MPLS Contract Job Trends in the UK excluding London

Multiprotocol Label Switching (MPLS)
UK > UK excluding London

The table below provides summary statistics and contractor rates for jobs advertised in the UK excluding London requiring MPLS skills. It covers contract job vacancies from the 6 months leading up to 20 November 2025, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
20 Nov 2025
Same period 2024 Same period 2023
Rank 294 241 247
Rank change year-on-year -53 +6 +107
Contract jobs citing MPLS 106 131 174
As % of all contract jobs in the UK excluding London 0.60% 0.79% 0.85%
As % of the Communications & Networking category 4.66% 5.30% 4.72%
Number of daily rates quoted 77 56 71
10th Percentile £263 £356 £258
25th Percentile £335 £381 £325
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £425 £500 £450
Median % change year-on-year -15.00% +11.11% +3.45%
75th Percentile £538 £550 £564
90th Percentile £638 £637 £627
UK median daily rate £450 £500 £525
% change year-on-year -10.00% -4.76% +10.53%
Number of hourly rates quoted 1 2 17
10th Percentile - £18.10 £19.55
25th Percentile £19.00 £18.82 £24.50
Median hourly rate £20.00 £20.08 £65.98
Median % change year-on-year -0.37% -69.57% +180.77%
75th Percentile £21.00 £21.27 -
90th Percentile - £21.95 £66.59
UK median hourly rate £20.00 £32.50 £65.98
% change year-on-year -38.46% -50.74% +151.35%

All Communications and Computer Networking Skills
UK excluding London

MPLS 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 2,273 2,474 3,688
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the UK excluding London 12.95% 14.97% 17.97%
Number of daily rates quoted 1,491 1,368 2,216
10th Percentile £191 £200 £205
25th Percentile £300 £345 £337
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £450 £475 £475
Median % change year-on-year -5.26% - +5.56%
75th Percentile £575 £583 £594
90th Percentile £648 £661 £675
UK median daily rate £475 £500 £500
% change year-on-year -5.00% - -
Number of hourly rates quoted 147 134 280
10th Percentile £15.50 £20.00 £17.67
25th Percentile £18.50 £24.26 £24.32
Median hourly rate £42.50 £49.00 £56.49
Median % change year-on-year -13.27% -13.26% +25.53%
75th Percentile £67.25 £68.44 £67.50
90th Percentile £80.00 £75.00 £75.67
UK median hourly rate £36.00 £45.00 £55.00
% change year-on-year -20.00% -18.18% +27.91%

MPLS
Job Vacancy Trend in the UK excluding London

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

MPLS job vacancy trend in the UK excluding London

MPLS
Daily Rate Trend in the UK excluding London

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

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

MPLS
Daily Rate Histogram in the UK excluding London

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing MPLS in the UK excluding London over the 6 months to 20 November 2025.

Daily rate histogram for MPLS in the UK excluding London

MPLS
Hourly Rate Trend in the UK excluding London

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

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

MPLS
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 MPLS within the UK excluding London region over the 6 months to 20 November 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
Midlands -10 37 £400 +6.67% 7
West Midlands -10 37 £400 -5.88% 7
South East -28 31 £538 +6.44% 19
Scotland +11 13 £213 -43.33% 3
North of England -68 12 £438 -12.50% 4
North West -26 10 £435 -13.86% 2
South West -4 9 £625 -1.19% 3
Northern Ireland - 3 £475 -
East of England -21 2 £350 - 4
North East -9 1 £550 -
Yorkshire -55 1 £500 - 2
MPLS
UK

