Data Centre Contract Job Trends in the South West

Data Center
England > South West

The table below looks at the prevalence of the term Data Centre in contract job vacancies in the South West. Included is a benchmarking guide to the contractor rates offered in vacancies that cited Data Centre over the 6 months leading up to 10 July 2026, comparing them to the same period in the previous two years.

6 months to
10 Jul 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 95 70 43
Rank change year-on-year -25 -27 +23
Contract jobs citing Data Centre 54 48 133
As % of all contract jobs in the South West 1.50% 2.57% 4.12%
As % of the Miscellaneous category 5.87% 8.44% 12.90%
Number of daily rates quoted 36 35 94
10th Percentile £121 £440 £447
25th Percentile £442 £503 £463
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £495 £550 £538
Median % change year-on-year -10.00% +2.23% -2.18%
75th Percentile £647 £625 £675
90th Percentile £722 £738 -
England median daily rate £500 £525 £538
% change year-on-year -4.76% -2.33% -2.27%
Number of hourly rates quoted 2 0 10
10th Percentile £23.50 - £11.75
25th Percentile £36.25 - -
Median hourly rate £57.50 - £40.00
75th Percentile £78.75 - -
90th Percentile £91.50 - -
England median hourly rate £20.43 £25.15 £24.87
% change year-on-year -18.79% +1.13% +14.77%

All Generic Skills
South West

Data Centre falls under the General and Transferable Skills category. For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all contract job vacancies requiring generic IT skills in the South West.

Contract vacancies with a requirement for generic IT skills 920 569 1,031
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the South West 25.59% 30.41% 31.91%
Number of daily rates quoted 533 361 622
10th Percentile £305 £250 £301
25th Percentile £402 £375 £463
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £525 £550
Median % change year-on-year -4.76% -4.55% -
75th Percentile £606 £623 £630
90th Percentile £725 £675 £693
England median daily rate £525 £525 £550
% change year-on-year - -4.55% -2.22%
Number of hourly rates quoted 107 44 179
10th Percentile £14.36 £8.24 £13.69
25th Percentile £19.33 £16.85 £26.75
Median hourly rate £57.35 £19.94 £55.00
Median % change year-on-year +187.61% -63.75% -24.66%
75th Percentile £65.00 £60.00 £70.00
90th Percentile £73.40 £75.00 £72.50
England median hourly rate £43.96 £32.95 £37.50
% change year-on-year +33.43% -12.15% +19.05%

Data Centre
Job Vacancy Trend in the South West

Historical trend showing the proportion of contract IT job postings citing Data Centre relative to all contract IT jobs advertised in the South West.

Data Centre job vacancy trend in the South West

Data Centre
Daily Rate Trend in the South West

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in the South West citing Data Centre.

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in the South West citing Data Centre

Data Centre
Daily Rate Histogram in the South West

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing Data Centre in the South West over the 6 months to 10 July 2026.

Daily rate histogram for Data Centre in the South West

Data Centre
Hourly Rate Trend in the South West

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in the South West citing Data Centre.

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in the South West citing Data Centre

Data Centre
Hourly Rate Histogram in the South West

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing Data Centre in the South West over the 6 months to 10 July 2026.

Hourly rate histogram for Data Centre in the South West

Data Centre
Contract Job Locations in the South West

The table below looks at the demand and provides a guide to the median contractor rates quoted in IT jobs citing Data Centre within the South West region over the 6 months to 10 July 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
Devon - 17 £495 -
Wiltshire -15 10 £700 +21.74% 2
Bristol -25 9 £123 -78.70% 3
Somerset -18 8 £600 +9.09% 4
Dorset - 5 £547 - 3
Gloucestershire -13 4 £400 -26.94% 4
Data Centre
England

