PKI Contract Job Trends in the UK excluding London

Public-Key Infrastructure (PKI)
UK > UK excluding London

The table below looks at the prevalence of the term PKI in contract job vacancies in the UK excluding London. Included is a benchmarking guide to the contractor rates offered in vacancies that cited PKI over the 6 months leading up to 14 March 2026, comparing them to the same period in the previous two years.

6 months to
14 Mar 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 255 209 125
Rank change year-on-year -46 -84 +117
Contract jobs citing PKI 176 144 372
As % of all contract jobs in the UK excluding London 0.81% 1.13% 1.76%
As % of the Miscellaneous category 2.63% 3.38% 5.90%
Number of daily rates quoted 115 88 237
10th Percentile £358 £413 £363
25th Percentile £485 £513 £463
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £550 £570 £550
Median % change year-on-year -3.51% +3.64% -2.87%
75th Percentile £663 £632 £638
90th Percentile £725 £725 £675
UK median daily rate £564 £550 £550
% change year-on-year +2.50% - -8.33%
Number of hourly rates quoted 8 0 2
10th Percentile £61.41 - £56.61
25th Percentile £70.50 - £56.93
Median hourly rate £79.50 - £59.70
75th Percentile £96.25 - £64.73
90th Percentile £101.65 - £66.39
UK median hourly rate £79.50 - £59.70
% change year-on-year - - +8.55%

All Generic Skills
UK excluding London

PKI falls under the General and Transferable Skills category. For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all contract job vacancies requiring generic IT skills in the UK excluding London.

Contract vacancies with a requirement for generic IT skills 6,684 4,257 6,307
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the UK excluding London 30.88% 33.29% 29.88%
Number of daily rates quoted 4,146 2,592 3,769
10th Percentile £204 £200 £205
25th Percentile £363 £363 £363
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £475 £496 £500
Median % change year-on-year -4.26% -0.77% -
75th Percentile £575 £599 £593
90th Percentile £675 £675 £675
UK median daily rate £501 £525 £525
% change year-on-year -4.67% - -4.55%
Number of hourly rates quoted 532 266 669
10th Percentile £14.59 £16.95 £12.25
25th Percentile £18.24 £21.31 £14.71
Median hourly rate £39.72 £31.76 £26.00
Median % change year-on-year +25.06% +22.15% +18.18%
75th Percentile £68.75 £66.00 £57.50
90th Percentile £84.00 £84.50 £66.48
UK median hourly rate £35.75 £32.50 £28.00
% change year-on-year +10.00% +16.07% +24.53%

PKI
Job Vacancy Trend in the UK excluding London

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

PKI job vacancy trend in the UK excluding London

PKI
Daily Rate Trend in the UK excluding London

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

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

PKI
Daily Rate Histogram in the UK excluding London

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing PKI in the UK excluding London over the 6 months to 14 March 2026.

Daily rate histogram for PKI in the UK excluding London

PKI
Hourly Rate Trend in the UK excluding London

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

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

PKI
Hourly Rate Histogram in the UK excluding London

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing PKI in the UK excluding London over the 6 months to 14 March 2026.

Hourly rate histogram for PKI in the UK excluding London

PKI
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 PKI within the UK excluding London region over the 6 months to 14 March 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 +22 100 £600 -0.83% 21
South West -47 27 £563 - 2
Midlands -44 25 £400 -5.88% 8
West Midlands -51 25 £400 -5.88% 4
North of England -67 18 £482 -32.35% 3
Yorkshire -52 10 £482 -33.52%
North West -31 8 £444 -11.25% 3
Scotland -21 5 £613 +14.59% 1
East of England - 3 £550 - 3
Wales -9 1 £550 +20.22% 2
PKI
UK

