2nd Line Engineer Contract Job Trends in London

Second Line Engineer
England > London

The median Second Line Engineer daily rate in London is £240, 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 415 340 361
Rank change year-on-year -75 +21 +30
Contract jobs requiring a 2nd Line Engineer 27 27 33
As % of all contract jobs in London 0.13% 0.20% 0.20%
As % of the Job Titles category 0.14% 0.22% 0.22%
Number of daily rates quoted 24 20 26
10th Percentile £190 £161 £140
25th Percentile £225 £170 £158
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £240 £238 £218
Median % change year-on-year +1.05% +9.20% +8.75%
75th Percentile £338 £269 £297
90th Percentile £364 £320 £355
England median daily rate £240 £200 £210
% change year-on-year +20.00% -4.76% +3.96%
Number of hourly rates quoted 1 1 0
Median hourly rate £27.00 £24.66 -
Median % change year-on-year +9.49% - -
England median hourly rate £15.24 £22.88 £22.58
% change year-on-year -33.38% +1.31% +7.52%

All Contract IT Job Roles
London

For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all contract IT job vacancies in London. 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 London with a recognized job title 18,705 12,491 15,254
% of contract IT jobs with a recognized job title 93.17% 92.91% 94.07%
Number of daily rates quoted 12,164 8,408 10,681
10th Percentile £363 £325 £350
25th Percentile £450 £425 £450
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £550 £540 £550
Median % change year-on-year +1.85% -1.82% -4.35%
75th Percentile £659 £675 £688
90th Percentile £775 £775 £800
England median daily rate £525 £510 £525
% change year-on-year +2.94% -2.86% -4.55%
Number of hourly rates quoted 354 206 198
10th Percentile £17.60 £17.98 £17.25
25th Percentile £21.93 £22.93 £22.00
Median hourly rate £37.50 £29.04 £33.29
Median % change year-on-year +29.15% -12.77% -11.05%
75th Percentile £59.94 £49.31 £54.69
90th Percentile £79.63 £65.00 £71.88
England median hourly rate £42.50 £25.15 £45.00
% change year-on-year +68.99% -44.11% +7.40%

2nd Line Engineer
Job Vacancy Trend in London

Historical trend showing the proportion of contract IT job postings featuring '2nd Line Engineer' in the job title relative to all contract IT jobs advertised in London.

2nd Line Engineer job vacancy trend in London

2nd Line Engineer
Daily Rate Trend in London

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for 2nd Line Engineer job vacancies in London.

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for 2nd Line Engineer job vacancies in London

2nd Line Engineer
Daily Rate Histogram in London

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing 2nd Line Engineer in London over the 6 months to 19 August 2026.

Daily rate histogram for 2nd Line Engineer in London

2nd Line Engineer
Hourly Rate Trend in London

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for 2nd Line Engineer job vacancies in London.

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for 2nd Line Engineer job vacancies in London

2nd Line Engineer
Contract Job Locations in London

The table below looks at the demand and provides a guide to the median contractor rates quoted in IT jobs citing 2nd Line Engineer within the London 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
West London -21 8 £240 -4.00% 1
Central London -7 4 £220 -
2nd Line Engineer
England

2nd Line Engineer Skill Set
Top 30 Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities in London

For the 6 months to 19 August 2026, 2nd Line 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 London region featuring 2nd Line Engineer in the job title.

1 26 (96.30%) Windows
2 17 (62.96%) Microsoft 365
3 15 (55.56%) Active Directory
4 11 (40.74%) Microsoft
5 10 (37.04%) Mac OS
6 7 (25.93%) Customer Service
6 7 (25.93%) Entra ID
6 7 (25.93%) Migration
7 6 (22.22%) DNS
7 6 (22.22%) Problem-Solving
7 6 (22.22%) TCP/IP
7 6 (22.22%) Windows 10
8 5 (18.52%) Apple
8 5 (18.52%) Linux
9 4 (14.81%) Configuration Management
9 4 (14.81%) Degree
9 4 (14.81%) SCCM
9 4 (14.81%) Security Cleared
9 4 (14.81%) Ubuntu
9 4 (14.81%) Wi-Fi
10 3 (11.11%) Antivirus Management
10 3 (11.11%) Apple iOS
10 3 (11.11%) Internet
10 3 (11.11%) Inventory Management
10 3 (11.11%) Samsung
10 3 (11.11%) SC Cleared
10 3 (11.11%) User Experience
10 3 (11.11%) VPN
11 2 (7.41%) Android
11 2 (7.41%) Azure

