Security Cleared Contract Job Trends in the South East

Security Clearance
England > South East

The table below provides summary statistics for contract job vacancies advertised in the South East with a requirement for Security Cleared qualifications. It includes a benchmarking guide to the contractor rates offered over the 6 months leading up to 7 April 2026, comparing them to the same period in the previous two years.

6 months to
7 Apr 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 1 2 1
Rank change year-on-year +1 -1 0
Contract jobs citing Security Cleared 2,130 785 1,899
As % of all contract jobs in the South East 37.86% 26.29% 33.81%
As % of the Qualifications category 81.95% 65.53% 75.09%
Number of daily rates quoted 1,447 564 1,094
10th Percentile £350 £350 £370
25th Percentile £454 £463 £475
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £531 £550 £575
Median % change year-on-year -3.44% -4.35% +4.55%
75th Percentile £626 £630 £663
90th Percentile £725 £700 £738
England median daily rate £525 £540 £550
% change year-on-year -2.78% -1.82% -2.14%
Number of hourly rates quoted 219 51 121
10th Percentile £18.23 £20.12 £22.52
25th Percentile £25.02 £29.18 £52.90
Median hourly rate £65.00 £59.00 £62.50
Median % change year-on-year +10.17% -5.60% +2.17%
75th Percentile £85.31 £67.06 £75.24
90th Percentile £90.09 £80.00 £87.00
England median hourly rate £52.50 £57.50 £52.00
% change year-on-year -8.70% +10.58% -13.33%

All Academic and Professional Certifications
South East

Security Cleared falls under the Academic Qualifications and Professional Certifications category. For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all contract job vacancies requiring academic qualifications or professional certifications in the South East.

Contract vacancies requiring academic qualifications or professional certifications 2,599 1,198 2,529
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the South East 46.20% 40.12% 45.03%
Number of daily rates quoted 1,724 776 1,424
10th Percentile £306 £304 £279
25th Percentile £430 £437 £425
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £525 £544 £550
Median % change year-on-year -3.45% -1.14% +4.76%
75th Percentile £625 £625 £638
90th Percentile £725 £688 £719
England median daily rate £520 £525 £538
% change year-on-year -0.95% -2.33% -2.27%
Number of hourly rates quoted 271 83 210
10th Percentile £15.75 £18.80 £17.59
25th Percentile £20.65 £27.55 £26.92
Median hourly rate £50.00 £55.00 £57.35
Median % change year-on-year -9.09% -4.10% +9.24%
75th Percentile £84.00 £70.00 £66.94
90th Percentile £88.00 £76.85 £84.40
England median hourly rate £37.92 £50.00 £37.50
% change year-on-year -24.17% +33.33% -27.88%

Security Cleared
Job Vacancy Trend in the South East

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

Security Cleared job vacancy trend in the South East

Security Cleared
Daily Rate Trend in the South East

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in the South East citing Security Cleared.

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in the South East citing Security Cleared

Security Cleared
Daily Rate Histogram in the South East

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing Security Cleared in the South East over the 6 months to 7 April 2026.

Daily rate histogram for Security Cleared in the South East

Security Cleared
Hourly Rate Trend in the South East

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in the South East citing Security Cleared.

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in the South East citing Security Cleared

Security Cleared
Hourly Rate Histogram in the South East

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing Security Cleared in the South East over the 6 months to 7 April 2026.

Hourly rate histogram for Security Cleared in the South East

Security Cleared
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 Security Cleared within the South East region over the 6 months to 7 April 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 +1 1,107 £500 -9.09% 170
Hampshire 0 831 £600 +8.89% 149
Berkshire +1 701 £460 -20.00% 96
Buckinghamshire +1 325 £560 +11.89% 57
Surrey +7 89 £525 -9.17% 44
Oxfordshire +12 81 £450 -23.40% 20
West Sussex +4 50 £550 -4.10% 13
Kent +3 27 £443 +4.12% 17
Sussex +1 7 £475 +9.83% 4
East Sussex +3 4 £459 -16.55% 3
Isle of Wight - 2 £81 -
Middlesex - 1 - -
Home Counties - 1 £500 -
Security Cleared
England

