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 11 January 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
11 Jan 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 62 42 35
Rank change year-on-year -20 -7 +18
Contract jobs citing Firewall 665 636 965
As % of all contract jobs in the UK excluding London 3.69% 4.58% 4.94%
As % of the Communications & Networking category 30.74% 28.48% 28.43%
Number of daily rates quoted 443 358 639
10th Percentile £311 £271 £312
25th Percentile £400 £370 £386
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £488 £498 £500
Median % change year-on-year -2.01% -0.50% +4.00%
75th Percentile £569 £575 £608
90th Percentile £642 £632 £675
UK median daily rate £500 £520 £525
% change year-on-year -3.85% -0.95% -
Number of hourly rates quoted 25 18 43
10th Percentile £35.50 £20.00 £47.91
25th Percentile £37.25 £20.05 £62.50
Median hourly rate £56.00 £35.00 £65.98
Median % change year-on-year +60.00% -46.95% +60.81%
75th Percentile £85.00 £41.25 £76.25
90th Percentile £89.63 £64.13 £76.53
UK median hourly rate £41.94 £35.00 £65.98
% change year-on-year +19.83% -46.95% +104.59%

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 2,163 2,233 3,394
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the UK excluding London 12.01% 16.08% 17.39%
Number of daily rates quoted 1,433 1,256 2,022
10th Percentile £200 £190 £205
25th Percentile £300 £310 £338
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £450 £471 £475
Median % change year-on-year -4.51% -0.79% +3.26%
75th Percentile £560 £580 £594
90th Percentile £650 £650 £681
UK median daily rate £475 £500 £500
% change year-on-year -5.00% - -2.44%
Number of hourly rates quoted 125 108 265
10th Percentile £15.35 £15.22 £17.72
25th Percentile £16.25 £20.64 £27.50
Median hourly rate £42.50 £31.79 £59.50
Median % change year-on-year +33.69% -46.57% +173.56%
75th Percentile £67.25 £61.75 £65.98
90th Percentile £78.00 £71.25 £75.00
UK median hourly rate £35.50 £32.50 £56.49
% change year-on-year +9.23% -42.47% +125.96%

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 11 January 2026.

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 11 January 2026.

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 11 January 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
South East +17 191 £500 - 200
North of England -22 186 £500 +5.26% 130
Midlands -21 122 £475 -6.91% 73
West Midlands +2 113 £475 +7.04% 43
North West -27 100 £519 +9.16% 62
Yorkshire -16 82 £463 +8.82% 51
Scotland -12 61 £425 -15.00% 30
South West -34 52 £550 +15.79% 71
East of England -25 36 £475 -9.52% 74
Wales -20 10 £293 -19.86% 27
East Midlands -49 8 £500 -23.14% 30
North East -9 7 £550 - 20
Northern Ireland - 7 £500 - 10
South Coast - 4 £600 -
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 31 (4.66%) Confluence
2 12 (1.80%) Microsoft Exchange
3 10 (1.50%) Apache
3 10 (1.50%) nginx
