Network Security Contract Job Trends in England

Network Security
UK > England

The table below provides summary statistics and contractor rates for jobs advertised in England requiring Network Security skills. It covers contract job vacancies from the 6 months leading up to 4 December 2025, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
4 Dec 2025
Same period 2024 Same period 2023
Rank 167 142 152
Rank change year-on-year -25 +10 +110
Contract jobs citing Network Security 511 546 659
As % of all contract jobs in England 1.64% 1.79% 1.74%
As % of the Communications & Networking category 14.95% 14.43% 12.28%
Number of daily rates quoted 310 349 456
10th Percentile £340 £363 £403
25th Percentile £407 £450 £475
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £525 £550
Median % change year-on-year -4.76% -4.55% -
75th Percentile £586 £626 £646
90th Percentile £681 £738 £700
UK median daily rate £500 £525 £550
% change year-on-year -4.76% -4.55% -
Number of hourly rates quoted 16 9 5
10th Percentile £40.50 £18.05 £65.00
25th Percentile £45.00 £35.00 £68.75
Median hourly rate £68.33 £45.00 £72.50
Median % change year-on-year +51.84% -37.93% +61.11%
75th Percentile £85.00 £58.75 £76.25
90th Percentile £94.38 £70.77 -
UK median hourly rate £68.33 £41.00 £72.50
% change year-on-year +66.66% -43.45% +61.11%

All Communications and Computer Networking Skills
England

Network Security 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 3,417 3,783 5,366
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in England 10.97% 12.37% 14.16%
Number of daily rates quoted 2,205 2,191 3,340
10th Percentile £206 £225 £210
25th Percentile £356 £375 £363
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £482 £500 £500
Median % change year-on-year -3.60% - -
75th Percentile £588 £608 £610
90th Percentile £680 £688 £700
UK median daily rate £475 £500 £500
% change year-on-year -5.00% - -
Number of hourly rates quoted 177 130 326
10th Percentile £15.50 £17.49 £18.29
25th Percentile £20.18 £23.03 £23.00
Median hourly rate £30.00 £48.56 £56.45
Median % change year-on-year -38.22% -13.97% +25.43%
75th Percentile £65.00 £67.50 £66.25
90th Percentile £74.56 £75.00 £76.25
UK median hourly rate £34.00 £41.00 £55.00
% change year-on-year -17.07% -25.45% +26.44%

Network Security
Job Vacancy Trend in England

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

Network Security job vacancy trend in England

Network Security
Daily Rate Trend in England

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

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

Network Security
Daily Rate Histogram in England

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing Network Security in England over the 6 months to 4 December 2025.

Daily rate histogram for Network Security in England

Network Security
Hourly Rate Trend in England

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

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

Network Security
Hourly Rate Histogram in England

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing Network Security in England over the 6 months to 4 December 2025.

Hourly rate histogram for Network Security in England

Network Security
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 within the England region over the 6 months to 4 December 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 -13 233 £515 -4.23% 82
North of England -36 98 £466 -6.75% 44
Midlands -17 70 £500 -14.02% 18
North West 0 67 £492 -4.70% 28
West Midlands -1 66 £500 -21.26% 10
South East -29 59 £425 -20.19% 104
Yorkshire -30 45 £205 -59.00% 13
South West -9 25 £600 +14.29% 24
East of England -13 22 £488 +44.44% 15
East Midlands -26 4 £650 +73.33% 8
South Coast - 2 - -
North East -10 1 £550 -32.52% 4
Network Security
UK

