Security Cleared Contract Job Trends in England

Security Clearance
UK > England

The table below provides summary statistics for contract job vacancies advertised in England with a requirement for Security Cleared qualifications. It includes a benchmarking guide to the contractor rates offered over the 6 months leading up to 21 August 2026, comparing them to the same period in the previous two years.

6 months to
21 Aug 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 1 4 3
Rank change year-on-year +3 -1 +1
Contract jobs citing Security Cleared 10,004 5,113 6,414
As % of all contract jobs in England 21.91% 18.55% 19.27%
As % of the Qualifications category 69.13% 58.74% 63.12%
Number of daily rates quoted 7,063 3,288 4,256
10th Percentile £383 £350 £359
25th Percentile £456 £450 £456
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £540 £538 £550
Median % change year-on-year +0.47% -2.27% -
75th Percentile £638 £625 £650
90th Percentile £725 £700 £738
UK median daily rate £538 £534 £550
% change year-on-year +0.75% -3.00% -
Number of hourly rates quoted 746 494 429
10th Percentile £19.50 £18.51 £15.08
25th Percentile £28.55 £18.87 £22.22
Median hourly rate £65.00 £25.15 £59.50
Median % change year-on-year +158.45% -57.73% -0.83%
75th Percentile £80.00 £53.75 £72.50
90th Percentile £88.00 £75.00 £80.00
UK median hourly rate £63.50 £25.15 £56.50
% change year-on-year +152.49% -55.49% -5.83%

All Academic and Professional Certifications
England

Security Cleared falls under the Academic Qualifications and Professional Certifications category. For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all contract job vacancies requiring academic qualifications or professional certifications in England.

Contract vacancies requiring academic qualifications or professional certifications 14,472 8,705 10,161
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in England 31.69% 31.59% 30.52%
Number of daily rates quoted 9,744 5,463 6,454
10th Percentile £350 £300 £325
25th Percentile £435 £413 £425
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £525 £525 £538
Median % change year-on-year - -2.33% -2.27%
75th Percentile £627 £625 £638
90th Percentile £725 £713 £738
UK median daily rate £525 £525 £525
% change year-on-year - - -4.55%
Number of hourly rates quoted 1,122 685 718
10th Percentile £18.25 £18.16 £14.84
25th Percentile £25.77 £18.87 £21.37
Median hourly rate £52.50 £25.15 £47.50
Median % change year-on-year +108.75% -47.05% -13.64%
75th Percentile £74.88 £55.49 £67.69
90th Percentile £88.00 £75.00 £77.50
UK median hourly rate £48.77 £25.15 £43.00
% change year-on-year +93.90% -41.51% -21.82%

Security Cleared
Job Vacancy Trend in England

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

Security Cleared job vacancy trend in England

Security Cleared
Daily Rate Trend in England

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

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

Security Cleared
Daily Rate Histogram in England

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing Security Cleared in England over the 6 months to 21 August 2026.

Daily rate histogram for Security Cleared in England

Security Cleared
Hourly Rate Trend in England

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

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

Security Cleared
Hourly Rate Histogram in England

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing Security Cleared in England over the 6 months to 21 August 2026.

Hourly rate histogram for Security Cleared in England

Security Cleared
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 Security Cleared within the England region over the 6 months to 21 August 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 +7 3,542 £550 +3.77% 558
South East +1 2,407 £563 +4.65% 526
South West 0 1,360 £547 -1.65% 394
North of England +3 1,198 £511 +2.20% 304
Midlands 0 909 £469 -8.93% 154
West Midlands +1 783 £469 -8.93% 114
North West +3 682 £530 -0.09% 178
East of England 0 333 £550 - 159
Yorkshire +2 303 £492 - 62
North East 0 237 £475 -5.00% 69
East Midlands -3 118 £438 -7.89% 40
Security Cleared
UK

