DNS Contract Job Trends

Domain Name System (DNS)
UK

The table below provides summary statistics and contractor rates for jobs requiring DNS skills. It covers contract job vacancies from the 6 months leading up to 22 January 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
22 Jan 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 148 111 116
Rank change year-on-year -37 +5 +6
Contract jobs citing DNS 722 713 892
As % of all contract jobs in the UK 1.91% 2.25% 2.07%
As % of the Communications & Networking category 18.23% 17.48% 15.15%
Number of daily rates quoted 468 447 575
10th Percentile £219 £223 £206
25th Percentile £400 £350 £363
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £514 £500 £485
Median % change year-on-year +2.75% +3.09% -7.62%
75th Percentile £612 £615 £600
90th Percentile £675 £750 £675
UK excluding London median daily rate £500 £450 £500
% change year-on-year +11.11% -10.00% -
Number of hourly rates quoted 25 9 21
10th Percentile £15.50 £17.26 £24.25
25th Percentile £21.25 £21.25 £31.25
Median hourly rate £39.50 £23.59 £40.00
Median % change year-on-year +67.44% -41.03% +3.90%
75th Percentile £74.26 £25.30 £60.00
90th Percentile £78.00 £40.40 £70.00
UK excluding London median hourly rate £48.72 £22.50 £55.70
% change year-on-year +116.53% -59.61% +44.68%

All Communications and Computer Networking Skills
UK

DNS falls under the Communications and Computer Networking category. For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all contract job vacancies requiring communications or computer networking skills.

Contract vacancies with a requirement for communications or computer networking skills 3,961 4,080 5,888
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the UK 10.48% 12.87% 13.66%
Number of daily rates quoted 2,604 2,373 3,603
10th Percentile £204 £213 £209
25th Percentile £355 £363 £360
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £475 £500 £500
Median % change year-on-year -5.00% - -2.91%
75th Percentile £588 £600 £600
90th Percentile £675 £688 £700
UK excluding London median daily rate £450 £467 £475
% change year-on-year -3.54% -1.79% +2.70%
Number of hourly rates quoted 166 140 362
10th Percentile £15.50 £16.16 £17.30
25th Percentile £19.00 £21.46 £23.00
Median hourly rate £32.00 £35.00 £55.00
Median % change year-on-year -8.57% -36.36% +158.82%
75th Percentile £65.00 £58.09 £65.00
90th Percentile £75.00 £70.00 £75.00
UK excluding London median hourly rate £41.94 £32.50 £57.75
% change year-on-year +29.05% -43.72% +206.83%

DNS
Job Vacancy Trend

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

DNS job vacancy trend in the UK

DNS
Daily Rate Trend

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in the UK citing DNS.

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in the UK citing DNS

DNS
Daily Rate Histogram

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing DNS over the 6 months to 22 January 2026.

Daily rate histogram for DNS in the UK

DNS
Hourly Rate Trend

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in the UK citing DNS.

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in the UK citing DNS

DNS
Hourly Rate Histogram

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing DNS over the 6 months to 22 January 2026.

Hourly rate histogram for DNS in the UK

DNS
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 DNS within the UK over the 6 months to 22 January 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 -7 650 £525 +10.53% 320
UK excluding London -32 446 £500 +11.11% 311
London -4 226 £550 +4.76% 60
Work from Home -47 174 £525 -0.94% 101
North of England -30 138 £465 +9.41% 64
South East -13 114 £503 +8.65% 99
Midlands +12 111 £380 -10.59% 41
West Midlands +28 107 £385 -4.94% 23
North West -2 95 £488 +2.90% 25
South West -24 63 £575 +5.12% 44
Yorkshire -38 48 £449 +49.50% 32
East of England -23 36 £475 +72.73% 43
Scotland -14 27 £460 -7.55% 23
North East -21 7 £575 +155.56% 10
East Midlands -36 4 £275 -38.89% 18
Wales -15 3 £550 +33.33% 6