PKI
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 18 (10.23%) Microsoft Exchange
2 6 (3.41%) SharePoint
3 3 (1.70%) Confluence
3 3 (1.70%) Exchange Server 2010
4 2 (1.14%) IIS
4 2 (1.14%) SharePoint Server
4 2 (1.14%) Skype for Business
5 1 (0.57%) Apache
5 1 (0.57%) ArcGIS
5 1 (0.57%) Tomcat
5 1 (0.57%) WebSphere
Applications
1 7 (3.98%) Microsoft Office
Business Applications
1 4 (2.27%) Remedy ITSM
2 1 (0.57%) Cloudability
Cloud Services
1 28 (15.91%) Azure
2 25 (14.20%) AWS
3 15 (8.52%) Entra ID
4 9 (5.11%) OpenShift
5 8 (4.55%) Microsoft 365
5 8 (4.55%) Power Platform
6 4 (2.27%) AWS CloudFormation
6 4 (2.27%) GCP
6 4 (2.27%) SaaS
7 3 (1.70%) Azure DevOps
7 3 (1.70%) Azure Key Vault
7 3 (1.70%) GitHub
7 3 (1.70%) Power Automate
8 2 (1.14%) AWS KMS
8 2 (1.14%) Google Workspace
8 2 (1.14%) OneDrive
9 1 (0.57%) Anthos
9 1 (0.57%) Azure Sentinel
9 1 (0.57%) OCI
Communications & Networking
1 47 (26.70%) DNS
1 47 (26.70%) Firewall
2 38 (21.59%) BGP
3 33 (18.75%) DHCP
4 32 (18.18%) WAN
5 23 (13.07%) Junos
6 22 (12.50%) VPN
7 21 (11.93%) OSPF
8 20 (11.36%) LAN
9 19 (10.80%) BIG-IP
9 19 (10.80%) Ethernet VPN
9 19 (10.80%) VXLAN
10 18 (10.23%) Cisco ISE
11 17 (9.66%) MPLS
12 12 (6.82%) SSL
13 11 (6.25%) IPsec
14 10 (5.68%) Cisco IOS
15 9 (5.11%) TCP/IP
16 7 (3.98%) Network Security
16 7 (3.98%) Skype
Database & Business Intelligence
1 8 (4.55%) SQL Server
2 4 (2.27%) Power BI
Development Applications
1 8 (4.55%) JIRA
2 6 (3.41%) Robot Framework
3 4 (2.27%) Sonatype Nexus
4 2 (1.14%) GitLab
5 1 (0.57%) Git
5 1 (0.57%) Jenkins
General
1 29 (16.48%) Social Skills
2 22 (12.50%) Public Sector
3 13 (7.39%) Analytical Skills
4 7 (3.98%) Military
5 6 (3.41%) Finance
6 3 (1.70%) Banking
6 3 (1.70%) Presentation Skills
7 2 (1.14%) Financial Institution
7 2 (1.14%) Legal
8 1 (0.57%) Aerospace
8 1 (0.57%) Back Office
8 1 (0.57%) Documentation Skills
8 1 (0.57%) Influencing Skills
8 1 (0.57%) Retail Banking
Job Titles
1 48 (27.27%) Architect
2 33 (18.75%) Senior
3 26 (14.77%) Infrastructure Engineer
4 15 (8.52%) Network Engineer
5 13 (7.39%) Senior Infrastructure Engineer
5 13 (7.39%) Support Engineer
6 12 (6.82%) 3rd Line Engineer
7 10 (5.68%) Firewall Specialist
7 10 (5.68%) Network Specialist
8 9 (5.11%) 3rd Line Support
8 9 (5.11%) Security Engineer
8 9 (5.11%) Senior Network Engineer
9 8 (4.55%) 3rd Line Support Engineer
9 8 (4.55%) Cloud Engineer
9 8 (4.55%) Senior Architect
9 8 (4.55%) Wintel Engineer
10 7 (3.98%) 2nd Line Engineer
11 6 (3.41%) WAN Engineer
12 5 (2.84%) DV Cleared Network Engineer
12 5 (2.84%) Infrastructure Support
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 19 (10.80%) 802.1X
2 7 (3.98%) LDAP
3 6 (3.41%) REST
4 5 (2.84%) OpenID
5 4 (2.27%) OAuth
5 4 (2.27%) SAML
6 3 (1.70%) OAuth2
6 3 (1.70%) SailPoint
7 2 (1.14%) JSON
8 1 (0.57%) OpenTelemetry
8 1 (0.57%) Web Services
8 1 (0.57%) YAML
Miscellaneous
1 20 (11.36%) Clustering
1 20 (11.36%) Data Centre
2 9 (5.11%) Fat Client
2 9 (5.11%) Thin Client
3 6 (3.41%) Algorithms
3 6 (3.41%) Public Cloud
4 5 (2.84%) Smartcard
5 4 (2.27%) Hybrid Cloud
5 4 (2.27%) Onboarding
5 4 (2.27%) Security Operations Centre
6 3 (1.70%) Operational Technology
6 3 (1.70%) Security Posture
7 2 (1.14%) Data Protection Act
7 2 (1.14%) Management Information System
7 2 (1.14%) SWIFT Messaging Network
8 1 (0.57%) CMDB
8 1 (0.57%) Distributed Architecture
8 1 (0.57%) Enterprise Software
