Cloud Engineer Contract Job Trends

Cloud Engineer
UK

The median Cloud Engineer daily rate in the UK is £525, according to job vacancies posted in the 6 months leading up to 15 July 2026.

The table below compares current contractor rates and summary statistics with the previous two years.

6 months to
15 Jul 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 205 318 331
Rank change year-on-year +113 +13 -54
Contract jobs requiring a Cloud Engineer 668 254 272
As % of all contract jobs in the UK 1.27% 0.78% 0.64%
As % of the Job Titles category 1.37% 0.85% 0.68%
Number of daily rates quoted 435 190 189
10th Percentile £396 £400 £386
25th Percentile £450 £425 £450
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £525 £500 £550
Median % change year-on-year +5.00% -9.09% -
75th Percentile £619 £575 £625
90th Percentile £688 £650 £675
UK excluding London median daily rate £510 £500 £510
% change year-on-year +2.00% -1.96% -7.27%
Number of hourly rates quoted 23 3 2
10th Percentile £32.76 £32.50 -
25th Percentile £73.75 £36.25 £27.50
Median hourly rate £77.00 £45.00 £30.00
Median % change year-on-year +71.11% +50.00% -
75th Percentile £81.25 £55.00 £32.50
90th Percentile £84.25 £59.50 -
UK excluding London median hourly rate £76.00 - £30.00

All Contract IT Job Roles
UK

For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all contract IT job vacancies. Most job vacancies include a discernible job title that can be normalized. As such, the figures in the second row provide an indication of the number of contract jobs in our overall sample.

Contract vacancies in the UK with a recognized job title 48,692 29,793 39,772
% of contract IT jobs with a recognized job title 92.54% 91.81% 93.04%
Number of daily rates quoted 29,483 18,982 25,593
10th Percentile £325 £288 £288
25th Percentile £419 £400 £410
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £525 £500 £525
Median % change year-on-year +5.00% -4.76% -2.33%
75th Percentile £625 £625 £638
90th Percentile £725 £738 £750
UK excluding London median daily rate £500 £475 £495
% change year-on-year +5.26% -4.04% -1.00%
Number of hourly rates quoted 3,276 1,398 2,720
10th Percentile £15.93 £13.75 £13.00
25th Percentile £21.35 £17.44 £17.00
Median hourly rate £45.00 £26.45 £40.00
Median % change year-on-year +70.13% -33.88% -5.88%
75th Percentile £67.84 £56.19 £63.41
90th Percentile £80.07 £73.75 £73.78
UK excluding London median hourly rate £45.56 £25.15 £40.00
% change year-on-year +81.13% -37.13% +6.67%

Cloud Engineer
Job Vacancy Trend

Historical trend showing the proportion of contract IT job postings featuring 'Cloud Engineer' in the job title relative to all contract IT jobs advertised.

Cloud Engineer job vacancy trend in the UK

Cloud Engineer
Daily Rate Trend

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for Cloud Engineer job vacancies in the UK.

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for Cloud Engineer job vacancies in the UK

Cloud Engineer
Daily Rate Histogram

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing Cloud Engineer over the 6 months to 15 July 2026.

Daily rate histogram for Cloud Engineer in the UK

Cloud Engineer
Hourly Rate Trend

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for Cloud Engineer job vacancies in the UK.

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for Cloud Engineer job vacancies in the UK

Cloud Engineer
Hourly Rate Histogram

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing Cloud Engineer over the 6 months to 15 July 2026.

Hourly rate histogram for Cloud Engineer in the UK

Cloud Engineer
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 Cloud Engineer within the UK over the 6 months to 15 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 +81 557 £525 +5.00% 290
UK excluding London +50 310 £510 +2.00% 233
London +62 298 £540 +3.35% 90
Work from Home -5 173 £540 +8.00% 179
North of England -19 84 £500 +11.11% 69
South East -16 80 £538 +7.50% 58
Scotland +35 60 £448 -10.40% 20
Midlands -24 46 £513 +7.89% 32
North West -19 43 £500 +17.65% 41
Yorkshire -24 34 £475 -2.56% 21
West Midlands -44 26 £525 - 14
East of England -3 22 £505 +60.32% 18
East Midlands -2 19 £450 -5.26% 18
South West -24 16 £550 -2.22% 28
North East -40 7 £525 +5.00% 7
Wales -8 4 - - 8

Cloud Engineer Skill Set
Top 30 Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities

For the 6 months to 15 July 2026, Cloud Engineer contract job roles required the following skills and capabilities in order of popularity. The figures indicate the absolute number of co-occurrences and as a proportion of all contract job ads featuring Cloud Engineer in the job title.

