Data Centre Contract Job Trends in the South East

Data Center
England > South East

The table below looks at the prevalence of the term Data Centre in contract job vacancies in the South East. Included is a benchmarking guide to the contractor rates offered in vacancies that cited Data Centre over the 6 months leading up to 18 January 2026, comparing them to the same period in the previous two years.

6 months to
18 Jan 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 89 86 63
Rank change year-on-year -3 -23 +28
Contract jobs citing Data Centre 99 78 163
As % of all contract jobs in the South East 2.25% 2.34% 3.19%
As % of the Miscellaneous category 7.57% 7.17% 10.34%
Number of daily rates quoted 74 45 123
10th Percentile £293 £154 £280
25th Percentile £352 £363 £363
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £445 £440 £481
Median % change year-on-year +1.14% -8.52% -9.46%
75th Percentile £500 £560 £604
90th Percentile £563 £616 £675
England median daily rate £492 £525 £525
% change year-on-year -6.29% - -4.55%
Number of hourly rates quoted 0 6 7
10th Percentile - £22.24 £16.90
25th Percentile - - £22.42
Median hourly rate - £24.18 £63.00
Median % change year-on-year - -61.62% -10.00%
75th Percentile - - £76.53
90th Percentile - £26.72 -
England median hourly rate £25.77 £24.18 £23.00
% change year-on-year +6.58% +5.13% -64.62%

All Generic Skills
South East

Data Centre falls under the General and Transferable Skills category. For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all contract job vacancies requiring generic IT skills in the South East.

Contract vacancies with a requirement for generic IT skills 1,307 1,088 1,576
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the South East 29.70% 32.59% 30.89%
Number of daily rates quoted 875 629 965
10th Percentile £204 £235 £205
25th Percentile £363 £380 £313
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £485 £520 £495
Median % change year-on-year -6.73% +5.05% -5.71%
75th Percentile £588 £625 £600
90th Percentile £683 £675 £688
England median daily rate £510 £550 £550
% change year-on-year -7.27% - -4.35%
Number of hourly rates quoted 71 43 112
10th Percentile £12.50 £20.04 £16.25
25th Percentile £16.13 £25.87 £23.91
Median hourly rate £23.00 £35.00 £50.00
Median % change year-on-year -34.29% -30.00% +33.33%
75th Percentile £62.00 £60.50 £61.99
90th Percentile £81.00 £71.77 £76.53
England median hourly rate £29.50 £38.07 £35.00
% change year-on-year -22.51% +8.77% +46.38%

Data Centre
Job Vacancy Trend in the South East

Historical trend showing the proportion of contract IT job postings citing Data Centre relative to all contract IT jobs advertised in the South East.

Data Centre job vacancy trend in the South East

Data Centre
Daily Rate Trend in the South East

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in the South East citing Data Centre.

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in the South East citing Data Centre

Data Centre
Daily Rate Histogram in the South East

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing Data Centre in the South East over the 6 months to 18 January 2026.

Daily rate histogram for Data Centre in the South East

Data Centre
Hourly Rate Trend in the South East

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in the South East citing Data Centre.

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in the South East citing Data Centre

Data Centre
Contract Job Locations in the South East

The table below looks at the demand and provides a guide to the median contractor rates quoted in IT jobs citing Data Centre within the South East region over the 6 months to 18 January 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
Thames Valley +15 56 £360 -20.35% 48
Berkshire +15 50 £359 -7.83% 36
Hampshire -31 20 £500 +12.36% 30
Kent +9 13 £440 -20.90% 10
West Sussex -7 6 £713 +21.28% 12
Buckinghamshire -5 4 £525 -2.78% 7
Oxfordshire -10 2 £500 - 5
Surrey -19 2 £505 +219.62% 11
East Sussex +4 1 £475 -24.00% 7
Data Centre
England

