DV Cleared Contract Job Trends

Developed Vetting (DV) Clearance
UK

The table below provides summary statistics for contract job vacancies with a requirement for DV Cleared qualifications. It includes a benchmarking guide to the contractor rates offered over the 6 months leading up to 23 January 2026, comparing them to the same period in the previous two years.

6 months to
23 Jan 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 64 55 42
Rank change year-on-year -9 -13 +67
Contract jobs citing DV Cleared 1,369 1,196 1,974
As % of all contract jobs in the UK 3.61% 3.77% 4.53%
As % of the Qualifications category 10.63% 12.63% 14.96%
Number of daily rates quoted 973 763 1,386
10th Percentile £451 £370 £370
25th Percentile £513 £500 £511
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £585 £588 £600
Median % change year-on-year -0.43% -2.08% -
75th Percentile £688 £675 £700
90th Percentile £738 £725 £788
UK excluding London median daily rate £575 £588 £600
% change year-on-year -2.13% -2.08% -
Number of hourly rates quoted 39 31 111
10th Percentile £16.35 £36.25 £48.40
25th Percentile £18.50 £55.87 £56.50
Median hourly rate £55.50 £63.15 £63.00
Median % change year-on-year -12.11% +0.24% -9.68%
75th Percentile £76.25 £73.88 £77.50
90th Percentile £87.80 £86.08 £85.61
UK excluding London median hourly rate £65.00 £63.15 £63.00
% change year-on-year +2.93% +0.24% -11.02%

All Academic and Professional Certifications
UK

DV Cleared 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 12,876 9,472 13,196
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the UK 33.96% 29.89% 30.31%
Number of daily rates quoted 8,514 5,723 8,241
10th Percentile £316 £300 £300
25th Percentile £416 £413 £425
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £519 £525 £550
Median % change year-on-year -1.24% -4.55% -
75th Percentile £625 £636 £650
90th Percentile £725 £725 £725
UK excluding London median daily rate £500 £500 £538
% change year-on-year -0.05% -7.02% +2.48%
Number of hourly rates quoted 960 468 851
10th Percentile £15.99 £19.12 £14.16
25th Percentile £19.10 £24.18 £21.46
Median hourly rate £25.15 £39.52 £47.75
Median % change year-on-year -36.36% -17.24% +6.11%
75th Percentile £61.18 £66.00 £66.25
90th Percentile £75.87 £77.54 £78.00
UK excluding London median hourly rate £25.15 £42.69 £48.40
% change year-on-year -41.09% -11.80% +7.56%

DV Cleared
Job Vacancy Trend

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

DV Cleared job vacancy trend in the UK

DV Cleared
Daily Rate Trend

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

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in the UK citing DV Cleared

DV Cleared
Daily Rate Histogram

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing DV Cleared over the 6 months to 23 January 2026.

Daily rate histogram for DV Cleared in the UK

DV Cleared
Hourly Rate Trend

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

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in the UK citing DV Cleared

DV Cleared
Hourly Rate Histogram

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing DV Cleared over the 6 months to 23 January 2026.

Hourly rate histogram for DV Cleared in the UK

DV Cleared
Top 17 Contract Job Locations

The table below looks at the demand and provides a guide to the median contractor rates quoted in IT jobs citing DV Cleared within the UK over the 6 months to 23 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 -14 1,247 £575 -3.77% 379
UK excluding London -7 966 £575 -2.13% 347
South East +5 494 £575 - 130
South West -5 291 £575 -4.17% 110
London -43 286 £619 +5.32% 58
Work from Home +7 179 £555 -1.77% 150
Midlands -19 72 £588 -15.32% 13
West Midlands -23 64 £588 -15.32% 9
North of England -40 50 £590 +7.27% 41
East of England -3 44 £575 - 48
North West -2 43 £580 +182.93% 33
Scotland -23 27 £652 +26.20% 7
Northern Ireland +4 9 £600 - 2
East Midlands -22 8 £650 +16.07% 4
Yorkshire -51 6 £613 +11.36% 7
Wales -4 5 £600 -14.29% 7
North East -22 1 - - 1

