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 17 August 2026, comparing them to the same period in the previous two years.

6 months to
17 Aug 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 252 234 114
Rank change year-on-year -18 -120 +91
Contract jobs citing PKI 226 133 345
As % of all contract jobs in the UK excluding London 0.82% 0.86% 1.90%
As % of the Miscellaneous category 2.70% 2.53% 6.59%
Number of daily rates quoted 164 110 253
10th Percentile £417 £350 £363
25th Percentile £463 £463 £425
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £550 £550 £550
75th Percentile £626 £600 £608
90th Percentile £700 £649 £649
UK median daily rate £550 £550 £538
% change year-on-year - +2.33% -2.27%
Number of hourly rates quoted 7 0 1
10th Percentile £91.60 - -
25th Percentile £97.41 - £36.75
Median hourly rate £98.82 - £38.50
75th Percentile £99.41 - £40.25
90th Percentile £100.00 - -
UK median hourly rate £98.82 - £23.80
% change year-on-year - - -68.05%

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 8,381 5,259 5,238
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the UK excluding London 30.45% 34.13% 28.84%
Number of daily rates quoted 5,005 3,121 3,145
10th Percentile £297 £230 £213
25th Percentile £406 £363 £400
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £475 £500
Median % change year-on-year +5.26% -5.00% -
75th Percentile £600 £575 £612
90th Percentile £688 £660 £700
UK median daily rate £525 £525 £550
% change year-on-year - -4.55% -
Number of hourly rates quoted 800 414 486
10th Percentile £14.24 £14.78 £12.15
25th Percentile £18.50 £18.22 £18.00
Median hourly rate £43.96 £30.00 £45.00
Median % change year-on-year +46.53% -33.33% +10.86%
75th Percentile £70.00 £62.25 £70.00
90th Percentile £85.00 £80.00 £75.00
UK median hourly rate £43.50 £29.50 £45.00
% change year-on-year +47.46% -34.44% +10.86%

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 17 August 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 17 August 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 17 August 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 -2 99 £590 +2.61% 26
North of England -32 52 £500 +0.81% 22
Scotland +14 30 £481 -10.01% 4
North West -23 29 £484 -1.68% 11
South West -65 26 £697 +21.13% 12
Yorkshire -12 23 £500 -16.67% 8
East of England -17 7 £500 -4.76% 4
Midlands -65 7 £475 +18.75% 9
West Midlands -71 6 £475 +18.75% 7
Wales - 6 £463 -
East Midlands -16 1 £475 - 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 10 (4.42%) SharePoint
2 8 (3.54%) Confluence
2 8 (3.54%) Microsoft Exchange
3 5 (2.21%) IIS
4 3 (1.33%) Apache
4 3 (1.33%) Exchange Server 2010
4 3 (1.33%) Tomcat
4 3 (1.33%) WebSphere
5 1 (0.44%) ArcGIS
5 1 (0.44%) nginx
Applications
1 4 (1.77%) Microsoft Office
Business Applications
1 12 (5.31%) Remedy ITSM
2 1 (0.44%) Dynamics GP
Cloud Services
1 57 (25.22%) Azure
2 40 (17.70%) Entra ID
3 39 (17.26%) AWS
4 20 (8.85%) GCP
5 17 (7.52%) Power Platform
6 14 (6.19%) Microsoft 365
7 6 (2.65%) Azure Key Vault
8 4 (1.77%) AWS KMS
8 4 (1.77%) Azure DevOps
8 4 (1.77%) OpenShift
9 3 (1.33%) GitHub
10 2 (0.88%) Azure Monitor
10 2 (0.88%) Azure Sentinel
10 2 (0.88%) Google Kubernetes Engine
11 1 (0.44%) Azure Logic Apps
11 1 (0.44%) GitHub Actions
11 1 (0.44%) Kong
