CompTIA Security+ Contract Job Trends

CompTIA Security+
UK

The table below provides summary statistics for contract job vacancies with a requirement for CompTIA Security+ qualifications. It includes a benchmarking guide to the contractor rates offered over the 6 months leading up to 30 September 2026, comparing them to the same period in the previous two years.

6 months to
30 Sep 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 601 496 520
Rank change year-on-year -105 +24 +112
Contract jobs citing CompTIA Security+ 82 57 47
As % of all contract jobs in the UK 0.15% 0.17% 0.12%
As % of the Qualifications category 0.47% 0.55% 0.43%
Number of daily rates quoted 51 36 29
10th Percentile £389 £319 £483
25th Percentile £425 £409 £513
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £506 £500 £600
Median % change year-on-year +1.20% -16.67% +14.29%
75th Percentile £600 £617 £640
90th Percentile £713 £691 £700
UK excluding London median daily rate £506 £520 £613
% change year-on-year -2.69% -15.10% +11.87%
Number of hourly rates quoted 5 5 0
10th Percentile - £42.66 -
25th Percentile - £43.75 -
Median hourly rate £71.00 £54.00 -
Median % change year-on-year +31.48% - -
75th Percentile £78.70 £62.25 -
90th Percentile £78.88 £62.85 -
UK excluding London median hourly rate £71.00 £41.94 -
% change year-on-year +69.29% - -

All Academic and Professional Certifications
UK

CompTIA Security+ falls under the Academic Qualifications and Professional Certifications category. For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all contract job vacancies requiring academic qualifications or professional certifications.

Contract vacancies requiring academic qualifications or professional certifications 17,415 10,358 10,991
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the UK 31.73% 31.54% 29.23%
Number of daily rates quoted 11,583 6,484 6,674
10th Percentile £350 £283 £313
25th Percentile £445 £413 £425
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £530 £525 £525
Median % change year-on-year +0.95% - -4.55%
75th Percentile £631 £625 £634
90th Percentile £713 £710 £725
UK excluding London median daily rate £525 £500 £525
% change year-on-year +5.00% -4.76% -1.87%
Number of hourly rates quoted 1,404 870 609
10th Percentile £17.00 £17.87 £17.98
25th Percentile £25.75 £18.87 £25.26
Median hourly rate £45.35 £25.15 £49.00
Median % change year-on-year +80.32% -48.67% -8.69%
75th Percentile £72.25 £42.81 £68.75
90th Percentile £88.75 £70.00 £75.57
UK excluding London median hourly rate £45.00 £25.15 £50.00
% change year-on-year +78.93% -49.70% -3.65%

CompTIA Security+
Job Vacancy Trend

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

CompTIA Security+ job vacancy trend in the UK

CompTIA Security+
Daily Rate Trend

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in the UK citing CompTIA Security+.

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in the UK citing CompTIA Security+

CompTIA Security+
Daily Rate Histogram

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing CompTIA Security+ over the 6 months to 30 September 2026.

Daily rate histogram for CompTIA Security+ in the UK

CompTIA Security+
Hourly Rate Trend

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in the UK citing CompTIA Security+.

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in the UK citing CompTIA Security+

CompTIA Security+
Top 15 Contract Job Locations

The table below looks at the demand and provides a guide to the median contractor rates quoted in IT jobs citing CompTIA Security+ within the UK over the 6 months to 30 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 -95 75 £506 +1.20% 196
UK excluding London -77 45 £506 -2.69% 139
London -78 33 £525 +10.53% 70
Work from Home -68 18 £568 +46.45% 71
North of England -73 15 £430 -23.45% 28
South West -31 14 £688 +20.35% 15
North West -41 13 £430 -29.25% 19
South East -51 10 £675 +63.64% 41
Channel Islands -4 2 £600 -17.24%
Midlands -38 2 £579 +36.18% 19
Wales -12 1 £815 +242.44% 5
East Midlands -17 1 £533 +25.29% 9
Scotland -19 1 - - 17
Yorkshire -44 1 £575 +10.58% 8
West Midlands - 1 £625 - 10

