Network Security Engineer Contract Job Trends in England

Network Security Engineer
UK > England

The median Network Security Engineer daily rate in England is £413, according to job vacancies posted in the 6 months leading up to 24 January 2026.

The table below compares current contractor rates and summary statistics with the previous two years.

6 months to
24 Jan 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 500 425 517
Rank change year-on-year -75 +92 +125
Contract jobs requiring a Network Security Engineer 49 63 42
As % of all contract jobs in England 0.15% 0.24% 0.11%
As % of the Job Titles category 0.16% 0.25% 0.12%
Number of daily rates quoted 20 39 20
10th Percentile £339 £295 £395
25th Percentile £379 £400 £450
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £413 £445 £500
Median % change year-on-year -7.30% -11.00% -4.31%
75th Percentile £538 £544 £567
90th Percentile £550 £593 £669
UK median daily rate £413 £445 £500
% change year-on-year -7.30% -11.00% -4.31%

All Contract IT Job Roles
England

For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all contract IT job vacancies in England. Most job vacancies include a discernible job title that can be normalized. As such, the figures in the second row provide an indication of the number of contract jobs in our overall sample.

Contract vacancies in England with a recognized job title 29,794 24,851 34,829
% of contract IT jobs with a recognized job title 91.64% 92.97% 92.98%
Number of daily rates quoted 19,017 15,358 23,541
10th Percentile £300 £300 £275
25th Percentile £406 £413 £413
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £503 £525 £525
Median % change year-on-year -4.29% - -4.55%
75th Percentile £625 £638 £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 1,844 750 1,852
10th Percentile £14.50 £15.92 £13.42
25th Percentile £18.50 £21.25 £17.72
Median hourly rate £29.60 £35.00 £38.45
Median % change year-on-year -15.43% -8.98% +9.86%
75th Percentile £63.32 £64.50 £62.50
90th Percentile £70.00 £75.00 £73.75
UK median hourly rate £27.72 £32.50 £38.10
% change year-on-year -14.72% -14.69% +9.53%

Network Security Engineer
Job Vacancy Trend in England

Historical trend showing the proportion of contract IT job postings featuring 'Network Security Engineer' in the job title relative to all contract IT jobs advertised in England.

Network Security Engineer job vacancy trend in England

Network Security Engineer
Daily Rate Trend in England

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for Network Security Engineer job vacancies in England.

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for Network Security Engineer job vacancies in England

Network Security Engineer
Daily Rate Histogram in England

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing Network Security Engineer in England over the 6 months to 24 January 2026.

Daily rate histogram for Network Security Engineer in England

Network Security Engineer
Hourly Rate Trend in England

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for Network Security Engineer job vacancies in England.

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for Network Security Engineer job vacancies in England

Network Security Engineer
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 Security Engineer within the England region over the 6 months to 24 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 -15 23 £550 +4.76% 8
North of England -65 11 £525 +24.26% 11
Midlands -40 10 £380 +4.11% 5
West Midlands -42 10 £380 +4.11% 3
South East -29 9 £400 -23.81% 5
North West -30 9 £525 +17.98% 7
Yorkshire -63 2 - - 3
East of England -18 1 £475 +72.73% 5
Network Security Engineer
UK

Network Security Engineer Skill Set
Top 30 Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities in England

For the 6 months to 24 January 2026, Network Security Engineer contract job roles required the following skills and capabilities in order of popularity. The figures indicate the absolute number of co-occurrences and as a proportion of all contract job ads across the England region featuring Network Security Engineer in the job title.

1 36 (73.47%) Network Security
2 34 (69.39%) Firewall
3 30 (61.22%) Cisco
4 18 (36.73%) F5
5 17 (34.69%) DNS
6 16 (32.65%) VPN
7 15 (30.61%) BGP
7 15 (30.61%) Palo Alto
8 13 (26.53%) CheckPoint
9 12 (24.49%) Fortinet
10 11 (22.45%) SC Cleared
10 11 (22.45%) Security Cleared
10 11 (22.45%) WAN
11 10 (20.41%) AWS
11 10 (20.41%) Azure
12 9 (18.37%) OSPF
12 9 (18.37%) Wireless
13 8 (16.33%) Change Management
13 8 (16.33%) Cisco Certification
13 8 (16.33%) Load Balancing
13 8 (16.33%) Problem-Solving
13 8 (16.33%) SSL
13 8 (16.33%) Zscaler
14 7 (14.29%) CCNP
14 7 (14.29%) Cloud Security
14 7 (14.29%) Cybersecurity
14 7 (14.29%) Incident Management
14 7 (14.29%) Juniper
14 7 (14.29%) Network Architecture
14 7 (14.29%) SIEM