Network Security
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 6 (1.17%) Confluence
2 5 (0.98%) SharePoint
3 4 (0.78%) Apache
4 3 (0.59%) Microsoft Exchange
5 1 (0.20%) IIS
5 1 (0.20%) nginx
5 1 (0.20%) Skype for Business
Applications
1 15 (2.94%) Microsoft Office
2 5 (0.98%) MS Visio
3 3 (0.59%) Microsoft PowerPoint
4 2 (0.39%) Microsoft Excel
4 2 (0.39%) Microsoft Project
5 1 (0.20%) Windchill
Cloud Services
1 132 (25.83%) Azure
2 108 (21.14%) AWS
3 44 (8.61%) GCP
4 27 (5.28%) Entra ID
4 27 (5.28%) Microsoft 365
5 22 (4.31%) Virtual Private Cloud
6 21 (4.11%) Amazon S3
6 21 (4.11%) Azure DevOps
7 19 (3.72%) Amazon EC2
8 16 (3.13%) Amazon CloudWatch
8 16 (3.13%) Amazon ELB
8 16 (3.13%) Azure Key Vault
8 16 (3.13%) Azure Monitor
9 15 (2.94%) GitHub
10 13 (2.54%) Azure Logic Apps
10 13 (2.54%) GitHub Actions
11 12 (2.35%) Azure Sentinel
11 12 (2.35%) Serverless
12 11 (2.15%) Azure Service Bus
12 11 (2.15%) Google Workspace
Communications & Networking
1 243 (47.55%) Firewall
2 100 (19.57%) VPN
3 99 (19.37%) DNS
4 81 (15.85%) WAN
5 60 (11.74%) SSL
6 55 (10.76%) BGP
7 54 (10.57%) TCP/IP
8 53 (10.37%) LAN
9 48 (9.39%) SD-WAN
10 41 (8.02%) OSPF
11 40 (7.83%) F5 BIG-IP LTM
12 36 (7.05%) Wireless
13 35 (6.85%) VLAN
14 33 (6.46%) DMZ
14 33 (6.46%) F5 BIG-IP GTM
15 23 (4.50%) HTTP
16 22 (4.31%) Internet
16 22 (4.31%) Intrusion Detection
17 20 (3.91%) IPsec
18 19 (3.72%) Wi-Fi
Database & Business Intelligence
1 3 (0.59%) Amazon RDS
1 3 (0.59%) InfluxDB
1 3 (0.59%) Relational Database
2 2 (0.39%) Azure SQL Database
2 2 (0.39%) Data Lake
2 2 (0.39%) Power BI
3 1 (0.20%) Amazon Athena
3 1 (0.20%) GIS
3 1 (0.20%) MySQL
3 1 (0.20%) PostgreSQL
3 1 (0.20%) Redis
3 1 (0.20%) SQL Server
3 1 (0.20%) Tableau
Development Applications
1 24 (4.70%) Jenkins
2 22 (4.31%) GitLab
3 20 (3.91%) Git
4 7 (1.37%) JIRA
5 1 (0.20%) Burp Suite
5 1 (0.20%) Metasploit
5 1 (0.20%) SonarQube
5 1 (0.20%) Sonatype Nexus
5 1 (0.20%) Subversion
General
1 160 (31.31%) Social Skills
2 85 (16.63%) Analytical Skills
3 54 (10.57%) Finance
4 41 (8.02%) Public Sector
5 36 (7.05%) Banking
6 21 (4.11%) Telecoms
7 17 (3.33%) Documentation Skills
8 16 (3.13%) Investment Banking
9 11 (2.15%) Inclusion and Diversity
10 10 (1.96%) Law
10 10 (1.96%) Pharmaceutical
11 9 (1.76%) Legal
12 7 (1.37%) Military
12 7 (1.37%) Presentation Skills
13 6 (1.17%) Financial Institution
13 6 (1.17%) Manufacturing
14 5 (0.98%) Influencing Skills
15 4 (0.78%) Organisational Skills
16 3 (0.59%) Aerospace
16 3 (0.59%) Marketing
Job Titles
1 107 (20.94%) Network Engineer
2 101 (19.77%) Security Engineer
3 81 (15.85%) Architect
