Systems Engineer Contract Job Trends in England

System Engineer
UK > England

The median System Engineer daily rate in England is £475, according to job vacancies posted in the 6 months leading up to 19 August 2026.

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

6 months to
19 Aug 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 231 324 227
Rank change year-on-year +93 -97 +124
Contract jobs requiring a Systems Engineer 521 187 340
As % of all contract jobs in England 1.14% 0.68% 1.02%
As % of the Job Titles category 1.23% 0.74% 1.10%
Number of daily rates quoted 110 59 74
10th Percentile £261 £329 £316
25th Percentile £382 £400 £363
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £475 £475 £450
Median % change year-on-year - +5.56% -18.18%
75th Percentile £566 £600 £563
90th Percentile £725 £640 £629
UK median daily rate £475 £475 £450
% change year-on-year - +5.56% -18.18%
Number of hourly rates quoted 275 55 126
10th Percentile £47.47 £44.96 £39.96
25th Percentile £55.99 £51.72 £45.30
Median hourly rate £65.90 £56.44 £65.00
Median % change year-on-year +16.76% -13.17% +15.06%
75th Percentile £74.98 £73.50 £71.44
90th Percentile £80.00 £75.47 £76.86
UK median hourly rate £67.00 £56.44 £62.50
% change year-on-year +18.71% -9.70% +9.02%

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 42,268 25,250 30,900
% of contract IT jobs with a recognized job title 92.45% 91.54% 92.94%
Number of daily rates quoted 25,556 16,282 20,186
10th Percentile £325 £281 £300
25th Percentile £425 £400 £413
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £525 £510 £525
Median % change year-on-year +2.94% -2.86% -4.55%
75th Percentile £630 £625 £638
90th Percentile £738 £738 £750
UK median daily rate £525 £500 £525
% change year-on-year +5.00% -4.76% -1.87%
Number of hourly rates quoted 3,197 1,355 1,747
10th Percentile £15.24 £13.50 £14.16
25th Percentile £21.25 £17.48 £21.00
Median hourly rate £42.50 £25.15 £45.00
Median % change year-on-year +68.99% -44.11% +7.40%
75th Percentile £68.00 £55.00 £66.33
90th Percentile £80.00 £73.75 £75.00
UK median hourly rate £41.71 £25.15 £43.00
% change year-on-year +65.84% -41.51% +2.87%

Systems Engineer
Job Vacancy Trend in England

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

Systems Engineer job vacancy trend in England

Systems Engineer
Daily Rate Trend in England

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

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for Systems Engineer job vacancies in England

Systems Engineer
Daily Rate Histogram in England

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing Systems Engineer in England over the 6 months to 19 August 2026.

Daily rate histogram for Systems Engineer in England

Systems Engineer
Hourly Rate Trend in England

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

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for Systems Engineer job vacancies in England

Systems Engineer
Hourly Rate Histogram in England

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing Systems Engineer in England over the 6 months to 19 August 2026.

Hourly rate histogram for Systems Engineer in England

Systems 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 Systems Engineer within the England region over the 6 months to 19 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
South East +35 149 £500 +5.26% 189
South West +37 124 £495 -1.00% 127
London -32 81 £475 -9.09% 144
Midlands -2 60 £475 +11.76% 71
East of England -16 53 £250 -54.55% 74
North of England -49 53 £488 +12.85% 86
North West -38 37 £500 +15.74% 52
West Midlands -30 35 £395 -22.93% 46
East Midlands -2 25 £475 +533.33% 24
Yorkshire - 9 £275 - 26
North East -32 7 £350 - 18
Systems Engineer
UK

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

For the 6 months to 19 August 2026, Systems 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 Systems Engineer in the job title.

