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 4 August 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
4 Aug 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 285 269 277
Rank change year-on-year -16 +8 -20
Contract jobs citing VLAN 187 100 101
As % of all contract jobs in the UK excluding London 0.69% 0.66% 0.55%
As % of the Communications & Networking category 6.51% 4.66% 3.60%
Number of daily rates quoted 116 66 65
10th Percentile £313 £178 £244
25th Percentile £406 £357 £275
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £495 £450 £425
Median % change year-on-year +10.00% +5.88% -5.56%
75th Percentile £600 £536 £553
90th Percentile £662 £685 £666
UK median daily rate £475 £436 £450
% change year-on-year +8.88% -3.06% -6.25%
Number of hourly rates quoted 23 0 0
10th Percentile £13.64 - -
25th Percentile £26.10 - -
Median hourly rate £51.50 - -
75th Percentile £74.00 - -
90th Percentile £76.05 - -
UK median hourly rate £51.50 £57.50 -
% change year-on-year -10.43% - -

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 2,872 2,145 2,803
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the UK excluding London 10.63% 14.12% 15.18%
Number of daily rates quoted 1,615 1,297 1,639
10th Percentile £213 £200 £205
25th Percentile £372 £325 £350
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £492 £475 £500
Median % change year-on-year +3.58% -5.00% +9.89%
75th Percentile £582 £575 £608
90th Percentile £650 £638 £675
UK median daily rate £500 £488 £500
% change year-on-year +2.56% -2.50% -
Number of hourly rates quoted 300 136 282
10th Percentile £15.18 £14.99 £14.16
25th Percentile £19.33 £19.45 £18.27
Median hourly rate £26.69 £45.00 £53.69
Median % change year-on-year -40.69% -16.18% -6.49%
75th Percentile £65.38 £68.17 £65.00
90th Percentile £74.26 £87.75 £75.00
UK median hourly rate £26.66 £50.00 £47.50
% change year-on-year -46.68% +5.26% -5.79%

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 4 August 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
Hourly Rate Histogram in the UK excluding London

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing VLAN in the UK excluding London over the 6 months to 4 August 2026.