4 55 (10.76%) Network Security Engineer
5 51 (9.98%) Security Architect
6 46 (9.00%) Senior
7 40 (7.83%) Analyst
8 34 (6.65%) Network Architect
9 22 (4.31%) Consultant
10 20 (3.91%) Administrator
11 19 (3.72%) Network Security Architect
12 18 (3.52%) Cybersecurity Engineer
12 18 (3.52%) Security Analyst
12 18 (3.52%) SOC Analyst
13 16 (3.13%) Lead
13 16 (3.13%) Operations Engineer
14 15 (2.94%) IT Engineer
15 14 (2.74%) Support Engineer
16 13 (2.54%) Project Manager
16 13 (2.54%) Systems Administrator
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 14 (2.74%) LDAP
2 12 (2.35%) 802.1X
3 10 (1.96%) ARM Templates
4 8 (1.57%) .NET
5 6 (1.17%) ADO
5 6 (1.17%) Node.js
5 6 (1.17%) SAML
5 6 (1.17%) YAML
6 5 (0.98%) .NET Core
6 5 (0.98%) AngularJS
6 5 (0.98%) PyTorch
6 5 (0.98%) React
6 5 (0.98%) TensorFlow
7 4 (0.78%) RabbitMQ
8 3 (0.59%) Elastic Stack
8 3 (0.59%) SailPoint
9 2 (0.39%) OAuth
9 2 (0.39%) OAuth2
9 2 (0.39%) OpenID
10 1 (0.20%) .NET Framework
Miscellaneous
1 40 (7.83%) Management Information System
2 39 (7.63%) Security Posture
3 38 (7.44%) Data Centre
4 27 (5.28%) Hybrid Cloud
5 22 (4.31%) Cloud Native
6 18 (3.52%) Security Operations Centre
7 17 (3.33%) Cyber Threat
7 17 (3.33%) PKI
8 16 (3.13%) Analytical Mindset
8 16 (3.13%) Onboarding
8 16 (3.13%) Operational Technology
9 12 (2.35%) Public Cloud
9 12 (2.35%) Virtual Team
10 11 (2.15%) Cloud Security Posture
10 11 (2.15%) Cyberattack
11 10 (1.96%) CSOC
11 10 (1.96%) Data Protection Act
12 9 (1.76%) SCADA
13 8 (1.57%) Cyber Security Posture
13 8 (1.57%) Product Ownership
Operating Systems
1 77 (15.07%) Windows
2 62 (12.13%) Linux
3 17 (3.33%) Windows Server
4 7 (1.37%) Unix
5 5 (0.98%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
6 4 (0.78%) VMS
7 3 (0.59%) Mac OS
8 2 (0.39%) Windows Server 2019
9 1 (0.20%) CentOS
9 1 (0.20%) Data ONTAP
9 1 (0.20%) Kali Linux
9 1 (0.20%) Ubuntu
9 1 (0.20%) Windows 10
9 1 (0.20%) Windows Server 2016
Processes & Methodologies
1 124 (24.27%) Cybersecurity
2 106 (20.74%) Problem-Solving
3 101 (19.77%) Incident Response
4 94 (18.40%) SIEM
5 78 (15.26%) Cloud Security
6 69 (13.50%) Infrastructure as Code
7 68 (13.31%) CI/CD
8 67 (13.11%) DevOps
9 61 (11.94%) Change Management
10 51 (9.98%) Identity Access Management
11 50 (9.78%) Security Operations
12 47 (9.20%) Security Architecture
13 46 (9.00%) Migration
14 45 (8.81%) Load Balancing
15 44 (8.61%) Infrastructure Automation
15 44 (8.61%) Network Architecture
16 43 (8.41%) Vulnerability Management
16 43 (8.41%) Zero Trust
17 42 (8.22%) Agile
17 42 (8.22%) Continuous Improvement
Programming Languages
1 108 (21.14%) Python
