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

6 months to
9 May 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 99 58 50
Rank change year-on-year -41 -8 +7
Contract jobs citing Data Centre 49 57 115
As % of all contract jobs in the South West 1.47% 3.35% 3.63%
As % of the Miscellaneous category 5.74% 11.42% 11.06%
Number of daily rates quoted 32 36 83
10th Percentile £121 £480 £426
25th Percentile £409 £523 £463
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £498 £548 £600
Median % change year-on-year -9.22% -8.67% +9.09%
75th Percentile £629 £613 £675
90th Percentile £725 £738 £685
England median daily rate £481 £525 £525
% change year-on-year -8.33% - -4.55%
Number of hourly rates quoted 1 0 9
10th Percentile - - £34.35
25th Percentile - - -
Median hourly rate £15.00 - £40.00
75th Percentile - - -
90th Percentile - - -
England median hourly rate £19.34 £27.50 £24.87
% change year-on-year -29.67% +10.57% +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 854 499 1,040
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the South West 25.69% 29.35% 32.79%
Number of daily rates quoted 508 328 638
10th Percentile £300 £250 £300
25th Percentile £400 £397 £458
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £525 £525 £545
Median % change year-on-year - -3.67% -0.91%
75th Percentile £615 £606 £600
90th Percentile £738 £676 £698
England median daily rate £513 £545 £550
% change year-on-year -5.96% -0.91% -3.93%
Number of hourly rates quoted 128 35 169
10th Percentile £14.86 £18.51 £13.69
25th Percentile £22.33 £18.87 £15.75
Median hourly rate £60.00 £36.00 £46.39
Median % change year-on-year +66.67% -22.40% +373.37%
75th Percentile £65.56 £67.25 £70.00
90th Percentile £70.21 £75.00 £72.50
England median hourly rate £47.00 £35.00 £32.12
% change year-on-year +34.29% +8.98% +42.83%

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 9 May 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
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 9 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
Devon - 15 £495 - 5
Bristol -32 10 £123 -80.00% 9
Wiltshire -25 9 £700 +21.74% 11
Gloucestershire -9 7 £488 -10.88% 1
Dorset - 6 £449 - 1
Somerset -19 1 £610 +17.78%
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 1 (2.04%) Microsoft Exchange
Cloud Services
1 3 (6.12%) AWS
1 3 (6.12%) Azure
1 3 (6.12%) npm
2 2 (4.08%) GCP
3 1 (2.04%) GitHub
3 1 (2.04%) GitHub Actions
3 1 (2.04%) Google Ads
3 1 (2.04%) Microsoft 365
3 1 (2.04%) OpenShift
3 1 (2.04%) Virtual Private Cloud
Communications & Networking
1 14 (28.57%) SAN
2 11 (22.45%) Firewall
2 11 (22.45%) VLAN
3 10 (20.41%) BGP
3 10 (20.41%) Cisco Nexus
3 10 (20.41%) OSPF
4 9 (18.37%) VXLAN
5 7 (14.29%) Network Security
5 7 (14.29%) NX-OS
6 3 (6.12%) AMQP
6 3 (6.12%) DHCP
6 3 (6.12%) LAN
6 3 (6.12%) Structured Cabling
6 3 (6.12%) WAN
7 2 (4.08%) DNS
8 1 (2.04%) Cisco ASA
8 1 (2.04%) VPN
8 1 (2.04%) Wireless
8 1 (2.04%) Wireshark
8 1 (2.04%) WLAN
Database & Business Intelligence
1 2 (4.08%) InfluxDB
1 2 (4.08%) SQL Server
2 1 (2.04%) MS Access
2 1 (2.04%) PostgreSQL
2 1 (2.04%) RDBMS
2 1 (2.04%) Relational Database
Development Applications
1 4 (8.16%) Git
2 3 (6.12%) Maven
3 1 (2.04%) GitLab
3 1 (2.04%) Sonatype Nexus
General
1 19 (38.78%) Analytical Skills
2 9 (18.37%) Social Skills
3 4 (8.16%) Inclusion and Diversity
4 3 (6.12%) Public Sector
5 1 (2.04%) Finance
5 1 (2.04%) Telecoms
Job Titles
1 14 (28.57%) Field Engineer
