Firewall Contract Job Trends in the South West

Firewall
England > South West

The table below provides summary statistics and contractor rates for jobs advertised in the South West requiring Firewall skills. It covers contract job vacancies from the 6 months leading up to 21 April 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
21 Apr 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 87 38 26
Rank change year-on-year -49 -12 +19
Contract jobs citing Firewall 57 86 177
As % of all contract jobs in the South West 1.78% 4.99% 5.54%
As % of the Communications & Networking category 22.89% 32.45% 33.15%
Number of daily rates quoted 45 61 136
10th Percentile £400 £363 £406
25th Percentile £490 £450 £460
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £550 £547 £500
Median % change year-on-year +0.55% +9.40% -2.44%
75th Percentile £625 £600 £575
90th Percentile £715 £669 £638
England median daily rate £500 £520 £511
% change year-on-year -3.85% +1.71% -4.66%
Number of hourly rates quoted 4 0 1
10th Percentile £36.55 - -
25th Percentile £37.00 - -
Median hourly rate £40.54 - £46.39
75th Percentile £43.84 - -
90th Percentile - - -
England median hourly rate £56.00 £16.60 £68.25
% change year-on-year +237.35% -75.68% +10.08%

All Communications and Computer Networking Skills
South West

Firewall 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 West.

Contract vacancies with a requirement for communications or computer networking skills 249 265 534
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the South West 7.79% 15.38% 16.72%
Number of daily rates quoted 154 184 351
10th Percentile £285 £250 £275
25th Percentile £420 £411 £460
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £508 £549 £538
Median % change year-on-year -7.56% +2.14% +7.50%
75th Percentile £588 £613 £650
90th Percentile £714 £688 £725
England median daily rate £500 £500 £488
% change year-on-year - +2.56% -7.14%
Number of hourly rates quoted 33 5 40
10th Percentile £13.07 £33.15 £12.50
25th Percentile £37.25 £65.00 £15.75
Median hourly rate £60.00 £75.00 £40.00
Median % change year-on-year -20.00% +87.50% +308.16%
75th Percentile £72.54 - £70.81
90th Percentile £94.00 - £85.00
England median hourly rate £49.36 £36.65 £40.00
% change year-on-year +34.70% -8.39% +111.30%

Firewall
Job Vacancy Trend in the South West

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

Firewall job vacancy trend in the South West

Firewall
Daily Rate Trend in the South West

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

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

Firewall
Daily Rate Histogram in the South West

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing Firewall in the South West over the 6 months to 21 April 2026.

Daily rate histogram for Firewall in the South West

Firewall
Hourly Rate Trend in the South West

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

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

Firewall
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 Firewall within the South West region over the 6 months to 21 April 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
Wiltshire -16 20 £650 +13.04% 7
Bristol -35 16 £520 +30.90% 9
Somerset -6 10 £575 -4.17% 4
Devon -11 4 £458 +10.91% 5
Gloucestershire -23 4 £450 -17.73% 6
Dorset -7 1 £300 -17.24% 2
Firewall
England