2 65 (12.72%) PowerShell
3 40 (7.83%) Bash
4 20 (3.91%) Bicep
5 15 (2.94%) SQL
6 10 (1.96%) Kusto Query Language
7 8 (1.57%) JavaScript
8 6 (1.17%) Java
8 6 (1.17%) Perl
9 5 (0.98%) C#
9 5 (0.98%) Go
10 3 (0.59%) Shell Script
11 2 (0.39%) C
11 2 (0.39%) C++
12 1 (0.20%) C-shell
12 1 (0.20%) Korn
12 1 (0.20%) Rust
12 1 (0.20%) T-SQL
12 1 (0.20%) TypeScript
Qualifications
1 137 (26.81%) Security Cleared
2 92 (18.00%) SC Cleared
3 83 (16.24%) Cisco Certification
4 69 (13.50%) CISSP
5 63 (12.33%) CCNP
6 42 (8.22%) DV Cleared
7 39 (7.63%) Degree
8 35 (6.85%) CISM
9 23 (4.50%) CCIE
10 22 (4.31%) CEH
10 22 (4.31%) GIAC
11 18 (3.52%) CompTIA Security+
12 14 (2.74%) Computer Science Degree
13 13 (2.54%) CCNA
13 13 (2.54%) CCSA
13 13 (2.54%) CCSP
14 12 (2.35%) (ISC)2 CCSP
14 12 (2.35%) AWS Certification
14 12 (2.35%) Azure Certification
15 8 (1.57%) PMP
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 62 (12.13%) ISO/IEC 27001
2 55 (10.76%) NIST
3 47 (9.20%) GDPR
4 31 (6.07%) PCI DSS
5 12 (2.35%) Cyber Essentials
5 12 (2.35%) GRC
5 12 (2.35%) NCSC
6 11 (2.15%) HIPAA
7 6 (1.17%) SLA
8 5 (0.98%) PSD2
8 5 (0.98%) Sarbanes-Oxley
8 5 (0.98%) SOC 2
9 4 (0.78%) Cyber Essentials PLUS
10 3 (0.59%) California Consumer Privacy Act
10 3 (0.59%) JSP 440
11 2 (0.39%) GxP
11 2 (0.39%) ISO/IEC 27005
11 2 (0.39%) PMO
11 2 (0.39%) QA
12 1 (0.20%) ISO 22301
System Software
1 37 (7.24%) Docker
2 35 (6.85%) Active Directory
3 34 (6.65%) VMware Infrastructure
4 11 (2.15%) Virtual Machines
5 9 (1.76%) Firmware
6 6 (1.17%) VMware NSX
7 4 (0.78%) Hyper-V
7 4 (0.78%) ProxySG
8 3 (0.59%) Virtual Servers
8 3 (0.59%) vSphere
9 1 (0.20%) KVM
9 1 (0.20%) XenApp
9 1 (0.20%) XenDesktop
Systems Management
1 77 (15.07%) Terraform
2 47 (9.20%) Ansible
3 29 (5.68%) Kubernetes
4 20 (3.91%) FortiGate
5 10 (1.96%) QRadar
6 7 (1.37%) Microsoft Intune
7 6 (1.17%) CASB
7 6 (1.17%) Grafana
7 6 (1.17%) Prometheus
7 6 (1.17%) Single Sign-On
8 5 (0.98%) Kibana
9 4 (0.78%) CA Spectrum
10 3 (0.59%) Progress Chef
10 3 (0.59%) SCCM
11 2 (0.39%) Jamf Pro
11 2 (0.39%) Nessus
11 2 (0.39%) Puppet
12 1 (0.20%) HP Fortify
12 1 (0.20%) Icinga
12 1 (0.20%) vCenter Server
Vendors
1 118 (23.09%) Cisco
2 98 (19.18%) Palo Alto
3 90 (17.61%) F5
4 89 (17.42%) Microsoft
5 56 (10.96%) CheckPoint
6 46 (9.00%) Juniper
7 43 (8.41%) VMware
7 43 (8.41%) Zscaler
8 41 (8.02%) Fortinet
9 29 (5.68%) Splunk
10 25 (4.89%) Meraki
11 22 (4.31%) Google
12 21 (4.11%) CrowdStrike
13 19 (3.72%) SolarWinds
14 14 (2.74%) Tenable
15 12 (2.35%) Blue Coat
15 12 (2.35%) ServiceNow
16 11 (2.15%) Forcepoint
17 10 (1.96%) Qualys
18 9 (1.76%) ArcSight