Network Design Contract Job Trends in the UK excluding London

Network Design
UK > UK excluding London

The table below provides summary statistics and contractor rates for jobs advertised in the UK excluding London requiring Network Design skills. It covers contract job vacancies from the 6 months leading up to 15 January 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
15 Jan 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 297 233 218
Rank change year-on-year -64 -15 +93
Contract jobs citing Network Design 110 110 184
As % of all contract jobs in the UK excluding London 0.60% 0.79% 0.96%
As % of the Processes & Methodologies category 0.70% 0.90% 1.10%
Number of daily rates quoted 74 69 82
10th Percentile £343 £360 £425
25th Percentile £411 £419 £463
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £500 £550
Median % change year-on-year - -9.09% +17.33%
75th Percentile £549 £550 £600
90th Percentile £596 £625 £675
UK median daily rate £500 £525 £575
% change year-on-year -4.76% -8.70% +21.05%
Number of hourly rates quoted 2 1 10
10th Percentile - - £64.78
25th Percentile - - -
Median hourly rate £74.26 £75.00 £65.98
Median % change year-on-year -0.99% +13.67% -5.74%
75th Percentile - - -
90th Percentile - - £66.38
UK median hourly rate £74.26 £75.00 £65.98
% change year-on-year -0.99% +13.67% -5.74%

All Process & Methodology Skills
UK excluding London

Network Design falls under the Processes and Methodologies category. For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all contract job vacancies requiring process or methodology skills in the UK excluding London.

Contract vacancies with a requirement for process or methodology skills 15,669 12,263 16,774
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the UK excluding London 85.22% 88.08% 87.25%
Number of daily rates quoted 9,609 7,176 10,676
10th Percentile £221 £232 £250
25th Percentile £375 £380 £400
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £475 £500 £500
Median % change year-on-year -5.00% - -
75th Percentile £575 £600 £600
90th Percentile £675 £681 £688
UK median daily rate £500 £525 £525
% change year-on-year -4.76% - -4.55%
Number of hourly rates quoted 1,692 692 1,275
10th Percentile £14.35 £15.50 £14.16
25th Percentile £17.14 £20.00 £16.75
Median hourly rate £23.83 £30.45 £43.33
Median % change year-on-year -21.76% -29.73% +46.88%
75th Percentile £55.00 £63.75 £65.00
90th Percentile £68.00 £73.98 £76.53
UK median hourly rate £25.15 £32.50 £40.50
% change year-on-year -22.62% -19.75% +15.71%

Network Design
Job Vacancy Trend in the UK excluding London

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

Network Design job vacancy trend in the UK excluding London

Network Design
Daily Rate Trend in the UK excluding London

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

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

Network Design
Daily Rate Histogram in the UK excluding London

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing Network Design in the UK excluding London over the 6 months to 15 January 2026.

Daily rate histogram for Network Design in the UK excluding London

Network Design
Hourly Rate Trend in the UK excluding London

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

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

Network Design
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 Network Design within the UK excluding London region over the 6 months to 15 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 -18 37 £500 +5.26% 23
West Midlands -14 24 £400 -23.15% 11
Midlands -20 24 £400 -25.27% 18
North of England -53 20 £539 +7.70% 24
North West -17 18 £531 +11.79% 13
Scotland - 13 £563 - 6
South West -37 8 £450 -16.28% 15
East of England -18 6 £419 -16.25% 15
North East -9 2 £550 - 2
Wales -4 1 - - 5
Yorkshire -64 1 £650 +30.00% 9
Northern Ireland - 1 £600 - 2
Network Design
UK

