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 28 March 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
28 Mar 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 103 61 61
Rank change year-on-year -42 0 +13
Contract jobs citing Cisco 1,102 1,045 1,456
As % of all contract jobs in the UK 2.48% 3.60% 3.29%
As % of the Vendors category 5.70% 7.61% 7.71%
Number of daily rates quoted 749 664 875
10th Percentile £263 £305 £260
25th Percentile £400 £406 £376
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £475 £500 £475
Median % change year-on-year -5.00% +5.26% -2.56%
75th Percentile £550 £588 £588
90th Percentile £625 £650 £700
UK excluding London median daily rate £475 £490 £475
% change year-on-year -3.06% +3.16% +2.70%
Number of hourly rates quoted 40 19 50
10th Percentile £21.40 £17.55 £13.29
25th Percentile £33.63 £21.58 £16.74
Median hourly rate £68.17 £37.50 £25.00
Median % change year-on-year +81.77% +50.00% -50.00%
75th Percentile £74.26 £66.88 £41.25
90th Percentile £93.88 £75.00 £67.75
UK excluding London median hourly rate £74.26 £33.52 £24.00
% change year-on-year +121.52% +39.68% -49.47%

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 19,326 13,723 18,894
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the UK 43.48% 47.22% 42.72%
Number of daily rates quoted 12,358 8,677 11,800
10th Percentile £313 £293 £256
25th Percentile £413 £406 £400
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £515 £514
Median % change year-on-year -2.91% +0.19% -2.10%
75th Percentile £600 £618 £625
90th Percentile £700 £710 £725
UK excluding London median daily rate £494 £500 £500
% change year-on-year -1.25% - -
Number of hourly rates quoted 976 477 1,033
10th Percentile £15.25 £15.55 £12.13
25th Percentile £18.50 £20.64 £14.48
Median hourly rate £25.77 £28.75 £23.22
Median % change year-on-year -10.37% +23.84% -40.28%
75th Percentile £58.75 £62.50 £55.00
90th Percentile £78.25 £80.75 £70.00
UK excluding London median hourly rate £24.00 £27.24 £21.50
% change year-on-year -11.89% +26.69% -38.57%

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 28 March 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 28 March 2026.

Hourly rate histogram for Cisco in the UK

Cisco
Top 17 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 28 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 -43 918 £489 -2.59% 542
UK excluding London -26 702 £475 -3.06% 503
Work from Home -23 285 £450 -10.00% 112
London -59 276 £500 - 126
South East -5 224 £500 -4.76% 139
North of England -47 180 £481 -3.75% 121
North West -15 149 £481 -1.79% 58
Midlands -19 149 £350 -22.22% 92
West Midlands -4 135 £340 -22.29% 46
Scotland +27 68 £438 +9.38% 25
East of England -5 43 £475 -6.40% 60
South West -73 38 £513 -5.88% 58
