NIST Contract Job Trends in London

National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST)
England > London

The table below provides summary statistics and contractor rates for jobs advertised in London requiring NIST skills. It covers contract job vacancies from the 6 months leading up to 27 August 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
27 Aug 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 169 162 221
Rank change year-on-year -7 +59 -13
Contract jobs citing NIST 329 220 174
As % of all contract jobs in London 1.64% 1.64% 1.07%
As % of the Quality Assurance & Compliance category 8.66% 9.60% 7.82%
Number of daily rates quoted 223 153 137
10th Percentile £434 £422 £475
25th Percentile £500 £513 £540
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £590 £590 £650
Median % change year-on-year - -9.23% -3.70%
75th Percentile £701 £700 £775
90th Percentile £790 £825 £780
England median daily rate £575 £599 £650
% change year-on-year -4.01% -7.85% -

All Quality Assurance and Compliance Skills
London

NIST falls under the Quality Assurance and Compliance category. For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all contract job vacancies requiring quality assurance or compliance skills in London.

Contract vacancies with a requirement for quality assurance or compliance skills 3,800 2,291 2,226
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in London 18.90% 17.12% 13.69%
Number of daily rates quoted 2,557 1,534 1,475
10th Percentile £350 £325 £338
25th Percentile £425 £413 £425
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £525 £525 £550
Median % change year-on-year - -4.55% -4.35%
75th Percentile £638 £650 £675
90th Percentile £738 £756 £794
England median daily rate £508 £500 £525
% change year-on-year +1.50% -4.76% -2.78%
Number of hourly rates quoted 47 49 41
10th Percentile £20.13 - £18.13
25th Percentile £23.16 £25.15 £22.00
Median hourly rate £28.55 £34.00 £27.84
Median % change year-on-year -16.03% +22.13% +1.24%
75th Percentile £40.00 £43.21 £50.00
90th Percentile £58.00 £54.00 £71.88
England median hourly rate £36.07 £31.64 £25.77
% change year-on-year +14.00% +22.80% -27.42%

NIST
Job Vacancy Trend in London

Historical trend showing the proportion of contract IT job postings citing NIST relative to all contract IT jobs advertised in London.

NIST job vacancy trend in London

NIST
Daily Rate Trend in London

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in London citing NIST.

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in London citing NIST

NIST
Daily Rate Histogram in London

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing NIST in London over the 6 months to 27 August 2026.

Daily rate histogram for NIST in London

NIST
Hourly Rate Trend in London

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in London citing NIST.

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in London citing NIST

NIST
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 NIST within the London region over the 6 months to 27 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
Central London -6 48 £580 -5.38% 19
West London -18 4 £431 +11.29% 12
East London 0 3 £750 +33.33% 1
South London -12 3 £744 +35.18% 1
North London - 1 £650 - 1
NIST
England

