VPN Contract Job Trends in the South East

Virtual Private Network (VPN)
England > South East

The table below provides summary statistics and contractor rates for jobs advertised in the South East requiring VPN skills. It covers contract job vacancies from the 6 months leading up to 4 August 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
4 Aug 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 133 67 91
Rank change year-on-year -66 +24 +44
Contract jobs citing VPN 103 103 103
As % of all contract jobs in the South East 1.56% 2.95% 2.07%
As % of the Communications & Networking category 12.84% 17.34% 10.64%
Number of daily rates quoted 69 76 55
10th Percentile £231 £341 £270
25th Percentile £405 £450 £363
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £520 £500 £500
Median % change year-on-year +4.00% - +1.01%
75th Percentile £600 £591 £581
90th Percentile £648 £600 £714
England median daily rate £500 £450 £475
% change year-on-year +11.11% -5.26% -
Number of hourly rates quoted 2 5 5
10th Percentile £61.92 £48.06 £17.78
25th Percentile £62.18 £71.00 £18.00
Median hourly rate £65.24 £89.63 £19.00
Median % change year-on-year -27.21% +371.74% -5.52%
75th Percentile £69.18 - £22.40
90th Percentile £69.97 - £22.51
England median hourly rate £17.31 £63.50 £16.25
% change year-on-year -72.74% +290.77% -22.62%

All Communications and Computer Networking Skills
South East

VPN falls under the Communications and Computer Networking category. For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all contract job vacancies requiring communications or computer networking skills in the South East.

Contract vacancies with a requirement for communications or computer networking skills 802 594 968
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the South East 12.11% 17.03% 19.49%
Number of daily rates quoted 471 402 517
10th Percentile £275 £205 £260
25th Percentile £413 £359 £400
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £525 £500 £500
Median % change year-on-year +5.00% - +6.38%
75th Percentile £600 £588 £608
90th Percentile £675 £625 £655
England median daily rate £500 £494 £500
% change year-on-year +1.21% -1.20% -
Number of hourly rates quoted 85 31 102
10th Percentile £18.08 £14.20 £22.42
25th Percentile £22.50 £24.63 £51.06
Median hourly rate £47.50 £55.00 £57.35
Median % change year-on-year -13.64% -4.10% -0.26%
75th Percentile £56.21 £70.16 £70.00
90th Percentile £67.47 £89.63 £75.24
England median hourly rate £28.00 £45.00 £51.50
% change year-on-year -37.78% -12.62% -0.75%

VPN
Job Vacancy Trend in the South East

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

VPN job vacancy trend in the South East

VPN
Daily Rate Trend in the South East

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

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

VPN
Daily Rate Histogram in the South East

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing VPN in the South East over the 6 months to 4 August 2026.

Daily rate histogram for VPN in the South East

VPN
Hourly Rate Trend in the South East

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

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

VPN
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 VPN within the South East region over the 6 months to 4 August 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 -18 68 £500 +11.11% 14
Berkshire -24 35 £411 -8.61% 6
Buckinghamshire - 26 £607 - 1
Hampshire -66 18 £550 -4.35% 18
Surrey -17 13 £475 -9.52% 8
Oxfordshire -19 7 £250 -58.33% 7
Middlesex - 2 - -
West Sussex - 1 £105 - 2
Home Counties - 1 - -
VPN
England

