1st Line Support Engineer Contract Job Trends

First Line Support Engineer
UK

The median First Line Support Engineer daily rate in the UK is £180, according to job vacancies posted in the 6 months leading up to 14 December 2025.

The table below compares current contractor rates and summary statistics with the previous two years.

6 months to
14 Dec 2025
Same period 2024 Same period 2023
Rank 545 524 563
Rank change year-on-year -21 +39 +189
Contract jobs requiring a 1st Line Support Engineer 36 40 49
As % of all contract jobs in the UK 0.099% 0.12% 0.11%
As % of the Job Titles category 0.11% 0.12% 0.12%
Number of daily rates quoted 23 27 36
10th Percentile £132 £134 £113
25th Percentile £146 £150 £127
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £180 £163 £160
Median % change year-on-year +10.77% +1.40% -7.10%
75th Percentile £195 £190 £188
90th Percentile £200 £317 £211
UK excluding London median daily rate £178 £168 £160
% change year-on-year +5.97% +4.52% +0.94%
Number of hourly rates quoted 3 6 6
10th Percentile - £12.50 £13.50
25th Percentile £19.00 £12.69 £16.25
Median hourly rate £20.00 £14.03 £17.75
Median % change year-on-year +42.55% -20.96% +18.33%
75th Percentile £21.00 £17.21 £19.40
90th Percentile - £18.11 £20.64
UK excluding London median hourly rate £20.00 £13.50 £17.50
% change year-on-year +48.15% -22.86% +20.69%

All Contract IT Job Vacancies
UK

For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all contract IT job vacancies. 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 with a recognized job title 33,137 32,079 41,606
% of contract IT jobs with a recognized job title 90.94% 92.76% 93.43%
Number of daily rates quoted 20,987 19,722 27,981
10th Percentile £290 £300 £292
25th Percentile £404 £410 £413
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £525 £525
Median % change year-on-year -4.76% - -4.55%
75th Percentile £619 £638 £644
90th Percentile £723 £738 £740
UK excluding London median daily rate £475 £490 £500
% change year-on-year -3.06% -2.00% -
Number of hourly rates quoted 1,959 1,044 1,467
10th Percentile £14.25 £15.48 £15.16
25th Percentile £17.98 £21.05 £19.06
Median hourly rate £25.47 £35.00 £44.50
Median % change year-on-year -27.23% -21.35% +48.33%
75th Percentile £57.50 £63.75 £65.00
90th Percentile £71.46 £73.28 £77.50
UK excluding London median hourly rate £25.15 £32.50 £45.00
% change year-on-year -22.62% -27.78% +80.00%

1st Line Support Engineer
Job Vacancy Trend

Historical trend showing the proportion of contract IT job postings featuring '1st Line Support Engineer' in the job title relative to all contract IT jobs advertised.

1st Line Support Engineer job vacancy trend in the UK

1st Line Support Engineer
Daily Rate Trend

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for 1st Line Support Engineer job vacancies in the UK.

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for 1st Line Support Engineer job vacancies in the UK

1st Line Support Engineer
Hourly Rate Trend

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for 1st Line Support Engineer job vacancies in the UK.

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for 1st Line Support Engineer job vacancies in the UK

1st Line Support Engineer
Top 15 Contract Job Locations

The table below looks at the demand and provides a guide to the median contractor rates quoted in IT jobs citing 1st Line Support Engineer within the UK over the 6 months to 14 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
England -40 34 £175 +7.69% 19
UK excluding London -44 25 £178 +5.97% 18
London -5 11 £200 +33.33% 3
Midlands -32 7 £190 - 2
South East 0 6 £190 +11.76% 4
West Midlands -31 6 £190 - 2
North of England -40 5 £138 -15.38% 3
South West -8 4 £175 -10.26% 3
Yorkshire -42 3 £138 -25.68% 2
North West -25 2 £138 -15.38%
Work from Home +15 1 - - 3
Scotland +1 1 £180 +2.86% 1
Wales - 1 £180 -
East Midlands - 1 £180 -
East of England - 1 £145 - 7

1st Line Support Engineer Skill Set
Top 30 Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities

For the 6 months to 14 December 2025, 1st Line Support Engineer contract job roles required the following skills and capabilities in order of popularity. The figures indicate the absolute number of co-occurrences and as a proportion of all contract job ads featuring 1st Line Support Engineer in the job title.

