VLAN Contract Job Trends in the UK excluding London

Virtual LAN (VLAN)
UK > UK excluding London

The table below provides summary statistics and contractor rates for jobs advertised in the UK excluding London requiring VLAN skills. It covers contract job vacancies from the 6 months leading up to 17 January 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
17 Jan 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 268 234 271
Rank change year-on-year -34 +37 +60
Contract jobs citing VLAN 133 121 142
As % of all contract jobs in the UK excluding London 0.72% 0.87% 0.72%
As % of the Communications & Networking category 6.05% 5.36% 4.09%
Number of daily rates quoted 97 75 89
10th Percentile £219 £223 £207
25th Percentile £300 £293 £313
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £474 £413 £450
Median % change year-on-year +14.91% -8.33% -
75th Percentile £550 £588 £630
90th Percentile £628 £628 £700
UK median daily rate £475 £428 £450
% change year-on-year +10.99% -5.00% -4.26%
Number of hourly rates quoted 3 1 8
10th Percentile £67.45 - £32.86
25th Percentile £70.01 £21.25 £34.61
Median hourly rate £74.26 £22.50 £71.90
Median % change year-on-year +230.04% -68.71% +196.48%
75th Percentile - £23.75 £76.53
90th Percentile - - -
UK median hourly rate £66.50 £30.25 £46.52
% change year-on-year +119.83% -34.97% +55.07%

All Communications and Computer Networking Skills
UK excluding London

VLAN falls under the Communications and Computer Networking category. For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all contract job vacancies requiring communications or computer networking skills in the UK excluding London.

Contract vacancies with a requirement for communications or computer networking skills 2,200 2,259 3,468
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the UK excluding London 11.90% 16.24% 17.52%
Number of daily rates quoted 1,467 1,274 2,054
10th Percentile £195 £191 £205
25th Percentile £300 £301 £350
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £450 £468 £475
Median % change year-on-year -3.74% -1.58% +2.94%
75th Percentile £563 £575 £595
90th Percentile £650 £650 £681
UK median daily rate £475 £500 £500
% change year-on-year -5.00% - -2.44%
Number of hourly rates quoted 116 114 284
10th Percentile £15.25 £15.22 £17.72
25th Percentile £16.00 £21.00 £27.50
Median hourly rate £41.94 £32.50 £58.50
Median % change year-on-year +29.05% -44.44% +179.48%
75th Percentile £65.00 £62.25 £65.98
90th Percentile £74.63 £70.00 £74.70
UK median hourly rate £30.00 £35.00 £56.49
% change year-on-year -14.29% -38.04% +134.16%

VLAN
Job Vacancy Trend in the UK excluding London

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

VLAN job vacancy trend in the UK excluding London

VLAN
Daily Rate Trend in the UK excluding London

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

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

VLAN
Daily Rate Histogram in the UK excluding London

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing VLAN in the UK excluding London over the 6 months to 17 January 2026.

Daily rate histogram for VLAN in the UK excluding London

VLAN
Hourly Rate Trend in the UK excluding London

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

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

VLAN
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 VLAN within the UK excluding London region over the 6 months to 17 January 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
North of England -32 54 £479 +47.50% 20
North West +3 45 £491 +3.29% 10
South East -17 42 £463 - 51
Midlands -45 16 £525 -8.66% 17
West Midlands -41 14 £531 -9.56% 7
Yorkshire -50 9 £300 +23.71% 7
South West -29 7 £425 +3.03% 18
Scotland +5 6 £298 -25.63% 5
East of England -15 5 £460 +87.76% 18
Wales +4 3 £293 - 3
North East - 3 £550 - 4
East Midlands -30 2 £275 -41.18% 9
VLAN
UK

