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 28 April 2026, comparing them to the same period in the previous two years.

6 months to
28 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 2,180 793 1,864
As % of all contract jobs in the South East 37.46% 26.49% 33.75%
As % of the Qualifications category 82.17% 64.89% 75.22%
Number of daily rates quoted 1,502 552 1,095
10th Percentile £356 £363 £388
25th Percentile £455 £464 £475
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £536 £550 £582
Median % change year-on-year -2.60% -5.50% +6.01%
75th Percentile £633 £630 £675
90th Percentile £725 £700 £738
England median daily rate £525 £538 £550
% change year-on-year -2.33% -2.27% -
Number of hourly rates quoted 218 51 120
10th Percentile £18.32 £24.18 £22.52
25th Percentile £25.77 £26.13 £54.48
Median hourly rate £70.00 £60.50 £62.07
Median % change year-on-year +15.70% -2.53% -0.76%
75th Percentile £85.00 £72.50 £80.00
90th Percentile £90.09 £80.10 £87.46
England median hourly rate £55.00 £56.75 £56.89
% change year-on-year -3.08% -0.24% -5.19%

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 2,653 1,222 2,478
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the South East 45.59% 40.81% 44.87%
Number of daily rates quoted 1,783 773 1,401
10th Percentile £309 £301 £313
25th Percentile £425 £438 £438
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £525 £538 £550
Median % change year-on-year -2.33% -2.27% +4.76%
75th Percentile £625 £625 £650
90th Percentile £725 £688 £735
England median daily rate £520 £525 £538
% change year-on-year -0.95% -2.33% -2.27%
Number of hourly rates quoted 268 84 214
10th Percentile £16.35 £20.01 £17.53
25th Percentile £22.79 £26.62 £26.92
Median hourly rate £55.00 £57.13 £57.35
Median % change year-on-year -3.72% -0.39% +0.82%
75th Percentile £84.00 £70.31 £67.02
90th Percentile £88.00 £78.01 £85.29
England median hourly rate £47.50 £47.65 £40.00
% change year-on-year -0.32% +19.13% -23.81%

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 28 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 28 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 28 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 1,129 £503 -10.27% 104
Hampshire 0 849 £600 +9.09% 201
Berkshire +1 682 £450 -23.24% 56
Buckinghamshire +1 358 £558 +2.29% 29
Surrey +4 90 £525 -6.67% 54
Oxfordshire +12 89 £450 -28.00% 20
West Sussex +3 57 £509 -5.31% 16
Kent +4 27 £443 +26.43% 9
East Sussex +5 7 £459 -16.55% 2
Sussex +1 7 £475 +9.83% 4
Home Counties - 2 £525 -
Isle of Wight - 1 - -
Middlesex - 1 - - 1
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 (2.02%) SharePoint
2 37 (1.70%) Microsoft Exchange
3 20 (0.92%) Confluence
4 12 (0.55%) Oracle Application Server
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 4 (0.18%) Apache
7 3 (0.14%) MS Project Server
8 2 (0.092%) Apache Airflow
8 2 (0.092%) Apache Spark
8 2 (0.092%) CMS
8 2 (0.092%) Palantir Foundry
8 2 (0.092%) SAS
8 2 (0.092%) Umbraco
9 1 (0.046%) Apache Pulsar
9 1 (0.046%) BizTalk Server
9 1 (0.046%) Smallworld
