Network Security Contracts in the North West

Network Security
England > North West

The table below provides summary statistics for contract job vacancies advertised in the North West requiring Network Security skills. It includes a benchmarking guide to the contractor rates offered in vacancies that cited Network Security over the 6 months leading up to 5 July 2025, comparing them to the same period in the previous two years.

6 months to
5 Jul 2025
Same period 2024 Same period 2023
Rank 78 76 84
Rank change year-on-year -2 +8 +54
Contract jobs citing Network Security 48 54 70
As % of all contract jobs advertised in the North West 2.28% 1.95% 2.28%
As % of the Communications & Networking category 15.34% 16.41% 16.28%
Number of daily rates quoted 32 46 38
10th Percentile £363 £463 £288
25th Percentile £441 £517 £375
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £476 £655 £486
Median % change year-on-year -27.29% +34.77% -16.62%
75th Percentile £581 £693 £538
90th Percentile £698 £775 £603
England median daily rate £525 £550 £563
% change year-on-year -4.55% -2.22% +4.17%
Number of hourly rates quoted 1 0 1
Median hourly rate £70.16 - £52.13
England median hourly rate £81.35 £16.25 £55.00
% change year-on-year +400.62% -70.45% +0.92%

All Communications and Computer Networking Skills
North West

Network Security 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 313 329 430
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the North West 14.88% 11.91% 14.00%
Number of daily rates quoted 185 231 283
10th Percentile £183 £210 £288
25th Percentile £350 £350 £363
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £450 £500 £468
Median % change year-on-year -10.00% +6.95% -1.58%
75th Percentile £538 £669 £566
90th Percentile £638 £825 £638
England median daily rate £492 £500 £513
% change year-on-year -1.60% -2.44% +2.50%
Number of hourly rates quoted 2 14 10
10th Percentile £27.70 £21.28 £15.41
25th Percentile £34.78 £26.06 £16.42
Median hourly rate £47.37 £45.88 £24.10
Median % change year-on-year +3.25% +90.35% +25.21%
75th Percentile £59.17 £50.44 £44.62
90th Percentile £65.76 £51.91 £53.22
England median hourly rate £37.50 £45.88 £22.00
% change year-on-year -18.27% +108.55% -12.00%

Network Security
Job Vacancy Trend in the North West

Job postings citing Network Security as a proportion of all IT jobs advertised in the North West.

Job vacancy trend for Network Security in the North West

Network Security
Contractor Daily Rate Trend in the North West

3-month moving average daily rate quoted in jobs citing Network Security in the North West.

Daily rate trend for Network Security in the North West

Network Security
Daily Rate Histogram in the North West

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing Network Security in the North West over the 6 months to 5 July 2025.

Daily rate histogram for Network Security in the North West

Network Security
Contractor Hourly Rate Trend in the North West

3-month moving average hourly rates quoted in jobs citing Network Security in the North West.

Hourly rate trend for Network Security in the North West

Network Security
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 Network Security within the North West region over the 6 months to 5 July 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
Manchester +7 24 £488 -22.00% 52
Cheshire -1 14 £475 -2.56% 27
Lancashire - 5 £375 - 20
Cumbria -2 4 £638 -4.71%
Merseyside - 1 £550 - 21
Network Security
England

Network Security
Co-occurring Skills and Capabilities in the North West by Category

The follow tables expand on the table above by listing co-occurrences grouped by category. The same employment type, locality and period is covered with up to 20 co-occurrences shown in each of the following categories:

Application Platforms
1 6 (12.50%) Microsoft Exchange
2 1 (2.08%) IIS
Applications
1 1 (2.08%) Microsoft Office
1 1 (2.08%) MS Visio
Cloud Services
1 12 (25.00%) Azure
2 9 (18.75%) Microsoft 365
3 8 (16.67%) AWS
4 6 (12.50%) Entra ID
4 6 (12.50%) IaaS
5 4 (8.33%) GCP
6 1 (2.08%) Akamai
6 1 (2.08%) Amazon EC2
6 1 (2.08%) Amazon S3
6 1 (2.08%) AWS CloudFormation
6 1 (2.08%) Cloudflare
6 1 (2.08%) Microsoft Purview
6 1 (2.08%) Nutanix
6 1 (2.08%) Virtual Private Cloud
Communications & Networking
1 29 (60.42%) Firewall
2 14 (29.17%) VPN
3 11 (22.92%) Intrusion Detection
4 8 (16.67%) BGP
4 8 (16.67%) OSPF
4 8 (16.67%) WAN
5 7 (14.58%) LAN
5 7 (14.58%) MPLS
6 6 (12.50%) Internet
6 6 (12.50%) Wireless
7 5 (10.42%) DWDM
8 4 (8.33%) DNS
8 4 (8.33%) Ethernet
8 4 (8.33%) SD-WAN
8 4 (8.33%) VLAN
8 4 (8.33%) Wi-Fi
9 3 (6.25%) DMZ
9 3 (6.25%) SAN
9 3 (6.25%) Software-Defined Networking
9 3 (6.25%) WLAN
Database & Business Intelligence
1 6 (12.50%) SQL Server
Development Applications
1 1 (2.08%) JIRA
General
1 9 (18.75%) Social Skills
2 6 (12.50%) Telecoms
3 5 (10.42%) Finance
3 5 (10.42%) Legal
4 4 (8.33%) Analytical Skills
5 2 (4.17%) Banking
5 2 (4.17%) Documentation Skills
5 2 (4.17%) Pharmaceutical
6 1 (2.08%) Presentation Skills
6 1 (2.08%) Retail
Job Titles
1 20 (41.67%) Network Engineer
2 11 (22.92%) Security Engineer
3 9 (18.75%) Analyst
4 8 (16.67%) Network Security Engineer
5 5 (10.42%) Infrastructure Analyst
6 4 (8.33%) Cisco Engineer
6 4 (8.33%) Cisco Network Engineer
6 4 (8.33%) Designer
6 4 (8.33%) Infrastructure Engineer
6 4 (8.33%) Network Designer
6 4 (8.33%) SOC Analyst
6 4 (8.33%) Solutions Designer
7 3 (6.25%) 3rd Line Engineer
7 3 (6.25%) 3rd Line Infrastructure Engineer
7 3 (6.25%) Cybersecurity Engineer
7 3 (6.25%) Industrial Engineer
7 3 (6.25%) SC Cleared Network Engineer
7 3 (6.25%) Senior
8 2 (4.17%) Lead
8 2 (4.17%) Security Support Engineer
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 2 (4.17%) 802.1X
2 1 (2.08%) SailPoint
Miscellaneous
1 4 (8.33%) Hybrid Cloud
2 3 (6.25%) Cyber Threat
3 2 (4.17%) Management Information System
3 2 (4.17%) Security Operations Centre
4 1 (2.08%) Clustering
4 1 (2.08%) CMDB
4 1 (2.08%) FMCG
4 1 (2.08%) Onboarding
4 1 (2.08%) Product Ownership
4 1 (2.08%) Self-Motivation
4 1 (2.08%) Virtual Team
Operating Systems
1 14 (29.17%) Windows
2 10 (20.83%) Windows Server
3 8 (16.67%) Linux
4 3 (6.25%) Windows Server 2003
4 3 (6.25%) Windows Server 2019
5 1 (2.08%) CentOS
5 1 (2.08%) Windows Server 2016
Processes & Methodologies
1 14 (29.17%) Problem-Solving
2 13 (27.08%) Cybersecurity
2 13 (27.08%) Network Design
3 12 (25.00%) High Availability
4 11 (22.92%) Project Delivery
5 10 (20.83%) Change Management
5 10 (20.83%) Incident Response
6 9 (18.75%) Business Continuity
6 9 (18.75%) Infrastructure Engineering
6 9 (18.75%) Roadmaps
7 8 (16.67%) Disaster Recovery
7 8 (16.67%) Network Architecture
7 8 (16.67%) Strategic Roadmap
8 7 (14.58%) Analytics
8 7 (14.58%) Network Monitoring
8 7 (14.58%) Vulnerability Scanning
9 6 (12.50%) Data Management
9 6 (12.50%) Information Security
9 6 (12.50%) Risk Assessment
9 6 (12.50%) SIEM
Programming Languages
1 9 (18.75%) PowerShell
2 3 (6.25%) Kusto Query Language
2 3 (6.25%) Python
3 1 (2.08%) Perl
Qualifications
1 17 (35.42%) Cisco Certification
2 15 (31.25%) CCNP
3 10 (20.83%) Degree
4 9 (18.75%) Microsoft Certification
5 6 (12.50%) Azure Certification
5 6 (12.50%) CCIE
5 6 (12.50%) CCNA
6 5 (10.42%) SC Cleared
6 5 (10.42%) Security Cleared
7 4 (8.33%) Computer Science Degree
7 4 (8.33%) JNCIE
7 4 (8.33%) Master's Degree
8 2 (4.17%) CCSA
8 2 (4.17%) Network+ Certification
9 1 (2.08%) CISM
9 1 (2.08%) CISSP
9 1 (2.08%) CRISC
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 3 (6.25%) PCI DSS
2 2 (4.17%) GDPR
2 2 (4.17%) ISO/IEC 27001
3 1 (2.08%) California Consumer Privacy Act
3 1 (2.08%) GRC
3 1 (2.08%) HIPAA
3 1 (2.08%) NIST
3 1 (2.08%) SLA
System Software
1 10 (20.83%) Active Directory
2 8 (16.67%) VMware Infrastructure
3 6 (12.50%) vSphere
4 2 (4.17%) VMware NSX
5 1 (2.08%) VMware ESXi
Systems Management
1 6 (12.50%) Microsoft Intune
2 3 (6.25%) Backup Exec
2 3 (6.25%) vCenter Server
3 2 (4.17%) Ansible
4 1 (2.08%) Nagios
4 1 (2.08%) Prometheus
4 1 (2.08%) Terraform
4 1 (2.08%) ZABBIX
Vendors
1 24 (50.00%) Cisco
2 16 (33.33%) Microsoft
3 12 (25.00%) VMware
4 10 (20.83%) Palo Alto
5 7 (14.58%) F5
5 7 (14.58%) Zscaler
6 5 (10.42%) Fortinet
7 4 (8.33%) Meraki
8 3 (6.25%) HP
8 3 (6.25%) Symantec
8 3 (6.25%) Thycotic
8 3 (6.25%) Veeam
9 2 (4.17%) Aruba
10 1 (2.08%) Arista
10 1 (2.08%) CheckPoint
10 1 (2.08%) CrowdStrike
10 1 (2.08%) CyberArk
10 1 (2.08%) Dell
10 1 (2.08%) ServiceNow
10 1 (2.08%) Splunk