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 15 September 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
15 Sep 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 121 79 67
Rank change year-on-year -42 -12 -13
Contract jobs citing Cisco 1,219 981 1,198
As % of all contract jobs in the UK 2.24% 3.02% 3.14%
As % of the Vendors category 5.36% 6.41% 7.11%
Number of daily rates quoted 799 616 719
10th Percentile £280 £300 £250
25th Percentile £400 £400 £375
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £475 £490 £500
Median % change year-on-year -3.01% -2.05% +8.11%
75th Percentile £575 £575 £583
90th Percentile £651 £638 £650
UK excluding London median daily rate £463 £492 £500
% change year-on-year -6.00% -1.60% +11.11%
Number of hourly rates quoted 41 41 36
10th Percentile £26.72 - £19.25
25th Percentile £44.00 £25.15 £21.06
Median hourly rate £55.00 £30.00 £27.50
Median % change year-on-year +83.33% +9.09% -42.11%
75th Percentile £67.84 £58.75 £56.25
90th Percentile £78.75 £83.00 £75.00
UK excluding London median hourly rate £55.00 £32.50 £43.75
% change year-on-year +69.23% -25.71% -8.53%

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 22,747 15,293 16,860
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the UK 41.80% 47.12% 44.20%
Number of daily rates quoted 13,964 9,367 10,148
10th Percentile £313 £275 £288
25th Percentile £413 £400 £413
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £513 £500 £525
Median % change year-on-year +2.50% -4.76% -
75th Percentile £613 £612 £625
90th Percentile £700 £700 £730
UK excluding London median daily rate £500 £475 £500
% change year-on-year +5.26% -5.00% -
Number of hourly rates quoted 1,253 777 684
10th Percentile £14.00 £14.60 £14.26
25th Percentile £16.72 £17.44 £15.62
Median hourly rate £26.90 £25.15 £30.21
Median % change year-on-year +6.96% -16.74% -30.36%
75th Percentile £62.00 £43.25 £63.75
90th Percentile £79.75 £67.50 £70.00
UK excluding London median hourly rate £26.14 £21.00 £30.00
% change year-on-year +24.48% -30.00% -25.60%

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 15 September 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 15 September 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 15 September 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 -45 1,012 £500 - 1,360
UK excluding London -37 710 £463 -6.00% 928
London -30 384 £500 - 566
Work from Home -30 294 £476 +1.41% 347
North of England +1 247 £485 +2.11% 189
North West +16 170 £483 +1.68% 91
South East -69 136 £456 -8.75% 236
Midlands -41 127 £425 -8.11% 126
West Midlands -30 120 £425 -10.53% 73
Scotland +25 97 £413 -2.94% 54
Yorkshire -13 70 £500 +1.63% 70
South West -46 62 £525 -4.55% 147
East of England -26 34 £455 -5.70% 137
