Cisco Contract Job Trends

Cisco
UK

The table below provides summary statistics for contract job vacancies requiring knowledge or experience of Cisco products and/or services. It includes a benchmarking guide to contractor rates offered in vacancies that cited Cisco over the 6 months leading up to 2 October 2026, comparing them to the same period in the previous two years.

The figures below represent the IT contractor job market in general and are not representative of contractor rates within Cisco Systems, Inc.

6 months to
2 Oct 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 122 81 65
Rank change year-on-year -41 -16 -13
Contract jobs citing Cisco 1,214 996 1,257
As % of all contract jobs in the UK 2.21% 3.01% 3.30%
As % of the Vendors category 5.31% 6.31% 7.41%
Number of daily rates quoted 777 634 747
10th Percentile £250 £290 £257
25th Percentile £400 £400 £400
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £475 £484 £500
Median % change year-on-year -1.81% -3.25% +8.11%
75th Percentile £575 £575 £588
90th Percentile £675 £638 £663
UK excluding London median daily rate £463 £490 £500
% change year-on-year -5.52% -2.10% +11.11%
Number of hourly rates quoted 48 44 37
10th Percentile £27.62 - £19.40
25th Percentile £44.00 £25.15 £20.50
Median hourly rate £55.00 £30.00 £27.50
Median % change year-on-year +83.33% +9.09% -42.11%
75th Percentile £68.75 £46.81 £55.00
90th Percentile £78.75 £87.64 £75.00
UK excluding London median hourly rate £55.00 £32.50 £37.50
% change year-on-year +69.23% -13.33% -23.34%

All Vendors
UK

Cisco falls under the Vendor Products and Services category. For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all contract job vacancies requiring knowledge or experience of all vendor products and services.

Contract vacancies with a requirement for knowledge or experience of vendor products and services 22,868 15,778 16,957
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the UK 41.65% 47.64% 44.53%
Number of daily rates quoted 13,862 9,705 10,012
10th Percentile £310 £275 £285
25th Percentile £413 £404 £413
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £513 £500 £525
Median % change year-on-year +2.50% -4.76% -
75th Percentile £619 £613 £626
90th Percentile £710 £700 £725
UK excluding London median daily rate £500 £485 £500
% change year-on-year +3.09% -3.00% -
Number of hourly rates quoted 1,358 820 628
10th Percentile £13.97 £14.75 £14.78
25th Percentile £16.35 £17.69 £15.70
Median hourly rate £25.28 £25.15 £31.25
Median % change year-on-year +0.53% -19.52% -26.90%
75th Percentile £57.50 £41.11 £64.63
90th Percentile £77.73 £68.00 £70.00
UK excluding London median hourly rate £24.19 £21.30 £29.77
% change year-on-year +13.57% -28.45% -29.95%

Cisco
Job Vacancy Trend

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

Cisco job vacancy trend in the UK

Cisco
Daily Rate Trend

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

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

Cisco
Daily Rate Histogram

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing Cisco over the 6 months to 2 October 2026.

Daily rate histogram for Cisco in the UK

Cisco
Hourly Rate Trend

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

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

Cisco
Hourly Rate Histogram

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing Cisco over the 6 months to 2 October 2026.

Hourly rate histogram for Cisco in the UK

Cisco
Top 18 Contract Job Locations

The table below looks at the demand and provides a guide to the median contractor rates quoted in IT jobs citing Cisco within the UK over the 6 months to 2 October 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 1,001 £494 -1.30% 1,375
UK excluding London -38 717 £463 -5.52% 958
London -34 374 £500 +5.26% 543
Work from Home -31 285 £475 +4.11% 326
North of England -1 234 £484 +1.89% 213
North West +12 157 £483 +1.68% 101
South East -77 126 £441 -11.75% 234
Midlands -47 125 £450 - 144
West Midlands -23 121 £450 -8.86% 74
Scotland +5 100 £400 -5.88% 55
Yorkshire -14 70 £500 +1.63% 77
South West -34 61 £525 -4.55% 136
East of England 0 59 £500 +3.63% 132
Wales +11 28 £376 +88.13% 33
Northern Ireland +6 10 £145 -69.47% 24
North East -38 9 £375 -6.25% 35
Channel Islands -3 3 £600 -17.24%
East Midlands -30 2 £525 +233.33% 70