Yorkshire -82 26 £450 -14.29% 43
Wales -15 25 £425 +1.49% 18
East Midlands -48 11 £410 -20.00% 46
North East -11 7 £175 -46.15% 20
Northern Ireland - 6 £385 - 8

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 41 (3.72%) SharePoint
2 36 (3.27%) Microsoft Exchange
3 18 (1.63%) Confluence
4 7 (0.64%) Apache
5 5 (0.45%) IIS
6 3 (0.27%) OpenStack
7 2 (0.18%) SharePoint Server
8 1 (0.091%) JBoss
8 1 (0.091%) Skype for Business
8 1 (0.091%) WebLogic
8 1 (0.091%) WebSphere
Applications
1 58 (5.26%) Microsoft Office
2 43 (3.90%) MS Visio
3 20 (1.81%) Microsoft Excel
4 15 (1.36%) Microsoft PowerPoint
5 5 (0.45%) Acrobat
5 5 (0.45%) Microsoft Project
6 1 (0.091%) AutoCAD
Business Applications
1 17 (1.54%) Remedy ITSM
2 3 (0.27%) Dynamics CRM
3 1 (0.091%) Actimize
Cloud Services
1 188 (17.06%) Azure
2 161 (14.61%) AWS
3 94 (8.53%) Microsoft 365
4 41 (3.72%) Entra ID
5 40 (3.63%) GCP
6 17 (1.54%) Virtual Private Cloud
7 15 (1.36%) Azure ExpressRoute
8 14 (1.27%) Datadog
9 12 (1.09%) Nutanix
10 11 (1.00%) OpenShift
11 10 (0.91%) Azure Sentinel
12 9 (0.82%) Azure DevOps
12 9 (0.82%) SaaS
13 8 (0.73%) AWS CloudFormation
13 8 (0.73%) GitHub
14 7 (0.64%) AWS Lambda
14 7 (0.64%) Microsoft Purview
14 7 (0.64%) OneDrive
14 7 (0.64%) Power Platform
14 7 (0.64%) Serverless
Communications & Networking
1 454 (41.20%) Firewall
2 347 (31.49%) WAN
3 260 (23.59%) BGP
4 257 (23.32%) LAN
5 240 (21.78%) VPN
6 203 (18.42%) Network Security
7 190 (17.24%) OSPF
8 155 (14.07%) Wireless
9 145 (13.16%) SD-WAN
10 128 (11.62%) DNS
11 119 (10.80%) VLAN
12 111 (10.07%) MPLS
13 106 (9.62%) Cisco ISE
14 83 (7.53%) Wi-Fi
15 81 (7.35%) Cisco ASA
16 80 (7.26%) Cisco Nexus
17 76 (6.90%) Cisco IOS
18 74 (6.72%) VXLAN
19 73 (6.62%) DHCP
19 73 (6.62%) IPsec
Database & Business Intelligence
1 6 (0.54%) SQL Server
2 5 (0.45%) DynamoDB
2 5 (0.45%) Power BI
3 3 (0.27%) Amazon Athena
4 2 (0.18%) MariaDB
5 1 (0.091%) Big Data
5 1 (0.091%) Metadata
5 1 (0.091%) MySQL
5 1 (0.091%) NoSQL
5 1 (0.091%) PostgreSQL
Development Applications
1 27 (2.45%) JIRA
2 14 (1.27%) Sonatype Nexus
3 11 (1.00%) Jenkins
4 9 (0.82%) Git
5 8 (0.73%) GitLab
6 2 (0.18%) Rational DOORS
7 1 (0.091%) Bitbucket
General
1 233 (21.14%) Social Skills
2 151 (13.70%) Finance
3 145 (13.16%) Public Sector
4 94 (8.53%) Telecoms
5 71 (6.44%) Analytical Skills
6 58 (5.26%) Banking
7 55 (4.99%) Legal
8 54 (4.90%) Manufacturing
9 51 (4.63%) Documentation Skills
10 37 (3.36%) Marketing
11 35 (3.18%) Electronics
12 17 (1.54%) Investment Banking
12 17 (1.54%) Presentation Skills
13 16 (1.45%) Financial Institution
14 15 (1.36%) Organisational Skills
15 11 (1.00%) Law
15 11 (1.00%) Retail
16 10 (0.91%) Inclusion and Diversity
17 8 (0.73%) Aerospace
17 8 (0.73%) Influencing Skills
Job Titles
1 436 (39.56%) Network Engineer