1 98 (18.81%) Security Cleared
2 96 (18.43%) Systems Engineering
3 80 (15.36%) SC Cleared
4 55 (10.56%) Validation
5 42 (8.06%) Windows
6 38 (7.29%) Verification and Validation
7 36 (6.91%) Rational DOORS
8 35 (6.72%) Microsoft
9 32 (6.14%) Linux
10 31 (5.95%) Degree
11 26 (4.99%) Model-Based Systems Engineering
12 25 (4.80%) Active Directory
12 25 (4.80%) Azure
12 25 (4.80%) Configuration Management
12 25 (4.80%) Problem-Solving
13 23 (4.41%) Windows Server
14 20 (3.84%) Python
15 19 (3.65%) VMware
15 19 (3.65%) VMware Infrastructure
16 18 (3.45%) DNS
16 18 (3.45%) EMC
17 17 (3.26%) Disaster Recovery
17 17 (3.26%) ITIL
18 16 (3.07%) BPSS Clearance
18 16 (3.07%) Firewall
18 16 (3.07%) PowerShell
19 15 (2.88%) Microsoft 365
20 14 (2.69%) DHCP
20 14 (2.69%) Hyper-V
20 14 (2.69%) MATLAB

Systems 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 4 (0.77%) JBoss
1 4 (0.77%) SAS
2 3 (0.58%) Microsoft Exchange
2 3 (0.58%) SharePoint
3 2 (0.38%) Confluence
Applications
1 13 (2.50%) Simulink
2 4 (0.77%) Stateflow
3 1 (0.19%) Microsoft Office
Business Applications
1 3 (0.58%) Sparx Enterprise Architect
2 1 (0.19%) ResourceLink
Cloud Services
1 25 (4.80%) Azure
2 15 (2.88%) Microsoft 365
3 12 (2.30%) Entra ID
4 11 (2.11%) AWS
5 10 (1.92%) SaaS
6 9 (1.73%) OpenShift
7 5 (0.96%) GitHub
8 4 (0.77%) GCP
9 3 (0.58%) Azure Logic Apps
9 3 (0.58%) Azure Monitor
9 3 (0.58%) GitHub Actions
10 2 (0.38%) Cloudflare
10 2 (0.38%) OneDrive
11 1 (0.19%) Amazon CloudWatch
11 1 (0.19%) AWS Lambda
11 1 (0.19%) AWS Step Functions
11 1 (0.19%) Azure Sentinel
11 1 (0.19%) Azure Service Bus
11 1 (0.19%) IaaS
11 1 (0.19%) Serverless
Communications & Networking
1 18 (3.45%) DNS
2 16 (3.07%) Firewall
3 14 (2.69%) DHCP
4 11 (2.11%) TCP/IP
5 10 (1.92%) Network Security
6 9 (1.73%) LAN
6 9 (1.73%) VPN
7 6 (1.15%) IPv4
7 6 (1.15%) Kerberos
7 6 (1.15%) Modbus
7 6 (1.15%) VLAN
8 5 (0.96%) ATM
9 4 (0.77%) WAN
10 3 (0.58%) NAS
10 3 (0.58%) SAN
11 2 (0.38%) DKIM
11 2 (0.38%) DMARC
11 2 (0.38%) Software-Defined Networking
11 2 (0.38%) VoIP
12 1 (0.19%) SpaceWire
Database & Business Intelligence
1 4 (0.77%) Big Data
1 4 (0.77%) Hadoop
2 3 (0.58%) SQL Server
3 2 (0.38%) SQL Server Reporting Services
4 1 (0.19%) Db2
4 1 (0.19%) GIS
4 1 (0.19%) NoSQL
Development Applications
1 36 (6.91%) Rational DOORS
2 7 (1.34%) Rational Rhapsody
3 3 (0.58%) JIRA
4 1 (0.19%) CANoe
4 1 (0.19%) Git
4 1 (0.19%) Jenkins
4 1 (0.19%) Storybook
General
1 84 (16.12%) Aerospace
