Network Design Contract Job Trends in England

Network Design
UK > England

The table below provides summary statistics and contractor rates for jobs advertised in England requiring Network Design skills. It covers contract job vacancies from the 6 months leading up to 2 October 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
2 Oct 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 465 363 311
Rank change year-on-year -102 -52 +28
Contract jobs citing Network Design 176 158 223
As % of all contract jobs in England 0.38% 0.56% 0.69%
As % of the Processes & Methodologies category 0.45% 0.62% 0.80%
Number of daily rates quoted 117 112 124
10th Percentile £400 £400 £404
25th Percentile £450 £413 £452
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £513 £475 £525
Median % change year-on-year +7.89% -9.52% -9.26%
75th Percentile £588 £600 £603
90th Percentile £650 £650 £684
UK median daily rate £500 £475 £525
% change year-on-year +5.26% -9.52% -8.70%
Number of hourly rates quoted 7 1 3
10th Percentile - - £43.00
25th Percentile £45.00 - £55.00
Median hourly rate £60.00 £55.00 £75.00
Median % change year-on-year +9.09% -26.67% +13.67%
75th Percentile £69.00 - -
90th Percentile £80.81 - -
UK median hourly rate £60.00 £55.00 £55.00
% change year-on-year +9.09% - -16.64%

All Process & Methodology Skills
England

Network Design falls under the Processes and Methodologies category. For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all contract job vacancies requiring process or methodology skills in England.

Contract vacancies with a requirement for process or methodology skills 39,430 25,460 28,039
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in England 84.71% 90.97% 86.29%
Number of daily rates quoted 23,919 16,157 17,165
10th Percentile £325 £300 £313
25th Percentile £425 £405 £420
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £525 £512 £525
Median % change year-on-year +2.64% -2.57% -4.55%
75th Percentile £638 £625 £645
90th Percentile £738 £738 £750
UK median daily rate £525 £500 £525
% change year-on-year +5.00% -4.76% -2.78%
Number of hourly rates quoted 2,918 1,560 1,201
10th Percentile £13.85 £14.42 £15.00
25th Percentile £17.60 £17.87 £20.25
Median hourly rate £40.08 £25.15 £43.00
Median % change year-on-year +59.36% -41.51% -3.37%
75th Percentile £67.50 £47.00 £67.00
90th Percentile £78.75 £67.28 £75.00
UK median hourly rate £38.72 £25.15 £42.50
% change year-on-year +53.96% -40.82% -

Network Design
Job Vacancy Trend in England

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

Network Design job vacancy trend in England

Network Design
Daily Rate Trend in England

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in England citing Network Design.

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in England citing Network Design

Network Design
Daily Rate Histogram in England

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing Network Design in England over the 6 months to 2 October 2026.

Daily rate histogram for Network Design in England

Network Design
Hourly Rate Trend in England

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in England citing Network Design.

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in England citing Network Design

Network Design
Hourly Rate Histogram in England

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing Network Design in England over the 6 months to 2 October 2026.

Hourly rate histogram for Network Design in England

Network Design
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 Network Design within the England region over the 6 months to 2 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 -82 53 £494 +9.72% 108
South East -63 38 £553 +10.50% 38
North of England -64 31 £575 +21.05% 24
North West -46 24 £575 +21.05% 15
Midlands -55 21 £450 +5.88% 18
West Midlands -43 20 £450 +5.88% 11
South West -41 11 £535 -16.41% 19
North East -36 7 £650 +18.18% 2
East of England -23 6 £500 +21.21% 4
Yorkshire -29 6 £519 -9.74% 8
East Midlands - 1 - - 7
Network Design
UK

