BGP Contract Job Trends

Border Gateway Protocol (BGP)
UK

The table below provides summary statistics and contractor rates for jobs requiring BGP skills. It covers contract job vacancies from the 6 months leading up to 1 July 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
1 Jul 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 287 240 275
Rank change year-on-year -47 +35 +21
Contract jobs citing BGP 437 338 371
As % of all contract jobs in the UK 0.85% 1.10% 0.86%
As % of the Communications & Networking category 8.92% 8.92% 6.88%
Number of daily rates quoted 256 212 234
10th Percentile £350 £329 £313
25th Percentile £405 £419 £400
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £475 £500 £475
Median % change year-on-year -5.00% +5.26% -5.00%
75th Percentile £560 £625 £538
90th Percentile £638 £700 £600
UK excluding London median daily rate £495 £475 £475
% change year-on-year +4.21% - -2.26%
Number of hourly rates quoted 3 3 4
10th Percentile £47.22 £37.00 £19.93
25th Percentile £56.01 £38.13 £22.06
Median hourly rate £71.33 £40.00 £39.25
Median % change year-on-year +78.33% +1.91% -43.93%
75th Percentile £73.13 £49.38 £57.50
90th Percentile £73.81 £55.00 £62.00
UK excluding London median hourly rate £71.33 - £19.00
% change year-on-year - - -69.35%

All Communications and Computer Networking Skills
UK

BGP 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.

Contract vacancies with a requirement for communications or computer networking skills 4,897 3,788 5,390
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the UK 9.53% 12.32% 12.49%
Number of daily rates quoted 2,987 2,310 3,177
10th Percentile £250 £230 £213
25th Percentile £400 £363 £350
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £480 £500
Median % change year-on-year +4.17% -4.00% -1.19%
75th Percentile £588 £588 £600
90th Percentile £675 £675 £688
UK excluding London median daily rate £481 £472 £490
% change year-on-year +1.91% -3.62% +3.16%
Number of hourly rates quoted 303 180 431
10th Percentile £16.01 £14.99 £13.87
25th Percentile £19.34 £23.56 £17.69
Median hourly rate £26.66 £45.00 £45.00
Median % change year-on-year -40.76% - +114.29%
75th Percentile £65.00 £62.31 £63.75
90th Percentile £74.00 £80.10 £73.25
UK excluding London median hourly rate £26.22 £36.57 £47.50
% change year-on-year -28.31% -23.01% +115.91%

BGP
Job Vacancy Trend

Historical trend showing the proportion of contract IT job postings citing BGP relative to all contract IT jobs advertised.

BGP job vacancy trend in the UK

BGP
Daily Rate Trend

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in the UK citing BGP.

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in the UK citing BGP

BGP
Daily Rate Histogram

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing BGP over the 6 months to 1 July 2026.

Daily rate histogram for BGP in the UK

BGP
Hourly Rate Trend

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in the UK citing BGP.

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in the UK citing BGP

BGP
Hourly Rate Histogram

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing BGP over the 6 months to 1 July 2026.

Hourly rate histogram for BGP in the UK

BGP
Top 16 Contract Job Locations

The table below looks at the demand and provides a guide to the median contractor rates quoted in IT jobs citing BGP within the UK over the 6 months to 1 July 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 -25 392 £495 -1.00% 74
UK excluding London -23 259 £495 +4.21% 61
Work from Home -37 123 £450 -15.09% 38
London -81 117 £475 - 30
South East +9 105 £480 +6.67% 17
North of England -33 93 £490 +3.16% 12
North West -12 73 £475 -2.56% 7
Midlands -33 53 £419 +11.67% 8
West Midlands -26 50 £413 +17.86% 6
South West -45 26 £538 -14.00% 8
North East -20 13 £650 +160.00%
Yorkshire -39 13 £483 +37.86% 5
Scotland -7 10 £418 -4.57% 5
East of England -21 5 £500 - 6
Wales -17 4 £425 -5.56% 1
East Midlands -14 2 - - 2

