3rd Line Engineer Contract Job Trends

Third Line Engineer
UK

The median Third Line Engineer daily rate in the UK is £475, according to job vacancies posted in the 6 months leading up to 18 August 2026.

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

6 months to
18 Aug 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 597 475 455
Rank change year-on-year -122 -20 +20
Contract jobs requiring a 3rd Line Engineer 77 70 102
As % of all contract jobs in the UK 0.14% 0.21% 0.26%
As % of the Job Titles category 0.16% 0.23% 0.28%
Number of daily rates quoted 65 54 60
10th Percentile £225 £231 £263
25th Percentile £275 £366 £325
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £475 £513 £380
Median % change year-on-year -7.32% +34.87% +1.33%
75th Percentile £515 £588 £444
90th Percentile £568 £600 £521
UK excluding London median daily rate £450 £550 £375
% change year-on-year -18.18% +46.67% +7.14%
Number of hourly rates quoted 0 4 2
10th Percentile - £25.96 £27.76
25th Percentile - £27.92 £33.14
Median hourly rate - £30.00 £42.09
Median % change year-on-year - -28.72% -
75th Percentile - £45.66 £51.05
90th Percentile - £72.04 £56.42
UK excluding London median hourly rate - £89.63 £24.18
% change year-on-year - +270.68% -

All Contract IT Job Roles
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 49,538 30,006 36,016
% of contract IT jobs with a recognized job title 92.49% 91.28% 92.96%
Number of daily rates quoted 29,704 18,935 23,189
10th Percentile £325 £281 £300
25th Percentile £425 £400 £413
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £525 £500 £525
Median % change year-on-year +5.00% -4.76% -1.87%
75th Percentile £625 £621 £638
90th Percentile £725 £725 £750
UK excluding London median daily rate £500 £475 £500
% change year-on-year +5.26% -5.00% -
Number of hourly rates quoted 3,506 1,542 1,988
10th Percentile £15.00 £13.56 £14.16
25th Percentile £20.69 £17.30 £20.00
Median hourly rate £41.74 £25.15 £43.00
Median % change year-on-year +65.94% -41.51% +3.61%
75th Percentile £67.84 £53.83 £65.00
90th Percentile £80.00 £72.50 £75.00
UK excluding London median hourly rate £42.50 £25.15 £44.02
% change year-on-year +68.99% -42.87% +22.28%

3rd Line Engineer
Job Vacancy Trend

Historical trend showing the proportion of contract IT job postings featuring '3rd Line Engineer' in the job title relative to all contract IT jobs advertised.

3rd Line Engineer job vacancy trend in the UK

3rd Line Engineer
Daily Rate Trend

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for 3rd Line Engineer job vacancies in the UK.

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for 3rd Line Engineer job vacancies in the UK

3rd Line Engineer
Daily Rate Histogram

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing 3rd Line Engineer over the 6 months to 18 August 2026.

Daily rate histogram for 3rd Line Engineer in the UK

3rd Line Engineer
Hourly Rate Trend

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for 3rd Line Engineer job vacancies in the UK.

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for 3rd Line Engineer job vacancies in the UK

3rd Line Engineer
Top 14 Contract Job Locations

The table below looks at the demand and provides a guide to the median contractor rates quoted in IT jobs citing 3rd Line Engineer within the UK over the 6 months to 18 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
England -118 77 £475 -13.64% 34
UK excluding London -93 62 £450 -18.18% 34
South East -67 38 £475 -17.39% 15
London -72 15 £625 +56.25% 5
Midlands -51 10 £300 -25.00% 8
Work from Home -54 8 £300 +4.35% 13
North of England -76 8 £310 -11.43% 4
East Midlands - 5 £300 - 4
South West -38 4 £425 +21.43% 1
North West -48 4 £400 +14.29% 2
West Midlands -52 3 £250 -37.50% 4
North East - 3 £290 - 2
East of England - 3 £223 - 5
Yorkshire - 2 £305 -

3rd Line Engineer Skill Set
Top 30 Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities

For the 6 months to 18 August 2026, 3rd Line 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 3rd Line Engineer in the job title.