Hourly rate histogram for VLAN in the UK excluding London

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 4 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
North of England -18 57 £500 +7.53% 36
South East -51 47 £475 +5.56% 55
North West -27 38 £575 +21.05% 25
South West -17 31 £495 +130.23% 21
Midlands -43 29 £413 -7.30% 15
Yorkshire -26 18 £475 +58.20% 9
East Midlands -1 14 £275 -57.69% 7
West Midlands -56 14 £413 +13.01% 8
East of England -23 12 £600 +152.63% 14
Scotland -8 11 £388 -11.93% 6
Wales -12 2 £170 -62.64% 4
North East -40 1 - - 2
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 9 (4.81%) Microsoft Exchange
1 9 (4.81%) SharePoint
2 4 (2.14%) FactoryTalk
3 1 (0.53%) Apache
3 1 (0.53%) JBoss
3 1 (0.53%) OpenStack
Applications
1 3 (1.60%) Microsoft Office
2 2 (1.07%) Microsoft Excel
3 1 (0.53%) MS Visio
Business Applications
1 1 (0.53%) Remedy ITSM
Cloud Services
1 50 (26.74%) Azure
2 27 (14.44%) AWS
3 23 (12.30%) Microsoft 365
4 22 (11.76%) Entra ID
5 8 (4.28%) GCP
6 7 (3.74%) Azure DevOps
6 7 (3.74%) GitHub
7 6 (3.21%) IaaS
7 6 (3.21%) Nutanix
7 6 (3.21%) Virtual Private Cloud
8 4 (2.14%) OneDrive
9 3 (1.60%) Azure Sentinel
10 2 (1.07%) AWS Direct Connect
10 2 (1.07%) Azure ExpressRoute
10 2 (1.07%) GitHub Actions
10 2 (1.07%) Google Ads
10 2 (1.07%) Google Workspace
11 1 (0.53%) Amazon GuardDuty
11 1 (0.53%) OCI
11 1 (0.53%) Route 53
Communications & Networking
1 114 (60.96%) Firewall
2 83 (44.39%) DNS
3 68 (36.36%) DHCP
4 59 (31.55%) BGP
4 59 (31.55%) LAN
5 58 (31.02%) OSPF
5 58 (31.02%) VPN
6 54 (28.88%) WAN
7 52 (27.81%) TCP/IP
8 44 (23.53%) Wireless
9 35 (18.72%) SAN
10 34 (18.18%) Network Security
11 32 (17.11%) Wi-Fi
12 28 (14.97%) Cisco Nexus
13 25 (13.37%) NX-OS
13 25 (13.37%) SD-WAN
14 24 (12.83%) NAS
15 21 (11.23%) Cisco IOS
15 21 (11.23%) WLAN
16 18 (9.63%) VXLAN
Database & Business Intelligence
1 10 (5.35%) SQL Server
2 1 (0.53%) OpenStack Swift
Development Applications
1 8 (4.28%) JIRA
2 7 (3.74%) Jenkins
3 3 (1.60%) Git
3 3 (1.60%) Sonatype Nexus
4 2 (1.07%) GitLab
4 2 (1.07%) SQL Server Management Studio (SSMS)
5 1 (0.53%) Browser DevTools
5 1 (0.53%) MSI
General
1 56 (29.95%) Social Skills
2 22 (11.76%) Analytical Skills
3 14 (7.49%) Documentation Skills
4 13 (6.95%) Public Sector
5 9 (4.81%) Manufacturing
6 8 (4.28%) Inclusion and Diversity
6 8 (4.28%) Organisational Skills
6 8 (4.28%) Telecoms
7 6 (3.21%) Legal
8 5 (2.67%) Pharmaceutical
8 5 (2.67%) Police
9 4 (2.14%) Finance
10 3 (1.60%) Games
10 3 (1.60%) Influencing Skills
11 2 (1.07%) Advertising
12 1 (0.53%) Law
Job Titles
1 75 (40.11%) Network Engineer
2 41 (21.93%) Infrastructure Engineer
3 30 (16.04%) Architect
4 21 (11.23%) Senior
5 19 (10.16%) IT Engineer
5 19 (10.16%) Network Architect
6 13 (6.95%) SC Cleared Network Engineer
7 12 (6.42%) IT Support
8 10 (5.35%) Senior Network Engineer
8 10 (5.35%) Technical Architect
9 9 (4.81%) Support Engineer
10 8 (4.28%) IT Infrastructure Engineer
10 8 (4.28%) Network Infrastructure Engineer
10 8 (4.28%) Test Engineer
11 7 (3.74%) Automation Specialist
11 7 (3.74%) Cisco Engineer
12 6 (3.21%) IT Support Engineer
12 6 (3.21%) Technical Specialist
13 5 (2.67%) Cisco Network Engineer
13 5 (2.67%) Senior Unix Technical Specialist
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 10 (5.35%) 802.1X
2 2 (1.07%) ModSecurity
2 2 (1.07%) NETCONF
2 2 (1.07%) ODBC
2 2 (1.07%) RFC 2544
3 1 (0.53%) HTML
3 1 (0.53%) HTML5
3 1 (0.53%) Microsoft Graph
3 1 (0.53%) REST
Miscellaneous
1 68 (36.36%) Data Centre
2 14 (7.49%) Onboarding
2 14 (7.49%) Self-Motivation
3 11 (5.88%) Replication
4 10 (5.35%) Operational Technology
4 10 (5.35%) PKI
5 9 (4.81%) Cloud Native
6 8 (4.28%) SCADA