11 1 (0.44%) OCI
11 1 (0.44%) Power Automate
11 1 (0.44%) Serverless
Communications & Networking
1 71 (31.42%) DNS
2 60 (26.55%) Firewall
3 50 (22.12%) DHCP
4 25 (11.06%) LAN
4 25 (11.06%) TCP/IP
5 24 (10.62%) WAN
6 23 (10.18%) BGP
6 23 (10.18%) VPN
7 20 (8.85%) OSPF
8 18 (7.96%) SSL
8 18 (7.96%) VSAN
9 16 (7.08%) IPsec
10 13 (5.75%) Cisco ASA
10 13 (5.75%) Cisco Firepower
10 13 (5.75%) Cisco ISE
10 13 (5.75%) Network Security
11 12 (5.31%) BIG-IP
11 12 (5.31%) Ethernet VPN
11 12 (5.31%) Junos
11 12 (5.31%) VXLAN
Database & Business Intelligence
1 24 (10.62%) SQL Server
2 12 (5.31%) Power BI
3 1 (0.44%) NoSQL
3 1 (0.44%) Relational Database
Development Applications
1 10 (4.42%) JIRA
2 5 (2.21%) Git
3 4 (1.77%) Jenkins
4 3 (1.33%) Robot Framework
4 3 (1.33%) Sonatype Nexus
5 2 (0.88%) Burp Suite
5 2 (0.88%) Cucumber
5 2 (0.88%) Gatling
5 2 (0.88%) GitLab
5 2 (0.88%) Gradle
5 2 (0.88%) LoadRunner
5 2 (0.88%) MSI
5 2 (0.88%) REST Assured
5 2 (0.88%) SonarQube
General
1 37 (16.37%) Social Skills
2 24 (10.62%) Finance
3 18 (7.96%) Public Sector
4 15 (6.64%) Analytical Skills
5 9 (3.98%) Banking
5 9 (3.98%) Documentation Skills
6 5 (2.21%) Police
7 3 (1.33%) Military
7 3 (1.33%) Retail
8 2 (0.88%) Corporate Banking
8 2 (0.88%) Inclusion and Diversity
8 2 (0.88%) Investment Banking
8 2 (0.88%) Legal
8 2 (0.88%) Retail Banking
9 1 (0.44%) Aerospace
9 1 (0.44%) Influencing Skills
9 1 (0.44%) Law
9 1 (0.44%) Publishing
Job Titles
1 59 (26.11%) Senior
2 39 (17.26%) Infrastructure Engineer
3 23 (10.18%) Architect
4 22 (9.73%) Network Engineer
5 19 (8.41%) Senior Infrastructure Engineer
6 17 (7.52%) Support Engineer
7 16 (7.08%) Senior Network Engineer
8 15 (6.64%) Platform Engineer
9 13 (5.75%) 3rd Line Engineer
9 13 (5.75%) Storage Engineer
10 9 (3.98%) Firewall Specialist
10 9 (3.98%) Network Specialist
11 8 (3.54%) Lead
11 8 (3.54%) Senior Architect
12 7 (3.10%) Principal Engineer
12 7 (3.10%) VMware Engineer
13 6 (2.65%) Cloud Engineer
13 6 (2.65%) Consultant
13 6 (2.65%) Solutions Architect
14 5 (2.21%) Integration Engineer
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 22 (9.73%) 802.1X
2 18 (7.96%) LDAP
3 17 (7.52%) OpenID
4 15 (6.64%) SAML
5 14 (6.19%) OAuth
6 13 (5.75%) REST
7 8 (3.54%) .NET
7 8 (3.54%) .NET Framework
7 8 (3.54%) XML
8 6 (2.65%) OAuth2
9 5 (2.21%) RabbitMQ
10 4 (1.77%) JSON
11 2 (0.88%) Microsoft Graph
11 2 (0.88%) ModSecurity
11 2 (0.88%) Node.js
11 2 (0.88%) Playwright
11 2 (0.88%) React
11 2 (0.88%) Spring
11 2 (0.88%) Spring Boot
11 2 (0.88%) Web Services
Miscellaneous
1 33 (14.60%) Data Centre
2 29 (12.83%) Clustering
3 12 (5.31%) Public Cloud
4 8 (3.54%) Cloud Native
4 8 (3.54%) Hybrid Cloud
4 8 (3.54%) Self-Motivation
5 7 (3.10%) Linux Command Line
6 6 (2.65%) Distributed Systems
6 6 (2.65%) Legacy Systems
6 6 (2.65%) Management Information System
6 6 (2.65%) Onboarding
7 5 (2.21%) Data Protection Act
8 4 (1.77%) Enterprise Software
8 4 (1.77%) Fat Client
8 4 (1.77%) Fibre Optics
8 4 (1.77%) Product Ownership
8 4 (1.77%) Security Posture
8 4 (1.77%) Tandem
8 4 (1.77%) Thin Client
9 3 (1.33%) Private Cloud
Operating Systems
1 121 (53.54%) Windows
2 65 (28.76%) Linux
2 65 (28.76%) Windows Server
3 8 (3.54%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
3 8 (3.54%) Windows Server 2016
