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 May 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
15 May 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 39 78 104
Rank change year-on-year +39 +26 -47
Contract jobs citing DNS 150 47 31
As % of all contract jobs in the North West 4.62% 2.42% 1.17%
As % of the Communications & Networking category 36.59% 14.64% 9.60%
Number of daily rates quoted 63 29 22
10th Percentile £308 £250 £201
25th Percentile £365 £313 £285
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £446 £425 £425
Median % change year-on-year +4.82% - -20.93%
75th Percentile £612 £525 £523
90th Percentile £639 £550 £639
England median daily rate £480 £548 £484
% change year-on-year -12.41% +13.22% -7.81%
Number of hourly rates quoted 3 0 0
Median hourly rate £74.26 - -
England median hourly rate £45.71 £80.68 £40.00
% change year-on-year -43.34% +101.69% -18.56%

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 410 321 323
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the North West 12.62% 16.50% 12.19%
Number of daily rates quoted 244 188 220
10th Percentile £308 £192 £200
25th Percentile £379 £309 £322
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £483 £450 £483
Median % change year-on-year +7.42% -6.74% -0.72%
75th Percentile £588 £528 £665
90th Percentile £639 £600 £828
England median daily rate £500 £500 £495
% change year-on-year - +1.01% -5.71%
Number of hourly rates quoted 14 3 12
10th Percentile £16.16 £20.00 £18.02
25th Percentile £17.94 £21.12 £22.06
Median hourly rate £38.88 £24.59 £34.37
Median % change year-on-year +58.15% -28.46% +24.96%
75th Percentile £66.18 £25.47 £45.88
90th Percentile £74.26 £25.90 £94.59
England median hourly rate £41.94 £29.00 £40.00
% change year-on-year +44.62% -27.50% +116.22%

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 May 2026.

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
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 May 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
Merseyside +22 61 £315 +6.78% 8
Manchester -17 35 £375 -21.05% 19
Cheshire +10 33 £447 +37.62% 2
Cumbria -1 16 £612 +16.57% 3
Lancashire - 5 £190 - 9
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 11 (7.33%) Microsoft Exchange
2 4 (2.67%) IIS
2 4 (2.67%) SharePoint
2 4 (2.67%) Skype for Business
Applications
1 4 (2.67%) Microsoft Office
Cloud Services
1 33 (22.00%) Azure
2 26 (17.33%) AWS
3 12 (8.00%) Microsoft 365
4 9 (6.00%) GCP
5 6 (4.00%) Akamai
6 5 (3.33%) Entra ID
6 5 (3.33%) SaaS
7 4 (2.67%) Azure ExpressRoute
7 4 (2.67%) IaaS
7 4 (2.67%) Nutanix
7 4 (2.67%) PaaS
8 3 (2.00%) Asana
8 3 (2.00%) Google Drive
8 3 (2.00%) Google Workspace
9 2 (1.33%) OneDrive
10 1 (0.67%) Azure DevOps
10 1 (0.67%) Dynamics 365