DNS
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 93 (12.88%) Microsoft Exchange
2 66 (9.14%) SharePoint
3 34 (4.71%) Skype for Business
4 19 (2.63%) Confluence
5 12 (1.66%) nginx
6 10 (1.39%) Exchange Server 2010
7 9 (1.25%) IIS
7 9 (1.25%) SharePoint Server
8 8 (1.11%) Exchange Server 2013
9 5 (0.69%) Apache
9 5 (0.69%) Exchange Server 2003
9 5 (0.69%) Exchange Server 2007
9 5 (0.69%) Office Communications Server
10 4 (0.55%) OpenStack
11 3 (0.42%) Tomcat
12 2 (0.28%) Cloud Foundry
12 2 (0.28%) Oracle HTTP Server
12 2 (0.28%) WebLogic
12 2 (0.28%) WordPress
Applications
1 44 (6.09%) Microsoft Office
2 14 (1.94%) MS Visio
3 9 (1.25%) Mozilla Thunderbird
4 2 (0.28%) Microsoft Excel
4 2 (0.28%) Spreadsheet
4 2 (0.28%) Windchill
5 1 (0.14%) Microsoft PowerPoint
Business Applications
1 2 (0.28%) Remedy ITSM
1 2 (0.28%) SystmOne
1 2 (0.28%) Teamcenter
Cloud Services
1 254 (35.18%) Azure
2 184 (25.48%) AWS
3 141 (19.53%) Microsoft 365
4 106 (14.68%) Entra ID
5 67 (9.28%) Virtual Private Cloud
6 55 (7.62%) Amazon CloudWatch
7 54 (7.48%) Amazon S3
8 49 (6.79%) Amazon EC2
9 46 (6.37%) GitHub
10 44 (6.09%) GCP
11 39 (5.40%) Amazon ELB
12 35 (4.85%) AWS CloudFormation
13 32 (4.43%) Amazon ECS
13 32 (4.43%) IaaS
14 26 (3.60%) Route 53
14 26 (3.60%) Serverless
15 24 (3.32%) AWS Lambda
16 23 (3.19%) GitHub Actions
16 23 (3.19%) SaaS
17 18 (2.49%) AWS KMS
Communications & Networking
1 316 (43.77%) DHCP
2 238 (32.96%) TCP/IP
3 235 (32.55%) Firewall
4 183 (25.35%) VPN
5 93 (12.88%) SSL
6 92 (12.74%) WAN
7 90 (12.47%) Network Security
8 82 (11.36%) HTTP
9 71 (9.83%) LAN
10 66 (9.14%) VLAN
11 47 (6.51%) F5 BIG-IP LTM
12 44 (6.09%) F5 BIG-IP GTM
13 41 (5.68%) BIG-IP
14 40 (5.54%) BGP
14 40 (5.54%) Wireless
14 40 (5.54%) Wireshark
15 37 (5.12%) Wi-Fi
16 35 (4.85%) DMZ
17 33 (4.57%) Skype
18 32 (4.43%) SMTP
Database & Business Intelligence
1 30 (4.16%) Amazon RDS
2 24 (3.32%) PostgreSQL
3 22 (3.05%) SQL Server
4 16 (2.22%) Amazon Aurora
5 9 (1.25%) Elasticsearch
5 9 (1.25%) MongoDB
6 7 (0.97%) DynamoDB
6 7 (0.97%) MySQL
6 7 (0.97%) Redis
7 6 (0.83%) Data Hub
8 4 (0.55%) DocumentDB
8 4 (0.55%) NoSQL
8 4 (0.55%) Relational Database
9 3 (0.42%) BigQuery
10 1 (0.14%) Apache Cassandra
10 1 (0.14%) CouchDB
10 1 (0.14%) Electronic Patient Records
10 1 (0.14%) Geospatial Data
10 1 (0.14%) Oracle Reports
10 1 (0.14%) Power BI
Development Applications
1 80 (11.08%) Jenkins
2 70 (9.70%) Git
3 49 (6.79%) GitLab
4 40 (5.54%) JIRA
5 25 (3.46%) Fiddler
6 14 (1.94%) Vagrant
7 8 (1.11%) Terragrunt
8 5 (0.69%) Subversion
9 4 (0.55%) CircleCI
9 4 (0.55%) TeamCity
10 1 (0.14%) Atlassian Bamboo
10 1 (0.14%) Bitbucket
10 1 (0.14%) Browser DevTools
10 1 (0.14%) GCC
10 1 (0.14%) MSI
10 1 (0.14%) Octopus Deploy
10 1 (0.14%) Sonatype Nexus
10 1 (0.14%) Visual Studio Code
10 1 (0.14%) Vite
10 1 (0.14%) webpack
General
1 212 (29.36%) Social Skills
2 101 (13.99%) Analytical Skills
3 71 (9.83%) Public Sector
4 54 (7.48%) Banking
5 42 (5.82%) Finance
6 41 (5.68%) Investment Banking
7 38 (5.26%) Documentation Skills
8 21 (2.91%) Telecoms
9 19 (2.63%) Legal
