Network Engineer Contract Job Trends in the South East

Network Engineer
England > South East

The median Network Engineer daily rate in the South East is £500, according to job vacancies posted in the 6 months leading up to 23 January 2026.

The table below compares current contractor rates and summary statistics with the previous two years.

6 months to
23 Jan 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 68 61 57
Rank change year-on-year -7 -4 +23
Contract jobs requiring a Network Engineer 137 111 182
As % of all contract jobs in the South East 3.06% 3.38% 3.50%
As % of the Job Titles category 3.38% 3.64% 3.74%
Number of daily rates quoted 115 69 100
10th Percentile £303 £297 £250
25th Percentile £413 £418 £356
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £500 £478
Median % change year-on-year - +4.71% -2.05%
75th Percentile £506 £575 £527
90th Percentile £583 £625 £700
England median daily rate £481 £490 £460
% change year-on-year -1.79% +6.52% +2.22%
Number of hourly rates quoted 4 1 7
10th Percentile £26.76 - £22.65
25th Percentile £38.40 £18.50 £24.38
Median hourly rate £52.58 £19.00 £25.00
Median % change year-on-year +176.74% -24.00% +6.38%
75th Percentile £56.44 £19.50 £68.75
90th Percentile - - £70.76
England median hourly rate £48.72 £20.00 £62.50
% change year-on-year +143.60% -68.00% +86.57%

All Contract IT Job Roles
South East

For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all contract IT job vacancies in the South East. Most job vacancies include a discernible job title that can be normalized. As such, the figures in the second row provide an indication of the number of contract jobs in our overall sample.

Contract vacancies in the South East with a recognized job title 4,050 3,050 4,869
% of contract IT jobs with a recognized job title 90.48% 92.87% 93.56%
Number of daily rates quoted 2,630 1,898 3,072
10th Percentile £255 £234 £205
25th Percentile £400 £398 £371
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £500 £500
75th Percentile £600 £613 £600
90th Percentile £688 £675 £688
England median daily rate £501 £525 £525
% change year-on-year -4.67% - -4.55%
Number of hourly rates quoted 350 106 341
10th Percentile £13.88 £19.00 £13.15
25th Percentile £16.50 £24.18 £20.25
Median hourly rate £25.15 £42.50 £48.40
Median % change year-on-year -40.82% -12.19% +14.11%
75th Percentile £57.50 £62.50 £63.00
90th Percentile £81.10 £70.00 £76.10
England median hourly rate £29.60 £35.00 £39.55
% change year-on-year -15.43% -11.50% +13.00%

Network Engineer
Job Vacancy Trend in the South East

Historical trend showing the proportion of contract IT job postings featuring 'Network Engineer' in the job title relative to all contract IT jobs advertised in the South East.

Network Engineer job vacancy trend in the South East

Network Engineer
Daily Rate Trend in the South East

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for Network Engineer job vacancies in the South East.

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for Network Engineer job vacancies in the South East

Network Engineer
Daily Rate Histogram in the South East

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing Network Engineer in the South East over the 6 months to 23 January 2026.

Daily rate histogram for Network Engineer in the South East

Network Engineer
Hourly Rate Trend in the South East

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for Network Engineer job vacancies in the South East.

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for Network Engineer job vacancies in the South East

Network Engineer
Hourly Rate Histogram in the South East

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing Network Engineer in the South East over the 6 months to 23 January 2026.

Hourly rate histogram for Network Engineer in the South East

Network Engineer
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 Network Engineer within the South East region over the 6 months to 23 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
Hampshire -4 66 £500 -4.76% 17
Thames Valley -12 44 £453 -9.40% 24
Berkshire -15 32 £453 -4.63% 19
Kent +11 17 £438 -2.78% 11
West Sussex -8 8 £438 -2.78% 5
Oxfordshire -7 7 £425 -22.73%
Buckinghamshire -6 5 £560 +14.87% 5
Surrey -20 1 £500 +5.26% 7
East Sussex - 1 £275 - 4
Network Engineer
England

Network Engineer Skill Set
Top 30 Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities in the South East

For the 6 months to 23 January 2026, Network Engineer contract job roles required the following skills and capabilities in order of popularity. The figures indicate the absolute number of co-occurrences and as a proportion of all contract job ads across the South East region featuring Network Engineer in the job title.