1 14 (28.57%) Field Service Engineer
1 14 (28.57%) IT Engineer
2 11 (22.45%) Support Engineer
3 10 (20.41%) Architect
4 8 (16.33%) Field Support Engineer
4 8 (16.33%) IT Support
4 8 (16.33%) IT Support Engineer
5 5 (10.20%) Network Engineer
5 5 (10.20%) Technical Architect
6 4 (8.16%) Network Architect
7 3 (6.12%) Applications Engineer
7 3 (6.12%) Applications Support
7 3 (6.12%) Applications Support Engineer
7 3 (6.12%) Infrastructure Engineer
8 2 (4.08%) Cabling Engineer
8 2 (4.08%) Network Specialist
8 2 (4.08%) Senior
9 1 (2.04%) Lead
9 1 (2.04%) SC Cleared Network Engineer
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 1 (2.04%) Jinja
1 1 (2.04%) NETCONF
1 1 (2.04%) ODBC
1 1 (2.04%) REST
Miscellaneous
1 14 (28.57%) Analytical Mindset
2 2 (4.08%) Fibre Optics
2 2 (4.08%) Hybrid Cloud
3 1 (2.04%) Data Protection Act
3 1 (2.04%) Driving Licence
3 1 (2.04%) Legacy Applications
3 1 (2.04%) Legacy Systems
3 1 (2.04%) PMI
3 1 (2.04%) Private Cloud
3 1 (2.04%) Security Posture
3 1 (2.04%) Self-Motivation
Operating Systems
1 8 (16.33%) Linux
2 7 (14.29%) Windows
3 6 (12.24%) Windows Server
4 1 (2.04%) CentOS
4 1 (2.04%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
4 1 (2.04%) Windows Server 2016
4 1 (2.04%) Windows Server 2019
Processes & Methodologies
1 24 (48.98%) Problem-Solving
2 14 (28.57%) Break/Fix
2 14 (28.57%) Customer Service
3 9 (18.37%) Continuous Improvement
4 7 (14.29%) Infrastructure as Code
5 6 (12.24%) Mentoring
5 6 (12.24%) Technical Leadership
6 5 (10.20%) Commercial Awareness
6 5 (10.20%) Identity Access Management
6 5 (10.20%) Security Architecture
6 5 (10.20%) Zero Trust
7 4 (8.16%) Architectural Patterns
7 4 (8.16%) Data Centre Operations
7 4 (8.16%) Infrastructure Engineering
7 4 (8.16%) Migration
7 4 (8.16%) Network Design
7 4 (8.16%) Test Automation
8 3 (6.12%) Microservices
8 3 (6.12%) Storage Management
8 3 (6.12%) Translating Business Requirements
Programming Languages
1 4 (8.16%) Python
2 3 (6.12%) Java
3 1 (2.04%) C
3 1 (2.04%) PowerShell
3 1 (2.04%) SQL
3 1 (2.04%) VB
3 1 (2.04%) VBA
Qualifications
1 17 (34.69%) Cisco Certification
2 16 (32.65%) Security Cleared
3 15 (30.61%) CCNA
4 14 (28.57%) A+ Certification
4 14 (28.57%) MCSE
4 14 (28.57%) Microsoft Certification
4 14 (28.57%) Network+ Certification
5 9 (18.37%) DV Cleared
6 7 (14.29%) SC Cleared
7 2 (4.08%) BPSS Clearance
8 1 (2.04%) APMP
8 1 (2.04%) BICSI Certification
8 1 (2.04%) CCIE
8 1 (2.04%) City & Guilds
8 1 (2.04%) Degree
8 1 (2.04%) MAPM
8 1 (2.04%) PMI Certification
8 1 (2.04%) PMP
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 2 (4.08%) NIST
1 2 (4.08%) PCI DSS
1 2 (4.08%) QA
2 1 (2.04%) Actionable Recommendations
2 1 (2.04%) GDPR
2 1 (2.04%) GRC
2 1 (2.04%) ISO/IEC 27001
2 1 (2.04%) NCSC
2 1 (2.04%) PMO
System Software
1 7 (14.29%) VMware Infrastructure
2 6 (12.24%) Active Directory
2 6 (12.24%) VMware NSX
3 1 (2.04%) Docker
3 1 (2.04%) Hyper-V
Systems Management
1 5 (10.20%) Active Directory Federation Services
1 5 (10.20%) Ansible
2 4 (8.16%) Terraform
3 3 (6.12%) Grafana
4 2 (4.08%) Kubernetes
5 1 (2.04%) EMC VPLEX
5 1 (2.04%) FortiGate
5 1 (2.04%) Nagios
5 1 (2.04%) SCCM
Vendors
1 15 (30.61%) Cisco
1 15 (30.61%) Dell
2 10 (20.41%) F5
3 7 (14.29%) VMware
4 4 (8.16%) Oracle
5 2 (4.08%) Fortinet
5 2 (4.08%) Infoblox
5 2 (4.08%) Microsoft
5 2 (4.08%) Palo Alto
6 1 (2.04%) CheckPoint
6 1 (2.04%) Citrix
6 1 (2.04%) FireEye
6 1 (2.04%) Juniper
6 1 (2.04%) NetApp
6 1 (2.04%) NetScout