Security Engineer Contracts in the UK excluding London

Security Engineer
UK > UK excluding London

The median Security Engineer daily rate in the UK excluding London is £500, according to job vacancies posted in the 6 months leading up to 7 June 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
7 Jun 2025
Same period 2024 Same period 2023
Rank 230 243 201
Rank change year-on-year +13 -42 +140
Contract jobs requiring a Security Engineer 122 150 262
As % of all contract jobs advertised in the UK excluding London 0.93% 0.71% 1.15%
As % of the Job Titles category 1.01% 0.77% 1.22%
Number of daily rates quoted 74 116 186
10th Percentile £325 £414 £359
25th Percentile £406 £425 £452
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £525 £525
Median % change year-on-year -4.76% - +1.20%
75th Percentile £591 £628 £613
90th Percentile £651 £732 £700
UK median daily rate £525 £550 £575
% change year-on-year -4.55% -4.35% +4.55%
Number of hourly rates quoted 4 4 18
10th Percentile £59.75 - £67.00
25th Percentile £63.13 £30.70 £83.31
Median hourly rate £74.21 £48.40 £83.40
Median % change year-on-year +53.32% -41.97% +13.07%
75th Percentile £84.43 £70.63 -
90th Percentile £86.27 £76.25 -
UK median hourly rate £74.21 £48.40 £83.40
% change year-on-year +53.32% -41.97% +85.33%

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 12,074 19,457 21,469
% of contract IT jobs with a recognized job title 91.70% 92.44% 94.29%
Number of daily rates quoted 7,614 11,679 14,923
10th Percentile £213 £213 £225
25th Percentile £363 £363 £388
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £475 £488 £500
Median % change year-on-year -2.56% -2.50% +5.26%
75th Percentile £575 £593 £600
90th Percentile £650 £688 £688
UK median daily rate £500 £525 £540
% change year-on-year -4.76% -2.78% +2.86%
Number of hourly rates quoted 890 2,454 1,081
10th Percentile £13.55 £12.51 £13.41
25th Percentile £16.95 £15.85 £18.00
Median hourly rate £25.31 £40.00 £42.50
Median % change year-on-year -36.73% -5.88% +112.50%
75th Percentile £60.00 £62.50 £65.00
90th Percentile £75.00 £74.00 £75.50
UK median hourly rate £28.18 £37.50 £45.00
% change year-on-year -24.85% -16.67% +83.67%

Security Engineer
Job Vacancy Trend in the UK excluding London

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

Job vacancy trend for Security Engineer in the UK excluding London

Security Engineer
Contractor Daily Rate Trend in the UK excluding London

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

Daily rate trend for Security Engineer in the UK excluding London

Security Engineer
Daily Rate Histogram in the UK excluding London

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing Security Engineer in the UK excluding London over the 6 months to 7 June 2025.

Daily rate histogram for Security Engineer in the UK excluding London

Security Engineer
Contractor Hourly Rate Trend in the UK excluding London

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

Hourly rate trend for Security Engineer in the UK excluding London

Security Engineer
Hourly Rate Histogram in the UK excluding London

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing Security Engineer in the UK excluding London over the 6 months to 7 June 2025.

Hourly rate histogram for Security Engineer in the UK excluding London

Security 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 Security Engineer within the UK excluding London region over the 6 months to 7 June 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 +30 41 £525 -0.47% 120
South East +17 32 £450 - 170
North West +21 26 £525 - 79
South West +30 16 £488 -18.75% 62
East of England +31 15 £538 +79.17% 63
West Midlands +18 13 £544 -16.35% 41
Midlands +5 13 £544 -16.35% 59
North East +5 8 £525 +10.53% 17
Yorkshire +10 7 £525 -15.80% 24
Scotland +3 6 £550 -4.35% 32
Wales +5 2 £500 -5.88% 21
Security Engineer
UK

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

For the 6 months to 7 June 2025, Security 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 Security Engineer in the job title.

1 43 (35.25%) Azure
2 40 (32.79%) Cybersecurity
3 35 (28.69%) Microsoft
4 34 (27.87%) Firewall
5 28 (22.95%) Social Skills
6 27 (22.13%) SIEM
7 25 (20.49%) Cloud Security
8 22 (18.03%) PowerShell
8 22 (18.03%) Python
9 21 (17.21%) Problem-Solving
10 20 (16.39%) Information Security
10 20 (16.39%) Network Security
11 19 (15.57%) Windows
11 19 (15.57%) Security Operations
12 18 (14.75%) Cisco
12 18 (14.75%) Security Cleared
13 16 (13.11%) Data Protection
13 16 (13.11%) AWS
13 16 (13.11%) Microsoft 365
13 16 (13.11%) Zero Trust
14 15 (12.30%) Identity Access Management
14 15 (12.30%) Vulnerability Management
14 15 (12.30%) Finance
15 14 (11.48%) Analytical Skills
15 14 (11.48%) SC Cleared
15 14 (11.48%) Cyber Threat
15 14 (11.48%) Data Loss Prevention
16 13 (10.66%) NIST
16 13 (10.66%) ISO/IEC 27001
16 13 (10.66%) Security Management

