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

6 months to
1 Jan 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 364 304 296
Rank change year-on-year -60 -8 +192
Contract jobs citing Network Design 181 203 260
As % of all contract jobs in England 0.57% 0.72% 0.72%
As % of the Processes & Methodologies category 0.64% 0.81% 0.81%
Number of daily rates quoted 132 122 141
10th Percentile £400 £400 £425
25th Percentile £413 £450 £475
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £498 £520 £579
Median % change year-on-year -4.37% -10.08% +28.57%
75th Percentile £575 £588 £638
90th Percentile £667 £649 £713
UK median daily rate £500 £525 £575
% change year-on-year -4.76% -8.70% +21.05%
Number of hourly rates quoted 2 1 14
10th Percentile - - £38.60
25th Percentile - - -
Median hourly rate £74.26 £75.00 £65.98
Median % change year-on-year -0.99% +13.67% -5.74%
75th Percentile - - -
90th Percentile - - £69.10
UK median hourly rate £74.26 £50.00 £65.98
% change year-on-year +48.52% -24.22% -5.74%

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 28,064 24,952 32,014
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in England 88.52% 88.77% 88.18%
Number of daily rates quoted 17,908 15,353 21,703
10th Percentile £304 £310 £306
25th Percentile £408 £413 £425
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £525 £540
Median % change year-on-year -4.76% -2.78% -1.82%
75th Percentile £625 £645 £650
90th Percentile £725 £750 £750
UK median daily rate £500 £525 £525
% change year-on-year -4.76% - -4.55%
Number of hourly rates quoted 1,766 818 1,417
10th Percentile £15.18 £15.62 £14.39
25th Percentile £17.96 £20.30 £19.25
Median hourly rate £25.15 £35.00 £45.00
Median % change year-on-year -28.14% -22.22% +26.76%
75th Percentile £56.69 £64.50 £65.00
90th Percentile £70.00 £75.00 £77.50
UK median hourly rate £25.15 £32.50 £44.50
% change year-on-year -22.62% -26.97% +27.14%

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 1 January 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
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 1 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 -11 79 £475 -9.52% 9
South East -20 34 £500 -1.23% 14
West Midlands -7 29 £413 -20.75% 1
Midlands -16 29 £413 -22.93% 4
North of England -73 20 £539 +7.70% 6
North West -21 18 £531 +11.79% 5
South West -26 11 £450 -14.29% 7
East of England -14 6 £419 -16.25% 3
North East -6 2 £550 -
Yorkshire -76 1 £650 +30.00% 1
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 7 (3.87%) OpenStack
Applications
1 5 (2.76%) MS Visio
2 3 (1.66%) Microsoft Office
3 2 (1.10%) Microsoft Excel
3 2 (1.10%) Microsoft PowerPoint
Business Applications
1 2 (1.10%) Dynamics CRM
2 1 (0.55%) DELMIA
2 1 (0.55%) Remedy ITSM