8 1 (0.57%) Replication
8 1 (0.57%) Tandem
Operating Systems
1 71 (40.34%) Windows
2 32 (18.18%) Linux
2 32 (18.18%) Windows Server
3 9 (5.11%) Windows 7
4 8 (4.55%) Windows Server 2012
5 6 (3.41%) Ubuntu
6 5 (2.84%) CentOS
6 5 (2.84%) Windows 10
7 4 (2.27%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
8 3 (1.70%) Windows Server 2016
9 2 (1.14%) VMS
9 2 (1.14%) Windows Server 2019
10 1 (0.57%) Solaris
10 1 (0.57%) Unix
Processes & Methodologies
1 50 (28.41%) Agile
2 40 (22.73%) Identity Access Management
3 30 (17.05%) Infrastructure Engineering
3 30 (17.05%) Problem-Solving
4 25 (14.20%) ITIL
4 25 (14.20%) Load Balancing
5 23 (13.07%) Key Management
6 22 (12.50%) CI/CD
6 22 (12.50%) High Availability
6 22 (12.50%) Observability
7 21 (11.93%) Service Management
8 18 (10.23%) DevOps
8 18 (10.23%) ITSM
9 17 (9.66%) Change Management
9 17 (9.66%) Cybersecurity
9 17 (9.66%) Platform Engineering
10 15 (8.52%) Continuous Improvement
10 15 (8.52%) Infrastructure as Code
10 15 (8.52%) Prototyping
11 13 (7.39%) Knowledge Transfer
Programming Languages
1 36 (20.45%) PowerShell
2 35 (19.89%) Python
3 14 (7.95%) SQL
4 11 (6.25%) Bash
5 4 (2.27%) C#
5 4 (2.27%) JavaScript
5 4 (2.27%) PHP
6 1 (0.57%) Go
6 1 (0.57%) Java
6 1 (0.57%) Perl
6 1 (0.57%) Shell Script
Qualifications
1 129 (73.30%) Security Cleared
2 82 (46.59%) DV Cleared
3 44 (25.00%) SC Cleared
4 19 (10.80%) Cisco Certification
5 15 (8.52%) Degree
6 14 (7.95%) CISM
6 14 (7.95%) CISSP
7 10 (5.68%) Microsoft Certification
8 8 (4.55%) GIAC
8 8 (4.55%) MCSE
9 7 (3.98%) JNCIA
9 7 (3.98%) JNCIP
9 7 (3.98%) JNCIS
10 5 (2.84%) VMware Certified Professional (VCP)
11 4 (2.27%) APMG
11 4 (2.27%) AWS Certification
11 4 (2.27%) CompTIA Security+
11 4 (2.27%) Master's Degree
11 4 (2.27%) SSCP
12 3 (1.70%) Computer Science Degree
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 14 (7.95%) NIST
2 12 (6.82%) ISO/IEC 27001
3 7 (3.98%) Cyber Essentials
4 6 (3.41%) PCI DSS
5 5 (2.84%) Cyber Essentials PLUS
5 5 (2.84%) NCSC
6 4 (2.27%) GDPR
6 4 (2.27%) SLA
7 1 (0.57%) HMG Security Policy Framework
7 1 (0.57%) NIST 800
7 1 (0.57%) SOC 2
System Software
1 55 (31.25%) Active Directory
2 31 (17.61%) VMware Infrastructure
3 9 (5.11%) VMware NSX
4 7 (3.98%) Docker
4 7 (3.98%) Firmware
4 7 (3.98%) VMware ESXi
5 6 (3.41%) Hyper-V
6 4 (2.27%) Virtual Machines
7 3 (1.70%) Sendmail
8 2 (1.14%) KVM
8 2 (1.14%) Microsoft Virtual Server
8 2 (1.14%) Virtual Servers
8 2 (1.14%) vSphere
9 1 (0.57%) NFS
Systems Management
1 25 (14.20%) Ansible
1 25 (14.20%) Terraform
2 19 (10.80%) FortiGate
3 16 (9.09%) Kubernetes
4 15 (8.52%) vCenter Server
5 13 (7.39%) Single Sign-On
6 9 (5.11%) WMI
7 7 (3.98%) Microsoft Intune
7 7 (3.98%) WSUS
8 6 (3.41%) SCCM
9 5 (2.84%) Active Directory Federation Services
9 5 (2.84%) SCOM
10 4 (2.27%) Prometheus
10 4 (2.27%) QRadar
11 3 (1.70%) Grafana
11 3 (1.70%) Podman
11 3 (1.70%) Proxmox
12 1 (0.57%) Argo
12 1 (0.57%) CASB
12 1 (0.57%) Istio
Vendors
1 57 (32.39%) Microsoft
2 52 (29.55%) VMware
3 42 (23.86%) Cisco
4 35 (19.89%) Juniper
5 28 (15.91%) SolarWinds
6 25 (14.20%) Splunk
7 21 (11.93%) F5
8 18 (10.23%) Extreme Networks
9 10 (5.68%) Thales
10 8 (4.55%) ServiceNow
11 7 (3.98%) Google
12 6 (3.41%) Veeam
13 5 (2.84%) Broadcom
14 4 (2.27%) BMC
14 4 (2.27%) Palo Alto
14 4 (2.27%) Red Hat
14 4 (2.27%) Remedy
15 3 (1.70%) Citrix
15 3 (1.70%) IBM
15 3 (1.70%) Zscaler