Firewall Contract Job Trends in the UK excluding London

Firewall
UK > UK excluding London

The table below provides summary statistics and contractor rates for jobs advertised in the UK excluding London requiring Firewall skills. It covers contract job vacancies from the 6 months leading up to 16 December 2025, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
16 Dec 2025
Same period 2024 Same period 2023
Rank 58 40 35
Rank change year-on-year -18 -5 +19
Contract jobs citing Firewall 693 706 1,025
As % of all contract jobs in the UK excluding London 3.83% 4.72% 5.20%
As % of the Communications & Networking category 31.05% 29.65% 29.12%
Number of daily rates quoted 452 400 669
10th Percentile £309 £274 £302
25th Percentile £400 £389 £378
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £490 £500 £500
Median % change year-on-year -2.10% - +5.26%
75th Percentile £575 £580 £608
90th Percentile £650 £638 £675
UK median daily rate £500 £524 £525
% change year-on-year -4.49% -0.29% -
Number of hourly rates quoted 25 16 50
10th Percentile £24.05 £19.25 £40.63
25th Percentile £35.00 £20.00 £62.50
Median hourly rate £66.50 £22.45 £65.98
Median % change year-on-year +196.21% -65.97% +60.81%
75th Percentile £86.00 £35.00 £75.67
90th Percentile £89.63 £50.75 £76.53
UK median hourly rate £45.33 £31.25 £65.98
% change year-on-year +45.06% -52.64% +77.27%

All Communications and Computer Networking Skills
UK excluding London

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 UK excluding London.

Contract vacancies with a requirement for communications or computer networking skills 2,232 2,381 3,520
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the UK excluding London 12.34% 15.92% 17.87%
Number of daily rates quoted 1,479 1,334 2,096
10th Percentile £200 £200 £205
25th Percentile £300 £325 £338
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £450 £475 £475
Median % change year-on-year -5.26% - +5.56%
75th Percentile £563 £580 £595
90th Percentile £641 £650 £675
UK median daily rate £475 £500 £500
% change year-on-year -5.00% - -
Number of hourly rates quoted 136 123 281
10th Percentile £15.50 £17.71 £17.00
25th Percentile £18.50 £21.46 £24.00
Median hourly rate £43.75 £41.00 £56.49
Median % change year-on-year +6.71% -27.42% +25.53%
75th Percentile £67.88 £65.00 £66.25
90th Percentile £83.38 £73.75 £75.67
UK median hourly rate £36.75 £37.50 £55.00
% change year-on-year -2.00% -31.82% +32.53%

Firewall
Job Vacancy Trend in the UK excluding London

Historical trend showing the proportion of contract IT job postings citing Firewall relative to all contract IT jobs advertised in the UK excluding London.

Firewall job vacancy trend in the UK excluding London

Firewall
Daily Rate Trend in the UK excluding London

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in the UK excluding London citing Firewall.

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in the UK excluding London citing Firewall

Firewall
Daily Rate Histogram in the UK excluding London

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing Firewall in the UK excluding London over the 6 months to 16 December 2025.

Daily rate histogram for Firewall in the UK excluding London

Firewall
Hourly Rate Trend in the UK excluding London

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in the UK excluding London citing Firewall.

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in the UK excluding London citing Firewall

Firewall
Hourly Rate Histogram in the UK excluding London

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing Firewall in the UK excluding London over the 6 months to 16 December 2025.

Hourly rate histogram for Firewall in the UK excluding London

Firewall
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 Firewall within the UK excluding London region over the 6 months to 16 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
North of England -23 200 £506 +4.33% 126
South East -2 181 £488 -2.50% 209
Midlands -13 135 £475 -5.00% 66
West Midlands 0 125 £475 -5.00% 53
North West -28 102 £525 +6.06% 82
Yorkshire -14 93 £450 +5.88% 35
Scotland -15 58 £425 -16.05% 19
South West -31 55 £540 +13.68% 57
East of England -29 41 £483 -12.27% 56
Wales -10 12 £293 -22.00% 29
East Midlands -41 9 £450 -12.20% 13
Northern Ireland - 9 £500 - 4
North East -9 8 £550 - 12
South Coast - 4 £600 -
Channel Islands - 2 £725 -
Firewall
UK