Network Design
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 11 (6.25%) OpenStack
2 3 (1.70%) Apache
2 3 (1.70%) CloudStack
3 2 (1.14%) Confluence
4 1 (0.57%) Apache Airflow
Applications
1 8 (4.55%) Microsoft PowerPoint
2 7 (3.98%) Microsoft Office
3 5 (2.84%) Microsoft Excel
3 5 (2.84%) MS Visio
4 3 (1.70%) AutoCAD
5 1 (0.57%) CPLEX
Cloud Services
1 54 (30.68%) Azure
2 49 (27.84%) AWS
3 15 (8.52%) OCI
4 11 (6.25%) GCP
5 10 (5.68%) SaaS
6 9 (5.11%) GitHub
7 7 (3.98%) OpenShift
8 6 (3.41%) Azure ExpressRoute
8 6 (3.41%) IaaS
9 5 (2.84%) Entra ID
10 4 (2.27%) Azure Sentinel
10 4 (2.27%) GitHub Actions
11 3 (1.70%) AWS Control Tower
11 3 (1.70%) AWS Direct Connect
12 2 (1.14%) Amazon GuardDuty
12 2 (1.14%) Azure Storage
12 2 (1.14%) Datadog
12 2 (1.14%) PaaS
13 1 (0.57%) Microsoft 365
13 1 (0.57%) Virtual Private Cloud
Communications & Networking
1 79 (44.89%) Firewall
2 62 (35.23%) BGP
3 54 (30.68%) WAN
4 44 (25.00%) OSPF
5 35 (19.89%) LAN
5 35 (19.89%) VLAN
6 34 (19.32%) Network Security
7 28 (15.91%) VPN
8 27 (15.34%) SD-WAN
9 23 (13.07%) VXLAN
10 22 (12.50%) Wi-Fi
11 20 (11.36%) 5G
11 20 (11.36%) Ethernet VPN
11 20 (11.36%) F5 BIG-IP LTM
11 20 (11.36%) MPLS
12 19 (10.80%) 4G
13 18 (10.23%) WLAN
14 17 (9.66%) BIG-IP
15 16 (9.09%) Wireless
16 15 (8.52%) Radio Access Network
Database & Business Intelligence
1 3 (1.70%) Metadata
Development Applications
1 14 (7.95%) GitLab
2 3 (1.70%) Jenkins
3 2 (1.14%) JIRA
4 1 (0.57%) Git
General
1 42 (23.86%) Social Skills
2 27 (15.34%) Telecoms
3 21 (11.93%) Analytical Skills
4 18 (10.23%) Public Sector
5 11 (6.25%) Manufacturing
6 9 (5.11%) Legal
7 7 (3.98%) Documentation Skills
8 6 (3.41%) Retail
9 5 (2.84%) Finance
10 3 (1.70%) Agriculture
10 3 (1.70%) Automotive
10 3 (1.70%) Billing
10 3 (1.70%) Cyber-Physical System
10 3 (1.70%) Inclusion and Diversity
11 2 (1.14%) Local Government
11 2 (1.14%) Military
12 1 (0.57%) Aviation
12 1 (0.57%) Banking
12 1 (0.57%) Pharmaceutical
12 1 (0.57%) Polish Language
Job Titles
1 59 (33.52%) Network Engineer
2 41 (23.30%) Senior
3 35 (19.89%) Architect
4 21 (11.93%) Network Architect
4 21 (11.93%) Network Specialist
4 21 (11.93%) Senior Network Engineer
5 16 (9.09%) Infrastructure Engineer
6 13 (7.39%) Senior Infrastructure Engineer
7 11 (6.25%) Senior Data Warehouse Specialist
7 11 (6.25%) Senior Network Specialist
8 10 (5.68%) Design Engineer
8 10 (5.68%) Designer
8 10 (5.68%) Network Design Specialist
9 9 (5.11%) Consultant
10 8 (4.55%) RAN Engineer
10 8 (4.55%) Security Architect
11 7 (3.98%) Lead
11 7 (3.98%) Network Design Engineer
11 7 (3.98%) Network Designer
11 7 (3.98%) Solutions Architect
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 43 (24.43%) Terraform
2 9 (5.11%) NETCONF
2 9 (5.11%) YANG
3 7 (3.98%) 802.1X
4 6 (3.41%) REST
5 4 (2.27%) Azure Blueprints
5 4 (2.27%) OpenConfig
5 4 (2.27%) RESTCONF
6 3 (1.70%) Elastic Stack
7 1 (0.57%) eBPF
7 1 (0.57%) YAML
Miscellaneous
1 58 (32.95%) Data Centre
2 41 (23.30%) Hybrid Cloud
3 26 (14.77%) Cloud Native
4 8 (4.55%) Operational Technology
4 8 (4.55%) Public Cloud
5 6 (3.41%) Analytical Mindset
5 6 (3.41%) Private Cloud
6 5 (2.84%) IoT
6 5 (2.84%) Management Information System
6 5 (2.84%) PKI
7 4 (2.27%) CMDB