VPN
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 10 (9.71%) SharePoint
2 3 (2.91%) Microsoft Exchange
Applications
1 4 (3.88%) Microsoft Office
2 2 (1.94%) Adobe Creative Suite
2 2 (1.94%) Houdini
2 2 (1.94%) NUKE
3 1 (0.97%) Microsoft Excel
3 1 (0.97%) Microsoft PowerPoint
3 1 (0.97%) MS Visio
Cloud Services
1 52 (50.49%) Azure
2 22 (21.36%) Entra ID
3 19 (18.45%) AWS
4 16 (15.53%) Microsoft 365
5 10 (9.71%) Azure Monitor
5 10 (9.71%) OneDrive
6 8 (7.77%) Azure ExpressRoute
6 8 (7.77%) Azure Sentinel
7 7 (6.80%) GCP
8 5 (4.85%) Azure AKS
8 5 (4.85%) Azure DevOps
8 5 (4.85%) Virtual Private Cloud
9 4 (3.88%) Azure Key Vault
10 3 (2.91%) AWS CloudFormation
10 3 (2.91%) AWS Direct Connect
10 3 (2.91%) OpenShift
11 2 (1.94%) Amazon EKS
11 2 (1.94%) Google Workspace
11 2 (1.94%) PaaS
12 1 (0.97%) SaaS
Communications & Networking
1 68 (66.02%) Firewall
2 52 (50.49%) DNS
3 40 (38.83%) WAN
4 39 (37.86%) LAN
5 36 (34.95%) DHCP
6 30 (29.13%) TCP/IP
7 29 (28.16%) Network Security
8 22 (21.36%) SD-WAN
9 20 (19.42%) BGP
9 20 (19.42%) VLAN
10 17 (16.50%) SSL
11 16 (15.53%) IPsec
11 16 (15.53%) MPLS
11 16 (15.53%) OSPF
12 12 (11.65%) Cisco ASA
12 12 (11.65%) Cisco Firepower
12 12 (11.65%) Wi-Fi
13 10 (9.71%) Wireless
14 8 (7.77%) Cisco Nexus
14 8 (7.77%) NGFW
Database & Business Intelligence
1 2 (1.94%) SQL Server
Development Applications
1 4 (3.88%) Sonatype Nexus
2 3 (2.91%) JIRA
3 2 (1.94%) Git
4 1 (0.97%) Browser DevTools
4 1 (0.97%) GitLab
4 1 (0.97%) Jenkins
General
1 40 (38.83%) Social Skills
2 16 (15.53%) Analytical Skills
3 11 (10.68%) Finance
4 10 (9.71%) Telecoms
5 9 (8.74%) Public Sector
6 5 (4.85%) Retail
7 4 (3.88%) Legal
8 3 (2.91%) Aerospace
8 3 (2.91%) Influencing Skills
9 2 (1.94%) Documentation Skills
9 2 (1.94%) Financial Institution
9 2 (1.94%) Military
9 2 (1.94%) Organisational Skills
10 1 (0.97%) Inclusion and Diversity
10 1 (0.97%) Local Government
10 1 (0.97%) Manufacturing
Job Titles
1 24 (23.30%) Network Engineer
1 24 (23.30%) Senior
2 21 (20.39%) Architect
3 13 (12.62%) Infrastructure Engineer
4 12 (11.65%) Network Architect
4 12 (11.65%) Senior Network Engineer
5 8 (7.77%) Azure Engineer
5 8 (7.77%) IT Engineer
6 7 (6.80%) Support Engineer
7 6 (5.83%) Cloud Engineer
7 6 (5.83%) IT Support
7 6 (5.83%) IT Support Engineer
7 6 (5.83%) Technical Architect
8 5 (4.85%) DV Cleared Network Engineer
8 5 (4.85%) Head of Infrastructure
8 5 (4.85%) Platform Engineer
8 5 (4.85%) Security Engineer
8 5 (4.85%) Senior Infrastructure Engineer
9 4 (3.88%) Infrastructure Architect
9 4 (3.88%) Test Engineer
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 9 (8.74%) 802.1X
1 9 (8.74%) ARM Templates
2 2 (1.94%) ModSecurity
2 2 (1.94%) Unreal Engine
3 1 (0.97%) SAML
3 1 (0.97%) Software Packaging
3 1 (0.97%) YAML
Miscellaneous
1 26 (25.24%) Data Centre
2 21 (20.39%) Hybrid Cloud
3 14 (13.59%) Onboarding
4 9 (8.74%) Cloud Native
5 8 (7.77%) Public Cloud
6 7 (6.80%) PKI
7 6 (5.83%) Management Information System
8 5 (4.85%) Private Cloud
9 4 (3.88%) ARM Cortex
9 4 (3.88%) Fibre Optics
10 3 (2.91%) Distributed Denial-of-Service