VLAN
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 (7.52%) Microsoft Exchange
2 8 (6.02%) Skype for Business
3 3 (2.26%) SharePoint
4 2 (1.50%) WordPress
5 1 (0.75%) Confluence
5 1 (0.75%) IIS
5 1 (0.75%) OpenStack
Applications
1 9 (6.77%) Microsoft Office
2 4 (3.01%) MS Visio
Cloud Services
1 44 (33.08%) Azure
2 29 (21.80%) AWS
3 14 (10.53%) Microsoft 365
4 7 (5.26%) GCP
5 5 (3.76%) Virtual Private Cloud
6 4 (3.01%) Azure ExpressRoute
6 4 (3.01%) Entra ID
6 4 (3.01%) SaaS
7 2 (1.50%) AWS Direct Connect
7 2 (1.50%) AWS IoT
8 1 (0.75%) Akamai
8 1 (0.75%) Azure DevOps
8 1 (0.75%) Azure Sentinel
8 1 (0.75%) IaaS
8 1 (0.75%) PaaS
Communications & Networking
1 78 (58.65%) Firewall
2 47 (35.34%) DNS
3 42 (31.58%) DHCP
3 42 (31.58%) TCP/IP
4 40 (30.08%) VPN
5 39 (29.32%) WAN
6 36 (27.07%) BGP
7 35 (26.32%) LAN
8 33 (24.81%) Network Security
9 27 (20.30%) OSPF
10 24 (18.05%) Wi-Fi
11 20 (15.04%) Wireless
12 19 (14.29%) SD-WAN
13 13 (9.77%) Cisco ASA
14 12 (9.02%) MPLS
15 11 (8.27%) WLAN
16 10 (7.52%) EIGRP
16 10 (7.52%) Software-Defined Networking
16 10 (7.52%) VXLAN
17 9 (6.77%) Skype
Database & Business Intelligence
1 2 (1.50%) SQL Server
Development Applications
1 1 (0.75%) Bitbucket
1 1 (0.75%) JIRA
1 1 (0.75%) Sonatype Nexus
General
1 31 (23.31%) Social Skills
2 28 (21.05%) Analytical Skills
3 12 (9.02%) Public Sector
4 6 (4.51%) Telecoms
5 5 (3.76%) Documentation Skills
5 5 (3.76%) Legal
6 3 (2.26%) Finance
6 3 (2.26%) Inclusion and Diversity
6 3 (2.26%) Influencing Skills
6 3 (2.26%) Manufacturing
7 1 (0.75%) Electronics
7 1 (0.75%) Law
7 1 (0.75%) Marketing
7 1 (0.75%) Presentation Skills
Job Titles
1 47 (35.34%) Network Engineer
2 22 (16.54%) Infrastructure Engineer
3 16 (12.03%) SC Cleared Network Engineer
3 16 (12.03%) Support Engineer
4 11 (8.27%) Architect
4 11 (8.27%) Infrastructure Support
4 11 (8.27%) Infrastructure Support Engineer
5 10 (7.52%) Analyst
6 9 (6.77%) Senior
7 8 (6.02%) IT Engineer
8 7 (5.26%) IT Analyst
8 7 (5.26%) Platform Engineer
9 6 (4.51%) Cisco Engineer
9 6 (4.51%) IT Support
9 6 (4.51%) IT Support Analyst
9 6 (4.51%) Support Analyst
9 6 (4.51%) Technical Architect
10 5 (3.76%) Administrator
11 4 (3.01%) Network Architect
11 4 (3.01%) Server Engineer
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 4 (3.01%) 802.1X
2 2 (1.50%) XMPP
3 1 (0.75%) JFC
3 1 (0.75%) Middleware
Miscellaneous
1 31 (23.31%) Data Centre
2 14 (10.53%) Analytical Mindset
3 9 (6.77%) Onboarding
4 8 (6.02%) Product Ownership
5 6 (4.51%) Replication
6 4 (3.01%) Operational Technology
7 3 (2.26%) 3D Printing
7 3 (2.26%) CCTV
7 3 (2.26%) Clustering
7 3 (2.26%) IoT
7 3 (2.26%) NHS
8 2 (1.50%) Driving Licence
8 2 (1.50%) Hybrid Cloud
8 2 (1.50%) Legacy Systems
8 2 (1.50%) Private Cloud
9 1 (0.75%) IBM XIV
9 1 (0.75%) Public Cloud
9 1 (0.75%) Security Operations Centre
9 1 (0.75%) Smartphone
9 1 (0.75%) Video Conferencing
Operating Systems
1 50 (37.59%) Windows
2 23 (17.29%) Linux
3 19 (14.29%) Windows Server
