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 1 May 2026, comparing them to the same period in the previous two years.

6 months to
1 May 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 1 2 1
Rank change year-on-year +1 -1 0
Contract jobs citing Security Cleared 2,189 792 1,864
As % of all contract jobs in the South East 37.52% 26.31% 33.54%
As % of the Qualifications category 82.11% 64.81% 74.92%
Number of daily rates quoted 1,513 555 1,102
10th Percentile £356 £360 £388
25th Percentile £455 £463 £475
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £538 £550 £582
Median % change year-on-year -2.27% -5.50% +6.01%
75th Percentile £630 £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 219 50 120
10th Percentile £18.32 £23.77 £22.52
25th Percentile £27.06 £25.64 £52.90
Median hourly rate £70.00 £60.25 £61.65
Median % change year-on-year +16.18% -2.26% -1.45%
75th Percentile £85.31 £73.13 £80.00
90th Percentile £90.09 £80.72 £87.46
England median hourly rate £55.00 £55.00 £57.33
% change year-on-year - -4.06% -4.45%

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 2,666 1,222 2,488
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the South East 45.70% 40.60% 44.76%
Number of daily rates quoted 1,796 778 1,413
10th Percentile £306 £302 £313
25th Percentile £425 £438 £438
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £525 £537 £550
Median % change year-on-year -2.28% -2.32% +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 269 83 214
10th Percentile £16.35 £20.00 £17.53
25th Percentile £22.79 £26.13 £26.92
Median hourly rate £55.00 £56.75 £57.35
Median % change year-on-year -3.08% -1.05% +0.05%
75th Percentile £84.00 £70.63 £66.94
90th Percentile £88.42 £78.13 £85.29
England median hourly rate £47.50 £45.00 £40.00
% change year-on-year +5.56% +12.50% -23.51%

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 1 May 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 1 May 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 1 May 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 1,141 £512 -8.57% 101
Hampshire 0 847 £600 +9.09% 188
Berkshire +1 680 £450 -22.75% 49
Buckinghamshire +1 366 £550 +0.46% 34
Oxfordshire +12 95 £450 -28.00% 21
Surrey +3 89 £525 -3.97% 39
West Sussex +4 58 £503 -6.33% 12
Kent +3 26 £443 +26.43% 8
East Sussex +6 7 £459 -16.55% 2
Sussex +1 7 £475 +9.83% 4
Home Counties - 2 £525 -
Middlesex - 1 - - 1
Isle of Wight - 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 46 (2.10%) SharePoint
2 36 (1.64%) Microsoft Exchange
3 21 (0.96%) 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 (0.091%) Apache Airflow
8 2 (0.091%) Apache Spark
8 2 (0.091%) CMS
8 2 (0.091%) Palantir Foundry
8 2 (0.091%) SAS
8 2 (0.091%) Umbraco
9 1 (0.046%) Apache Pulsar
9 1 (0.046%) BizTalk Server
9 1 (0.046%) Smallworld
Applications
1 66 (3.02%) Microsoft Excel
2 59 (2.70%) Microsoft Office
3 36 (1.64%) Microsoft Project
4 31 (1.42%) Microsoft PowerPoint
5 12 (0.55%) MS Visio
6 3 (0.14%) Spreadsheet
7 2 (0.091%) CPLEX
7 2 (0.091%) Lectora
7 2 (0.091%) 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 33 (1.51%) SAP S/4HANA
2 29 (1.32%) 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 (0.27%) Oracle Assets
5 6 (0.27%) Oracle Payables
5 6 (0.27%) Oracle Subledger Accounting
5 6 (0.27%) SAP BRIM
5 6 (0.27%) SAP Hybris
6 5 (0.23%) SAP CRM
7 4 (0.18%) Primavera
7 4 (0.18%) Teamcenter
8 3 (0.14%) Payment Gateway
8 3 (0.14%) SAP EWM
8 3 (0.14%) SAP HCM
9 2 (0.091%) SAP MM
10 1 (0.046%) Oracle EBS
10 1 (0.046%) SAP FI
Cloud Services
1 329 (15.03%) Azure
2 202 (9.23%) AWS
3 84 (3.84%) GCP
4 83 (3.79%) Entra ID
5 66 (3.02%) Azure DevOps
6 60 (2.74%) Microsoft 365
6 60 (2.74%) Power Platform
7 37 (1.69%) PaaS