Security Cleared
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 44 (2.07%) SharePoint
2 36 (1.69%) Microsoft Exchange
3 17 (0.80%) Confluence
4 6 (0.28%) Oracle Application Server
5 5 (0.23%) Apache
5 5 (0.23%) ArcGIS
5 5 (0.23%) IIS
5 5 (0.23%) NetWeaver
5 5 (0.23%) Oracle Workflow
5 5 (0.23%) SAP EP
6 3 (0.14%) MS Project Server
7 2 (0.094%) Apache Airflow
7 2 (0.094%) SAS
8 1 (0.047%) Anypoint
8 1 (0.047%) Apache Pulsar
8 1 (0.047%) BizTalk Server
8 1 (0.047%) JBoss
8 1 (0.047%) Palantir Foundry
8 1 (0.047%) Smallworld
8 1 (0.047%) WebLogic
Applications
1 69 (3.24%) Microsoft Excel
2 63 (2.96%) Microsoft Office
3 40 (1.88%) Microsoft Project
4 30 (1.41%) Microsoft PowerPoint
5 11 (0.52%) MS Visio
6 2 (0.094%) CPLEX
6 2 (0.094%) Lectora
6 2 (0.094%) Oracle Smart View
6 2 (0.094%) Spreadsheet
7 1 (0.047%) Autodesk Inventor
7 1 (0.047%) CATIA
7 1 (0.047%) MicroStation
7 1 (0.047%) PTC Creo
7 1 (0.047%) Siemens NX
7 1 (0.047%) Windchill
Business Applications
1 36 (1.69%) SAP S/4HANA
2 29 (1.36%) Sparx Enterprise Architect
3 9 (0.42%) SAP PSCD
4 7 (0.33%) Oracle Assets
4 7 (0.33%) Oracle ERP
4 7 (0.33%) Oracle Payables
4 7 (0.33%) Oracle Subledger Accounting
5 6 (0.28%) Remedy ITSM
5 6 (0.28%) Salesforce CRM
5 6 (0.28%) SAP BRIM
5 6 (0.28%) SAP Hybris
6 5 (0.23%) iTrent
6 5 (0.23%) SAP CRM
6 5 (0.23%) Teamcenter
7 4 (0.19%) Primavera
7 4 (0.19%) SAP EWM
8 3 (0.14%) Payment Gateway
8 3 (0.14%) SAP HCM
9 2 (0.094%) Oracle General Ledger
9 2 (0.094%) Oracle Receivables
Cloud Services
1 297 (13.94%) Azure
2 198 (9.30%) AWS
3 80 (3.76%) GCP
4 74 (3.47%) Entra ID
5 64 (3.00%) Microsoft 365
6 59 (2.77%) Azure DevOps
7 49 (2.30%) Power Platform
8 45 (2.11%) OpenShift
9 34 (1.60%) IaaS
9 34 (1.60%) PaaS
10 33 (1.55%) GitHub
11 19 (0.89%) GitHub Actions
12 17 (0.80%) SaaS
13 16 (0.75%) SuccessFactors
14 15 (0.70%) Cloud Computing
15 14 (0.66%) Serverless
16 12 (0.56%) OCI
17 11 (0.52%) AWS CloudFormation
17 11 (0.52%) OneDrive
18 10 (0.47%) Datadog
Communications & Networking
1 161 (7.56%) Firewall
2 104 (4.88%) WAN
3 101 (4.74%) LAN
4 99 (4.65%) DNS
5 81 (3.80%) BGP
6 76 (3.57%) OSPF
7 67 (3.15%) Network Security
8 66 (3.10%) DHCP
9 50 (2.35%) VPN
10 40 (1.88%) TCP/IP
11 34 (1.60%) Junos
11 34 (1.60%) Wireless
12 30 (1.41%) Cisco ISE
13 28 (1.31%) Ethernet VPN
13 28 (1.31%) IPsec
14 27 (1.27%) VXLAN
15 25 (1.17%) BIG-IP
16 24 (1.13%) SD-WAN
16 24 (1.13%) VLAN
17 22 (1.03%) Structured Cabling