1 59 (76.62%) Windows
2 50 (64.94%) Windows Server
3 48 (62.34%) Security Cleared
4 46 (59.74%) Microsoft
5 44 (57.14%) Active Directory
6 39 (50.65%) VMware
7 37 (48.05%) DV Cleared
8 35 (45.45%) VMware Infrastructure
9 31 (40.26%) Infrastructure Engineering
10 21 (27.27%) DNS
10 21 (27.27%) vCenter Server
11 20 (25.97%) PowerShell
12 18 (23.38%) Hyper-V
12 18 (23.38%) ITSM
12 18 (23.38%) SCOM
13 17 (22.08%) Microsoft Exchange
14 16 (20.78%) Problem-Solving
15 15 (19.48%) Dell
16 14 (18.18%) Azure
17 13 (16.88%) Avamar
17 13 (16.88%) DHCP
17 13 (16.88%) Entra ID
17 13 (16.88%) Thales
18 12 (15.58%) Change Management
19 11 (14.29%) Firewall
19 11 (14.29%) Microsoft 365
19 11 (14.29%) Microsoft Intune
19 11 (14.29%) SC Cleared
20 10 (12.99%) Citrix
20 10 (12.99%) Continuous Improvement

3rd Line 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 17 (22.08%) Microsoft Exchange
2 8 (10.39%) SharePoint
3 2 (2.60%) Confluence
Applications
1 3 (3.90%) Microsoft Office
Business Applications
1 1 (1.30%) Remedy ITSM
Cloud Services
1 14 (18.18%) Azure
2 13 (16.88%) Entra ID
3 11 (14.29%) Microsoft 365
4 7 (9.09%) AWS
5 6 (7.79%) IaaS
5 6 (7.79%) PaaS
6 4 (5.19%) GCP
7 3 (3.90%) OpenShift
8 2 (2.60%) Azure Data Factory
8 2 (2.60%) Power Platform
9 1 (1.30%) Mimecast
9 1 (1.30%) OneDrive
Communications & Networking
1 21 (27.27%) DNS
2 13 (16.88%) DHCP
3 11 (14.29%) Firewall
4 9 (11.69%) VPN
5 8 (10.39%) SMTP
6 3 (3.90%) TCP/IP
7 2 (2.60%) Skype
7 2 (2.60%) Wi-Fi
8 1 (1.30%) DKIM
8 1 (1.30%) NetScaler
Database & Business Intelligence
1 6 (7.79%) Elasticsearch
2 5 (6.49%) Amazon RDS
3 3 (3.90%) Big Data
3 3 (3.90%) Data Mining
3 3 (3.90%) SQL Server
4 2 (2.60%) SQL Server Integration Services
Development Applications
1 2 (2.60%) Git
1 2 (2.60%) JIRA
General
1 16 (20.78%) Social Skills
2 10 (12.99%) Analytical Skills
3 7 (9.09%) Marketing
4 3 (3.90%) Manufacturing
5 2 (2.60%) Advertising
5 2 (2.60%) Documentation Skills
5 2 (2.60%) Military
5 2 (2.60%) Public Sector
6 1 (1.30%) Pharmaceutical
Miscellaneous
1 20 (25.97%) PKI
2 9 (11.69%) Clustering
3 5 (6.49%) Data Centre
4 4 (5.19%) Enterprise Storage
5 3 (3.90%) Enterprise Software
6 2 (2.60%) Legacy Systems
6 2 (2.60%) NHS
6 2 (2.60%) Operational Technology
7 1 (1.30%) Enterprise Cloud
7 1 (1.30%) Hybrid Cloud
7 1 (1.30%) Onboarding
7 1 (1.30%) Replication
7 1 (1.30%) Security Posture
Operating Systems
1 59 (76.62%) Windows
2 50 (64.94%) Windows Server
3 10 (12.99%) Linux