NIST
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 6 (1.82%) SharePoint
2 5 (1.52%) Microsoft Exchange
3 4 (1.22%) Confluence
4 1 (0.30%) OpenStack
4 1 (0.30%) Red Hat Fuse
Applications
1 8 (2.43%) Microsoft Excel
2 4 (1.22%) Microsoft PowerPoint
3 2 (0.61%) Microsoft Project
4 1 (0.30%) Microsoft Office
Cloud Services
1 144 (43.77%) Azure
2 107 (32.52%) AWS
3 61 (18.54%) Entra ID
4 52 (15.81%) GCP
5 21 (6.38%) Azure Sentinel
6 19 (5.78%) SaaS
7 18 (5.47%) Azure DevOps
8 17 (5.17%) Microsoft 365
9 14 (4.26%) OCI
10 11 (3.34%) Microsoft Purview
11 10 (3.04%) GitHub
12 9 (2.74%) AWS Control Tower
13 8 (2.43%) Azure Key Vault
13 8 (2.43%) Datadog
14 6 (1.82%) Amazon S3
14 6 (1.82%) AWS KMS
14 6 (1.82%) Azure Monitor
14 6 (1.82%) GitHub Actions
14 6 (1.82%) Serverless
15 5 (1.52%) Azure Logic Apps
Communications & Networking
1 27 (8.21%) Network Security
2 17 (5.17%) Firewall
3 12 (3.65%) DNS
4 10 (3.04%) VPN
5 8 (2.43%) X.509
6 7 (2.13%) IPsec
6 7 (2.13%) TCP/IP
7 6 (1.82%) Kerberos
7 6 (1.82%) NGFW
8 5 (1.52%) HTTP
8 5 (1.52%) SSL
9 4 (1.22%) SSH
10 3 (0.91%) Cisco IPT
10 3 (0.91%) DHCP
10 3 (0.91%) Internet
10 3 (0.91%) Modbus
11 2 (0.61%) 4G
11 2 (0.61%) IPv4
11 2 (0.61%) S/MIME
11 2 (0.61%) WAN
Database & Business Intelligence
1 5 (1.52%) Amazon RDS
1 5 (1.52%) DynamoDB
2 4 (1.22%) Big Data
3 3 (0.91%) Azure SQL Database
4 2 (0.61%) Power BI
5 1 (0.30%) Data Hub
5 1 (0.30%) Metadata
5 1 (0.30%) PostgreSQL
Development Applications
1 10 (3.04%) JIRA
2 7 (2.13%) GitLab
3 6 (1.82%) Jenkins
3 6 (1.82%) Snyk
4 4 (1.22%) Burp Suite
4 4 (1.22%) Git
4 4 (1.22%) SonarQube
5 2 (0.61%) Claude Code
5 2 (0.61%) MSI
5 2 (0.61%) Robot Framework
5 2 (0.61%) Selenium
5 2 (0.61%) TestRail
6 1 (0.30%) Postman
General
1 104 (31.61%) Social Skills
2 92 (27.96%) Finance
3 44 (13.37%) Analytical Skills
4 27 (8.21%) Banking
5 25 (7.60%) Public Sector
6 23 (6.99%) Legal
7 15 (4.56%) Documentation Skills
8 9 (2.74%) Influencing Skills
9 7 (2.13%) Financial Institution
9 7 (2.13%) Manufacturing
10 5 (1.52%) Law
11 4 (1.22%) Presentation Skills
12 3 (0.91%) Investment Banking
12 3 (0.91%) Local Government
12 3 (0.91%) Organisational Skills
12 3 (0.91%) Retail
12 3 (0.91%) Telecoms
13 2 (0.61%) German Language
13 2 (0.61%) Inclusion and Diversity
13 2 (0.61%) Pharmaceutical
Job Titles
1 87 (26.44%) Architect
2 55 (16.72%) Analyst
3 48 (14.59%) Security Architect
4 38 (11.55%) Consultant
5 28 (8.51%) Senior
6 27 (8.21%) Lead
7 25 (7.60%) Security Analyst
8 23 (6.99%) Security Consultant
9 21 (6.38%) Business Analyst
10 20 (6.08%) Security Engineer
11 16 (4.86%) Cybersecurity Consultant
12 15 (4.56%) Security Manager
13 13 (3.95%) Cybersecurity Analyst
13 13 (3.95%) Project Manager
13 13 (3.95%) Solutions Architect
14 11 (3.34%) Senior Architect
15 9 (2.74%) CyberArk Architect
15 9 (2.74%) Cybersecurity Architect
15 9 (2.74%) Security Specialist
16 8 (2.43%) Cloud Architect
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 26 (7.90%) Terraform
2 16 (4.86%) SailPoint
3 13 (3.95%) OAuth
4 11 (3.34%) SAML
5 9 (2.74%) REST
6 8 (2.43%) JSON
7 7 (2.13%) LDAP
8 5 (1.52%) SOAP
9 4 (1.22%) OpenID
9 4 (1.22%) YAML
10 3 (0.91%) JDBC
10 3 (0.91%) Playwright
10 3 (0.91%) SLSA
10 3 (0.91%) SPIFFE
11 2 (0.61%) Azure Blueprints
11 2 (0.61%) Elastic Stack
11 2 (0.61%) Kafka
11 2 (0.61%) Middleware
11 2 (0.61%) pytest
11 2 (0.61%) RESTful
Miscellaneous
1 32 (9.73%) Cloud Native
2 29 (8.81%) Onboarding
3 27 (8.21%) Security Posture
4 21 (6.38%) Operational Technology
5 14 (4.26%) Hybrid Cloud
6 12 (3.65%) CMDB
7 11 (3.34%) AI Agents
8 10 (3.04%) Management Information System