Database & Business Intelligence
1 46 (2.16%) SQL Server
2 43 (2.02%) Power BI
3 27 (1.27%) PostgreSQL
4 17 (0.80%) Oracle Reports
5 13 (0.61%) Relational Database
6 12 (0.56%) Data Warehouse
6 12 (0.56%) Oracle Database
7 11 (0.52%) Redis
8 10 (0.47%) Azure SQL Database
8 10 (0.47%) Metadata
9 8 (0.38%) Oracle ODI
10 7 (0.33%) Oracle Database 12c
10 7 (0.33%) SAP HANA
11 6 (0.28%) MySQL
12 5 (0.23%) Metadata Repository
12 5 (0.23%) SAP Data Services
13 4 (0.19%) MongoDB
13 4 (0.19%) NoSQL
13 4 (0.19%) Tableau
14 3 (0.14%) Oracle BI Publisher
Development Applications
1 52 (2.44%) JIRA
2 42 (1.97%) GitLab
3 41 (1.92%) Git
4 38 (1.78%) Rational DOORS
5 37 (1.74%) Jenkins
6 18 (0.85%) Burp Suite
6 18 (0.85%) Metasploit
7 11 (0.52%) SonarQube
8 10 (0.47%) Visual Studio
9 9 (0.42%) Postman
10 8 (0.38%) Artifactory
10 8 (0.38%) JUnit
11 7 (0.33%) Android Studio
11 7 (0.33%) Subversion
12 6 (0.28%) Robot Framework
13 5 (0.23%) Bitbucket
13 5 (0.23%) Gradle
13 5 (0.23%) Maven
13 5 (0.23%) Sonatype Nexus
14 4 (0.19%) Cypress.io
General
1 523 (24.55%) Social Skills
2 318 (14.93%) Public Sector
3 205 (9.62%) Analytical Skills
4 133 (6.24%) Finance
5 94 (4.41%) Aerospace
6 76 (3.57%) Documentation Skills
7 47 (2.21%) Military
8 37 (1.74%) Legal
9 36 (1.69%) Influencing Skills
10 34 (1.60%) Manufacturing
10 34 (1.60%) Telecoms
11 23 (1.08%) Law
12 21 (0.99%) Presentation Skills
13 18 (0.85%) Organisational Skills
14 15 (0.70%) Marketing
15 13 (0.61%) Billing
16 11 (0.52%) Advertising
16 11 (0.52%) Electronics
17 7 (0.33%) Aviation
17 7 (0.33%) Police
Job Titles
1 347 (16.29%) Architect
2 205 (9.62%) Senior
3 167 (7.84%) Lead
4 151 (7.09%) Analyst
5 130 (6.10%) Developer
6 125 (5.87%) Network Engineer
7 122 (5.73%) Consultant
8 79 (3.71%) Project Manager
9 74 (3.47%) Technical Architect
10 59 (2.77%) Delivery Manager
11 57 (2.68%) Tester
12 56 (2.63%) Infrastructure Engineer
12 56 (2.63%) Security Architect
13 55 (2.58%) Enterprise Architect
14 49 (2.30%) Product Manager
15 47 (2.21%) DevOps Engineer
16 41 (1.92%) Software Engineer
17 39 (1.83%) Product Delivery Manager
17 39 (1.83%) SOC Analyst
18 37 (1.74%) Support Engineer
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 40 (1.88%) REST
2 36 (1.69%) .NET
3 34 (1.60%) LDAP
4 33 (1.55%) React
5 25 (1.17%) RESTful
6 23 (1.08%) 802.1X
6 23 (1.08%) JSON
7 20 (0.94%) AngularJS
8 18 (0.85%) XML
9 17 (0.80%) Oracle Fusion
9 17 (0.80%) SailPoint
9 17 (0.80%) SOAP
10 16 (0.75%) Elastic Stack
