WAN Contract Job Trends in the South East

Wide Area Network (WAN)
England > South East

The table below provides summary statistics and contractor rates for jobs advertised in the South East requiring WAN skills. It covers contract job vacancies from the 6 months leading up to 22 June 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
22 Jun 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 76 88 64
Rank change year-on-year +12 -24 -9
Contract jobs citing WAN 169 69 170
As % of all contract jobs in the South East 2.73% 2.27% 2.94%
As % of the Communications & Networking category 22.62% 12.83% 14.38%
Number of daily rates quoted 96 44 59
10th Percentile £400 £283 £203
25th Percentile £431 £381 £375
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £450 £475
Median % change year-on-year +11.11% -5.26% +5.56%
75th Percentile £538 £506 £589
90th Percentile £600 £625 £705
England median daily rate £500 £489 £488
% change year-on-year +2.35% +0.21% +2.63%
Number of hourly rates quoted 7 0 7
10th Percentile £31.86 - £18.15
25th Percentile £41.74 - £20.45
Median hourly rate £42.71 - £67.02
75th Percentile £62.29 - £75.24
90th Percentile £75.62 - £75.94
England median hourly rate £26.72 £30.00 £24.87
% change year-on-year -10.93% +20.63% -57.61%

All Communications and Computer Networking Skills
South East

WAN 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 747 538 1,182
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the South East 12.06% 17.69% 20.47%
Number of daily rates quoted 475 357 558
10th Percentile £293 £217 £218
25th Percentile £413 £325 £400
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £525 £480 £500
Median % change year-on-year +9.38% -4.00% +4.05%
75th Percentile £600 £588 £608
90th Percentile £675 £624 £650
England median daily rate £500 £495 £500
% change year-on-year +0.93% -0.92% -2.44%
Number of hourly rates quoted 62 26 144
10th Percentile £17.74 £14.20 £17.64
25th Percentile £22.50 £21.80 £34.31
Median hourly rate £42.25 £45.50 £57.35
Median % change year-on-year -7.14% -20.66% -3.54%
75th Percentile £56.21 £58.39 £70.00
90th Percentile £60.00 £61.31 £85.65
England median hourly rate £29.52 £40.50 £45.88
% change year-on-year -27.11% -11.73% +142.37%

WAN
Job Vacancy Trend in the South East

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

WAN job vacancy trend in the South East

WAN
Daily Rate Trend in the South East

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

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

WAN
Daily Rate Histogram in the South East

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing WAN in the South East over the 6 months to 22 June 2026.

Daily rate histogram for WAN in the South East

WAN
Hourly Rate Trend in the South East

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

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

WAN
Hourly Rate Histogram in the South East

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing WAN in the South East over the 6 months to 22 June 2026.

Hourly rate histogram for WAN in the South East

WAN
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 WAN within the South East region over the 6 months to 22 June 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 +12 103 £473 +14.04% 16
Berkshire +20 84 £425 +2.41% 4
Hampshire -20 35 £525 +5.00% 10
Surrey -16 16 £475 +11.76% 11
Buckinghamshire - 15 £560 - 7
Kent +11 11 £445 +1.71% 1
Oxfordshire -27 4 £480 - 5
East Sussex - 2 - - 2
West Sussex - 1 - - 1
Isle of Wight - 1 - -
WAN
England