8 33 (1.51%) OpenShift
9 32 (1.46%) IaaS
10 26 (1.19%) GitHub
11 20 (0.91%) SaaS
12 19 (0.87%) GitHub Actions
13 18 (0.82%) SuccessFactors
14 14 (0.64%) Serverless
15 12 (0.55%) OCI
16 11 (0.50%) AWS CloudFormation
16 11 (0.50%) Azure Monitor
16 11 (0.50%) Cloud Computing
17 10 (0.46%) Datadog
Communications & Networking
1 166 (7.58%) Firewall
2 113 (5.16%) WAN
3 109 (4.98%) LAN
4 100 (4.57%) DNS
5 85 (3.88%) BGP
6 80 (3.65%) OSPF
7 75 (3.43%) DHCP
8 72 (3.29%) Network Security
9 50 (2.28%) VPN
10 40 (1.83%) TCP/IP
11 36 (1.64%) Wireless
12 32 (1.46%) Junos
13 31 (1.42%) Ethernet VPN
13 31 (1.42%) VXLAN
14 30 (1.37%) 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 (1.05%) MPLS
Database & Business Intelligence
1 58 (2.65%) SQL Server
2 51 (2.33%) Power BI
3 30 (1.37%) Data Warehouse
4 28 (1.28%) PostgreSQL
5 22 (1.01%) Oracle Reports
6 15 (0.69%) Oracle Database
7 13 (0.59%) Metadata
7 13 (0.59%) Oracle ODI
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 (0.27%) Tableau
12 5 (0.23%) Metadata Repository
13 4 (0.18%) Amazon RDS
13 4 (0.18%) Big Data
13 4 (0.18%) MongoDB
13 4 (0.18%) Oracle BI Publisher
Development Applications
1 56 (2.56%) JIRA
2 45 (2.06%) Git
3 40 (1.83%) GitLab
4 37 (1.69%) Rational DOORS
5 28 (1.28%) Jenkins
6 16 (0.73%) Burp Suite
6 16 (0.73%) Metasploit
7 12 (0.55%) 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 (0.27%) 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%) Selenium
General
1 497 (22.70%) Social Skills
2 289 (13.20%) Public Sector
3 201 (9.18%) Analytical Skills
4 130 (5.94%) Finance
5 100 (4.57%) Aerospace
6 82 (3.75%) Documentation Skills
7 51 (2.33%) Military
8 38 (1.74%) Influencing Skills
9 34 (1.55%) Legal
9 34 (1.55%) Telecoms
10 28 (1.28%) Manufacturing
11 24 (1.10%) Law
12 19 (0.87%) Organisational Skills
12 19 (0.87%) Presentation Skills
13 13 (0.59%) Billing
13 13 (0.59%) Marketing
14 12 (0.55%) Advertising
15 9 (0.41%) Electronics
16 8 (0.37%) Aviation
16 8 (0.37%) Inclusion and Diversity
Job Titles
1 336 (15.35%) Architect
2 224 (10.23%) Senior
3 177 (8.09%) Lead
4 156 (7.13%) Developer
5 155 (7.08%) Analyst
6 127 (5.80%) Network Engineer
7 104 (4.75%) Consultant
8 88 (4.02%) Project Manager
9 74 (3.38%) Technical Architect
10 60 (2.74%) Delivery Manager
10 60 (2.74%) Infrastructure Engineer
11 57 (2.60%) Security Architect
12 55 (2.51%) DevOps Engineer
12 55 (2.51%) Enterprise Architect
13 52 (2.38%) Tester
14 49 (2.24%) Product Manager
15 43 (1.96%) SOC Analyst
16 41 (1.87%) Software Engineer
17 39 (1.78%) Product Delivery Manager
17 39 (1.78%) Senior Manager
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 41 (1.87%) REST
2 40 (1.83%) .NET
3 34 (1.55%) LDAP
4 31 (1.42%) React
5 29 (1.32%) RESTful
6 28 (1.28%) 802.1X
7 24 (1.10%) JSON
8 23 (1.05%) AngularJS
9 21 (0.96%) SailPoint
10 19 (0.87%) XML
11 18 (0.82%) Oracle Fusion
12 15 (0.69%) Kafka
12 15 (0.69%) OAuth
12 15 (0.69%) SOAP
13 12 (0.55%) OAuth2
13 12 (0.55%) Web Services
14 11 (0.50%) CSS
14 11 (0.50%) Elastic Stack
14 11 (0.50%) Quarkus
14 11 (0.50%) YAML
Miscellaneous
1 104 (4.75%) Data Centre
2 86 (3.93%) PKI
3 77 (3.52%) Product Ownership
4 66 (3.02%) Onboarding
5 37 (1.69%) Management Information System
6 36 (1.64%) Self-Motivation
7 34 (1.55%) Data Structures
8 30 (1.37%) Replication
9 29 (1.32%) Clustering
10 27 (1.23%) Cloud Native
11 26 (1.19%) Distributed Systems
11 26 (1.19%) Security Operations Centre
12 23 (1.05%) Analytical Mindset
13 22 (1.01%) Public Cloud
14 21 (0.96%) Cyber Threat
14 21 (0.96%) Security Posture
15 19 (0.87%) Greenfield Project
15 19 (0.87%) Operational Technology
16 18 (0.82%) Virtual Team
17 16 (0.73%) Private Cloud
Operating Systems
1 268 (12.24%) Windows
2 200 (9.14%) Linux