Data Centre
Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities in the South East 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 (6.06%) OpenStack
2 3 (3.03%) GeoServer
2 3 (3.03%) Smallworld
3 2 (2.02%) Confluence
3 2 (2.02%) ThingWorx
4 1 (1.01%) SharePoint
Applications
1 7 (7.07%) Microsoft Office
1 7 (7.07%) MS Visio
2 4 (4.04%) Microsoft Excel
2 4 (4.04%) Microsoft Project
3 2 (2.02%) Microsoft PowerPoint
Cloud Services
1 8 (8.08%) AWS
2 7 (7.07%) Azure
3 6 (6.06%) OpenShift
4 4 (4.04%) IaaS
5 2 (2.02%) GitHub
5 2 (2.02%) Microsoft 365
5 2 (2.02%) Nutanix
5 2 (2.02%) PaaS
5 2 (2.02%) SaaS
6 1 (1.01%) Entra ID
Communications & Networking
1 35 (35.35%) Firewall
2 31 (31.31%) LAN
2 31 (31.31%) WAN
3 25 (25.25%) BGP
4 21 (21.21%) OSPF
5 13 (13.13%) IPsec
5 13 (13.13%) Structured Cabling
5 13 (13.13%) VPN
6 12 (12.12%) Wireless
7 10 (10.10%) MPLS
8 8 (8.08%) SNMP
8 8 (8.08%) TACACS
9 7 (7.07%) Cisco Nexus
9 7 (7.07%) Network Security
9 7 (7.07%) TCP/IP
10 6 (6.06%) SAN
11 5 (5.05%) WLAN
12 4 (4.04%) IPv4
12 4 (4.04%) IPv6
12 4 (4.04%) VLAN
Database & Business Intelligence
1 4 (4.04%) SQL Server
2 3 (3.03%) Geospatial Data
2 3 (3.03%) GIS
2 3 (3.03%) QGIS
Development Applications
1 2 (2.02%) Bitbucket
1 2 (2.02%) JIRA
1 2 (2.02%) Rational DOORS
1 2 (2.02%) ScriptRunner
General
1 26 (26.26%) Social Skills
2 18 (18.18%) Documentation Skills
3 10 (10.10%) Public Sector
4 9 (9.09%) Analytical Skills
4 9 (9.09%) Telecoms
5 8 (8.08%) Finance
5 8 (8.08%) Manufacturing
6 5 (5.05%) Retail
7 4 (4.04%) Front Office
8 2 (2.02%) Back Office
8 2 (2.02%) Banking
9 1 (1.01%) Billing
9 1 (1.01%) Influencing Skills
9 1 (1.01%) Organisational Skills
Job Titles
1 29 (29.29%) Network Engineer
2 12 (12.12%) Cisco Engineer
2 12 (12.12%) Cisco Network Engineer
3 10 (10.10%) Architect
4 9 (9.09%) Analyst
4 9 (9.09%) Data Centre Analyst
4 9 (9.09%) Designer
4 9 (9.09%) Project Manager
5 8 (8.08%) Data Analyst
5 8 (8.08%) Data Centre Engineer
6 7 (7.07%) SC Cleared Network Engineer
6 7 (7.07%) Test Engineer
7 6 (6.06%) Data Centre Manager
7 6 (6.06%) IP Designer
7 6 (6.06%) Senior
8 5 (5.05%) Data Centre Project Manager
8 5 (5.05%) Data Network Engineer
9 4 (4.04%) Data Centre Technician
9 4 (4.04%) Lead
9 4 (4.04%) Network Architect
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 7 (7.07%) RFC 2544
2 2 (2.02%) Middleware
2 2 (2.02%) NETCONF
2 2 (2.02%) OpenConfig
2 2 (2.02%) RESTCONF
2 2 (2.02%) YANG
3 1 (1.01%) 802.1X
Miscellaneous
1 12 (12.12%) Hybrid Cloud
2 9 (9.09%) Self-Motivation
3 8 (8.08%) Fibre Optics
4 4 (4.04%) Virtual Team
5 3 (3.03%) Analytical Mindset
5 3 (3.03%) Distributed Systems
5 3 (3.03%) Driving Licence
5 3 (3.03%) Legacy Systems
6 2 (2.02%) Data Protection Act
6 2 (2.02%) Industrial Internet of Things
6 2 (2.02%) IoT
6 2 (2.02%) Linux Command Line
6 2 (2.02%) Management Information System
