Firewall Contract Job Trends in the North West

Firewall
England > North West

The table below provides summary statistics and contractor rates for jobs advertised in the North West requiring Firewall skills. It covers contract job vacancies from the 6 months leading up to 18 June 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
18 Jun 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 34 34 40
Rank change year-on-year 0 +6 -4
Contract jobs citing Firewall 175 111 110
As % of all contract jobs in the North West 5.02% 5.61% 3.88%
As % of the Communications & Networking category 39.77% 35.58% 33.03%
Number of daily rates quoted 147 71 72
10th Percentile £397 £350 £413
25th Percentile £457 £406 £498
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £535 £475 £688
Median % change year-on-year +12.63% -30.91% +52.78%
75th Percentile £609 £579 £850
90th Percentile £636 £650 -
England median daily rate £500 £500 £515
% change year-on-year -0.05% -2.86% -1.90%
Number of hourly rates quoted 4 0 1
10th Percentile £32.88 - -
25th Percentile £38.71 - £46.25
Median hourly rate £41.94 - £47.50
75th Percentile £50.02 - £48.75
90th Percentile £64.56 - -
England median hourly rate £56.00 £27.50 £60.00
% change year-on-year +103.64% -54.17% -3.65%

All Communications and Computer Networking Skills
North West

Firewall 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 440 312 333
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the North West 12.61% 15.78% 11.73%
Number of daily rates quoted 284 189 228
10th Percentile £308 £189 £210
25th Percentile £379 £350 £345
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £487 £450 £500
Median % change year-on-year +8.23% -10.00% +5.26%
75th Percentile £588 £538 £669
90th Percentile £637 £638 £825
England median daily rate £500 £495 £500
% change year-on-year +1.11% -1.10% -2.44%
Number of hourly rates quoted 17 2 12
10th Percentile £14.80 £27.70 £20.93
25th Percentile £16.50 £34.78 £25.13
Median hourly rate £22.50 £47.37 £40.44
Median % change year-on-year -52.50% +17.14% +29.41%
75th Percentile £41.94 £59.17 £46.60
90th Percentile £74.26 £65.76 £50.78
England median hourly rate £29.52 £37.50 £40.00
% change year-on-year -21.28% -6.25% +117.75%

Firewall
Job Vacancy Trend in the North West

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

Firewall job vacancy trend in the North West

Firewall
Daily Rate Trend in the North West

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

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

Firewall
Daily Rate Histogram in the North West

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing Firewall in the North West over the 6 months to 18 June 2026.

Daily rate histogram for Firewall in the North West

Firewall
Hourly Rate Trend in the North West

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

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

Firewall
Hourly Rate Histogram in the North West

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing Firewall in the North West over the 6 months to 18 June 2026.

Hourly rate histogram for Firewall in the North West

Firewall
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 Firewall within the North West region over the 6 months to 18 June 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
Manchester -14 59 £540 +18.03% 31
Cumbria -2 47 £525 +2.44% 7
Cheshire +12 44 £550 +15.79% 10
Lancashire +9 21 £475 -5.00% 8
Merseyside -14 3 £330 -17.50% 3
Firewall
England