BGP
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 (2.52%) OpenStack
2 4 (0.92%) Confluence
2 4 (0.92%) SharePoint
3 3 (0.69%) SAS
4 1 (0.23%) Microsoft Exchange
Applications
1 13 (2.97%) MS Visio
2 7 (1.60%) Microsoft Office
2 7 (1.60%) Microsoft PowerPoint
3 5 (1.14%) Microsoft Excel
4 3 (0.69%) AutoCAD
Cloud Services
1 102 (23.34%) Azure
2 89 (20.37%) AWS
3 31 (7.09%) GCP
4 22 (5.03%) OCI
5 17 (3.89%) SaaS
5 17 (3.89%) Virtual Private Cloud
6 14 (3.20%) Azure ExpressRoute
7 10 (2.29%) Azure Sentinel
8 9 (2.06%) AWS Direct Connect
9 7 (1.60%) Azure Monitor
10 6 (1.37%) GitHub
10 6 (1.37%) Nutanix
11 5 (1.14%) Amazon GuardDuty
11 5 (1.14%) Route 53
12 4 (0.92%) Amazon EKS
12 4 (0.92%) AWS CloudFormation
12 4 (0.92%) Entra ID
13 3 (0.69%) Amazon S3
13 3 (0.69%) IaaS
13 3 (0.69%) Microsoft 365
Communications & Networking
1 288 (65.90%) OSPF
2 257 (58.81%) Firewall
3 246 (56.29%) WAN
4 150 (34.32%) LAN
5 128 (29.29%) VPN
6 117 (26.77%) VXLAN
7 107 (24.49%) Network Security
8 106 (24.26%) MPLS
9 103 (23.57%) VLAN
10 94 (21.51%) DNS
11 91 (20.82%) SD-WAN
12 87 (19.91%) Ethernet VPN
13 71 (16.25%) Multicast
14 65 (14.87%) BIG-IP
15 64 (14.65%) TCP/IP
16 59 (13.50%) IPsec
17 50 (11.44%) Wireless
18 49 (11.21%) F5 BIG-IP LTM
19 48 (10.98%) Cisco ASA
20 47 (10.76%) Cisco Nexus
Development Applications
1 21 (4.81%) GitLab
2 12 (2.75%) Git
3 9 (2.06%) Sonatype Nexus
4 7 (1.60%) JIRA
5 3 (0.69%) Jenkins
6 1 (0.23%) AppScan
6 1 (0.23%) Bitbucket
6 1 (0.23%) Burp Suite
6 1 (0.23%) Metasploit
General
1 66 (15.10%) Social Skills
2 44 (10.07%) Finance
3 37 (8.47%) Analytical Skills
4 34 (7.78%) Public Sector
5 31 (7.09%) Banking
6 30 (6.86%) Telecoms
7 23 (5.26%) Documentation Skills
8 20 (4.58%) Investment Banking
9 13 (2.97%) Financial Institution
10 11 (2.52%) Military
11 7 (1.60%) Legal
12 5 (1.14%) Manufacturing
12 5 (1.14%) Police
12 5 (1.14%) Retail
13 3 (0.69%) French Language
13 3 (0.69%) German Language
13 3 (0.69%) Inclusion and Diversity
13 3 (0.69%) Italian Language
13 3 (0.69%) Marketing
13 3 (0.69%) Spanish Language
Job Titles
1 245 (56.06%) Network Engineer
2 86 (19.68%) Senior
3 59 (13.50%) Cisco Engineer
4 56 (12.81%) Cisco Network Engineer
5 50 (11.44%) Security Engineer
6 48 (10.98%) Senior Network Engineer
7 45 (10.30%) Architect
7 45 (10.30%) Network Security Engineer
8 44 (10.07%) Data Network Engineer
9 34 (7.78%) Cisco Security Engineer
10 33 (7.55%) Data Engineer
11 32 (7.32%) Network Architect
12 25 (5.72%) Network Specialist
13 24 (5.49%) Infrastructure Engineer
14 21 (4.81%) SC Cleared Network Engineer
15 18 (4.12%) Senior Infrastructure Engineer
16 16 (3.66%) Consultant
16 16 (3.66%) Web Engineer
17 14 (3.20%) Firewall Specialist
18 13 (2.97%) Operations Engineer
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 38 (8.70%) 802.1X
2 15 (3.43%) REST
3 11 (2.52%) NETCONF
3 11 (2.52%) YANG
4 7 (1.60%) LDAP
5 5 (1.14%) CSS
6 4 (0.92%) Jinja
6 4 (0.92%) OpenConfig
6 4 (0.92%) RESTCONF
7 2 (0.46%) AWS CDK
7 2 (0.46%) RFC 2544
7 2 (0.46%) SAML
8 1 (0.23%) eBPF
8 1 (0.23%) HTML
8 1 (0.23%) Model Context Protocol
Miscellaneous
1 192 (43.94%) Data Centre
2 47 (10.76%) Hybrid Cloud
3 38 (8.70%) PKI
4 26 (5.95%) Clustering
5 25 (5.72%) Cloud Native
6 9 (2.06%) Distributed Denial-of-Service
7 8 (1.83%) Private Cloud
8 7 (1.60%) Analytical Mindset
8 7 (1.60%) Security Posture
9 5 (1.14%) Onboarding
9 5 (1.14%) Self-Motivation
10 4 (0.92%) Data Protection Act
10 4 (0.92%) Distributed Systems
