CCNP Contract Job Trends

Cisco Certified Network Professional (CCNP)
UK

The table below provides summary statistics for contract job vacancies with a requirement for CCNP qualifications. It includes a benchmarking guide to the contractor rates offered over the 6 months leading up to 15 June 2026, comparing them to the same period in the previous two years.

6 months to
15 Jun 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 337 251 284
Rank change year-on-year -86 +33 +30
Contract jobs citing CCNP 332 324 356
As % of all contract jobs in the UK 0.66% 1.09% 0.81%
As % of the Qualifications category 2.11% 3.54% 2.72%
Number of daily rates quoted 255 200 232
10th Percentile £363 £359 £329
25th Percentile £413 £425 £381
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £475 £500 £505
Median % change year-on-year -5.00% -0.99% +1.00%
75th Percentile £557 £603 £595
90th Percentile £626 £649 £684
UK excluding London median daily rate £475 £500 £514
% change year-on-year -5.00% -2.68% +8.16%
Number of hourly rates quoted 9 8 7
10th Percentile £55.00 - £17.05
25th Percentile £61.25 £29.00 £20.75
Median hourly rate £73.00 £30.00 £23.00
Median % change year-on-year +143.33% +30.43% -61.67%
75th Percentile £78.50 £64.38 £39.38
90th Percentile £79.00 £74.13 £59.00
UK excluding London median hourly rate £70.25 £30.00 £19.00
% change year-on-year +134.17% +57.89% -69.35%

All Academic and Professional Certifications
UK

CCNP falls under the Academic Qualifications and Professional Certifications category. For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all contract job vacancies requiring academic qualifications or professional certifications.

Contract vacancies requiring academic qualifications or professional certifications 15,731 9,165 13,077
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the UK 31.35% 30.95% 29.92%
Number of daily rates quoted 10,453 5,680 8,081
10th Percentile £350 £275 £310
25th Percentile £425 £413 £425
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £525 £520 £525
Median % change year-on-year +0.96% -0.95% -4.55%
75th Percentile £624 £615 £638
90th Percentile £713 £700 £738
UK excluding London median daily rate £505 £500 £525
% change year-on-year +1.00% -4.76% -0.94%
Number of hourly rates quoted 1,159 588 1,116
10th Percentile £17.08 £17.85 £13.99
25th Percentile £22.63 £21.00 £18.35
Median hourly rate £50.00 £30.00 £40.00
Median % change year-on-year +66.67% -25.00% -27.27%
75th Percentile £72.25 £63.38 £63.75
90th Percentile £85.25 £77.28 £75.75
UK excluding London median hourly rate £47.54 £28.34 £41.50
% change year-on-year +67.75% -31.71% -20.95%

CCNP
Job Vacancy Trend

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

CCNP job vacancy trend in the UK

CCNP
Daily Rate Trend

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

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

CCNP
Daily Rate Histogram

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing CCNP over the 6 months to 15 June 2026.

Daily rate histogram for CCNP in the UK

CCNP
Hourly Rate Trend

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

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

CCNP
Hourly Rate Histogram

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing CCNP over the 6 months to 15 June 2026.

Hourly rate histogram for CCNP in the UK

CCNP
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 CCNP within the UK over the 6 months to 15 June 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 -100 273 £475 -10.59% 72
UK excluding London -102 200 £475 -5.00% 74
London -69 96 £473 -5.50% 26
Work from Home -39 86 £463 -7.50% 34
North of England -39 67 £486 +2.22% 8
North West +1 61 £481 +1.32% 5
South East -66 59 £463 -2.63% 30
Midlands -51 30 £425 -19.05% 7
West Midlands -49 27 £425 -12.82% 4
Scotland -5 23 £421 +5.58% 8
South West -65 9 £551 -8.13% 6
East of England -30 8 £505 -8.18% 8
Yorkshire -56 6 £569 +3.41% 3
Wales -27 2 £600 +41.18% 3
East Midlands -31 2 - - 3
Northern Ireland - 2 £468 - 6