2 42 (8.06%) Social Skills
3 28 (5.37%) Avionics
4 25 (4.80%) Analytical Skills
4 25 (4.80%) Military
5 22 (4.22%) Manufacturing
6 16 (3.07%) Automotive
7 14 (2.69%) Electronics
8 13 (2.50%) Finance
9 10 (1.92%) Law
10 5 (0.96%) Aviation
11 4 (0.77%) Games
11 4 (0.77%) Influencing Skills
11 4 (0.77%) Presentation Skills
12 3 (0.58%) Documentation Skills
12 3 (0.58%) Public Sector
12 3 (0.58%) Telecoms
13 1 (0.19%) Banking
13 1 (0.19%) Financial Institution
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 6 (1.15%) NETCONF
2 5 (0.96%) OpenID
2 5 (0.96%) SAML
3 3 (0.58%) ISPF
3 3 (0.58%) REST
4 2 (0.38%) ARM Templates
4 2 (0.38%) HTML
4 2 (0.38%) Microsoft Graph
4 2 (0.38%) Middleware
5 1 (0.19%) CSS
5 1 (0.19%) JSON
5 1 (0.19%) Node.js
5 1 (0.19%) OpenGL
5 1 (0.19%) Qt
5 1 (0.19%) RESTful
5 1 (0.19%) SailPoint
5 1 (0.19%) XML
Miscellaneous
1 11 (2.11%) Operational Technology
2 10 (1.92%) SCADA
3 9 (1.73%) Renewable Energy
4 6 (1.15%) Embedded Systems
4 6 (1.15%) IoT
4 6 (1.15%) Mainframe
5 5 (0.96%) Clustering
5 5 (0.96%) Hybrid Cloud
5 5 (0.96%) Management Information System
5 5 (0.96%) Virtual Team
6 4 (0.77%) Animation
6 4 (0.77%) Data Centre
6 4 (0.77%) Legacy Systems
6 4 (0.77%) Onboarding
7 3 (0.58%) Acoustics
7 3 (0.58%) Cloud Native
7 3 (0.58%) Self-Motivation
8 2 (0.38%) Algorithms
8 2 (0.38%) Enterprise Software
8 2 (0.38%) Linux Command Line
Operating Systems
1 42 (8.06%) Windows
2 32 (6.14%) Linux
3 23 (4.41%) Windows Server
4 11 (2.11%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
5 6 (1.15%) Windows 10
6 5 (0.96%) Unix
7 4 (0.77%) zOS
8 3 (0.58%) Android
8 3 (0.58%) MVS
9 1 (0.19%) Debian
9 1 (0.19%) FreeRTOS
9 1 (0.19%) Mac OS
Processes & Methodologies
1 96 (18.43%) Systems Engineering
2 55 (10.56%) Validation
3 38 (7.29%) Verification and Validation
4 26 (4.99%) Model-Based Systems Engineering
5 25 (4.80%) Configuration Management
5 25 (4.80%) Problem-Solving
6 17 (3.26%) Disaster Recovery
6 17 (3.26%) ITIL
7 14 (2.69%) Project Management
8 13 (2.50%) Workflow
9 12 (2.30%) Root Cause Analysis
10 11 (2.11%) Agile
10 11 (2.11%) Continuous Improvement
10 11 (2.11%) Infrastructure as Code
10 11 (2.11%) Project Delivery
10 11 (2.11%) SysML
11 10 (1.92%) Migration
11 10 (1.92%) Network Architecture
11 10 (1.92%) Stakeholder Management
11 10 (1.92%) Test Automation
Programming Languages
1 20 (3.84%) Python
2 16 (3.07%) PowerShell
3 14 (2.69%) MATLAB
4 7 (1.34%) Bash
5 6 (1.15%) REXX
6 4 (0.77%) C