2 141 (12.79%) Architect
3 97 (8.80%) Cisco Engineer
4 86 (7.80%) Cisco Network Engineer
5 84 (7.62%) Network Architect
5 84 (7.62%) Senior
6 66 (5.99%) SC Cleared Network Engineer
7 65 (5.90%) Security Engineer
8 53 (4.81%) Analyst
9 45 (4.08%) Consultant
10 42 (3.81%) Network Security Engineer
11 41 (3.72%) IT Support
11 41 (3.72%) Network Consultant
11 41 (3.72%) Senior Network Engineer
12 36 (3.27%) Infrastructure Engineer
13 35 (3.18%) Data Network Engineer
13 35 (3.18%) Solutions Architect
14 34 (3.09%) DV Cleared Network Engineer
15 29 (2.63%) Infrastructure Analyst
16 27 (2.45%) Desktop Support
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 63 (5.72%) 802.1X
2 17 (1.54%) LDAP
3 16 (1.45%) Flash
4 14 (1.27%) XMPP
5 10 (0.91%) SAML
6 7 (0.64%) REST
7 6 (0.54%) NETCONF
7 6 (0.54%) YANG
8 5 (0.45%) Node.js
8 5 (0.45%) OpenConfig
9 4 (0.36%) HTML
9 4 (0.36%) Jinja
9 4 (0.36%) RESTCONF
9 4 (0.36%) VML
10 3 (0.27%) JSON
11 2 (0.18%) ADO
11 2 (0.18%) ARM Templates
11 2 (0.18%) Django
11 2 (0.18%) Microsoft Graph
11 2 (0.18%) RFC 2544
Miscellaneous
1 288 (26.13%) Data Centre
2 51 (4.63%) PKI
3 33 (2.99%) Replication
4 31 (2.81%) Linux Command Line
5 30 (2.72%) Clustering
5 30 (2.72%) Data Protection Act
5 30 (2.72%) Hybrid Cloud
6 29 (2.63%) Onboarding
7 27 (2.45%) Cloud Native
8 25 (2.27%) Operational Technology
9 24 (2.18%) Driving Licence
10 18 (1.63%) Product Ownership
11 17 (1.54%) Self-Motivation
12 15 (1.36%) Video Conferencing
13 14 (1.27%) Security Posture
14 13 (1.18%) NHS
14 13 (1.18%) SCADA
15 12 (1.09%) EMC VMAX
15 12 (1.09%) Enterprise Storage
15 12 (1.09%) Public Cloud
Operating Systems
1 187 (16.97%) Windows
2 108 (9.80%) Linux
3 64 (5.81%) Windows Server
4 41 (3.72%) Android
4 41 (3.72%) Mac OS
5 26 (2.36%) Windows 10
6 23 (2.09%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
7 16 (1.45%) Unix
8 7 (0.64%) Ubuntu
9 5 (0.45%) VMS
9 5 (0.45%) Windows Server 2012
9 5 (0.45%) Windows Server 2019
10 4 (0.36%) CatOS
10 4 (0.36%) Solaris
11 2 (0.18%) AIX
11 2 (0.18%) CentOS
11 2 (0.18%) Windows Server 2016
12 1 (0.091%) Oracle Linux
Processes & Methodologies
1 170 (15.43%) Migration
2 132 (11.98%) Problem-Solving
3 110 (9.98%) Load Balancing
4 97 (8.80%) ITIL
5 95 (8.62%) High Availability
6 94 (8.53%) Network Design
7 89 (8.08%) Agile
8 82 (7.44%) ITSM
9 81 (7.35%) Roadmaps
10 74 (6.72%) Cybersecurity
11 71 (6.44%) Change Management
12 69 (6.26%) Stakeholder Engagement
13 65 (5.90%) Project Delivery
14 61 (5.54%) Collaborative Working
15 57 (5.17%) Service Management
16 55 (4.99%) Network Monitoring
16 55 (4.99%) Stakeholder Management
17 53 (4.81%) Continuous Improvement
17 53 (4.81%) Network Architecture
18 51 (4.63%) Disaster Recovery
Programming Languages
1 127 (11.52%) Python