Security 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 9 (7.38%) SharePoint
2 6 (4.92%) Microsoft Exchange
3 3 (2.46%) Confluence
Applications
1 1 (0.82%) 1Password
1 1 (0.82%) Microsoft Excel
1 1 (0.82%) Microsoft Office
1 1 (0.82%) Microsoft PowerPoint
Business Applications
1 3 (2.46%) Teamcenter
2 1 (0.82%) Remedy ITSM
Cloud Services
1 43 (35.25%) Azure
2 16 (13.11%) AWS
2 16 (13.11%) Microsoft 365
3 12 (9.84%) Azure Sentinel
4 10 (8.20%) Entra ID
5 6 (4.92%) GCP
5 6 (4.92%) Microsoft Purview
6 4 (3.28%) GitHub
6 4 (3.28%) OneDrive
6 4 (3.28%) OpenShift
7 3 (2.46%) Amazon EKS
7 3 (2.46%) Cloud Computing
7 3 (2.46%) GitHub Actions
8 2 (1.64%) Amazon ECS
8 2 (1.64%) Amazon GuardDuty
8 2 (1.64%) Amazon S3
8 2 (1.64%) AWS CloudTrail
8 2 (1.64%) SaaS
9 1 (0.82%) Amazon ElastiCache
9 1 (0.82%) PaaS
Communications & Networking
1 34 (27.87%) Firewall
2 20 (16.39%) Network Security
3 8 (6.56%) Intrusion Detection
3 8 (6.56%) Wireless
4 7 (5.74%) DNS
5 6 (4.92%) Cisco ASA
5 6 (4.92%) VPN
6 4 (3.28%) SSL
7 3 (2.46%) BGP
7 3 (2.46%) Cisco Firepower
7 3 (2.46%) DHCP
7 3 (2.46%) Ethernet
7 3 (2.46%) MPLS
7 3 (2.46%) Multicast
7 3 (2.46%) WAN
8 2 (1.64%) NAS
8 2 (1.64%) OSPF
8 2 (1.64%) SAN
8 2 (1.64%) SD-WAN
8 2 (1.64%) Skype
Database & Business Intelligence
1 1 (0.82%) Amazon RDS
1 1 (0.82%) DB2
1 1 (0.82%) DynamoDB
1 1 (0.82%) Elasticsearch
1 1 (0.82%) Hadoop
1 1 (0.82%) MongoDB
1 1 (0.82%) SQL Server
Development Applications
1 6 (4.92%) Jenkins
2 3 (2.46%) Git
2 3 (2.46%) GitLab
3 2 (1.64%) JIRA
4 1 (0.82%) Rational Rhapsody
General
1 28 (22.95%) Social Skills
2 15 (12.30%) Finance
3 14 (11.48%) Analytical Skills
4 9 (7.38%) Public Sector
5 7 (5.74%) Telecoms
6 5 (4.10%) Organisational Skills
6 5 (4.10%) Pharmaceutical
7 4 (3.28%) Automotive
7 4 (3.28%) Banking
8 3 (2.46%) Fire and Rescue
8 3 (2.46%) Manufacturing
8 3 (2.46%) Presentation Skills
9 2 (1.64%) Aviation
9 2 (1.64%) Legal
9 2 (1.64%) Military
9 2 (1.64%) Police
9 2 (1.64%) Retail
9 2 (1.64%) Swedish Language
10 1 (0.82%) Aerospace
10 1 (0.82%) Marketing
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 6 (4.92%) Web Services
2 2 (1.64%) Elastic Stack
2 2 (1.64%) Middleware
2 2 (1.64%) React
3 1 (0.82%) 802.1X
3 1 (0.82%) Apache Axis
3 1 (0.82%) JSON
3 1 (0.82%) REST
Miscellaneous
1 14 (11.48%) Cyber Threat
2 13 (10.66%) Management Information System
3 9 (7.38%) Data Protection Act
3 9 (7.38%) Security Posture
4 8 (6.56%) Hybrid Cloud
5 4 (3.28%) Cyber Defence
5 4 (3.28%) Data Centre
5 4 (3.28%) Self-Motivation
6 3 (2.46%) Algorithms
6 3 (2.46%) Product Ownership
7 2 (1.64%) CCTV
7 2 (1.64%) Cloud Security Posture
7 2 (1.64%) Distributed Denial-of-Service
7 2 (1.64%) Operational Technology
7 2 (1.64%) Private Cloud
7 2 (1.64%) Robotics
7 2 (1.64%) SCADA
8 1 (0.82%) CMDB
8 1 (0.82%) Driving Licence
8 1 (0.82%) PKI
Operating Systems
1 19 (15.57%) Windows
2 10 (8.20%) Linux
3 9 (7.38%) Windows Server
