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 21 December 2025, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
21 Dec 2025
Same period 2024 Same period 2023
Rank 167 143 149
Rank change year-on-year -24 +6 +112
Contract jobs citing Network Security 527 533 640
As % of all contract jobs in England 1.68% 1.85% 1.73%
As % of the Communications & Networking category 15.56% 14.46% 12.21%
Number of daily rates quoted 319 336 450
10th Percentile £339 £360 £413
25th Percentile £412 £450 £480
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £525 £550
Median % change year-on-year -4.76% -4.55% -
75th Percentile £575 £626 £650
90th Percentile £676 £725 £740
UK median daily rate £500 £510 £550
% change year-on-year -1.96% -7.27% -
Number of hourly rates quoted 20 8 5
10th Percentile £44.10 £17.83 £65.00
25th Percentile £48.94 £30.88 £68.75
Median hourly rate £65.50 £43.00 £72.50
Median % change year-on-year +52.33% -40.69% +80.12%
75th Percentile £84.06 £52.19 £76.25
90th Percentile £93.88 £76.78 -
UK median hourly rate £65.50 £41.00 £72.50
% change year-on-year +59.76% -43.45% +80.12%

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 3,387 3,685 5,242
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in England 10.80% 12.80% 14.15%
Number of daily rates quoted 2,190 2,163 3,259
10th Percentile £206 £220 £210
25th Percentile £356 £375 £363
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £488 £500 £500
Median % change year-on-year -2.50% - -0.99%
75th Percentile £588 £600 £608
90th Percentile £675 £685 £700
UK median daily rate £475 £500 £500
% change year-on-year -5.00% - -
Number of hourly rates quoted 174 113 314
10th Percentile £15.50 £15.22 £18.68
25th Percentile £20.56 £21.46 £23.02
Median hourly rate £32.00 £35.00 £56.49
Median % change year-on-year -8.57% -38.04% +25.53%
75th Percentile £65.00 £65.00 £66.25
90th Percentile £75.00 £73.75 £76.21
UK median hourly rate £32.00 £35.00 £56.45
% change year-on-year -8.57% -37.99% +37.57%

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 21 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 21 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 21 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 -14 231 £515 -4.28% 50
North of England -21 102 £458 -8.50% 38
South East -18 73 £430 -21.82% 60
North West +5 71 £475 - 28
Midlands -23 63 £500 -14.24% 20
West Midlands -3 59 £500 -19.35% 13
Yorkshire -45 44 £205 -59.00% 8
East of England -17 27 £475 +18.75% 23
South West -19 23 £533 +1.43% 21
East Midlands -30 4 £650 +73.33% 7
North East -6 2 £475 -41.72% 3
South Coast - 2 - -
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 (1.14%) Confluence
2 5 (0.95%) SharePoint
3 4 (0.76%) Apache
4 3 (0.57%) Microsoft Exchange
5 1 (0.19%) IIS
5 1 (0.19%) nginx
5 1 (0.19%) Skype for Business
Applications
1 16 (3.04%) Microsoft Office
2 7 (1.33%) MS Visio
3 3 (0.57%) Microsoft PowerPoint
4 2 (0.38%) Microsoft Excel
4 2 (0.38%) Microsoft Project
5 1 (0.19%) Windchill
Cloud Services
1 144 (27.32%) Azure
2 117 (22.20%) AWS
3 44 (8.35%) GCP
4 26 (4.93%) Entra ID
5 25 (4.74%) Microsoft 365
6 24 (4.55%) Virtual Private Cloud
7 22 (4.17%) Amazon S3
8 20 (3.80%) Amazon EC2
9 19 (3.61%) Azure DevOps
10 16 (3.04%) Amazon CloudWatch
10 16 (3.04%) Amazon ELB
11 14 (2.66%) GitHub
12 13 (2.47%) Azure Sentinel
12 13 (2.47%) Serverless
13 12 (2.28%) Azure Key Vault
13 12 (2.28%) Azure Monitor
13 12 (2.28%) GitHub Actions