Firewall
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 9 (5.14%) CICS
2 2 (1.14%) Confluence
Applications
1 7 (4.00%) Microsoft Office
2 3 (1.71%) MS Visio
Business Applications
1 1 (0.57%) Teamcenter
Cloud Services
1 63 (36.00%) Azure
2 42 (24.00%) AWS
3 20 (11.43%) GCP
4 14 (8.00%) Google Kubernetes Engine
5 13 (7.43%) Entra ID
5 13 (7.43%) Virtual Private Cloud
6 11 (6.29%) OCI
6 11 (6.29%) SaaS
7 7 (4.00%) Azure Sentinel
7 7 (4.00%) Microsoft 365
8 5 (2.86%) Azure AI
8 5 (2.86%) Azure DevOps
8 5 (2.86%) Azure Key Vault
9 4 (2.29%) GitHub
9 4 (2.29%) IBM Watson
9 4 (2.29%) Microsoft Purview
9 4 (2.29%) Vertex AI
10 3 (1.71%) Nutanix
11 2 (1.14%) Azure Monitor
12 1 (0.57%) GitHub Actions
Communications & Networking
1 62 (35.43%) Network Security
2 46 (26.29%) WAN
3 45 (25.71%) Wireless
4 40 (22.86%) VLAN
5 38 (21.71%) VPN
6 33 (18.86%) DNS
7 26 (14.86%) BGP
8 24 (13.71%) OSPF
9 23 (13.14%) LAN
10 21 (12.00%) SD-WAN
11 20 (11.43%) Wi-Fi
12 19 (10.86%) Structured Cabling
12 19 (10.86%) TCP/IP
13 18 (10.29%) Cisco IOS
13 18 (10.29%) DHCP
14 17 (9.71%) Ethernet VPN
15 16 (9.14%) NAS
15 16 (9.14%) NX-OS
15 16 (9.14%) SAN
15 16 (9.14%) VXLAN
Database & Business Intelligence
1 9 (5.14%) DataStage
2 2 (1.14%) PostgreSQL
3 1 (0.57%) Redis
Development Applications
1 9 (5.14%) GitLab
2 7 (4.00%) JIRA
3 3 (1.71%) Git
3 3 (1.71%) Jenkins
4 2 (1.14%) Burp Suite
4 2 (1.14%) Cucumber
4 2 (1.14%) Gatling
4 2 (1.14%) Gradle
4 2 (1.14%) LoadRunner
4 2 (1.14%) REST Assured
4 2 (1.14%) SonarQube
4 2 (1.14%) Sonatype Nexus
General
1 35 (20.00%) Social Skills
2 32 (18.29%) Finance
3 16 (9.14%) Public Sector
4 12 (6.86%) Analytical Skills
4 12 (6.86%) Documentation Skills
5 10 (5.71%) Banking
6 9 (5.14%) Influencing Skills
7 4 (2.29%) Legal
8 3 (1.71%) Military
9 2 (1.14%) Retail
10 1 (0.57%) Advertising
10 1 (0.57%) Aerospace
10 1 (0.57%) Financial Institution
10 1 (0.57%) Manufacturing
10 1 (0.57%) Organisational Skills
10 1 (0.57%) Telecoms
Job Titles
1 58 (33.14%) Network Engineer
2 28 (16.00%) Architect
3 27 (15.43%) Infrastructure Engineer
4 25 (14.29%) Security Engineer
5 21 (12.00%) SC Cleared Network Engineer
5 21 (12.00%) Senior
6 12 (6.86%) Network Architect
6 12 (6.86%) Senior Infrastructure Engineer
7 10 (5.71%) Cloud Engineer
7 10 (5.71%) Designer
8 9 (5.14%) Infrastructure Designer
9 7 (4.00%) Cisco Engineer
10 6 (3.43%) Technical Architect
11 5 (2.86%) Artificial Intelligence Engineer
11 5 (2.86%) Cisco Network Engineer
11 5 (2.86%) Infrastructure Architect
11 5 (2.86%) Platform Engineer
11 5 (2.86%) Senior Network Engineer
12 4 (2.29%) Cloud Security Engineer
12 4 (2.29%) Cybersecurity Engineer
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 14 (8.00%) 802.1X
2 12 (6.86%) LDAP
3 10 (5.71%) Middleware
4 6 (3.43%) LangChain
4 6 (3.43%) PyTorch
4 6 (3.43%) scikit-learn
5 2 (1.14%) Node.js
5 2 (1.14%) Playwright
5 2 (1.14%) Quarkus
5 2 (1.14%) React
5 2 (1.14%) Spring
5 2 (1.14%) Spring Boot
6 1 (0.57%) ARM Templates
6 1 (0.57%) Azure Blueprints
6 1 (0.57%) JSON
6 1 (0.57%) ModSecurity
6 1 (0.57%) Software Packaging
Miscellaneous
1 60 (34.29%) Data Centre
2 34 (19.43%) Cloud Native
3 26 (14.86%) Security Posture
4 11 (6.29%) Hybrid Cloud
5 9 (5.14%) BYOD
5 9 (5.14%) Mainframe
5 9 (5.14%) VSAM
6 7 (4.00%) Management Information System