Data Centre
Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities in the South West 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 2 (3.70%) Confluence
Cloud Services
1 8 (14.81%) Azure
2 4 (7.41%) AWS
3 3 (5.56%) GitHub
4 2 (3.70%) Azure DevOps
4 2 (3.70%) Azure Key Vault
4 2 (3.70%) Azure Logic Apps
4 2 (3.70%) Azure Monitor
5 1 (1.85%) Entra ID
5 1 (1.85%) GCP
5 1 (1.85%) GitHub Actions
5 1 (1.85%) Google Ads
5 1 (1.85%) Microsoft 365
Communications & Networking
1 13 (24.07%) Firewall
1 13 (24.07%) SAN
2 12 (22.22%) VLAN
3 11 (20.37%) BGP
3 11 (20.37%) Cisco Nexus
3 11 (20.37%) OSPF
3 11 (20.37%) VXLAN
4 9 (16.67%) NX-OS
5 6 (11.11%) DHCP
5 6 (11.11%) DNS
6 5 (9.26%) Network Security
7 4 (7.41%) TCP/IP
8 3 (5.56%) LAN
8 3 (5.56%) VSAN
9 2 (3.70%) Structured Cabling
9 2 (3.70%) WAN
10 1 (1.85%) iSCSI
10 1 (1.85%) VPN
10 1 (1.85%) Wireless
10 1 (1.85%) WLAN
Database & Business Intelligence
1 4 (7.41%) Geospatial Data
2 2 (3.70%) Azure SQL Database
2 2 (3.70%) SQL Server
3 1 (1.85%) MS Access
3 1 (1.85%) PostgreSQL
Development Applications
1 3 (5.56%) Git
2 2 (3.70%) JIRA
2 2 (3.70%) MSI
3 1 (1.85%) GitLab
General
1 17 (31.48%) Analytical Skills
2 8 (14.81%) Social Skills
3 6 (11.11%) Inclusion and Diversity
4 3 (5.56%) Public Sector
5 1 (1.85%) Finance
5 1 (1.85%) Telecoms
Job Titles
1 13 (24.07%) Field Engineer
1 13 (24.07%) Field Service Engineer
1 13 (24.07%) IT Engineer
2 12 (22.22%) Architect
3 8 (14.81%) Field Support Engineer
3 8 (14.81%) IT Support
3 8 (14.81%) IT Support Engineer
3 8 (14.81%) Support Engineer
4 6 (11.11%) Technical Architect
5 5 (9.26%) Infrastructure Engineer
6 4 (7.41%) Network Engineer
7 3 (5.56%) Cabling Engineer
7 3 (5.56%) Developer
7 3 (5.56%) Network Architect
8 2 (3.70%) Data Centre Engineer
8 2 (3.70%) Infrastructure Architect
8 2 (3.70%) Installations Engineer
8 2 (3.70%) Network Specialist
8 2 (3.70%) Technical Developer
8 2 (3.70%) Technical Leader
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 4 (7.41%) GeoJSON
1 4 (7.41%) RESTful
2 3 (5.56%) REST
3 2 (3.70%) .NET
3 2 (3.70%) .NET Core
3 2 (3.70%) .NET Framework
3 2 (3.70%) ATL
3 2 (3.70%) COM
3 2 (3.70%) CSS
3 2 (3.70%) CSS3
3 2 (3.70%) HTML
3 2 (3.70%) HTML5
3 2 (3.70%) MFC
3 2 (3.70%) OpenAPI
3 2 (3.70%) Swagger
3 2 (3.70%) WPF
4 1 (1.85%) Jinja
4 1 (1.85%) NETCONF
4 1 (1.85%) ODBC
Miscellaneous
1 13 (24.07%) Analytical Mindset
2 4 (7.41%) Cloud Native
3 3 (5.56%) PKI
4 2 (3.70%) Hybrid Cloud
4 2 (3.70%) Onboarding
4 2 (3.70%) Product Ownership
5 1 (1.85%) Data Protection Act
5 1 (1.85%) Fibre Optics
5 1 (1.85%) Legacy Applications
