2nd Line Support Contracts in the UK excluding London

Second Line Support
UK > UK excluding London

The median Second Line Support daily rate in the UK excluding London is £205, according to job vacancies posted in the 6 months leading up to 4 August 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
4 Aug 2025
Same period 2024 Same period 2023
Rank 248 250 206
Rank change year-on-year +2 -44 -17
Contract jobs requiring a 2nd Line Support 115 121 253
As % of all contract jobs advertised in the UK excluding London 0.76% 0.66% 1.14%
As % of the Job Titles category 0.84% 0.71% 1.20%
Number of daily rates quoted 83 100 180
10th Percentile £153 £141 £152
25th Percentile £179 £175 £180
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £205 £195 £200
Median % change year-on-year +5.13% -2.50% +6.67%
75th Percentile £269 £250 £260
90th Percentile £312 £302 £332
UK median daily rate £215 £200 £200
% change year-on-year +7.50% - -
Number of hourly rates quoted 20 8 16
10th Percentile - £14.27 £15.63
25th Percentile £16.84 £17.09 £17.00
Median hourly rate £18.69 £19.28 £19.25
Median % change year-on-year -3.07% +0.14% +6.94%
75th Percentile £25.56 £24.82 £20.38
90th Percentile £28.00 £28.06 £21.50
UK median hourly rate £24.00 £23.80 £20.00
% change year-on-year +0.84% +19.00% -11.11%

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 13,732 16,995 21,083
% of contract IT jobs with a recognized job title 90.35% 92.01% 94.68%
Number of daily rates quoted 8,406 10,368 14,278
10th Percentile £215 £219 £230
25th Percentile £363 £375 £390
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £475 £500 £500
Median % change year-on-year -5.00% - +2.04%
75th Percentile £575 £600 £600
90th Percentile £650 £684 £688
UK median daily rate £500 £525 £538
% change year-on-year -4.76% -2.33% -0.46%
Number of hourly rates quoted 1,206 1,772 1,162
10th Percentile £13.36 £14.00 £14.00
25th Percentile £16.50 £18.35 £17.72
Median hourly rate £25.15 £43.90 £38.95
Median % change year-on-year -42.71% +12.71% +83.08%
75th Percentile £55.00 £65.00 £65.00
90th Percentile £75.00 £75.00 £77.00
UK median hourly rate £25.15 £43.00 £43.00
% change year-on-year -41.51% - +67.45%

2nd Line Support
Job Vacancy Trend in the UK excluding London

Job postings that featured 2nd Line Support in the job title as a proportion of all IT jobs advertised in the UK excluding London.

Job vacancy trend for 2nd Line Support in the UK excluding London

2nd Line Support
Contractor Daily Rate Trend in the UK excluding London

3-month moving average daily rate quoted in jobs citing 2nd Line Support in the UK excluding London.

Daily rate trend for 2nd Line Support in the UK excluding London

2nd Line Support
Daily Rate Histogram in the UK excluding London

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing 2nd Line Support in the UK excluding London over the 6 months to 4 August 2025.

Daily rate histogram for 2nd Line Support in the UK excluding London

2nd Line Support
Contractor Hourly Rate Trend in the UK excluding London

3-month moving average hourly rates quoted in jobs citing 2nd Line Support in the UK excluding London.

Hourly rate trend for 2nd Line Support in the UK excluding London

2nd Line Support
Hourly Rate Histogram in the UK excluding London

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing 2nd Line Support in the UK excluding London over the 6 months to 4 August 2025.

Hourly rate histogram for 2nd Line Support in the UK excluding London

2nd Line Support
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 2nd Line Support within the UK excluding London region over the 6 months to 4 August 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
South East +49 42 £263 -0.14% 33
Midlands -20 25 £231 +10.12% 15
North of England -14 23 £195 +4.70% 13
West Midlands -14 14 £275 +37.50% 10
East Midlands -8 11 £200 -23.08% 5
North West -4 10 £200 +6.67% 6
East of England +8 9 £200 -11.11% 4
Scotland -4 7 £239 +27.33% 3
Yorkshire -10 7 £163 -13.07% 7
South West +11 6 £195 +2.63% 10
North East +1 6 £195 +20.00%
Wales - 2 £246 - 1
Northern Ireland - 1 £165 - 1
2nd Line Support
UK

2nd Line Support Skill Set
Top 30 Co-occurring Skills and Capabilities in the UK excluding London

For the 6 months to 4 August 2025, 2nd Line Support 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 2nd Line Support in the job title.

1 56 (48.70%) Windows
1 56 (48.70%) Microsoft
2 45 (39.13%) Active Directory
3 40 (34.78%) Social Skills
4 39 (33.91%) Microsoft 365
5 37 (32.17%) ITIL
6 31 (26.96%) Security Cleared
6 31 (26.96%) Problem-Solving
7 24 (20.87%) Windows 10
8 23 (20.00%) ServiceNow
8 23 (20.00%) Finance
8 23 (20.00%) Microsoft Office
9 22 (19.13%) Service Management
9 22 (19.13%) SC Cleared
9 22 (19.13%) SCCM
10 20 (17.39%) Citrix
10 20 (17.39%) Customer Service
11 17 (14.78%) VPN
12 16 (13.91%) ITSM
13 15 (13.04%) Mobile Device Management
14 14 (12.17%) WebEx
14 14 (12.17%) Public Sector
14 14 (12.17%) Sage
14 14 (12.17%) Microsoft Exchange
15 12 (10.43%) WAN
15 12 (10.43%) Manufacturing
15 12 (10.43%) Degree
15 12 (10.43%) Analytical Skills
16 10 (8.70%) Patch Management
16 10 (8.70%) Apple