Cisco
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 39 (3.21%) SharePoint
2 34 (2.80%) Microsoft Exchange
3 14 (1.15%) CMS
4 12 (0.99%) Confluence
5 11 (0.91%) OpenStack
6 8 (0.66%) IIS
6 8 (0.66%) SAS
7 7 (0.58%) Apache
8 6 (0.49%) JBoss
9 4 (0.33%) nginx
10 3 (0.25%) CloudStack
10 3 (0.25%) Tomcat
11 2 (0.16%) Skype for Business
12 1 (0.082%) Apache Spark
12 1 (0.082%) FactoryTalk
12 1 (0.082%) Mendix
12 1 (0.082%) SharePoint Server
Applications
1 46 (3.79%) Microsoft Office
2 27 (2.22%) Microsoft Excel
3 22 (1.81%) MS Visio
4 7 (0.58%) Microsoft PowerPoint
5 3 (0.25%) Acrobat
6 1 (0.082%) Chatbot
Business Applications
1 1 (0.082%) Monis
1 1 (0.082%) Remedy ITSM
1 1 (0.082%) Workday HCM
Cloud Services
1 237 (19.52%) Azure
2 151 (12.44%) AWS
3 96 (7.91%) Microsoft 365
4 65 (5.35%) Entra ID
5 36 (2.97%) GitHub
6 32 (2.64%) OneDrive
7 31 (2.55%) GCP
8 19 (1.57%) Azure ExpressRoute
9 15 (1.24%) Nutanix
9 15 (1.24%) Power Platform
10 14 (1.15%) Virtual Private Cloud
11 13 (1.07%) OpenShift
12 12 (0.99%) SaaS
13 10 (0.82%) AWS Direct Connect
14 8 (0.66%) Azure Sentinel
15 7 (0.58%) GitHub Actions
15 7 (0.58%) OCI
15 7 (0.58%) Rubrik
16 6 (0.49%) IaaS
16 6 (0.49%) Microsoft Purview
Communications & Networking
1 490 (40.36%) Firewall
2 355 (29.24%) WAN
3 289 (23.81%) BGP
4 275 (22.65%) LAN
5 265 (21.83%) Network Security
6 257 (21.17%) VPN
7 212 (17.46%) Wireless
8 182 (14.99%) OSPF
9 175 (14.42%) VLAN
10 172 (14.17%) DNS
11 148 (12.19%) SD-WAN
12 136 (11.20%) Wi-Fi
13 135 (11.12%) MPLS
14 109 (8.98%) Cisco Nexus
15 102 (8.40%) DHCP
16 100 (8.24%) TCP/IP
17 93 (7.66%) Cisco ISE
18 89 (7.33%) Cisco IOS
19 83 (6.84%) Cisco ASA
19 83 (6.84%) VXLAN
Database & Business Intelligence
1 27 (2.22%) SQL Server
2 8 (0.66%) Power BI
3 6 (0.49%) Hadoop
4 5 (0.41%) Big Data
5 4 (0.33%) Amazon RDS
6 3 (0.25%) Metadata
6 3 (0.25%) MySQL
7 2 (0.16%) NoSQL
7 2 (0.16%) PostgreSQL
8 1 (0.082%) Apache Hive
8 1 (0.082%) ClickHouse
Development Applications
1 37 (3.05%) Git
2 15 (1.24%) GitLab
2 15 (1.24%) JIRA
3 11 (0.91%) Sonatype Nexus
4 7 (0.58%) Jenkins
5 2 (0.16%) Robot Framework
6 1 (0.082%) Bitbucket
6 1 (0.082%) Tricentis qTest
6 1 (0.082%) Zephyr
General
1 278 (22.90%) Social Skills
2 133 (10.96%) Finance
3 129 (10.63%) Telecoms
4 107 (8.81%) Analytical Skills
5 68 (5.60%) Banking
6 62 (5.11%) Public Sector
7 59 (4.86%) Documentation Skills
8 46 (3.79%) Legal
9 22 (1.81%) Organisational Skills
10 21 (1.73%) Investment Banking
11 20 (1.65%) Retail
12 17 (1.40%) Financial Institution
13 14 (1.15%) Military
14 12 (0.99%) Law
15 10 (0.82%) Manufacturing
16 9 (0.74%) Inclusion and Diversity
16 9 (0.74%) Influencing Skills
17 7 (0.58%) Police
18 6 (0.49%) Marketing
18 6 (0.49%) Presentation Skills
Job Titles
1 602 (49.59%) Network Engineer
2 178 (14.66%) Senior
3 147 (12.11%) Architect