Security Cleared
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
1 354 (3.54%) Confluence
2 259 (2.59%) SharePoint
3 163 (1.63%) SAS
4 114 (1.14%) Microsoft Exchange
5 89 (0.89%) Apache Airflow
6 83 (0.83%) Apache Spark
7 80 (0.80%) Apache
8 32 (0.32%) nginx
9 29 (0.29%) Jupyter
10 23 (0.23%) Oracle Application Server
11 22 (0.22%) WebLogic
12 21 (0.21%) Skype for Business
13 18 (0.18%) Tomcat
14 17 (0.17%) CMS
14 17 (0.17%) Palantir Foundry
15 16 (0.16%) IIS
16 14 (0.14%) Oracle Workflow
17 13 (0.13%) JBoss
18 10 (0.100%) NetWeaver
19 9 (0.090%) Tuxedo
Applications
1 180 (1.80%) Microsoft Excel
2 134 (1.34%) Microsoft Office
3 97 (0.97%) Microsoft Project
4 82 (0.82%) Microsoft PowerPoint
5 32 (0.32%) MS Visio
6 25 (0.25%) Spreadsheet
7 16 (0.16%) AutoCAD
7 16 (0.16%) Revit
8 15 (0.15%) SOLIDWORKS
9 13 (0.13%) Simulink
10 8 (0.080%) Chatbot
11 7 (0.070%) Windchill
12 6 (0.060%) Adobe XD
12 6 (0.060%) Sketch
13 5 (0.050%) Adobe Creative Suite
13 5 (0.050%) Notepad++
14 3 (0.030%) Trello
15 2 (0.020%) Houdini
15 2 (0.020%) InDesign
15 2 (0.020%) Oracle Smart View
Business Applications
1 121 (1.21%) SAP S/4HANA
2 75 (0.75%) Remedy ITSM
3 46 (0.46%) Oracle ERP
4 34 (0.34%) Oracle EBS
5 32 (0.32%) Sparx Enterprise Architect
6 29 (0.29%) Dynamics CRM
6 29 (0.29%) Teamcenter
7 22 (0.22%) SAP PSCD
8 20 (0.20%) Oracle Payroll
9 16 (0.16%) Oracle Payables
9 16 (0.16%) Primavera
10 14 (0.14%) SAP HR
11 13 (0.13%) Findur
12 12 (0.12%) iTrent
12 12 (0.12%) SAP FI
12 12 (0.12%) Siebel CRM
12 12 (0.12%) Temenos T24
13 11 (0.11%) NetSuite
14 10 (0.100%) SAP ERP
14 10 (0.100%) SAP GRC
Cloud Services
1 1,864 (18.63%) Azure
2 1,650 (16.49%) AWS
3 468 (4.68%) Azure DevOps
4 440 (4.40%) Power Platform
5 426 (4.26%) GitHub
6 381 (3.81%) GCP
7 283 (2.83%) Microsoft 365
8 277 (2.77%) GitHub Actions
9 263 (2.63%) Entra ID
10 245 (2.45%) Serverless
11 201 (2.01%) Amazon S3
12 166 (1.66%) AWS Lambda
13 151 (1.51%) OCI
14 150 (1.50%) SaaS
15 136 (1.36%) Amazon CloudWatch
16 131 (1.31%) OpenShift
17 125 (1.25%) Amazon EC2
18 121 (1.21%) PaaS
19 119 (1.19%) Amazon EKS
20 106 (1.06%) Power Automate
Communications & Networking
1 424 (4.24%) Firewall
2 347 (3.47%) DNS
3 204 (2.04%) WAN
4 200 (2.00%) Network Security
5 179 (1.79%) VPN
6 176 (1.76%) DHCP
7 173 (1.73%) LAN
8 133 (1.33%) BGP
8 133 (1.33%) TCP/IP
9 122 (1.22%) Wi-Fi
10 102 (1.02%) VLAN
11 95 (0.95%) OSPF
12 78 (0.78%) Wireless
13 69 (0.69%) VSAN
14 59 (0.59%) IPsec
15 58 (0.58%) MPLS
15 58 (0.58%) SD-WAN
16 52 (0.52%) SAN
16 52 (0.52%) SSL