6 7 (4.00%) Onboarding
7 5 (2.86%) Cloud Security Posture
7 5 (2.86%) Product Ownership
7 5 (2.86%) Public Cloud
8 4 (2.29%) PKI
9 3 (1.71%) Linux Command Line
9 3 (1.71%) Private Cloud
10 2 (1.14%) Cyber Threat
11 1 (0.57%) Cyber Defence
11 1 (0.57%) Distributed Denial-of-Service
11 1 (0.57%) Operational Technology
11 1 (0.57%) Security Operations Centre
Operating Systems
1 35 (20.00%) Linux
2 29 (16.57%) Windows
3 14 (8.00%) Unix
4 12 (6.86%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
5 9 (5.14%) AIX
5 9 (5.14%) Solaris
6 8 (4.57%) Windows Server
7 3 (1.71%) Windows Server 2012
7 3 (1.71%) Windows Server 2019
8 1 (0.57%) Mac OS
Processes & Methodologies
1 46 (26.29%) Load Balancing
2 36 (20.57%) CI/CD
3 33 (18.86%) Change Management
4 32 (18.29%) DevOps
4 32 (18.29%) Network Segmentation
5 29 (16.57%) Roadmaps
6 28 (16.00%) Infrastructure Engineering
6 28 (16.00%) Project Delivery
7 27 (15.43%) SIEM
8 23 (13.14%) Zero Trust
9 22 (12.57%) Cloud Security
9 22 (12.57%) Cybersecurity
9 22 (12.57%) ITIL
10 21 (12.00%) High Availability
11 20 (11.43%) Infrastructure as Code
12 19 (10.86%) ITSM
12 19 (10.86%) Network Monitoring
12 19 (10.86%) Problem-Solving
13 18 (10.29%) Agile
13 18 (10.29%) Network Design
Programming Languages
1 41 (23.43%) Python
2 27 (15.43%) PowerShell
3 17 (9.71%) Bash
4 12 (6.86%) Java
5 9 (5.14%) COBOL
6 7 (4.00%) Bicep
7 3 (1.71%) Perl
8 1 (0.57%) ActionScript
8 1 (0.57%) Kusto Query Language
8 1 (0.57%) VBScript
Qualifications
1 66 (37.71%) Security Cleared
2 65 (37.14%) Cisco Certification
3 55 (31.43%) SC Cleared
4 54 (30.86%) CCNA
5 50 (28.57%) CCNP
6 21 (12.00%) Degree
7 19 (10.86%) CISSP
8 15 (8.57%) Network+ Certification
8 15 (8.57%) Server+ Certification
9 13 (7.43%) Azure Certification
10 12 (6.86%) AWS Certification
11 7 (4.00%) CompTIA Security+
12 5 (2.86%) CCIE
12 5 (2.86%) MCSA
12 5 (2.86%) MCSE
12 5 (2.86%) Microsoft Certification
13 3 (1.71%) BPSS Clearance
13 3 (1.71%) CISM
13 3 (1.71%) Computer Science Degree
13 3 (1.71%) DV Cleared
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 7 (4.00%) NIST
2 5 (2.86%) ISO/IEC 27001
3 4 (2.29%) Cyber Essentials
3 4 (2.29%) SLA
4 3 (1.71%) GDPR
4 3 (1.71%) PCI DSS
5 2 (1.14%) ISO/IEC 27002 (supersedes ISO/IEC 17799)
5 2 (1.14%) SOC 2
System Software
1 21 (12.00%) Active Directory
2 17 (9.71%) Docker
3 8 (4.57%) VMware Infrastructure
4 3 (1.71%) Firmware
4 3 (1.71%) Virtual Desktop
4 3 (1.71%) Virtual Machines
4 3 (1.71%) vSphere
5 1 (0.57%) BitLocker
5 1 (0.57%) Hyper-V
5 1 (0.57%) VMware NSX
Systems Management
1 35 (20.00%) Terraform
2 21 (12.00%) Ansible
3 20 (11.43%) Kubernetes
4 12 (6.86%) Progress Chef
5 7 (4.00%) CASB
6 6 (3.43%) Nessus
7 4 (2.29%) Active Directory Federation Services
8 3 (1.71%) Cisco Prime
8 3 (1.71%) Microsoft Intune
8 3 (1.71%) SCCM
9 2 (1.14%) Grafana
9 2 (1.14%) Istio
9 2 (1.14%) Prometheus
10 1 (0.57%) Packer
Vendors
1 69 (39.43%) Cisco
2 34 (19.43%) Palo Alto
3 21 (12.00%) ServiceNow
4 19 (10.86%) F5
4 19 (10.86%) Microsoft
5 18 (10.29%) Google
6 17 (9.71%) Aruba
7 15 (8.57%) VMware
8 14 (8.00%) Arista
8 14 (8.00%) Red Hat
9 13 (7.43%) IBM
10 12 (6.86%) Fortinet
11 11 (6.29%) Splunk
12 8 (4.57%) CheckPoint
12 8 (4.57%) CyberArk
13 6 (3.43%) Juniper
14 5 (2.86%) Ekahau
14 5 (2.86%) ForeScout
14 5 (2.86%) Remedy
14 5 (2.86%) Tenable