7 7 (3.74%) Hybrid Cloud
8 6 (3.21%) Driving Licence
8 6 (3.21%) Life Science
9 5 (2.67%) Virtual Team
10 4 (2.14%) Private Cloud
11 3 (1.60%) Analytical Mindset
11 3 (1.60%) Animation
11 3 (1.60%) CMDB
11 3 (1.60%) Distributed Denial-of-Service
11 3 (1.60%) Security Posture
12 2 (1.07%) Fibre Optics
12 2 (1.07%) Handset
Operating Systems
1 52 (27.81%) Windows
2 37 (19.79%) Windows Server
3 16 (8.56%) Linux
4 10 (5.35%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
5 8 (4.28%) Windows 10
6 7 (3.74%) Rocky
7 6 (3.21%) CentOS
8 2 (1.07%) Unix
8 2 (1.07%) Windows Server 2019
9 1 (0.53%) Ubuntu
9 1 (0.53%) VMS
9 1 (0.53%) Windows Server 2016
Processes & Methodologies
1 52 (27.81%) Infrastructure Engineering
2 44 (23.53%) Problem-Solving
3 33 (17.65%) Network Segmentation
4 25 (13.37%) Continuous Improvement
5 22 (11.76%) ITIL
5 22 (11.76%) ITSM
6 21 (11.23%) Validation
7 20 (10.70%) Project Delivery
8 17 (9.09%) Disaster Recovery
8 17 (9.09%) High Availability
8 17 (9.09%) Migration
8 17 (9.09%) Network Design
8 17 (9.09%) Network Monitoring
9 16 (8.56%) CI/CD
10 15 (8.02%) Cybersecurity
10 15 (8.02%) Mentoring
11 14 (7.49%) Infrastructure as Code
12 13 (6.95%) Infrastructure Automation
13 12 (6.42%) DevOps
14 11 (5.88%) Stakeholder Engagement
Programming Languages
1 20 (10.70%) PowerShell
2 18 (9.63%) Python
3 5 (2.67%) ActionScript
4 4 (2.14%) Bash
4 4 (2.14%) SQL
5 2 (1.07%) T-SQL
6 1 (0.53%) Bicep
6 1 (0.53%) Perl
6 1 (0.53%) VBScript
Qualifications
1 79 (42.25%) Security Cleared
2 69 (36.90%) Cisco Certification
3 62 (33.16%) CCNP
4 60 (32.09%) SC Cleared
5 46 (24.60%) CCNA
6 17 (9.09%) DV Cleared
6 17 (9.09%) Network+ Certification
7 15 (8.02%) Server+ Certification
8 13 (6.95%) Degree
9 7 (3.74%) CCIE
10 5 (2.67%) Microsoft Certification
11 3 (1.60%) AWS Certification
11 3 (1.60%) Azure Certification
11 3 (1.60%) Computer Science Degree
11 3 (1.60%) DBS Check
11 3 (1.60%) VMware Certified Professional (VCP)
12 2 (1.07%) ISTQB
13 1 (0.53%) GCIA
13 1 (0.53%) JNCIA
13 1 (0.53%) JNCIS
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 8 (4.28%) NCSC
2 5 (2.67%) GxP
2 5 (2.67%) ISO/IEC 27001
3 4 (2.14%) 21 CFR Part 11
3 4 (2.14%) QA
3 4 (2.14%) SLA
4 3 (1.60%) Cyber Essentials
4 3 (1.60%) NIST
4 3 (1.60%) NIST 800
5 2 (1.07%) Cyber Essentials PLUS
5 2 (1.07%) GDPR
5 2 (1.07%) JSP 440
6 1 (0.53%) ISO/IEC 20000
System Software
1 47 (25.13%) VMware Infrastructure
2 36 (19.25%) Active Directory
3 15 (8.02%) Hyper-V
3 15 (8.02%) vSphere
4 11 (5.88%) VMware ESXi
5 10 (5.35%) VMware NSX
6 9 (4.81%) Virtual Machines
7 7 (3.74%) Firmware
8 5 (2.67%) Virtual Desktop
9 3 (1.60%) NFS
10 2 (1.07%) VirtualBox
11 1 (0.53%) BitLocker
11 1 (0.53%) Citrix Presentation Server
11 1 (0.53%) iptables
11 1 (0.53%) KVM
11 1 (0.53%) Samba
11 1 (0.53%) Snort
11 1 (0.53%) Virtual Servers
Systems Management
1 21 (11.23%) Ansible
2 18 (9.63%) Terraform
3 11 (5.88%) Microsoft Intune
4 8 (4.28%) WSUS
5 6 (3.21%) FortiGate
5 6 (3.21%) Nagios
5 6 (3.21%) NetBackup
5 6 (3.21%) vCenter Server
6 3 (1.60%) Avamar
6 3 (1.60%) Grafana
6 3 (1.60%) PowerCLI
7 2 (1.07%) Kubernetes
7 2 (1.07%) Red Hat Satellite
7 2 (1.07%) SCCM
7 2 (1.07%) Single Sign-On
7 2 (1.07%) Suricata
8 1 (0.53%) Iperf
8 1 (0.53%) Rundeck
8 1 (0.53%) systemd
8 1 (0.53%) ZABBIX
Vendors
1 95 (50.80%) Cisco
2 60 (32.09%) VMware
3 41 (21.93%) Microsoft
4 26 (13.90%) F5
4 26 (13.90%) Palo Alto
5 20 (10.70%) ServiceNow
6 17 (9.09%) Aruba
6 17 (9.09%) SolarWinds
6 17 (9.09%) Veeam
7 16 (8.56%) CheckPoint
8 14 (7.49%) Juniper
9 12 (6.42%) Fortinet
10 11 (5.88%) Meraki
11 10 (5.35%) Ekahau
11 10 (5.35%) NetApp
12 9 (4.81%) Citrix
13 6 (3.21%) Rockwell
14 5 (2.67%) Google
14 5 (2.67%) HP
14 5 (2.67%) Zerto