2nd Line Engineer Skill Set
Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities in London 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 2 (7.41%) Microsoft Exchange
2 1 (3.70%) Exchange Server 2013
2 1 (3.70%) SharePoint
Applications
1 2 (7.41%) Microsoft Office
Cloud Services
1 17 (62.96%) Microsoft 365
2 7 (25.93%) Entra ID
3 2 (7.41%) Azure
4 1 (3.70%) AWS
Communications & Networking
1 6 (22.22%) DNS
1 6 (22.22%) TCP/IP
2 4 (14.81%) Wi-Fi
3 3 (11.11%) Internet
3 3 (11.11%) VPN
4 1 (3.70%) DHCP
4 1 (3.70%) LAN
4 1 (3.70%) WAN
Database & Business Intelligence
1 1 (3.70%) SQL Server
General
1 6 (22.22%) Finance
2 4 (14.81%) Social Skills
3 1 (3.70%) Banking
3 1 (3.70%) Inclusion and Diversity
3 1 (3.70%) Investment Banking
3 1 (3.70%) Public Sector
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 1 (3.70%) Microsoft Graph
Miscellaneous
1 2 (7.41%) iPhone
2 1 (3.70%) iPad
2 1 (3.70%) Onboarding
2 1 (3.70%) Smartphone
2 1 (3.70%) Video Conferencing
Operating Systems
1 26 (96.30%) Windows
2 10 (37.04%) Mac OS
3 6 (22.22%) Windows 10
4 5 (18.52%) Linux
5 4 (14.81%) Ubuntu
6 3 (11.11%) Apple iOS
7 2 (7.41%) Android
7 2 (7.41%) Windows Server
8 1 (3.70%) OpenVMS
8 1 (3.70%) VMS
8 1 (3.70%) Windows 7
8 1 (3.70%) Windows Server 2008
8 1 (3.70%) Windows Server 2012
8 1 (3.70%) Windows Server 2019
Processes & Methodologies
1 7 (25.93%) Customer Service
1 7 (25.93%) Migration
2 6 (22.22%) Problem-Solving
3 4 (14.81%) Configuration Management
4 3 (11.11%) Antivirus Management
4 3 (11.11%) Inventory Management
4 3 (11.11%) User Experience
5 2 (7.41%) ITIL
5 2 (7.41%) Service Management
6 1 (3.70%) Agile
6 1 (3.70%) Continuous Improvement
6 1 (3.70%) DevOps
6 1 (3.70%) Incident Management
6 1 (3.70%) Investment Management
6 1 (3.70%) ITSM
6 1 (3.70%) Mobile Device Management
6 1 (3.70%) RBAC
6 1 (3.70%) Root Cause Analysis
6 1 (3.70%) Software Deployment
6 1 (3.70%) Ticket Management
Programming Languages
1 2 (7.41%) PowerShell
2 1 (3.70%) SQL
Qualifications
1 4 (14.81%) Degree
1 4 (14.81%) Security Cleared
2 3 (11.11%) SC Cleared
3 1 (3.70%) CCNA
3 1 (3.70%) Cisco Certification
3 1 (3.70%) DV Cleared
3 1 (3.70%) ITIL Certification
3 1 (3.70%) ITIL Foundation Certificate
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 1 (3.70%) Cyber Essentials
1 1 (3.70%) NCSC
1 1 (3.70%) SLA
System Software
1 15 (55.56%) Active Directory
2 1 (3.70%) Virtual Servers
2 1 (3.70%) VMware Infrastructure
Systems Management
1 4 (14.81%) SCCM
2 2 (7.41%) Microsoft Intune
3 1 (3.70%) NetBackup
3 1 (3.70%) WSUS
Vendors
1 11 (40.74%) Microsoft
2 5 (18.52%) Apple
3 3 (11.11%) Samsung
4 2 (7.41%) Google
4 2 (7.41%) ServiceNow
5 1 (3.70%) HP
5 1 (3.70%) Oracle
5 1 (3.70%) Snow
5 1 (3.70%) Veeam
5 1 (3.70%) Veritas
5 1 (3.70%) VMware
5 1 (3.70%) Yealink