Firewall
Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities in the UK excluding London 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 36 (5.19%) Confluence
2 19 (2.74%) Microsoft Exchange
3 14 (2.02%) SharePoint
4 11 (1.59%) Apache
4 11 (1.59%) nginx
5 5 (0.72%) OpenStack
6 4 (0.58%) IIS
6 4 (0.58%) JBoss
6 4 (0.58%) Tomcat
7 2 (0.29%) CICS
7 2 (0.29%) WebSphere
8 1 (0.14%) CMS
8 1 (0.14%) WebSphere Application Server
Applications
1 31 (4.47%) Microsoft Office
2 11 (1.59%) Microsoft Excel
2 11 (1.59%) Microsoft PowerPoint
2 11 (1.59%) MS Visio
3 10 (1.44%) Mozilla Thunderbird
4 2 (0.29%) Microsoft Project
Business Applications
1 1 (0.14%) Finacle
1 1 (0.14%) Pegasus Opera
1 1 (0.14%) Remedy ITSM
Cloud Services
1 195 (28.14%) AWS
2 186 (26.84%) Azure
3 80 (11.54%) GCP
4 61 (8.80%) Microsoft 365
5 53 (7.65%) Virtual Private Cloud
6 46 (6.64%) Amazon EC2
7 37 (5.34%) Amazon CloudWatch
8 35 (5.05%) Amazon S3
9 30 (4.33%) Amazon ELB
10 29 (4.18%) Entra ID
11 26 (3.75%) Azure Sentinel
12 25 (3.61%) Amazon ECS
13 22 (3.17%) AWS KMS
14 20 (2.89%) Serverless
15 19 (2.74%) AWS CloudFormation
16 16 (2.31%) AWS Lambda
16 16 (2.31%) IaaS
17 15 (2.16%) PaaS
18 14 (2.02%) Akamai
18 14 (2.02%) Azure Monitor
Communications & Networking
1 157 (22.66%) Network Security
2 146 (21.07%) VPN
3 145 (20.92%) DNS
4 125 (18.04%) WAN
5 88 (12.70%) TCP/IP
6 87 (12.55%) Wireless
7 83 (11.98%) LAN
8 79 (11.40%) BGP
9 65 (9.38%) OSPF
10 63 (9.09%) VLAN
11 55 (7.94%) DHCP
12 50 (7.22%) SD-WAN
13 43 (6.20%) Cisco ISE
14 41 (5.92%) SSL
15 38 (5.48%) Cisco ASA
16 37 (5.34%) Wi-Fi
17 33 (4.76%) HTTP
18 31 (4.47%) MPLS
19 30 (4.33%) Cisco Nexus
20 29 (4.18%) IPsec
Database & Business Intelligence
1 35 (5.05%) Amazon RDS
2 27 (3.90%) SQL Server
3 18 (2.60%) PostgreSQL
4 10 (1.44%) Amazon Aurora
5 7 (1.01%) Relational Database
6 3 (0.43%) DynamoDB
7 2 (0.29%) Azure SQL Database
7 2 (0.29%) Elasticsearch
7 2 (0.29%) MariaDB
7 2 (0.29%) MongoDB
7 2 (0.29%) MySQL
7 2 (0.29%) NoSQL
7 2 (0.29%) Oracle Database
8 1 (0.14%) Amazon QuickSight
8 1 (0.14%) BusinessObjects
8 1 (0.14%) BusinessObjects Business Intelligence
8 1 (0.14%) DB2
8 1 (0.14%) Redis
Development Applications
1 59 (8.51%) Jenkins
2 56 (8.08%) JIRA
3 52 (7.50%) Git
4 34 (4.91%) GitLab
5 19 (2.74%) Vagrant
6 16 (2.31%) Sonatype Nexus
7 10 (1.44%) Bitbucket
8 8 (1.15%) Burp Suite
8 8 (1.15%) Metasploit
9 3 (0.43%) CircleCI
9 3 (0.43%) Postman
10 2 (0.29%) Jaeger
11 1 (0.14%) Atlassian Bamboo
11 1 (0.14%) Eclipse
11 1 (0.14%) MSI
11 1 (0.14%) SonarQube
11 1 (0.14%) Subversion
11 1 (0.14%) Travis CI
General
1 203 (29.29%) Social Skills
2 87 (12.55%) Public Sector
3 86 (12.41%) Analytical Skills
4 61 (8.80%) Finance
5 43 (6.20%) Documentation Skills
6 30 (4.33%) Banking
7 29 (4.18%) Telecoms
8 22 (3.17%) Legal
9 21 (3.03%) Manufacturing
10 16 (2.31%) Presentation Skills
11 10 (1.44%) Military
12 9 (1.30%) Games
13 8 (1.15%) Organisational Skills
14 7 (1.01%) Law
