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 10 February 2026, comparing them to the same period in the previous two years.

6 months to
10 Feb 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 63 62 38
Rank change year-on-year -1 -24 +62
Contract jobs citing DV Cleared 1,473 1,102 2,145
As % of all contract jobs in the UK 3.74% 3.59% 4.77%
As % of the Qualifications category 11.08% 12.10% 15.73%
Number of daily rates quoted 1,038 700 1,500
10th Percentile £430 £372 £370
25th Percentile £506 £500 £510
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £575 £585 £600
Median % change year-on-year -1.71% -2.50% -
75th Percentile £688 £675 £700
90th Percentile £738 £723 £794
UK excluding London median daily rate £575 £585 £600
% change year-on-year -1.71% -2.50% -
Number of hourly rates quoted 39 29 116
10th Percentile £16.35 £35.25 £48.40
25th Percentile £18.50 £55.87 £56.65
Median hourly rate £65.00 £63.00 £63.29
Median % change year-on-year +3.17% -0.46% -9.26%
75th Percentile £79.75 £73.75 £78.00
90th Percentile £89.45 £87.36 £87.00
UK excluding London median hourly rate £66.00 £63.15 £63.29
% change year-on-year +4.51% -0.22% -11.67%

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 13,293 9,107 13,633
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the UK 33.77% 29.67% 30.34%
Number of daily rates quoted 8,783 5,501 8,445
10th Percentile £319 £300 £295
25th Percentile £416 £413 £425
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £517 £525 £540
Median % change year-on-year -1.52% -2.78% -1.82%
75th Percentile £619 £630 £650
90th Percentile £720 £725 £725
UK excluding London median daily rate £500 £503 £532
% change year-on-year -0.50% -5.59% +0.42%
Number of hourly rates quoted 978 435 956
10th Percentile £15.75 £20.00 £14.16
25th Percentile £19.10 £24.18 £21.19
Median hourly rate £25.15 £40.00 £45.88
Median % change year-on-year -37.13% -12.82% +1.96%
75th Percentile £63.75 £66.00 £65.00
90th Percentile £76.58 £79.42 £77.50
UK excluding London median hourly rate £25.15 £42.50 £46.18
% change year-on-year -40.82% -7.97% +2.62%

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 10 February 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 10 February 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 10 February 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 1,337 £575 -2.13% 401
UK excluding London -1 1,039 £575 -1.71% 348
South East +2 512 £565 -1.74% 150
South West -1 319 £575 -4.17% 106
London -29 301 £575 - 73
Work from Home +12 195 £555 -3.48% 135
Midlands -19 78 £575 -14.02% 23
West Midlands -18 64 £575 -16.36% 18
North of England -34 61 £590 +7.27% 24
East of England +6 50 £575 - 49
North West +5 49 £580 +182.93% 21
Scotland -17 29 £653 +26.80% 1
East Midlands -21 14 £650 +18.18% 5
Yorkshire -50 10 £613 +11.36% 3
Northern Ireland - 10 £600 -
Wales -5 5 £600 -14.29% 1
North East -20 2 - -

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 51 (3.46%) Microsoft Exchange
2 49 (3.33%) SharePoint
3 30 (2.04%) Apache
4 27 (1.83%) Confluence
5 24 (1.63%) Skype for Business
6 19 (1.29%) Palantir Foundry