4 9 (1.35%) SharePoint
5 7 (1.05%) IIS
6 5 (0.75%) OpenStack
7 3 (0.45%) Tomcat
8 2 (0.30%) CICS
8 2 (0.30%) WebSphere
9 1 (0.15%) CMS
9 1 (0.15%) JBoss
9 1 (0.15%) WebSphere Application Server
Applications
1 30 (4.51%) Microsoft Office
2 15 (2.26%) Microsoft Excel
2 15 (2.26%) Microsoft PowerPoint
3 13 (1.95%) MS Visio
4 9 (1.35%) Mozilla Thunderbird
5 1 (0.15%) Microsoft Project
Business Applications
1 1 (0.15%) Finacle
1 1 (0.15%) Pegasus Opera
1 1 (0.15%) Remedy ITSM
1 1 (0.15%) SAP S/4HANA
Cloud Services
1 190 (28.57%) AWS
2 181 (27.22%) Azure
3 72 (10.83%) GCP
4 48 (7.22%) Virtual Private Cloud
5 42 (6.32%) Amazon EC2
6 41 (6.17%) Microsoft 365
7 33 (4.96%) Amazon CloudWatch
8 31 (4.66%) Amazon S3
9 29 (4.36%) Entra ID
10 26 (3.91%) Amazon ELB
11 23 (3.46%) Amazon ECS
12 20 (3.01%) AWS CloudFormation
12 20 (3.01%) Serverless
13 19 (2.86%) AWS KMS
14 18 (2.71%) Azure Sentinel
15 17 (2.56%) IaaS
16 16 (2.41%) AWS Lambda
16 16 (2.41%) PaaS
17 15 (2.26%) Azure Monitor
18 14 (2.11%) Akamai
Communications & Networking
1 163 (24.51%) Network Security
2 148 (22.26%) VPN
3 130 (19.55%) DNS
3 130 (19.55%) WAN
4 88 (13.23%) LAN
5 85 (12.78%) BGP
6 84 (12.63%) TCP/IP
7 82 (12.33%) VLAN
8 80 (12.03%) Wireless
9 71 (10.68%) OSPF
10 54 (8.12%) DHCP
11 52 (7.82%) SD-WAN
12 39 (5.86%) IPsec
13 37 (5.56%) MPLS
14 36 (5.41%) Cisco ASA
14 36 (5.41%) Wi-Fi
15 35 (5.26%) Cisco ISE
15 35 (5.26%) SSL
16 28 (4.21%) Cisco Nexus
16 28 (4.21%) HTTP
Database & Business Intelligence
1 31 (4.66%) Amazon RDS
2 23 (3.46%) SQL Server
3 20 (3.01%) PostgreSQL
4 9 (1.35%) Amazon Aurora
5 4 (0.60%) MongoDB
5 4 (0.60%) Relational Database
6 3 (0.45%) DynamoDB
7 2 (0.30%) Elasticsearch
7 2 (0.30%) MariaDB
7 2 (0.30%) NoSQL
7 2 (0.30%) Oracle Database
8 1 (0.15%) Amazon QuickSight
8 1 (0.15%) BusinessObjects
8 1 (0.15%) BusinessObjects Business Intelligence
8 1 (0.15%) Metadata
8 1 (0.15%) Oracle Reports
8 1 (0.15%) Redis
8 1 (0.15%) SAP HANA
Development Applications
1 54 (8.12%) JIRA
2 53 (7.97%) Jenkins
3 47 (7.07%) Git
4 33 (4.96%) GitLab
5 16 (2.41%) Sonatype Nexus
6 15 (2.26%) Vagrant
7 14 (2.11%) Burp Suite
7 14 (2.11%) Metasploit
8 10 (1.50%) Bitbucket
9 6 (0.90%) Jaeger
10 4 (0.60%) CircleCI
11 2 (0.30%) Postman
12 1 (0.15%) Atlassian Bamboo
12 1 (0.15%) Chocolatey
12 1 (0.15%) Eclipse
12 1 (0.15%) MSI
12 1 (0.15%) SonarQube
12 1 (0.15%) Subversion
12 1 (0.15%) Travis CI
General
1 200 (30.08%) Social Skills
2 84 (12.63%) Analytical Skills
3 79 (11.88%) Public Sector
4 59 (8.87%) Finance
5 48 (7.22%) Documentation Skills
6 31 (4.66%) Banking
7 28 (4.21%) Telecoms
8 22 (3.31%) Legal
9 21 (3.16%) Manufacturing
10 15 (2.26%) Presentation Skills
11 7 (1.05%) Aerospace
11 7 (1.05%) Financial Institution
11 7 (1.05%) Inclusion and Diversity
11 7 (1.05%) Organisational Skills
11 7 (1.05%) Retail
12 6 (0.90%) Law
12 6 (0.90%) Military
13 5 (0.75%) Influencing Skills
14 4 (0.60%) Retail Banking