DV Cleared
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 48 (3.51%) Microsoft Exchange
1 48 (3.51%) SharePoint
2 32 (2.34%) Apache
3 29 (2.12%) Skype for Business
4 22 (1.61%) Confluence
5 6 (0.44%) OpenStack
5 6 (0.44%) SharePoint Server
6 5 (0.37%) Exchange Server 2003
6 5 (0.37%) Exchange Server 2007
6 5 (0.37%) Exchange Server 2010
6 5 (0.37%) Exchange Server 2013
6 5 (0.37%) Office Communications Server
7 3 (0.22%) Apache Spark
7 3 (0.22%) Documentum
7 3 (0.22%) IIS
7 3 (0.22%) Oracle Workflow
8 1 (0.073%) Mattermost
8 1 (0.073%) nginx
Applications
1 66 (4.82%) Microsoft Office
2 33 (2.41%) Microsoft Excel
3 16 (1.17%) Microsoft Project
4 11 (0.80%) Microsoft PowerPoint
5 6 (0.44%) MS Visio
6 1 (0.073%) Spreadsheet
Business Applications
1 17 (1.24%) SAP S/4HANA
2 12 (0.88%) Remedy ITSM
3 11 (0.80%) Sparx Enterprise Architect
4 10 (0.73%) SAP EWM
4 10 (0.73%) SAP WM
5 8 (0.58%) Maximo
6 5 (0.37%) Primavera
7 4 (0.29%) Oracle Applications
7 4 (0.29%) Oracle Assets
7 4 (0.29%) Oracle ERP
8 3 (0.22%) Oracle Payables
8 3 (0.22%) Oracle Subledger Accounting
9 1 (0.073%) Oracle Cash Management
9 1 (0.073%) Oracle General Ledger
9 1 (0.073%) Oracle Payroll
9 1 (0.073%) Oracle Procure-to-Pay
9 1 (0.073%) Oracle Receivables
9 1 (0.073%) SAP QM
Cloud Services
1 130 (9.50%) AWS
2 128 (9.35%) Azure
3 59 (4.31%) Microsoft 365
4 49 (3.58%) GitHub
5 40 (2.92%) Serverless
6 38 (2.78%) GCP
7 37 (2.70%) OpenShift
8 32 (2.34%) Azure DevOps
9 27 (1.97%) GitHub Actions
10 24 (1.75%) Amazon S3
11 20 (1.46%) Entra ID
12 19 (1.39%) Amazon ECS
12 19 (1.39%) AWS CloudFormation
12 19 (1.39%) IaaS
13 17 (1.24%) Amazon EC2
13 17 (1.24%) AWS Lambda
13 17 (1.24%) Azure Sentinel
14 14 (1.02%) Azure AKS
14 14 (1.02%) PaaS
15 13 (0.95%) Amazon EKS
Communications & Networking
1 104 (7.60%) Firewall
2 87 (6.36%) DNS
3 60 (4.38%) Network Security
4 48 (3.51%) VPN
5 40 (2.92%) TCP/IP
6 38 (2.78%) LAN
7 35 (2.56%) DHCP
8 34 (2.48%) WAN
9 28 (2.05%) Skype
10 27 (1.97%) Cisco IOS
11 25 (1.83%) Junos
12 23 (1.68%) SAN
13 22 (1.61%) Cisco ISE
14 21 (1.53%) BGP
14 21 (1.53%) Cisco Firepower
15 16 (1.17%) VLAN
16 13 (0.95%) OSPF
16 13 (0.95%) Wireless
17 12 (0.88%) MPLS
17 12 (0.88%) SSL
Database & Business Intelligence
1 29 (2.12%) PostgreSQL
2 18 (1.31%) Big Data
2 18 (1.31%) Elasticsearch
3 16 (1.17%) Amazon RDS
4 14 (1.02%) SQL Server
5 13 (0.95%) Oracle Database
6 12 (0.88%) Hadoop
7 11 (0.80%) MongoDB
7 11 (0.80%) Redis
8 10 (0.73%) Relational Database
9 8 (0.58%) MySQL
10 7 (0.51%) InfluxDB
10 7 (0.51%) Power BI
11 6 (0.44%) SAP HANA
12 4 (0.29%) Amazon Aurora
12 4 (0.29%) DynamoDB
12 4 (0.29%) Metadata
12 4 (0.29%) NoSQL
12 4 (0.29%) RDBMS
13 3 (0.22%) Data Lake
Development Applications
1 41 (2.99%) JIRA
2 34 (2.48%) GitLab
3 30 (2.19%) Jenkins
4 29 (2.12%) Git
5 17 (1.24%) SonarQube
6 15 (1.10%) Maven
7 13 (0.95%) Artifactory
8 12 (0.88%) Sonatype Nexus
9 9 (0.66%) Bitbucket
10 8 (0.58%) Cypress.io
11 7 (0.51%) Selenium
12 6 (0.44%) Postman
13 5 (0.37%) CircleCI
13 5 (0.37%) Gradle
13 5 (0.37%) JUnit
13 5 (0.37%) Snyk
13 5 (0.37%) webpack
14 4 (0.29%) Oracle APEX
14 4 (0.29%) Robot Framework
15 2 (0.15%) Atlassian Bamboo