7 5 (0.34%) OpenStack
8 4 (0.27%) Apache Spark
9 3 (0.20%) Documentum
9 3 (0.20%) Oracle Workflow
10 2 (0.14%) SharePoint Server
11 1 (0.068%) Apache Airflow
11 1 (0.068%) Exchange Server 2003
11 1 (0.068%) Exchange Server 2007
11 1 (0.068%) Exchange Server 2010
11 1 (0.068%) Exchange Server 2013
11 1 (0.068%) nginx
11 1 (0.068%) Office Communications Server
Applications
1 60 (4.07%) Microsoft Office
2 36 (2.44%) Microsoft Excel
3 16 (1.09%) Microsoft Project
4 11 (0.75%) Microsoft PowerPoint
5 7 (0.48%) MS Visio
6 1 (0.068%) Spreadsheet
Business Applications
1 13 (0.88%) Remedy ITSM
1 13 (0.88%) SAP S/4HANA
2 12 (0.81%) Sparx Enterprise Architect
3 8 (0.54%) Maximo
4 6 (0.41%) SAP EWM
5 5 (0.34%) Primavera
5 5 (0.34%) SAP WM
6 4 (0.27%) Oracle Applications
6 4 (0.27%) Oracle Assets
6 4 (0.27%) Oracle ERP
7 3 (0.20%) Oracle Payables
7 3 (0.20%) Oracle Subledger Accounting
8 2 (0.14%) SAP GRC
9 1 (0.068%) Oracle Cash Management
9 1 (0.068%) Oracle General Ledger
9 1 (0.068%) Oracle Payroll
9 1 (0.068%) Oracle Procure-to-Pay
9 1 (0.068%) Oracle Receivables
9 1 (0.068%) SAP FI
9 1 (0.068%) SAP HR
Cloud Services
1 131 (8.89%) AWS
2 125 (8.49%) Azure
3 55 (3.73%) Microsoft 365
4 53 (3.60%) GitHub
5 41 (2.78%) GCP
6 40 (2.72%) OpenShift
7 37 (2.51%) Serverless
8 32 (2.17%) Azure DevOps
9 30 (2.04%) GitHub Actions
10 21 (1.43%) Amazon S3
10 21 (1.43%) IaaS
11 18 (1.22%) AWS CloudFormation
11 18 (1.22%) Entra ID
12 17 (1.15%) Amazon EC2
12 17 (1.15%) Azure Sentinel
12 17 (1.15%) PaaS
13 16 (1.09%) Amazon ECS
14 14 (0.95%) AWS Lambda
15 13 (0.88%) Azure AKS
15 13 (0.88%) Power Platform
Communications & Networking
1 105 (7.13%) Firewall
2 90 (6.11%) DNS
3 65 (4.41%) Network Security
4 50 (3.39%) VPN
5 43 (2.92%) TCP/IP
6 34 (2.31%) DHCP
6 34 (2.31%) LAN
7 30 (2.04%) WAN
8 28 (1.90%) Cisco IOS
9 27 (1.83%) Skype
10 26 (1.77%) BGP
11 23 (1.56%) Junos
12 21 (1.43%) Cisco ISE
13 19 (1.29%) Cisco Firepower
13 19 (1.29%) SAN
14 18 (1.22%) VLAN
15 16 (1.09%) MPLS
16 15 (1.02%) OSPF
17 13 (0.88%) SSL
18 10 (0.68%) SMTP
Database & Business Intelligence
1 30 (2.04%) PostgreSQL
2 23 (1.56%) Elasticsearch
3 19 (1.29%) SQL Server
4 18 (1.22%) Big Data
5 15 (1.02%) Oracle Database
6 14 (0.95%) Amazon RDS
7 13 (0.88%) Hadoop
8 11 (0.75%) Redis
8 11 (0.75%) Relational Database
9 10 (0.68%) MongoDB
10 9 (0.61%) Power BI
11 8 (0.54%) MySQL
12 7 (0.48%) InfluxDB
12 7 (0.48%) SAP HANA
13 6 (0.41%) Metadata
14 5 (0.34%) SQL Server Integration Services
15 4 (0.27%) Data Warehouse
15 4 (0.27%) NoSQL
15 4 (0.27%) SQL Server Analysis Services
15 4 (0.27%) SQL Server Reporting Services
Development Applications
1 47 (3.19%) JIRA
2 32 (2.17%) GitLab
3 29 (1.97%) Jenkins
4 28 (1.90%) Git
5 15 (1.02%) SonarQube
6 14 (0.95%) Maven
7 12 (0.81%) Artifactory
8 10 (0.68%) Sonatype Nexus
9 8 (0.54%) Bitbucket
9 8 (0.54%) Cypress.io
10 5 (0.34%) Postman
10 5 (0.34%) Selenium
11 4 (0.27%) CircleCI
11 4 (0.27%) Gradle
11 4 (0.27%) JUnit
11 4 (0.27%) Oracle APEX
11 4 (0.27%) Robot Framework
11 4 (0.27%) Snyk
11 4 (0.27%) SQL Server Management Studio (SSMS)
11 4 (0.27%) webpack
General
1 270 (18.33%) Social Skills