1 308 (46.11%) Azure
2 297 (44.46%) Terraform
3 282 (42.22%) AWS
4 254 (38.02%) CI/CD
5 241 (36.08%) Infrastructure as Code
6 212 (31.74%) DevOps
7 179 (26.80%) Python
8 163 (24.40%) Security Cleared
9 153 (22.90%) Kubernetes
10 148 (22.16%) GCP
11 145 (21.71%) Cloud Security
12 141 (21.11%) Microsoft
13 130 (19.46%) Platform Engineering
13 130 (19.46%) PowerShell
14 126 (18.86%) SC Cleared
15 123 (18.41%) Infrastructure Engineering
16 105 (15.72%) Google
17 103 (15.42%) Windows
18 97 (14.52%) GitHub
19 92 (13.77%) Migration
20 83 (12.43%) AI
21 82 (12.28%) Agile
22 81 (12.13%) Containerisation
23 73 (10.93%) Active Directory
24 71 (10.63%) Firewall
25 70 (10.48%) Docker
26 69 (10.33%) Bash
26 69 (10.33%) Entra ID
27 68 (10.18%) DNS
28 67 (10.03%) Observability

Cloud Engineer Skill Set
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 12 (1.80%) Microsoft Exchange
2 8 (1.20%) Apache
3 7 (1.05%) Confluence
4 5 (0.75%) nginx
5 4 (0.60%) Apache Airflow
5 4 (0.60%) Apache Spark
5 4 (0.60%) SharePoint
6 3 (0.45%) IIS
6 3 (0.45%) Tomcat
7 2 (0.30%) CloudStack
7 2 (0.30%) OpenStack
8 1 (0.15%) Apache Pulsar
8 1 (0.15%) SAS
8 1 (0.15%) Traefik
Applications
1 1 (0.15%) Chatbot
Business Applications
1 2 (0.30%) Aladdin
Cloud Services
1 308 (46.11%) Azure
2 282 (42.22%) AWS
3 148 (22.16%) GCP
4 97 (14.52%) GitHub
5 69 (10.33%) Entra ID
6 64 (9.58%) Serverless
7 59 (8.83%) GitHub Actions
8 48 (7.19%) Azure AKS
9 46 (6.89%) AWS CloudFormation
10 45 (6.74%) Amazon S3
11 42 (6.29%) Azure DevOps
12 41 (6.14%) AWS Lambda
13 38 (5.69%) IaaS
14 37 (5.54%) PaaS
15 36 (5.39%) Virtual Private Cloud
16 35 (5.24%) Amazon EC2
16 35 (5.24%) Amazon EKS
17 34 (5.09%) Google Kubernetes Engine
18 33 (4.94%) Amazon ECS
19 30 (4.49%) Amazon CloudWatch
Communications & Networking
1 71 (10.63%) Firewall
2 68 (10.18%) DNS
3 37 (5.54%) VPN
4 28 (4.19%) Network Security
5 15 (2.25%) DHCP
5 15 (2.25%) WAN
6 14 (2.10%) TCP/IP
7 6 (0.90%) SD-WAN
8 5 (0.75%) BGP
8 5 (0.75%) Internet
8 5 (0.75%) Reverse Proxy
8 5 (0.75%) SSL
8 5 (0.75%) VLAN
9 4 (0.60%) LAN
9 4 (0.60%) SAN
9 4 (0.60%) Software-Defined Networking
10 3 (0.45%) IPv4
10 3 (0.45%) OSPF
10 3 (0.45%) SMTP
10 3 (0.45%) VSAN
Database & Business Intelligence
1 23 (3.44%) SQL Server
2 18 (2.69%) Amazon RDS
3 14 (2.10%) PostgreSQL
4 11 (1.65%) Amazon Athena
4 11 (1.65%) DynamoDB
5 8 (1.20%) BigQuery
6 6 (0.90%) Azure SQL Database
6 6 (0.90%) Data Lake
7 5 (0.75%) Amazon Redshift
7 5 (0.75%) Oracle Database
8 3 (0.45%) Amazon QuickSight
8 3 (0.45%) Big Data
8 3 (0.45%) MySQL
8 3 (0.45%) Oracle Database 12c
8 3 (0.45%) Relational Database
9 2 (0.30%) Delta Lake
9 2 (0.30%) Elasticsearch
9 2 (0.30%) Metadata
9 2 (0.30%) Oracle Exadata
9 2 (0.30%) Redis
Development Applications
1 53 (7.93%) Jenkins
2 45 (6.74%) GitLab
3 39 (5.84%) Git
4 17 (2.54%) JIRA
5 9 (1.35%) Artifactory