Cloud Services
1 39 (21.55%) Azure
2 30 (16.57%) AWS
3 12 (6.63%) GCP
4 6 (3.31%) PaaS
5 4 (2.21%) Azure ExpressRoute
5 4 (2.21%) Dynamics 365
6 3 (1.66%) AWS Direct Connect
6 3 (1.66%) IaaS
6 3 (1.66%) Microsoft 365
6 3 (1.66%) Virtual Private Cloud
7 2 (1.10%) SaaS
8 1 (0.55%) Akamai
8 1 (0.55%) Cloud Computing
8 1 (0.55%) Cloudflare
8 1 (0.55%) Google Ads
8 1 (0.55%) OpenShift
Communications & Networking
1 87 (48.07%) WAN
2 82 (45.30%) Firewall
3 58 (32.04%) LAN
4 45 (24.86%) VPN
5 42 (23.20%) BGP
6 39 (21.55%) MPLS
7 36 (19.89%) Network Security
8 35 (19.34%) Wi-Fi
9 34 (18.78%) SD-WAN
10 19 (10.50%) Radio Access Network
10 19 (10.50%) VLAN
11 17 (9.39%) Cisco Nexus
11 17 (9.39%) IPsec
11 17 (9.39%) TCP/IP
12 16 (8.84%) 4G
12 16 (8.84%) Cisco ISE
13 13 (7.18%) DNS
14 12 (6.63%) 5G
15 11 (6.08%) 3GPP
15 11 (6.08%) NetScaler
Database & Business Intelligence
1 3 (1.66%) GIS
Development Applications
1 5 (2.76%) Git
2 2 (1.10%) GitLab
3 1 (0.55%) Robot Framework
3 1 (0.55%) Sonatype Nexus
General
1 47 (25.97%) Social Skills
2 44 (24.31%) Telecoms
3 24 (13.26%) Public Sector
4 19 (10.50%) Analytical Skills
5 7 (3.87%) Finance
5 7 (3.87%) Manufacturing
6 5 (2.76%) Documentation Skills
7 4 (2.21%) Influencing Skills
7 4 (2.21%) Legal
7 4 (2.21%) Presentation Skills
8 2 (1.10%) Aviation
8 2 (1.10%) Electronics
9 1 (0.55%) Aerospace
9 1 (0.55%) Law
9 1 (0.55%) Local Government
9 1 (0.55%) Marketing
9 1 (0.55%) Military
9 1 (0.55%) Police
9 1 (0.55%) Publishing
9 1 (0.55%) Retail
Job Titles
1 62 (34.25%) Architect
2 59 (32.60%) Network Engineer
3 50 (27.62%) Network Architect
4 20 (11.05%) Network Design Specialist
4 20 (11.05%) Network Specialist
5 14 (7.73%) Design Engineer
6 13 (7.18%) DV Cleared Network Engineer
6 13 (7.18%) Network Design Architect
6 13 (7.18%) Network Design Engineer
6 13 (7.18%) Senior
7 11 (6.08%) Performance Specialist
8 9 (4.97%) 3rd Line Engineer
8 9 (4.97%) 3rd Line Support
8 9 (4.97%) 3rd Line Support Engineer
8 9 (4.97%) Support Engineer
9 8 (4.42%) Designer
9 8 (4.42%) IP Specialist
9 8 (4.42%) Network Designer
10 7 (3.87%) IP Architect
10 7 (3.87%) SC Cleared Network Engineer
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 12 (6.63%) 802.1X
2 10 (5.52%) YANG
3 9 (4.97%) NETCONF
4 6 (3.31%) REST
5 4 (2.21%) OpenID
5 4 (2.21%) SAML
6 2 (1.10%) JSON
6 2 (1.10%) OpenConfig
6 2 (1.10%) RESTCONF
7 1 (0.55%) eBPF
7 1 (0.55%) gRPC
7 1 (0.55%) Jinja
7 1 (0.55%) XML
Miscellaneous
1 43 (23.76%) Data Centre
2 18 (9.94%) Hybrid Cloud
3 13 (7.18%) Operational Technology
4 11 (6.08%) SCADA
5 9 (4.97%) Cloud Native
5 9 (4.97%) PKI
6 7 (3.87%) IoT
7 6 (3.31%) Data Protection Act
8 4 (2.21%) Management Information System
8 4 (2.21%) NB-IoT
8 4 (2.21%) Onboarding