1 15 (41.67%) Windows
2 14 (38.89%) Microsoft 365
3 13 (36.11%) Microsoft
4 11 (30.56%) TCP/IP
5 10 (27.78%) Customer Service
6 8 (22.22%) Active Directory
6 8 (22.22%) Agile
6 8 (22.22%) Internet
6 8 (22.22%) Server Management
7 7 (19.44%) Microsoft Office
8 6 (16.67%) Microsoft Intune
8 6 (16.67%) Problem-Solving
8 6 (16.67%) VPN
9 5 (13.89%) Service Management
9 5 (13.89%) ServiceNow
10 4 (11.11%) DNS
10 4 (11.11%) Entra ID
10 4 (11.11%) ITSM
10 4 (11.11%) JIRA
10 4 (11.11%) OneDrive
11 3 (8.33%) Azure
11 3 (8.33%) Change Control
11 3 (8.33%) Datto
11 3 (8.33%) Problem Management
11 3 (8.33%) Remote Monitoring and Management
11 3 (8.33%) Root Cause Analysis
11 3 (8.33%) Security Cleared
11 3 (8.33%) Windows 10
12 2 (5.56%) Cisco
12 2 (5.56%) ITIL

1st Line Support Engineer Skill Set
Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities 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 2 (5.56%) SharePoint
2 1 (2.78%) Microsoft Exchange
Applications
1 7 (19.44%) Microsoft Office
2 1 (2.78%) Microsoft Excel
Cloud Services
1 14 (38.89%) Microsoft 365
2 4 (11.11%) Entra ID
2 4 (11.11%) OneDrive
3 3 (8.33%) Azure
4 1 (2.78%) Slack
Communications & Networking
1 11 (30.56%) TCP/IP
2 8 (22.22%) Internet
3 6 (16.67%) VPN
4 4 (11.11%) DNS
5 2 (5.56%) Wi-Fi
6 1 (2.78%) DHCP
6 1 (2.78%) LAN
6 1 (2.78%) MPLS
6 1 (2.78%) SDH
6 1 (2.78%) SSL
6 1 (2.78%) WAN
6 1 (2.78%) WebEx
Development Applications
1 4 (11.11%) JIRA
General
1 24 (66.67%) Social Skills
2 8 (22.22%) Organisational Skills
3 3 (8.33%) Legal
3 3 (8.33%) Public Sector
4 2 (5.56%) Presentation Skills
5 1 (2.78%) Inclusion and Diversity
5 1 (2.78%) Italian Language
5 1 (2.78%) Polish Language
5 1 (2.78%) Spanish Language
5 1 (2.78%) Telecoms
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 1 (2.78%) XMPP
Miscellaneous
1 8 (22.22%) Data Centre
2 2 (5.56%) Onboarding
3 1 (2.78%) Data Protection Act
3 1 (2.78%) Driving Licence
3 1 (2.78%) Video Conferencing
Operating Systems
1 15 (41.67%) Windows
2 3 (8.33%) Windows 10
3 1 (2.78%) Mac OS
Processes & Methodologies
1 10 (27.78%) Customer Service
2 8 (22.22%) Agile
2 8 (22.22%) Server Management
3 6 (16.67%) Problem-Solving
4 5 (13.89%) Service Management
5 4 (11.11%) ITSM
6 3 (8.33%) Change Control
6 3 (8.33%) Problem Management
6 3 (8.33%) Remote Monitoring and Management
6 3 (8.33%) Root Cause Analysis
7 2 (5.56%) ITIL
8 1 (2.78%) Data Protection
8 1 (2.78%) Logistics
8 1 (2.78%) Project Delivery
8 1 (2.78%) Stakeholder Management
Qualifications
1 3 (8.33%) Security Cleared
2 2 (5.56%) SC Cleared
3 1 (2.78%) BPSS Clearance
3 1 (2.78%) DBS Check
3 1 (2.78%) Degree
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 1 (2.78%) Accessibility
System Software
1 8 (22.22%) Active Directory
Systems Management
1 6 (16.67%) Microsoft Intune
2 1 (2.78%) Jamf Pro
2 1 (2.78%) SCCM
Vendors
1 13 (36.11%) Microsoft
2 5 (13.89%) ServiceNow
3 3 (8.33%) Datto
4 2 (5.56%) Cisco
5 1 (2.78%) Apple
5 1 (2.78%) Citrix
5 1 (2.78%) F5
5 1 (2.78%) Google
5 1 (2.78%) Logitech
5 1 (2.78%) Zscaler