4 3 (2.46%) Unix
5 1 (0.82%) Windows Server 2016
Processes & Methodologies
1 40 (32.79%) Cybersecurity
2 27 (22.13%) SIEM
3 25 (20.49%) Cloud Security
4 21 (17.21%) Problem-Solving
5 20 (16.39%) Information Security
6 19 (15.57%) Security Operations
7 16 (13.11%) Data Protection
7 16 (13.11%) Zero Trust
8 15 (12.30%) Identity Access Management
8 15 (12.30%) Vulnerability Management
9 14 (11.48%) Data Loss Prevention
10 13 (10.66%) Security Management
11 12 (9.84%) CI/CD
11 12 (9.84%) Incident Response
11 12 (9.84%) Infrastructure Engineering
12 11 (9.02%) Migration
13 10 (8.20%) DevSecOps
13 10 (8.20%) Security Architecture
13 10 (8.20%) Validation
14 8 (6.56%) Threat Detection
Programming Languages
1 22 (18.03%) PowerShell
1 22 (18.03%) Python
2 4 (3.28%) Java
2 4 (3.28%) Kusto Query Language
3 3 (2.46%) C#
3 3 (2.46%) JavaScript
3 3 (2.46%) SQL
4 2 (1.64%) Ruby
5 1 (0.82%) Bash
5 1 (0.82%) Shell Script
5 1 (0.82%) VBA
Qualifications
1 18 (14.75%) Security Cleared
2 14 (11.48%) SC Cleared
3 13 (10.66%) CISSP
4 10 (8.20%) Degree
5 8 (6.56%) CISM
6 6 (4.92%) Microsoft Certification
7 4 (3.28%) Cisco Certification
7 4 (3.28%) DV Cleared
8 3 (2.46%) Azure Certification
8 3 (2.46%) SANS
9 2 (1.64%) AWS Certification
9 2 (1.64%) CCIE
9 2 (1.64%) CCSA
9 2 (1.64%) CEH
10 1 (0.82%) CCNP
10 1 (0.82%) CCSE
10 1 (0.82%) CCSP
10 1 (0.82%) CompTIA Security+
10 1 (0.82%) GCIH
10 1 (0.82%) OSCP
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 13 (10.66%) ISO/IEC 27001
1 13 (10.66%) NIST
2 8 (6.56%) GDPR
3 5 (4.10%) NCSC
4 4 (3.28%) HIPAA
5 3 (2.46%) AUTOSAR
5 3 (2.46%) JSP 440
6 2 (1.64%) Cyber Essentials
6 2 (1.64%) NIST 800
6 2 (1.64%) SOC 2
7 1 (0.82%) Accessibility
7 1 (0.82%) Actionable Recommendations
7 1 (0.82%) Cyber Essentials PLUS
7 1 (0.82%) Government Security Classifications
7 1 (0.82%) GRC
7 1 (0.82%) ISO/IEC 27005
7 1 (0.82%) QA
7 1 (0.82%) Sarbanes-Oxley
System Software
1 12 (9.84%) Active Directory
2 6 (4.92%) Docker
3 2 (1.64%) Hyper-V
3 2 (1.64%) VMware Infrastructure
4 1 (0.82%) Firmware
4 1 (0.82%) ProxySG
Systems Management
1 12 (9.84%) Kubernetes
2 7 (5.74%) Ansible
3 5 (4.10%) Terraform
4 4 (3.28%) Microsoft Intune
5 3 (2.46%) Grafana
5 3 (2.46%) SCCM
6 2 (1.64%) CASB
6 2 (1.64%) FortiGate
6 2 (1.64%) Nagios
6 2 (1.64%) NetBackup
6 2 (1.64%) Oracle RMAN
6 2 (1.64%) Progress Chef
7 1 (0.82%) Kibana
7 1 (0.82%) logstash
7 1 (0.82%) Nessus
7 1 (0.82%) Prometheus
7 1 (0.82%) Puppet
7 1 (0.82%) QRadar
7 1 (0.82%) Single Sign-On
7 1 (0.82%) WSUS
Vendors
1 35 (28.69%) Microsoft
2 18 (14.75%) Cisco
3 12 (9.84%) CheckPoint
4 9 (7.38%) Fortinet
4 9 (7.38%) Splunk
5 8 (6.56%) F5
5 8 (6.56%) VMware
5 8 (6.56%) Zscaler
6 5 (4.10%) Aruba
6 5 (4.10%) HP
6 5 (4.10%) Palo Alto
6 5 (4.10%) Veeam
7 4 (3.28%) Extreme Networks
7 4 (3.28%) Infoblox
7 4 (3.28%) Rapid7
7 4 (3.28%) Ruckus Wireless
7 4 (3.28%) Tenable
8 3 (2.46%) Qualys
8 3 (2.46%) SolarWinds
8 3 (2.46%) Thycotic