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 1 December 2025, comparing them to the same period in the previous two years.

6 months to
1 Dec 2025
Same period 2024 Same period 2023
Rank 246 178 171
Rank change year-on-year -68 -7 +90
Contract jobs citing PKI 158 198 301
As % of all contract jobs in the UK excluding London 0.90% 1.23% 1.48%
As % of the Miscellaneous category 2.65% 4.06% 4.72%
Number of daily rates quoted 115 108 169
10th Percentile £305 £413 £399
25th Percentile £400 £475 £500
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £540 £550 £575
Median % change year-on-year -1.82% -4.35% -
75th Percentile £603 £614 £650
90th Percentile £691 £725 £700
UK median daily rate £550 £550 £575
% change year-on-year - -4.35% -8.00%
Number of hourly rates quoted 5 0 5
10th Percentile £74.80 - £46.38
25th Percentile £82.00 - -
Median hourly rate £90.00 - £55.00
75th Percentile £100.00 - £56.40
90th Percentile £103.30 - £63.06
UK median hourly rate £90.00 £23.80 £55.00
% change year-on-year +278.15% -56.73% -10.57%

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 5,960 4,878 6,380
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the UK excluding London 33.83% 30.38% 31.43%
Number of daily rates quoted 3,675 2,655 4,095
10th Percentile £204 £208 £213
25th Percentile £358 £363 £373
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £475 £500 £500
Median % change year-on-year -5.00% - -
75th Percentile £575 £600 £600
90th Percentile £675 £690 £688
UK median daily rate £501 £538 £550
% change year-on-year -6.79% -2.27% -
Number of hourly rates quoted 477 287 380
10th Percentile £12.97 £15.69 £16.50
25th Percentile £16.95 £22.50 £20.84
Median hourly rate £26.50 £32.50 £45.88
Median % change year-on-year -18.46% -29.16% +55.53%
75th Percentile £60.25 £68.75 £65.00
90th Percentile £75.00 £75.00 £78.04
UK median hourly rate £26.50 £35.00 £43.42
% change year-on-year -24.29% -19.38% +24.04%

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 1 December 2025.

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 1 December 2025.