Network Design
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 6 (5.45%) OpenStack
Applications
1 6 (5.45%) MS Visio
2 3 (2.73%) Microsoft Office
3 2 (1.82%) Microsoft Excel
3 2 (1.82%) Microsoft PowerPoint
Business Applications
1 2 (1.82%) Dynamics CRM
2 1 (0.91%) Remedy ITSM
Cloud Services
1 25 (22.73%) Azure
2 22 (20.00%) AWS
3 9 (8.18%) GCP
4 4 (3.64%) Dynamics 365
4 4 (3.64%) PaaS
5 3 (2.73%) Azure ExpressRoute
5 3 (2.73%) Virtual Private Cloud
6 2 (1.82%) AWS Direct Connect
7 1 (0.91%) AWS IoT
7 1 (0.91%) Google Ads
Communications & Networking
1 61 (55.45%) WAN
2 51 (46.36%) Firewall
3 33 (30.00%) LAN
3 33 (30.00%) VPN
4 31 (28.18%) BGP
5 30 (27.27%) MPLS
6 21 (19.09%) Network Security
6 21 (19.09%) SD-WAN
7 16 (14.55%) Wi-Fi
8 15 (13.64%) IPsec
8 15 (13.64%) VLAN
9 14 (12.73%) Cisco ISE
9 14 (12.73%) TCP/IP
10 13 (11.82%) DNS
11 11 (10.00%) NetScaler
12 10 (9.09%) IPv6
13 8 (7.27%) IPv4
14 7 (6.36%) DHCP
14 7 (6.36%) OSPF
14 7 (6.36%) WLAN
Development Applications
1 1 (0.91%) GitLab
1 1 (0.91%) Robot Framework
General
1 31 (28.18%) Social Skills
2 12 (10.91%) Public Sector
2 12 (10.91%) Telecoms
3 11 (10.00%) Analytical Skills
4 7 (6.36%) Legal
5 6 (5.45%) Finance
6 4 (3.64%) Documentation Skills
6 4 (3.64%) Manufacturing
7 3 (2.73%) Influencing Skills
8 2 (1.82%) Aviation
8 2 (1.82%) Presentation Skills
9 1 (0.91%) Electronics
9 1 (0.91%) Marketing
9 1 (0.91%) Military
9 1 (0.91%) Publishing
9 1 (0.91%) Retail
Job Titles
1 42 (38.18%) Network Engineer
2 32 (29.09%) Architect
3 23 (20.91%) Network Architect
4 10 (9.09%) Design Engineer
4 10 (9.09%) Senior
5 9 (8.18%) Designer
5 9 (8.18%) IP Specialist
5 9 (8.18%) Network Design Engineer
5 9 (8.18%) Network Designer
5 9 (8.18%) Senior Designer
5 9 (8.18%) Senior Network Designer
6 8 (7.27%) 3rd Line Engineer
6 8 (7.27%) 3rd Line Support
6 8 (7.27%) 3rd Line Support Engineer
6 8 (7.27%) Support Engineer
7 7 (6.36%) DV Cleared Network Engineer
7 7 (6.36%) IP Architect
7 7 (6.36%) Solutions Architect
8 6 (5.45%) SC Cleared Network Engineer
9 5 (4.55%) Security Architect
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 11 (10.00%) 802.1X
2 9 (8.18%) YANG
3 8 (7.27%) NETCONF
4 6 (5.45%) REST
5 4 (3.64%) OpenID
5 4 (3.64%) SAML
6 2 (1.82%) OpenConfig
6 2 (1.82%) RESTCONF
7 1 (0.91%) gRPC
7 1 (0.91%) Jinja
7 1 (0.91%) JSON
7 1 (0.91%) Middleware
Miscellaneous
1 32 (29.09%) Data Centre
2 13 (11.82%) Hybrid Cloud
3 9 (8.18%) PKI
4 8 (7.27%) Cloud Native
5 6 (5.45%) Data Protection Act
6 5 (4.55%) Operational Technology
6 5 (4.55%) SCADA
7 3 (2.73%) Security Posture
7 3 (2.73%) Self-Motivation
8 2 (1.82%) Analytical Mindset
8 2 (1.82%) IoT
8 2 (1.82%) Management Information System
