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 10 June 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
10 Jun 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 422 345 309
Rank change year-on-year -77 -36 +136
Contract jobs citing Network Design 179 139 240
As % of all contract jobs in England 0.42% 0.57% 0.64%
As % of the Processes & Methodologies category 0.50% 0.62% 0.75%
Number of daily rates quoted 125 89 113
10th Percentile £400 £410 £363
25th Percentile £450 £463 £425
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £525 £550 £475
Median % change year-on-year -4.55% +15.79% -9.52%
75th Percentile £588 £638 £575
90th Percentile £675 £704 £638
UK median daily rate £525 £550 £475
% change year-on-year -4.55% +15.79% -9.52%
Number of hourly rates quoted 5 1 2
10th Percentile £29.05 - £24.43
25th Percentile £36.25 £66.25 £26.19
Median hourly rate £60.00 £67.50 £29.25
Median % change year-on-year -11.11% +130.77% -58.21%
75th Percentile £71.50 £68.75 £32.19
90th Percentile £72.12 - £33.88
UK median hourly rate £65.50 £67.50 £29.25
% change year-on-year -2.96% +130.77% -58.21%

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 35,948 22,351 32,031
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in England 85.10% 91.35% 85.47%
Number of daily rates quoted 22,764 14,463 20,809
10th Percentile £325 £303 £300
25th Percentile £413 £407 £413
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £515 £520 £525
Median % change year-on-year -0.96% -0.95% -4.55%
75th Percentile £625 £638 £650
90th Percentile £725 £750 £750
UK median daily rate £513 £508 £525
% change year-on-year +0.99% -3.33% -4.55%
Number of hourly rates quoted 2,246 1,016 2,371
10th Percentile £15.25 £14.20 £12.81
25th Percentile £20.75 £18.12 £16.00
Median hourly rate £47.00 £28.00 £37.50
Median % change year-on-year +67.86% -25.33% +4.17%
75th Percentile £68.00 £58.75 £61.30
90th Percentile £82.25 £75.00 £72.50
UK median hourly rate £43.96 £27.28 £36.50
% change year-on-year +61.14% -25.26% +1.39%

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 10 June 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 10 June 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 10 June 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 -49 62 £525 +9.38% 13
South East -67 42 £500 -13.04% 13
North of England -77 33 £575 +15.00% 5
North West -45 22 £575 +21.05% 3
South West -19 14 £565 -11.72% 6
West Midlands -49 10 £413 -25.00% 4
Yorkshire -51 10 £519 +3.80%
Midlands -60 10 £413 -25.00% 4
North East -17 7 £650 +18.18% 2
East of England -20 6 £525 +0.96% 2
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 9 (5.03%) OpenStack
2 2 (1.12%) Apache
2 2 (1.12%) CloudStack
2 2 (1.12%) Confluence
2 2 (1.12%) Microsoft Exchange
2 2 (1.12%) Skype for Business
3 1 (0.56%) ArcGIS
3 1 (0.56%) Smallworld
Applications
1 6 (3.35%) Microsoft PowerPoint
2 5 (2.79%) Microsoft Office
2 5 (2.79%) MS Visio
3 4 (2.23%) Microsoft Excel
4 3 (1.68%) AutoCAD
5 1 (0.56%) Autodesk Inventor
5 1 (0.56%) MicroStation
Business Applications
1 2 (1.12%) DELMIA