14 11 (2.09%) Google Workspace
14 11 (2.09%) IaaS
15 8 (1.52%) Azure Logic Apps
Communications & Networking
1 262 (49.72%) Firewall
2 115 (21.82%) VPN
3 104 (19.73%) DNS
4 91 (17.27%) WAN
5 66 (12.52%) SSL
6 63 (11.95%) BGP
7 61 (11.57%) LAN
8 59 (11.20%) TCP/IP
9 49 (9.30%) OSPF
9 49 (9.30%) SD-WAN
10 42 (7.97%) F5 BIG-IP LTM
10 42 (7.97%) VLAN
11 35 (6.64%) F5 BIG-IP GTM
12 34 (6.45%) DMZ
12 34 (6.45%) Wireless
13 25 (4.74%) HTTP
14 23 (4.36%) Intrusion Detection
15 22 (4.17%) Internet
16 19 (3.61%) Wi-Fi
16 19 (3.61%) WLAN
Database & Business Intelligence
1 4 (0.76%) Amazon RDS
1 4 (0.76%) InfluxDB
1 4 (0.76%) Relational Database
2 2 (0.38%) Azure SQL Database
2 2 (0.38%) Data Lake
2 2 (0.38%) Power BI
3 1 (0.19%) Amazon Athena
3 1 (0.19%) MySQL
3 1 (0.19%) PostgreSQL
3 1 (0.19%) Redis
3 1 (0.19%) SQL Server
3 1 (0.19%) Tableau
Development Applications
1 24 (4.55%) Jenkins
2 22 (4.17%) Git
2 22 (4.17%) GitLab
3 6 (1.14%) JIRA
4 2 (0.38%) Sonatype Nexus
5 1 (0.19%) Metasploit
5 1 (0.19%) Subversion
General
1 172 (32.64%) Social Skills
2 99 (18.79%) Analytical Skills
3 53 (10.06%) Finance
4 44 (8.35%) Public Sector
5 35 (6.64%) Banking
6 21 (3.98%) Telecoms
7 18 (3.42%) Documentation Skills
8 16 (3.04%) Investment Banking
9 12 (2.28%) Inclusion and Diversity
10 9 (1.71%) Pharmaceutical
11 7 (1.33%) Legal
11 7 (1.33%) Presentation Skills
12 6 (1.14%) Manufacturing
12 6 (1.14%) Military
13 5 (0.95%) Financial Institution
13 5 (0.95%) Influencing Skills
14 4 (0.76%) Aerospace
14 4 (0.76%) Law
14 4 (0.76%) Marketing
14 4 (0.76%) Organisational Skills
Job Titles
1 115 (21.82%) Network Engineer
2 95 (18.03%) Security Engineer
3 82 (15.56%) Architect
4 50 (9.49%) Security Architect
5 48 (9.11%) Network Security Engineer
6 45 (8.54%) Senior
7 44 (8.35%) Analyst
8 38 (7.21%) Network Architect
9 21 (3.98%) SOC Analyst
10 20 (3.80%) Administrator
10 20 (3.80%) Security Analyst
11 19 (3.61%) Cybersecurity Engineer
11 19 (3.61%) Network Security Architect
12 18 (3.42%) Consultant
13 17 (3.23%) Lead
13 17 (3.23%) Operations Engineer
14 15 (2.85%) IT Engineer
15 14 (2.66%) Infrastructure Engineer
15 14 (2.66%) Project Manager
15 14 (2.66%) Support Engineer
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 18 (3.42%) LDAP
2 12 (2.28%) 802.1X
3 8 (1.52%) .NET
3 8 (1.52%) Node.js
4 6 (1.14%) SAML
5 5 (0.95%) .NET Core
5 5 (0.95%) AngularJS
5 5 (0.95%) ARM Templates
5 5 (0.95%) Elastic Stack
5 5 (0.95%) PyTorch
5 5 (0.95%) RabbitMQ
5 5 (0.95%) React
5 5 (0.95%) TensorFlow
6 2 (0.38%) HTML
6 2 (0.38%) OAuth
6 2 (0.38%) OAuth2
6 2 (0.38%) OpenID
7 1 (0.19%) ADO
7 1 (0.19%) CSS
7 1 (0.19%) XML
Miscellaneous
1 54 (10.25%) Data Centre
2 45 (8.54%) Management Information System
3 33 (6.26%) Security Posture
4 31 (5.88%) Hybrid Cloud
5 24 (4.55%) Cloud Native
5 24 (4.55%) Security Operations Centre
6 22 (4.17%) Analytical Mindset
6 22 (4.17%) Cyber Threat
7 19 (3.61%) PKI
8 17 (3.23%) Onboarding
9 16 (3.04%) CSOC
9 16 (3.04%) Cyberattack
10 15 (2.85%) Operational Technology
11 13 (2.47%) Public Cloud
12 12 (2.28%) Cyber Security Posture
13 11 (2.09%) Virtual Team
14 10 (1.90%) Cloud Security Posture
15 7 (1.33%) Clustering
15 7 (1.33%) Data Protection Act
15 7 (1.33%) Enterprise Software
Operating Systems
1 82 (15.56%) Windows
2 63 (11.95%) Linux
3 21 (3.98%) Windows Server
4 7 (1.33%) Unix
5 4 (0.76%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
5 4 (0.76%) VMS
6 3 (0.57%) Mac OS
7 2 (0.38%) Windows Server 2019
