Security Engineer Contract Job Trends in the South East

Security Engineer
England > South East

The median Security Engineer daily rate in the South East is £500, according to job vacancies posted in the 6 months leading up to 25 September 2025.

The table below provides contractor rate benchmarking and summary statistics, comparing them to the same period in the previous two years.

6 months to
25 Sep 2025
Same period 2024 Same period 2023
Rank 139 108 165
Rank change year-on-year -31 +57 +60
Contract jobs requiring a Security Engineer 23 77 52
As % of all contract jobs advertised in the South East 0.66% 1.69% 0.94%
As % of the Job Titles category 0.73% 1.83% 0.99%
Number of daily rates quoted 15 59 39
10th Percentile £328 £400 £415
25th Percentile £406 £425 £470
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £450 £560
Median % change year-on-year +11.11% -19.64% +10.56%
75th Percentile £596 £563 £650
90th Percentile £628 £638 £700
England median daily rate £525 £550 £600
% change year-on-year -4.55% -8.33% +9.09%
Number of hourly rates quoted 0 0 2
10th Percentile - - £69.78
25th Percentile - - £72.05
Median hourly rate - - £78.36
75th Percentile - - £82.15
90th Percentile - - £82.91
England median hourly rate £90.50 £72.50 £83.40
% change year-on-year +24.83% -13.07% +30.82%

All Contract IT Job Vacancies
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 3,157 4,201 5,248
% of contract IT jobs with a recognized job title 89.94% 92.33% 94.88%
Number of daily rates quoted 2,046 2,500 3,547
10th Percentile £204 £245 £213
25th Percentile £363 £400 £384
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £508 £500
Median % change year-on-year -1.48% +1.50% -
75th Percentile £589 £625 £613
90th Percentile £650 £688 £700
England median daily rate £510 £525 £548
% change year-on-year -2.86% -4.11% -0.45%
Number of hourly rates quoted 278 295 250
10th Percentile £13.21 £16.00 £16.00
25th Percentile £15.50 £30.00 £21.05
Median hourly rate £25.15 £57.50 £51.66
Median % change year-on-year -56.26% +11.30% +111.81%
75th Percentile £57.50 £75.00 £66.39
90th Percentile £71.50 £80.00 £75.69
England median hourly rate £25.15 £46.18 £45.00
% change year-on-year -45.54% +2.62% +73.08%

Security Engineer
Job Vacancy Trend in the South East

Job postings that featured Security Engineer in the job title as a proportion of all IT jobs advertised in the South East.

Job vacancy trend for Security Engineer in the South East

Security Engineer
Daily Rate Trend in the South East

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

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

Security Engineer
Daily Rate Histogram in the South East

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing Security Engineer in the South East over the 6 months to 25 September 2025.

Daily rate histogram for Security Engineer in the South East

Security Engineer
Hourly Rate Trend in the South East

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

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

Security 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 Security Engineer within the South East region over the 6 months to 25 September 2025. 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 +7 15 £500 -4.76% 30
Hampshire -25 8 £450 - 11
Berkshire +9 7 £500 +8.11% 18
Oxfordshire - 5 £425 - 7
Buckinghamshire -2 3 £580 +10.48% 7
Surrey -8 1 £525 -2.33% 7
Security Engineer
England

Security Engineer Skill Set
Top 30 Co-occurring Skills and Capabilities in the South East

For the 6 months to 25 September 2025, Security Engineer contract job roles required the following skills and capabilities in order of popularity. The figures indicate the absolute number co-occurrences and as a proportion of all contract job ads across the South East region featuring Security Engineer in the job title.

1 10 (43.48%) Network Security
1 10 (43.48%) Azure
1 10 (43.48%) Cybersecurity
2 9 (39.13%) Security Cleared
3 8 (34.78%) SC Cleared
4 7 (30.43%) Cisco
4 7 (30.43%) Social Skills
5 5 (21.74%) Public Sector
5 5 (21.74%) Microsoft
5 5 (21.74%) CheckPoint
5 5 (21.74%) Firewall
6 4 (17.39%) SQL
6 4 (17.39%) Data Protection
6 4 (17.39%) SolarWinds
6 4 (17.39%) PowerShell
6 4 (17.39%) SIEM
6 4 (17.39%) Ansible
6 4 (17.39%) DevOps
6 4 (17.39%) Kubernetes
6 4 (17.39%) Jenkins
6 4 (17.39%) Infrastructure as Code
6 4 (17.39%) Problem-Solving
6 4 (17.39%) CI/CD
7 3 (13.04%) Platform Engineering
7 3 (13.04%) Security Posture
7 3 (13.04%) Entra ID
7 3 (13.04%) Amazon EKS
7 3 (13.04%) React
7 3 (13.04%) Private Cloud
7 3 (13.04%) OpenShift

Security Engineer Skill Set
Co-occurring Skills and Capabilities in the South East by Category

The follow tables expand on the table above by listing co-occurrences grouped by category. The same employment type, locality and period is covered with up to 20 co-occurrences shown in each of the following categories:

Cloud Services
1 10 (43.48%) Azure
2 3 (13.04%) Amazon EKS
2 3 (13.04%) Entra ID
2 3 (13.04%) OpenShift
3 2 (8.70%) IaaS
3 2 (8.70%) Microsoft 365
3 2 (8.70%) Microsoft Purview
3 2 (8.70%) PaaS
3 2 (8.70%) SaaS
4 1 (4.35%) AWS
4 1 (4.35%) Azure DevOps
4 1 (4.35%) Cloud Computing
4 1 (4.35%) GitHub
4 1 (4.35%) GitHub Actions
Communications & Networking
1 10 (43.48%) Network Security
2 5 (21.74%) Firewall
3 3 (13.04%) DNS
4 2 (8.70%) VPN
4 2 (8.70%) WAN
5 1 (4.35%) Cisco IPT
5 1 (4.35%) Cisco ISE
5 1 (4.35%) Cisco Nexus
5 1 (4.35%) DMVPN
5 1 (4.35%) HTTP
5 1 (4.35%) IPsec
5 1 (4.35%) LAN
5 1 (4.35%) NGFW
5 1 (4.35%) SSL
5 1 (4.35%) TCP/IP
5 1 (4.35%) Wi-Fi
5 1 (4.35%) Wireless
Development Applications
1 4 (17.39%) Jenkins
2 1 (4.35%) GitLab
General
1 7 (30.43%) Social Skills
2 5 (21.74%) Public Sector
3 2 (8.70%) Analytical Skills
4 1 (4.35%) Finance
4 1 (4.35%) French Language
4 1 (4.35%) German Language
4 1 (4.35%) Telecoms
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 3 (13.04%) Middleware
1 3 (13.04%) React
2 1 (4.35%) 802.1X
2 1 (4.35%) Web Services
Miscellaneous
1 3 (13.04%) Management Information System
1 3 (13.04%) Private Cloud
1 3 (13.04%) Security Posture
2 2 (8.70%) Data Centre
2 2 (8.70%) Data Protection Act
2 2 (8.70%) Driving Licence
3 1 (4.35%) Cloud Native
3 1 (4.35%) Clustering
3 1 (4.35%) Cyber Kill Chain
3 1 (4.35%) Cyber Threat
3 1 (4.35%) Greenfield Project
Operating Systems
1 2 (8.70%) Windows
2 1 (4.35%) Linux
2 1 (4.35%) Windows Server
Processes & Methodologies
1 10 (43.48%) Cybersecurity
2 4 (17.39%) CI/CD
2 4 (17.39%) Data Protection
2 4 (17.39%) DevOps
2 4 (17.39%) Infrastructure as Code
2 4 (17.39%) Problem-Solving
2 4 (17.39%) SIEM
3 3 (13.04%) Configuration Management
3 3 (13.04%) Information Security
3 3 (13.04%) Migration
3 3 (13.04%) Platform Engineering
4 2 (8.70%) Change Control
4 2 (8.70%) Cloud Security
4 2 (8.70%) Ethical Hacking
4 2 (8.70%) Incident Response
4 2 (8.70%) Risk Assessment
4 2 (8.70%) Risk Management
4 2 (8.70%) Security Architecture
4 2 (8.70%) Service Delivery
4 2 (8.70%) Threat Modelling
Programming Languages
1 4 (17.39%) PowerShell
1 4 (17.39%) SQL
2 3 (13.04%) C#
2 3 (13.04%) Java
2 3 (13.04%) JavaScript
2 3 (13.04%) Python
Qualifications
1 9 (39.13%) Security Cleared
2 8 (34.78%) SC Cleared
3 2 (8.70%) CISSP
4 1 (4.35%) CCNA
4 1 (4.35%) CEH
4 1 (4.35%) Cisco Certification
4 1 (4.35%) CISM
4 1 (4.35%) CompTIA Security+
4 1 (4.35%) DV Cleared
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 2 (8.70%) ISO/IEC 27001
1 2 (8.70%) NIST
2 1 (4.35%) Cyber Essentials
System Software
1 3 (13.04%) Active Directory
2 1 (4.35%) Docker
2 1 (4.35%) Hyper-V
Systems Management
1 4 (17.39%) Ansible
1 4 (17.39%) Kubernetes
2 2 (8.70%) Microsoft Intune
3 1 (4.35%) Failover Clustering
3 1 (4.35%) Terraform
Vendors
1 7 (30.43%) Cisco
2 5 (21.74%) CheckPoint
2 5 (21.74%) Microsoft
3 4 (17.39%) SolarWinds
4 3 (13.04%) Fortinet
4 3 (13.04%) Red Hat
5 2 (8.70%) F5
6 1 (4.35%) Blue Coat
6 1 (4.35%) FireEye
6 1 (4.35%) Juniper
6 1 (4.35%) Palo Alto
6 1 (4.35%) Qualys
6 1 (4.35%) Salesforce
6 1 (4.35%) Tanium