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 5 August 2026.

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

6 months to
5 Aug 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 201 304 330
Rank change year-on-year +103 +26 -66
Contract jobs requiring a Cloud Engineer 721 260 255
As % of all contract jobs in the UK 1.36% 0.79% 0.65%
As % of the Job Titles category 1.46% 0.86% 0.70%
Number of daily rates quoted 468 197 170
10th Percentile £400 £400 £386
25th Percentile £452 £425 £450
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £525 £500 £550
Median % change year-on-year +5.00% -9.09% -
75th Percentile £618 £575 £625
90th Percentile £688 £643 £675
UK excluding London median daily rate £520 £500 £520
% change year-on-year +4.00% -3.85% -5.45%
Number of hourly rates quoted 26 4 1
10th Percentile £23.20 £33.75 -
25th Percentile £71.00 £39.38 £27.50
Median hourly rate £77.00 £53.75 £30.00
Median % change year-on-year +43.26% +79.17% -
75th Percentile £81.25 £74.38 £32.50
90th Percentile £83.13 £95.75 -
UK excluding London median hourly rate £74.00 - £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 49,279 30,093 36,428
% of contract IT jobs with a recognized job title 92.64% 91.45% 92.94%
Number of daily rates quoted 29,675 19,115 23,531
10th Percentile £330 £282 £300
25th Percentile £425 £400 £413
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £525 £500 £525
Median % change year-on-year +5.00% -4.76% -2.33%
75th Percentile £625 £623 £638
90th Percentile £725 £725 £750
UK excluding London median daily rate £500 £475 £500
% change year-on-year +5.26% -5.00% -
Number of hourly rates quoted 3,419 1,494 2,063
10th Percentile £15.23 £13.60 £14.16
25th Percentile £21.14 £17.30 £20.12
Median hourly rate £42.50 £25.15 £43.00
Median % change year-on-year +68.99% -41.51% +1.18%
75th Percentile £67.99 £53.99 £65.00
90th Percentile £80.00 £73.10 £75.00
UK excluding London median hourly rate £44.10 £25.15 £43.90
% change year-on-year +75.33% -42.71% +17.07%

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 5 August 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 5 August 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 5 August 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 +76 615 £525 +5.00% 765
UK excluding London +83 367 £520 +4.00% 330
London +67 305 £525 +0.48% 457
Work from Home +15 184 £538 +7.50% 289
South East +1 107 £538 +2.38% 57
North of England -1 96 £525 +16.67% 113
Midlands -9 61 £525 +10.53% 34
Scotland +36 60 £437 -12.60% 27
North West -16 56 £538 +22.86% 72
West Midlands -27 34 £525 +8.81% 23
Yorkshire -20 33 £475 -5.00% 29
East Midlands +7 26 £450 -5.26% 11
East of England +4 22 £505 +26.25% 28
South West -37 16 £563 +2.27% 56
Wales -5 7 - - 3
North East -39 7 £525 +7.69% 12

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

For the 6 months to 5 August 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.