10 1 (0.67%) GitHub
10 1 (0.67%) OpenShift
10 1 (0.67%) Route 53
Communications & Networking
1 44 (29.33%) TCP/IP
1 44 (29.33%) VPN
2 36 (24.00%) DMZ
3 34 (22.67%) BGP
4 33 (22.00%) SSL
5 32 (21.33%) HTTP
5 32 (21.33%) Multicast
6 31 (20.67%) DHCP
7 30 (20.00%) F5 BIG-IP LTM
8 29 (19.33%) Wireshark
9 28 (18.67%) BIG-IP
10 26 (17.33%) Firewall
11 22 (14.67%) F5 BIG-IP GTM
12 18 (12.00%) VLAN
13 17 (11.33%) Wireless
14 14 (9.33%) SAN
15 13 (8.67%) Cisco IOS
16 12 (8.00%) NAS
16 12 (8.00%) NX-OS
16 12 (8.00%) Structured Cabling
Development Applications
1 27 (18.00%) Fiddler
2 6 (4.00%) JIRA
3 1 (0.67%) Git
3 1 (0.67%) Jenkins
General
1 42 (28.00%) Banking
2 35 (23.33%) Investment Banking
3 19 (12.67%) Social Skills
4 16 (10.67%) Finance
5 12 (8.00%) Documentation Skills
6 10 (6.67%) Analytical Skills
7 7 (4.67%) Public Sector
8 3 (2.00%) Legal
9 1 (0.67%) Military
9 1 (0.67%) Organisational Skills
Job Titles
1 71 (47.33%) Network Engineer
2 42 (28.00%) Web Engineer
3 40 (26.67%) Security Engineer
4 34 (22.67%) Network Security Engineer
5 33 (22.00%) Data Engineer
5 33 (22.00%) Data Network Engineer
6 32 (21.33%) Cisco Engineer
6 32 (21.33%) Cisco Network Engineer
6 32 (21.33%) Cisco Security Engineer
7 18 (12.00%) Blue Coat Engineer
7 18 (12.00%) IP Network Engineer
8 17 (11.33%) Analyst
8 17 (11.33%) Architect
9 12 (8.00%) Systems Analyst
10 10 (6.67%) Infrastructure Engineer
11 9 (6.00%) Junior
11 9 (6.00%) Junior Network Engineer
11 9 (6.00%) Technical Architect
12 7 (4.67%) Administrator
13 6 (4.00%) Network Architect
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 5 (3.33%) LDAP
2 4 (2.67%) 802.1X
3 3 (2.00%) OAuth
3 3 (2.00%) XMPP
4 2 (1.33%) Software Packaging
5 1 (0.67%) ARM Templates
5 1 (0.67%) JSON
5 1 (0.67%) OpenTelemetry
5 1 (0.67%) XML
Miscellaneous
1 21 (14.00%) Management Information System
2 17 (11.33%) Data Centre
3 13 (8.67%) Public Cloud
4 10 (6.67%) Enterprise Cloud
5 7 (4.67%) Distributed Denial-of-Service
6 5 (3.33%) Cloud Native
6 5 (3.33%) Cloud Security Posture
6 5 (3.33%) Hybrid Cloud
6 5 (3.33%) PKI
6 5 (3.33%) Security Posture
7 4 (2.67%) Private Cloud
8 3 (2.00%) Fat Client
8 3 (2.00%) Freedom of Information
8 3 (2.00%) Product Ownership
8 3 (2.00%) Thin Client
9 2 (1.33%) iPhone
9 2 (1.33%) Onboarding
10 1 (0.67%) Data Protection Act
10 1 (0.67%) Enterprise Software
10 1 (0.67%) Team-Oriented Environment
Operating Systems
1 25 (16.67%) Windows
2 13 (8.67%) Windows Server
3 9 (6.00%) Windows Server 2019
4 8 (5.33%) Linux
5 7 (4.67%) Windows 10
5 7 (4.67%) Windows Server 2012
6 6 (4.00%) Unix
7 4 (2.67%) Windows 7
8 2 (1.33%) Windows Server 2016
9 1 (0.67%) AIX
9 1 (0.67%) Apple iOS
9 1 (0.67%) Mac OS
9 1 (0.67%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
Processes & Methodologies