15 3 (0.45%) Marketing
Job Titles
1 186 (27.97%) Network Engineer
2 91 (13.68%) Architect
3 68 (10.23%) Senior
4 50 (7.52%) Security Engineer
5 45 (6.77%) Infrastructure Engineer
6 44 (6.62%) SC Cleared Network Engineer
7 38 (5.71%) Network Architect
8 35 (5.26%) Platform Engineer
9 33 (4.96%) DevOps Engineer
10 30 (4.51%) Analyst
11 23 (3.46%) Security Architect
12 22 (3.31%) AWS Engineer
12 22 (3.31%) IT Engineer
12 22 (3.31%) Support Engineer
13 21 (3.16%) IT Support
14 20 (3.01%) Cloud Platform Engineer
15 18 (2.71%) Cisco Engineer
15 18 (2.71%) Consultant
16 17 (2.56%) AWS DevOps
16 17 (2.56%) Network Security Engineer
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 30 (4.51%) 802.1X
2 18 (2.71%) LDAP
3 16 (2.41%) SAML
4 13 (1.95%) OAuth
4 13 (1.95%) OAuth2
4 13 (1.95%) OpenID
5 12 (1.80%) Middleware
6 11 (1.65%) Node.js
7 10 (1.50%) Kafka
8 9 (1.35%) JSON
9 8 (1.20%) REST
10 7 (1.05%) RFC 2544
11 6 (0.90%) OpenTelemetry
11 6 (0.90%) Spring Boot
12 4 (0.60%) XML
13 3 (0.45%) ARM Templates
13 3 (0.45%) Elastic Stack
13 3 (0.45%) Lambda Expressions
13 3 (0.45%) Microsoft Graph
14 2 (0.30%) ModSecurity
Miscellaneous
1 126 (18.95%) Data Centre
2 53 (7.97%) Security Posture
3 35 (5.26%) PKI
4 28 (4.21%) Operational Technology
4 28 (4.21%) Replication
5 27 (4.06%) Hybrid Cloud
6 24 (3.61%) Onboarding
7 15 (2.26%) Cloud Native
7 15 (2.26%) Data Protection Act
8 14 (2.11%) Cyber Threat
9 13 (1.95%) Security Operations Centre
10 12 (1.80%) Management Information System
11 11 (1.65%) Fat Client
11 11 (1.65%) Thin Client
12 10 (1.50%) Enterprise Software
12 10 (1.50%) Private Cloud
13 9 (1.35%) Legacy Systems
13 9 (1.35%) Product Ownership
13 9 (1.35%) SCADA
14 8 (1.20%) Public Cloud
Operating Systems
1 191 (28.72%) Windows
2 146 (21.95%) Linux
3 73 (10.98%) Windows Server
4 21 (3.16%) VMS
5 20 (3.01%) Unix
6 18 (2.71%) Amazon Linux
7 16 (2.41%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
8 12 (1.80%) Ubuntu
9 11 (1.65%) Windows 7
10 9 (1.35%) Windows Server 2019
11 8 (1.20%) Windows 10
12 6 (0.90%) Mac OS
13 4 (0.60%) Windows Server 2012
13 4 (0.60%) Windows Server 2016
14 3 (0.45%) Android
14 3 (0.45%) Apple iOS
14 3 (0.45%) CentOS
14 3 (0.45%) Solaris
15 2 (0.30%) Windows Server 2008
15 2 (0.30%) zOS
Processes & Methodologies
1 130 (19.55%) Cybersecurity
2 105 (15.79%) Problem-Solving
3 100 (15.04%) DevOps
4 88 (13.23%) CI/CD
5 83 (12.48%) Incident Response
6 78 (11.73%) SIEM
7 70 (10.53%) Infrastructure as Code
7 70 (10.53%) Infrastructure Engineering
8 64 (9.62%) Cloud Security
9 60 (9.02%) Agile
10 59 (8.87%) High Availability
10 59 (8.87%) ITIL
11 58 (8.72%) Containerisation
11 58 (8.72%) Load Balancing
12 52 (7.82%) Migration
12 52 (7.82%) Network Design
13 50 (7.52%) Change Management
14 49 (7.37%) Zero Trust
15 48 (7.22%) Mentoring
16 46 (6.92%) Platform Engineering
Programming Languages
1 134 (20.15%) Python
2 106 (15.94%) PowerShell