10 16 (0.75%) Kafka
11 11 (0.52%) Keycloak
11 11 (0.52%) Loki
11 11 (0.52%) OAuth
11 11 (0.52%) Oracle GoldenGate
11 11 (0.52%) Web Services
11 11 (0.52%) YAML
Miscellaneous
1 99 (4.65%) Data Centre
2 90 (4.23%) PKI
3 77 (3.62%) Product Ownership
4 55 (2.58%) Onboarding
5 41 (1.92%) Management Information System
6 36 (1.69%) Self-Motivation
7 33 (1.55%) Data Structures
7 33 (1.55%) Replication
8 30 (1.41%) Cloud Native
9 28 (1.31%) Clustering
10 27 (1.27%) Security Operations Centre
11 24 (1.13%) Analytical Mindset
11 24 (1.13%) Public Cloud
12 21 (0.99%) Virtual Team
13 19 (0.89%) Cyber Threat
13 19 (0.89%) Distributed Systems
13 19 (0.89%) Driving Licence
13 19 (0.89%) Security Posture
14 17 (0.80%) Private Cloud
15 15 (0.70%) Greenfield Project
Operating Systems
1 273 (12.82%) Windows
2 202 (9.48%) Linux
3 74 (3.47%) Windows Server
4 36 (1.69%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
5 24 (1.13%) Windows 10
6 17 (0.80%) Unix
7 16 (0.75%) Android
8 13 (0.61%) Ubuntu
9 7 (0.33%) Windows 7
9 7 (0.33%) Windows Server 2016
10 6 (0.28%) Embedded Linux
10 6 (0.28%) Mac OS
11 5 (0.23%) Debian
11 5 (0.23%) Windows Server 2019
12 4 (0.19%) CentOS
13 3 (0.14%) Apple iOS
13 3 (0.14%) Kali Linux
14 2 (0.094%) SUSE
14 2 (0.094%) SUSE Linux Enterprise Server
14 2 (0.094%) Windows Server 2012
Processes & Methodologies
1 404 (18.97%) Agile
2 227 (10.66%) Problem-Solving
3 210 (9.86%) ITIL
4 206 (9.67%) CI/CD
5 203 (9.53%) DevOps
6 191 (8.97%) Stakeholder Engagement
7 189 (8.87%) Stakeholder Management
8 183 (8.59%) Continuous Improvement
9 181 (8.50%) Migration
10 164 (7.70%) Cybersecurity
11 149 (7.00%) Roadmaps
12 126 (5.92%) Service Management
13 114 (5.35%) Project Management
14 112 (5.26%) ITSM
15 91 (4.27%) DevSecOps
16 90 (4.23%) SIEM
16 90 (4.23%) Software Engineering
17 88 (4.13%) Change Management
17 88 (4.13%) Infrastructure Engineering
18 87 (4.08%) Decision-Making
Programming Languages
1 186 (8.73%) Python
2 155 (7.28%) PowerShell
3 68 (3.19%) Java
4 67 (3.15%) SQL
5 53 (2.49%) Bash
6 46 (2.16%) C#
6 46 (2.16%) JavaScript
7 30 (1.41%) C++
8 21 (0.99%) Kusto Query Language
9 19 (0.89%) TypeScript
10 16 (0.75%) C
11 14 (0.66%) Shell Script
12 13 (0.61%) Go
13 11 (0.52%) ABAP
14 10 (0.47%) Bicep
15 9 (0.42%) Korn
15 9 (0.42%) PL/SQL
16 5 (0.23%) Embedded C++
16 5 (0.23%) T-SQL
17 3 (0.14%) Embedded C
Qualifications
1 1,328 (62.35%) SC Cleared
2 718 (33.71%) DV Cleared
3 168 (7.89%) Degree