6 5 (0.75%) Bitbucket
7 4 (0.60%) Claude Code
8 3 (0.45%) Selenium
8 3 (0.45%) Team Foundation Server
9 2 (0.30%) Atlassian Bamboo
9 2 (0.30%) Cypress.io
9 2 (0.30%) Liquibase
9 2 (0.30%) Robot Framework
9 2 (0.30%) SonarQube
10 1 (0.15%) Burp Suite
10 1 (0.15%) Chocolatey
10 1 (0.15%) CircleCI
10 1 (0.15%) Gatling
10 1 (0.15%) sqlmap
10 1 (0.15%) TestRail
General
1 82 (12.28%) Social Skills
2 79 (11.83%) Finance
3 58 (8.68%) Public Sector
4 24 (3.59%) Analytical Skills
4 24 (3.59%) Banking
5 11 (1.65%) Documentation Skills
6 9 (1.35%) Inclusion and Diversity
6 9 (1.35%) Investment Banking
7 5 (0.75%) Law
7 5 (0.75%) Legal
7 5 (0.75%) Pharmaceutical
7 5 (0.75%) Retail
8 3 (0.45%) Corporate Banking
8 3 (0.45%) Financial Institution
8 3 (0.45%) Local Government
8 3 (0.45%) Military
8 3 (0.45%) Police
8 3 (0.45%) Presentation Skills
8 3 (0.45%) Retail Banking
8 3 (0.45%) Telecoms
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 26 (3.89%) REST
2 14 (2.10%) Node.js
3 13 (1.95%) OAuth
3 13 (1.95%) OAuth2
4 9 (1.35%) ARM Templates
4 9 (1.35%) React
4 9 (1.35%) Spring
4 9 (1.35%) Spring Boot
5 8 (1.20%) Kafka
6 7 (1.05%) AWS CDK
6 7 (1.05%) Model Context Protocol
6 7 (1.05%) OpenID
7 6 (0.90%) .NET
7 6 (0.90%) YAML
8 5 (0.75%) FastAPI
8 5 (0.75%) Flask
8 5 (0.75%) Playwright
8 5 (0.75%) PySpark
9 4 (0.60%) Jest
9 4 (0.60%) TensorFlow
Miscellaneous
1 125 (18.71%) Cloud Native
2 37 (5.54%) Hybrid Cloud
3 31 (4.64%) Security Posture
4 25 (3.74%) Enterprise Cloud
4 25 (3.74%) Public Cloud
5 24 (3.59%) Onboarding
6 23 (3.44%) Data Centre
7 17 (2.54%) Enterprise Software
8 16 (2.40%) Distributed Systems
9 15 (2.25%) Cloud Security Posture
10 13 (1.95%) Management Information System
11 9 (1.35%) Linux Command Line
11 9 (1.35%) Product Ownership
11 9 (1.35%) Self-Motivation
12 8 (1.20%) Data Protection Act
13 7 (1.05%) Legacy Systems
14 5 (0.75%) PKI
14 5 (0.75%) Private Cloud
15 4 (0.60%) AI Agents
15 4 (0.60%) Virtual Team
Operating Systems
1 103 (15.42%) Windows
2 64 (9.58%) Linux
3 52 (7.78%) Windows Server
4 26 (3.89%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
5 8 (1.20%) Ubuntu
5 8 (1.20%) Windows Server 2019
6 3 (0.45%) CentOS
6 3 (0.45%) VMS
7 2 (0.30%) Windows Server 2012
8 1 (0.15%) Mac OS
Processes & Methodologies
1 254 (38.02%) CI/CD
2 241 (36.08%) Infrastructure as Code
3 212 (31.74%) DevOps
4 145 (21.71%) Cloud Security
5 130 (19.46%) Platform Engineering
6 123 (18.41%) Infrastructure Engineering
7 92 (13.77%) Migration
8 83 (12.43%) AI
9 82 (12.28%) Agile
10 81 (12.13%) Containerisation
11 67 (10.03%) Observability
12 55 (8.23%) Problem-Solving
13 53 (7.93%) Infrastructure Automation
13 53 (7.93%) Software Engineering
14 52 (7.78%) Technical Leadership
15 51 (7.63%) Continuous Improvement
16 40 (5.99%) DevSecOps
16 40 (5.99%) Mentoring
17 38 (5.69%) Deployment Automation
18 36 (5.39%) RBAC