2 183 (12.42%) Public Sector
3 117 (7.94%) Analytical Skills
4 64 (4.34%) Finance
5 57 (3.87%) Military
6 44 (2.99%) Documentation Skills
7 42 (2.85%) Legal
8 25 (1.70%) Telecoms
9 22 (1.49%) Aerospace
9 22 (1.49%) Law
9 22 (1.49%) Presentation Skills
10 21 (1.43%) Organisational Skills
11 19 (1.29%) Manufacturing
12 14 (0.95%) Marketing
13 13 (0.88%) Banking
13 13 (0.88%) Electronics
13 13 (0.88%) Police
14 8 (0.54%) Inclusion and Diversity
15 2 (0.14%) Influencing Skills
15 2 (0.14%) Multimedia
Job Titles
1 252 (17.11%) Architect
2 83 (5.63%) Analyst
3 79 (5.36%) Senior
4 78 (5.30%) Consultant
5 63 (4.28%) Network Engineer
6 59 (4.01%) Developer
6 59 (4.01%) Technical Architect
7 56 (3.80%) DevOps Engineer
7 56 (3.80%) Lead
8 52 (3.53%) Infrastructure Engineer
8 52 (3.53%) Support Engineer
9 48 (3.26%) Tester
10 44 (2.99%) DV Cleared Network Engineer
11 41 (2.78%) 3rd Line Engineer
12 38 (2.58%) Infrastructure Architect
13 37 (2.51%) Project Manager
13 37 (2.51%) Solutions Architect
14 36 (2.44%) SOC Analyst
15 35 (2.38%) Cloud Engineer
16 34 (2.31%) Security Architect
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 34 (2.31%) REST
2 31 (2.10%) Apache NiFi
3 23 (1.56%) OAuth
4 22 (1.49%) React
5 21 (1.43%) OpenID
6 19 (1.29%) Kafka
6 19 (1.29%) OAuth2
6 19 (1.29%) SAML
7 14 (0.95%) Flask
7 14 (0.95%) Node.js
8 13 (0.88%) Elastic Stack
8 13 (0.88%) YAML
9 12 (0.81%) .NET
9 12 (0.81%) FastAPI
9 12 (0.81%) RabbitMQ
10 11 (0.75%) LDAP
11 10 (0.68%) Web Services
12 9 (0.61%) AngularJS
12 9 (0.61%) JSON
12 9 (0.61%) WebSockets
Miscellaneous
1 93 (6.31%) PKI
2 47 (3.19%) Data Centre
3 35 (2.38%) Management Information System
4 32 (2.17%) Security Operations Centre
5 23 (1.56%) Cyber Threat
6 21 (1.43%) Cloud Native
7 19 (1.29%) Private Cloud
8 18 (1.22%) Cyberattack
8 18 (1.22%) Onboarding
9 16 (1.09%) Hybrid Cloud
9 16 (1.09%) Product Ownership
9 16 (1.09%) Replication
10 15 (1.02%) Analytical Mindset
11 13 (0.88%) Cyber Defence
12 12 (0.81%) Fat Client
12 12 (0.81%) Insider Threat
12 12 (0.81%) Thin Client
13 11 (0.75%) CSOC
13 11 (0.75%) Enterprise Software
13 11 (0.75%) Security Posture
Operating Systems
1 258 (17.52%) Windows
2 171 (11.61%) Linux
3 78 (5.30%) Windows Server
4 41 (2.78%) Windows 10
5 26 (1.77%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
6 18 (1.22%) Windows 7
7 15 (1.02%) Ubuntu
8 9 (0.61%) Android
8 9 (0.61%) Mac OS
8 9 (0.61%) Unix
9 8 (0.54%) CentOS
10 6 (0.41%) Windows Server 2003
10 6 (0.41%) Windows Server 2019
11 3 (0.20%) Debian
12 2 (0.14%) Rocky
12 2 (0.14%) VMS
12 2 (0.14%) Windows Server 2016
13 1 (0.068%) Data ONTAP
13 1 (0.068%) Mac OS X
13 1 (0.068%) Windows Server 2008
Processes & Methodologies
1 244 (16.56%) Agile
2 191 (12.97%) Problem-Solving
3 155 (10.52%) Cybersecurity
4 144 (9.78%) DevOps
5 122 (8.28%) CI/CD
6 109 (7.40%) ITIL
7 97 (6.59%) Infrastructure Engineering
8 96 (6.52%) Service Management
9 86 (5.84%) Continuous Improvement
9 86 (5.84%) Stakeholder Engagement
10 80 (5.43%) Infrastructure as Code
10 80 (5.43%) Stakeholder Management
11 73 (4.96%) ITSM
11 73 (4.96%) SIEM
12 67 (4.55%) Containerisation