4 71 (3.33%) Cisco Certification
5 53 (2.49%) CCNP
6 50 (2.35%) CISSP
7 46 (2.16%) BPSS Clearance
8 30 (1.41%) PMP
9 28 (1.31%) PMI Certification
10 26 (1.22%) CISM
11 22 (1.03%) CCNA
12 18 (0.85%) GIAC
13 17 (0.80%) Azure Certification
13 17 (0.80%) CEH
13 17 (0.80%) JNCIS
14 16 (0.75%) Computer Science Degree
15 15 (0.70%) AWS Certification
15 15 (0.70%) CHECK Team Member
16 13 (0.61%) CREST Certified
16 13 (0.61%) Cyber Scheme
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 90 (4.23%) NIST
2 88 (4.13%) ISO/IEC 27001
3 57 (2.68%) GDPR
3 57 (2.68%) NCSC
3 57 (2.68%) PMO
4 51 (2.39%) QA
5 25 (1.17%) Data Quality
6 23 (1.08%) SLA
7 17 (0.80%) PCI DSS
8 16 (0.75%) Accessibility
8 16 (0.75%) JSP 440
9 14 (0.66%) GRC
9 14 (0.66%) ISO/IEC 20000
9 14 (0.66%) NIST 800
10 10 (0.47%) COBIT
11 6 (0.28%) Cyber Essentials
11 6 (0.28%) Government Security Classifications
12 5 (0.23%) P3O
13 4 (0.19%) Actionable Recommendations
13 4 (0.19%) HMG Security Policy Framework
System Software
1 168 (7.89%) Active Directory
2 102 (4.79%) VMware Infrastructure
3 45 (2.11%) Docker
4 43 (2.02%) VMware NSX
5 37 (1.74%) vSphere
6 24 (1.13%) VMware ESXi
7 14 (0.66%) Firmware
8 12 (0.56%) vCloud
9 11 (0.52%) Hyper-V
9 11 (0.52%) Virtual Desktop
10 9 (0.42%) Oracle RAC
11 7 (0.33%) Virtual Machines
12 3 (0.14%) NFS
13 2 (0.094%) Embedded Firmware
13 2 (0.094%) UAG
14 1 (0.047%) KVM
14 1 (0.047%) RHEV
14 1 (0.047%) Sendmail
14 1 (0.047%) Terminal Services
14 1 (0.047%) Xen
Systems Management
1 102 (4.79%) Kubernetes
2 74 (3.47%) Terraform
3 65 (3.05%) Ansible
4 50 (2.35%) vCenter Server
5 43 (2.02%) Grafana
6 42 (1.97%) Prometheus
7 36 (1.69%) Argo
8 25 (1.17%) FortiGate
9 23 (1.08%) SCCM
10 20 (0.94%) Nmap
11 19 (0.89%) Microsoft Intune
12 18 (0.85%) Active Directory Federation Services
13 13 (0.61%) Kibana
13 13 (0.61%) Single Sign-On
13 13 (0.61%) WMI
14 11 (0.52%) Kustomize
15 10 (0.47%) Forefront Identity Manager
15 10 (0.47%) NetIQ Identity Manager
15 10 (0.47%) Oracle RMAN
15 10 (0.47%) SCOM
Vendors
1 224 (10.52%) Microsoft
2 203 (9.53%) VMware
3 176 (8.26%) Cisco
4 106 (4.98%) SAP
5 87 (4.08%) ServiceNow
6 85 (3.99%) Juniper
7 71 (3.33%) Red Hat
8 65 (3.05%) Splunk
9 61 (2.86%) Oracle
10 57 (2.68%) Aruba
11 46 (2.16%) SolarWinds
12 45 (2.11%) F5
13 38 (1.78%) Palo Alto
14 32 (1.50%) Google
15 31 (1.46%) IBM
16 30 (1.41%) Sparx
17 29 (1.36%) BeyondTrust
17 29 (1.36%) CyberArk
18 26 (1.22%) CheckPoint
19 19 (0.89%) Citrix