Network Engineer Contracts in the UK excluding London

Network Engineer
UK > UK excluding London

The median Network Engineer daily rate in the UK excluding London is £450, according to job vacancies posted in the 6 months leading up to 1 May 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
1 May 2025
Same period 2024 Same period 2023
Rank 89 57 82
Rank change year-on-year -32 +25 +71
Contract jobs requiring a Network Engineer 351 665 706
As % of all contract jobs advertised in the UK excluding London 2.75% 3.20% 2.93%
As % of the Job Titles category 2.98% 3.46% 3.11%
Number of daily rates quoted 238 404 468
10th Percentile £300 £275 £273
25th Percentile £366 £333 £350
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £450 £450 £450
Median % change year-on-year - - +8.76%
75th Percentile £565 £525 £525
90th Percentile £614 £634 £588
UK median daily rate £475 £460 £475
% change year-on-year +3.26% -3.16% +5.56%
Number of hourly rates quoted 2 17 21
10th Percentile £23.53 £17.05 £22.26
25th Percentile £31.06 £24.25 £50.00
Median hourly rate £45.75 £70.00 £62.00
Median % change year-on-year -34.64% +12.90% +47.22%
75th Percentile £62.06 £73.75 £66.00
90th Percentile £70.58 £75.24 £80.25
UK median hourly rate £57.50 £40.00 £63.23
% change year-on-year +43.75% -36.74% +85.97%

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 11,767 19,240 22,667
% of contract IT jobs with a recognized job title 92.17% 92.63% 94.18%
Number of daily rates quoted 7,552 11,748 15,893
10th Percentile £213 £213 £225
25th Percentile £363 £363 £395
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £475 £492 £500
Median % change year-on-year -3.46% -1.60% +5.26%
75th Percentile £575 £598 £595
90th Percentile £650 £688 £688
UK median daily rate £515 £525 £540
% change year-on-year -1.90% -2.78% +2.86%
Number of hourly rates quoted 829 2,243 1,165
10th Percentile £14.00 £12.50 £13.45
25th Percentile £17.61 £15.75 £18.09
Median hourly rate £28.00 £39.55 £42.50
Median % change year-on-year -29.20% -6.94% +117.95%
75th Percentile £64.50 £61.30 £65.00
90th Percentile £75.00 £73.75 £75.00
UK median hourly rate £29.00 £36.42 £45.00
% change year-on-year -20.37% -19.07% +91.49%

Network Engineer
Job Vacancy Trend in the UK excluding London

Job postings that featured Network Engineer in the job title as a proportion of all IT jobs advertised in the UK excluding London.

Job vacancy trend for Network Engineer in the UK excluding London

Network Engineer
Contractor Daily Rate Trend in the UK excluding London

3-month moving average daily rate quoted in jobs citing Network Engineer in the UK excluding London.

Daily rate trend for Network Engineer in the UK excluding London

Network Engineer
Daily Rate Histogram in the UK excluding London

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing Network Engineer in the UK excluding London over the 6 months to 1 May 2025.

Daily rate histogram for Network Engineer in the UK excluding London

Network Engineer
Contractor Hourly Rate Trend in the UK excluding London

3-month moving average hourly rates quoted in jobs citing Network Engineer in the UK excluding London.

Hourly rate trend for Network Engineer in the UK excluding London

Network Engineer
Hourly Rate Histogram in the UK excluding London

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing Network Engineer in the UK excluding London over the 6 months to 1 May 2025.

Hourly rate histogram for Network Engineer in the UK excluding London

Network Engineer
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 Engineer within the UK excluding London region over the 6 months to 1 May 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 +12 131 £483 +11.56% 32
North West +14 104 £483 +10.45% 15
South East -42 84 £500 - 93
South West -15 42 £473 -4.30% 37
Scotland +20 32 £400 - 22
Midlands -38 31 £425 +21.43% 36
Yorkshire +11 24 £500 +143.90% 13
Wales +21 22 £375 - 5
West Midlands -43 17 £275 -21.43% 27
East of England +17 16 £475 +58.33% 12
East Midlands +5 14 £450 +2.86% 8
North East -8 3 £325 -16.13% 5
Channel Islands - 1 £450 -
Network Engineer
UK

Network Engineer Skill Set
Top 30 Co-occurring Skills and Capabilities in the UK excluding London

For the 6 months to 1 May 2025, Network Engineer 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 Network Engineer in the job title.

