.47%) UMTS
Database & Business Intelligence
1 2 (1.18%) MongoDB
1 2 (1.18%) MySQL
1 2 (1.18%) NoSQL
Development Applications
1 5 (2.96%) Robot Framework
2 3 (1.78%) GitLab
2 3 (1.78%) JIRA
3 1 (0.59%) Sonatype Nexus
General
1 43 (25.44%) Telecoms
2 38 (22.49%) Social Skills
3 19 (11.24%) Analytical Skills
4 16 (9.47%) Finance
5 11 (6.51%) Public Sector
6 5 (2.96%) Documentation Skills
6 5 (2.96%) Spanish Language
7 4 (2.37%) Banking
7 4 (2.37%) Inclusion and Diversity
7 4 (2.37%) Law
7 4 (2.37%) Legal
8 3 (1.78%) Presentation Skills
9 2 (1.18%) Influencing Skills
9 2 (1.18%) Manufacturing
10 1 (0.59%) Billing
10 1 (0.59%) Marketing
10 1 (0.59%) Retail
10 1 (0.59%) Social Housing
Job Titles
1 77 (45.56%) Network Engineer
2 20 (11.83%) IP Engineer
3 15 (8.88%) Architect
3 15 (8.88%) Test Engineer
4 14 (8.28%) Cisco Engineer
4 14 (8.28%) Cisco Network Engineer
4 14 (8.28%) Senior
5 12 (7.10%) Principal Engineer
5 12 (7.10%) Principal Network Engineer
6 11 (6.51%) Implementation Engineer
6 11 (6.51%) Network Architect
7 10 (5.92%) Consultant
7 10 (5.92%) Infrastructure Engineer
7 10 (5.92%) WAN Engineer
8 9 (5.33%) 2nd Line Engineer
8 9 (5.33%) 2nd Line Support
8 9 (5.33%) Core Network Engineer
8 9 (5.33%) Integration Engineer
8 9 (5.33%) Network Implementation Engineer
8 9 (5.33%) Support Engineer
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 5 (2.96%) 802.1X
2 3 (1.78%) JSON
2 3 (1.78%) XML
3 2 (1.18%) NETCONF
3 2 (1.18%) REST
3 2 (1.18%) RESTCONF
3 2 (1.18%) SOAP
3 2 (1.18%) YAML
3 2 (1.18%) YANG
4 1 (0.59%) HTML
Miscellaneous
1 21 (12.43%) Self-Motivation
2 19 (11.24%) Hybrid Cloud
3 14 (8.28%) PKI
4 11 (6.51%) Public Cloud
5 9 (5.33%) Data Centre
6 8 (4.73%) Cloud Native
7 4 (2.37%) Foreign Exchange (FX)
7 4 (2.37%) Operational Technology
8 3 (1.78%) Clustering
8 3 (1.78%) Distributed Denial-of-Service
8 3 (1.78%) SCADA
8 3 (1.78%) Security Posture
9 2 (1.18%) Management Information System
9 2 (1.18%) Security Operations Centre
10 1 (0.59%) Data Protection Act
10 1 (0.59%) FMCG
10 1 (0.59%) Legacy Systems
10 1 (0.59%) NHS
10 1 (0.59%) Private Cloud
10 1 (0.59%) Virtual Team
Operating Systems
1 22 (13.02%) Linux
2 19 (11.24%) Unix
3 18 (10.65%) Windows
4 14 (8.28%) Windows Server
5 2 (1.18%) CentOS
5 2 (1.18%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
6 1 (0.59%) Mac OS
Processes & Methodologies
1 39 (23.08%) Problem-Solving
2 36 (21.30%) Migration
3 31 (18.34%) Network Monitoring
4 30 (17.75%) Project Delivery
5 23 (13.61%) ITIL
6 22 (13.02%) Network Architecture
6 22 (13.02%) Network Design
7 21 (12.43%) Test Strategy
8 19 (11.24%) Fault Management
8 19 (11.24%) Project Management
9 18 (10.65%) Infrastructure Engineering
9 18 (10.65%) Regression Testing
10 15 (8.88%) Data Loss Prevention
10 15 (8.88%) Roadmaps
10 15 (8.88%) Time Management
11 14 (8.28%) Change Management
12 11 (6.51%) Zero Trust
13 9 (5.33%) Containerisation
13 9 (5.33%) Infrastructure as Code
13 9 (5.33%) Network Management
Programming Languages
1 28 (16.57%) Python
2 16 (9.47%) Java
3 5 (2.96%) Perl
3 5 (2.96%) PowerShell
4 3 (1.78%) SQL
5 2 (1.18%) Bash
Qualifications
1 69 (40.83%) Cisco Certification
2 46 (27.22%) CCNP
3 31 (18.34%) Security Cleared
4 29 (17.16%) CCIE
5 23 (13.61%) SC Cleared
6 21 (12.43%) Degree
7 16 (9.47%) ISEB
7 16 (9.47%) ISTQB
7 16 (9.47%) ISTQB Foundation Certification
8 15 (8.88%) CCNA
9 5 (2.96%) CCIE Service Provider
9 5 (2.96%) DV Cleared
9 5 (2.96%) Microsoft Certification
10 4 (2.37%) Azure Certification
10 4 (2.37%) Computer Science Degree
10 4 (2.37%) JNCIE
11 3 (1.78%) AWS Certification
11 3 (1.78%) MCSE
11 3 (1.78%) VMware Certified Professional (VCP)
12 2 (1.18%) AWS Certified Solutions Architect
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 7 (4.14%) SLA
2 6 (3.55%) NIST
3 4 (2.37%) Cyber Essentials
3 4 (2.37%) NCSC
4 2 (1.18%) Government Security Classifications
4 2 (1.18%) ISO/IEC 27001
5 1 (0.59%) PCI DSS
5 1 (0.59%) QA
5 1 (0.59%) Sarbanes-Oxley
System Software
1 14 (8.28%) Active Directory
2 9 (5.33%) VMware Infrastructure
3 7 (4.14%) Docker
4 5 (2.96%) VMware NSX
5 1 (0.59%) Firmware
5 1 (0.59%) Hyper-V
5 1 (0.59%) vSphere
5 1 (0.59%) XenApp
Systems Management
1 26 (15.38%) Ansible
2 13 (7.69%) Microsoft Intune
3 10 (5.92%) FortiGate
4 8 (4.73%) ZABBIX
5 7 (4.14%) Kubernetes
5 7 (4.14%) Terraform
6 5 (2.96%) Nagios
7 4 (2.37%) Cisco Prime
8 1 (0.59%) OpenView
8 1 (0.59%) OPNET
8 1 (0.59%) SCCM
8 1 (0.59%) SolarWinds Orion
8 1 (0.59%) Tivoli
Vendors
1 98 (57.99%) Cisco
2 43 (25.44%) Juniper
3 38 (22.49%) Microsoft
4 31 (18.34%) Fortinet
5 27 (15.98%) Palo Alto
6 21 (12.43%) SolarWinds
7 19 (11.24%) F5
8 14 (8.28%) Aruba
8 14 (8.28%) CheckPoint
9 12 (7.10%) Nokia
10 10 (5.92%) VMware
10 10 (5.92%) Zscaler
11 9 (5.33%) Citrix
12 8 (4.73%) Arista
13 6 (3.55%) Meraki
14 5 (2.96%) Splunk
15 4 (2.37%) BMC
15 4 (2.37%) Huawei
15 4 (2.37%) Remedy
16 3 (1.78%) Google