8 2 (1.82%) Private Cloud
8 2 (1.82%) Product Ownership
9 1 (0.91%) 3D Printing
9 1 (0.91%) CMDB
9 1 (0.91%) Cyber Security Posture
9 1 (0.91%) Life Science
9 1 (0.91%) NB-IoT
9 1 (0.91%) NHS
Operating Systems
1 3 (2.73%) Linux
2 2 (1.82%) Windows
3 1 (0.91%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
Processes & Methodologies
1 31 (28.18%) Network Architecture
2 26 (23.64%) Load Balancing
3 16 (14.55%) Network Management
4 15 (13.64%) Cybersecurity
5 14 (12.73%) Migration
5 14 (12.73%) Network Segmentation
5 14 (12.73%) Roadmaps
5 14 (12.73%) Stakeholder Management
6 12 (10.91%) Impact Assessments
6 12 (10.91%) Network Virtualisation
7 11 (10.00%) ITIL
7 11 (10.00%) Stakeholder Engagement
7 11 (10.00%) Zero Trust
8 10 (9.09%) Data Protection
8 10 (9.09%) Enterprise Architecture
8 10 (9.09%) Strategic Thinking
8 10 (9.09%) TOGAF
9 9 (8.18%) High Availability
10 8 (7.27%) DevOps
10 8 (7.27%) Problem-Solving
Programming Languages
1 18 (16.36%) Python
2 3 (2.73%) Perl
3 2 (1.82%) Bash
3 2 (1.82%) PowerShell
3 2 (1.82%) SQL
4 1 (0.91%) Ruby
Qualifications
1 49 (44.55%) Security Cleared
2 37 (33.64%) Cisco Certification
3 29 (26.36%) SC Cleared
4 26 (23.64%) CCNP
5 22 (20.00%) CCIE
6 16 (14.55%) DV Cleared
7 11 (10.00%) CCNA
7 11 (10.00%) Degree
8 10 (9.09%) CISSP
8 10 (9.09%) JNCIE
9 8 (7.27%) JNCIS
10 4 (3.64%) (ISC)2 CCSP
10 4 (3.64%) AWS Certification
10 4 (3.64%) CCSP
10 4 (3.64%) Computer Science Degree
11 3 (2.73%) Azure Certification
11 3 (2.73%) CCIE Security
12 2 (1.82%) BPSS Clearance
12 2 (1.82%) ITIL Certification
12 2 (1.82%) JNCIP
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 8 (7.27%) GDPR
2 5 (4.55%) ISO/IEC 27001
2 5 (4.55%) PCI DSS
3 4 (3.64%) NIST
4 1 (0.91%) Disclosure Scotland
4 1 (0.91%) GRC
4 1 (0.91%) ISO/IEC 27002 (supersedes ISO/IEC 17799)
4 1 (0.91%) QA
System Software
1 5 (4.55%) VMware Infrastructure
1 5 (4.55%) VMware NSX
2 2 (1.82%) Active Directory
3 1 (0.91%) Firmware
3 1 (0.91%) KVM
3 1 (0.91%) RHEV
3 1 (0.91%) Virtual Machines
3 1 (0.91%) Xen
Systems Management
1 14 (12.73%) Ansible
2 11 (10.00%) FortiGate
3 6 (5.45%) Terraform
4 5 (4.55%) Nagios
5 1 (0.91%) Failover Clustering
5 1 (0.91%) Host Intrusion Detection System
5 1 (0.91%) Proxmox
Vendors
1 56 (50.91%) Cisco
2 33 (30.00%) Palo Alto
3 28 (25.45%) Juniper
4 19 (17.27%) Meraki
5 15 (13.64%) Microsoft
6 13 (11.82%) F5
7 10 (9.09%) Fortinet
8 8 (7.27%) SolarWinds
9 7 (6.36%) VMware
10 6 (5.45%) CheckPoint
11 3 (2.73%) Arista
11 3 (2.73%) Nokia
12 2 (1.82%) Aruba
12 2 (1.82%) Ericsson
12 2 (1.82%) Forcepoint
12 2 (1.82%) McAfee
13 1 (0.91%) Actix
13 1 (0.91%) Mapinfo
13 1 (0.91%) Remedy
13 1 (0.91%) Veeam