Wales +11 29 £390 +95.00% 31
Northern Ireland +3 8 £115 -71.25% 27
North East -34 8 £375 -31.82% 30
East Midlands -24 4 £525 +20.00% 53
Channel Islands -4 3 £600 -17.24%

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 (3.20%) SharePoint
2 35 (2.87%) Microsoft Exchange
3 13 (1.07%) Confluence
4 9 (0.74%) OpenStack
5 8 (0.66%) SAS
6 7 (0.57%) Apache
7 6 (0.49%) IIS
7 6 (0.49%) JBoss
8 4 (0.33%) nginx
9 3 (0.25%) CloudStack
9 3 (0.25%) Tomcat
10 2 (0.16%) CMS
10 2 (0.16%) Skype for Business
11 1 (0.082%) Apache Spark
11 1 (0.082%) FactoryTalk
11 1 (0.082%) Mendix
11 1 (0.082%) SharePoint Server
Applications
1 49 (4.02%) Microsoft Office
2 26 (2.13%) Microsoft Excel
3 22 (1.80%) MS Visio
4 7 (0.57%) 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
1 253 (20.75%) Azure
2 159 (13.04%) AWS
3 103 (8.45%) Microsoft 365
4 65 (5.33%) Entra ID
5 35 (2.87%) GitHub
6 30 (2.46%) OneDrive
7 27 (2.21%) GCP
8 19 (1.56%) Azure ExpressRoute
9 18 (1.48%) OpenShift
10 17 (1.39%) Virtual Private Cloud
11 14 (1.15%) Power Platform
12 13 (1.07%) Nutanix
13 12 (0.98%) SaaS
14 9 (0.74%) Azure Sentinel
15 8 (0.66%) Azure DevOps
15 8 (0.66%) GitHub Actions
16 7 (0.57%) AWS Direct Connect
16 7 (0.57%) IaaS
17 6 (0.49%) Cloudflare
17 6 (0.49%) Rubrik
Communications & Networking
1 513 (42.08%) Firewall
2 358 (29.37%) WAN
3 301 (24.69%) BGP
4 272 (22.31%) LAN
5 270 (22.15%) VPN
6 255 (20.92%) Network Security
7 212 (17.39%) Wireless
8 191 (15.67%) VLAN
9 189 (15.50%) OSPF
10 186 (15.26%) DNS
11 148 (12.14%) SD-WAN
12 138 (11.32%) Wi-Fi
13 126 (10.34%) MPLS
14 119 (9.76%) Cisco Nexus
15 106 (8.70%) DHCP
16 96 (7.88%) TCP/IP
17 91 (7.47%) Cisco ISE
18 87 (7.14%) Cisco ASA
19 86 (7.05%) Cisco IOS
19 86 (7.05%) VXLAN
Database & Business Intelligence
1 27 (2.21%) SQL Server
2 7 (0.57%) Power BI
3 6 (0.49%) Big Data
3 6 (0.49%) Hadoop
4 4 (0.33%) Amazon RDS
5 3 (0.25%) MySQL
6 2 (0.16%) Metadata
6 2 (0.16%) NoSQL
6 2 (0.16%) PostgreSQL
7 1 (0.082%) Apache Hive
7 1 (0.082%) ClickHouse
Development Applications
1 32 (2.63%) Git
2 20 (1.64%) JIRA
3 13 (1.07%) Sonatype Nexus
4 12 (0.98%) GitLab
5 8 (0.66%) Jenkins
6 2 (0.16%) Robot Framework
7 1 (0.082%) Bitbucket
7 1 (0.082%) Tricentis qTest
7 1 (0.082%) Zephyr
General
1 284 (23.30%) Social Skills
2 123 (10.09%) Finance
3 122 (10.01%) Telecoms
4 99 (8.12%) Analytical Skills
5 64 (5.25%) Public Sector
6 63 (5.17%) Banking
7 59 (4.84%) Documentation Skills
8 41 (3.36%) Legal
9 22 (1.80%) Organisational Skills
10 19 (1.56%) Investment Banking
10 19 (1.56%) Retail
11 16 (1.31%) Financial Institution
12 14 (1.15%) Law
12 14 (1.15%) Military
13 11 (0.90%) Inclusion and Diversity
14 10 (0.82%) Manufacturing
14 10 (0.82%) Police
15 9 (0.74%) Influencing Skills
16 6 (0.49%) Marketing
17 5 (0.41%) Presentation Skills
Job Titles