14 7 (1.01%) Retail
15 6 (0.87%) Aerospace
15 6 (0.87%) Local Government
16 5 (0.72%) Inclusion and Diversity
16 5 (0.72%) Influencing Skills
17 4 (0.58%) Financial Institution
Job Titles
1 185 (26.70%) Network Engineer
2 87 (12.55%) Architect
3 63 (9.09%) Security Engineer
4 58 (8.37%) Senior
5 43 (6.20%) Platform Engineer
6 41 (5.92%) DevOps Engineer
7 40 (5.77%) Infrastructure Engineer
8 39 (5.63%) SC Cleared Network Engineer
9 37 (5.34%) Analyst
10 35 (5.05%) Network Architect
11 25 (3.61%) AWS Engineer
12 24 (3.46%) Security Architect
13 23 (3.32%) IT Engineer
13 23 (3.32%) Network Security Engineer
13 23 (3.32%) Support Engineer
14 20 (2.89%) Cloud Platform Engineer
14 20 (2.89%) Consultant
14 20 (2.89%) IT Support
15 19 (2.74%) AWS DevOps
15 19 (2.74%) Firewall Engineer
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 26 (3.75%) 802.1X
2 22 (3.17%) LDAP
3 16 (2.31%) SAML
4 13 (1.88%) OAuth
4 13 (1.88%) OAuth2
4 13 (1.88%) OpenID
5 12 (1.73%) JSON
6 11 (1.59%) Middleware
6 11 (1.59%) Node.js
7 10 (1.44%) REST
7 10 (1.44%) RFC 2544
8 8 (1.15%) Kafka
9 6 (0.87%) XML
10 3 (0.43%) CSS
10 3 (0.43%) Elastic Stack
10 3 (0.43%) HTML
10 3 (0.43%) Lambda Expressions
10 3 (0.43%) Microsoft Graph
11 2 (0.29%) ModSecurity
11 2 (0.29%) Spring Boot
Miscellaneous
1 117 (16.88%) Data Centre
2 52 (7.50%) Security Posture
3 41 (5.92%) PKI
4 34 (4.91%) Operational Technology
5 33 (4.76%) Hybrid Cloud
5 33 (4.76%) Replication
6 20 (2.89%) Onboarding
7 16 (2.31%) Data Protection Act
8 15 (2.16%) Cloud Native
8 15 (2.16%) Cyber Defence
9 13 (1.88%) Cyber Threat
9 13 (1.88%) Security Operations Centre
10 12 (1.73%) Management Information System
11 10 (1.44%) Enterprise Software
11 10 (1.44%) Fat Client
11 10 (1.44%) Thin Client
12 9 (1.30%) Legacy Systems
12 9 (1.30%) Private Cloud
12 9 (1.30%) Product Ownership
12 9 (1.30%) SCADA
Operating Systems
1 200 (28.86%) Windows
2 146 (21.07%) Linux
3 73 (10.53%) Windows Server
4 29 (4.18%) VMS
5 22 (3.17%) Amazon Linux
6 21 (3.03%) Unix
7 19 (2.74%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
8 16 (2.31%) Mac OS
9 14 (2.02%) Ubuntu
10 12 (1.73%) Android
11 11 (1.59%) Windows 10
12 10 (1.44%) Windows 7
13 8 (1.15%) Windows Server 2019
14 7 (1.01%) Windows Server 2016
15 6 (0.87%) Windows Server 2012
16 4 (0.58%) CentOS
17 3 (0.43%) Apple iOS
17 3 (0.43%) Solaris
18 2 (0.29%) CatOS
18 2 (0.29%) zOS
Processes & Methodologies
1 130 (18.76%) Cybersecurity
2 115 (16.59%) Problem-Solving
3 97 (14.00%) DevOps
4 86 (12.41%) Incident Response
5 84 (12.12%) CI/CD
5 84 (12.12%) SIEM
6 77 (11.11%) Cloud Security
7 66 (9.52%) Infrastructure as Code
8 65 (9.38%) ITIL
8 65 (9.38%) Migration
9 64 (9.24%) High Availability
10 62 (8.95%) Agile
10 62 (8.95%) Infrastructure Engineering
11 60 (8.66%) Containerisation
12 59 (8.51%) Change Management
13 56 (8.08%) Load Balancing
14 55 (7.94%) Network Design
15 48 (6.93%) Platform Engineering
15 48 (6.93%) Security Operations
15 48 (6.93%) Zero Trust