6 2 (2.02%) Operational Technology
6 2 (2.02%) SCADA
7 1 (1.01%) Cyber Defence
7 1 (1.01%) Legacy Applications
7 1 (1.01%) Onboarding
7 1 (1.01%) Replication
7 1 (1.01%) Thin Client
Operating Systems
1 6 (6.06%) Windows
2 5 (5.05%) Linux
3 4 (4.04%) Windows Server
4 3 (3.03%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
4 3 (3.03%) Unix
4 3 (3.03%) Windows Server 2016
4 3 (3.03%) Windows Server 2019
Processes & Methodologies
1 16 (16.16%) Incident Management
2 15 (15.15%) ITIL
3 13 (13.13%) Change Control
3 13 (13.13%) Continuous Improvement
4 12 (12.12%) Problem-Solving
5 11 (11.11%) Agile
5 11 (11.11%) Service Management
6 10 (10.10%) Capacity Management
6 10 (10.10%) Customer Requirements
7 9 (9.09%) Project Management
8 8 (8.08%) PRINCE2
9 7 (7.07%) Business Case
9 7 (7.07%) Case Management
9 7 (7.07%) Change Management
9 7 (7.07%) DevOps
9 7 (7.07%) Disaster Recovery
9 7 (7.07%) Migration
9 7 (7.07%) Test Scripting
9 7 (7.07%) Validation
10 6 (6.06%) Project Delivery
Programming Languages
1 10 (10.10%) Python
2 6 (6.06%) PowerShell
3 2 (2.02%) Java
3 2 (2.02%) SQL
4 1 (1.01%) Bash
Qualifications
1 49 (49.49%) Security Cleared
2 39 (39.39%) SC Cleared
3 28 (28.28%) Cisco Certification
4 20 (20.20%) CCNP
5 14 (14.14%) Degree
6 10 (10.10%) CCNA
7 8 (8.08%) CCIE
7 8 (8.08%) DV Cleared
7 8 (8.08%) JNCIE
8 6 (6.06%) AWS Certification
9 5 (5.05%) JNCIS
10 3 (3.03%) Computer Science Degree
10 3 (3.03%) Server+ Certification
11 2 (2.02%) JNCIA
11 2 (2.02%) Master's Degree
11 2 (2.02%) VCAP
11 2 (2.02%) VMware Certified Professional (VCP)
12 1 (1.01%) APMP
12 1 (1.01%) BPSS Clearance
12 1 (1.01%) DBS Check
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 4 (4.04%) PMO
2 3 (3.03%) Data Quality
2 3 (3.03%) QA
3 2 (2.02%) ISO/IEC 27001
3 2 (2.02%) SLA
4 1 (1.01%) Accessibility
4 1 (1.01%) Cyber Essentials
4 1 (1.01%) PCI DSS
System Software
1 16 (16.16%) VMware Infrastructure
2 13 (13.13%) VMware NSX
3 3 (3.03%) Active Directory
3 3 (3.03%) vSphere
4 2 (2.02%) vCloud
4 2 (2.02%) Virtual Machines
5 1 (1.01%) Firmware
5 1 (1.01%) Hyper-V
5 1 (1.01%) KVM
5 1 (1.01%) NFS
5 1 (1.01%) RHEV
5 1 (1.01%) VMware ESXi
5 1 (1.01%) Xen
Systems Management
1 10 (10.10%) Ansible
2 8 (8.08%) Terraform
3 5 (5.05%) SCCM
4 4 (4.04%) Nagios
4 4 (4.04%) Single Sign-On
5 3 (3.03%) Endace
6 2 (2.02%) vRealize
6 2 (2.02%) vRealize Orchestrator
7 1 (1.01%) Microsoft Intune
7 1 (1.01%) Proxmox
7 1 (1.01%) vCenter Server
7 1 (1.01%) VxRail
Vendors
1 48 (48.48%) Cisco
2 20 (20.20%) Juniper
3 19 (19.19%) VMware
4 18 (18.18%) Palo Alto
5 17 (17.17%) F5
6 14 (14.14%) CheckPoint
7 13 (13.13%) Aruba
8 9 (9.09%) Fortinet
8 9 (9.09%) Microsoft
9 4 (4.04%) SolarWinds
10 3 (3.03%) Citrix
10 3 (3.03%) ESRI
10 3 (3.03%) Intergraph
10 3 (3.03%) Zscaler
11 2 (2.02%) IBM
11 2 (2.02%) Mellanox
11 2 (2.02%) Nokia
11 2 (2.02%) NVIDIA
11 2 (2.02%) Oracle
11 2 (2.02%) Tanium