1 607 (49.79%) Network Engineer
2 179 (14.68%) Senior
3 149 (12.22%) Architect
4 144 (11.81%) Cisco Engineer
5 128 (10.50%) Cisco Network Engineer
5 128 (10.50%) Senior Network Engineer
6 89 (7.30%) Security Engineer
7 76 (6.23%) Network Architect
8 67 (5.50%) Network Security Engineer
9 62 (5.09%) Infrastructure Engineer
10 51 (4.18%) SC Cleared Network Engineer
11 43 (3.53%) Field Engineer
12 38 (3.12%) Analyst
12 38 (3.12%) Support Engineer
13 37 (3.04%) Lead
14 35 (2.87%) Data Network Engineer
14 35 (2.87%) Telecoms Engineer
15 34 (2.79%) Solutions Architect
16 30 (2.46%) Consultant
17 28 (2.30%) Automation Engineer
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 86 (7.05%) Terraform
2 58 (4.76%) 802.1X
3 30 (2.46%) REST
4 18 (1.48%) YAML
5 16 (1.31%) JSON
6 12 (0.98%) NETCONF
6 12 (0.98%) SAML
7 8 (0.66%) YANG
8 7 (0.57%) Microsoft Graph
8 7 (0.57%) RESTCONF
8 7 (0.57%) XMPP
9 6 (0.49%) Flash
10 5 (0.41%) OpenConfig
11 3 (0.25%) .NET
11 3 (0.25%) Django
11 3 (0.25%) Java RMI
11 3 (0.25%) LAMP
11 3 (0.25%) LDAP
11 3 (0.25%) LEMP Stack
11 3 (0.25%) Middleware
Miscellaneous
1 296 (24.28%) Data Centre
2 54 (4.43%) Hybrid Cloud
3 51 (4.18%) Onboarding
4 47 (3.86%) PKI
5 44 (3.61%) Driving Licence
6 35 (2.87%) Data Protection Act
6 35 (2.87%) Operational Technology
7 28 (2.30%) Video Conferencing
8 25 (2.05%) Replication
9 23 (1.89%) Cloud Native
9 23 (1.89%) Clustering
10 22 (1.80%) Public Cloud
11 21 (1.72%) Management Information System
12 20 (1.64%) Analytical Mindset
13 18 (1.48%) Self-Motivation
14 17 (1.39%) Enterprise Storage
14 17 (1.39%) Private Cloud
15 16 (1.31%) Linux Command Line
16 14 (1.15%) IoT
16 14 (1.15%) SCADA
Operating Systems
1 229 (18.79%) Windows
2 123 (10.09%) Linux
3 90 (7.38%) Windows Server
4 20 (1.64%) Mac OS
5 18 (1.48%) Ubuntu
6 17 (1.39%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
6 17 (1.39%) Windows 10
7 11 (0.90%) Android
8 9 (0.74%) Unix
8 9 (0.74%) Windows Server 2012
9 8 (0.66%) Windows Server 2019
10 7 (0.57%) AIX
10 7 (0.57%) Data ONTAP
11 6 (0.49%) CentOS
12 4 (0.33%) Windows Server 2016
13 3 (0.25%) VMS
14 1 (0.082%) Debian
14 1 (0.082%) Oracle Linux
14 1 (0.082%) Windows 7
14 1 (0.082%) Windows Server 2003
Processes & Methodologies
1 193 (15.83%) Migration
2 155 (12.72%) Project Delivery
3 135 (11.07%) ITIL
4 134 (10.99%) Problem-Solving
5 112 (9.19%) High Availability
6 108 (8.86%) Load Balancing
7 99 (8.12%) Infrastructure Engineering
8 98 (8.04%) Change Management
9 95 (7.79%) Stakeholder Management
10 89 (7.30%) Network Design
11 85 (6.97%) Infrastructure as Code
12 82 (6.73%) Validation
13 81 (6.64%) Continuous Improvement
14 72 (5.91%) Technical Leadership
15 67 (5.50%) Zero Trust
16 66 (5.41%) Data Protection
17 65 (5.33%) ITSM
18 61 (5.00%) CI/CD