1 342 (47.43%) Azure
2 310 (43.00%) Terraform
3 276 (38.28%) AWS
4 259 (35.92%) CI/CD
5 255 (35.37%) Infrastructure as Code
6 211 (29.26%) DevOps
7 191 (26.49%) Python
8 177 (24.55%) Security Cleared
9 173 (23.99%) Kubernetes
10 164 (22.75%) GCP
11 163 (22.61%) Cloud Security
12 159 (22.05%) Microsoft
13 151 (20.94%) PowerShell
14 144 (19.97%) Infrastructure Engineering
15 134 (18.59%) SC Cleared
16 133 (18.45%) Platform Engineering
17 114 (15.81%) Google
18 112 (15.53%) Windows
19 92 (12.76%) AI
20 91 (12.62%) GitHub
21 88 (12.21%) Containerisation
21 88 (12.21%) Entra ID
22 87 (12.07%) Migration
23 86 (11.93%) Agile
24 82 (11.37%) Active Directory
25 79 (10.96%) Bash
26 77 (10.68%) Firewall
27 76 (10.54%) DNS
27 76 (10.54%) Docker
27 76 (10.54%) 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 (1.66%) Microsoft Exchange
2 10 (1.39%) Apache
3 7 (0.97%) Confluence
4 6 (0.83%) Apache Airflow
5 5 (0.69%) SharePoint
6 4 (0.55%) nginx
7 3 (0.42%) Apache Spark
7 3 (0.42%) IIS
7 3 (0.42%) Tomcat
8 2 (0.28%) CloudStack
8 2 (0.28%) OpenStack
9 1 (0.14%) Apache Pulsar
9 1 (0.14%) Traefik
Applications
1 1 (0.14%) Chatbot
Business Applications
1 2 (0.28%) Aladdin
Cloud Services
1 342 (47.43%) Azure
2 276 (38.28%) AWS
3 164 (22.75%) GCP
4 91 (12.62%) GitHub
5 88 (12.21%) Entra ID
6 62 (8.60%) Serverless
7 57 (7.91%) GitHub Actions
8 49 (6.80%) Azure DevOps
9 46 (6.38%) Azure AKS
10 45 (6.24%) AWS CloudFormation
11 44 (6.10%) IaaS
12 42 (5.83%) Amazon S3
13 41 (5.69%) AWS Lambda
14 38 (5.27%) Virtual Private Cloud
15 36 (4.99%) Amazon EC2
15 36 (4.99%) Google Kubernetes Engine
16 33 (4.58%) Amazon EKS
16 33 (4.58%) PaaS
17 32 (4.44%) Azure Monitor
18 31 (4.30%) Amazon ECS
Communications & Networking
1 77 (10.68%) Firewall
2 76 (10.54%) DNS
3 40 (5.55%) VPN
4 31 (4.30%) Network Security
5 17 (2.36%) DHCP
6 16 (2.22%) WAN
7 15 (2.08%) TCP/IP
8 11 (1.53%) Internet
9 6 (0.83%) SD-WAN
9 6 (0.83%) VLAN
10 5 (0.69%) BGP
10 5 (0.69%) Reverse Proxy
10 5 (0.69%) SSL
11 4 (0.55%) LAN
11 4 (0.55%) SAN
11 4 (0.55%) VSAN
12 3 (0.42%) IPv4
12 3 (0.42%) OSPF
12 3 (0.42%) SMTP
12 3 (0.42%) Wireless
Database & Business Intelligence
1 25 (3.47%) SQL Server
2 17 (2.36%) Amazon RDS
3 13 (1.80%) PostgreSQL
4 11 (1.53%) Amazon Athena
4 11 (1.53%) BigQuery
5 9 (1.25%) DynamoDB
6 7 (0.97%) Oracle Exadata
7 6 (0.83%) Azure SQL Database
8 5 (0.69%) Data Lake
8 5 (0.69%) Oracle Database
9 4 (0.55%) Amazon Redshift
10 3 (0.42%) Amazon QuickSight
10 3 (0.42%) Flink
10 3 (0.42%) Looker
10 3 (0.42%) MySQL
10 3 (0.42%) Oracle Database 12c
11 2 (0.28%) Big Data
11 2 (0.28%) Elasticsearch
11 2 (0.28%) Redis
11 2 (0.28%) Relational Database
Development Applications
1 52 (7.21%) GitLab
2 50 (6.93%) Jenkins
3 38 (5.27%) Git
4 19 (2.64%) JIRA
5 9 (1.25%) Artifactory
6 6 (0.83%) Claude Code
7 5 (0.69%) Bitbucket
8 3 (0.42%) Selenium
