1st Line Engineer Contracts in the UK excluding London

First Line Engineer
UK > UK excluding London

The median First Line Engineer daily rate in the UK excluding London is £184, according to job vacancies posted in the 6 months leading up to 1 May 2025.

The table below provides contractor rate benchmarking and summary statistics, comparing them to the same period in the previous two years.

6 months to
1 May 2025
Same period 2024 Same period 2023
Rank 318 340 425
Rank change year-on-year +22 +85 -10
Contract jobs requiring a 1st Line Engineer 18 59 37
As % of all contract jobs advertised in the UK excluding London 0.14% 0.28% 0.15%
As % of the Job Titles category 0.15% 0.31% 0.16%
Number of daily rates quoted 14 25 17
10th Percentile £129 £105 £118
25th Percentile £156 £122 £128
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £184 £135 £165
Median % change year-on-year +36.11% -18.18% +17.86%
75th Percentile £220 £165 £180
90th Percentile £435 £180 £188
UK median daily rate £163 £133 £175
% change year-on-year +22.64% -24.29% +25.00%
Number of hourly rates quoted 1 3 8
10th Percentile - - £13.40
25th Percentile - £16.25 £14.38
Median hourly rate £18.13 £17.50 £16.00
Median % change year-on-year +3.60% +9.38% -5.88%
75th Percentile - £18.88 £18.50
90th Percentile - £18.95 -
UK median hourly rate £27.00 £17.50 £16.00
% change year-on-year +54.29% +9.38% -17.95%

All Contract IT Job Vacancies
UK excluding London

For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all contract IT job vacancies in the UK excluding London. Most job vacancies include a discernible job title that can be normalized. As such, the figures in the second row provide an indication of the number of contract jobs in our overall sample.

Contract vacancies in the UK excluding London with a recognized job title 11,767 19,240 22,667
% of contract IT jobs with a recognized job title 92.17% 92.63% 94.18%
Number of daily rates quoted 7,552 11,748 15,893
10th Percentile £213 £213 £225
25th Percentile £363 £363 £395
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £475 £492 £500
Median % change year-on-year -3.46% -1.60% +5.26%
75th Percentile £575 £598 £595
90th Percentile £650 £688 £688
UK median daily rate £515 £525 £540
% change year-on-year -1.90% -2.78% +2.86%
Number of hourly rates quoted 829 2,243 1,165
10th Percentile £14.00 £12.50 £13.45
25th Percentile £17.61 £15.75 £18.09
Median hourly rate £28.00 £39.55 £42.50
Median % change year-on-year -29.20% -6.94% +117.95%
75th Percentile £64.50 £61.30 £65.00
90th Percentile £75.00 £73.75 £75.00
UK median hourly rate £29.00 £36.42 £45.00
% change year-on-year -20.37% -19.07% +91.49%

1st Line Engineer
Job Vacancy Trend in the UK excluding London

Job postings that featured 1st Line Engineer in the job title as a proportion of all IT jobs advertised in the UK excluding London.

Job vacancy trend for 1st Line Engineer in the UK excluding London

1st Line Engineer
Contractor Daily Rate Trend in the UK excluding London

3-month moving average daily rate quoted in jobs citing 1st Line Engineer in the UK excluding London.

Daily rate trend for 1st Line Engineer in the UK excluding London

1st Line Engineer
Daily Rate Histogram in the UK excluding London

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing 1st Line Engineer in the UK excluding London over the 6 months to 1 May 2025.

Daily rate histogram for 1st Line Engineer in the UK excluding London

1st Line Engineer
Contractor Hourly Rate Trend in the UK excluding London

3-month moving average hourly rates quoted in jobs citing 1st Line Engineer in the UK excluding London.