3 76 (3.47%) Windows Server
4 32 (1.46%) Unix
5 30 (1.37%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
6 17 (0.78%) Android
7 13 (0.59%) 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 (0.27%) 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 (0.091%) VMS
14 2 (0.091%) Windows Server 2012
15 1 (0.046%) Data ONTAP
15 1 (0.046%) OpenVMS
Processes & Methodologies
1 416 (19.00%) Agile
2 236 (10.78%) Problem-Solving
3 221 (10.10%) ITIL
4 211 (9.64%) DevOps
5 204 (9.32%) CI/CD
6 195 (8.91%) Stakeholder Management
7 191 (8.73%) Cybersecurity
8 190 (8.68%) Continuous Improvement
9 170 (7.77%) Stakeholder Engagement
10 159 (7.26%) Migration
11 127 (5.80%) Roadmaps
12 125 (5.71%) ITSM
13 124 (5.66%) Service Management
14 114 (5.21%) Project Management
15 105 (4.80%) SIEM
16 97 (4.43%) Software Engineering
17 93 (4.25%) Computer Science
18 88 (4.02%) DevSecOps
18 88 (4.02%) Infrastructure Engineering
18 88 (4.02%) Project Delivery
Programming Languages
1 198 (9.05%) Python
2 165 (7.54%) PowerShell
3 86 (3.93%) SQL
4 70 (3.20%) Java
5 48 (2.19%) C#
6 47 (2.15%) JavaScript
7 46 (2.10%) Bash
8 30 (1.37%) 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 (0.59%) Shell Script
14 10 (0.46%) Bicep
14 10 (0.46%) PL/SQL
15 9 (0.41%) Korn
16 8 (0.37%) ABAP
17 7 (0.32%) T-SQL
18 4 (0.18%) Embedded C++
19 3 (0.14%) Embedded C
Qualifications
1 1,391 (63.54%) SC Cleared
2 732 (33.44%) DV Cleared
3 176 (8.04%) Degree
4 76 (3.47%) Cisco Certification
5 54 (2.47%) CCNP
6 51 (2.33%) BPSS Clearance
7 47 (2.15%) CISSP
8 33 (1.51%) PMP
9 30 (1.37%) PMI Certification
10 25 (1.14%) CISM
11 21 (0.96%) CCNA
12 19 (0.87%) GIAC
13 18 (0.82%) Computer Science Degree
14 17 (0.78%) Azure Certification
14 17 (0.78%) JNCIS
15 15 (0.69%) AWS Certification
15 15 (0.69%) CHECK Team Member
16 14 (0.64%) CEH
17 13 (0.59%) ISTQB
17 13 (0.59%) VMware Certified Professional (VCP)
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 106 (4.84%) NIST
2 103 (4.71%) ISO/IEC 27001
3 65 (2.97%) NCSC
4 62 (2.83%) PMO
5 57 (2.60%) QA
6 53 (2.42%) GDPR
7 28 (1.28%) Data Quality
8 22 (1.01%) SLA
9 17 (0.78%) Accessibility
9 17 (0.78%) JSP 440
9 17 (0.78%) PCI DSS
10 15 (0.69%) NIST 800
11 14 (0.64%) GRC
12 12 (0.55%) Cyber Essentials
12 12 (0.55%) ISO/IEC 20000
13 10 (0.46%) COBIT
14 6 (0.27%) Government Security Classifications
15 5 (0.23%) RMADS
16 4 (0.18%) Actionable Recommendations
16 4 (0.18%) HMG Security Policy Framework
System Software
1 173 (7.90%) Active Directory
2 102 (4.66%) VMware Infrastructure
3 42 (1.92%) Docker
4 41 (1.87%) VMware NSX
5 27 (1.23%) 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%) Oracle RAC
9 11 (0.50%) Virtual Desktop
10 8 (0.37%) Virtual Machines
11 4 (0.18%) Embedded Firmware
12 3 (0.14%) NFS
12 3 (0.14%) UAG
13 1 (0.046%) KVM
13 1 (0.046%) Sendmail
13 1 (0.046%) Terminal Services
13 1 (0.046%) Virtual Servers
13 1 (0.046%) Xen
Systems Management
1 93 (4.25%) Kubernetes
2 68 (3.11%) Terraform
3 56 (2.56%) Ansible
4 44 (2.01%) vCenter Server
5 33 (1.51%) Grafana
6 31 (1.42%) Prometheus
7 30 (1.37%) FortiGate
8 25 (1.14%) Argo
9 19 (0.87%) Microsoft Intune
10 18 (0.82%) Active Directory Federation Services
10 18 (0.82%) Nmap
10 18 (0.82%) SCCM
11 13 (0.59%) Kibana
11 13 (0.59%) 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
1 230 (10.51%) Microsoft
2 199 (9.09%) VMware
3 151 (6.90%) Cisco
4 111 (5.07%) SAP
5 88 (4.02%) Oracle
6 82 (3.75%) Juniper
6 82 (3.75%) ServiceNow
7 64 (2.92%) Splunk
8 62 (2.83%) Red Hat
9 51 (2.33%) F5
10 45 (2.06%) SolarWinds
11 38 (1.74%) Palo Alto
12 36 (1.64%) BeyondTrust
13 35 (1.60%) CyberArk
14 33 (1.51%) Aruba
15 31 (1.42%) Google
16 30 (1.37%) IBM
16 30 (1.37%) Sparx
17 26 (1.19%) CheckPoint
18 23 (1.05%) Extreme Networks