General
1 272 (19.87%) Social Skills
2 186 (13.59%) Public Sector
3 110 (8.04%) Analytical Skills
4 64 (4.67%) Finance
5 47 (3.43%) Military
6 42 (3.07%) Documentation Skills
7 33 (2.41%) Legal
8 28 (2.05%) Manufacturing
9 27 (1.97%) Telecoms
10 25 (1.83%) Presentation Skills
11 21 (1.53%) Organisational Skills
12 20 (1.46%) Aerospace
12 20 (1.46%) Law
13 17 (1.24%) Marketing
14 16 (1.17%) Electronics
15 15 (1.10%) Banking
16 13 (0.95%) Police
17 8 (0.58%) Inclusion and Diversity
18 2 (0.15%) Influencing Skills
18 2 (0.15%) Multimedia
Job Titles
1 236 (17.24%) Architect
2 81 (5.92%) Analyst
2 81 (5.92%) Consultant
3 78 (5.70%) Senior
4 63 (4.60%) Network Engineer
5 58 (4.24%) DevOps Engineer
6 57 (4.16%) Support Engineer
7 54 (3.94%) Developer
7 54 (3.94%) Lead
8 52 (3.80%) Technical Architect
9 47 (3.43%) DV Cleared Network Engineer
10 44 (3.21%) Infrastructure Engineer
11 42 (3.07%) 3rd Line Engineer
12 39 (2.85%) Tester
13 38 (2.78%) Solutions Architect
14 37 (2.70%) Cloud Engineer
14 37 (2.70%) Project Manager
15 34 (2.48%) SOC Analyst
16 33 (2.41%) Infrastructure Architect
17 32 (2.34%) Security Architect
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 32 (2.34%) REST
2 31 (2.26%) Apache NiFi
3 22 (1.61%) OAuth
3 22 (1.61%) React
4 20 (1.46%) OpenID
5 19 (1.39%) SAML
6 18 (1.31%) Node.js
6 18 (1.31%) OAuth2
7 17 (1.24%) Kafka
8 15 (1.10%) Elastic Stack
8 15 (1.10%) YAML
9 12 (0.88%) .NET
9 12 (0.88%) FastAPI
9 12 (0.88%) Flask
9 12 (0.88%) RabbitMQ
10 10 (0.73%) JSON
11 9 (0.66%) gRPC
11 9 (0.66%) Web Services
11 9 (0.66%) WebSockets
12 8 (0.58%) GraphQL
Miscellaneous
1 92 (6.72%) PKI
2 47 (3.43%) Data Centre
3 32 (2.34%) Management Information System
3 32 (2.34%) Security Operations Centre
4 27 (1.97%) Cyber Threat
5 20 (1.46%) Cloud Native
6 19 (1.39%) Replication
7 18 (1.31%) Onboarding
7 18 (1.31%) Private Cloud
8 16 (1.17%) Cyberattack
9 15 (1.10%) Product Ownership
10 14 (1.02%) Analytical Mindset
10 14 (1.02%) Cyber Defence
11 13 (0.95%) Hybrid Cloud
12 12 (0.88%) Fat Client
12 12 (0.88%) Insider Threat
12 12 (0.88%) Thin Client
13 11 (0.80%) CSOC
13 11 (0.80%) Enterprise Software
14 10 (0.73%) Driving Licence
Operating Systems
1 253 (18.48%) Windows
2 155 (11.32%) Linux
3 79 (5.77%) Windows Server
4 41 (2.99%) Windows 10
5 27 (1.97%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
6 18 (1.31%) Windows 7
7 11 (0.80%) Android
7 11 (0.80%) Mac OS
7 11 (0.80%) Ubuntu
7 11 (0.80%) Unix
8 9 (0.66%) Windows Server 2003
9 7 (0.51%) CentOS
10 6 (0.44%) Windows Server 2019
11 3 (0.22%) Debian
12 2 (0.15%) VMS
12 2 (0.15%) Windows Server 2016
13 1 (0.073%) Data ONTAP
13 1 (0.073%) Mac OS X
13 1 (0.073%) Rocky
13 1 (0.073%) Windows Server 2008
Processes & Methodologies
1 236 (17.24%) Agile
2 156 (11.40%) Problem-Solving
3 151 (11.03%) Cybersecurity
4 140 (10.23%) DevOps
5 122 (8.91%) CI/CD
6 101 (7.38%) ITIL
7 86 (6.28%) Stakeholder Engagement
8 83 (6.06%) Continuous Improvement
9 81 (5.92%) Infrastructure as Code
9 81 (5.92%) Service Management
10 78 (5.70%) SIEM
11 76 (5.55%) Stakeholder Management
12 75 (5.48%) Infrastructure Engineering
13 74 (5.41%) ITSM