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 1 December 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
South East -1 54 £600 +4.35% 38
South West -29 44 £550 +0.36% 5
Midlands -7 36 £400 -27.27% 2
West Midlands +2 35 £400 -27.27% 2
North of England -44 12 £444 -38.79% 9
North West -12 11 £388 -20.51%
Scotland -26 8 £538 +4.88% 1
East of England -12 3 £550 - 5
Wales -4 1 £550 - 1
Yorkshire -42 1 £600 -18.64% 8
East Midlands - 1 - -
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 28 (17.72%) Microsoft Exchange
2 11 (6.96%) SharePoint
3 8 (5.06%) Apache
4 6 (3.80%) Skype for Business
5 4 (2.53%) Confluence
5 4 (2.53%) JBoss
5 4 (2.53%) SharePoint Server
6 3 (1.90%) Exchange Server 2010
7 2 (1.27%) IIS
Applications
1 9 (5.70%) Microsoft Office
Business Applications
1 2 (1.27%) Dynamics GP
Cloud Services
1 27 (17.09%) Azure
2 22 (13.92%) AWS
3 12 (7.59%) Microsoft 365
4 6 (3.80%) Power Platform
5 5 (3.16%) AWS CloudFormation
5 5 (3.16%) Azure Sentinel
5 5 (3.16%) Entra ID
5 5 (3.16%) GitHub
6 4 (2.53%) Azure DevOps
7 3 (1.90%) Power Automate
7 3 (1.90%) SaaS
8 2 (1.27%) AWS KMS
8 2 (1.27%) Datadog
8 2 (1.27%) GCP
8 2 (1.27%) GitHub Actions
8 2 (1.27%) Google Workspace
9 1 (0.63%) Amazon CloudWatch
9 1 (0.63%) OneDrive
9 1 (0.63%) OpenShift
9 1 (0.63%) Virtual Private Cloud
Communications & Networking
1 42 (26.58%) Firewall
2 31 (19.62%) DNS
3 26 (16.46%) VPN
4 25 (15.82%) BGP
4 25 (15.82%) IPsec
4 25 (15.82%) WAN
5 24 (15.19%) MPLS
6 16 (10.13%) DHCP
6 16 (10.13%) Skype
7 10 (6.33%) Network Security
7 10 (6.33%) SSL
8 9 (5.70%) Junos
9 7 (4.43%) TCP/IP
10 6 (3.80%) VSAN
11 5 (3.16%) Unified Communications
12 3 (1.90%) 4G
12 3 (1.90%) 5G
12 3 (1.90%) Cisco IOS
12 3 (1.90%) Internet
12 3 (1.90%) NX-OS
Database & Business Intelligence
1 14 (8.86%) SQL Server
2 3 (1.90%) Relational Database
3 1 (0.63%) Amazon RDS
Development Applications
1 7 (4.43%) JIRA
2 3 (1.90%) GitLab
2 3 (1.90%) Robot Framework
2 3 (1.90%) Sonatype Nexus
3 2 (1.27%) Artifactory
3 2 (1.27%) MSI
3 2 (1.27%) SpecFlow
4 1 (0.63%) CircleCI
4 1 (0.63%) Jenkins
General
1 42 (26.58%) Social Skills
2 25 (15.82%) Public Sector
3 19 (12.03%) Analytical Skills
4 6 (3.80%) Military
5 4 (2.53%) Finance
6 3 (1.90%) Presentation Skills
7 1 (0.63%) Aerospace
7 1 (0.63%) Banking
7 1 (0.63%) Inclusion and Diversity
7 1 (0.63%) Influencing Skills
7 1 (0.63%) Legal
7 1 (0.63%) Manufacturing
7 1 (0.63%) Retail Banking
Job Titles
1 36 (22.78%) Architect
2 24 (15.19%) 3rd Line Engineer
2 24 (15.19%) Support Engineer
3 19 (12.03%) 3rd Line Support
4 18 (11.39%) 3rd Line Support Engineer
5 17 (10.76%) Infrastructure Engineer
6 15 (9.49%) Senior
7 11 (6.96%) WAN Engineer
8 10 (6.33%) 2nd Line Engineer
9 9 (5.70%) Administrator
9 9 (5.70%) Network Engineer
9 9 (5.70%) Platform Manager
9 9 (5.70%) Senior Infrastructure Engineer
9 9 (5.70%) Systems Administrator
9 9 (5.70%) Systems Manager
9 9 (5.70%) Wintel Administrator
9 9 (5.70%) Wintel Systems Administrator
10 8 (5.06%) Wintel Engineer
11 7 (4.43%) Cloud Engineer
11 7 (4.43%) Security Architect
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 4 (2.53%) Kafka
2 3 (1.90%) REST
3 2 (1.27%) .NET
3 2 (1.27%) AngularJS
3 2 (1.27%) Gherkin
3 2 (1.27%) ModSecurity
3 2 (1.27%) Playwright
3 2 (1.27%) YAML
4 1 (0.63%) Elastic Stack
4 1 (0.63%) Middleware
4 1 (0.63%) OpenID
Miscellaneous
1 9 (5.70%) Fat Client
1 9 (5.70%) Thin Client
2 5 (3.16%) Public Cloud
3 4 (2.53%) Data Centre
3 4 (2.53%) Security Operations Centre
3 4 (2.53%) Self-Motivation
4 3 (1.90%) Algorithms
4 3 (1.90%) Cloud Native
4 3 (1.90%) Cyber Defence
4 3 (1.90%) Onboarding
4 3 (1.90%) Private Cloud
4 3 (1.90%) Replication
