DNS Contract Job Trends in the North West

Domain Name System (DNS)
England > North West

The table below provides summary statistics and contractor rates for jobs advertised in the North West requiring DNS skills. It covers contract job vacancies from the 6 months leading up to 15 October 2025, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
15 Oct 2025
Same period 2024 Same period 2023
Rank 74 71 85
Rank change year-on-year -3 +14 -24
Contract jobs citing DNS 62 49 59
As % of all contract jobs in the North West 2.79% 2.02% 2.08%
As % of the Communications & Networking category 21.53% 15.71% 12.24%
Number of daily rates quoted 19 25 35
10th Percentile £285 £313 £207
25th Percentile £415 £450 £344
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £450 £500 £395
Median % change year-on-year -10.00% +26.58% -29.78%
75th Percentile £543 £675 £531
90th Percentile £621 £750 £641
England median daily rate £510 £488 £500
% change year-on-year +4.62% -2.50% -3.85%
Number of hourly rates quoted 6 1 0
10th Percentile - - -
25th Percentile £15.50 £46.25 -
Median hourly rate £16.00 £47.50 -
Median % change year-on-year -66.32% - -
75th Percentile £16.50 £48.75 -
90th Percentile £41.88 - -
England median hourly rate £43.25 £23.99 £40.00
% change year-on-year +80.28% -40.03% +81.82%

All Communications and Computer Networking Skills
North West

DNS 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 the North West.

Contract vacancies with a requirement for communications or computer networking skills 288 312 482
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the North West 12.97% 12.89% 16.97%
Number of daily rates quoted 167 155 337
10th Percentile £146 £255 £325
25th Percentile £320 £413 £406
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £438 £500 £493
Median % change year-on-year -12.50% +1.42% +3.79%
75th Percentile £538 £584 £593
90th Percentile £683 £688 £650
England median daily rate £485 £500 £500
% change year-on-year -3.00% - -2.44%
Number of hourly rates quoted 15 9 10
10th Percentile - £24.61 £15.72
25th Percentile £15.50 £35.00 £15.75
Median hourly rate £19.00 £48.56 £16.68
Median % change year-on-year -60.87% +191.13% -16.10%
75th Percentile £34.97 £51.91 £46.88
90th Percentile £67.25 £52.02 £49.35
England median hourly rate £34.00 £57.50 £56.49
% change year-on-year -40.87% +1.79% +34.50%

DNS
Job Vacancy Trend in the North West

Historical trend showing the proportion of contract IT job postings citing DNS relative to all contract IT jobs advertised in the North West.

DNS job vacancy trend in the North West

DNS
Daily Rate Trend in the North West

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in the North West citing DNS.

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in the North West citing DNS

DNS
Daily Rate Histogram in the North West

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing DNS in the North West over the 6 months to 15 October 2025.

Daily rate histogram for DNS in the North West

DNS
Hourly Rate Trend in the North West

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in the North West citing DNS.

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in the North West citing DNS

DNS
Hourly Rate Histogram in the North West

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing DNS in the North West over the 6 months to 15 October 2025.

Hourly rate histogram for DNS in the North West

DNS
Contract Job Locations in the North West

The table below looks at the demand and provides a guide to the median contractor rates quoted in IT jobs citing DNS within the North West region over the 6 months to 15 October 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
Cheshire -12 24 £514 +4.42% 6
Merseyside +14 23 £295 - 2
Manchester -8 10 £518 +3.50% 22
Cumbria +13 4 £442 - 4
Lancashire - 1 £175 - 12
DNS
England