8 4 (2.21%) Security Posture
8 4 (2.21%) Self-Motivation
9 3 (1.66%) Distributed Architecture
10 2 (1.10%) Analytical Mindset
10 2 (1.10%) Fibre Optics
10 2 (1.10%) Insider Threat
10 2 (1.10%) Life Science
10 2 (1.10%) Product Ownership
10 2 (1.10%) Renewable Energy
Operating Systems
1 9 (4.97%) Windows
2 4 (2.21%) Linux
Processes & Methodologies
1 52 (28.73%) Network Architecture
2 33 (18.23%) Load Balancing
3 20 (11.05%) Problem-Solving
4 18 (9.94%) High Availability
4 18 (9.94%) Roadmaps
4 18 (9.94%) Root Cause Analysis
5 17 (9.39%) Cybersecurity
5 17 (9.39%) Stakeholder Management
6 16 (8.84%) Network Management
7 15 (8.29%) Network Segmentation
7 15 (8.29%) Network Virtualisation
7 15 (8.29%) Zero Trust
8 14 (7.73%) Migration
9 13 (7.18%) DevOps
10 12 (6.63%) Impact Assessments
10 12 (6.63%) ITIL
10 12 (6.63%) Stakeholder Engagement
11 11 (6.08%) Strategic Thinking
11 11 (6.08%) TOGAF
12 10 (5.52%) Network Monitoring
Programming Languages
1 23 (12.71%) Python
2 6 (3.31%) SQL
3 4 (2.21%) Bash
3 4 (2.21%) PowerShell
4 2 (1.10%) Perl
5 1 (0.55%) C
Qualifications
1 80 (44.20%) Security Cleared
2 47 (25.97%) SC Cleared
3 45 (24.86%) Cisco Certification
4 34 (18.78%) CCNP
5 28 (15.47%) DV Cleared
6 22 (12.15%) CCIE
7 17 (9.39%) Degree
8 13 (7.18%) CCNA
8 13 (7.18%) CISSP
9 11 (6.08%) JNCIE
10 10 (5.52%) JNCIS
11 6 (3.31%) AWS Certification
12 5 (2.76%) Computer Science Degree
12 5 (2.76%) JNCIP
13 4 (2.21%) (ISC)2 CCSP
13 4 (2.21%) Azure Certification
13 4 (2.21%) BPSS Clearance
13 4 (2.21%) CCSP
14 3 (1.66%) CCIE Security
15 2 (1.10%) ITIL Certification
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 10 (5.52%) GDPR
2 8 (4.42%) ISO/IEC 27001
3 7 (3.87%) NIST
3 7 (3.87%) PCI DSS
4 2 (1.10%) ISO/IEC 27002 (supersedes ISO/IEC 17799)
5 1 (0.55%) Def Stans
5 1 (0.55%) DO-160
5 1 (0.55%) NCSC
5 1 (0.55%) QA
System Software
1 5 (2.76%) VMware Infrastructure
1 5 (2.76%) VMware NSX
2 3 (1.66%) Firmware
3 2 (1.10%) Active Directory
3 2 (1.10%) Virtual Machines
4 1 (0.55%) KVM
4 1 (0.55%) RHEV
4 1 (0.55%) Xen
Systems Management
1 20 (11.05%) Ansible
2 15 (8.29%) FortiGate
3 11 (6.08%) Terraform
4 3 (1.66%) Nagios
5 1 (0.55%) Cisco Prime
5 1 (0.55%) Dell DRAC
5 1 (0.55%) Failover Clustering
5 1 (0.55%) Grafana
5 1 (0.55%) Kubernetes
5 1 (0.55%) Prometheus
5 1 (0.55%) Proxmox
Vendors
1 74 (40.88%) Cisco
2 39 (21.55%) Palo Alto
3 38 (20.99%) Juniper
4 27 (14.92%) Fortinet
5 21 (11.60%) F5
5 21 (11.60%) Meraki
6 16 (8.84%) Nokia
7 15 (8.29%) Microsoft
8 11 (6.08%) Ericsson
9 10 (5.52%) Actix
9 10 (5.52%) CheckPoint
9 10 (5.52%) SolarWinds
10 8 (4.42%) VMware
11 7 (3.87%) Aruba
12 3 (1.66%) Arista
12 3 (1.66%) LogicMonitor
13 2 (1.10%) Forcepoint
13 2 (1.10%) Rockwell
13 2 (1.10%) Virgin Media
13 2 (1.10%) Zscaler