MPLS
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 16 (15.09%) OpenStack
2 7 (6.60%) Confluence
3 1 (0.94%) Microsoft Exchange
3 1 (0.94%) SharePoint
Applications
1 14 (13.21%) Microsoft Office
2 5 (4.72%) MS Visio
3 4 (3.77%) Microsoft Excel
3 4 (3.77%) Microsoft PowerPoint
Cloud Services
1 23 (21.70%) AWS
2 16 (15.09%) Azure
3 7 (6.60%) GCP
4 6 (5.66%) OpenShift
5 4 (3.77%) Azure ExpressRoute
5 4 (3.77%) Virtual Private Cloud
6 2 (1.89%) AWS Direct Connect
7 1 (0.94%) Microsoft 365
7 1 (0.94%) Mimecast
Communications & Networking
1 71 (66.98%) BGP
2 69 (65.09%) WAN
3 55 (51.89%) VPN
4 40 (37.74%) LAN
5 39 (36.79%) IPsec
6 31 (29.25%) Firewall
7 26 (24.53%) OSPF
8 17 (16.04%) SD-WAN
9 16 (15.09%) DNS
9 16 (15.09%) Wireless
10 13 (12.26%) VLAN
11 12 (11.32%) SDH
12 10 (9.43%) Cisco ASA
13 8 (7.55%) DHCP
13 8 (7.55%) Junos
13 8 (7.55%) Unified Communications
13 8 (7.55%) WLAN
14 7 (6.60%) IPv4
14 7 (6.60%) SNMP
14 7 (6.60%) TACACS
Database & Business Intelligence
1 1 (0.94%) MongoDB
1 1 (0.94%) NoSQL
Development Applications
1 8 (7.55%) JIRA
2 2 (1.89%) GitLab
3 1 (0.94%) Robot Framework
General
1 46 (43.40%) Social Skills
2 16 (15.09%) Telecoms
3 14 (13.21%) Public Sector
4 12 (11.32%) Analytical Skills
5 8 (7.55%) Documentation Skills
6 4 (3.77%) Influencing Skills
7 2 (1.89%) Organisational Skills
7 2 (1.89%) Presentation Skills
8 1 (0.94%) Finance
8 1 (0.94%) Police
Job Titles
1 37 (34.91%) Network Engineer
2 18 (16.98%) Architect
2 18 (16.98%) Support Engineer
3 16 (15.09%) Senior
4 14 (13.21%) 3rd Line Engineer
5 13 (12.26%) 3rd Line Support
5 13 (12.26%) 3rd Line Support Engineer
6 12 (11.32%) WAN Engineer
7 11 (10.38%) Designer
7 11 (10.38%) Network Architect
8 10 (9.43%) 2nd Line Engineer
8 10 (9.43%) Senior Network Engineer
9 9 (8.49%) Field Engineer
10 7 (6.60%) IP Specialist
11 6 (5.66%) IP Architect
11 6 (5.66%) IP Designer
11 6 (5.66%) Solutions Architect
12 5 (4.72%) Network Designer
12 5 (4.72%) Network Support
12 5 (4.72%) Network Support Engineer
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 15 (14.15%) NETCONF
2 9 (8.49%) RESTCONF
2 9 (8.49%) YANG
3 7 (6.60%) REST
4 2 (1.89%) JSON
5 1 (0.94%) 802.1X
5 1 (0.94%) gRPC
5 1 (0.94%) Jinja
5 1 (0.94%) OpenConfig
5 1 (0.94%) SOAP
5 1 (0.94%) XML
5 1 (0.94%) YAML
Miscellaneous
1 31 (29.25%) PKI
2 17 (16.04%) Data Centre
3 14 (13.21%) Hybrid Cloud
4 10 (9.43%) Cloud Native
5 7 (6.60%) Driving Licence
6 5 (4.72%) Operational Technology
6 5 (4.72%) Self-Motivation
7 4 (3.77%) Data Protection Act
8 3 (2.83%) SCADA
8 3 (2.83%) Virtual Team
9 2 (1.89%) Management Information System
9 2 (1.89%) Onboarding
10 1 (0.94%) Analytical Mindset
10 1 (0.94%) Enterprise Cloud
10 1 (0.94%) TM Forum
Operating Systems
1 1 (0.94%) CentOS
1 1 (0.94%) Linux
1 1 (0.94%) Unix
1 1 (0.94%) Windows
Processes & Methodologies
1 31 (29.25%) Network Design
2 24 (22.64%) Load Balancing
3 23 (21.70%) Network Virtualisation
4 19 (17.92%) Validation
5 15 (14.15%) Problem-Solving
5 15 (14.15%) Roadmaps
6 12 (11.32%) Network Architecture
6 12 (11.32%) Stakeholder Management
6 12 (11.32%) TOGAF
7 11 (10.38%) Project Delivery
7 11 (10.38%) Strategic Thinking
8 10 (9.43%) Stakeholder Engagement
9 9 (8.49%) Enterprise Architecture
9 9 (8.49%) Incident Response
9 9 (8.49%) Knowledge Transfer
9 9 (8.49%) Network Management
10 8 (7.55%) NsoIT
10 8 (7.55%) Service Management
10 8 (7.55%) System Testing
11 7 (6.60%) Data Protection
Programming Languages
1 32 (30.19%) Python
2 3 (2.83%) Bash
3 1 (0.94%) Lisp
3 1 (0.94%) SQL
Qualifications
1 56 (52.83%) Security Cleared
2 43 (40.57%) Cisco Certification
2 43 (40.57%) SC Cleared
3 29 (27.36%) CCNP
4 24 (22.64%) CCIE
5 17 (16.04%) JNCIE
6 14 (13.21%) Degree
7 11 (10.38%) AWS Certification
8 10 (9.43%) CCNA
9 6 (5.66%) BPSS Clearance
9 6 (5.66%) DV Cleared
10 4 (3.77%) (ISC)2 CCSP
10 4 (3.77%) Azure Certification
10 4 (3.77%) CCSP
10 4 (3.77%) CISSP
11 3 (2.83%) CCIE Security
11 3 (2.83%) JNCIP
12 2 (1.89%) CCDP
12 2 (1.89%) JNCIS
13 1 (0.94%) MCP
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 8 (7.55%) SLA
2 6 (5.66%) ISO/IEC 27001
2 6 (5.66%) PCI DSS
3 5 (4.72%) GDPR
3 5 (4.72%) NIST
System Software
1 18 (16.98%) VMware Infrastructure
2 10 (9.43%) VMware NSX
3 7 (6.60%) VMware ESXi
4 5 (4.72%) Docker
5 1 (0.94%) Active Directory
Systems Management
1 31 (29.25%) Ansible
2 11 (10.38%) Terraform
3 3 (2.83%) Iperf
3 3 (2.83%) Nmap
4 2 (1.89%) FortiGate
5 1 (0.94%) Amdocs OSS
5 1 (0.94%) Kubernetes
5 1 (0.94%) SCCM
Vendors
1 65 (61.32%) Cisco
2 42 (39.62%) Juniper
3 26 (24.53%) Fortinet
4 18 (16.98%) VMware
5 17 (16.04%) F5
5 17 (16.04%) Palo Alto
6 13 (12.26%) Microsoft
7 9 (8.49%) SolarWinds
8 7 (6.60%) Atlassian
8 7 (6.60%) CheckPoint
8 7 (6.60%) Meraki
9 5 (4.72%) Nokia
10 4 (3.77%) Aruba
10 4 (3.77%) Dell
11 2 (1.89%) BT
11 2 (1.89%) CenturyLink
11 2 (1.89%) Forcepoint
12 1 (0.94%) Cramer
12 1 (0.94%) Fujitsu
12 1 (0.94%) Google