7 4 (2.27%) Data Protection Act
7 4 (2.27%) Handset
7 4 (2.27%) SCADA
7 4 (2.27%) Security Posture
8 3 (1.70%) Data Fabric
8 3 (1.70%) Enterprise Software
8 3 (1.70%) Product Ownership
9 2 (1.14%) EMC VNX
9 2 (1.14%) Onboarding
Operating Systems
1 16 (9.09%) Linux
2 14 (7.95%) Windows
3 8 (4.55%) Ubuntu
3 8 (4.55%) Windows Server
4 4 (2.27%) Alpine Linux
4 4 (2.27%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
5 2 (1.14%) Data ONTAP
Processes & Methodologies
1 38 (21.59%) Stakeholder Management
2 33 (18.75%) Infrastructure as Code
2 33 (18.75%) Zero Trust
3 32 (18.18%) High Availability
4 29 (16.48%) Migration
4 29 (16.48%) Network Architecture
5 28 (15.91%) DevOps
5 28 (15.91%) Roadmaps
6 26 (14.77%) Infrastructure Engineering
7 25 (14.20%) Problem-Solving
7 25 (14.20%) Project Delivery
8 24 (13.64%) Load Balancing
9 23 (13.07%) CI/CD
10 21 (11.93%) Validation
11 18 (10.23%) Cybersecurity
12 17 (9.66%) Technical Leadership
13 15 (8.52%) Continuous Improvement
14 14 (7.95%) Agile
15 13 (7.39%) Capacity Planning
15 13 (7.39%) TOGAF
Programming Languages
1 40 (22.73%) Python
2 7 (3.98%) Bicep
3 5 (2.84%) PowerShell
4 2 (1.14%) Bash
4 2 (1.14%) JavaScript
5 1 (0.57%) ActionScript
Qualifications
1 53 (30.11%) Security Cleared
2 35 (19.89%) SC Cleared
3 34 (19.32%) Cisco Certification
4 23 (13.07%) CCNP
5 14 (7.95%) CCIE
6 13 (7.39%) DV Cleared
7 10 (5.68%) AWS Certification
7 10 (5.68%) JNCIE
8 8 (4.55%) Degree
9 7 (3.98%) Azure Certification
10 6 (3.41%) VMware Certified Professional (VCP)
11 5 (2.84%) AWS Certified Solutions Architect
11 5 (2.84%) CISSP
12 4 (2.27%) CISM
13 2 (1.14%) AWS Certified DevOps Engineer
13 2 (1.14%) CCNA
13 2 (1.14%) ISSAP
13 2 (1.14%) Microsoft Certification
13 2 (1.14%) NCDA
13 2 (1.14%) NCIE
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 11 (6.25%) NIST
2 9 (5.11%) ISO/IEC 27001
3 4 (2.27%) SOC 2
4 3 (1.70%) Actionable Recommendations
4 3 (1.70%) NIST 800
5 2 (1.14%) GDPR
5 2 (1.14%) GxP
5 2 (1.14%) HIPAA
5 2 (1.14%) QA
5 2 (1.14%) Sarbanes-Oxley
6 1 (0.57%) Cyber Essentials
6 1 (0.57%) Def Stans
6 1 (0.57%) NCSC
6 1 (0.57%) SLA
System Software
1 13 (7.39%) VMware Infrastructure
2 9 (5.11%) vSphere
3 7 (3.98%) VMware NSX
4 5 (2.84%) Active Directory
5 4 (2.27%) FreeRADIUS
6 3 (1.70%) Docker
6 3 (1.70%) Firmware
6 3 (1.70%) Hyper-V
6 3 (1.70%) VMware ESXi
7 2 (1.14%) EMC RecoverPoint
7 2 (1.14%) NFS
7 2 (1.14%) SRDF
Systems Management
1 41 (23.30%) Ansible
2 11 (6.25%) Kubernetes
3 9 (5.11%) Grafana
3 9 (5.11%) Prometheus
4 8 (4.55%) FortiGate
5 3 (1.70%) Check_MK
5 3 (1.70%) vCenter Server
6 2 (1.14%) Argo
6 2 (1.14%) EMC NetWorker
6 2 (1.14%) EMC VPLEX
6 2 (1.14%) NetBackup
6 2 (1.14%) SnapMirror
6 2 (1.14%) SnapVault
7 1 (0.57%) Cisco CUCM
7 1 (0.57%) QRadar
7 1 (0.57%) SCCM
7 1 (0.57%) Suricata
7 1 (0.57%) vRealize
Vendors
1 68 (38.64%) Cisco
2 42 (23.86%) Fortinet
2 42 (23.86%) Palo Alto
3 36 (20.45%) F5
4 24 (13.64%) Arista
5 21 (11.93%) Aruba
6 19 (10.80%) Juniper
7 18 (10.23%) Microsoft
8 16 (9.09%) Nokia
9 15 (8.52%) Ericsson
9 15 (8.52%) VMware
10 9 (5.11%) Zscaler
11 7 (3.98%) CheckPoint
11 7 (3.98%) Splunk
12 6 (3.41%) Huawei
13 5 (2.84%) Google
13 5 (2.84%) Meraki
13 5 (2.84%) ServiceNow
13 5 (2.84%) SolarWinds
13 5 (2.84%) Veeam