3rd Line Engineer Contract Job Trends

Third Line Engineer
UK

The median Third Line Engineer daily rate in the UK is £500, according to job vacancies posted in the 6 months leading up to 9 March 2026.

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

6 months to
9 Mar 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 550 485 455
Rank change year-on-year -65 -30 +129
Contract jobs requiring a 3rd Line Engineer 62 37 147
As % of all contract jobs in the UK 0.15% 0.12% 0.33%
As % of the Job Titles category 0.16% 0.13% 0.35%
Number of daily rates quoted 52 33 85
10th Percentile £283 £241 £250
25th Percentile £413 £350 £290
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £375 £340
Median % change year-on-year +33.33% +10.29% -15.00%
75th Percentile - £488 £388
90th Percentile £638 £600 £475
UK excluding London median daily rate £500 £375 £334
% change year-on-year +33.33% +12.44% -11.07%
Number of hourly rates quoted 0 2 0
Median hourly rate - £23.58 -
UK excluding London median hourly rate - £22.50 -

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 38,836 27,659 41,539
% of contract IT jobs with a recognized job title 91.96% 92.95% 92.88%
Number of daily rates quoted 24,338 17,830 27,237
10th Percentile £310 £294 £270
25th Percentile £409 £406 £406
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £525 £525
Median % change year-on-year -4.76% - -4.55%
75th Percentile £613 £638 £638
90th Percentile £720 £738 £738
UK excluding London median daily rate £481 £475 £488
% change year-on-year +1.26% -2.56% -2.50%
Number of hourly rates quoted 2,391 872 2,505
10th Percentile £14.82 £15.81 £13.00
25th Percentile £19.00 £21.25 £16.25
Median hourly rate £34.95 £33.75 £32.69
Median % change year-on-year +3.54% +3.24% -20.33%
75th Percentile £65.00 £65.00 £60.00
90th Percentile £75.00 £76.25 £71.89
UK excluding London median hourly rate £33.50 £32.50 £32.90
% change year-on-year +3.08% -1.20% -17.30%

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 9 March 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 12 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 9 March 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 -46 62 £500 +25.00% 59
UK excluding London -67 38 £500 +33.33% 58
South East -26 26 £500 -6.98% 29
London -23 24 £450 +16.13% 12
Midlands -56 7 £400 +6.67% 5
Work from Home -33 6 £280 -30.43% 25
West Midlands -52 5 £400 +6.67% 3
South West -27 3 £375 - 2
East Midlands - 2 £248 - 2
North West -27 1 - - 3
East of England -34 1 - - 7
North of England -59 1 - - 11

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

For the 6 months to 9 March 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 47 (75.81%) Security Cleared
2 36 (58.06%) DV Cleared
3 29 (46.77%) Windows
4 26 (41.94%) Active Directory
5 22 (35.48%) PowerShell
5 22 (35.48%) vCenter Server
5 22 (35.48%) Windows Server
6 21 (33.87%) ITSM
7 20 (32.26%) VMware
8 17 (27.42%) DNS
9 16 (25.81%) Juniper
9 16 (25.81%) Microsoft
10 15 (24.19%) Firewall
10 15 (24.19%) VPN
11 14 (22.58%) VMware Infrastructure
12 13 (20.97%) Azure
12 13 (20.97%) Cisco
12 13 (20.97%) Linux
12 13 (20.97%) Problem-Solving
13 12 (19.35%) Change Management
13 12 (19.35%) Cisco Firepower
13 12 (19.35%) Cisco IOS
13 12 (19.35%) Cisco ISE
13 12 (19.35%) DHCP
13 12 (19.35%) Infrastructure Engineering
13 12 (19.35%) Junos
13 12 (19.35%) SolarWinds
13 12 (19.35%) VMware NSX
14 11 (17.74%) Microsoft 365
14 11 (17.74%) Microsoft Exchange