17 45 (0.45%) VXLAN
Database & Business Intelligence
1 315 (3.15%) Power BI
2 262 (2.62%) SQL Server
3 243 (2.43%) Data Warehouse
4 241 (2.41%) PostgreSQL
5 146 (1.46%) Oracle Database
6 136 (1.36%) Metadata
7 115 (1.15%) Data Lake
8 107 (1.07%) Relational Database
9 99 (0.99%) Amazon RDS
10 87 (0.87%) MySQL
11 85 (0.85%) NoSQL
11 85 (0.85%) Oracle Reports
12 83 (0.83%) MongoDB
13 78 (0.78%) Pentaho
14 61 (0.61%) Amazon Redshift
15 60 (0.60%) Amazon Athena
16 53 (0.53%) Tableau
17 51 (0.51%) Elasticsearch
18 44 (0.44%) Amazon Aurora
18 44 (0.44%) Big Data
Development Applications
1 556 (5.56%) JIRA
2 478 (4.78%) Git
3 413 (4.13%) GitLab
4 397 (3.97%) Jenkins
5 106 (1.06%) Selenium
6 73 (0.73%) SonarQube
7 72 (0.72%) Postman
8 61 (0.61%) JUnit
9 55 (0.55%) JMeter
10 54 (0.54%) Maven
11 52 (0.52%) Rational DOORS
12 43 (0.43%) Cucumber
12 43 (0.43%) Visual Studio
13 42 (0.42%) Zephyr
14 41 (0.41%) Bitbucket
15 40 (0.40%) Mockito
16 36 (0.36%) Cypress.io
17 35 (0.35%) Gradle
18 34 (0.34%) Artifactory
19 32 (0.32%) REST Assured
General
1 2,128 (21.27%) Social Skills
2 2,015 (20.14%) Public Sector
3 785 (7.85%) Analytical Skills
4 699 (6.99%) Finance
5 332 (3.32%) Military
6 295 (2.95%) Aerospace
7 246 (2.46%) Documentation Skills
8 171 (1.71%) Influencing Skills
9 148 (1.48%) Organisational Skills
10 142 (1.42%) Telecoms
11 137 (1.37%) Banking
12 133 (1.33%) Legal
13 106 (1.06%) Law
14 104 (1.04%) Inclusion and Diversity
15 98 (0.98%) Manufacturing
16 93 (0.93%) Police
17 64 (0.64%) Presentation Skills
18 44 (0.44%) Marketing
19 43 (0.43%) Retail
20 34 (0.34%) Local Government
Job Titles
1 1,510 (15.09%) Architect
2 1,025 (10.25%) Developer
3 944 (9.44%) Senior
4 933 (9.33%) Lead
5 559 (5.59%) Consultant
6 556 (5.56%) Analyst
7 454 (4.54%) Data Engineer
8 393 (3.93%) DevOps Engineer
9 382 (3.82%) Infrastructure Engineer
10 282 (2.82%) Software Engineer
11 269 (2.69%) Technical Architect
12 245 (2.45%) Solutions Architect
13 237 (2.37%) Network Engineer
14 227 (2.27%) Security Architect
15 222 (2.22%) Data Architect
16 191 (1.91%) Administrator
16 191 (1.91%) Delivery Manager
17 187 (1.87%) Java Developer
18 186 (1.86%) Project Manager
19 180 (1.80%) Azure Engineer
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 865 (8.65%) Terraform
2 376 (3.76%) REST
3 203 (2.03%) .NET
4 201 (2.01%) Spring
5 188 (1.88%) Kafka
6 175 (1.75%) React
6 175 (1.75%) Spring Boot
7 171 (1.71%) RESTful
8 151 (1.51%) SOAP
9 132 (1.32%) Node.js
10 127 (1.27%) JSON
11 119 (1.19%) AngularJS