8 3 (0.42%) Team Foundation Server
9 2 (0.28%) Atlassian Bamboo
9 2 (0.28%) Cypress.io
9 2 (0.28%) Liquibase
9 2 (0.28%) Octopus Deploy
9 2 (0.28%) Robot Framework
9 2 (0.28%) SonarQube
10 1 (0.14%) Burp Suite
10 1 (0.14%) CircleCI
10 1 (0.14%) Gatling
10 1 (0.14%) sqlmap
10 1 (0.14%) TestRail
General
1 91 (12.62%) Finance
2 79 (10.96%) Social Skills
3 61 (8.46%) Public Sector
4 28 (3.88%) Analytical Skills
5 26 (3.61%) Banking
6 12 (1.66%) Documentation Skills
7 9 (1.25%) Inclusion and Diversity
8 8 (1.11%) Investment Banking
9 5 (0.69%) Law
9 5 (0.69%) Local Government
10 4 (0.55%) Legal
10 4 (0.55%) Pharmaceutical
11 3 (0.42%) Front Office
11 3 (0.42%) Italian Language
11 3 (0.42%) Military
11 3 (0.42%) Police
11 3 (0.42%) Presentation Skills
11 3 (0.42%) Retail
11 3 (0.42%) Telecoms
12 2 (0.28%) Billing
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 26 (3.61%) REST
2 14 (1.94%) Node.js
3 13 (1.80%) OAuth
3 13 (1.80%) OAuth2
4 12 (1.66%) ARM Templates
5 10 (1.39%) Spring
5 10 (1.39%) Spring Boot
6 8 (1.11%) AWS CDK
6 8 (1.11%) Model Context Protocol
6 8 (1.11%) React
7 7 (0.97%) OpenID
8 6 (0.83%) .NET
8 6 (0.83%) FastAPI
8 6 (0.83%) Flask
8 6 (0.83%) Kafka
8 6 (0.83%) YAML
9 5 (0.69%) Playwright
9 5 (0.69%) PyTorch
9 5 (0.69%) TensorFlow
10 4 (0.55%) Express.js
Miscellaneous
1 133 (18.45%) Cloud Native
2 48 (6.66%) Security Posture
3 38 (5.27%) Enterprise Cloud
4 34 (4.72%) Hybrid Cloud
5 27 (3.74%) Onboarding
6 23 (3.19%) Public Cloud
7 21 (2.91%) Enterprise Software
8 20 (2.77%) Cloud Security Posture
9 19 (2.64%) Data Centre
10 16 (2.22%) Distributed Systems
11 15 (2.08%) Management Information System
12 10 (1.39%) Linux Command Line
13 9 (1.25%) Data Protection Act
13 9 (1.25%) Self-Motivation
14 8 (1.11%) AI Agents
14 8 (1.11%) Product Ownership
15 7 (0.97%) Legacy Systems
15 7 (0.97%) PKI
16 5 (0.69%) Private Cloud
17 4 (0.55%) Virtual Team
Operating Systems
1 112 (15.53%) Windows
2 72 (9.99%) Linux
3 53 (7.35%) Windows Server
4 29 (4.02%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
5 10 (1.39%) Windows Server 2019
6 8 (1.11%) Ubuntu
7 3 (0.42%) CentOS
7 3 (0.42%) VMS
8 2 (0.28%) Windows Server 2012
9 1 (0.14%) Mac OS
Processes & Methodologies
1 259 (35.92%) CI/CD
2 255 (35.37%) Infrastructure as Code
3 211 (29.26%) DevOps
4 163 (22.61%) Cloud Security
5 144 (19.97%) Infrastructure Engineering
6 133 (18.45%) Platform Engineering
7 92 (12.76%) AI
8 88 (12.21%) Containerisation
9 87 (12.07%) Migration
10 86 (11.93%) Agile
11 76 (10.54%) Observability
12 60 (8.32%) Software Engineering
13 55 (7.63%) Infrastructure Automation
14 53 (7.35%) Technical Leadership
15 52 (7.21%) Problem-Solving
16 51 (7.07%) Continuous Improvement
17 46 (6.38%) DevSecOps
18 44 (6.10%) Change Management
19 43 (5.96%) Deployment Automation
20 41 (5.69%) Mentoring
Programming Languages