DNS
Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities in the North West 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 5 (8.06%) SharePoint
2 4 (6.45%) OpenStack
3 2 (3.23%) Microsoft Exchange
4 1 (1.61%) IIS
Applications
1 4 (6.45%) MS Visio
2 1 (1.61%) Microsoft Office
Cloud Services
1 12 (19.35%) Azure
2 10 (16.13%) Microsoft 365
3 9 (14.52%) AWS
4 8 (12.90%) SaaS
5 5 (8.06%) Power Platform
6 3 (4.84%) Azure Logic Apps
6 3 (4.84%) Entra ID
6 3 (4.84%) Virtual Private Cloud
7 2 (3.23%) AWS Direct Connect
7 2 (3.23%) Azure Monitor
7 2 (3.23%) Azure Sentinel
8 1 (1.61%) Amazon CloudWatch
8 1 (1.61%) Amazon ELB
8 1 (1.61%) AWS Lambda
8 1 (1.61%) Azure DevOps
8 1 (1.61%) Azure Service Bus
8 1 (1.61%) Azure Stack
8 1 (1.61%) Fastly
8 1 (1.61%) OneDrive
8 1 (1.61%) Serverless
Communications & Networking
1 26 (41.94%) F5 BIG-IP GTM
1 26 (41.94%) F5 BIG-IP LTM
2 25 (40.32%) DMZ
3 23 (37.10%) TCP/IP
4 21 (33.87%) Network Security
5 14 (22.58%) DHCP
5 14 (22.58%) SSL
6 13 (20.97%) Wireshark
7 12 (19.35%) Firewall
8 10 (16.13%) BIG-IP
8 10 (16.13%) HTTP
9 9 (14.52%) VLAN
10 8 (12.90%) BGP
11 5 (8.06%) Internet
11 5 (8.06%) Unified Communications
11 5 (8.06%) Wi-Fi
12 4 (6.45%) IPsec
12 4 (6.45%) MPLS
12 4 (6.45%) OSPF
12 4 (6.45%) Wireless
Database & Business Intelligence
1 1 (1.61%) PostgreSQL
1 1 (1.61%) SQL Server
Development Applications
1 9 (14.52%) Fiddler
2 1 (1.61%) Git
2 1 (1.61%) GitLab
2 1 (1.61%) Jenkins
General
1 21 (33.87%) Banking
1 21 (33.87%) Investment Banking
2 16 (25.81%) Social Skills
3 8 (12.90%) Public Sector
4 7 (11.29%) Analytical Skills
5 4 (6.45%) Finance
6 2 (3.23%) Documentation Skills
6 2 (3.23%) Military
7 1 (1.61%) Retail
Job Titles
1 19 (30.65%) Network Engineer
2 11 (17.74%) Operations Engineer
3 7 (11.29%) Automation Engineer
4 6 (9.68%) IT Support
4 6 (9.68%) Web Engineer
5 5 (8.06%) IT Support Technician
5 5 (8.06%) IT Technician
5 5 (8.06%) Junior
5 5 (8.06%) Junior Network Engineer
5 5 (8.06%) Python Engineer
5 5 (8.06%) Service Desk Support
5 5 (8.06%) Service Desk Technician
5 5 (8.06%) Support Technician
6 4 (6.45%) Cisco Engineer
6 4 (6.45%) Cisco Wireless Engineer
6 4 (6.45%) Network Designer
6 4 (6.45%) Senior
6 4 (6.45%) Server Engineer
6 4 (6.45%) Wireless Engineer
6 4 (6.45%) Wireless Network Engineer
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 3 (4.84%) LDAP
2 2 (3.23%) JSON
3 1 (1.61%) Flask
3 1 (1.61%) SQLAlchemy
3 1 (1.61%) YAML
Miscellaneous
1 20 (32.26%) Management Information System
2 9 (14.52%) Onboarding
3 6 (9.68%) Data Centre
4 5 (8.06%) Enterprise Software
4 5 (8.06%) Low-Code
4 5 (8.06%) Replication
4 5 (8.06%) Video Conferencing
5 4 (6.45%) Operational Technology