1 100 (72.99%) Security Cleared
2 94 (68.61%) Cisco
3 61 (44.53%) SC Cleared
4 59 (43.07%) Firewall
5 49 (35.77%) Juniper
6 40 (29.20%) DV Cleared
7 39 (28.47%) BGP
8 36 (26.28%) LAN
9 35 (25.55%) Cisco Certification
10 34 (24.82%) CCNP
11 33 (24.09%) OSPF
12 32 (23.36%) WAN
13 30 (21.90%) SolarWinds
14 29 (21.17%) Palo Alto
15 27 (19.71%) Junos
16 25 (18.25%) Cisco IOS
17 24 (17.52%) VMware NSX
18 22 (16.06%) vCenter Server
19 21 (15.33%) Aruba
19 21 (15.33%) Cisco Firepower
19 21 (15.33%) VPN
20 20 (14.60%) Cisco ISE
20 20 (14.60%) ITSM
21 19 (13.87%) CheckPoint
21 19 (13.87%) Service Management
22 18 (13.14%) IPsec
22 18 (13.14%) Network Security
22 18 (13.14%) Windows
22 18 (13.14%) Windows Server
23 17 (12.41%) Active Directory

Network Engineer Skill Set
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:

Applications
1 1 (0.73%) MS Visio
Cloud Services
1 10 (7.30%) AWS
2 7 (5.11%) Azure
3 2 (1.46%) GCP
3 2 (1.46%) Google Ads
3 2 (1.46%) IaaS
3 2 (1.46%) PaaS
3 2 (1.46%) SaaS
4 1 (0.73%) Nutanix
4 1 (0.73%) Virtual Private Cloud
Communications & Networking
1 59 (43.07%) Firewall
2 39 (28.47%) BGP
3 36 (26.28%) LAN
4 33 (24.09%) OSPF
5 32 (23.36%) WAN
6 27 (19.71%) Junos
7 25 (18.25%) Cisco IOS
8 21 (15.33%) Cisco Firepower
8 21 (15.33%) VPN
9 20 (14.60%) Cisco ISE
10 18 (13.14%) IPsec
10 18 (13.14%) Network Security
11 13 (9.49%) Structured Cabling
12 12 (8.76%) VLAN
13 11 (8.03%) Wireless
14 10 (7.30%) MPLS
15 6 (4.38%) Cisco Nexus
15 6 (4.38%) NX-OS
15 6 (4.38%) WLAN
16 5 (3.65%) DNS
Database & Business Intelligence
1 1 (0.73%) SQL Server
Development Applications
1 1 (0.73%) GitLab
1 1 (0.73%) Jenkins
General
1 33 (24.09%) Social Skills
2 20 (14.60%) Documentation Skills
3 15 (10.95%) Public Sector
4 12 (8.76%) Manufacturing
5 10 (7.30%) Telecoms
6 6 (4.38%) Analytical Skills
7 4 (2.92%) Finance
8 3 (2.19%) Electronics
8 3 (2.19%) Marketing
9 2 (1.46%) Military
9 2 (1.46%) Pharmaceutical
10 1 (0.73%) Inclusion and Diversity
10 1 (0.73%) Legal
10 1 (0.73%) Organisational Skills
10 1 (0.73%) Police
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 4 (2.92%) RFC 2544
Miscellaneous
1 29 (21.17%) Data Centre
2 5 (3.65%) NHS
3 4 (2.92%) Fibre Optics
3 4 (2.92%) PKI
4 3 (2.19%) Data Protection Act
4 3 (2.19%) Driving Licence
4 3 (2.19%) Legacy Systems
4 3 (2.19%) Self-Motivation
5 2 (1.46%) Linux Command Line
5 2 (1.46%) Onboarding
6 1 (0.73%) Clustering
6 1 (0.73%) Life Science
6 1 (0.73%) Management Information System
6 1 (0.73%) Operational Technology