Applications
1 64 (2.94%) Microsoft Excel
2 60 (2.75%) Microsoft Office
3 35 (1.61%) Microsoft Project
4 29 (1.33%) Microsoft PowerPoint
5 12 (0.55%) MS Visio
6 3 (0.14%) Spreadsheet
7 2 (0.092%) CPLEX
7 2 (0.092%) Lectora
7 2 (0.092%) Oracle Smart View
8 1 (0.046%) Autodesk Inventor
8 1 (0.046%) CATIA
8 1 (0.046%) InVision
8 1 (0.046%) MicroStation
8 1 (0.046%) Siemens NX
8 1 (0.046%) Sketch
8 1 (0.046%) Windchill
Business Applications
1 36 (1.65%) SAP S/4HANA
2 29 (1.33%) Sparx Enterprise Architect
3 12 (0.55%) SAP PSCD
4 7 (0.32%) iTrent
4 7 (0.32%) Oracle ERP
4 7 (0.32%) Remedy ITSM
5 6 (0.28%) Oracle Assets
5 6 (0.28%) Oracle Payables
5 6 (0.28%) Oracle Subledger Accounting
5 6 (0.28%) SAP BRIM
5 6 (0.28%) SAP Hybris
6 5 (0.23%) SAP CRM
7 4 (0.18%) Primavera
7 4 (0.18%) SAP EWM
7 4 (0.18%) Teamcenter
8 3 (0.14%) Payment Gateway
8 3 (0.14%) SAP HCM
9 2 (0.092%) SAP MM
10 1 (0.046%) SAP FI
10 1 (0.046%) SAP WM
Cloud Services
1 320 (14.68%) Azure
2 199 (9.13%) AWS
3 82 (3.76%) GCP
4 80 (3.67%) Entra ID
5 63 (2.89%) Azure DevOps
6 59 (2.71%) Power Platform
7 57 (2.61%) Microsoft 365
8 34 (1.56%) OpenShift
8 34 (1.56%) PaaS
9 29 (1.33%) IaaS
10 26 (1.19%) GitHub
11 19 (0.87%) GitHub Actions
12 18 (0.83%) SaaS
12 18 (0.83%) SuccessFactors
13 14 (0.64%) Serverless
14 12 (0.55%) OCI
15 11 (0.50%) AWS CloudFormation
15 11 (0.50%) Azure Monitor
15 11 (0.50%) Cloud Computing
16 10 (0.46%) Datadog
Communications & Networking
1 167 (7.66%) Firewall
2 112 (5.14%) WAN
3 107 (4.91%) LAN
4 100 (4.59%) DNS
5 86 (3.94%) BGP
6 81 (3.72%) OSPF
7 75 (3.44%) DHCP
8 72 (3.30%) Network Security
9 51 (2.34%) VPN
10 40 (1.83%) TCP/IP
11 36 (1.65%) Wireless
12 32 (1.47%) Junos
13 31 (1.42%) Ethernet VPN
13 31 (1.42%) VXLAN
14 30 (1.38%) IPsec
15 28 (1.28%) BIG-IP
15 28 (1.28%) Cisco ISE
16 26 (1.19%) SD-WAN
16 26 (1.19%) VLAN
17 23 (1.06%) MPLS
Database & Business Intelligence
1 56 (2.57%) SQL Server
2 51 (2.34%) Power BI
3 30 (1.38%) Data Warehouse
4 28 (1.28%) PostgreSQL
5 21 (0.96%) Oracle Reports
6 14 (0.64%) Oracle Database
7 13 (0.60%) Oracle ODI
8 12 (0.55%) Metadata
8 12 (0.55%) Redis
8 12 (0.55%) Relational Database
9 10 (0.46%) Azure SQL Database
10 7 (0.32%) MySQL
10 7 (0.32%) NoSQL
10 7 (0.32%) Oracle Database 12c
11 6 (0.28%) Tableau
12 5 (0.23%) Metadata Repository
13 4 (0.18%) MongoDB
13 4 (0.18%) Oracle BI Publisher
13 4 (0.18%) SAP Data Services
13 4 (0.18%) SAP HANA
Development Applications
1 55 (2.52%) JIRA
2 45 (2.06%) Git
3 40 (1.83%) GitLab
4 37 (1.70%) Rational DOORS
5 28 (1.28%) Jenkins
6 16 (0.73%) Burp Suite
6 16 (0.73%) Metasploit
7 13 (0.60%) SonarQube
8 10 (0.46%) Postman
8 10 (0.46%) Visual Studio
9 7 (0.32%) Android Studio
9 7 (0.32%) JUnit
9 7 (0.32%) Subversion
10 6 (0.28%) Robot Framework
11 5 (0.23%) Bitbucket
11 5 (0.23%) Gradle
11 5 (0.23%) Maven
11 5 (0.23%) Sonatype Nexus
12 4 (0.18%) Artifactory
12 4 (0.18%) Eclipse
General
1 500 (22.94%) Social Skills
2 297 (13.62%) Public Sector
3 201 (9.22%) Analytical Skills
4 129 (5.92%) Finance
5 97 (4.45%) Aerospace
6 79 (3.62%) Documentation Skills