Cloud Services
1 63 (35.20%) Azure
2 48 (26.82%) AWS
3 15 (8.38%) OCI
4 10 (5.59%) SaaS
5 9 (5.03%) GCP
6 7 (3.91%) GitHub
7 6 (3.35%) IaaS
8 5 (2.79%) Azure ExpressRoute
8 5 (2.79%) Azure Sentinel
8 5 (2.79%) Entra ID
9 3 (1.68%) AWS Control Tower
9 3 (1.68%) PaaS
10 2 (1.12%) Azure Storage
10 2 (1.12%) Datadog
10 2 (1.12%) GitHub Actions
10 2 (1.12%) IBM Watson
10 2 (1.12%) Microsoft 365
10 2 (1.12%) OpenShift
11 1 (0.56%) AWS CloudFormation
11 1 (0.56%) Mimecast
Communications & Networking
1 73 (40.78%) Firewall
2 65 (36.31%) WAN
3 56 (31.28%) BGP
4 46 (25.70%) OSPF
5 34 (18.99%) VPN
6 32 (17.88%) LAN
7 31 (17.32%) SD-WAN
8 28 (15.64%) Wi-Fi
9 27 (15.08%) VXLAN
10 26 (14.53%) Network Security
11 24 (13.41%) VLAN
12 22 (12.29%) 5G
12 22 (12.29%) Ethernet VPN
12 22 (12.29%) MPLS
13 19 (10.61%) F5 BIG-IP LTM
14 17 (9.50%) 4G
14 17 (9.50%) BIG-IP
14 17 (9.50%) Radio Access Network
15 15 (8.38%) DNS
16 13 (7.26%) WLAN
Database & Business Intelligence
1 3 (1.68%) Metadata
2 1 (0.56%) GIS
Development Applications
1 13 (7.26%) GitLab
2 4 (2.23%) JIRA
3 3 (1.68%) Jenkins
4 1 (0.56%) Sonatype Nexus
General
1 39 (21.79%) Social Skills
2 22 (12.29%) Telecoms
3 18 (10.06%) Analytical Skills
3 18 (10.06%) Public Sector
4 11 (6.15%) Legal
5 9 (5.03%) Finance
6 7 (3.91%) Documentation Skills
7 4 (2.23%) Manufacturing
7 4 (2.23%) Police
8 3 (1.68%) Banking
8 3 (1.68%) Inclusion and Diversity
8 3 (1.68%) Retail
9 2 (1.12%) Influencing Skills
9 2 (1.12%) Military
10 1 (0.56%) Aviation
10 1 (0.56%) Polish Language
10 1 (0.56%) Presentation Skills
10 1 (0.56%) Retail Banking
Job Titles
1 48 (26.82%) Network Engineer
2 45 (25.14%) Senior
3 35 (19.55%) Architect
4 31 (17.32%) Network Specialist
5 22 (12.29%) Designer
6 21 (11.73%) Network Architect
6 21 (11.73%) Network Design Specialist
7 17 (9.50%) Network Designer
8 16 (8.94%) Infrastructure Engineer
8 16 (8.94%) Senior Network Engineer
9 13 (7.26%) Senior Infrastructure Engineer
10 8 (4.47%) SC Cleared Network Engineer
10 8 (4.47%) Senior Data Warehouse Specialist
10 8 (4.47%) Senior Network Specialist
11 7 (3.91%) Design Engineer
11 7 (3.91%) Senior Designer
11 7 (3.91%) Senior Network Designer
12 6 (3.35%) Lead
12 6 (3.35%) Network Design Engineer
12 6 (3.35%) Security Architect
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 8 (4.47%) NETCONF
1 8 (4.47%) YANG
2 7 (3.91%) REST
3 6 (3.35%) 802.1X
4 4 (2.23%) Azure Blueprints
5 2 (1.12%) Django
5 2 (1.12%) Elastic Stack
5 2 (1.12%) OpenConfig
5 2 (1.12%) RESTCONF
Miscellaneous
1 55 (30.73%) Data Centre
2 37 (20.67%) Hybrid Cloud
3 28 (15.64%) Cloud Native
4 7 (3.91%) Data Protection Act
5 6 (3.35%) Management Information System
5 6 (3.35%) PKI
6 4 (2.23%) CMDB
6 4 (2.23%) IoT
6 4 (2.23%) Security Posture
7 3 (1.68%) Data Fabric
7 3 (1.68%) Product Ownership
7 3 (1.68%) Public Cloud
8 2 (1.12%) Analytical Mindset
8 2 (1.12%) Distributed Denial-of-Service
8 2 (1.12%) EMC VMAX
8 2 (1.12%) EMC VNX
8 2 (1.12%) Enterprise Storage
8 2 (1.12%) Greenfield Project
8 2 (1.12%) Private Cloud
8 2 (1.12%) Self-Motivation
Operating Systems