6 1 (0.73%) Security Operations Centre
6 1 (0.73%) Security Posture
Operating Systems
1 18 (13.14%) Windows
1 18 (13.14%) Windows Server
2 4 (2.92%) Linux
Processes & Methodologies
1 20 (14.60%) ITSM
2 19 (13.87%) Service Management
3 14 (10.22%) Collaborative Working
4 10 (7.30%) Network Design
5 9 (6.57%) Problem-Solving
6 8 (5.84%) Customer Requirements
6 8 (5.84%) High Availability
7 7 (5.11%) Network Monitoring
8 6 (4.38%) Change Management
8 6 (4.38%) Network Management
8 6 (4.38%) Network Segmentation
8 6 (4.38%) Network Virtualisation
9 5 (3.65%) Change Control
9 5 (3.65%) Incident Response
9 5 (3.65%) Infrastructure Engineering
9 5 (3.65%) Knowledge Transfer
9 5 (3.65%) Project Delivery
9 5 (3.65%) Stakeholder Engagement
10 4 (2.92%) Case Management
10 4 (2.92%) Validation
Programming Languages
1 4 (2.92%) Python
2 2 (1.46%) SQL
3 1 (0.73%) Bash
3 1 (0.73%) PowerShell
Qualifications
1 100 (72.99%) Security Cleared
2 61 (44.53%) SC Cleared
3 40 (29.20%) DV Cleared
4 35 (25.55%) Cisco Certification
5 34 (24.82%) CCNP
6 15 (10.95%) CCNA
7 9 (6.57%) JNCIS
8 7 (5.11%) Degree
9 5 (3.65%) JNCIA
9 5 (3.65%) JNCIP
9 5 (3.65%) Network+ Certification
10 2 (1.46%) BPSS Clearance
11 1 (0.73%) BC Cleared
11 1 (0.73%) CEH
11 1 (0.73%) CISSP
11 1 (0.73%) CompTIA Security+
11 1 (0.73%) Computer Science Degree
11 1 (0.73%) DBS Check
11 1 (0.73%) MCP
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 2 (1.46%) QA
1 2 (1.46%) SLA
2 1 (0.73%) ISO/IEC 27001
2 1 (0.73%) JSP 440
2 1 (0.73%) NIST
System Software
1 24 (17.52%) VMware NSX
2 17 (12.41%) Active Directory
3 7 (5.11%) VMware Infrastructure
4 5 (3.65%) Firmware
5 2 (1.46%) Hyper-V
5 2 (1.46%) vCloud
6 1 (0.73%) Docker
6 1 (0.73%) KVM
6 1 (0.73%) RHEV
6 1 (0.73%) Xen
Systems Management
1 22 (16.06%) vCenter Server
2 6 (4.38%) Ansible
2 6 (4.38%) FortiGate
3 4 (2.92%) Nagios
4 3 (2.19%) Terraform
5 2 (1.46%) Dell DRAC
6 1 (0.73%) Amdocs OSS
6 1 (0.73%) Backup Exec
6 1 (0.73%) Failover Clustering
6 1 (0.73%) Kubernetes
6 1 (0.73%) Norton AntiVirus
6 1 (0.73%) Proxmox
6 1 (0.73%) SCOM
6 1 (0.73%) WhatsUp Gold
6 1 (0.73%) WSUS
Vendors
1 94 (68.61%) Cisco
2 49 (35.77%) Juniper
3 30 (21.90%) SolarWinds
4 29 (21.17%) Palo Alto
5 21 (15.33%) Aruba
6 19 (13.87%) CheckPoint
7 14 (10.22%) Fortinet
8 10 (7.30%) VMware
9 8 (5.84%) F5
10 7 (5.11%) Meraki
11 5 (3.65%) Nokia
12 4 (2.92%) Broadcom
12 4 (2.92%) Microsoft
13 3 (2.19%) SAP
14 2 (1.46%) Dell
14 2 (1.46%) McAfee
14 2 (1.46%) Mellanox
14 2 (1.46%) NVIDIA
14 2 (1.46%) Pegasus
14 2 (1.46%) Zscaler