2 54 (4.90%) PowerShell
3 28 (2.54%) Bash
4 15 (1.36%) Perl
5 8 (0.73%) SQL
6 5 (0.45%) JavaScript
6 5 (0.45%) Lisp
7 4 (0.36%) C
7 4 (0.36%) PHP
8 2 (0.18%) ActionScript
8 2 (0.18%) Korn
8 2 (0.18%) Kusto Query Language
8 2 (0.18%) Shell Script
9 1 (0.091%) C++
9 1 (0.091%) Ruby
Qualifications
1 426 (38.66%) Security Cleared
2 329 (29.85%) SC Cleared
3 299 (27.13%) Cisco Certification
4 239 (21.69%) CCNP
5 110 (9.98%) DV Cleared
6 107 (9.71%) CCNA
7 85 (7.71%) Degree
8 77 (6.99%) CCIE
9 24 (2.18%) BPSS Clearance
10 22 (2.00%) JNCIS
11 21 (1.91%) Microsoft Certification
12 19 (1.72%) Azure Certification
13 17 (1.54%) CISSP
13 17 (1.54%) JNCIP
13 17 (1.54%) Network+ Certification
14 16 (1.45%) JNCIA
15 14 (1.27%) AWS Certification
15 14 (1.27%) CCSE
16 13 (1.18%) MCSE
16 13 (1.18%) VMware Certified Professional (VCP)
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 43 (3.90%) ISO/IEC 27001
2 35 (3.18%) NIST
3 32 (2.90%) SLA
4 24 (2.18%) Cyber Essentials
5 19 (1.72%) GDPR
6 18 (1.63%) PMO
7 16 (1.45%) NCSC
8 14 (1.27%) PCI DSS
9 6 (0.54%) Cyber Essentials PLUS
10 5 (0.45%) QA
11 4 (0.36%) JSP 440
12 3 (0.27%) Disclosure Scotland
12 3 (0.27%) HIPAA
12 3 (0.27%) ISO/IEC 27002 (supersedes ISO/IEC 17799)
12 3 (0.27%) RMADS
13 2 (0.18%) HMG Security Policy Framework
13 2 (0.18%) ISA99
14 1 (0.091%) Accessibility
14 1 (0.091%) GRC
14 1 (0.091%) NIST 800
System Software
1 145 (13.16%) VMware Infrastructure
2 96 (8.71%) Active Directory
3 65 (5.90%) VMware NSX
4 58 (5.26%) vSphere
5 42 (3.81%) VMware ESXi
6 18 (1.63%) Firmware
7 16 (1.45%) GPFS
7 16 (1.45%) NFS
8 14 (1.27%) Virtual Machines
9 12 (1.09%) Hyper-V
10 10 (0.91%) Docker
11 8 (0.73%) SRDF
12 4 (0.36%) Snort
12 4 (0.36%) vCloud
13 3 (0.27%) Virtual Desktop
14 2 (0.18%) EMC RecoverPoint
14 2 (0.18%) KVM
14 2 (0.18%) Squid
14 2 (0.18%) Virtual Servers
15 1 (0.091%) XenDesktop
Systems Management
1 110 (9.98%) Ansible
2 94 (8.53%) FortiGate
3 47 (4.26%) Terraform
4 38 (3.45%) vCenter Server
5 36 (3.27%) vRealize
6 23 (2.09%) Grafana
7 22 (2.00%) SCCM
8 19 (1.72%) Microsoft Intune
8 19 (1.72%) VxRail
9 17 (1.54%) Prometheus
10 13 (1.18%) Cisco Prime
11 12 (1.09%) Kubernetes
12 11 (1.00%) Single Sign-On
13 10 (0.91%) Cisco CUCM
14 9 (0.82%) Nagios
15 7 (0.64%) Nessus
16 6 (0.54%) EMC TimeFinder
16 6 (0.54%) QRadar
16 6 (0.54%) SCOM
16 6 (0.54%) WSUS
Vendors
1 285 (25.86%) Palo Alto
2 185 (16.79%) VMware
3 182 (16.52%) Juniper
4 179 (16.24%) Microsoft
5 168 (15.25%) F5
6 144 (13.07%) Aruba
7 118 (10.71%) Fortinet
8 111 (10.07%) CheckPoint
9 99 (8.98%) SolarWinds
10 98 (8.89%) ServiceNow
11 95 (8.62%) Meraki
12 71 (6.44%) Dell
13 60 (5.44%) Arista
14 56 (5.08%) Splunk
15 55 (4.99%) HP
16 49 (4.45%) IBM
17 41 (3.72%) Zscaler
18 35 (3.18%) SAP
19 31 (2.81%) Apple
20 30 (2.72%) Citrix