CompTIA Security+
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 4 (4.88%) Confluence
2 1 (1.22%) SharePoint
Applications
1 3 (3.66%) Microsoft Office
2 1 (1.22%) MS Visio
Cloud Services
1 31 (37.80%) Azure
2 20 (24.39%) AWS
3 9 (10.98%) GCP
4 8 (9.76%) Azure Sentinel
5 6 (7.32%) Azure DevOps
5 6 (7.32%) Microsoft 365
6 5 (6.10%) GitHub
7 4 (4.88%) Entra ID
7 4 (4.88%) GitHub Actions
8 3 (3.66%) Microsoft Purview
9 2 (2.44%) Anthropic Claude
9 2 (2.44%) Azure Logic Apps
9 2 (2.44%) Datadog
9 2 (2.44%) SaaS
10 1 (1.22%) AWS CloudFormation
10 1 (1.22%) Azure Key Vault
10 1 (1.22%) Cloudflare
10 1 (1.22%) Google Workspace
10 1 (1.22%) Power Platform
10 1 (1.22%) SuccessFactors
Communications & Networking
1 10 (12.20%) Network Security
2 8 (9.76%) Firewall
3 5 (6.10%) DNS
4 4 (4.88%) Wireless
5 2 (2.44%) SSH
6 1 (1.22%) HTTP
6 1 (1.22%) Intrusion Detection
6 1 (1.22%) IPFIX
6 1 (1.22%) SNMP
6 1 (1.22%) TCP/IP
6 1 (1.22%) VPN
6 1 (1.22%) WAN
Database & Business Intelligence
1 1 (1.22%) Metadata
1 1 (1.22%) MongoDB
1 1 (1.22%) Power BI
1 1 (1.22%) SQL Server
Development Applications
1 4 (4.88%) GitLab
1 4 (4.88%) Jenkins
2 3 (3.66%) JIRA
3 2 (2.44%) Claude Code
4 1 (1.22%) Git
General
1 22 (26.83%) Analytical Skills
2 18 (21.95%) Social Skills
3 13 (15.85%) Finance
4 7 (8.54%) Aerospace
4 7 (8.54%) Banking
5 5 (6.10%) Public Sector
6 3 (3.66%) Documentation Skills
7 2 (2.44%) Military
8 1 (1.22%) Investment Banking
8 1 (1.22%) Local Government
8 1 (1.22%) Organisational Skills
Job Titles
1 24 (29.27%) Analyst
2 15 (18.29%) Senior
3 12 (14.63%) Consultant
3 12 (14.63%) Security Analyst
4 11 (13.41%) Security Consultant
5 9 (10.98%) Security Engineer
5 9 (10.98%) SOC Analyst
6 8 (9.76%) Architect
7 7 (8.54%) Security Architect
8 6 (7.32%) Cybersecurity Analyst
8 6 (7.32%) Operations Analyst
8 6 (7.32%) Project Consultant
8 6 (7.32%) Security Operations Analyst
8 6 (7.32%) Senior Analyst
9 5 (6.10%) DevSecOps Engineer
9 5 (6.10%) Lead
9 5 (6.10%) Unix Engineer
10 4 (4.88%) Network Engineer
11 3 (3.66%) Security Officer
11 3 (3.66%) Senior Security Analyst
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 9 (10.98%) Terraform
2 4 (4.88%) 802.1X
3 3 (3.66%) ARM Templates
3 3 (3.66%) REST
4 2 (2.44%) LDAP
4 2 (2.44%) SailPoint
4 2 (2.44%) YAML
5 1 (1.22%) ADO
5 1 (1.22%) JDBC
5 1 (1.22%) JSON
5 1 (1.22%) OAuth
5 1 (1.22%) OAuth2
5 1 (1.22%) OpenID
5 1 (1.22%) RabbitMQ
5 1 (1.22%) Regular Expression
5 1 (1.22%) SAML
5 1 (1.22%) Spring
5 1 (1.22%) Spring Boot
Miscellaneous
1 11 (13.41%) Security Posture
2 9 (10.98%) Security Operations Centre
3 8 (9.76%) Onboarding
4 6 (7.32%) Cyber Threat
5 5 (6.10%) Cyber Defence
5 5 (6.10%) Data Centre
5 5 (6.10%) Legacy Systems
5 5 (6.10%) Management Information System
5 5 (6.10%) Operational Technology
6 4 (4.88%) Cyber Kill Chain
6 4 (4.88%) Hybrid Cloud
6 4 (4.88%) PKI
7 3 (3.66%) Analytical Mindset
7 3 (3.66%) Embedded Systems
8 2 (2.44%) CESG