WAN
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 7 (4.14%) OpenStack
2 1 (0.59%) Confluence
2 1 (0.59%) Microsoft Exchange
Applications
1 5 (2.96%) MS Visio
2 4 (2.37%) Microsoft Excel
3 3 (1.78%) Microsoft Office
3 3 (1.78%) Microsoft Project
4 2 (1.18%) Microsoft PowerPoint
Cloud Services
1 41 (24.26%) Azure
2 32 (18.93%) AWS
3 4 (2.37%) Entra ID
3 4 (2.37%) GCP
4 3 (1.78%) Azure DevOps
4 3 (1.78%) Microsoft 365
5 2 (1.18%) AWS Direct Connect
5 2 (1.18%) Virtual Private Cloud
6 1 (0.59%) AWS CloudFormation
6 1 (0.59%) Azure ExpressRoute
6 1 (0.59%) Azure Sentinel
6 1 (0.59%) IaaS
6 1 (0.59%) PaaS
6 1 (0.59%) SaaS
Communications & Networking
1 139 (82.25%) LAN
2 102 (60.36%) Firewall
3 86 (50.89%) BGP
4 70 (41.42%) OSPF
5 62 (36.69%) SD-WAN
6 49 (28.99%) DNS
7 45 (26.63%) DHCP
8 44 (26.04%) VPN
9 43 (25.44%) MPLS
10 33 (19.53%) IPsec
11 32 (18.93%) Network Security
12 31 (18.34%) BIG-IP
13 30 (17.75%) VXLAN
14 28 (16.57%) Ethernet VPN
15 26 (15.38%) Cisco ISE
16 25 (14.79%) Junos
17 24 (14.20%) Wi-Fi
18 20 (11.83%) TCP/IP
18 20 (11.83%) Wireless
19 15 (8.88%) VLAN
Development Applications
1 5 (2.96%) JIRA
2 2 (1.18%) Browser DevTools
3 1 (0.59%) GitLab
3 1 (0.59%) Jenkins
3 1 (0.59%) Sonatype Nexus
General
1 37 (21.89%) Social Skills
2 17 (10.06%) Analytical Skills
3 13 (7.69%) Documentation Skills
3 13 (7.69%) Public Sector
3 13 (7.69%) Telecoms
4 12 (7.10%) Finance
5 8 (4.73%) Manufacturing
6 6 (3.55%) Military
7 4 (2.37%) Financial Institution
7 4 (2.37%) Legal
8 3 (1.78%) Billing
9 2 (1.18%) Organisational Skills
10 1 (0.59%) Police
Job Titles
1 59 (34.91%) Network Engineer
2 33 (19.53%) Architect
3 30 (17.75%) Senior
4 21 (12.43%) Senior Network Engineer
5 20 (11.83%) Network Architect
6 15 (8.88%) Network Specialist
7 14 (8.28%) Firewall Specialist
8 13 (7.69%) Cisco Engineer
8 13 (7.69%) Network Manager
9 12 (7.10%) Cisco Network Engineer
9 12 (7.10%) Lead
9 12 (7.10%) SC Cleared Network Engineer
10 11 (6.51%) Project Manager
11 9 (5.33%) Technical Architect
12 7 (4.14%) Developer
12 7 (4.14%) DV Cleared Network Engineer
12 7 (4.14%) Network Project Manager
12 7 (4.14%) Senior Architect
12 7 (4.14%) Senior Network Architect
13 6 (3.55%) Test Engineer
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 34 (20.12%) 802.1X
2 9 (5.33%) NETCONF
2 9 (5.33%) YANG
3 7 (4.14%) REST
4 5 (2.96%) Middleware
5 2 (1.18%) OpenConfig
5 2 (1.18%) RESTCONF
6 1 (0.59%) SAML
Miscellaneous
1 67 (39.64%) Data Centre
2 28 (16.57%) PKI
3 25 (14.79%) Clustering
4 17 (10.06%) Hybrid Cloud
5 9 (5.33%) Cloud Native
6 8 (4.73%) Public Cloud
7 6 (3.55%) Analytical Mindset
8 5 (2.96%) Private Cloud
8 5 (2.96%) Self-Motivation
9 4 (2.37%) Security Posture
10 3 (1.78%) BYOD