Network Security Engineer Skill Set
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 3 (6.12%) Microsoft Exchange
2 1 (2.04%) Confluence
Cloud Services
1 10 (20.41%) AWS
1 10 (20.41%) Azure
2 5 (10.20%) GCP
3 2 (4.08%) Mimecast
4 1 (2.04%) Azure Sentinel
4 1 (2.04%) Entra ID
4 1 (2.04%) OCI
Communications & Networking
1 36 (73.47%) Network Security
2 34 (69.39%) Firewall
3 17 (34.69%) DNS
4 16 (32.65%) VPN
5 15 (30.61%) BGP
6 11 (22.45%) WAN
7 9 (18.37%) OSPF
7 9 (18.37%) Wireless
8 8 (16.33%) SSL
9 6 (12.24%) DMZ
9 6 (12.24%) Multicast
9 6 (12.24%) TCP/IP
10 5 (10.20%) IPsec
10 5 (10.20%) NGFW
11 4 (8.16%) Cisco ASA
11 4 (8.16%) Cisco IPT
11 4 (8.16%) DMVPN
11 4 (8.16%) Intrusion Detection
11 4 (8.16%) Wi-Fi
12 3 (6.12%) Wireshark
Development Applications
1 2 (4.08%) JIRA
General
1 10 (20.41%) Social Skills
2 7 (14.29%) Analytical Skills
3 5 (10.20%) Banking
3 5 (10.20%) Finance
4 4 (8.16%) Investment Banking
4 4 (8.16%) Pharmaceutical
4 4 (8.16%) Public Sector
4 4 (8.16%) Telecoms
5 3 (6.12%) Spanish Language
6 2 (4.08%) Documentation Skills
7 1 (2.04%) Financial Institution
7 1 (2.04%) Manufacturing
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 4 (8.16%) 802.1X
2 3 (6.12%) SAML
3 1 (2.04%) JSON
Miscellaneous
1 11 (22.45%) Data Centre
2 4 (8.16%) Security Posture
3 3 (6.12%) Hybrid Cloud
3 3 (6.12%) Life Science
3 3 (6.12%) Management Information System
3 3 (6.12%) Operational Technology
4 2 (4.08%) Driving Licence
5 1 (2.04%) Clustering
5 1 (2.04%) Data Protection Act
5 1 (2.04%) Distributed Denial-of-Service
5 1 (2.04%) Insider Threat
5 1 (2.04%) Renewable Energy
5 1 (2.04%) SCADA
Operating Systems
1 6 (12.24%) Linux
2 3 (6.12%) Windows
2 3 (6.12%) Windows Server
Processes & Methodologies
1 8 (16.33%) Change Management
1 8 (16.33%) Load Balancing
1 8 (16.33%) Problem-Solving
2 7 (14.29%) Cloud Security
2 7 (14.29%) Cybersecurity
2 7 (14.29%) Incident Management
2 7 (14.29%) Network Architecture
2 7 (14.29%) SIEM
2 7 (14.29%) Zero Trust
3 6 (12.24%) Incident Response
3 6 (12.24%) Security Monitoring
4 5 (10.20%) Migration
4 5 (10.20%) Security Management
4 5 (10.20%) Security Operations
5 4 (8.16%) Continuous Improvement
5 4 (8.16%) Information Security
5 4 (8.16%) Information Security Management
5 4 (8.16%) Inventory Management
5 4 (8.16%) Network Segmentation
5 4 (8.16%) Stakeholder Management
Programming Languages
1 2 (4.08%) Python
2 1 (2.04%) Bash
2 1 (2.04%) PowerShell
2 1 (2.04%) SQL
Qualifications
1 11 (22.45%) SC Cleared
1 11 (22.45%) Security Cleared
2 8 (16.33%) Cisco Certification
3 7 (14.29%) CCNP
4 4 (8.16%) CISSP
5 3 (6.12%) CompTIA Security+
6 2 (4.08%) CCNA
7 1 (2.04%) BPSS Clearance
7 1 (2.04%) CCIE
7 1 (2.04%) CCIE Data Center
7 1 (2.04%) CCSE
7 1 (2.04%) CEH
7 1 (2.04%) CHECK Team Leader
7 1 (2.04%) CREST Certified
7 1 (2.04%) Degree
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 4 (8.16%) ISO/IEC 27001
2 3 (6.12%) GDPR
2 3 (6.12%) NIST
3 2 (4.08%) GxP
4 1 (2.04%) Actionable Recommendations
4 1 (2.04%) GRC
4 1 (2.04%) ISO/IEC 27002 (supersedes ISO/IEC 17799)
4 1 (2.04%) PCI DSS
4 1 (2.04%) SLA
4 1 (2.04%) SOC 2
System Software
1 4 (8.16%) Active Directory
1 4 (8.16%) Virtual Machines
2 1 (2.04%) Hyper-V
2 1 (2.04%) Virtual Servers
Systems Management
1 3 (6.12%) CASB
1 3 (6.12%) FortiGate
1 3 (6.12%) SCCM
1 3 (6.12%) SCOrch
1 3 (6.12%) Single Sign-On
2 2 (4.08%) Ansible
2 2 (4.08%) Terraform
3 1 (2.04%) Failover Clustering
Vendors
1 30 (61.22%) Cisco
2 18 (36.73%) F5
3 15 (30.61%) Palo Alto
4 13 (26.53%) CheckPoint
5 12 (24.49%) Fortinet
6 8 (16.33%) Zscaler
7 7 (14.29%) Juniper
8 5 (10.20%) Microsoft
9 4 (8.16%) Blue Coat
9 4 (8.16%) SolarWinds
10 3 (6.12%) Meraki
10 3 (6.12%) Splunk
11 2 (4.08%) ServiceNow
12 1 (2.04%) CrowdStrike
12 1 (2.04%) FireEye
12 1 (2.04%) Infoblox
12 1 (2.04%) Rockwell
12 1 (2.04%) Tanium
12 1 (2.04%) Tenable