10 15 (2.08%) Presentation Skills
11 8 (1.11%) Military
12 7 (0.97%) Influencing Skills
12 7 (0.97%) Organisational Skills
13 6 (0.83%) Law
14 5 (0.69%) Inclusion and Diversity
15 4 (0.55%) Aerospace
15 4 (0.55%) Marketing
16 3 (0.42%) Financial Institution
16 3 (0.42%) Local Government
17 2 (0.28%) Front Office
Job Titles
1 99 (13.71%) Network Engineer
2 85 (11.77%) Architect
3 73 (10.11%) Infrastructure Engineer
4 70 (9.70%) Analyst
5 69 (9.56%) Senior
6 65 (9.00%) Support Engineer
7 44 (6.09%) Platform Engineer
8 42 (5.82%) DevOps Engineer
9 41 (5.68%) IT Support
10 34 (4.71%) Security Engineer
11 31 (4.29%) AWS Engineer
12 28 (3.88%) Lead
13 27 (3.74%) Senior Infrastructure Engineer
14 26 (3.60%) 2nd Line Support
14 26 (3.60%) Web Engineer
15 23 (3.19%) Cloud Platform Engineer
16 22 (3.05%) Operations Engineer
16 22 (3.05%) SOC Analyst
17 21 (2.91%) AWS DevOps
17 21 (2.91%) AWS DevOps Engineer
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 55 (7.62%) LDAP
2 43 (5.96%) SAML
3 37 (5.12%) OAuth
4 23 (3.19%) OpenID
5 20 (2.77%) OAuth2
6 16 (2.22%) REST
7 13 (1.80%) Kafka
8 12 (1.66%) 802.1X
9 11 (1.52%) Elastic Stack
10 10 (1.39%) SOAP
11 7 (0.97%) AngularJS
11 7 (0.97%) Middleware
11 7 (0.97%) OpenTelemetry
12 6 (0.83%) AWS CDK
12 6 (0.83%) RESTful
13 5 (0.69%) cloud-init
13 5 (0.69%) Keycloak
13 5 (0.69%) React
13 5 (0.69%) Spring Boot
13 5 (0.69%) YAML
Miscellaneous
1 63 (8.73%) Replication
2 57 (7.89%) PKI
3 52 (7.20%) Data Centre
4 43 (5.96%) Management Information System
5 30 (4.16%) Onboarding
6 23 (3.19%) Enterprise Software
6 23 (3.19%) Security Operations Centre
7 22 (3.05%) Analytical Mindset
7 22 (3.05%) Cloud Native
8 20 (2.77%) Cyberattack
9 15 (2.08%) Hybrid Cloud
10 13 (1.80%) Private Cloud
10 13 (1.80%) Public Cloud
11 12 (1.66%) Clustering
12 11 (1.52%) Cyber Threat
12 11 (1.52%) Self-Motivation
13 10 (1.39%) Video Conferencing
14 9 (1.25%) NHS
14 9 (1.25%) SCADA
15 8 (1.11%) Distributed Systems
Operating Systems
1 364 (50.42%) Windows
2 176 (24.38%) Windows Server
3 149 (20.64%) Linux
4 63 (8.73%) Windows 10
5 30 (4.16%) Windows Server 2019
6 23 (3.19%) Unix
7 22 (3.05%) Windows Server 2016
8 21 (2.91%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
8 21 (2.91%) VMS
9 17 (2.35%) Amazon Linux
9 17 (2.35%) Android
9 17 (2.35%) Windows Server 2012
10 14 (1.94%) Ubuntu
11 13 (1.80%) CentOS
12 12 (1.66%) Apple iOS
13 11 (1.52%) Windows Server 2003
14 10 (1.39%) Windows 7
15 7 (0.97%) Mac OS
16 5 (0.69%) Solaris
17 4 (0.55%) CatOS
Processes & Methodologies
1 159 (22.02%) Problem-Solving
2 121 (16.76%) ITIL
3 120 (16.62%) Load Balancing
4 118 (16.34%) CI/CD
5 111 (15.37%) DevOps
6 100 (13.85%) Infrastructure as Code
7 94 (13.02%) Infrastructure Engineering
8 90 (12.47%) High Availability
9 78 (10.80%) Change Management
10 76 (10.53%) Cybersecurity
11 73 (10.11%) Migration
12 70 (9.70%) Incident Response
13 69 (9.56%) Disaster Recovery
14 63 (8.73%) Service Management
15 57 (7.89%) Root Cause Analysis
16 56 (7.76%) SIEM
17 53 (7.34%) Mentoring
17 53 (7.34%) Platform Engineering
18 50 (6.93%) Agile
18 50 (6.93%) Continuous Improvement