4 144 (11.86%) Cisco Engineer
5 133 (10.96%) Senior Network Engineer
6 121 (9.97%) Cisco Network Engineer
7 88 (7.25%) Security Engineer
8 78 (6.43%) Network Architect
9 66 (5.44%) Network Security Engineer
10 60 (4.94%) Infrastructure Engineer
11 50 (4.12%) SC Cleared Network Engineer
12 43 (3.54%) Lead
13 42 (3.46%) Analyst
13 42 (3.46%) Field Engineer
14 41 (3.38%) Support Engineer
15 35 (2.88%) Solutions Architect
15 35 (2.88%) Telecoms Engineer
16 29 (2.39%) Consultant
17 28 (2.31%) Data Network Engineer
18 25 (2.06%) IT Engineer
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 85 (7.00%) Terraform
2 55 (4.53%) 802.1X
3 33 (2.72%) REST
4 21 (1.73%) YAML
5 20 (1.65%) XMPP
6 19 (1.57%) JSON
7 13 (1.07%) NETCONF
8 12 (0.99%) SAML
9 9 (0.74%) YANG
10 7 (0.58%) Microsoft Graph
10 7 (0.58%) RESTCONF
11 6 (0.49%) Flash
12 5 (0.41%) OpenConfig
13 3 (0.25%) .NET
13 3 (0.25%) Django
13 3 (0.25%) Java RMI
13 3 (0.25%) LAMP
13 3 (0.25%) LDAP
13 3 (0.25%) OpenID
13 3 (0.25%) RFC 2544
Miscellaneous
1 286 (23.56%) Data Centre
2 53 (4.37%) Hybrid Cloud
3 47 (3.87%) Onboarding
3 47 (3.87%) Video Conferencing
4 46 (3.79%) Driving Licence
5 40 (3.29%) PKI
6 37 (3.05%) Data Protection Act
7 36 (2.97%) Operational Technology
8 29 (2.39%) Management Information System
9 24 (1.98%) Public Cloud
9 24 (1.98%) Self-Motivation
10 22 (1.81%) Replication
11 21 (1.73%) Cloud Native
11 21 (1.73%) Clustering
12 19 (1.57%) Analytical Mindset
13 18 (1.48%) Private Cloud
14 16 (1.32%) Linux Command Line
15 15 (1.24%) IoT
16 13 (1.07%) Enterprise Storage
16 13 (1.07%) Virtual Team
Operating Systems
1 240 (19.77%) Windows
2 124 (10.21%) Linux
3 95 (7.83%) Windows Server
4 24 (1.98%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
5 23 (1.89%) Mac OS
6 17 (1.40%) Ubuntu
6 17 (1.40%) Windows 10
7 11 (0.91%) Android
8 10 (0.82%) Unix
9 8 (0.66%) Windows Server 2012
9 8 (0.66%) Windows Server 2019
10 7 (0.58%) AIX
11 6 (0.49%) Data ONTAP
12 5 (0.41%) CentOS
13 4 (0.33%) Windows Server 2016
14 3 (0.25%) VMS
15 1 (0.082%) Debian
15 1 (0.082%) Oracle Linux
15 1 (0.082%) Windows 7
15 1 (0.082%) Windows Server 2003
Processes & Methodologies
1 189 (15.57%) Migration
2 162 (13.34%) Project Delivery
3 149 (12.27%) Problem-Solving
4 129 (10.63%) ITIL
5 114 (9.39%) Stakeholder Management
6 101 (8.32%) High Availability
7 98 (8.07%) Infrastructure Engineering
7 98 (8.07%) Load Balancing
8 92 (7.58%) Change Management
8 92 (7.58%) Network Design
9 91 (7.50%) Continuous Improvement
10 89 (7.33%) Validation
11 86 (7.08%) Infrastructure as Code
12 73 (6.01%) Data Protection
13 72 (5.93%) Technical Leadership
13 72 (5.93%) Zero Trust
14 68 (5.60%) Cybersecurity
15 63 (5.19%) Stakeholder Engagement
16 62 (5.11%) ITSM
17 60 (4.94%) CI/CD
Programming Languages
1 141 (11.61%) Python