2nd Line Support 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 14 (12.17%) Microsoft Exchange
2 8 (6.96%) SharePoint
Applications
1 23 (20.00%) Microsoft Office
2 5 (4.35%) Microsoft PowerPoint
2 5 (4.35%) MS Visio
3 2 (1.74%) Microsoft Excel
Business Applications
1 1 (0.87%) Remedy ITSM
Cloud Services
1 39 (33.91%) Microsoft 365
2 6 (5.22%) OneDrive
3 3 (2.61%) Azure
4 2 (1.74%) Entra ID
Communications & Networking
1 17 (14.78%) VPN
2 14 (12.17%) WebEx
3 12 (10.43%) WAN
4 10 (8.70%) LAN
5 7 (6.09%) BGP
5 7 (6.09%) IPsec
5 7 (6.09%) MPLS
6 5 (4.35%) DHCP
6 5 (4.35%) DNS
6 5 (4.35%) Remote Desktop
6 5 (4.35%) Wi-Fi
7 3 (2.61%) VLAN
7 3 (2.61%) VoIP
8 2 (1.74%) Cisco Firepower
8 2 (1.74%) Softphone
8 2 (1.74%) TCP/IP
9 1 (0.87%) Broadband
9 1 (0.87%) Wireless
Development Applications
1 6 (5.22%) JIRA
General
1 40 (34.78%) Social Skills
2 23 (20.00%) Finance
3 14 (12.17%) Public Sector
4 12 (10.43%) Analytical Skills
4 12 (10.43%) Manufacturing
5 7 (6.09%) Electronics
5 7 (6.09%) Marketing
5 7 (6.09%) Telecoms
6 5 (4.35%) Documentation Skills
6 5 (4.35%) Presentation Skills
7 4 (3.48%) Banking
8 3 (2.61%) Inclusion and Diversity
8 3 (2.61%) Legal
9 1 (0.87%) Advertising
9 1 (0.87%) Aerospace
9 1 (0.87%) Local Government
9 1 (0.87%) Retail
Miscellaneous
1 7 (6.09%) PKI
2 6 (5.22%) Management Information System
3 4 (3.48%) Enterprise Software
4 3 (2.61%) Driving Licence
4 3 (2.61%) NHS
5 2 (1.74%) Client/Server
6 1 (0.87%) Cloud Native
6 1 (0.87%) Self-Motivation
6 1 (0.87%) Smartphone
6 1 (0.87%) W3C
Operating Systems
1 56 (48.70%) Windows
2 24 (20.87%) Windows 10
3 9 (7.83%) Windows Server
4 6 (5.22%) Apple iOS
5 5 (4.35%) Windows 8
5 5 (4.35%) Windows Server 2003
5 5 (4.35%) Windows Server 2008
5 5 (4.35%) Windows Server 2012
5 5 (4.35%) Windows Server 2016
5 5 (4.35%) Windows XP
6 2 (1.74%) Mac OS
7 1 (0.87%) Android
Processes & Methodologies
1 37 (32.17%) ITIL
2 31 (26.96%) Problem-Solving
3 22 (19.13%) Service Management
4 20 (17.39%) Customer Service
5 16 (13.91%) ITSM
6 15 (13.04%) Mobile Device Management
7 10 (8.70%) Patch Management
8 8 (6.96%) Migration
8 8 (6.96%) Service Delivery
8 8 (6.96%) Time Management
8 8 (6.96%) Workflow
9 7 (6.09%) Business Intelligence
9 7 (6.09%) Digital Marketing
9 7 (6.09%) Programme Management
9 7 (6.09%) Workflow Management
10 6 (5.22%) Asset Management
10 6 (5.22%) Mentoring
10 6 (5.22%) Problem Management
10 6 (5.22%) Project Delivery
11 5 (4.35%) Proactive Maintenance
Programming Languages
1 2 (1.74%) SQL
2 1 (0.87%) PowerShell
Qualifications
1 31 (26.96%) Security Cleared
2 22 (19.13%) SC Cleared
3 12 (10.43%) Degree
4 8 (6.96%) Microsoft Certification
5 5 (4.35%) DV Cleared
5 5 (4.35%) ITIL Foundation Certificate
6 4 (3.48%) ITIL Certification
7 3 (2.61%) DBS Check
8 1 (0.87%) IBM Certification
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 6 (5.22%) SLA
2 2 (1.74%) QA
3 1 (0.87%) Accessibility
System Software
1 45 (39.13%) Active Directory
2 4 (3.48%) VMware Infrastructure
3 1 (0.87%) Hyper-V
Systems Management
1 22 (19.13%) SCCM
2 6 (5.22%) SCOM
3 5 (4.35%) Microsoft Intune
4 2 (1.74%) AppManager
Vendors
1 56 (48.70%) Microsoft
2 23 (20.00%) ServiceNow
3 20 (17.39%) Citrix
4 14 (12.17%) Sage
5 10 (8.70%) Apple
6 7 (6.09%) Juniper
6 7 (6.09%) SAP
7 6 (5.22%) SolarWinds
8 5 (4.35%) Canon
9 4 (3.48%) VMware
10 2 (1.74%) Cisco
10 2 (1.74%) Dell
10 2 (1.74%) Google
10 2 (1.74%) Ivanti
10 2 (1.74%) Okta
11 1 (0.87%) CyberArk
11 1 (0.87%) Genesys
11 1 (0.87%) IBM
11 1 (0.87%) Remedy
11 1 (0.87%) ZyXEL