Programming Languages
1 222 (30.75%) PowerShell
2 156 (21.61%) Python
3 77 (10.66%) Bash
4 43 (5.96%) SQL
5 22 (3.05%) Java
6 21 (2.91%) Perl
7 14 (1.94%) Groovy
8 13 (1.80%) Bicep
9 12 (1.66%) Shell Script
9 12 (1.66%) VBScript
10 11 (1.52%) Go
11 10 (1.39%) Ruby
11 10 (1.39%) VB
12 7 (0.97%) Lisp
13 6 (0.83%) Kusto Query Language
14 5 (0.69%) C++
14 5 (0.69%) JavaScript
15 3 (0.42%) C#
15 3 (0.42%) Search Processing Language
15 3 (0.42%) T-SQL
Qualifications
1 265 (36.70%) Security Cleared
2 192 (26.59%) SC Cleared
3 87 (12.05%) DV Cleared
4 69 (9.56%) Degree
5 59 (8.17%) Microsoft Certification
6 43 (5.96%) Cisco Certification
7 39 (5.40%) CCNP
8 38 (5.26%) Azure Certification
9 26 (3.60%) AWS Certification
10 19 (2.63%) CompTIA Security+
11 18 (2.49%) Computer Science Degree
11 18 (2.49%) Network+ Certification
12 16 (2.22%) CCNA
13 13 (1.80%) CompTIA CySA+
14 12 (1.66%) CISSP
15 11 (1.52%) Server+ Certification
16 8 (1.11%) AWS Certified Solutions Architect
16 8 (1.11%) CCIE
16 8 (1.11%) ITIL Certification
16 8 (1.11%) MCSE
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 35 (4.85%) GDPR
2 23 (3.19%) ISO/IEC 27001
3 21 (2.91%) Sarbanes-Oxley
4 19 (2.63%) SLA
5 18 (2.49%) NIST
6 9 (1.25%) NCSC
6 9 (1.25%) PCI DSS
7 8 (1.11%) Cyber Essentials
8 6 (0.83%) Accessibility
8 6 (0.83%) QA
9 3 (0.42%) Data Quality
9 3 (0.42%) HMG Security Policy Framework
10 2 (0.28%) Disclosure Scotland
10 2 (0.28%) JSP 440
10 2 (0.28%) PMO
11 1 (0.14%) Cyber Essentials PLUS
11 1 (0.14%) Government Security Classifications
11 1 (0.14%) SOC 2
11 1 (0.14%) WCAG
System Software
1 321 (44.46%) Active Directory
2 187 (25.90%) VMware Infrastructure
3 90 (12.47%) Docker
4 54 (7.48%) Hyper-V
5 43 (5.96%) VMware NSX
6 30 (4.16%) vSphere
7 27 (3.74%) Virtual Machines
8 21 (2.91%) Firmware
9 18 (2.49%) VMware ESXi
10 17 (2.35%) DFS Replication
11 12 (1.66%) BitLocker
12 10 (1.39%) Postfix
12 10 (1.39%) Virtual Desktop
13 9 (1.25%) Dovecot
13 9 (1.25%) Squid
13 9 (1.25%) Virtual Servers
14 7 (0.97%) Terminal Services
15 6 (0.83%) Microsoft App-V
15 6 (0.83%) NFS
16 5 (0.69%) Microsoft Virtual Server
Systems Management
1 131 (18.14%) Terraform
2 121 (16.76%) Ansible
3 83 (11.50%) Microsoft Intune
4 77 (10.66%) SCCM
5 66 (9.14%) Single Sign-On
6 60 (8.31%) Kubernetes
7 48 (6.65%) Active Directory Federation Services
8 37 (5.12%) vCenter Server
9 33 (4.57%) Grafana
10 25 (3.46%) Prometheus
11 21 (2.91%) WSUS
12 18 (2.49%) FortiGate
13 13 (1.80%) Argo
14 12 (1.66%) Proxmox
14 12 (1.66%) SCOM
15 11 (1.52%) Nessus
15 11 (1.52%) Packer
16 10 (1.39%) Puppet
17 9 (1.25%) Microsoft Clustering
18 7 (0.97%) Progress Chef
Vendors
1 276 (38.23%) Microsoft
2 224 (31.02%) VMware
3 121 (16.76%) F5
4 109 (15.10%) Cisco
5 81 (11.22%) ServiceNow
6 57 (7.89%) Splunk
7 55 (7.62%) Palo Alto
8 47 (6.51%) CheckPoint
9 42 (5.82%) Blue Coat
10 34 (4.71%) Citrix
11 32 (4.43%) SolarWinds
12 30 (4.16%) McAfee
13 26 (3.60%) NetApp
13 26 (3.60%) Veeam
14 24 (3.32%) Juniper
15 22 (3.05%) Dell
15 22 (3.05%) Okta
16 21 (2.91%) Fortinet
16 21 (2.91%) Red Hat
17 19 (2.63%) Zscaler