4 9 (11.69%) Windows Server 2019
5 7 (9.09%) Windows 10
6 4 (5.19%) Windows Server 2003
7 2 (2.60%) Windows 7
7 2 (2.60%) Windows Server 2008
7 2 (2.60%) Windows Server 2012
7 2 (2.60%) Windows Server 2016
8 1 (1.30%) Mac OS
Processes & Methodologies
1 31 (40.26%) Infrastructure Engineering
2 18 (23.38%) ITSM
3 16 (20.78%) Problem-Solving
4 12 (15.58%) Change Management
5 10 (12.99%) Continuous Improvement
6 8 (10.39%) Coaching
7 7 (9.09%) ITIL
7 7 (9.09%) Privileged Access Management
8 6 (7.79%) Customer Service
9 5 (6.49%) AI
9 5 (6.49%) DevOps
9 5 (6.49%) Incident Management
9 5 (6.49%) Service Delivery
9 5 (6.49%) Vulnerability Remediation
10 4 (5.19%) Cybersecurity
10 4 (5.19%) Infrastructure Monitoring
11 3 (3.90%) Collaborative Working
11 3 (3.90%) Identity Access Management
11 3 (3.90%) Server Management
11 3 (3.90%) Vulnerability Management
Programming Languages
1 20 (25.97%) PowerShell
2 7 (9.09%) SQL
3 1 (1.30%) Python
Qualifications
1 48 (62.34%) Security Cleared
2 37 (48.05%) DV Cleared
3 11 (14.29%) SC Cleared
4 5 (6.49%) Degree
5 3 (3.90%) Microsoft Certification
6 1 (1.30%) BPSS Clearance
6 1 (1.30%) CCNA
6 1 (1.30%) Cisco Certification
6 1 (1.30%) MCSE
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 1 (1.30%) Cyber Essentials
1 1 (1.30%) GxP
1 1 (1.30%) NCSC
1 1 (1.30%) SLA
System Software
1 44 (57.14%) Active Directory
2 35 (45.45%) VMware Infrastructure
3 18 (23.38%) Hyper-V
4 8 (10.39%) BitLocker
4 8 (10.39%) VMware ESXi
5 7 (9.09%) Microsoft App-V
6 6 (7.79%) Docker
7 5 (6.49%) vSphere
8 4 (5.19%) Terminal Services
9 1 (1.30%) Citrix Hypervisor
9 1 (1.30%) Virtual Desktop
Systems Management
1 21 (27.27%) vCenter Server
2 18 (23.38%) SCOM
3 13 (16.88%) Avamar
4 11 (14.29%) Microsoft Intune
5 8 (10.39%) Ansible
6 7 (9.09%) SCCM
6 7 (9.09%) vMotion
7 6 (7.79%) Kubernetes
7 6 (7.79%) Puppet
8 3 (3.90%) Backup Exec
8 3 (3.90%) Nagios
8 3 (3.90%) SCSM
9 2 (2.60%) Failover Clustering
9 2 (2.60%) Microsoft Clustering
10 1 (1.30%) SysTrack
10 1 (1.30%) WSUS
Vendors
1 46 (59.74%) Microsoft
2 39 (50.65%) VMware
3 15 (19.48%) Dell
4 13 (16.88%) Thales
5 10 (12.99%) Citrix
6 9 (11.69%) Juniper
7 8 (10.39%) NetApp
8 7 (9.09%) HP
9 5 (6.49%) ServiceNow
10 4 (5.19%) Google
10 4 (5.19%) Symantec
10 4 (5.19%) Veeam
11 3 (3.90%) Cisco
11 3 (3.90%) McAfee
11 3 (3.90%) Trend Micro
12 2 (2.60%) Proofpoint
13 1 (1.30%) Clearswift
13 1 (1.30%) Nexthink
13 1 (1.30%) Okta
13 1 (1.30%) SolarWinds