CCNP
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 5 (1.51%) Confluence
2 3 (0.90%) SharePoint
3 2 (0.60%) Apache
3 2 (0.60%) CloudStack
Applications
1 14 (4.22%) Microsoft Office
1 14 (4.22%) MS Visio
2 3 (0.90%) Microsoft Excel
3 2 (0.60%) Microsoft PowerPoint
4 1 (0.30%) Microsoft Project
Cloud Services
1 85 (25.60%) Azure
2 72 (21.69%) AWS
3 16 (4.82%) GCP
4 8 (2.41%) Entra ID
5 7 (2.11%) Azure Sentinel
6 6 (1.81%) Azure ExpressRoute
7 5 (1.51%) GitHub
7 5 (1.51%) Virtual Private Cloud
8 4 (1.20%) Microsoft 365
9 3 (0.90%) AWS Direct Connect
9 3 (0.90%) Azure DevOps
9 3 (0.90%) Catchpoint
9 3 (0.90%) IaaS
10 2 (0.60%) Amazon EKS
10 2 (0.60%) Google Ads
10 2 (0.60%) Nutanix
10 2 (0.60%) OpenShift
11 1 (0.30%) PaaS
11 1 (0.30%) Route 53
11 1 (0.30%) SaaS
Communications & Networking
1 208 (62.65%) Firewall
2 138 (41.57%) WAN
3 114 (34.34%) LAN
4 109 (32.83%) BGP
5 101 (30.42%) Network Security
6 83 (25.00%) OSPF
7 82 (24.70%) VPN
8 80 (24.10%) VLAN
9 78 (23.49%) Wireless
10 55 (16.57%) DNS
11 52 (15.66%) SD-WAN
12 45 (13.55%) Wi-Fi
13 39 (11.75%) DHCP
14 35 (10.54%) Cisco IOS
15 33 (9.94%) TCP/IP
15 33 (9.94%) VXLAN
16 32 (9.64%) MPLS
16 32 (9.64%) Structured Cabling
17 30 (9.04%) IPsec
18 29 (8.73%) NX-OS
Development Applications
1 11 (3.31%) JIRA
2 8 (2.41%) Sonatype Nexus
3 7 (2.11%) Git
4 3 (0.90%) Bitbucket
4 3 (0.90%) Jenkins
5 2 (0.60%) GitLab
6 1 (0.30%) Atlassian Bamboo
6 1 (0.30%) Browser DevTools
General
1 83 (25.00%) Social Skills
2 34 (10.24%) Analytical Skills
2 34 (10.24%) Documentation Skills
3 25 (7.53%) Finance
4 24 (7.23%) Public Sector
5 19 (5.72%) Telecoms
6 13 (3.92%) Manufacturing
7 9 (2.71%) Legal
8 5 (1.51%) Banking
8 5 (1.51%) Retail
9 4 (1.20%) Presentation Skills
10 3 (0.90%) Local Government
10 3 (0.90%) Military
10 3 (0.90%) Police
11 2 (0.60%) Aviation
11 2 (0.60%) Financial Institution
11 2 (0.60%) Influencing Skills
11 2 (0.60%) Investment Banking
12 1 (0.30%) Aerospace
12 1 (0.30%) Front Office
Job Titles
1 190 (57.23%) Network Engineer
2 50 (15.06%) Architect
3 29 (8.73%) Cisco Engineer
3 29 (8.73%) Senior
4 28 (8.43%) SC Cleared Network Engineer
5 27 (8.13%) Network Architect
6 24 (7.23%) Cisco Network Engineer
7 16 (4.82%) Security Engineer
7 16 (4.82%) Technical Architect
8 14 (4.22%) Network Security Engineer
8 14 (4.22%) Senior Network Engineer
9 13 (3.92%) Operations Engineer
10 11 (3.31%) Automation Engineer
10 11 (3.31%) Lead
11 8 (2.41%) Designer
11 8 (2.41%) Infrastructure Engineer
12 7 (2.11%) NOC Engineer
13 6 (1.81%) Network Manager
13 6 (1.81%) Security Architect
13 6 (1.81%) Technical Leader
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 28 (8.43%) 802.1X
2 5 (1.51%) REST
3 4 (1.20%) Jinja
4 3 (0.90%) CSS
4 3 (0.90%) HTML
4 3 (0.90%) SOAP
5 2 (0.60%) Elastic Stack
5 2 (0.60%) JSON
5 2 (0.60%) RFC 2544
5 2 (0.60%) XML
6 1 (0.30%) ARM Templates
Miscellaneous
1 143 (43.07%) Data Centre
2 16 (4.82%) Hybrid Cloud
3 12 (3.61%) Public Cloud
4 11 (3.31%) Operational Technology
5 8 (2.41%) Data Protection Act
5 8 (2.41%) Onboarding
5 8 (2.41%) PKI
6 7 (2.11%) Security Posture
7 4 (1.20%) Distributed Denial-of-Service
7 4 (1.20%) EMC VMAX
7 4 (1.20%) Enterprise Storage
7 4 (1.20%) Management Information System