Programming Languages
1 148 (21.36%) Python
2 131 (18.90%) PowerShell
3 69 (9.96%) Bash
4 37 (5.34%) Perl
5 35 (5.05%) Java
6 34 (4.91%) SQL
7 19 (2.74%) Groovy
8 10 (1.44%) Ruby
9 9 (1.30%) Shell Script
10 6 (0.87%) Bicep
10 6 (0.87%) Kusto Query Language
11 4 (0.58%) C#
11 4 (0.58%) JavaScript
12 3 (0.43%) Go
12 3 (0.43%) Kotlin
13 2 (0.29%) Rust
14 1 (0.14%) C++
14 1 (0.14%) Korn
14 1 (0.14%) Lisp
14 1 (0.14%) PL/SQL
Qualifications
1 268 (38.67%) Security Cleared
2 183 (26.41%) SC Cleared
3 131 (18.90%) Cisco Certification
4 102 (14.72%) CCNP
5 68 (9.81%) Degree
6 62 (8.95%) DV Cleared
7 51 (7.36%) CISSP
8 47 (6.78%) CCNA
9 38 (5.48%) AWS Certification
10 34 (4.91%) Azure Certification
11 33 (4.76%) Microsoft Certification
12 27 (3.90%) CCIE
13 23 (3.32%) CISM
14 15 (2.16%) Computer Science Degree
15 13 (1.88%) CEH
15 13 (1.88%) Network+ Certification
16 12 (1.73%) CompTIA Security+
17 11 (1.59%) GIAC
18 9 (1.30%) (ISC)2 CCSP
18 9 (1.30%) CCSP
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 58 (8.37%) ISO/IEC 27001
2 53 (7.65%) NIST
3 44 (6.35%) GDPR
4 30 (4.33%) PCI DSS
5 15 (2.16%) NCSC
5 15 (2.16%) QA
6 8 (1.15%) Cyber Essentials
6 8 (1.15%) SLA
7 7 (1.01%) COBIT
8 6 (0.87%) PMO
9 5 (0.72%) PSD2
10 4 (0.58%) Actionable Recommendations
11 3 (0.43%) NIST 800
12 2 (0.29%) Disclosure Scotland
12 2 (0.29%) GRC
12 2 (0.29%) GxP
12 2 (0.29%) ISO/IEC 27002 (supersedes ISO/IEC 17799)
12 2 (0.29%) JSP 440
13 1 (0.14%) Accessibility
13 1 (0.14%) ISO/IEC 42001
System Software
1 126 (18.18%) Active Directory
2 103 (14.86%) VMware Infrastructure
3 89 (12.84%) Docker
4 32 (4.62%) Hyper-V
5 23 (3.32%) VMware NSX
6 19 (2.74%) DFS Replication
7 18 (2.60%) vSphere
8 12 (1.73%) VMware ESXi
9 11 (1.59%) Virtual Machines
10 10 (1.44%) Dovecot
10 10 (1.44%) Postfix
10 10 (1.44%) Squid
11 6 (0.87%) Firmware
11 6 (0.87%) Terminal Services
11 6 (0.87%) Virtual Servers
12 5 (0.72%) KVM
13 2 (0.29%) Xen
13 2 (0.29%) XenApp
14 1 (0.14%) Veritas Cluster Server
14 1 (0.14%) XenDesktop
Systems Management
1 98 (14.14%) Terraform
2 76 (10.97%) Ansible
3 61 (8.80%) Kubernetes
4 29 (4.18%) FortiGate
5 27 (3.90%) Grafana
5 27 (3.90%) Microsoft Intune
6 23 (3.32%) Prometheus
6 23 (3.32%) SCCM
7 20 (2.89%) Active Directory Federation Services
7 20 (2.89%) vCenter Server
8 19 (2.74%) Single Sign-On
9 16 (2.31%) Nessus
10 11 (1.59%) Nmap
10 11 (1.59%) Proxmox
11 10 (1.44%) CSIRT
11 10 (1.44%) WMI
12 9 (1.30%) Puppet
13 8 (1.15%) Fluentd
14 7 (1.01%) NetBackup
14 7 (1.01%) Progress Chef
Vendors
1 260 (37.52%) Cisco
2 181 (26.12%) Microsoft
3 145 (20.92%) Palo Alto
4 127 (18.33%) VMware
5 101 (14.57%) F5
6 79 (11.40%) CheckPoint
7 65 (9.38%) Fortinet
8 59 (8.51%) Splunk
9 52 (7.50%) Juniper
10 47 (6.78%) Meraki
11 46 (6.64%) SolarWinds
12 41 (5.92%) Oracle
13 33 (4.76%) Google
14 30 (4.33%) Citrix
14 30 (4.33%) ServiceNow
15 28 (4.04%) Aruba
16 22 (3.17%) Zscaler
17 17 (2.45%) Red Hat
18 16 (2.31%) Dell
19 11 (1.59%) Blue Coat