SANS Contract Job Trends in the Thames Valley

SANS Institute
South East > Thames Valley

The table below provides summary statistics for contract job vacancies advertised in the Thames Valley with a requirement for SANS qualifications. It includes a benchmarking guide to the contractor rates offered over the 6 months leading up to 14 December 2025, comparing them to the same period in the previous two years.

6 months to
14 Dec 2025
Same period 2024 Same period 2023
Rank 125 - 72
Rank change year-on-year - - +105
Contract jobs citing SANS 3 0 71
As % of all contract jobs in the Thames Valley 0.15% - 2.84%
As % of the Qualifications category 0.36% - 6.77%
Number of daily rates quoted 1 0 1
10th Percentile - - -
25th Percentile £406 - -
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £413 - £600
Median % change year-on-year - - +9.09%
75th Percentile £419 - -
90th Percentile - - -
South East median daily rate £413 - £645
% change year-on-year - - +22.86%

All Academic and Professional Certifications
Thames Valley

SANS falls under the Academic Qualifications and Professional Certifications category. For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all contract job vacancies requiring academic qualifications or professional certifications in the Thames Valley.

Contract vacancies requiring academic qualifications or professional certifications 837 773 1,049
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the Thames Valley 40.49% 38.23% 41.93%
Number of daily rates quoted 556 470 663
10th Percentile £255 £256 £210
25th Percentile £375 £398 £364
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £481 £523 £510
Median % change year-on-year -8.01% +2.45% +2.00%
75th Percentile £550 £638 £618
90th Percentile £625 £700 £675
South East median daily rate £500 £540 £538
% change year-on-year -7.41% +0.47% +1.42%
Number of hourly rates quoted 89 36 67
10th Percentile £18.25 £20.90 £24.40
25th Percentile £20.50 £41.25 £48.40
Median hourly rate £25.15 £60.25 £60.14
Median % change year-on-year -58.26% +0.18% +186.38%
75th Percentile £65.00 £64.73 £68.63
90th Percentile £95.00 £75.13 £75.67
South East median hourly rate £25.15 £56.75 £60.00
% change year-on-year -55.68% -5.43% +33.33%

SANS
Job Vacancy Trend in the Thames Valley

Historical trend showing the proportion of contract IT job postings citing SANS relative to all contract IT jobs advertised in the Thames Valley.

SANS job vacancy trend in the Thames Valley

SANS
Daily Rate Trend in the Thames Valley

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in the Thames Valley citing SANS.

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in the Thames Valley citing SANS

SANS
Contract Job Locations in the Thames Valley

The table below looks at the demand and provides a guide to the median contractor rates quoted in IT jobs citing SANS within the Thames Valley region over the 6 months to 14 December 2025. 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
Berkshire - 3 £413 - 1
SANS
South East

SANS
Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities in the Thames Valley 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:

Cloud Services
1 1 (33.33%) AWS
1 1 (33.33%) Azure
1 1 (33.33%) GCP
1 1 (33.33%) OCI
Communications & Networking
1 1 (33.33%) Internet
1 1 (33.33%) Intranet
1 1 (33.33%) Wireless
Development Applications
1 1 (33.33%) Burp Suite
General
1 3 (100.00%) Social Skills
Job Titles
1 2 (66.67%) Cybersecurity Specialist
1 2 (66.67%) Security Specialist
2 1 (33.33%) Penetration Tester
2 1 (33.33%) Tester
Miscellaneous
1 2 (66.67%) CSOC
1 2 (66.67%) Cyber Threat
1 2 (66.67%) Security Operations Centre
2 1 (33.33%) Security Posture
Operating Systems
1 1 (33.33%) Kali Linux
1 1 (33.33%) Linux
Processes & Methodologies
1 3 (100.00%) Cybersecurity
2 2 (66.67%) Agile
2 2 (66.67%) DevSecOps
2 2 (66.67%) Incident Response
2 2 (66.67%) MITRE ATT&CK
2 2 (66.67%) Security Operations
2 2 (66.67%) SIEM
3 1 (33.33%) Cloud Security
3 1 (33.33%) Computer Science
3 1 (33.33%) Information Security
3 1 (33.33%) Manual Testing
3 1 (33.33%) OWASP
3 1 (33.33%) Penetration Testing
3 1 (33.33%) Problem-Solving
3 1 (33.33%) Red Team
3 1 (33.33%) SDLC
3 1 (33.33%) Social Engineering
3 1 (33.33%) Software Testing
3 1 (33.33%) Test Automation
3 1 (33.33%) Vulnerability Assessment
Qualifications
1 3 (100.00%) CISSP
1 3 (100.00%) Degree
2 2 (66.67%) CISM
2 2 (66.67%) CREST Certified
2 2 (66.67%) GIAC
3 1 (33.33%) (ISC)2 CCSP
3 1 (33.33%) CCSP
3 1 (33.33%) Cisco Certification
3 1 (33.33%) Computer Science Degree
3 1 (33.33%) Master's Degree
3 1 (33.33%) OSCP
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 2 (66.67%) NIST
Systems Management
1 1 (33.33%) Nessus
1 1 (33.33%) Nmap