10 3 (2.91%) iPhone
11 2 (1.94%) Blackberry
11 2 (1.94%) Data Protection Act
11 2 (1.94%) Driving Licence
11 2 (1.94%) Enterprise Software
11 2 (1.94%) Motion Graphics
11 2 (1.94%) Replication
11 2 (1.94%) SCADA
11 2 (1.94%) Social Media
Operating Systems
1 42 (40.78%) Windows
2 21 (20.39%) Linux
3 17 (16.50%) Windows Server
4 6 (5.83%) Windows 10
5 3 (2.91%) Mac OS
6 2 (1.94%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
7 1 (0.97%) Apple iOS
7 1 (0.97%) VMS
Processes & Methodologies
1 25 (24.27%) ITIL
2 18 (17.48%) Infrastructure Engineering
3 17 (16.50%) Cybersecurity
3 17 (16.50%) DevOps
3 17 (16.50%) Infrastructure as Code
4 16 (15.53%) CI/CD
4 16 (15.53%) Network Virtualisation
4 16 (15.53%) Project Delivery
5 15 (14.56%) Analytics
6 14 (13.59%) Migration
6 14 (13.59%) Network Architecture
6 14 (13.59%) Zero Trust
7 13 (12.62%) Change Management
7 13 (12.62%) High Availability
7 13 (12.62%) Problem-Solving
8 12 (11.65%) Disaster Recovery
8 12 (11.65%) Stakeholder Management
8 12 (11.65%) Technical Leadership
9 11 (10.68%) RBAC
9 11 (10.68%) Roadmaps
Programming Languages
1 17 (16.50%) PowerShell
2 14 (13.59%) Bicep
3 9 (8.74%) Bash
4 8 (7.77%) Python
5 1 (0.97%) SQL
Qualifications
1 59 (57.28%) Security Cleared
2 33 (32.04%) DV Cleared
3 32 (31.07%) SC Cleared
4 14 (13.59%) CCNP
4 14 (13.59%) Cisco Certification
5 10 (9.71%) Microsoft Certification
6 9 (8.74%) Degree
7 7 (6.80%) Azure Certification
8 6 (5.83%) VMware Certified Professional (VCP)
9 5 (4.85%) AWS Certification
10 3 (2.91%) AWS Certified Solutions Architect
10 3 (2.91%) CCIE
10 3 (2.91%) PMP
11 2 (1.94%) CCIP
11 2 (1.94%) Network+ Certification
12 1 (0.97%) CCDA
12 1 (0.97%) CCDP
12 1 (0.97%) CCNA
12 1 (0.97%) MCSE
12 1 (0.97%) Microsoft Certified Professional
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 11 (10.68%) NCSC
2 9 (8.74%) NIST
3 6 (5.83%) ISO/IEC 27001
3 6 (5.83%) JSP 440
4 4 (3.88%) GDPR
4 4 (3.88%) RMADS
5 2 (1.94%) Cyber Essentials
5 2 (1.94%) NIST 800
6 1 (0.97%) QA
6 1 (0.97%) SLA
System Software
1 34 (33.01%) Active Directory
2 30 (29.13%) VMware Infrastructure
3 18 (17.48%) VMware NSX
4 9 (8.74%) Hyper-V
5 6 (5.83%) Docker
5 6 (5.83%) vSphere
6 5 (4.85%) Virtual Machines
7 2 (1.94%) Virtual Desktop
7 2 (1.94%) Virtual Servers
7 2 (1.94%) VMware ESXi
Systems Management
1 24 (23.30%) Terraform
2 19 (18.45%) Microsoft Intune
3 16 (15.53%) Ansible
4 11 (10.68%) Kubernetes
5 8 (7.77%) SCCM
6 5 (4.85%) Cisco CUCM
6 5 (4.85%) Grafana
7 4 (3.88%) Prometheus
8 2 (1.94%) Endace
8 2 (1.94%) FortiGate
8 2 (1.94%) Istio
8 2 (1.94%) Nagios
8 2 (1.94%) Single Sign-On
9 1 (0.97%) CASB
9 1 (0.97%) Jamf Pro
9 1 (0.97%) Rancher
Vendors
1 41 (39.81%) Microsoft
2 37 (35.92%) VMware
3 34 (33.01%) Cisco
4 19 (18.45%) SolarWinds
5 18 (17.48%) Palo Alto
6 14 (13.59%) F5
7 12 (11.65%) Juniper
8 9 (8.74%) CheckPoint
8 9 (8.74%) Fortinet
9 8 (7.77%) ServiceNow
10 6 (5.83%) Veeam
11 5 (4.85%) Arista
11 5 (4.85%) BT
11 5 (4.85%) CrowdStrike
11 5 (4.85%) Google
11 5 (4.85%) Meraki
11 5 (4.85%) Zscaler
12 4 (3.88%) Becrypt
12 4 (3.88%) Red Hat
12 4 (3.88%) Xerox