7 4 (1.20%) Private Cloud
7 4 (1.20%) SCADA
7 4 (1.20%) Video Conferencing
7 4 (1.20%) Virtual Team
8 3 (0.90%) BYOD
8 3 (0.90%) Cloud Native
8 3 (0.90%) Linux Command Line
8 3 (0.90%) Product Ownership
Operating Systems
1 31 (9.34%) Windows
2 25 (7.53%) Linux
3 7 (2.11%) Windows Server
4 2 (0.60%) Ubuntu
5 1 (0.30%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
5 1 (0.30%) VMS
Processes & Methodologies
1 45 (13.55%) High Availability
1 45 (13.55%) ITIL
2 43 (12.95%) Project Delivery
3 41 (12.35%) Migration
3 41 (12.35%) Problem-Solving
4 40 (12.05%) Network Design
5 38 (11.45%) Continuous Improvement
5 38 (11.45%) Network Monitoring
6 36 (10.84%) Change Management
7 34 (10.24%) Agile
8 33 (9.94%) Network Segmentation
9 32 (9.64%) Infrastructure as Code
10 30 (9.04%) Load Balancing
11 29 (8.73%) Mentoring
12 28 (8.43%) ITSM
12 28 (8.43%) Network Architecture
12 28 (8.43%) Validation
13 25 (7.53%) Technical Leadership
14 20 (6.02%) Capacity Planning
14 20 (6.02%) Cybersecurity
Programming Languages
1 50 (15.06%) Python
2 11 (3.31%) Bash
3 5 (1.51%) PowerShell
4 3 (0.90%) JavaScript
4 3 (0.90%) Lisp
5 2 (0.60%) Perl
Qualifications
1 332 (100.00%) Cisco Certification
2 115 (34.64%) Security Cleared
3 107 (32.23%) CCNA
4 97 (29.22%) SC Cleared
5 63 (18.98%) CCIE
6 42 (12.65%) Degree
7 24 (7.23%) Network+ Certification
8 18 (5.42%) DV Cleared
9 17 (5.12%) Server+ Certification
10 15 (4.52%) CCSE
11 10 (3.01%) AWS Certification
11 10 (3.01%) Microsoft Certification
12 8 (2.41%) Azure Certification
12 8 (2.41%) VMware Certified Professional (VCP)
13 7 (2.11%) Computer Science Degree
13 7 (2.11%) JNCIS
14 6 (1.81%) AWS Certified Solutions Architect
14 6 (1.81%) CISSP
14 6 (1.81%) CompTIA Security+
14 6 (1.81%) JNCIP
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 13 (3.92%) NCSC
2 9 (2.71%) SLA
3 8 (2.41%) NIST
4 7 (2.11%) QA
5 6 (1.81%) ISO/IEC 27001
6 3 (0.90%) GDPR
7 2 (0.60%) Disclosure Scotland
8 1 (0.30%) Actionable Recommendations
8 1 (0.30%) GRC
8 1 (0.30%) GxP
8 1 (0.30%) PCI DSS
8 1 (0.30%) RMADS
System Software
1 17 (5.12%) VMware Infrastructure
2 16 (4.82%) Active Directory
3 11 (3.31%) VMware NSX
4 9 (2.71%) VMware ESXi
5 7 (2.11%) vSphere
6 6 (1.81%) Firmware
6 6 (1.81%) Hyper-V
7 4 (1.20%) SRDF
8 2 (0.60%) Virtual Servers
9 1 (0.30%) Docker
9 1 (0.30%) Virtual Machines
Systems Management
1 53 (15.96%) Ansible
2 27 (8.13%) Terraform
3 20 (6.02%) FortiGate
4 15 (4.52%) Grafana
4 15 (4.52%) Prometheus
5 6 (1.81%) Cisco Prime
6 5 (1.51%) Cisco CUCM
7 4 (1.20%) EMC TimeFinder
7 4 (1.20%) Kubernetes
7 4 (1.20%) Nagios
8 3 (0.90%) Progress Chef
8 3 (0.90%) Puppet
8 3 (0.90%) QRadar
9 2 (0.60%) Check_MK
9 2 (0.60%) Iperf
9 2 (0.60%) Nmap
9 2 (0.60%) SCCM
10 1 (0.30%) OPNET
10 1 (0.30%) SolarWinds Orion
10 1 (0.30%) TrustSec
Vendors
1 251 (75.60%) Cisco
2 108 (32.53%) Palo Alto
3 67 (20.18%) Fortinet
4 49 (14.76%) Aruba
5 48 (14.46%) Juniper
6 45 (13.55%) CheckPoint
7 39 (11.75%) F5
7 39 (11.75%) Microsoft
8 36 (10.84%) Arista
9 34 (10.24%) VMware
10 33 (9.94%) ServiceNow
11 15 (4.52%) Ekahau
12 14 (4.22%) Meraki
13 13 (3.92%) Zscaler
14 12 (3.61%) SolarWinds
15 8 (2.41%) Infoblox
15 8 (2.41%) Splunk
16 7 (2.11%) Dell
16 7 (2.11%) ForeScout
16 7 (2.11%) HP