4 3 (1.90%) Security Posture
5 2 (1.27%) Cyber Threat
5 2 (1.27%) Legacy Systems
6 1 (0.63%) Analytical Mindset
6 1 (0.63%) Cyber Security Posture
6 1 (0.63%) Linux Command Line
6 1 (0.63%) Product Ownership
6 1 (0.63%) Tandem
Operating Systems
1 68 (43.04%) Windows
2 39 (24.68%) Linux
3 32 (20.25%) Windows Server
4 13 (8.23%) Windows 10
5 9 (5.70%) Windows 7
6 8 (5.06%) Windows Server 2012
7 6 (3.80%) Windows Server 2019
8 5 (3.16%) CentOS
8 5 (3.16%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
8 5 (3.16%) Windows Server 2016
9 4 (2.53%) Windows Server 2008
10 2 (1.27%) VMS
11 1 (0.63%) Solaris
11 1 (0.63%) SUSE
11 1 (0.63%) Ubuntu
11 1 (0.63%) Unix
Processes & Methodologies
1 39 (24.68%) Agile
2 21 (13.29%) ITIL
2 21 (13.29%) Service Management
3 20 (12.66%) Change Management
3 20 (12.66%) Cryptography
4 18 (11.39%) Infrastructure Engineering
4 18 (11.39%) Load Balancing
4 18 (11.39%) Problem-Solving
5 16 (10.13%) DevOps
5 16 (10.13%) SIEM
6 15 (9.49%) CI/CD
6 15 (9.49%) Platform Engineering
7 14 (8.86%) Cybersecurity
7 14 (8.86%) Incident Response
7 14 (8.86%) Prototyping
8 12 (7.59%) Continuous Improvement
8 12 (7.59%) Network Design
9 11 (6.96%) Migration
9 11 (6.96%) Roadmaps
9 11 (6.96%) Security Operations
Programming Languages
1 37 (23.42%) PowerShell
2 22 (13.92%) Python
3 15 (9.49%) SQL
4 6 (3.80%) Bash
5 2 (1.27%) C#
5 2 (1.27%) JavaScript
5 2 (1.27%) PHP
6 1 (0.63%) Bicep
6 1 (0.63%) C
6 1 (0.63%) Perl
6 1 (0.63%) Shell Script
Qualifications
1 116 (73.42%) Security Cleared
2 64 (40.51%) DV Cleared
3 51 (32.28%) SC Cleared
4 15 (9.49%) Degree
5 14 (8.86%) Microsoft Certification
6 12 (7.59%) MCSE
7 7 (4.43%) Cisco Certification
7 7 (4.43%) ITIL Certification
8 6 (3.80%) CCNP
8 6 (3.80%) VMware Certified Professional (VCP)
9 5 (3.16%) AWS Certification
9 5 (3.16%) CCNA
9 5 (3.16%) Master's Degree
10 4 (2.53%) CISSP
11 3 (1.90%) AWS Certified Solutions Architect
11 3 (1.90%) CISM
12 2 (1.27%) Computer Science Degree
12 2 (1.27%) ISTQB
12 2 (1.27%) MCSA
13 1 (0.63%) OSCP
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 10 (6.33%) NIST
2 9 (5.70%) NCSC
3 5 (3.16%) PCI DSS
4 4 (2.53%) GDPR
4 4 (2.53%) ISO/IEC 27001
5 3 (1.90%) FIPS 140-2
6 2 (1.27%) Disclosure Scotland
6 2 (1.27%) SLA
6 2 (1.27%) SOC 1
7 1 (0.63%) Accessibility
7 1 (0.63%) Cyber Essentials
7 1 (0.63%) Cyber Essentials PLUS
7 1 (0.63%) JSP 440
7 1 (0.63%) NIST 800
7 1 (0.63%) PMO
7 1 (0.63%) RMADS
System Software
1 56 (35.44%) Active Directory
2 35 (22.15%) VMware Infrastructure
3 10 (6.33%) Docker
4 9 (5.70%) Hyper-V
4 9 (5.70%) VMware NSX
5 6 (3.80%) Virtual Machines
5 6 (3.80%) Virtual Servers
6 5 (3.16%) Microsoft Virtual Server
6 5 (3.16%) VMware ESXi
7 3 (1.90%) Firmware
7 3 (1.90%) Sendmail
8 2 (1.27%) vSphere
9 1 (0.63%) NFS
Systems Management
1 18 (11.39%) Ansible
2 15 (9.49%) vCenter Server
3 11 (6.96%) SCCM
3 11 (6.96%) Terraform
3 11 (6.96%) WMI
3 11 (6.96%) WSUS
4 10 (6.33%) Microsoft Intune
5 9 (5.70%) Active Directory Federation Services
6 7 (4.43%) Kubernetes
6 7 (4.43%) Single Sign-On
7 4 (2.53%) Podman
7 4 (2.53%) QRadar
8 3 (1.90%) Check_MK
8 3 (1.90%) OPNET
8 3 (1.90%) Proxmox
8 3 (1.90%) SCOM
9 2 (1.27%) Progress Chef
10 1 (0.63%) Grafana
10 1 (0.63%) Host Intrusion Detection System
10 1 (0.63%) SCOrch
Vendors
1 65 (41.14%) Microsoft
2 48 (30.38%) VMware
3 30 (18.99%) Juniper
4 25 (15.82%) Cisco
5 14 (8.86%) Veeam
6 13 (8.23%) SolarWinds
6 13 (8.23%) Splunk
7 6 (3.80%) Google
8 5 (3.16%) Fortinet
8 5 (3.16%) IBM
8 5 (3.16%) Red Hat
9 4 (2.53%) Oracle
10 3 (1.90%) Broadcom
10 3 (1.90%) ServiceNow
10 3 (1.90%) Thales
10 3 (1.90%) Zscaler
11 2 (1.27%) CheckPoint
11 2 (1.27%) Citrix
11 2 (1.27%) Qualys
11 2 (1.27%) Wyse