Hourly rate trend for 1st Line Engineer in the UK excluding London

1st Line Engineer
Contract Job Locations in the UK excluding London

The table below looks at the demand and provides a guide to the median contractor rates quoted in IT jobs citing 1st Line Engineer within the UK excluding London region over the 6 months to 1 May 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
North of England +10 5 £163 +25.00% 6
South East +42 4 £435 +174.02% 11
North West +13 4 £163 +33.20% 3
Midlands +4 4 £135 -25.00% 4
West Midlands -3 4 £135 -25.00%
South West +45 2 £220 +64.49% 3
Scotland +11 2 £135 +7.14%
East of England +25 1 £180 +33.33%
Yorkshire +4 1 £188 +44.23% 3
1st Line Engineer
UK

1st Line Engineer Skill Set
Top 30 Co-occurring Skills and Capabilities in the UK excluding London

For the 6 months to 1 May 2025, 1st Line Engineer contract job roles required the following skills and capabilities in order of popularity. The figures indicate the absolute number co-occurrences and as a proportion of all contract job ads across the UK excluding London region featuring 1st Line Engineer in the job title.

1 14 (77.78%) Windows
2 13 (72.22%) Microsoft 365
3 11 (61.11%) Microsoft
4 10 (55.56%) Active Directory
5 7 (38.89%) Microsoft Exchange
6 6 (33.33%) Social Skills
7 5 (27.78%) Microsoft Intune
7 5 (27.78%) Windows 10
8 4 (22.22%) VPN
9 3 (16.67%) Microsoft Excel
9 3 (16.67%) Microsoft Office
9 3 (16.67%) Windows 7
9 3 (16.67%) Azure
9 3 (16.67%) Hudson
9 3 (16.67%) Wealth Management
9 3 (16.67%) Problem-Solving
9 3 (16.67%) Proactive Maintenance
9 3 (16.67%) Customer Service
10 2 (11.11%) ITIL
10 2 (11.11%) BPSS Clearance
10 2 (11.11%) SC Cleared
10 2 (11.11%) DV Cleared
10 2 (11.11%) Security Cleared
10 2 (11.11%) ServiceNow
10 2 (11.11%) Software Licensing
10 2 (11.11%) Banking
10 2 (11.11%) Service Management
11 1 (5.56%) Electronics
11 1 (5.56%) Telecoms
11 1 (5.56%) Finance

1st Line Engineer Skill Set
Co-occurring Skills and Capabilities in the UK excluding London by Category

The follow tables expand on the table above by listing co-occurrences grouped by category. The same employment type, locality and period is covered with up to 20 co-occurrences shown in each of the following categories:

Application Platforms
1 7 (38.89%) Microsoft Exchange
Applications
1 3 (16.67%) Microsoft Excel
1 3 (16.67%) Microsoft Office
Cloud Services
1 13 (72.22%) Microsoft 365
2 3 (16.67%) Azure
Communications & Networking
1 4 (22.22%) VPN
Development Applications
1 3 (16.67%) Hudson
General
1 6 (33.33%) Social Skills
2 2 (11.11%) Banking
3 1 (5.56%) Electronics
3 1 (5.56%) Finance
3 1 (5.56%) Inclusion and Diversity
3 1 (5.56%) Manufacturing
3 1 (5.56%) Marketing
3 1 (5.56%) Public Sector
3 1 (5.56%) Telecoms
Miscellaneous
1 1 (5.56%) EPoS
1 1 (5.56%) Onboarding
Operating Systems
1 14 (77.78%) Windows
2 5 (27.78%) Windows 10
3 3 (16.67%) Windows 7
4 1 (5.56%) Windows Server
Processes & Methodologies
1 3 (16.67%) Customer Service
1 3 (16.67%) Proactive Maintenance
1 3 (16.67%) Problem-Solving
1 3 (16.67%) Wealth Management
2 2 (11.11%) ITIL
2 2 (11.11%) Service Management
2 2 (11.11%) Software Licensing
3 1 (5.56%) Asset Management
3 1 (5.56%) Business Intelligence
3 1 (5.56%) Digital Marketing
3 1 (5.56%) Multi-Factor Authentication
3 1 (5.56%) Programme Management
Qualifications
1 2 (11.11%) BPSS Clearance
1 2 (11.11%) DV Cleared
1 2 (11.11%) SC Cleared
1 2 (11.11%) Security Cleared
System Software
1 10 (55.56%) Active Directory
Systems Management
1 5 (27.78%) Microsoft Intune
2 1 (5.56%) SCCM
Vendors
1 11 (61.11%) Microsoft
2 2 (11.11%) ServiceNow
3 1 (5.56%) Cisco
3 1 (5.56%) Citrix
3 1 (5.56%) Nexthink
3 1 (5.56%) SAP