12 115 (1.15%) HTML
13 114 (1.14%) Web Services
14 108 (1.08%) OAuth
15 92 (0.92%) XML
16 86 (0.86%) PySpark
17 81 (0.81%) CSS
18 79 (0.79%) Oracle Fusion
19 73 (0.73%) Middleware
Miscellaneous
1 436 (4.36%) Cloud Native
2 358 (3.58%) Onboarding
3 329 (3.29%) Product Ownership
4 263 (2.63%) Data Centre
5 170 (1.70%) Legacy Systems
6 153 (1.53%) Management Information System
7 151 (1.51%) PKI
8 132 (1.32%) Distributed Systems
9 130 (1.30%) Enterprise Software
10 126 (1.26%) CMDB
11 117 (1.17%) Self-Motivation
12 112 (1.12%) Hybrid Cloud
13 106 (1.06%) Replication
14 98 (0.98%) Data Structures
15 92 (0.92%) Clustering
16 90 (0.90%) Security Operations Centre
17 86 (0.86%) Cyber Threat
18 80 (0.80%) Public Cloud
19 75 (0.75%) Operational Technology
20 72 (0.72%) Security Posture
Operating Systems
1 874 (8.74%) Windows
2 700 (7.00%) Linux
3 317 (3.17%) Windows Server
4 200 (2.00%) Unix
5 137 (1.37%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
6 119 (1.19%) Windows 10
7 69 (0.69%) Android
8 60 (0.60%) Solaris
9 46 (0.46%) Mac OS
10 36 (0.36%) CentOS
11 35 (0.35%) Windows Server 2019
12 34 (0.34%) Ubuntu
13 32 (0.32%) AIX
13 32 (0.32%) Apple iOS
14 24 (0.24%) Windows 7
15 19 (0.19%) VMS
16 18 (0.18%) Windows Server 2012
16 18 (0.18%) Windows Server 2016
17 14 (0.14%) Embedded Linux
18 12 (0.12%) Windows Server 2008
Processes & Methodologies
1 2,115 (21.14%) Agile
2 1,562 (15.61%) DevOps
3 1,468 (14.67%) CI/CD
4 1,241 (12.41%) Stakeholder Management
5 1,153 (11.53%) Continuous Improvement
6 1,039 (10.39%) Problem-Solving
7 962 (9.62%) Stakeholder Engagement
8 834 (8.34%) Infrastructure as Code
9 817 (8.17%) Migration
10 726 (7.26%) Cybersecurity
11 696 (6.96%) ITIL
12 638 (6.38%) Test Automation
13 629 (6.29%) Analytics
14 603 (6.03%) Roadmaps
15 601 (6.01%) Software Engineering
16 599 (5.99%) Containerisation
17 574 (5.74%) AI
18 569 (5.69%) Technical Leadership
19 546 (5.46%) Decision-Making
20 534 (5.34%) Data Modelling
Programming Languages
1 1,108 (11.08%) Python
2 981 (9.81%) SQL
3 656 (6.56%) Java
4 524 (5.24%) PowerShell
5 354 (3.54%) JavaScript
6 277 (2.77%) Bash
7 231 (2.31%) C#
8 159 (1.59%) TypeScript
9 135 (1.35%) PL/SQL
10 103 (1.03%) Bicep
11 80 (0.80%) C++
12 69 (0.69%) Shell Script
13 64 (0.64%) C
14 45 (0.45%) Groovy
15 43 (0.43%) Go
16 42 (0.42%) Kotlin
17 39 (0.39%) Scala
18 35 (0.35%) Apex Code
19 34 (0.34%) Ruby
20 33 (0.33%) Data Analysis Expressions
Qualifications
1 7,507 (75.04%) SC Cleared
2 2,032 (20.31%) DV Cleared
3 425 (4.25%) Degree