2 57 (4.70%) PowerShell
3 31 (2.55%) Bash
4 28 (2.31%) SQL
5 5 (0.41%) Java
6 4 (0.33%) C
6 4 (0.33%) C++
7 3 (0.25%) Lisp
7 3 (0.25%) Shell Script
8 2 (0.16%) Go
8 2 (0.16%) Perl
9 1 (0.082%) Bicep
9 1 (0.082%) Kusto Query Language
9 1 (0.082%) Ladder Logic
9 1 (0.082%) R
Qualifications
1 324 (26.69%) Cisco Certification
2 285 (23.48%) Security Cleared
3 231 (19.03%) CCNP
4 209 (17.22%) SC Cleared
5 125 (10.30%) CCNA
6 73 (6.01%) DV Cleared
7 72 (5.93%) Degree
8 67 (5.52%) CCIE
9 25 (2.06%) Microsoft Certification
10 22 (1.81%) VMware Certified Professional (VCP)
11 20 (1.65%) CISSP
12 17 (1.40%) MCSE
13 15 (1.24%) AWS Certification
14 14 (1.15%) Azure Certification
15 13 (1.07%) CCSE
15 13 (1.07%) Computer Science Degree
16 12 (0.99%) BPSS Clearance
16 12 (0.99%) Network+ Certification
17 11 (0.91%) ISTQB
18 10 (0.82%) PMI Certification
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 40 (3.29%) SLA
2 31 (2.55%) NIST
3 22 (1.81%) ISO/IEC 27001
4 21 (1.73%) QA
5 15 (1.24%) PCI DSS
6 13 (1.07%) Cyber Essentials
7 9 (0.74%) GDPR
8 7 (0.58%) NCSC
9 6 (0.49%) GRC
10 5 (0.41%) Data Quality
10 5 (0.41%) ISO 31000
10 5 (0.41%) ISO 9001
10 5 (0.41%) ISO/IEC 27005
11 4 (0.33%) Disclosure Scotland
11 4 (0.33%) JSP 440
11 4 (0.33%) NIST 800
11 4 (0.33%) PMO
12 3 (0.25%) Cyber Essentials PLUS
13 2 (0.16%) Accessibility
13 2 (0.16%) Government Security Classifications
System Software
1 155 (12.77%) VMware Infrastructure
2 130 (10.71%) Active Directory
3 53 (4.37%) vSphere
4 41 (3.38%) VMware NSX
5 38 (3.13%) VMware ESXi
6 33 (2.72%) Hyper-V
7 28 (2.31%) Firmware
7 28 (2.31%) Virtual Machines
8 18 (1.48%) Docker
9 8 (0.66%) NFS
10 6 (0.49%) GPFS
11 5 (0.41%) FreeRADIUS
11 5 (0.41%) ISA Server
11 5 (0.41%) Virtual Desktop
12 4 (0.33%) EMC RecoverPoint
12 4 (0.33%) SRDF
12 4 (0.33%) Virtual Servers
13 3 (0.25%) Dovecot
13 3 (0.25%) Postfix
14 2 (0.16%) IAG
Systems Management
1 141 (11.61%) Ansible
2 72 (5.93%) FortiGate
3 34 (2.80%) Cisco CUCM
4 29 (2.39%) Kubernetes
5 28 (2.31%) Microsoft Intune
6 21 (1.73%) SCCM
6 21 (1.73%) vCenter Server
7 18 (1.48%) Cisco Prime
8 12 (0.99%) Nagios
9 9 (0.74%) Grafana
9 9 (0.74%) WMI
10 8 (0.66%) Failover Clustering
10 8 (0.66%) Prometheus
10 8 (0.66%) Puppet
10 8 (0.66%) WSUS
11 7 (0.58%) Single Sign-On
12 6 (0.49%) CASB
12 6 (0.49%) Red Hat Satellite
12 6 (0.49%) vRealize
13 5 (0.41%) EMC VPLEX
Vendors
1 264 (21.75%) Palo Alto
2 245 (20.18%) Microsoft
3 214 (17.63%) VMware
4 202 (16.64%) Fortinet
5 175 (14.42%) F5
6 132 (10.87%) Meraki
7 123 (10.13%) Juniper
8 105 (8.65%) CheckPoint
9 89 (7.33%) Aruba
10 83 (6.84%) SolarWinds
11 81 (6.67%) ServiceNow
12 71 (5.85%) Arista
13 58 (4.78%) Zscaler
14 39 (3.21%) Red Hat
15 38 (3.13%) Splunk
16 32 (2.64%) Dell
17 29 (2.39%) Nokia
18 28 (2.31%) NetApp
19 24 (1.98%) Infoblox
20 21 (1.73%) Citrix