7 50 (2.29%) Military
8 35 (1.61%) Influencing Skills
8 35 (1.61%) Telecoms
9 33 (1.51%) Legal
10 30 (1.38%) Manufacturing
11 23 (1.06%) Law
12 21 (0.96%) Presentation Skills
13 19 (0.87%) Organisational Skills
14 14 (0.64%) Marketing
15 13 (0.60%) Billing
16 12 (0.55%) Advertising
17 10 (0.46%) Electronics
18 8 (0.37%) Aviation
18 8 (0.37%) Police
Job Titles
1 340 (15.60%) Architect
2 223 (10.23%) Senior
3 173 (7.94%) Lead
4 159 (7.29%) Developer
5 153 (7.02%) Analyst
6 125 (5.73%) Network Engineer
7 111 (5.09%) Consultant
8 84 (3.85%) Project Manager
9 77 (3.53%) Technical Architect
10 60 (2.75%) Delivery Manager
11 59 (2.71%) Infrastructure Engineer
12 58 (2.66%) Security Architect
13 55 (2.52%) Enterprise Architect
14 54 (2.48%) DevOps Engineer
15 51 (2.34%) Tester
16 49 (2.25%) Product Manager
17 43 (1.97%) SOC Analyst
18 41 (1.88%) Software Engineer
19 39 (1.79%) Product Delivery Manager
19 39 (1.79%) Senior Manager
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 43 (1.97%) REST
2 40 (1.83%) .NET
3 33 (1.51%) LDAP
4 31 (1.42%) React
5 29 (1.33%) RESTful
6 28 (1.28%) 802.1X
7 24 (1.10%) AngularJS
7 24 (1.10%) JSON
8 21 (0.96%) SailPoint
9 19 (0.87%) XML
10 18 (0.83%) Oracle Fusion
11 17 (0.78%) SOAP
12 15 (0.69%) Kafka
12 15 (0.69%) OAuth
13 14 (0.64%) Web Services
14 12 (0.55%) OAuth2
14 12 (0.55%) Quarkus
15 11 (0.50%) Elastic Stack
15 11 (0.50%) Keycloak
15 11 (0.50%) YAML
Miscellaneous
1 104 (4.77%) Data Centre
2 86 (3.94%) PKI
3 77 (3.53%) Product Ownership
4 67 (3.07%) Onboarding
5 37 (1.70%) Management Information System
6 36 (1.65%) Self-Motivation
7 35 (1.61%) Data Structures
8 32 (1.47%) Replication
9 30 (1.38%) Clustering
10 27 (1.24%) Cloud Native
11 26 (1.19%) Distributed Systems
11 26 (1.19%) Security Operations Centre
12 23 (1.06%) Analytical Mindset
13 22 (1.01%) Greenfield Project
13 22 (1.01%) Public Cloud
14 20 (0.92%) Cyber Threat
14 20 (0.92%) Security Posture
15 16 (0.73%) PMI
15 16 (0.73%) Private Cloud
15 16 (0.73%) Virtual Team
Operating Systems
1 267 (12.25%) Windows
2 196 (8.99%) Linux
3 76 (3.49%) Windows Server
4 30 (1.38%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
5 27 (1.24%) Unix
6 17 (0.78%) Android
7 16 (0.73%) Windows 10
8 12 (0.55%) Ubuntu
9 8 (0.37%) Embedded Linux
10 7 (0.32%) Mac OS
10 7 (0.32%) Windows Server 2016
11 6 (0.28%) Windows Server 2019
12 5 (0.23%) Debian
12 5 (0.23%) Windows 7
13 4 (0.18%) Apple iOS
13 4 (0.18%) CentOS
14 2 (0.092%) VMS
14 2 (0.092%) Windows Server 2012
15 1 (0.046%) OpenVMS
15 1 (0.046%) SUSE
Processes & Methodologies
1 412 (18.90%) Agile
2 235 (10.78%) Problem-Solving
3 220 (10.09%) ITIL
4 205 (9.40%) DevOps
5 199 (9.13%) CI/CD
6 192 (8.81%) Stakeholder Management
7 183 (8.39%) Continuous Improvement
8 180 (8.26%) Cybersecurity
9 173 (7.94%) Stakeholder Engagement
10 168 (7.71%) Migration
11 133 (6.10%) Roadmaps
12 124 (5.69%) ITSM
13 123 (5.64%) Service Management
14 110 (5.05%) Project Management
15 98 (4.50%) SIEM
15 98 (4.50%) Software Engineering
16 93 (4.27%) Computer Science
17 88 (4.04%) DevSecOps