9 9 (2.74%) Cyber Threat
9 9 (2.74%) PKI
9 9 (2.74%) SCADA
10 7 (2.13%) Self-Motivation
11 5 (1.52%) Cloud Security Posture
11 5 (1.52%) Data Centre
11 5 (1.52%) Enterprise Software
12 4 (1.22%) Algorithms
12 4 (1.22%) Data Protection Act
12 4 (1.22%) Legacy Systems
13 3 (0.91%) Cyber Defence
13 3 (0.91%) Security Operations Centre
Operating Systems
1 21 (6.38%) Windows
2 18 (5.47%) Linux
3 7 (2.13%) Windows Server
4 6 (1.82%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
5 4 (1.22%) Unix
6 3 (0.91%) Ubuntu
7 2 (0.61%) Alpine Linux
8 1 (0.30%) Android
8 1 (0.30%) Apple iOS
8 1 (0.30%) CentOS
8 1 (0.30%) Mac OS
Processes & Methodologies
1 182 (55.32%) Cybersecurity
2 80 (24.32%) Security Architecture
3 72 (21.88%) Stakeholder Management
4 67 (20.36%) Risk Management
5 65 (19.76%) Cloud Security
6 61 (18.54%) Stakeholder Engagement
7 58 (17.63%) Roadmaps
8 55 (16.72%) Identity Access Management
9 50 (15.20%) AI
9 50 (15.20%) Incident Response
9 50 (15.20%) Threat Modelling
10 48 (14.59%) Vulnerability Management
11 47 (14.29%) CI/CD
11 47 (14.29%) Information Security
12 44 (13.37%) SIEM
12 44 (13.37%) Zero Trust
13 40 (12.16%) Continuous Improvement
13 40 (12.16%) DevOps
14 35 (10.64%) Agile
14 35 (10.64%) Risk Assessment
Programming Languages
1 40 (12.16%) Python
2 36 (10.94%) PowerShell
3 17 (5.17%) SQL
4 10 (3.04%) Bash
5 7 (2.13%) Java
6 6 (1.82%) Bicep
6 6 (1.82%) Kusto Query Language
7 3 (0.91%) BeanShell
8 2 (0.61%) C#
8 2 (0.61%) Go
8 2 (0.61%) Objective-C
9 1 (0.30%) C
9 1 (0.30%) JavaScript
9 1 (0.30%) Korn
Qualifications
1 96 (29.18%) CISSP
2 69 (20.97%) Security Cleared
3 53 (16.11%) CISM
4 52 (15.81%) SC Cleared
5 31 (9.42%) Degree
6 24 (7.29%) Cisco Certification
7 21 (6.38%) (ISC)2 CCSP
8 20 (6.08%) GIAC
9 19 (5.78%) Azure Certification
9 19 (5.78%) CEH
9 19 (5.78%) CRISC
10 18 (5.47%) CompTIA Security+
11 16 (4.86%) AWS Certification
11 16 (4.86%) CISA
12 15 (4.56%) DV Cleared
13 12 (3.65%) PMI Certification
13 12 (3.65%) PMP
14 10 (3.04%) CCSP
14 10 (3.04%) FFIEC
14 10 (3.04%) GCIH
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 200 (60.79%) ISO/IEC 27001
2 53 (16.11%) GDPR
3 42 (12.77%) GRC
4 37 (11.25%) COBIT
5 35 (10.64%) NCSC
6 27 (8.21%) NIST 800
7 21 (6.38%) PCI DSS
8 17 (5.17%) Cyber Essentials
8 17 (5.17%) SOC 2
9 15 (4.56%) Sarbanes-Oxley
10 12 (3.65%) EU AI Act
10 12 (3.65%) ISO/IEC 42001
10 12 (3.65%) ITGC
11 11 (3.34%) QA
12 8 (2.43%) Cyber Essentials PLUS
12 8 (2.43%) SLA
13 7 (2.13%) ISO/IEC 27002 (supersedes ISO/IEC 17799)
14 5 (1.52%) PMO
15 4 (1.22%) HIPAA
15 4 (1.22%) HMG Security Policy Framework
System Software
1 41 (12.46%) Active Directory
2 15 (4.56%) Docker
3 3 (0.91%) VMware Infrastructure
4 2 (0.61%) Hyper-V
4 2 (0.61%) OpenSSH
4 2 (0.61%) Virtual Machines
5 1 (0.30%) Firmware
5 1 (0.30%) Varnish
Systems Management
1 21 (6.38%) Kubernetes
2 12 (3.65%) Single Sign-On
3 10 (3.04%) Ansible
4 9 (2.74%) Microsoft Intune
5 3 (0.91%) Nessus
6 2 (0.61%) Argo
6 2 (0.61%) CASB
6 2 (0.61%) Docker Swarm
6 2 (0.61%) Grafana
6 2 (0.61%) HP Fortify
6 2 (0.61%) Nexpose
6 2 (0.61%) Prometheus
6 2 (0.61%) Puppet
6 2 (0.61%) SCCM
7 1 (0.30%) QRadar
Vendors
1 72 (21.88%) Microsoft
2 28 (8.51%) CyberArk
3 25 (7.60%) ServiceNow
4 23 (6.99%) Splunk
5 16 (4.86%) CrowdStrike
6 14 (4.26%) Google
7 13 (3.95%) Tenable
8 11 (3.34%) Qualys
9 9 (2.74%) Okta
9 9 (2.74%) Palo Alto
10 8 (2.43%) Zscaler
11 7 (2.13%) Rapid7
12 6 (1.82%) Cisco
13 5 (1.52%) ForgeRock
14 4 (1.22%) Veracode
15 3 (0.91%) BeyondTrust
15 3 (0.91%) Commvault
15 3 (0.91%) OpenAI
15 3 (0.91%) Salesforce
15 3 (0.91%) Workday