4 7 (3.10%) Unix
5 6 (2.65%) Debian
5 6 (2.65%) Windows Server 2012
6 5 (2.21%) Windows Server 2019
7 3 (1.33%) CentOS
8 2 (0.88%) Android
8 2 (0.88%) Apple iOS
8 2 (0.88%) Mac OS
8 2 (0.88%) Windows 10
9 1 (0.44%) Data ONTAP
9 1 (0.44%) Ubuntu
9 1 (0.44%) VMS
Processes & Methodologies
1 84 (37.17%) Identity Access Management
2 47 (20.80%) Infrastructure Engineering
3 45 (19.91%) ITIL
4 40 (17.70%) Problem-Solving
5 36 (15.93%) Technical Leadership
6 35 (15.49%) Agile
7 34 (15.04%) High Availability
8 33 (14.60%) Cybersecurity
9 31 (13.72%) DevSecOps
9 31 (13.72%) Infrastructure as Code
10 30 (13.27%) CI/CD
11 29 (12.83%) Continuous Improvement
11 29 (12.83%) ITSM
11 29 (12.83%) Zero Trust
12 28 (12.39%) Service Management
13 26 (11.50%) Platform Engineering
14 25 (11.06%) Key Management
14 25 (11.06%) Mentoring
15 23 (10.18%) SIEM
16 22 (9.73%) Identity Management
Programming Languages
1 70 (30.97%) PowerShell
2 44 (19.47%) Python
3 21 (9.29%) Bash
4 12 (5.31%) JavaScript
4 12 (5.31%) SQL
5 11 (4.87%) C#
6 6 (2.65%) Java
7 2 (0.88%) Shell Script
8 1 (0.44%) Ruby
Qualifications
1 131 (57.96%) Security Cleared
2 87 (38.50%) DV Cleared
3 53 (23.45%) SC Cleared
4 26 (11.50%) Cisco Certification
5 16 (7.08%) Degree
6 14 (6.19%) Microsoft Certification
7 12 (5.31%) CCNP
7 12 (5.31%) CISSP
7 12 (5.31%) VCAP
8 11 (4.87%) MCSE
9 7 (3.10%) AWS Certification
9 7 (3.10%) Azure Certification
10 6 (2.65%) CISM
11 5 (2.21%) Computer Science Degree
11 5 (2.21%) GIAC
11 5 (2.21%) ISTQB
11 5 (2.21%) ISTQB Foundation Certification
11 5 (2.21%) Master's Degree
12 4 (1.77%) MCSA
13 3 (1.33%) JNCIA
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 21 (9.29%) NIST
2 14 (6.19%) NCSC
3 11 (4.87%) SLA
4 10 (4.42%) ISO/IEC 27001
5 6 (2.65%) Cyber Essentials
6 5 (2.21%) JSP 440
7 2 (0.88%) GDPR
7 2 (0.88%) ISA99
7 2 (0.88%) ISO/IEC 27002 (supersedes ISO/IEC 17799)
7 2 (0.88%) PCI DSS
8 1 (0.44%) QA
System Software
1 108 (47.79%) Active Directory
2 57 (25.22%) VMware Infrastructure
3 34 (15.04%) VMware NSX
4 25 (11.06%) Hyper-V
5 20 (8.85%) Docker
6 15 (6.64%) vSphere
7 3 (1.33%) Firmware
7 3 (1.33%) OpenAM
8 2 (0.88%) Virtual Desktop
8 2 (0.88%) Virtual Machines
8 2 (0.88%) VMware ESXi
8 2 (0.88%) XenApp
8 2 (0.88%) XenDesktop
9 1 (0.44%) Active Directory Lightweight Directory Services
9 1 (0.44%) KVM
Systems Management
1 40 (17.70%) Ansible
1 40 (17.70%) Terraform
2 37 (16.37%) Kubernetes
3 17 (7.52%) Single Sign-On
4 16 (7.08%) vCenter Server
5 14 (6.19%) VxRail
6 13 (5.75%) Avamar
6 13 (5.75%) SCOM
7 12 (5.31%) FortiGate
8 9 (3.98%) Microsoft Intune
9 7 (3.10%) Istio
9 7 (3.10%) SCCM
10 5 (2.21%) Failover Clustering
10 5 (2.21%) WSUS
11 4 (1.77%) Active Directory Federation Services
11 4 (1.77%) Cisco CUCM
11 4 (1.77%) WMI
12 2 (0.88%) Kibana
13 1 (0.44%) Forefront Identity Manager
13 1 (0.44%) Progress Chef
Vendors
1 88 (38.94%) Microsoft
2 72 (31.86%) VMware
3 43 (19.03%) Cisco
4 25 (11.06%) Thales
5 22 (9.73%) Okta
6 21 (9.29%) ServiceNow
7 19 (8.41%) SolarWinds
8 17 (7.52%) Juniper
9 16 (7.08%) BeyondTrust
9 16 (7.08%) F5
10 13 (5.75%) Dell
10 13 (5.75%) Splunk
11 12 (5.31%) BMC
11 12 (5.31%) Extreme Networks
11 12 (5.31%) Remedy
12 11 (4.87%) Palo Alto
13 9 (3.98%) Citrix
14 8 (3.54%) IBM
15 7 (3.10%) CheckPoint
16 6 (2.65%) Google