1 69 (46.00%) Load Balancing
2 30 (20.00%) Data Loss Prevention
3 27 (18.00%) Malware Detection/Protection
4 24 (16.00%) Project Delivery
5 19 (12.67%) ITSM
5 19 (12.67%) Problem-Solving
6 18 (12.00%) Migration
7 16 (10.67%) Agile
8 13 (8.67%) Infrastructure Engineering
9 12 (8.00%) ITIL
9 12 (8.00%) Waterfall
10 11 (7.33%) Network Segmentation
10 11 (7.33%) Stakeholder Engagement
11 10 (6.67%) Change Management
11 10 (6.67%) Workshop Facilitation
12 9 (6.00%) CI/CD
12 9 (6.00%) Infrastructure as Code
12 9 (6.00%) Systems Analysis
12 9 (6.00%) Validation
13 8 (5.33%) Service Management
Programming Languages
1 17 (11.33%) Python
2 16 (10.67%) PowerShell
3 4 (2.67%) VB
3 4 (2.67%) VBScript
4 3 (2.00%) Bicep
4 3 (2.00%) SQL
5 1 (0.67%) Bash
5 1 (0.67%) JavaScript
5 1 (0.67%) Kusto Query Language
Qualifications
1 26 (17.33%) Security Cleared
2 22 (14.67%) Cisco Certification
3 20 (13.33%) CCNA
3 20 (13.33%) SC Cleared
4 17 (11.33%) CCNP
5 14 (9.33%) Network+ Certification
6 11 (7.33%) Server+ Certification
7 8 (5.33%) CompTIA Security+
7 8 (5.33%) Degree
8 6 (4.00%) BPSS Clearance
9 5 (3.33%) Azure Certification
9 5 (3.33%) CISSP
9 5 (3.33%) MCSA
9 5 (3.33%) MCSE
9 5 (3.33%) Microsoft Certification
10 3 (2.00%) AWS Certification
10 3 (2.00%) AWS Certified Solutions Architect
11 2 (1.33%) CCIE
11 2 (1.33%) DV Cleared
11 2 (1.33%) ITIL Certification
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 4 (2.67%) SLA
2 1 (0.67%) NIST
System Software
1 28 (18.67%) Active Directory
1 28 (18.67%) VMware Infrastructure
2 19 (12.67%) Firmware
3 14 (9.33%) VMware NSX
4 6 (4.00%) vSphere
5 5 (3.33%) Virtual Desktop
6 4 (2.67%) BitLocker
6 4 (2.67%) Docker
6 4 (2.67%) Hyper-V
7 2 (1.33%) Virtual Machines
8 1 (0.67%) NFS
8 1 (0.67%) Veritas Volume Manager
8 1 (0.67%) VMware ESXi
Systems Management
1 13 (8.67%) Ansible
2 12 (8.00%) SCCM
3 7 (4.67%) Active Directory Federation Services
3 7 (4.67%) Terraform
4 6 (4.00%) Microsoft Intune
4 6 (4.00%) Single Sign-On
5 5 (3.33%) CASB
5 5 (3.33%) Kubernetes
5 5 (3.33%) Nessus
6 3 (2.00%) WSUS
7 2 (1.33%) AirWatch
7 2 (1.33%) CA Single Sign-On
7 2 (1.33%) vCenter Server
8 1 (0.67%) Failover Clustering
8 1 (0.67%) Grafana
8 1 (0.67%) Microsoft Clustering
8 1 (0.67%) NetApp OnCommand
8 1 (0.67%) PowerBroker
8 1 (0.67%) vRealize
8 1 (0.67%) vRealize Orchestrator
Vendors
1 76 (50.67%) F5
2 52 (34.67%) Cisco
3 44 (29.33%) VMware
4 28 (18.67%) Blue Coat
5 27 (18.00%) McAfee
6 18 (12.00%) Microsoft
6 18 (12.00%) NetApp
7 17 (11.33%) ServiceNow
8 16 (10.67%) Infoblox
9 6 (4.00%) Citrix
10 5 (3.33%) CyberArk
10 5 (3.33%) Remedy
10 5 (3.33%) Splunk
10 5 (3.33%) Tenable
11 4 (2.67%) Computacenter
11 4 (2.67%) Veeam
12 3 (2.00%) ForeScout
12 3 (2.00%) Google
12 3 (2.00%) Red Hat
13 2 (1.33%) Tanium