4 367 (3.67%) BPSS Clearance
5 181 (1.81%) CISSP
6 163 (1.63%) Cisco Certification
7 156 (1.56%) Azure Certification
8 146 (1.46%) Microsoft Certification
9 126 (1.26%) AWS Certification
10 114 (1.14%) CISM
11 99 (0.99%) PMI Certification
12 97 (0.97%) PMP
13 82 (0.82%) ISTQB
14 78 (0.78%) CCNP
15 67 (0.67%) CCNA
16 66 (0.66%) VMware Certified Professional (VCP)
17 63 (0.63%) Computer Science Degree
18 42 (0.42%) ITIL Certification
19 41 (0.41%) VCAP
20 40 (0.40%) TOGAF Certification
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 429 (4.29%) QA
2 317 (3.17%) Data Quality
3 275 (2.75%) NIST
4 269 (2.69%) ISO/IEC 27001
5 235 (2.35%) NCSC
6 221 (2.21%) PMO
7 215 (2.15%) Accessibility
8 152 (1.52%) GDPR
9 128 (1.28%) GRC
9 128 (1.28%) SLA
10 65 (0.65%) WCAG
11 60 (0.60%) JSP 440
12 43 (0.43%) Cyber Essentials
13 42 (0.42%) NIST 800
14 34 (0.34%) Def Stans
15 30 (0.30%) ISO/IEC 20000
16 26 (0.26%) Government Security Classifications
16 26 (0.26%) HMG Security Policy Framework
17 21 (0.21%) Actionable Recommendations
18 19 (0.19%) RMADS
System Software
1 659 (6.59%) Docker
2 503 (5.03%) Active Directory
3 378 (3.78%) VMware Infrastructure
4 145 (1.45%) VMware NSX
5 135 (1.35%) VMware ESXi
6 119 (1.19%) vSphere
7 107 (1.07%) Hyper-V
8 77 (0.77%) Virtual Machines
9 40 (0.40%) Virtual Desktop
10 39 (0.39%) Oracle RAC
11 33 (0.33%) Firmware
12 26 (0.26%) BitLocker
13 25 (0.25%) vCloud
14 13 (0.13%) Postfix
15 11 (0.11%) NFS
15 11 (0.11%) Squid
16 10 (0.100%) Virtual Servers
17 9 (0.090%) KVM
18 8 (0.080%) Microsoft App-V
19 7 (0.070%) Embedded Firmware
Systems Management
1 802 (8.02%) Kubernetes
2 402 (4.02%) Ansible
3 225 (2.25%) Grafana
4 173 (1.73%) Prometheus
5 135 (1.35%) vCenter Server
6 121 (1.21%) SCCM
7 84 (0.84%) Microsoft Intune
8 72 (0.72%) SCOM
9 61 (0.61%) Argo
10 52 (0.52%) Puppet
11 50 (0.50%) Single Sign-On
12 47 (0.47%) Oracle RMAN
13 35 (0.35%) Data Guard
14 34 (0.34%) Progress Chef
15 28 (0.28%) Nagios
16 27 (0.27%) Control-M
16 27 (0.27%) FortiGate
16 27 (0.27%) WSUS
17 25 (0.25%) Istio
17 25 (0.25%) VxRail
Vendors
1 1,295 (12.94%) Microsoft
2 791 (7.91%) Oracle
3 547 (5.47%) VMware
4 467 (4.67%) ServiceNow
5 385 (3.85%) SAP
6 282 (2.82%) Cisco
7 214 (2.14%) Google
8 183 (1.83%) Splunk
9 182 (1.82%) Databricks
10 129 (1.29%) Red Hat
11 126 (1.26%) Salesforce
12 117 (1.17%) IBM
13 108 (1.08%) Palo Alto
14 104 (1.04%) Talend
15 103 (1.03%) Informatica
16 83 (0.83%) Remedy
17 80 (0.80%) Dynatrace
18 78 (0.78%) Juniper
19 74 (0.74%) SolarWinds
20 72 (0.72%) F5