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 11 (17.74%) Microsoft Exchange
2 3 (4.84%) SharePoint
Cloud Services
1 13 (20.97%) Azure
2 11 (17.74%) Microsoft 365
3 8 (12.90%) Entra ID
4 5 (8.06%) IaaS
4 5 (8.06%) PaaS
5 4 (6.45%) AWS
6 3 (4.84%) Power Platform
7 2 (3.23%) Microsoft Purview
7 2 (3.23%) PowerApps
8 1 (1.61%) GCP
8 1 (1.61%) Nutanix
8 1 (1.61%) OneDrive
Communications & Networking
1 17 (27.42%) DNS
2 15 (24.19%) Firewall
2 15 (24.19%) VPN
3 12 (19.35%) Cisco Firepower
3 12 (19.35%) Cisco IOS
3 12 (19.35%) Cisco ISE
3 12 (19.35%) DHCP
3 12 (19.35%) Junos
4 6 (9.68%) WAN
5 5 (8.06%) NX-OS
5 5 (8.06%) SMTP
6 4 (6.45%) BGP
6 4 (6.45%) IPsec
6 4 (6.45%) MPLS
7 3 (4.84%) VLAN
8 2 (3.23%) LAN
8 2 (3.23%) TCP/IP
9 1 (1.61%) DKIM
9 1 (1.61%) Network Security
Database & Business Intelligence
1 5 (8.06%) Elasticsearch
2 2 (3.23%) SQL Server
3 1 (1.61%) Power BI
General
1 9 (14.52%) Public Sector
1 9 (14.52%) Social Skills
2 8 (12.90%) Analytical Skills
3 2 (3.23%) Inclusion and Diversity
4 1 (1.61%) Aerospace
4 1 (1.61%) Law
4 1 (1.61%) Local Government
Miscellaneous
1 19 (30.65%) PKI
2 5 (8.06%) Clustering
2 5 (8.06%) Enterprise Storage
3 4 (6.45%) Analytical Mindset
4 2 (3.23%) Hybrid Cloud
4 2 (3.23%) Operational Technology
5 1 (1.61%) Enterprise Software
5 1 (1.61%) Legacy Systems
5 1 (1.61%) Onboarding
5 1 (1.61%) Security Posture
5 1 (1.61%) Self-Motivation
5 1 (1.61%) Smartphone
Operating Systems
1 29 (46.77%) Windows
2 22 (35.48%) Windows Server
3 13 (20.97%) Linux
4 5 (8.06%) Windows 10
4 5 (8.06%) Windows Server 2003
5 3 (4.84%) Mac OS
6 2 (3.23%) Windows Server 2019
7 1 (1.61%) Windows Server 2016
Processes & Methodologies
1 21 (33.87%) ITSM
2 13 (20.97%) Problem-Solving
3 12 (19.35%) Change Management
3 12 (19.35%) Infrastructure Engineering
4 10 (16.13%) Agile
4 10 (16.13%) ITIL
5 9 (14.52%) Service Management
6 6 (9.68%) Mentoring
7 5 (8.06%) Creative Thinking
7 5 (8.06%) Incident Management
7 5 (8.06%) Load Balancing
7 5 (8.06%) Platform Engineering
7 5 (8.06%) Zero Trust
8 4 (6.45%) Change Control
8 4 (6.45%) Customer Service
8 4 (6.45%) Network Design
8 4 (6.45%) Network Virtualisation
8 4 (6.45%) Root Cause Analysis
9 3 (4.84%) Performance Metrics
9 3 (4.84%) Vulnerability Management
Programming Languages
1 22 (35.48%) PowerShell
2 2 (3.23%) Bash
2 2 (3.23%) SQL
2 2 (3.23%) VBScript
3 1 (1.61%) Python
Qualifications
1 47 (75.81%) Security Cleared
2 36 (58.06%) DV Cleared
3 10 (16.13%) SC Cleared
4 3 (4.84%) Microsoft Certification
5 2 (3.23%) Degree
5 2 (3.23%) ITIL Foundation Certificate
6 1 (1.61%) CCNA
6 1 (1.61%) Cisco Certification
6 1 (1.61%) MCSE
6 1 (1.61%) Network+ Certification
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 4 (6.45%) Cyber Essentials
1 4 (6.45%) ISO/IEC 27001
2 2 (3.23%) GDPR
System Software
1 26 (41.94%) Active Directory
2 14 (22.58%) VMware Infrastructure
3 12 (19.35%) VMware NSX
4 8 (12.90%) Hyper-V
5 5 (8.06%) BitLocker
5 5 (8.06%) Docker
5 5 (8.06%) Microsoft App-V
5 5 (8.06%) VMware ESXi
6 4 (6.45%) Firmware
7 2 (3.23%) Virtual Machines
8 1 (1.61%) vSphere
Systems Management
1 22 (35.48%) vCenter Server
2 11 (17.74%) Microsoft Intune
3 9 (14.52%) SCCM
4 6 (9.68%) Ansible
4 6 (9.68%) SCOM
5 5 (8.06%) Kubernetes
5 5 (8.06%) Puppet
5 5 (8.06%) vMotion
6 2 (3.23%) Jamf Pro
Vendors
1 20 (32.26%) VMware
2 16 (25.81%) Juniper
2 16 (25.81%) Microsoft
3 13 (20.97%) Cisco
4 12 (19.35%) SolarWinds
5 9 (14.52%) NetApp
6 5 (8.06%) Broadcom
6 5 (8.06%) Citrix
7 2 (3.23%) Apple
7 2 (3.23%) Proofpoint
8 1 (1.61%) Barracuda Networks
8 1 (1.61%) CheckPoint
8 1 (1.61%) ConnectWise
8 1 (1.61%) Netskope
8 1 (1.61%) Palo Alto
8 1 (1.61%) QNAP
8 1 (1.61%) ServiceNow