Firewall
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 3 (5.26%) Microsoft Exchange
2 2 (3.51%) Skype for Business
3 1 (1.75%) SharePoint
Applications
1 1 (1.75%) Microsoft Office
Cloud Services
1 11 (19.30%) Azure
2 6 (10.53%) AWS
3 5 (8.77%) Azure Sentinel
3 5 (8.77%) GCP
4 3 (5.26%) Azure Monitor
4 3 (5.26%) IaaS
4 3 (5.26%) Microsoft 365
4 3 (5.26%) PaaS
5 2 (3.51%) Azure DevOps
5 2 (3.51%) Entra ID
5 2 (3.51%) Google Kubernetes Engine
6 1 (1.75%) Cloud Computing
6 1 (1.75%) GitHub
6 1 (1.75%) GitHub Actions
6 1 (1.75%) Google Compute Engine
6 1 (1.75%) Mimecast
6 1 (1.75%) n8n
6 1 (1.75%) OCI
6 1 (1.75%) Virtual Private Cloud
Communications & Networking
1 15 (26.32%) DNS
1 15 (26.32%) Network Security
2 11 (19.30%) DHCP
3 9 (15.79%) Wireless
4 8 (14.04%) VPN
5 6 (10.53%) HTTPS
5 6 (10.53%) WAN
6 5 (8.77%) LAN
7 4 (7.02%) BGP
7 4 (7.02%) Cisco Nexus
7 4 (7.02%) OSPF
7 4 (7.02%) VLAN
8 3 (5.26%) Cisco IOS
9 2 (3.51%) Cisco ASA
9 2 (3.51%) Cisco ISE
9 2 (3.51%) NGFW
9 2 (3.51%) Skype
9 2 (3.51%) Spanning Tree
9 2 (3.51%) VoIP
10 1 (1.75%) WireGuard
Database & Business Intelligence
1 3 (5.26%) SQL Server
2 1 (1.75%) NoSQL
2 1 (1.75%) TimescaleDB
Development Applications
1 4 (7.02%) JIRA
2 3 (5.26%) GitLab
3 2 (3.51%) Git
3 2 (3.51%) Jenkins
4 1 (1.75%) Bitbucket
4 1 (1.75%) MSI
4 1 (1.75%) Sonatype Nexus
General
1 18 (31.58%) Social Skills
2 10 (17.54%) Analytical Skills
3 5 (8.77%) Documentation Skills
4 4 (7.02%) Public Sector
5 1 (1.75%) Back Office
5 1 (1.75%) Banking
5 1 (1.75%) Finance
5 1 (1.75%) Inclusion and Diversity
5 1 (1.75%) Legal
5 1 (1.75%) Police
Job Titles
1 11 (19.30%) Architect
2 10 (17.54%) Network Engineer
3 7 (12.28%) Infrastructure Engineer
4 6 (10.53%) Technical Architect
5 4 (7.02%) SC Cleared Network Engineer
6 3 (5.26%) Security Engineer
6 3 (5.26%) Support Engineer
6 3 (5.26%) Technical Support
7 2 (3.51%) Analyst
7 2 (3.51%) Cisco Engineer
7 2 (3.51%) Cisco Network Engineer
7 2 (3.51%) Cloud Engineer
7 2 (3.51%) Defect Manager
7 2 (3.51%) Infrastructure Manager
7 2 (3.51%) Network Infrastructure Manager
7 2 (3.51%) Network Security Engineer
7 2 (3.51%) Solutions Architect
7 2 (3.51%) Wintel Engineer
7 2 (3.51%) Wintel Support
7 2 (3.51%) Wintel Support Engineer
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 8 (14.04%) OAuth
1 8 (14.04%) OAuth2
1 8 (14.04%) OpenID
1 8 (14.04%) SAML
2 6 (10.53%) 802.1X
3 1 (1.75%) .NET
3 1 (1.75%) Apache NiFi
3 1 (1.75%) ARM Templates
3 1 (1.75%) Elastic Stack
3 1 (1.75%) Jinja
3 1 (1.75%) LDAP
3 1 (1.75%) NETCONF
3 1 (1.75%) Node.js
3 1 (1.75%) REST
Miscellaneous
1 12 (21.05%) Data Centre
2 6 (10.53%) IoT
3 5 (8.77%) Private Cloud
4 3 (5.26%) Replication
5 2 (3.51%) Cloud Native
5 2 (3.51%) Hybrid Cloud
5 2 (3.51%) Onboarding
5 2 (3.51%) Self-Motivation
6 1 (1.75%) CAN bus
6 1 (1.75%) CCTV
6 1 (1.75%) Device Driver
6 1 (1.75%) Driving Licence
6 1 (1.75%) Operational Technology
6 1 (1.75%) PKI
6 1 (1.75%) Public Cloud