1 17 (9.50%) Linux
1 17 (9.50%) Windows
2 12 (6.70%) Windows Server
3 6 (3.35%) Ubuntu
4 4 (2.23%) Alpine Linux
4 4 (2.23%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
5 2 (1.12%) Data ONTAP
5 2 (1.12%) Windows Server 2016
Processes & Methodologies
1 37 (20.67%) Network Architecture
2 36 (20.11%) High Availability
3 34 (18.99%) Infrastructure as Code
4 29 (16.20%) Zero Trust
5 28 (15.64%) DevOps
5 28 (15.64%) Problem-Solving
6 27 (15.08%) Load Balancing
7 26 (14.53%) CI/CD
7 26 (14.53%) Migration
8 24 (13.41%) Roadmaps
9 22 (12.29%) Infrastructure Engineering
10 16 (8.94%) Stakeholder Management
11 15 (8.38%) Capacity Planning
11 15 (8.38%) Continuous Improvement
11 15 (8.38%) Validation
12 14 (7.82%) Project Delivery
13 13 (7.26%) Network Segmentation
13 13 (7.26%) TOGAF
14 12 (6.70%) Cybersecurity
14 12 (6.70%) Security Architecture
Programming Languages
1 38 (21.23%) Python
2 10 (5.59%) PowerShell
3 7 (3.91%) Bicep
4 5 (2.79%) Bash
5 2 (1.12%) SQL
6 1 (0.56%) ActionScript
Qualifications
1 59 (32.96%) Security Cleared
2 39 (21.79%) Cisco Certification
3 35 (19.55%) SC Cleared
4 27 (15.08%) CCNP
5 18 (10.06%) DV Cleared
6 13 (7.26%) CCIE
7 11 (6.15%) Azure Certification
8 10 (5.59%) AWS Certification
9 9 (5.03%) Degree
9 9 (5.03%) JNCIE
10 6 (3.35%) CCNA
11 5 (2.79%) AWS Certified Solutions Architect
11 5 (2.79%) VMware Certified Professional (VCP)
12 4 (2.23%) JNCIS
13 3 (1.68%) CISM
13 3 (1.68%) CISSP
14 2 (1.12%) Microsoft Certification
14 2 (1.12%) PMI Certification
14 2 (1.12%) PMP
14 2 (1.12%) Project+ Certification
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 10 (5.59%) NIST
2 4 (2.23%) ISO/IEC 27001
3 3 (1.68%) NCSC
3 3 (1.68%) SLA
4 2 (1.12%) GDPR
4 2 (1.12%) HIPAA
4 2 (1.12%) NIST 800
4 2 (1.12%) QA
4 2 (1.12%) SOC 2
5 1 (0.56%) Actionable Recommendations
5 1 (0.56%) Cyber Essentials
5 1 (0.56%) Def Stans
System Software
1 17 (9.50%) VMware Infrastructure
2 11 (6.15%) VMware NSX
3 9 (5.03%) Active Directory
4 7 (3.91%) Hyper-V
5 6 (3.35%) vSphere
6 3 (1.68%) Firmware
7 2 (1.12%) EMC RecoverPoint
7 2 (1.12%) KVM
7 2 (1.12%) NFS
7 2 (1.12%) SRDF
7 2 (1.12%) VMware ESXi
8 1 (0.56%) Docker
Systems Management
1 37 (20.67%) Ansible
2 32 (17.88%) Terraform
3 10 (5.59%) Kubernetes
4 7 (3.91%) FortiGate
5 4 (2.23%) Grafana
5 4 (2.23%) Prometheus
6 3 (1.68%) Nagios
6 3 (1.68%) vCenter Server
7 2 (1.12%) Active Directory Federation Services
7 2 (1.12%) Argo
7 2 (1.12%) Check_MK
7 2 (1.12%) EMC NetWorker
7 2 (1.12%) EMC VPLEX
7 2 (1.12%) McAfee ePO
7 2 (1.12%) NetBackup
7 2 (1.12%) SCCM
7 2 (1.12%) SnapMirror
7 2 (1.12%) SnapVault
8 1 (0.56%) Iperf
8 1 (0.56%) Suricata
Vendors
1 70 (39.11%) Cisco
2 40 (22.35%) Palo Alto
3 32 (17.88%) F5
4 27 (15.08%) Fortinet
5 23 (12.85%) Microsoft
6 21 (11.73%) Juniper
6 21 (11.73%) VMware
7 20 (11.17%) Aruba
8 19 (10.61%) Arista
9 16 (8.94%) Nokia
10 14 (7.82%) Ericsson
11 13 (7.26%) Huawei
12 10 (5.59%) CheckPoint
13 9 (5.03%) Meraki
13 9 (5.03%) SolarWinds
14 7 (3.91%) Splunk
15 6 (3.35%) Zscaler
16 4 (2.23%) CrowdStrike
16 4 (2.23%) Okta
16 4 (2.23%) Veeam