1 266 (75.78%) Cisco
2 199 (56.70%) Firewall
3 157 (44.73%) Security Cleared
4 129 (36.75%) SC Cleared
5 126 (35.90%) Cisco Certification
6 115 (32.76%) WAN
7 107 (30.48%) BGP
8 99 (28.21%) Palo Alto
9 97 (27.64%) VPN
10 90 (25.64%) OSPF
11 89 (25.36%) CCNP
12 82 (23.36%) LAN
12 82 (23.36%) Wireless
13 78 (22.22%) Network Security
14 69 (19.66%) Cisco ASA
15 66 (18.80%) Social Skills
16 60 (17.09%) Cisco Firepower
16 60 (17.09%) CCNA
17 58 (16.52%) IPsec
18 53 (15.10%) CheckPoint
18 53 (15.10%) Problem-Solving
19 51 (14.53%) Wi-Fi
20 49 (13.96%) Data Centre
21 47 (13.39%) Network Architecture
21 47 (13.39%) EIGRP
21 47 (13.39%) Network Design
21 47 (13.39%) Load Balancing
22 45 (12.82%) MPLS
23 44 (12.54%) Juniper
24 42 (11.97%) Cisco Nexus

Network Engineer 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 4 (1.14%) Oracle SOA Suite
2 2 (0.57%) Confluence
3 1 (0.28%) Apache
3 1 (0.28%) Exchange Server 2010
3 1 (0.28%) IIS
3 1 (0.28%) Microsoft Exchange
3 1 (0.28%) SharePoint
3 1 (0.28%) Skype for Business
Applications
1 8 (2.28%) Microsoft Office
2 7 (1.99%) MS Visio
3 3 (0.85%) Microsoft PowerPoint
Business Applications
1 1 (0.28%) Remedy ITSM
Cloud Services
1 35 (9.97%) Azure
2 28 (7.98%) AWS
3 5 (1.42%) Cloud Computing
3 5 (1.42%) Cloudflare
4 3 (0.85%) Microsoft 365
5 2 (0.57%) Akamai
5 2 (0.57%) Dynamics 365
5 2 (0.57%) Virtual Private Cloud
6 1 (0.28%) Entra ID
6 1 (0.28%) GCP
6 1 (0.28%) GitHub
6 1 (0.28%) Mimecast
6 1 (0.28%) Nutanix
6 1 (0.28%) OneDrive
6 1 (0.28%) OpenShift
Communications & Networking
1 199 (56.70%) Firewall
2 115 (32.76%) WAN
3 107 (30.48%) BGP
4 97 (27.64%) VPN
5 90 (25.64%) OSPF
6 82 (23.36%) LAN
6 82 (23.36%) Wireless
7 78 (22.22%) Network Security
8 69 (19.66%) Cisco ASA
9 60 (17.09%) Cisco Firepower
10 58 (16.52%) IPsec
11 51 (14.53%) Wi-Fi
12 47 (13.39%) EIGRP
13 45 (12.82%) MPLS
14 42 (11.97%) Cisco Nexus
15 40 (11.40%) DNS
16 38 (10.83%) HSRP
17 36 (10.26%) SD-WAN
17 36 (10.26%) TCP/IP
18 34 (9.69%) Cisco ISE
Database & Business Intelligence
1 4 (1.14%) Oracle Database
2 1 (0.28%) MongoDB
2 1 (0.28%) NoSQL
2 1 (0.28%) Oracle Reports
Development Applications
1 4 (1.14%) Sonatype Nexus
2 3 (0.85%) JIRA
3 2 (0.57%) GitLab
General
1 66 (18.80%) Social Skills
2 38 (10.83%) Public Sector
3 22 (6.27%) Analytical Skills
3 22 (6.27%) Telecoms
4 17 (4.84%) Finance
5 8 (2.28%) Manufacturing
6 6 (1.71%) Documentation Skills
6 6 (1.71%) Inclusion and Diversity
7 5 (1.42%) Advertising
7 5 (1.42%) Electronics
8 4 (1.14%) Banking
8 4 (1.14%) Legal
8 4 (1.14%) Marketing
9 2 (0.57%) Automotive
9 2 (0.57%) Back Office
9 2 (0.57%) Law
9 2 (0.57%) Military
10 1 (0.28%) Presentation Skills
10 1 (0.28%) Retail
10 1 (0.28%) Social Housing
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 26 (7.41%) 802.1X
2 5 (1.42%) Spine.js
3 2 (0.57%) JSON
3 2 (0.57%) NETCONF
3 2 (0.57%) REST
3 2 (0.57%) RESTCONF
3 2 (0.57%) XML
3 2 (0.57%) YAML
4 1 (0.28%) HTML
4 1 (0.28%) Java RMI
4 1 (0.28%) Jinja
4 1 (0.28%) SOAP
4 1 (0.28%) YANG
Miscellaneous
1 49 (13.96%) Data Centre
2 9 (2.56%) PKI
3 8 (2.28%) Self-Motivation
3 8 (2.28%) Video Conferencing
4 7 (1.99%) Management Information System
4 7 (1.99%) NHS
5 6 (1.71%) Driving Licence
5 6 (1.71%) Hybrid Cloud
6 5 (1.42%) CMDB
6 5 (1.42%) Public Cloud