10 3 (1.78%) Distributed Denial-of-Service
11 2 (1.18%) Virtual Team
12 1 (0.59%) Cyber Kill Chain
12 1 (0.59%) Data Protection Act
12 1 (0.59%) Enterprise Software
12 1 (0.59%) Greenfield Project
12 1 (0.59%) iSeries
12 1 (0.59%) Linux Command Line
12 1 (0.59%) NHS
Operating Systems
1 40 (23.67%) Windows
2 14 (8.28%) Linux
3 2 (1.18%) Mac OS
4 1 (0.59%) VMS
4 1 (0.59%) Windows Server
Processes & Methodologies
1 42 (24.85%) High Availability
2 40 (23.67%) ITIL
3 33 (19.53%) Problem-Solving
4 30 (17.75%) Identity Access Management
4 30 (17.75%) Load Balancing
5 26 (15.38%) Observability
6 24 (14.20%) Network Architecture
7 21 (12.43%) Stakeholder Management
8 20 (11.83%) Migration
8 20 (11.83%) Network Design
8 20 (11.83%) Network Virtualisation
9 18 (10.65%) ITSM
9 18 (10.65%) Roadmaps
9 18 (10.65%) Technical Leadership
10 15 (8.88%) Change Management
10 15 (8.88%) Project Delivery
11 14 (8.28%) TOGAF
12 13 (7.69%) Agile
12 13 (7.69%) Network Monitoring
12 13 (7.69%) Project Management
Programming Languages
1 12 (7.10%) Python
2 3 (1.78%) SQL
Qualifications
1 108 (63.91%) Security Cleared
2 70 (41.42%) Cisco Certification
3 57 (33.73%) SC Cleared
4 45 (26.63%) DV Cleared
5 40 (23.67%) CCNP
6 15 (8.88%) CCIE
7 14 (8.28%) CCNA
7 14 (8.28%) Degree
8 11 (6.51%) PMP
9 9 (5.33%) JNCIE
10 8 (4.73%) JNCIA
10 8 (4.73%) JNCIP
10 8 (4.73%) JNCIS
11 6 (3.55%) AWS Certification
12 5 (2.96%) Azure Certification
12 5 (2.96%) PMI Certification
13 4 (2.37%) VMware Certified Professional (VCP)
14 2 (1.18%) ITIL Certification
14 2 (1.18%) Microsoft Certification
14 2 (1.18%) Network+ Certification
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 8 (4.73%) NIST
2 5 (2.96%) NCSC
3 4 (2.37%) QA
4 3 (1.78%) ISO/IEC 27001
5 1 (0.59%) GDPR
5 1 (0.59%) JSP 440
5 1 (0.59%) SLA
System Software
1 21 (12.43%) VMware Infrastructure
2 14 (8.28%) VMware NSX
3 11 (6.51%) Active Directory
4 4 (2.37%) Hyper-V
4 4 (2.37%) Virtual Machines
4 4 (2.37%) vSphere
5 3 (1.78%) Firmware
6 1 (0.59%) Virtual Desktop
6 1 (0.59%) Virtual Servers
Systems Management
1 30 (17.75%) FortiGate
2 17 (10.06%) Ansible
3 6 (3.55%) Terraform
4 4 (2.37%) Endace
5 2 (1.18%) CASB
5 2 (1.18%) Cisco CUCM
5 2 (1.18%) Nagios
6 1 (0.59%) SCCM
6 1 (0.59%) Single Sign-On
6 1 (0.59%) WSUS
Vendors
1 94 (55.62%) Cisco
2 44 (26.04%) Juniper
3 43 (25.44%) SolarWinds
4 40 (23.67%) F5
5 31 (18.34%) Palo Alto
6 30 (17.75%) VMware
7 25 (14.79%) Splunk
8 22 (13.02%) Aruba
8 22 (13.02%) Extreme Networks
9 21 (12.43%) Microsoft
10 19 (11.24%) Fortinet
11 16 (9.47%) CheckPoint
12 10 (5.92%) ServiceNow
13 8 (4.73%) Meraki
14 5 (2.96%) BT
14 5 (2.96%) MuleSoft
14 5 (2.96%) Veeam
15 4 (2.37%) Commvault
15 4 (2.37%) NetApp
15 4 (2.37%) Xerox