Cyber Essentials Contracts

Cyber Essentials
UK

The table below provides summary statistics for contract job vacancies requiring Cyber Essentials skills. It includes a benchmarking guide to the contractor rates offered in vacancies that cited Cyber Essentials over the 6 months leading up to 31 May 2025, comparing them to the same period in the previous two years.

6 months to
31 May 2025
Same period 2024 Same period 2023
Rank 450 501 551
Rank change year-on-year +51 +50 +147
Contract jobs citing Cyber Essentials 69 71 138
As % of all contract jobs advertised in the UK 0.24% 0.17% 0.25%
As % of the Quality Assurance & Compliance category 1.48% 1.18% 1.82%
Number of daily rates quoted 42 48 103
10th Percentile £333 £207 £425
25th Percentile £463 £366 £500
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £550 £500 £550
Median % change year-on-year +10.00% -9.09% +14.70%
75th Percentile £629 £600 £694
90th Percentile £686 £666 £800
UK excluding London median daily rate £583 £500 £545
% change year-on-year +16.50% -8.26% +21.11%
Number of hourly rates quoted 5 0 0
10th Percentile £28.32 - -
25th Percentile £29.51 - -
Median hourly rate £73.60 - -
75th Percentile £83.20 - -
90th Percentile - - -
UK excluding London median hourly rate £31.49 - -

All Quality Assurance and Compliance Skills
UK

Cyber Essentials falls under the Quality Assurance and Compliance category. For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all contract job vacancies requiring quality assurance or compliance skills.

Contract vacancies with a requirement for quality assurance or compliance skills 4,652 5,994 7,575
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the UK 15.95% 13.97% 13.50%
Number of daily rates quoted 2,978 3,792 5,161
10th Percentile £263 £280 £290
25th Percentile £400 £400 £413
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £510 £525
Median % change year-on-year -1.96% -2.86% +1.94%
75th Percentile £613 £625 £640
90th Percentile £725 £750 £750
UK excluding London median daily rate £475 £475 £485
% change year-on-year - -2.06% +7.78%
Number of hourly rates quoted 180 402 240
10th Percentile £15.13 £10.96 £13.29
25th Percentile £22.11 £13.20 £18.50
Median hourly rate £33.50 £22.04 £37.50
Median % change year-on-year +52.01% -41.24% +26.05%
75th Percentile £67.50 £47.81 £63.36
90th Percentile £80.28 £68.87 £77.73
UK excluding London median hourly rate £33.88 £18.97 £35.00
% change year-on-year +78.60% -45.80% +55.56%

Cyber Essentials
Job Vacancy Trend

Job postings citing Cyber Essentials as a proportion of all IT jobs advertised.

Job vacancy trend for Cyber Essentials in the UK

Cyber Essentials
Contractor Daily Rate Trend

3-month moving average daily rate quoted in jobs citing Cyber Essentials.

Daily rate trend for Cyber Essentials in the UK

Cyber Essentials
Daily Rate Histogram

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing Cyber Essentials over the 6 months to 31 May 2025.

Daily rate histogram for Cyber Essentials in the UK

Cyber Essentials
Contractor Hourly Rate Trend

3-month moving average hourly rates quoted in jobs citing Cyber Essentials.

Hourly rate trend for Cyber Essentials in the UK

Cyber Essentials
Hourly Rate Histogram

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing Cyber Essentials over the 6 months to 31 May 2025.

Hourly rate histogram for Cyber Essentials in the UK

Cyber Essentials
Top 15 Contract Locations

The table below looks at the demand and provides a guide to the median contractor rates quoted in IT jobs citing Cyber Essentials within the UK over the 6 months to 31 May 2025. 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 +52 61 £550 +7.32% 121
UK excluding London +54 39 £583 +16.50% 116
Work from Home +46 25 £550 - 59
London +43 24 £525 - 36
South East +54 13 £600 +252.94% 27
North of England +16 6 £575 +53.33% 29
South West +41 5 £600 +4.35% 15
Midlands +12 5 £325 -48.00% 11
Scotland -1 5 £550 +10.00% 13
East of England - 5 £249 - 7
West Midlands +12 3 £325 -56.67% 8
North West +6 3 £225 -43.75% 15
Yorkshire +15 2 £575 +130.00% 9
East Midlands +9 2 - - 3
North East - 1 £775 - 5

Cyber Essentials
Co-occurring Skills and Capabilities by Category

The follow tables expand on the table above by listing co-occurrences grouped by category. The same employment type, locality and period is covered with up to 20 co-occurrences shown in each of the following categories:

Application Platforms
1 3 (4.35%) SharePoint
Applications
1 1 (1.45%) Microsoft Office
Business Applications
1 2 (2.90%) Infor CloudSuite
Cloud Services
1 20 (28.99%) Azure
2 12 (17.39%) AWS
3 8 (11.59%) Microsoft 365
4 5 (7.25%) Azure Sentinel
4 5 (7.25%) GitHub
4 5 (7.25%) SaaS
5 4 (5.80%) GCP
5 4 (5.80%) Tricentis Tosca
6 3 (4.35%) Entra ID
6 3 (4.35%) OneDrive
7 2 (2.90%) Azure Stack
7 2 (2.90%) Cloud Computing
7 2 (2.90%) IaaS
7 2 (2.90%) PaaS
8 1 (1.45%) Azure Data Factory
8 1 (1.45%) Azure Key Vault
8 1 (1.45%) Azure Monitor
8 1 (1.45%) Microsoft Purview
8 1 (1.45%) Mimecast
Communications & Networking
1 8 (11.59%) Firewall
2 7 (10.14%) VPN
3 5 (7.25%) SD-WAN
3 5 (7.25%) WAN
4 4 (5.80%) BGP
4 4 (5.80%) Cisco Nexus
4 4 (5.80%) MPLS
4 4 (5.80%) Network Security
4 4 (5.80%) NGFW
4 4 (5.80%) OSPF
4 4 (5.80%) TCP/IP
5 3 (4.35%) DNS
5 3 (4.35%) VLAN
5 3 (4.35%) VSAN
6 2 (2.90%) Cisco ASA
6 2 (2.90%) Intrusion Detection
7 1 (1.45%) Kerberos
7 1 (1.45%) NAS
7 1 (1.45%) SAN
Database & Business Intelligence
1 3 (4.35%) Oracle Database
1 3 (4.35%) PostgreSQL
1 3 (4.35%) SQL Server
2 1 (1.45%) InfluxDB
2 1 (1.45%) MongoDB
Development Applications
1 5 (7.25%) Burp Suite
1 5 (7.25%) Metasploit
1 5 (7.25%) SonarQube
2 1 (1.45%) Jenkins
General
1 21 (30.43%) Social Skills
2 13 (18.84%) Public Sector
3 6 (8.70%) Finance
4 5 (7.25%) Legal
4 5 (7.25%) Manufacturing
5 4 (5.80%) Documentation Skills
6 3 (4.35%) Military
7 2 (2.90%) Organisational Skills
7 2 (2.90%) Presentation Skills
7 2 (2.90%) Retail
8 1 (1.45%) Analytical Skills
8 1 (1.45%) Banking
8 1 (1.45%) Law
8 1 (1.45%) Local Government
Job Titles
1 11 (15.94%) Senior
2 8 (11.59%) Architect
3 7 (10.14%) Analyst
3 7 (10.14%) Security Manager
4 6 (8.70%) Cybersecurity Engineer
4 6 (8.70%) Security Engineer
5 5 (7.25%) Consultant
5 5 (7.25%) Information Manager
6 4 (5.80%) Administrator
6 4 (5.80%) Applications Developer
6 4 (5.80%) Cybersecurity Manager
6 4 (5.80%) Developer
6 4 (5.80%) IAM Specialist
6 4 (5.80%) Lead
6 4 (5.80%) Security Analyst
6 4 (5.80%) Senior Applications Developer
6 4 (5.80%) Senior Developer
6 4 (5.80%) Support Engineer
6 4 (5.80%) Technical Architect
7 3 (4.35%) IT Engineer
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 4 (5.80%) .NET
1 4 (5.80%) LDAP
1 4 (5.80%) OAuth
1 4 (5.80%) OpenID
1 4 (5.80%) SAML
2 3 (4.35%) X-Windows
3 2 (2.90%) ModSecurity
4 1 (1.45%) REST
Miscellaneous
1 10 (14.49%) Security Posture
2 6 (8.70%) Security Operations Centre
3 5 (7.25%) Management Information System
4 4 (5.80%) Enterprise Software
4 4 (5.80%) Hybrid Cloud
4 4 (5.80%) PKI
4 4 (5.80%) Public Cloud
5 3 (4.35%) Onboarding
5 3 (4.35%) Operational Technology
6 2 (2.90%) Cyber Threat
6 2 (2.90%) Industry 4.0
6 2 (2.90%) Low-Code
7 1 (1.45%) Linux Command Line
7 1 (1.45%) Reinsurance
Operating Systems
1 14 (20.29%) Windows
2 10 (14.49%) Linux