1 191 (26.49%) Python
2 151 (20.94%) PowerShell
3 79 (10.96%) Bash
4 63 (8.74%) Bicep
5 60 (8.32%) SQL
6 37 (5.13%) Java
7 19 (2.64%) C#
8 13 (1.80%) JavaScript
8 13 (1.80%) Shell Script
9 10 (1.39%) Go
10 8 (1.11%) TypeScript
11 4 (0.55%) Groovy
12 3 (0.42%) C
12 3 (0.42%) Scala
13 2 (0.28%) Kusto Query Language
13 2 (0.28%) Ruby
14 1 (0.14%) Apex Code
14 1 (0.14%) Data Analysis Expressions
14 1 (0.14%) Perl
14 1 (0.14%) R
Qualifications
1 177 (24.55%) Security Cleared
2 134 (18.59%) SC Cleared
3 56 (7.77%) DV Cleared
4 48 (6.66%) AWS Certification
4 48 (6.66%) Azure Certification
5 29 (4.02%) Degree
6 17 (2.36%) AWS Certified Solutions Architect
6 17 (2.36%) CISSP
7 15 (2.08%) Microsoft Certification
8 11 (1.53%) Cisco Certification
9 10 (1.39%) Computer Science Degree
10 7 (0.97%) BPSS Clearance
10 7 (0.97%) CCNP
11 6 (0.83%) AWS Certified DevOps Engineer
11 6 (0.83%) CISM
11 6 (0.83%) MCSE
12 4 (0.55%) (ISC)2 CCSP
12 4 (0.55%) CCIE
12 4 (0.55%) VMware Certified Professional (VCP)
13 3 (0.42%) CEH
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 13 (1.80%) Data Quality
2 12 (1.66%) ISO/IEC 27001
3 10 (1.39%) NIST
3 10 (1.39%) QA
4 9 (1.25%) NCSC
5 5 (0.69%) GDPR
6 4 (0.55%) Cyber Essentials
7 3 (0.42%) Disclosure Scotland
8 2 (0.28%) PCI DSS
8 2 (0.28%) SLA
9 1 (0.14%) Accessibility
9 1 (0.14%) Actionable Recommendations
9 1 (0.14%) Cyber Essentials PLUS
9 1 (0.14%) Government Security Classifications
9 1 (0.14%) GRC
9 1 (0.14%) SOC 2
9 1 (0.14%) WCAG
System Software
1 82 (11.37%) Active Directory
2 76 (10.54%) Docker
3 36 (4.99%) VMware Infrastructure
4 31 (4.30%) Virtual Machines
5 25 (3.47%) VMware ESXi
6 22 (3.05%) VMware NSX
7 18 (2.50%) vSphere
8 17 (2.36%) Virtual Desktop
9 12 (1.66%) vCloud
10 11 (1.53%) Hyper-V
11 7 (0.97%) Squid
12 5 (0.69%) Firmware
13 3 (0.42%) Ceph
13 3 (0.42%) Dovecot
13 3 (0.42%) NFS
13 3 (0.42%) Postfix
14 2 (0.28%) KVM
14 2 (0.28%) Virtual Servers
Systems Management
1 310 (43.00%) Terraform
2 173 (23.99%) Kubernetes
3 53 (7.35%) Ansible
4 23 (3.19%) Grafana
5 22 (3.05%) Prometheus
6 21 (2.91%) vCenter Server
7 20 (2.77%) Progress Chef
7 20 (2.77%) Single Sign-On
8 19 (2.64%) Microsoft Intune
8 19 (2.64%) SCOM
9 16 (2.22%) Puppet
10 8 (1.11%) Argo
10 8 (1.11%) Istio
10 8 (1.11%) Packer
11 6 (0.83%) Cilium
12 5 (0.69%) VxRail
13 4 (0.55%) HAProxy
13 4 (0.55%) Suricata
14 3 (0.42%) Salt
14 3 (0.42%) vRealize
Vendors
1 159 (22.05%) Microsoft
2 114 (15.81%) Google
3 57 (7.91%) VMware
4 27 (3.74%) Oracle
5 17 (2.36%) Red Hat
5 17 (2.36%) Zscaler
6 16 (2.22%) Okta
7 14 (1.94%) ServiceNow
8 13 (1.80%) Palo Alto
9 12 (1.66%) Splunk
10 10 (1.39%) Cisco
10 10 (1.39%) OpenAI
11 9 (1.25%) CrowdStrike
11 9 (1.25%) Salesforce
12 8 (1.11%) BeyondTrust
12 8 (1.11%) Broadcom
12 8 (1.11%) Databricks
12 8 (1.11%) Dynatrace
12 8 (1.11%) SolarWinds
13 7 (0.97%) New Relic