5 1 (1.85%) Legacy Systems
5 1 (1.85%) PMI
5 1 (1.85%) Private Cloud
5 1 (1.85%) Security Posture
5 1 (1.85%) Virtual Team
Operating Systems
1 13 (24.07%) Windows
2 10 (18.52%) Linux
3 6 (11.11%) Windows Server
Processes & Methodologies
1 22 (40.74%) Problem-Solving
2 13 (24.07%) Break/Fix
2 13 (24.07%) Customer Service
2 13 (24.07%) Infrastructure as Code
2 13 (24.07%) Technical Leadership
3 11 (20.37%) Continuous Improvement
3 11 (20.37%) Mentoring
4 7 (12.96%) Commercial Awareness
4 7 (12.96%) DevSecOps
5 6 (11.11%) Architectural Patterns
5 6 (11.11%) CI/CD
5 6 (11.11%) Identity Access Management
5 6 (11.11%) Infrastructure Engineering
5 6 (11.11%) Zero Trust
6 5 (9.26%) Security Architecture
6 5 (9.26%) Service Design
7 4 (7.41%) Agile
7 4 (7.41%) API Design
7 4 (7.41%) Migration
7 4 (7.41%) Network Design
Programming Languages
1 9 (16.67%) Python
2 5 (9.26%) PowerShell
3 4 (7.41%) Bash
3 4 (7.41%) Bicep
4 3 (5.56%) SQL
5 2 (3.70%) C#
5 2 (3.70%) JavaScript
5 2 (3.70%) TypeScript
6 1 (1.85%) C
6 1 (1.85%) VB
6 1 (1.85%) VBA
Qualifications
1 18 (33.33%) Security Cleared
2 16 (29.63%) Cisco Certification
3 14 (25.93%) CCNA
4 13 (24.07%) A+ Certification
4 13 (24.07%) MCSE
4 13 (24.07%) Microsoft Certification
4 13 (24.07%) Network+ Certification
5 9 (16.67%) DV Cleared
6 8 (14.81%) SC Cleared
7 2 (3.70%) BPSS Clearance
7 2 (3.70%) VCAP
8 1 (1.85%) APMP
8 1 (1.85%) AWS Certification
8 1 (1.85%) BICSI Certification
8 1 (1.85%) CCIE
8 1 (1.85%) Degree
8 1 (1.85%) MAPM
8 1 (1.85%) PMI Certification
8 1 (1.85%) PMP
8 1 (1.85%) VMware Certified Professional (VCP)
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 4 (7.41%) NCSC
2 2 (3.70%) Accessibility
2 2 (3.70%) QA
2 2 (3.70%) WCAG
3 1 (1.85%) Actionable Recommendations
3 1 (1.85%) GDPR
3 1 (1.85%) GRC
3 1 (1.85%) ISO/IEC 27001
3 1 (1.85%) NIST
3 1 (1.85%) PCI DSS
3 1 (1.85%) PMO
3 1 (1.85%) SLA
System Software
1 11 (20.37%) VMware Infrastructure
2 9 (16.67%) Active Directory
2 9 (16.67%) VMware NSX
3 5 (9.26%) Docker
4 4 (7.41%) Hyper-V
5 3 (5.56%) vSphere
Systems Management
1 9 (16.67%) Terraform
2 7 (12.96%) Kubernetes
3 5 (9.26%) Active Directory Federation Services
3 5 (9.26%) Ansible
4 3 (5.56%) VxRail
5 1 (1.85%) EMC VPLEX
5 1 (1.85%) FortiGate
5 1 (1.85%) Nagios
Vendors
1 15 (27.78%) Cisco
2 14 (25.93%) Dell
3 11 (20.37%) F5
3 11 (20.37%) VMware
4 5 (9.26%) Microsoft
5 2 (3.70%) CyberArk
5 2 (3.70%) Fortinet
5 2 (3.70%) Infoblox
5 2 (3.70%) Palo Alto
6 1 (1.85%) Citrix
6 1 (1.85%) FireEye
6 1 (1.85%) Juniper
6 1 (1.85%) NetScout
6 1 (1.85%) Oracle
6 1 (1.85%) Thales