7 4 (1.14%) Linux Command Line
8 3 (0.85%) Data Protection Act
8 3 (0.85%) Embedded Systems
8 3 (0.85%) Fibre Optics
8 3 (0.85%) Operational Technology
9 2 (0.57%) Foreign Exchange (FX)
9 2 (0.57%) Mainframe
9 2 (0.57%) Robotics
9 2 (0.57%) Security Posture
9 2 (0.57%) Self-Driving Car
Operating Systems
1 26 (7.41%) Linux
2 18 (5.13%) Unix
3 16 (4.56%) Windows
4 7 (1.99%) Windows Server
5 3 (0.85%) Embedded Linux
6 2 (0.57%) CentOS
6 2 (0.57%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
6 2 (0.57%) Windows 10
6 2 (0.57%) zOS
7 1 (0.28%) Android
7 1 (0.28%) Rocky
7 1 (0.28%) Solaris
7 1 (0.28%) Ubuntu
7 1 (0.28%) Windows Server 2019
Processes & Methodologies
1 53 (15.10%) Problem-Solving
2 47 (13.39%) Load Balancing
2 47 (13.39%) Network Architecture
2 47 (13.39%) Network Design
3 40 (11.40%) Migration
4 36 (10.26%) Network Management
5 29 (8.26%) Network Monitoring
6 24 (6.84%) Agile
6 24 (6.84%) ITIL
7 21 (5.98%) Change Management
8 20 (5.70%) Project Delivery
9 19 (5.41%) Computer Science
10 17 (4.84%) Continuous Improvement
11 16 (4.56%) ITSM
12 14 (3.99%) Impact Assessments
12 14 (3.99%) Validation
13 12 (3.42%) High Availability
13 12 (3.42%) Project Management
14 11 (3.13%) Preventative Maintenance
14 11 (3.13%) Problem Management
Programming Languages
1 29 (8.26%) Python
2 10 (2.85%) Perl
3 6 (1.71%) VB
4 5 (1.42%) Java
4 5 (1.42%) SQL
5 4 (1.14%) Bash
5 4 (1.14%) PL/SQL
6 3 (0.85%) PowerShell
7 2 (0.57%) JCL
7 2 (0.57%) REXX
8 1 (0.28%) Go
Qualifications
1 157 (44.73%) Security Cleared
2 129 (36.75%) SC Cleared
3 126 (35.90%) Cisco Certification
4 89 (25.36%) CCNP
5 60 (17.09%) CCNA
6 34 (9.69%) Degree
7 29 (8.26%) DV Cleared
8 23 (6.55%) CCIE
9 20 (5.70%) Computer Science Degree
10 5 (1.42%) ISEB
10 5 (1.42%) ISTQB
10 5 (1.42%) ISTQB Foundation Certification
10 5 (1.42%) VMware Certified Professional (VCP)
11 3 (0.85%) JNCIP
12 2 (0.57%) BC Cleared
12 2 (0.57%) CCDP
12 2 (0.57%) DBS Check
12 2 (0.57%) HP APS
12 2 (0.57%) JNCIA
12 2 (0.57%) JNCIS
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 14 (3.99%) SLA
2 2 (0.57%) ISO/IEC 27001
2 2 (0.57%) PCI DSS
2 2 (0.57%) QA
3 1 (0.28%) Accessibility
3 1 (0.28%) Cyber Essentials
3 1 (0.28%) Cyber Essentials PLUS
3 1 (0.28%) Disclosure Scotland
3 1 (0.28%) GDPR
3 1 (0.28%) NIST
3 1 (0.28%) SOC 2
System Software
1 15 (4.27%) VMware Infrastructure
2 8 (2.28%) Active Directory
3 7 (1.99%) VMware NSX
4 5 (1.42%) Firmware
5 2 (0.57%) Docker
5 2 (0.57%) Virtual Machines
6 1 (0.28%) Ceph
6 1 (0.28%) Hyper-V
6 1 (0.28%) KVM
Systems Management
1 27 (7.69%) Ansible
2 21 (5.98%) FortiGate
3 12 (3.42%) Terraform
4 9 (2.56%) Cisco Prime
5 5 (1.42%) Cacti
5 5 (1.42%) vCenter Server
6 3 (0.85%) Kubernetes
7 2 (0.57%) Nagios
7 2 (0.57%) Tivoli NetView
7 2 (0.57%) ZABBIX
8 1 (0.28%) Argo
8 1 (0.28%) CASB
8 1 (0.28%) Iperf
8 1 (0.28%) Microsoft Intune
Vendors
1 266 (75.78%) Cisco
2 99 (28.21%) Palo Alto
3 53 (15.10%) CheckPoint
4 44 (12.54%) Juniper
5 37 (10.54%) SolarWinds
6 32 (9.12%) Meraki
7 31 (8.83%) F5
8 26 (7.41%) Aruba
9 23 (6.55%) Fortinet
10 21 (5.98%) Microsoft
11 20 (5.70%) VMware
12 12 (3.42%) Citrix
13 11 (3.13%) Zscaler
14 9 (2.56%) Infoblox
15 8 (2.28%) Extreme Networks
16 7 (1.99%) HP
17 6 (1.71%) Arista
18 5 (1.42%) Oracle
18 5 (1.42%) ServiceNow
19 4 (1.14%) SAP