8 1 (0.19%) Data ONTAP
8 1 (0.19%) Ubuntu
8 1 (0.19%) Windows 10
8 1 (0.19%) Windows Server 2016
Processes & Methodologies
1 131 (24.86%) Cybersecurity
2 106 (20.11%) SIEM
3 104 (19.73%) Problem-Solving
4 101 (19.17%) Incident Response
5 80 (15.18%) Cloud Security
6 66 (12.52%) CI/CD
6 66 (12.52%) DevOps
6 66 (12.52%) Infrastructure as Code
7 60 (11.39%) Change Management
8 54 (10.25%) Security Operations
8 54 (10.25%) Zero Trust
9 49 (9.30%) Migration
10 47 (8.92%) Security Architecture
11 46 (8.73%) Identity Access Management
12 45 (8.54%) Infrastructure Automation
12 45 (8.54%) Load Balancing
12 45 (8.54%) Network Architecture
13 44 (8.35%) Continuous Improvement
13 44 (8.35%) Threat Modelling
14 42 (7.97%) Vulnerability Management
Programming Languages
1 115 (21.82%) Python
2 76 (14.42%) PowerShell
3 35 (6.64%) Bash
4 16 (3.04%) SQL
5 15 (2.85%) Bicep
6 13 (2.47%) Kusto Query Language
7 11 (2.09%) JavaScript
8 7 (1.33%) Go
8 7 (1.33%) Java
9 5 (0.95%) C#
10 4 (0.76%) Perl
10 4 (0.76%) Shell Script
11 2 (0.38%) C
11 2 (0.38%) C++
12 1 (0.19%) C-shell
12 1 (0.19%) Korn
12 1 (0.19%) Rust
12 1 (0.19%) T-SQL
12 1 (0.19%) TypeScript
Qualifications
1 156 (29.60%) Security Cleared
2 113 (21.44%) SC Cleared
3 96 (18.22%) Cisco Certification
4 74 (14.04%) CCNP
4 74 (14.04%) CISSP
5 47 (8.92%) DV Cleared
6 41 (7.78%) Degree
7 32 (6.07%) CISM
8 27 (5.12%) GIAC
9 26 (4.93%) CCIE
10 25 (4.74%) CEH
11 19 (3.61%) CCNA
12 18 (3.42%) CompTIA Security+
13 17 (3.23%) Azure Certification
14 14 (2.66%) Computer Science Degree
15 13 (2.47%) AWS Certification
15 13 (2.47%) CCSP
16 12 (2.28%) (ISC)2 CCSP
16 12 (2.28%) CCSA
17 8 (1.52%) CISA
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 63 (11.95%) ISO/IEC 27001
2 55 (10.44%) NIST
3 43 (8.16%) GDPR
4 30 (5.69%) PCI DSS
5 14 (2.66%) Cyber Essentials
6 12 (2.28%) NCSC
7 10 (1.90%) GRC
8 9 (1.71%) HIPAA
9 7 (1.33%) SLA
10 5 (0.95%) PSD2
10 5 (0.95%) Sarbanes-Oxley
10 5 (0.95%) SOC 2
11 4 (0.76%) Cyber Essentials PLUS
11 4 (0.76%) JSP 440
12 2 (0.38%) California Consumer Privacy Act
12 2 (0.38%) GxP
12 2 (0.38%) ISO/IEC 27005
12 2 (0.38%) ISO/IEC 42001
12 2 (0.38%) PMO
12 2 (0.38%) QA
System Software
1 39 (7.40%) Active Directory
2 37 (7.02%) Docker
2 37 (7.02%) VMware Infrastructure
3 10 (1.90%) Hyper-V
4 9 (1.71%) Firmware
5 8 (1.52%) VMware NSX
6 7 (1.33%) Virtual Machines
7 4 (0.76%) ProxySG
7 4 (0.76%) vSphere
8 3 (0.57%) Virtual Servers
9 2 (0.38%) KVM
10 1 (0.19%) RHEV
10 1 (0.19%) Xen
10 1 (0.19%) XenApp
10 1 (0.19%) XenDesktop
Systems Management
1 87 (16.51%) Terraform
2 58 (11.01%) Ansible
3 28 (5.31%) Kubernetes
4 23 (4.36%) FortiGate
5 11 (2.09%) Nagios
6 10 (1.90%) Kibana
7 9 (1.71%) QRadar
8 8 (1.52%) Microsoft Intune
9 7 (1.33%) Grafana
9 7 (1.33%) Prometheus
10 6 (1.14%) Microsoft Clustering
10 6 (1.14%) Single Sign-On
11 5 (0.95%) CASB
12 4 (0.76%) CA Spectrum
12 4 (0.76%) Progress Chef
13 3 (0.57%) Icinga
13 3 (0.57%) Puppet
13 3 (0.57%) SCCM
14 2 (0.38%) Docker Swarm
14 2 (0.38%) Jamf Pro
Vendors
1 128 (24.29%) Cisco
2 105 (19.92%) Palo Alto
3 89 (16.89%) F5
3 89 (16.89%) Microsoft
4 58 (11.01%) CheckPoint
5 51 (9.68%) Juniper
6 46 (8.73%) VMware
7 45 (8.54%) Fortinet
8 38 (7.21%) Zscaler
9 29 (5.50%) Splunk
10 25 (4.74%) Meraki
10 25 (4.74%) SolarWinds
11 21 (3.98%) CrowdStrike
12 19 (3.61%) Google
13 16 (3.04%) Tenable
14 14 (2.66%) ServiceNow
15 12 (2.28%) Blue Coat
15 12 (2.28%) Qualys
16 11 (2.09%) Forcepoint
17 10 (1.90%) Tanium