18 87 (3.99%) Infrastructure Engineering
19 86 (3.94%) Change Management
Programming Languages
1 195 (8.94%) Python
2 163 (7.48%) PowerShell
3 82 (3.76%) SQL
4 71 (3.26%) Java
5 49 (2.25%) JavaScript
6 48 (2.20%) C#
7 45 (2.06%) Bash
8 30 (1.38%) C++
9 22 (1.01%) Go
10 21 (0.96%) Kusto Query Language
11 17 (0.78%) C
12 16 (0.73%) TypeScript
13 13 (0.60%) Shell Script
14 10 (0.46%) ABAP
14 10 (0.46%) Bicep
15 9 (0.41%) Korn
16 7 (0.32%) PL/SQL
16 7 (0.32%) T-SQL
17 4 (0.18%) Embedded C++
18 3 (0.14%) Embedded C
Qualifications
1 1,376 (63.12%) SC Cleared
2 734 (33.67%) DV Cleared
3 174 (7.98%) Degree
4 75 (3.44%) Cisco Certification
5 55 (2.52%) CCNP
6 51 (2.34%) BPSS Clearance
7 44 (2.02%) CISSP
8 33 (1.51%) PMP
9 30 (1.38%) PMI Certification
10 22 (1.01%) CCNA
10 22 (1.01%) CISM
11 18 (0.83%) Computer Science Degree
12 17 (0.78%) Azure Certification
12 17 (0.78%) GIAC
12 17 (0.78%) JNCIS
13 15 (0.69%) AWS Certification
13 15 (0.69%) CHECK Team Member
14 14 (0.64%) CEH
15 13 (0.60%) ISTQB
15 13 (0.60%) VMware Certified Professional (VCP)
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 100 (4.59%) NIST
2 96 (4.40%) ISO/IEC 27001
3 62 (2.84%) NCSC
4 61 (2.80%) PMO
5 58 (2.66%) QA
6 52 (2.39%) GDPR
7 28 (1.28%) Data Quality
8 21 (0.96%) SLA
9 17 (0.78%) Accessibility
9 17 (0.78%) PCI DSS
10 16 (0.73%) JSP 440
11 15 (0.69%) GRC
11 15 (0.69%) NIST 800
12 12 (0.55%) ISO/IEC 20000
13 10 (0.46%) COBIT
14 7 (0.32%) Cyber Essentials
15 6 (0.28%) Government Security Classifications
16 4 (0.18%) Actionable Recommendations
16 4 (0.18%) HMG Security Policy Framework
16 4 (0.18%) RMADS
System Software
1 171 (7.84%) Active Directory
2 103 (4.72%) VMware Infrastructure
3 42 (1.93%) Docker
4 41 (1.88%) VMware NSX
5 27 (1.24%) VMware ESXi
6 26 (1.19%) vSphere
7 17 (0.78%) Firmware
8 12 (0.55%) Hyper-V
8 12 (0.55%) vCloud
9 11 (0.50%) Virtual Desktop
10 10 (0.46%) Oracle RAC
11 7 (0.32%) Virtual Machines
12 4 (0.18%) Embedded Firmware
13 3 (0.14%) NFS
13 3 (0.14%) UAG
14 1 (0.046%) KVM
14 1 (0.046%) Sendmail
14 1 (0.046%) Terminal Services
14 1 (0.046%) Virtual Servers
14 1 (0.046%) Xen
Systems Management
1 94 (4.31%) Kubernetes
2 68 (3.12%) Terraform
3 57 (2.61%) Ansible
4 44 (2.02%) vCenter Server
5 33 (1.51%) Grafana
6 31 (1.42%) Prometheus
7 30 (1.38%) FortiGate
8 26 (1.19%) Argo
9 19 (0.87%) Microsoft Intune
10 18 (0.83%) Active Directory Federation Services
10 18 (0.83%) Nmap
10 18 (0.83%) SCCM
11 13 (0.60%) Kibana
12 12 (0.55%) Oracle RMAN
12 12 (0.55%) Single Sign-On
13 11 (0.50%) SCOM
13 11 (0.50%) WMI
14 10 (0.46%) Forefront Identity Manager
14 10 (0.46%) NetIQ Identity Manager
15 9 (0.41%) Nagios
Vendors
1 224 (10.28%) Microsoft
2 198 (9.08%) VMware
3 157 (7.20%) Cisco
4 117 (5.37%) SAP
5 85 (3.90%) Oracle
6 84 (3.85%) ServiceNow
7 81 (3.72%) Juniper
8 64 (2.94%) Splunk
9 63 (2.89%) Red Hat
10 51 (2.34%) F5
11 45 (2.06%) SolarWinds
12 38 (1.74%) Aruba
12 38 (1.74%) Palo Alto
13 34 (1.56%) BeyondTrust
14 33 (1.51%) CyberArk
15 31 (1.42%) Google
16 30 (1.38%) IBM
16 30 (1.38%) Sparx
17 26 (1.19%) CheckPoint
18 22 (1.01%) Extreme Networks