7 3 (0.58%) Bicep
7 3 (0.58%) JCL
7 3 (0.58%) SQL
8 2 (0.38%) C++
8 2 (0.38%) Java
9 1 (0.19%) COBOL
9 1 (0.19%) Perl
9 1 (0.19%) Rust
9 1 (0.19%) Shell Script
Qualifications
1 98 (18.81%) Security Cleared
2 80 (15.36%) SC Cleared
3 31 (5.95%) Degree
4 16 (3.07%) BPSS Clearance
5 10 (1.92%) DV Cleared
6 6 (1.15%) Microsoft Certification
7 5 (0.96%) Azure Certification
7 5 (0.96%) Chartered Engineer
7 5 (0.96%) Cisco Certification
8 4 (0.77%) CCNA
9 3 (0.58%) CCA
9 3 (0.58%) VMware Certified Professional (VCP)
10 2 (0.38%) AWS Certification
10 2 (0.38%) CCNP
10 2 (0.38%) Computer Science Degree
10 2 (0.38%) ITIL Foundation Certificate
11 1 (0.19%) CISSP
11 1 (0.19%) HND
11 1 (0.19%) Master's Degree
11 1 (0.19%) Numerate Degree
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 6 (1.15%) Def Stans
2 4 (0.77%) ISO/IEC 27001
3 3 (0.58%) ISO/IEC 15288
3 3 (0.58%) NCSC
3 3 (0.58%) QA
4 2 (0.38%) Data Quality
4 2 (0.38%) DO-254
4 2 (0.38%) GxP
4 2 (0.38%) NIST
5 1 (0.19%) Accessibility
5 1 (0.19%) ARP4761
5 1 (0.19%) Cyber Essentials
5 1 (0.19%) DICOM
5 1 (0.19%) HAZOP
5 1 (0.19%) HL7
5 1 (0.19%) IEC 61508
5 1 (0.19%) ISO 26262
5 1 (0.19%) MIL-STD-1553
5 1 (0.19%) NIST 800
5 1 (0.19%) WCAG
System Software
1 25 (4.80%) Active Directory
2 19 (3.65%) VMware Infrastructure
3 14 (2.69%) Hyper-V
4 6 (1.15%) Firmware
5 4 (0.77%) Docker
5 4 (0.77%) Virtual Desktop
5 4 (0.77%) Virtual Machines
6 3 (0.58%) Embedded Firmware
7 2 (0.38%) VMware Workstation
8 1 (0.19%) Job Entry Subsystem
8 1 (0.19%) KVM
8 1 (0.19%) Microsoft App-V
Systems Management
1 11 (2.11%) Ansible
2 10 (1.92%) Kubernetes
3 9 (1.73%) Terraform
4 8 (1.54%) Microsoft Intune
4 8 (1.54%) Puppet
5 5 (0.96%) Failover Clustering
6 4 (0.77%) Progress Chef
6 4 (0.77%) Red Hat Satellite
7 2 (0.38%) Functional Safety
7 2 (0.38%) Grafana
7 2 (0.38%) Istio
7 2 (0.38%) Prometheus
7 2 (0.38%) Tivoli NetView
8 1 (0.19%) Amdocs OSS
8 1 (0.19%) Control-M
8 1 (0.19%) Microsoft Clustering
8 1 (0.19%) Packer
8 1 (0.19%) PingFederate
8 1 (0.19%) SCCM
8 1 (0.19%) Single Sign-On
Vendors
1 35 (6.72%) Microsoft
2 19 (3.65%) VMware
3 18 (3.45%) EMC
4 12 (2.30%) Cisco
5 11 (2.11%) IBM
5 11 (2.11%) Red Hat
6 4 (0.77%) Perforce
6 4 (0.77%) SaltStack
6 4 (0.77%) ServiceNow
7 3 (0.58%) AVEVA
7 3 (0.58%) Fortinet
7 3 (0.58%) NEC
7 3 (0.58%) Rockwell
7 3 (0.58%) Siemens
7 3 (0.58%) Sparx
7 3 (0.58%) Splunk
8 2 (0.38%) BeyondTrust
8 2 (0.38%) Broadcom
8 2 (0.38%) CrowdStrike
8 2 (0.38%) Okta