Programming Languages
1 179 (26.80%) Python
2 130 (19.46%) PowerShell
3 69 (10.33%) Bash
4 58 (8.68%) SQL
5 50 (7.49%) Bicep
6 33 (4.94%) Java
7 17 (2.54%) C#
8 12 (1.80%) JavaScript
9 10 (1.50%) Go
10 9 (1.35%) TypeScript
11 8 (1.20%) Shell Script
12 5 (0.75%) Groovy
13 2 (0.30%) Kusto Query Language
13 2 (0.30%) R
13 2 (0.30%) Ruby
14 1 (0.15%) Apex Code
14 1 (0.15%) Cypher
14 1 (0.15%) Kotlin
14 1 (0.15%) Perl
14 1 (0.15%) Scala
Qualifications
1 163 (24.40%) Security Cleared
2 126 (18.86%) SC Cleared
3 46 (6.89%) DV Cleared
4 44 (6.59%) Azure Certification
5 43 (6.44%) AWS Certification
6 20 (2.99%) Degree
7 17 (2.54%) AWS Certified Solutions Architect
8 14 (2.10%) Microsoft Certification
9 13 (1.95%) CISSP
10 11 (1.65%) Cisco Certification
11 8 (1.20%) AWS Certified DevOps Engineer
11 8 (1.20%) BPSS Clearance
12 7 (1.05%) CCNP
12 7 (1.05%) Computer Science Degree
13 6 (0.90%) MCSE
14 4 (0.60%) (ISC)2 CCSP
14 4 (0.60%) CCIE
15 3 (0.45%) AWS Certified SysOps Administrator
15 3 (0.45%) CISM
15 3 (0.45%) VMware Certified Professional (VCP)
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 12 (1.80%) NIST
2 10 (1.50%) Data Quality
2 10 (1.50%) ISO/IEC 27001
2 10 (1.50%) QA
3 7 (1.05%) NCSC
4 5 (0.75%) GDPR
5 4 (0.60%) Cyber Essentials
5 4 (0.60%) PCI DSS
6 3 (0.45%) Disclosure Scotland
7 2 (0.30%) SLA
8 1 (0.15%) Accessibility
8 1 (0.15%) Actionable Recommendations
8 1 (0.15%) Cyber Essentials PLUS
8 1 (0.15%) Government Security Classifications
8 1 (0.15%) GRC
8 1 (0.15%) SOC 2
8 1 (0.15%) WCAG
System Software
1 73 (10.93%) Active Directory
2 70 (10.48%) Docker
3 30 (4.49%) VMware Infrastructure
4 25 (3.74%) Virtual Machines
5 23 (3.44%) VMware ESXi
6 21 (3.14%) VMware NSX
7 16 (2.40%) vSphere
8 14 (2.10%) Virtual Desktop
9 12 (1.80%) Hyper-V
9 12 (1.80%) vCloud
10 7 (1.05%) Squid
11 4 (0.60%) Firmware
12 3 (0.45%) Ceph
12 3 (0.45%) Dovecot
12 3 (0.45%) NFS
12 3 (0.45%) Postfix
13 2 (0.30%) KVM
Systems Management
1 297 (44.46%) Terraform
2 153 (22.90%) Kubernetes
3 49 (7.34%) Ansible
4 24 (3.59%) Grafana
5 23 (3.44%) Prometheus
6 21 (3.14%) Single Sign-On
7 19 (2.84%) vCenter Server
8 18 (2.69%) Progress Chef
9 17 (2.54%) SCOM
10 16 (2.40%) Microsoft Intune
11 15 (2.25%) Puppet
12 9 (1.35%) Istio
12 9 (1.35%) Packer
13 7 (1.05%) Argo
14 6 (0.90%) Cilium
15 4 (0.60%) HAProxy
15 4 (0.60%) Suricata
15 4 (0.60%) VxRail
16 3 (0.45%) Salt
16 3 (0.45%) vRealize
Vendors
1 141 (21.11%) Microsoft
2 105 (15.72%) Google
3 50 (7.49%) VMware
4 27 (4.04%) Oracle
5 17 (2.54%) Zscaler
6 16 (2.40%) Red Hat
7 14 (2.10%) Okta
8 13 (1.95%) Palo Alto
8 13 (1.95%) ServiceNow
9 10 (1.50%) Cisco
10 9 (1.35%) CrowdStrike
10 9 (1.35%) Databricks
10 9 (1.35%) Dynatrace
11 8 (1.20%) Salesforce
11 8 (1.20%) Splunk
12 6 (0.90%) BeyondTrust
12 6 (0.90%) Broadcom
12 6 (0.90%) Fortinet
12 6 (0.90%) OpenAI
12 6 (0.90%) SolarWinds