4 13 (9.77%) Windows 10
5 8 (6.02%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
5 8 (6.02%) Windows 7
6 2 (1.50%) VMS
6 2 (1.50%) Windows Server 2012
7 1 (0.75%) CentOS
7 1 (0.75%) Ubuntu
Processes & Methodologies
1 30 (22.56%) Problem-Solving
2 26 (19.55%) Infrastructure Engineering
3 24 (18.05%) Service Management
4 19 (14.29%) ITIL
5 17 (12.78%) Disaster Recovery
5 17 (12.78%) ITSM
6 16 (12.03%) Cybersecurity
6 16 (12.03%) Virtual Infrastructure
7 15 (11.28%) Network Design
7 15 (11.28%) Network Monitoring
8 13 (9.77%) High Availability
8 13 (9.77%) Project Delivery
9 12 (9.02%) Continuous Improvement
10 11 (8.27%) Change Control
10 11 (8.27%) Preventative Maintenance
11 10 (7.52%) Network Segmentation
12 9 (6.77%) Incident Response
13 8 (6.02%) Containerisation
13 8 (6.02%) Disk Encryption
14 7 (5.26%) Network Management
Programming Languages
1 25 (18.80%) PowerShell
2 15 (11.28%) Python
3 13 (9.77%) Bash
4 8 (6.02%) VB
4 8 (6.02%) VBScript
5 6 (4.51%) Perl
6 2 (1.50%) SQL
7 1 (0.75%) Ruby
Qualifications
1 66 (49.62%) Security Cleared
2 52 (39.10%) SC Cleared
3 47 (35.34%) Cisco Certification
4 42 (31.58%) CCNP
5 27 (20.30%) CCNA
6 18 (13.53%) Network+ Certification
7 14 (10.53%) Azure Certification
7 14 (10.53%) Microsoft Certification
8 13 (9.77%) Degree
9 12 (9.02%) DV Cleared
10 11 (8.27%) Server+ Certification
11 8 (6.02%) CCIE
12 4 (3.01%) JNCIS
13 3 (2.26%) (ISC)2 CCSP
13 3 (2.26%) AWS Certification
13 3 (2.26%) CCDP
13 3 (2.26%) CCIE Security
13 3 (2.26%) CCSP
13 3 (2.26%) CISSP
13 3 (2.26%) DBS Check
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 6 (4.51%) ISO/IEC 27001
1 6 (4.51%) PCI DSS
1 6 (4.51%) SLA
2 5 (3.76%) NIST
3 4 (3.01%) GDPR
4 3 (2.26%) Cyber Essentials
5 1 (0.75%) ISO/IEC 20000
5 1 (0.75%) QA
System Software
1 39 (29.32%) VMware Infrastructure
2 25 (18.80%) Active Directory
3 16 (12.03%) Hyper-V
4 8 (6.02%) BitLocker
5 7 (5.26%) VMware ESXi
6 6 (4.51%) vSphere
7 5 (3.76%) VMware NSX
8 4 (3.01%) Docker
9 3 (2.26%) KVM
9 3 (2.26%) Virtual Machines
10 2 (1.50%) Virtual Servers
11 1 (0.75%) Ceph
11 1 (0.75%) Firmware
11 1 (0.75%) QEMU
11 1 (0.75%) RHEV
11 1 (0.75%) Xen
Systems Management
1 10 (7.52%) Ansible
1 10 (7.52%) FortiGate
1 10 (7.52%) SCCM
1 10 (7.52%) vCenter Server
2 8 (6.02%) Terraform
3 7 (5.26%) Nagios
4 5 (3.76%) Kubernetes
4 5 (3.76%) VxRail
5 3 (2.26%) Iperf
5 3 (2.26%) Microsoft Intune
5 3 (2.26%) Nmap
6 2 (1.50%) Cisco CUCM
6 2 (1.50%) Dell DRAC
7 1 (0.75%) Failover Clustering
7 1 (0.75%) Proxmox
7 1 (0.75%) Red Hat Satellite
7 1 (0.75%) WhatsUp Gold
Vendors
1 68 (51.13%) Cisco
2 44 (33.08%) Microsoft
3 41 (30.83%) VMware
4 32 (24.06%) Palo Alto
5 20 (15.04%) SolarWinds
6 18 (13.53%) Fortinet
7 16 (12.03%) Dell
8 11 (8.27%) Juniper
9 10 (7.52%) F5
9 10 (7.52%) Veeam
10 8 (6.02%) Aruba
10 8 (6.02%) CheckPoint
10 8 (6.02%) ServiceNow
11 7 (5.26%) Red Hat
12 6 (4.51%) Citrix
13 5 (3.76%) NetApp
14 4 (3.01%) Meraki
15 3 (2.26%) Arista
15 3 (2.26%) Zscaler
16 2 (1.50%) Ekahau