14 66 (4.82%) Containerisation
15 64 (4.67%) Risk Management
16 62 (4.53%) Incident Response
17 60 (4.38%) Project Delivery
18 59 (4.31%) Project Management
19 56 (4.09%) Test Automation
Programming Languages
1 135 (9.86%) Python
2 119 (8.69%) PowerShell
3 63 (4.60%) SQL
4 44 (3.21%) Java
5 33 (2.41%) JavaScript
6 32 (2.34%) Bash
7 19 (1.39%) Go
8 16 (1.17%) TypeScript
9 15 (1.10%) C#
9 15 (1.10%) Shell Script
10 12 (0.88%) C++
11 10 (0.73%) VBScript
12 9 (0.66%) Bicep
13 8 (0.58%) C
13 8 (0.58%) VB
14 5 (0.37%) ABAP
14 5 (0.37%) PL/SQL
15 3 (0.22%) T-SQL
16 2 (0.15%) Ruby
17 1 (0.073%) Kusto Query Language
Qualifications
1 1,369 (100.00%) Security Cleared
2 439 (32.07%) SC Cleared
3 55 (4.02%) Degree
4 54 (3.94%) CISSP
5 38 (2.78%) CISM
6 33 (2.41%) Cisco Certification
6 33 (2.41%) Microsoft Certification
7 22 (1.61%) CCNP
8 21 (1.53%) CompTIA Security+
9 19 (1.39%) GIAC
10 17 (1.24%) BPSS Clearance
11 16 (1.17%) CEH
11 16 (1.17%) Computer Science Degree
12 14 (1.02%) CompTIA CySA+
12 14 (1.02%) CTC Cleared
13 13 (0.95%) Azure Certification
13 13 (0.95%) CCNA
13 13 (0.95%) CESG Certified Professional
14 10 (0.73%) ISO 27001 Lead Implementer
15 9 (0.66%) JNCIS
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 71 (5.19%) NIST
2 58 (4.24%) ISO/IEC 27001
3 50 (3.65%) NCSC
4 35 (2.56%) QA
5 28 (2.05%) JSP 440
6 24 (1.75%) PMO
7 19 (1.39%) GDPR
8 17 (1.24%) SLA
9 15 (1.10%) NIST 800
10 14 (1.02%) Data Quality
10 14 (1.02%) GRC
11 9 (0.66%) RMADS
12 6 (0.44%) ISO/IEC 20000
13 5 (0.37%) Cyber Essentials
13 5 (0.37%) P3O
14 3 (0.22%) Actionable Recommendations
14 3 (0.22%) Cyber Essentials PLUS
14 3 (0.22%) EU AI Act
14 3 (0.22%) HMG Security Policy Framework
14 3 (0.22%) ISO/IEC 42001
System Software
1 116 (8.47%) Active Directory
2 80 (5.84%) Docker
3 68 (4.97%) VMware Infrastructure
4 45 (3.29%) VMware NSX
5 27 (1.97%) VMware ESXi
6 17 (1.24%) vSphere
7 11 (0.80%) Virtual Machines
8 10 (0.73%) BitLocker
9 8 (0.58%) Firmware
9 8 (0.58%) Hyper-V
10 6 (0.44%) vCloud
11 5 (0.37%) Brightmail
11 5 (0.37%) ISA Server
12 4 (0.29%) NFS
12 4 (0.29%) Oracle RAC
13 3 (0.22%) Microsoft App-V
13 3 (0.22%) Virtual Desktop
14 2 (0.15%) GPFS
14 2 (0.15%) Lustre
14 2 (0.15%) Virtual Servers
Systems Management
1 132 (9.64%) Kubernetes
2 109 (7.96%) Terraform
3 79 (5.77%) Ansible
4 51 (3.73%) vCenter Server
5 38 (2.78%) Grafana
6 33 (2.41%) Single Sign-On
7 32 (2.34%) Active Directory Federation Services
7 32 (2.34%) Prometheus
8 26 (1.90%) SCCM
9 16 (1.17%) WMI
10 15 (1.10%) Progress Chef
11 13 (0.95%) Puppet
12 11 (0.80%) Podman
12 11 (0.80%) vRealize
13 10 (0.73%) SCOM
14 8 (0.58%) Argo
14 8 (0.58%) Microsoft Intune
15 7 (0.51%) Microsoft Clustering
15 7 (0.51%) Nessus
15 7 (0.51%) VxRail
Vendors
1 214 (15.63%) Microsoft
2 143 (10.45%) VMware
3 102 (7.45%) Cisco
4 51 (3.73%) Splunk
5 46 (3.36%) Juniper
6 45 (3.29%) SAP
7 38 (2.78%) Oracle
7 38 (2.78%) Red Hat
8 29 (2.12%) SolarWinds
9 24 (1.75%) Palantir
10 22 (1.61%) Dell
10 22 (1.61%) ServiceNow
11 21 (1.53%) NetApp
12 19 (1.39%) Foundry
13 14 (1.02%) Google
13 14 (1.02%) Remedy
13 14 (1.02%) Sparx
14 13 (0.95%) Atlassian
14 13 (0.95%) IBM
14 13 (0.95%) Palo Alto