WAN Contract Job Trends in Reading

Wide Area Network (WAN)
Berkshire > Reading

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

6 months to
27 Feb 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 66 61 94
Rank change year-on-year -5 +33 -25
Contract jobs citing WAN 17 13 5
As % of all contract jobs in Reading 1.86% 1.72% 0.44%
As % of the Communications & Networking category 13.71% 8.18% 2.12%
Number of daily rates quoted 1 10 2
10th Percentile - £250 -
25th Percentile £510 £263 -
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £520 £365 £650
Median % change year-on-year +42.47% -43.85% +33.33%
75th Percentile £530 £456 -
90th Percentile - £546 -
Berkshire median daily rate £451 £400 £150
% change year-on-year +12.63% +166.67% -69.62%

All Communications and Computer Networking Skills
Reading

WAN 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 Reading.

Contract vacancies with a requirement for communications or computer networking skills 124 159 236
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in Reading 13.54% 21.06% 20.72%
Number of daily rates quoted 82 64 139
10th Percentile £255 £300 £205
25th Percentile £350 £398 £210
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £475 £484 £400
Median % change year-on-year -1.81% +20.94% -26.61%
75th Percentile £600 £602 £591
90th Percentile £683 £650 £615
Berkshire median daily rate £430 £480 £425
% change year-on-year -10.42% +12.94% -17.07%
Number of hourly rates quoted 3 0 7
10th Percentile £72.40 - £72.88
25th Percentile £76.00 - £82.83
Median hourly rate £84.00 - £87.53
Median % change year-on-year - - +7.57%
75th Percentile £89.88 - -
90th Percentile £92.20 - -
Berkshire median hourly rate £71.33 £24.66 £83.77
% change year-on-year +189.25% -70.56% +49.58%

WAN
Job Vacancy Trend in Reading

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

WAN job vacancy trend in Reading

WAN
Daily Rate Trend in Reading

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in Reading citing WAN.

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in Reading citing WAN

WAN
Hourly Rate Trend in Reading

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in Reading citing WAN.

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in Reading citing WAN

WAN
Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities in Reading 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 (35.29%) OpenStack
Applications
1 4 (23.53%) Microsoft Excel
1 4 (23.53%) MS Visio
2 3 (17.65%) Microsoft Office
2 3 (17.65%) Microsoft PowerPoint
Cloud Services
1 6 (35.29%) AWS
2 4 (23.53%) Azure
3 2 (11.76%) OpenShift
Communications & Networking
1 17 (100.00%) BGP
2 14 (82.35%) LAN
3 10 (58.82%) OSPF
4 9 (52.94%) MPLS
5 8 (47.06%) BIG-IP
5 8 (47.06%) Cisco ISE
6 7 (41.18%) DHCP
6 7 (41.18%) DNS
6 7 (41.18%) Ethernet VPN
6 7 (41.18%) Firewall
6 7 (41.18%) Junos
6 7 (41.18%) VXLAN
7 5 (29.41%) SNMP
7 5 (29.41%) TACACS
8 3 (17.65%) TCP/IP
8 3 (17.65%) Wireless
9 1 (5.88%) Cisco Nexus
9 1 (5.88%) EIGRP
9 1 (5.88%) WLAN
General
1 9 (52.94%) Social Skills
2 3 (17.65%) Analytical Skills
3 2 (11.76%) Documentation Skills
4 1 (5.88%) Billing
4 1 (5.88%) Finance
Job Titles
1 6 (35.29%) IP Specialist
2 4 (23.53%) Network Engineer
2 4 (23.53%) Senior
2 4 (23.53%) Senior Network Engineer
3 3 (17.65%) Architect
3 3 (17.65%) IP Architect
4 2 (11.76%) Designer
4 2 (11.76%) Firewall Specialist
4 2 (11.76%) IP Designer
4 2 (11.76%) Network Specialist
5 1 (5.88%) Cisco Project Manager
5 1 (5.88%) Lead
5 1 (5.88%) Network Architect
5 1 (5.88%) Network Support
5 1 (5.88%) Project Manager
5 1 (5.88%) Security Specialist
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 7 (41.18%) 802.1X
1 7 (41.18%) NETCONF
1 7 (41.18%) YANG
2 4 (23.53%) REST
3 3 (17.65%) OpenConfig
3 3 (17.65%) RESTCONF
Miscellaneous
1 12 (70.59%) Data Centre
2 9 (52.94%) Hybrid Cloud
3 7 (41.18%) Clustering
3 7 (41.18%) PKI
4 4 (23.53%) Cloud Native
4 4 (23.53%) Self-Motivation
5 3 (17.65%) Analytical Mindset
6 1 (5.88%) iSeries
Operating Systems
1 7 (41.18%) Windows
Processes & Methodologies
1 8 (47.06%) Problem-Solving
2 7 (41.18%) High Availability
2 7 (41.18%) Identity Access Management
2 7 (41.18%) Load Balancing
2 7 (41.18%) Network Design
2 7 (41.18%) Observability
3 6 (35.29%) Network Virtualisation
4 4 (23.53%) DevOps
4 4 (23.53%) Enterprise Architecture
4 4 (23.53%) ITIL
4 4 (23.53%) ITSM
4 4 (23.53%) Microservices
4 4 (23.53%) Network Architecture
4 4 (23.53%) Network Segmentation
4 4 (23.53%) Roadmaps
4 4 (23.53%) Service Management
4 4 (23.53%) Strategic Thinking
4 4 (23.53%) TOGAF
5 2 (11.76%) Availability Management
5 2 (11.76%) Validation
Programming Languages
1 9 (52.94%) Python
Qualifications
1 15 (88.24%) Cisco Certification
2 9 (52.94%) CCIE
2 9 (52.94%) JNCIE
3 7 (41.18%) Security Cleared
4 4 (23.53%) JNCIA
4 4 (23.53%) JNCIP
4 4 (23.53%) JNCIS
5 2 (11.76%) AWS Certification
6 1 (5.88%) Degree
6 1 (5.88%) DV Cleared
6 1 (5.88%) PRINCE2 Practitioner
6 1 (5.88%) SC Cleared
System Software
1 2 (11.76%) VMware Infrastructure
1 2 (11.76%) VMware NSX
Systems Management
1 9 (52.94%) Ansible
2 7 (41.18%) FortiGate
3 2 (11.76%) Terraform
Vendors
1 13 (76.47%) Cisco
1 13 (76.47%) F5
2 12 (70.59%) Juniper
3 7 (41.18%) SolarWinds
3 7 (41.18%) Splunk
4 6 (35.29%) Extreme Networks
5 5 (29.41%) Fortinet
6 3 (17.65%) Microsoft
7 2 (11.76%) VMware
8 1 (5.88%) Meraki