18 61 (5.00%) Stakeholder Engagement
19 59 (4.84%) Disaster Recovery
Programming Languages
1 145 (11.89%) Python
2 62 (5.09%) PowerShell
3 32 (2.63%) Bash
4 27 (2.21%) 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
1 326 (26.74%) Cisco Certification
2 296 (24.28%) Security Cleared
3 231 (18.95%) CCNP
4 222 (18.21%) SC Cleared
5 130 (10.66%) CCNA
6 75 (6.15%) DV Cleared
7 73 (5.99%) Degree
8 61 (5.00%) CCIE
9 27 (2.21%) Microsoft Certification
10 23 (1.89%) VMware Certified Professional (VCP)
11 19 (1.56%) MCSE
12 16 (1.31%) AWS Certification
12 16 (1.31%) Azure Certification
13 15 (1.23%) CISSP
14 14 (1.15%) Computer Science Degree
14 14 (1.15%) Network+ Certification
15 13 (1.07%) CCSE
16 12 (0.98%) BPSS Clearance
17 11 (0.90%) ISTQB
17 11 (0.90%) Server+ Certification
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 39 (3.20%) SLA
2 27 (2.21%) NIST
3 22 (1.80%) QA
4 21 (1.72%) ISO/IEC 27001
5 16 (1.31%) Cyber Essentials
6 11 (0.90%) NCSC
7 10 (0.82%) PCI DSS
8 8 (0.66%) GDPR
9 5 (0.41%) Disclosure Scotland
9 5 (0.41%) JSP 440
9 5 (0.41%) PMO
10 4 (0.33%) Data Quality
10 4 (0.33%) GRC
11 3 (0.25%) Cyber Essentials PLUS
11 3 (0.25%) ISO 31000
11 3 (0.25%) ISO 9001
11 3 (0.25%) ISO/IEC 27005
11 3 (0.25%) NIST 800
12 2 (0.16%) Government Security Classifications
12 2 (0.16%) ISO/IEC 27002 (supersedes ISO/IEC 17799)
System Software
1 141 (11.57%) VMware Infrastructure
2 121 (9.93%) Active Directory
3 43 (3.53%) vSphere
4 42 (3.45%) VMware NSX
5 39 (3.20%) VMware ESXi
6 36 (2.95%) Hyper-V
7 31 (2.54%) Firmware
8 29 (2.38%) Virtual Machines
9 16 (1.31%) Docker
10 10 (0.82%) NFS
11 6 (0.49%) EMC RecoverPoint
11 6 (0.49%) GPFS
12 5 (0.41%) Virtual Desktop
13 4 (0.33%) FreeRADIUS
13 4 (0.33%) SRDF
13 4 (0.33%) Virtual Servers
14 3 (0.25%) Dovecot
14 3 (0.25%) ISA Server
14 3 (0.25%) Postfix
15 2 (0.16%) UAG
Systems Management
1 146 (11.98%) Ansible
2 75 (6.15%) FortiGate
3 32 (2.63%) Kubernetes
3 32 (2.63%) Microsoft Intune
4 22 (1.80%) Cisco CUCM
5 21 (1.72%) Cisco Prime
5 21 (1.72%) SCCM
5 21 (1.72%) vCenter Server
6 10 (0.82%) Grafana
6 10 (0.82%) Prometheus
7 8 (0.66%) Failover Clustering
7 8 (0.66%) Puppet
7 8 (0.66%) WMI
7 8 (0.66%) WSUS
8 7 (0.57%) EMC VPLEX
8 7 (0.57%) Single Sign-On
9 6 (0.49%) Red Hat Satellite
9 6 (0.49%) vRealize
10 5 (0.41%) Avamar
10 5 (0.41%) Jamf Pro
Vendors
1 265 (21.74%) Palo Alto
2 240 (19.69%) Microsoft
3 209 (17.15%) Fortinet
4 197 (16.16%) VMware
5 190 (15.59%) F5
6 128 (10.50%) Juniper
7 127 (10.42%) Meraki
8 109 (8.94%) CheckPoint
9 88 (7.22%) Aruba
10 83 (6.81%) ServiceNow
11 77 (6.32%) SolarWinds
12 74 (6.07%) Arista
13 55 (4.51%) Zscaler
14 40 (3.28%) Splunk
15 37 (3.04%) Red Hat
16 36 (2.95%) Dell
17 29 (2.38%) Nokia
18 28 (2.30%) NetApp
19 22 (1.80%) Citrix
20 21 (1.72%) Infoblox