10 4 (0.92%) Management Information System
10 4 (0.92%) Operational Technology
10 4 (0.92%) Public Cloud
11 3 (0.69%) Greenfield Project
11 3 (0.69%) Linux Command Line
11 3 (0.69%) SCADA
11 3 (0.69%) Virtual Team
Operating Systems
1 48 (10.98%) Windows
2 17 (3.89%) Linux
3 6 (1.37%) Ubuntu
4 3 (0.69%) Windows Server
5 2 (0.46%) Unix
5 2 (0.46%) VMS
6 1 (0.23%) Kali Linux
6 1 (0.23%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
6 1 (0.23%) Windows Server 2012
6 1 (0.23%) Windows Server 2016
6 1 (0.23%) Windows Server 2019
Processes & Methodologies
1 108 (24.71%) Load Balancing
2 78 (17.85%) High Availability
3 69 (15.79%) Network Design
4 66 (15.10%) Infrastructure as Code
5 64 (14.65%) Migration
6 63 (14.42%) Zero Trust
7 50 (11.44%) Problem-Solving
8 47 (10.76%) Network Architecture
9 43 (9.84%) ITIL
10 41 (9.38%) CI/CD
11 36 (8.24%) Change Management
12 35 (8.01%) Observability
13 34 (7.78%) DevOps
13 34 (7.78%) Project Delivery
14 33 (7.55%) Infrastructure Engineering
15 32 (7.32%) Validation
16 30 (6.86%) Network Segmentation
17 27 (6.18%) Identity Access Management
18 26 (5.95%) Agile
18 26 (5.95%) Continuous Improvement
Programming Languages
1 117 (26.77%) Python
2 9 (2.06%) Bash
3 7 (1.60%) PowerShell
4 6 (1.37%) SQL
5 4 (0.92%) PHP
6 3 (0.69%) Perl
7 1 (0.23%) JavaScript
7 1 (0.23%) Lisp
Qualifications
1 158 (36.16%) Cisco Certification
2 142 (32.49%) Security Cleared
3 113 (25.86%) CCNP
4 98 (22.43%) SC Cleared
5 58 (13.27%) CCIE
6 45 (10.30%) DV Cleared
7 29 (6.64%) Degree
8 23 (5.26%) CCNA
9 16 (3.66%) JNCIE
10 14 (3.20%) JNCIP
11 11 (2.52%) JNCIS
12 10 (2.29%) AWS Certification
12 10 (2.29%) JNCIA
13 8 (1.83%) Azure Certification
13 8 (1.83%) Computer Science Degree
14 6 (1.37%) CISSP
14 6 (1.37%) GIAC
15 5 (1.14%) CompTIA Security+
16 4 (0.92%) APMG
16 4 (0.92%) VMware Certified Professional (VCP)
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 13 (2.97%) NCSC
2 11 (2.52%) NIST
3 10 (2.29%) ISO/IEC 27001
4 5 (1.14%) Cyber Essentials
5 4 (0.92%) Cyber Essentials PLUS
5 4 (0.92%) GDPR
5 4 (0.92%) QA
5 4 (0.92%) SLA
6 3 (0.69%) PCI DSS
7 2 (0.46%) NIST 800
7 2 (0.46%) RMADS
8 1 (0.23%) Actionable Recommendations
8 1 (0.23%) COBIT
8 1 (0.23%) GRC
8 1 (0.23%) HMG Security Policy Framework
8 1 (0.23%) JSP 440
System Software
1 29 (6.64%) VMware Infrastructure
2 14 (3.20%) VMware NSX
3 8 (1.83%) Active Directory
3 8 (1.83%) VMware ESXi
4 7 (1.60%) Firmware
5 6 (1.37%) Hyper-V
6 4 (0.92%) vSphere
7 2 (0.46%) Docker
7 2 (0.46%) vCloud
7 2 (0.46%) Virtual Machines
7 2 (0.46%) Virtual Servers
8 1 (0.23%) KVM
8 1 (0.23%) ProxySG
Systems Management
1 116 (26.54%) Ansible
2 70 (16.02%) Terraform
3 57 (13.04%) FortiGate
4 20 (4.58%) Grafana
5 17 (3.89%) Prometheus
6 7 (1.60%) Kubernetes
7 6 (1.37%) vCenter Server
8 4 (0.92%) Cisco Prime
9 3 (0.69%) SCOM
10 2 (0.46%) CASB
10 2 (0.46%) Iperf
10 2 (0.46%) Microsoft Intune
10 2 (0.46%) Nagios
10 2 (0.46%) Nmap
10 2 (0.46%) QRadar
10 2 (0.46%) Single Sign-On
11 1 (0.23%) Cilium
11 1 (0.23%) OPNET
11 1 (0.23%) Suricata
11 1 (0.23%) VxRail
Vendors
1 297 (67.96%) Cisco
2 156 (35.70%) F5
3 127 (29.06%) Palo Alto
4 92 (21.05%) Juniper
5 87 (19.91%) Fortinet
6 80 (18.31%) Arista
7 43 (9.84%) Aruba
8 42 (9.61%) CheckPoint
9 40 (9.15%) VMware
10 38 (8.70%) SolarWinds
11 31 (7.09%) Splunk
12 26 (5.95%) Extreme Networks
13 22 (5.03%) Microsoft
13 22 (5.03%) Zscaler
14 17 (3.89%) Meraki
15 10 (2.29%) ServiceNow
16 9 (2.06%) Google
17 8 (1.83%) Citrix
18 7 (1.60%) Ekahau
19 6 (1.37%) Nokia