8 2 (2.44%) Virtual Team
9 1 (1.22%) CSOC
9 1 (1.22%) Data Protection Act
9 1 (1.22%) Podcast
9 1 (1.22%) SCADA
Operating Systems
1 15 (18.29%) Linux
2 13 (15.85%) Windows
3 7 (8.54%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
4 6 (7.32%) Unix
5 5 (6.10%) AIX
5 5 (6.10%) HPUX
5 5 (6.10%) Oracle Linux
5 5 (6.10%) Solaris
5 5 (6.10%) SUSE
6 3 (3.66%) Windows Server
7 1 (1.22%) CentOS
7 1 (1.22%) Ubuntu
Processes & Methodologies
1 52 (63.41%) Cybersecurity
2 33 (40.24%) Security Operations
3 31 (37.80%) Incident Response
3 31 (37.80%) Vulnerability Management
4 30 (36.59%) SIEM
5 21 (25.61%) Continuous Improvement
5 21 (25.61%) Threat Intelligence
6 20 (24.39%) Threat Detection
7 18 (21.95%) MITRE ATT&CK
7 18 (21.95%) Problem-Solving
7 18 (21.95%) Security Architecture
8 17 (20.73%) SOAR
9 16 (19.51%) Security Monitoring
10 15 (18.29%) Cyber Threat Intelligence
10 15 (18.29%) Risk Management
10 15 (18.29%) Threat Modelling
11 14 (17.07%) Cloud Security
12 13 (15.85%) DevOps
13 12 (14.63%) RBAC
13 12 (14.63%) Vulnerability Remediation
Programming Languages
1 18 (21.95%) PowerShell
2 16 (19.51%) Python
3 11 (13.41%) Bash
4 4 (4.88%) Bicep
4 4 (4.88%) Search Processing Language
5 3 (3.66%) Perl
6 2 (2.44%) Kusto Query Language
7 1 (1.22%) Java
Qualifications
1 57 (69.51%) CISSP
2 28 (34.15%) Security Cleared
3 25 (30.49%) CEH
4 21 (25.61%) CISM
4 21 (25.61%) SC Cleared
5 19 (23.17%) Cisco Certification
6 16 (19.51%) CompTIA CySA+
7 15 (18.29%) Network+ Certification
8 14 (17.07%) (ISC)2 CCSP
8 14 (17.07%) GIAC
9 12 (14.63%) Degree
10 11 (13.41%) CRISC
11 10 (12.20%) DV Cleared
12 8 (9.76%) CCSP
12 8 (9.76%) GCIH
13 7 (8.54%) AWS Certification
13 7 (8.54%) ISACA
13 7 (8.54%) SSCP
14 6 (7.32%) Azure Certification
14 6 (7.32%) OSCP
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 36 (43.90%) NIST
2 34 (41.46%) ISO/IEC 27001
3 10 (12.20%) NCSC
4 9 (10.98%) GDPR
5 8 (9.76%) Cyber Essentials
6 7 (8.54%) GRC
6 7 (8.54%) PCI DSS
7 5 (6.10%) NIST 800
8 4 (4.88%) COBIT
9 3 (3.66%) Cyber Essentials PLUS
9 3 (3.66%) SOC 2
10 2 (2.44%) HIPAA
10 2 (2.44%) SOC 1
11 1 (1.22%) Data Quality
11 1 (1.22%) JSP 440
11 1 (1.22%) QA
System Software
1 4 (4.88%) Docker
2 3 (3.66%) Active Directory
2 3 (3.66%) Embedded Firmware
2 3 (3.66%) Firmware
Systems Management
1 9 (10.98%) Kubernetes
2 6 (7.32%) Ansible
3 4 (4.88%) QRadar
4 2 (2.44%) Nexpose
4 2 (2.44%) Puppet
5 1 (1.22%) Grafana
5 1 (1.22%) Host Intrusion Detection System
5 1 (1.22%) Istio
5 1 (1.22%) Microsoft Intune
5 1 (1.22%) Prometheus
Vendors
1 24 (29.27%) Microsoft
2 15 (18.29%) Splunk
3 11 (13.41%) CrowdStrike
4 5 (6.10%) HP
4 5 (6.10%) Oracle
4 5 (6.10%) Red Hat
5 4 (4.88%) ForeScout
5 4 (4.88%) Google
5 4 (4.88%) ServiceNow
5 4 (4.88%) SolarWinds
6 3 (3.66%) Palo Alto
6 3 (3.66%) Tenable
7 2 (2.44%) CyberArk
7 2 (2.44%) IBM
7 2 (2.44%) Rapid7
7 2 (2.44%) Sophos
7 2 (2.44%) Trend Micro
8 1 (1.22%) CheckPoint
8 1 (1.22%) Clearswift
8 1 (1.22%) New Relic