6 1 (1.75%) Security Posture
6 1 (1.75%) Video Conferencing
Operating Systems
1 26 (45.61%) Windows
2 19 (33.33%) Windows Server
3 8 (14.04%) Linux
4 2 (3.51%) Data ONTAP
4 2 (3.51%) Windows Server 2016
5 1 (1.75%) Mac OS
5 1 (1.75%) Windows 10
Processes & Methodologies
1 16 (28.07%) Zero Trust
2 13 (22.81%) Problem-Solving
3 12 (21.05%) Identity Access Management
3 12 (21.05%) Infrastructure as Code
3 12 (21.05%) Infrastructure Engineering
4 11 (19.30%) Security Architecture
5 9 (15.79%) Load Balancing
5 9 (15.79%) Technical Leadership
6 8 (14.04%) Network Segmentation
6 8 (14.04%) RBAC
7 7 (12.28%) Regulatory Compliance
7 7 (12.28%) Risk Assessment
7 7 (12.28%) Stakeholder Engagement
7 7 (12.28%) Vulnerability Management
8 6 (10.53%) Change Management
8 6 (10.53%) Network Design
8 6 (10.53%) SIEM
9 5 (8.77%) Continuous Improvement
9 5 (8.77%) Identity Management
9 5 (8.77%) Mentoring
Programming Languages
1 16 (28.07%) PowerShell
2 3 (5.26%) Bicep
2 3 (5.26%) Python
3 2 (3.51%) SQL
4 1 (1.75%) Bash
4 1 (1.75%) C
4 1 (1.75%) JavaScript
Qualifications
1 29 (50.88%) Security Cleared
2 18 (31.58%) DV Cleared
3 15 (26.32%) SC Cleared
4 8 (14.04%) Microsoft Certification
5 5 (8.77%) BPSS Clearance
6 4 (7.02%) Cisco Certification
7 3 (5.26%) Azure Certification
7 3 (5.26%) VMware Certified Professional (VCP)
8 2 (3.51%) CISSP
8 2 (3.51%) Degree
9 1 (1.75%) (ISC)2 CCSP
9 1 (1.75%) CCNA
9 1 (1.75%) CCNP
9 1 (1.75%) CEH
9 1 (1.75%) CISA
9 1 (1.75%) CISM
9 1 (1.75%) Computer Science Degree
9 1 (1.75%) GIAC
9 1 (1.75%) Network+ Certification
9 1 (1.75%) SANS
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 3 (5.26%) NIST
1 3 (5.26%) PCI DSS
2 2 (3.51%) GDPR
2 2 (3.51%) ISO/IEC 27001
3 1 (1.75%) Actionable Recommendations
3 1 (1.75%) Data Quality
3 1 (1.75%) GRC
3 1 (1.75%) HIPAA
3 1 (1.75%) NCSC
3 1 (1.75%) NIST 800
3 1 (1.75%) RMADS
System Software
1 24 (42.11%) Active Directory
2 19 (33.33%) VMware Infrastructure
3 10 (17.54%) VMware NSX
4 7 (12.28%) Hyper-V
5 3 (5.26%) VMware ESXi
6 1 (1.75%) Docker
6 1 (1.75%) iptables
6 1 (1.75%) UAG
6 1 (1.75%) Virtual Machines
Systems Management
1 13 (22.81%) Active Directory Federation Services
2 10 (17.54%) Terraform
3 8 (14.04%) Single Sign-On
4 3 (5.26%) Ansible
5 2 (3.51%) Grafana
5 2 (3.51%) Kubernetes
5 2 (3.51%) McAfee ePO
5 2 (3.51%) Microsoft Intune
5 2 (3.51%) vCenter Server
6 1 (1.75%) Argo
6 1 (1.75%) CASB
6 1 (1.75%) FortiGate
6 1 (1.75%) Icinga
6 1 (1.75%) Kibana
6 1 (1.75%) logstash
6 1 (1.75%) Nagios
6 1 (1.75%) Prometheus
6 1 (1.75%) SCCM
6 1 (1.75%) SCOM
Vendors
1 20 (35.09%) VMware
2 19 (33.33%) Microsoft
3 10 (17.54%) Cisco
4 6 (10.53%) ForeScout
5 5 (8.77%) Fortinet
6 3 (5.26%) Google
6 3 (5.26%) Palo Alto
7 2 (3.51%) CheckPoint
7 2 (3.51%) F5
7 2 (3.51%) Infoblox
7 2 (3.51%) Juniper
7 2 (3.51%) McAfee
7 2 (3.51%) NetApp
7 2 (3.51%) SolarWinds
8 1 (1.75%) Citrix
8 1 (1.75%) EMC
8 1 (1.75%) NetScout
8 1 (1.75%) Nokia
8 1 (1.75%) Siemens
8 1 (1.75%) Sophos