13 66 (4.48%) Incident Response
14 65 (4.41%) Project Delivery
15 64 (4.34%) Risk Management
16 59 (4.01%) Project Management
16 59 (4.01%) Test Automation
Programming Languages
1 142 (9.64%) Python
2 118 (8.01%) PowerShell
3 67 (4.55%) SQL
4 48 (3.26%) Java
5 34 (2.31%) JavaScript
6 30 (2.04%) Bash
7 20 (1.36%) Go
8 19 (1.29%) TypeScript
9 16 (1.09%) C#
10 15 (1.02%) Shell Script
11 12 (0.81%) C++
12 9 (0.61%) Bicep
13 8 (0.54%) VB
14 7 (0.48%) VBScript
15 6 (0.41%) ABAP
15 6 (0.41%) C
16 5 (0.34%) PL/SQL
17 4 (0.27%) PHP
17 4 (0.27%) Rust
18 3 (0.20%) T-SQL
Qualifications
1 1,473 (100.00%) Security Cleared
2 465 (31.57%) SC Cleared
3 57 (3.87%) Degree
4 56 (3.80%) CISSP
5 39 (2.65%) Cisco Certification
6 38 (2.58%) CISM
7 34 (2.31%) Microsoft Certification
8 26 (1.77%) CCNP
8 26 (1.77%) CompTIA Security+
9 22 (1.49%) GIAC
10 18 (1.22%) BPSS Clearance
10 18 (1.22%) Computer Science Degree
11 16 (1.09%) CCNA
11 16 (1.09%) CompTIA CySA+
12 15 (1.02%) CEH
12 15 (1.02%) CESG Certified Professional
13 14 (0.95%) Azure Certification
13 14 (0.95%) CTC Cleared
14 10 (0.68%) AWS Certification
14 10 (0.68%) ISO 27001 Lead Implementer
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 77 (5.23%) NIST
2 61 (4.14%) ISO/IEC 27001
3 52 (3.53%) NCSC
4 39 (2.65%) QA
5 29 (1.97%) JSP 440
6 27 (1.83%) PMO
7 20 (1.36%) GDPR
8 19 (1.29%) GRC
9 16 (1.09%) Data Quality
9 16 (1.09%) NIST 800
10 14 (0.95%) SLA
11 10 (0.68%) RMADS
12 8 (0.54%) Cyber Essentials
13 6 (0.41%) Cyber Essentials PLUS
13 6 (0.41%) ISO/IEC 20000
14 5 (0.34%) HMG Security Policy Framework
14 5 (0.34%) P3O
15 4 (0.27%) Actionable Recommendations
16 3 (0.20%) EU AI Act
16 3 (0.20%) ISO/IEC 42001
System Software
1 116 (7.88%) Active Directory
2 85 (5.77%) Docker
3 79 (5.36%) VMware Infrastructure
4 44 (2.99%) VMware NSX
5 34 (2.31%) VMware ESXi
6 18 (1.22%) vSphere
7 11 (0.75%) BitLocker
7 11 (0.75%) Hyper-V
7 11 (0.75%) Virtual Machines
8 8 (0.54%) Firmware
9 7 (0.48%) vCloud
10 4 (0.27%) Microsoft App-V
10 4 (0.27%) NFS
10 4 (0.27%) Oracle RAC
11 3 (0.20%) GPFS
11 3 (0.20%) Lustre
11 3 (0.20%) Slurm Workload Manager
11 3 (0.20%) Virtual Desktop
12 2 (0.14%) UAG
12 2 (0.14%) Virtual Servers
Systems Management
1 137 (9.30%) Kubernetes
2 114 (7.74%) Terraform
3 81 (5.50%) Ansible
4 57 (3.87%) vCenter Server
5 37 (2.51%) Grafana
6 34 (2.31%) Single Sign-On
7 33 (2.24%) Active Directory Federation Services
8 31 (2.10%) Prometheus
9 27 (1.83%) SCCM
10 16 (1.09%) WMI
11 14 (0.95%) Progress Chef
12 13 (0.88%) Puppet
13 11 (0.75%) SCOM
14 10 (0.68%) Podman
15 9 (0.61%) VxRail
16 8 (0.54%) Argo
16 8 (0.54%) vRealize
17 7 (0.48%) Nessus
18 6 (0.41%) Forefront Identity Manager
18 6 (0.41%) Kibana
Vendors
1 213 (14.46%) Microsoft
2 155 (10.52%) VMware
3 107 (7.26%) Cisco
4 50 (3.39%) Splunk
5 42 (2.85%) Juniper
5 42 (2.85%) Oracle
6 40 (2.72%) Red Hat
7 38 (2.58%) SAP
8 32 (2.17%) ServiceNow
9 31 (2.10%) NetApp
10 28 (1.90%) SolarWinds
11 24 (1.63%) Palantir
12 22 (1.49%) Dell
13 19 (1.29%) Foundry
14 18 (1.22%) Fortinet
15 16 (1.09%) Google
16 15 (1.02%) Palo Alto
16 15 (1.02%) Remedy
17 14 (0.95%) Atlassian
17 14 (0.95%) Sparx