6 3 (4.84%) Cloud Security Posture
6 3 (4.84%) Security Posture
7 2 (3.23%) Clustering
7 2 (3.23%) Hybrid Cloud
8 1 (1.61%) Private Cloud
8 1 (1.61%) Product Ownership
Operating Systems
1 16 (25.81%) Windows
2 5 (8.06%) Windows Server
3 4 (6.45%) Linux
4 3 (4.84%) Unix
5 2 (3.23%) Windows 10
5 2 (3.23%) Windows Server 2019
6 1 (1.61%) Windows 7
6 1 (1.61%) Windows 8
6 1 (1.61%) Windows Server 2012
6 1 (1.61%) Windows Server 2016
Processes & Methodologies
1 30 (48.39%) Load Balancing
2 16 (25.81%) Business Strategy
3 10 (16.13%) Design Patterns
3 10 (16.13%) User Experience
4 8 (12.90%) Cybersecurity
4 8 (12.90%) Migration
4 8 (12.90%) Ticket Management
5 6 (9.68%) Change Management
5 6 (9.68%) Customer Service
5 6 (9.68%) Data Loss Prevention
5 6 (9.68%) Project Delivery
6 5 (8.06%) Business Intelligence
6 5 (8.06%) High Availability
6 5 (8.06%) Malware Detection/Protection
6 5 (8.06%) Network Segmentation
6 5 (8.06%) Proactive Management
6 5 (8.06%) Problem Management
6 5 (8.06%) Problem-Solving
6 5 (8.06%) Validation
7 4 (6.45%) Mentoring
Programming Languages
1 10 (16.13%) Python
2 6 (9.68%) PowerShell
3 4 (6.45%) Lisp
4 2 (3.23%) Kusto Query Language
5 1 (1.61%) Bash
5 1 (1.61%) Bicep
Qualifications
1 14 (22.58%) Security Cleared
2 9 (14.52%) SC Cleared
3 7 (11.29%) Degree
4 4 (6.45%) CCNP
4 4 (6.45%) Cisco Certification
5 3 (4.84%) CISSP
5 3 (4.84%) CompTIA Security+
5 3 (4.84%) MCSA
5 3 (4.84%) MCSE
5 3 (4.84%) Microsoft Certification
6 2 (3.23%) Azure Certification
7 1 (1.61%) BPSS Clearance
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 2 (3.23%) NIST
2 1 (1.61%) GDPR
2 1 (1.61%) NCSC
2 1 (1.61%) SLA
System Software
1 25 (40.32%) VMware Infrastructure
2 16 (25.81%) Active Directory
3 5 (8.06%) Docker
3 5 (8.06%) VMware NSX
4 3 (4.84%) Firmware
5 2 (3.23%) Hyper-V
5 2 (3.23%) Virtual Servers
6 1 (1.61%) Virtual Machines
6 1 (1.61%) VMware ESXi
Systems Management
1 9 (14.52%) Ansible
2 5 (8.06%) Microsoft Intune
2 5 (8.06%) SCCM
3 4 (6.45%) FortiGate
3 4 (6.45%) vCenter Server
4 3 (4.84%) CASB
4 3 (4.84%) Nessus
4 3 (4.84%) Terraform
5 2 (3.23%) Active Directory Federation Services
6 1 (1.61%) Microsoft Clustering
6 1 (1.61%) NetApp OnCommand
6 1 (1.61%) Single Sign-On
6 1 (1.61%) vMotion
6 1 (1.61%) WSUS
Vendors
1 31 (50.00%) F5
1 31 (50.00%) VMware
2 12 (19.35%) Microsoft
2 12 (19.35%) NetApp
3 11 (17.74%) Blue Coat
4 10 (16.13%) McAfee
5 9 (14.52%) Dell
5 9 (14.52%) ServiceNow
6 8 (12.90%) Cisco
7 7 (11.29%) Remedy
8 5 (8.06%) Veeam
9 4 (6.45%) Ekahau
9 4 (6.45%) SolarWinds
10 3 (4.84%) Computacenter
10 3 (4.84%) CyberArk
10 3 (4.84%) Splunk
10 3 (4.84%) Tenable
11 2 (3.23%) LogRhythm
12 1 (1.61%) CheckPoint
12 1 (1.61%) Palo Alto