3 65 (9.77%) Bash
4 37 (5.56%) SQL
5 35 (5.26%) Java
6 33 (4.96%) Perl
7 15 (2.26%) Groovy
8 10 (1.50%) Ruby
9 8 (1.20%) Bicep
10 7 (1.05%) Shell Script
11 6 (0.90%) Rust
12 4 (0.60%) C#
12 4 (0.60%) Kusto Query Language
13 3 (0.45%) Go
14 1 (0.15%) C++
14 1 (0.15%) JavaScript
14 1 (0.15%) Korn
14 1 (0.15%) Lisp
14 1 (0.15%) PL/SQL
Qualifications
1 287 (43.16%) Security Cleared
2 198 (29.77%) SC Cleared
3 133 (20.00%) Cisco Certification
4 110 (16.54%) CCNP
5 69 (10.38%) DV Cleared
6 67 (10.08%) Degree
7 56 (8.42%) CCNA
8 46 (6.92%) CISSP
9 35 (5.26%) AWS Certification
10 31 (4.66%) Azure Certification
11 29 (4.36%) Microsoft Certification
12 26 (3.91%) CCIE
13 22 (3.31%) CISM
14 14 (2.11%) CHECK Team Member
15 12 (1.80%) CREST Certified
15 12 (1.80%) Cyber Scheme
16 11 (1.65%) CompTIA Security+
16 11 (1.65%) Postgraduate
17 10 (1.50%) Computer Science Degree
17 10 (1.50%) Network+ Certification
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 60 (9.02%) ISO/IEC 27001
2 49 (7.37%) NIST
3 41 (6.17%) GDPR
4 32 (4.81%) PCI DSS
5 18 (2.71%) SLA
6 14 (2.11%) Cyber Essentials
7 13 (1.95%) QA
8 12 (1.80%) NCSC
9 10 (1.50%) PMO
10 7 (1.05%) COBIT
11 5 (0.75%) PSD2
12 4 (0.60%) Actionable Recommendations
13 3 (0.45%) NIST 800
14 2 (0.30%) Disclosure Scotland
14 2 (0.30%) GRC
14 2 (0.30%) ISO/IEC 27002 (supersedes ISO/IEC 17799)
14 2 (0.30%) JSP 440
15 1 (0.15%) Accessibility
15 1 (0.15%) Cyber Essentials PLUS
15 1 (0.15%) ISO/IEC 42001
System Software
1 111 (16.69%) Active Directory
2 101 (15.19%) VMware Infrastructure
3 89 (13.38%) Docker
4 30 (4.51%) Hyper-V
5 23 (3.46%) vSphere
6 20 (3.01%) VMware NSX
7 18 (2.71%) DFS Replication
8 14 (2.11%) VMware ESXi
9 9 (1.35%) Dovecot
9 9 (1.35%) Postfix
9 9 (1.35%) Squid
10 8 (1.20%) Virtual Machines
11 6 (0.90%) Firmware
11 6 (0.90%) Virtual Servers
12 5 (0.75%) KVM
13 3 (0.45%) Terminal Services
14 2 (0.30%) Virtual Desktop
14 2 (0.30%) Xen
15 1 (0.15%) NetIQ eDirectory
15 1 (0.15%) RHEV
Systems Management
1 94 (14.14%) Terraform
2 73 (10.98%) Ansible
3 66 (9.92%) Kubernetes
4 27 (4.06%) FortiGate
4 27 (4.06%) Grafana
5 23 (3.46%) Prometheus
6 20 (3.01%) vCenter Server
7 19 (2.86%) Active Directory Federation Services
7 19 (2.86%) Microsoft Intune
7 19 (2.86%) Single Sign-On
8 17 (2.56%) Nmap
9 14 (2.11%) SCCM
10 12 (1.80%) Nessus
11 11 (1.65%) WMI
12 10 (1.50%) CSIRT
12 10 (1.50%) Proxmox
13 9 (1.35%) Nagios
14 8 (1.20%) Fluentd
15 6 (0.90%) Kiali
15 6 (0.90%) Puppet
Vendors
1 256 (38.50%) Cisco
2 162 (24.36%) Palo Alto
3 145 (21.80%) Microsoft
4 126 (18.95%) VMware
5 93 (13.98%) F5
6 79 (11.88%) CheckPoint
7 56 (8.42%) Fortinet
8 49 (7.37%) Juniper
9 48 (7.22%) Splunk
10 42 (6.32%) Meraki
11 40 (6.02%) SolarWinds
12 37 (5.56%) Aruba
13 36 (5.41%) Oracle
14 33 (4.96%) ServiceNow
15 30 (4.51%) Google
16 23 (3.46%) Citrix
17 20 (3.01%) Dell
18 17 (2.56%) Zscaler
19 16 (2.41%) Red Hat
20 12 (1.80%) Veeam