3 6 (8.70%) Windows Server
4 4 (5.80%) Mac OS
4 4 (5.80%) Unix
5 2 (2.90%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
6 1 (1.45%) Data ONTAP
6 1 (1.45%) Windows Server 2019
Processes & Methodologies
1 30 (43.48%) Cybersecurity
2 23 (33.33%) Information Security
3 14 (20.29%) Incident Response
4 12 (17.39%) Risk Management
4 12 (17.39%) Security Operations
5 10 (14.49%) DevSecOps
5 10 (14.49%) Vulnerability Assessment
6 9 (13.04%) Infrastructure as Code
6 9 (13.04%) ITIL
6 9 (13.04%) OWASP
7 8 (11.59%) CI/CD
7 8 (11.59%) Data Protection
7 8 (11.59%) Disaster Recovery
8 7 (10.14%) Penetration Testing
8 7 (10.14%) Roadmaps
8 7 (10.14%) Security Management
9 6 (8.70%) IT Strategy
9 6 (8.70%) Risk Assessment
9 6 (8.70%) TOGAF
9 6 (8.70%) Vulnerability Management
Programming Languages
1 7 (10.14%) Bash
1 7 (10.14%) Python
1 7 (10.14%) SQL
2 5 (7.25%) PowerShell
3 4 (5.80%) Shell Script
4 2 (2.90%) ActionScript
5 1 (1.45%) Perl
Qualifications
1 26 (37.68%) Security Cleared
2 22 (31.88%) SC Cleared
3 17 (24.64%) CISSP
4 15 (21.74%) CISM
5 8 (11.59%) OSCP
6 6 (8.70%) CREST Certified
6 6 (8.70%) CRISC
7 5 (7.25%) CHECK Team Member
7 5 (7.25%) CISA
7 5 (7.25%) Tigerscheme
8 4 (5.80%) GIAC
8 4 (5.80%) Microsoft Certification
9 3 (4.35%) Degree
9 3 (4.35%) DV Cleared
9 3 (4.35%) ISO 27001 Lead Auditor
9 3 (4.35%) MCSE
9 3 (4.35%) VMware Certified Professional (VCP)
10 2 (2.90%) ISO 27001 Lead Implementer
11 1 (1.45%) Computer Science Degree
11 1 (1.45%) TOGAF Certification
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 32 (46.38%) ISO/IEC 27001
2 30 (43.48%) NIST
3 21 (30.43%) Cyber Essentials PLUS
4 12 (17.39%) GDPR
4 12 (17.39%) NCSC
5 7 (10.14%) GRC
6 4 (5.80%) PCI DSS
6 4 (5.80%) SOC 2
7 3 (4.35%) COBIT
8 2 (2.90%) ISO 9001
8 2 (2.90%) NIST 800
9 1 (1.45%) Accessibility
9 1 (1.45%) Disclosure Scotland
9 1 (1.45%) HIPAA
9 1 (1.45%) JSP 440
9 1 (1.45%) PMO
9 1 (1.45%) SLA
System Software
1 7 (10.14%) Active Directory
2 6 (8.70%) Docker
2 6 (8.70%) VMware Infrastructure
3 5 (7.25%) VMware NSX
4 4 (5.80%) Hyper-V
5 3 (4.35%) Virtual Servers
6 1 (1.45%) KVM
6 1 (1.45%) Virtual Machines
Systems Management
1 5 (7.25%) Microsoft Intune
1 5 (7.25%) Nmap
1 5 (7.25%) Single Sign-On
2 3 (4.35%) Kubernetes
3 2 (2.90%) Ansible
4 1 (1.45%) FortiGate
4 1 (1.45%) Grafana
4 1 (1.45%) HAProxy
4 1 (1.45%) Jamf Pro
4 1 (1.45%) Nagios
4 1 (1.45%) Red Hat Satellite
4 1 (1.45%) SCCM
4 1 (1.45%) Terraform
Vendors
1 21 (30.43%) Microsoft
2 7 (10.14%) Palo Alto
3 6 (8.70%) Cisco
3 6 (8.70%) VMware
4 5 (7.25%) Veracode
5 4 (5.80%) Oracle
6 3 (4.35%) Ping Identity
7 2 (2.90%) Infor
7 2 (2.90%) Qualys
7 2 (2.90%) Red Hat
8 1 (1.45%) Commvault
8 1 (1.45%) Dell
8 1 (1.45%) EMC
8 1 (1.45%) Meraki
8 1 (1.45%) NetApp
8 1 (1.45%) OneTrust
8 1 (1.45%) Progress
8 1 (1.45%) Proofpoint
8 1 (1.45%) ServiceNow
8 1 (1.45%) Sophos