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 12 January 2026, comparing them to the same period in the previous two years.

6 months to
12 Jan 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 68 54 44
Rank change year-on-year -14 -10 +71
Contract jobs citing DV Cleared 1,272 1,213 1,887
As % of all contract jobs in the UK 3.51% 3.85% 4.39%
As % of the Qualifications category 10.34% 12.91% 14.54%
Number of daily rates quoted 896 781 1,311
10th Percentile £463 £372 £370
25th Percentile £513 £500 £510
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £600 £585 £600
Median % change year-on-year +2.56% -2.50% -
75th Percentile £688 £675 £700
90th Percentile £738 £725 £775
UK excluding London median daily rate £575 £583 £600
% change year-on-year -1.29% -2.92% -
Number of hourly rates quoted 41 30 105
10th Percentile £17.05 £46.24 £50.34
25th Percentile £20.82 £56.65 £57.33
Median hourly rate £45.00 £63.15 £63.29
Median % change year-on-year -28.74% -0.22% -8.94%
75th Percentile £75.00 £73.94 £77.50
90th Percentile £87.50 £86.72 £81.25
UK excluding London median hourly rate £65.00 £63.15 £63.29
% change year-on-year +2.93% -0.22% -10.10%

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 12,299 9,399 12,977
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the UK 33.93% 29.83% 30.22%
Number of daily rates quoted 8,064 5,705 8,157
10th Percentile £313 £300 £300
25th Percentile £419 £413 £425
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £525 £525 £550
Median % change year-on-year - -4.55% -
75th Percentile £625 £631 £650
90th Percentile £725 £725 £725
UK excluding London median daily rate £500 £500 £540
% change year-on-year - -7.41% +2.86%
Number of hourly rates quoted 943 453 757
10th Percentile £16.10 £18.82 £15.01
25th Percentile £19.07 £24.18 £23.75
Median hourly rate £25.15 £39.00 £50.00
Median % change year-on-year -35.51% -22.00% +11.11%
75th Percentile £55.00 £66.00 £67.50
90th Percentile £76.58 £77.77 £78.36
UK excluding London median hourly rate £25.15 £41.25 £50.00
% change year-on-year -39.03% -17.50% +11.11%

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 12 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 12 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 12 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 -17 1,157 £580 -0.85% 481
UK excluding London -13 878 £575 -1.29% 447
South East +3 476 £575 - 155
London -41 286 £625 +7.63% 62
South West -7 251 £600 - 131
Work from Home -11 166 £563 -2.17% 134
Midlands -16 70 £588 -16.07% 36
West Midlands -9 63 £581 -16.96% 16
East of England -9 36 £550 -4.35% 62
North of England -48 30 £513 -6.82% 57
Scotland -32 26 £653 +26.80% 6
North West -19 23 £500 +65.29% 35
Northern Ireland +4 9 £600 - 4
East Midlands -16 7 £650 +16.07% 20
Yorkshire -40 6 £613 +11.36% 18
Wales -3 5 £600 -14.29% 9
North East -17 1 - - 4

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 44 (3.46%) Microsoft Exchange
1 44 (3.46%) SharePoint
2 36 (2.83%) Apache
3 28 (2.20%) Skype for Business
4 24 (1.89%) Confluence
5 7 (0.55%) SharePoint Server
6 6 (0.47%) Exchange Server 2003
6 6 (0.47%) Exchange Server 2007
6 6 (0.47%) Exchange Server 2010
6 6 (0.47%) Exchange Server 2013
6 6 (0.47%) Office Communications Server
6 6 (0.47%) OpenStack
7 3 (0.24%) Apache Spark
7 3 (0.24%) Documentum
7 3 (0.24%) IIS
8 2 (0.16%) Oracle Workflow
9 1 (0.079%) CMS
9 1 (0.079%) Mattermost
9 1 (0.079%) nginx
Applications
1 62 (4.87%) Microsoft Office
2 27 (2.12%) Microsoft Excel
3 15 (1.18%) Microsoft Project
4 9 (0.71%) Microsoft PowerPoint
5 6 (0.47%) MS Visio
6 1 (0.079%) Spreadsheet
Business Applications
1 17 (1.34%) SAP S/4HANA
2 12 (0.94%) Remedy ITSM
3 11 (0.86%) Sparx Enterprise Architect
4 10 (0.79%) SAP EWM
4 10 (0.79%) SAP WM
5 8 (0.63%) Maximo
6 5 (0.39%) Primavera
7 4 (0.31%) Oracle Applications
8 3 (0.24%) Oracle Assets
8 3 (0.24%) Oracle ERP
9 2 (0.16%) Oracle Payables
9 2 (0.16%) Oracle Subledger Accounting
10 1 (0.079%) Oracle Cash Management
10 1 (0.079%) Oracle General Ledger
10 1 (0.079%) Oracle Payroll
10 1 (0.079%) Oracle Procure-to-Pay
10 1 (0.079%) Oracle Receivables
10 1 (0.079%) SAP QM
Cloud Services
1 122 (9.59%) Azure
2 118 (9.28%) AWS
3 58 (4.56%) Microsoft 365
4 42 (3.30%) GitHub
4 42 (3.30%) Serverless
5 35 (2.75%) OpenShift
6 33 (2.59%) GCP
7 31 (2.44%) Azure DevOps
8 24 (1.89%) Amazon S3
9 23 (1.81%) GitHub Actions
10 19 (1.49%) Entra ID
10 19 (1.49%) IaaS
11 18 (1.42%) AWS CloudFormation
11 18 (1.42%) Azure Sentinel
12 17 (1.34%) Amazon EC2
12 17 (1.34%) Amazon ECS
12 17 (1.34%) AWS Lambda
13 14 (1.10%) Azure AKS
13 14 (1.10%) PaaS
14 13 (1.02%) Amazon EKS
Communications & Networking
1 94 (7.39%) Firewall
2 84 (6.60%) DNS
3 55 (4.32%) Network Security
4 45 (3.54%) VPN
5 40 (3.14%) LAN
6 38 (2.99%) TCP/IP
7 37 (2.91%) WAN
8 34 (2.67%) DHCP
9 26 (2.04%) Cisco IOS
9 26 (2.04%) Skype
10 25 (1.97%) Junos
11 24 (1.89%) SAN
12 22 (1.73%) Cisco ISE
13 21 (1.65%) Cisco Firepower
14 18 (1.42%) BGP
15 15 (1.18%) Wireless
16 14 (1.10%) SSL
17 13 (1.02%) VLAN
18 11 (0.86%) OSPF
19 10 (0.79%) Unified Communications
Database & Business Intelligence
1 25 (1.97%) PostgreSQL
2 24 (1.89%) Big Data
3 20 (1.57%) Elasticsearch
4 16 (1.26%) Hadoop
5 15 (1.18%) Amazon RDS
6 14 (1.10%) SQL Server
7 12 (0.94%) Oracle Database
8 10 (0.79%) MongoDB
8 10 (0.79%) Redis
9 9 (0.71%) Relational Database
10 7 (0.55%) MySQL
10 7 (0.55%) Power BI
11 6 (0.47%) InfluxDB
11 6 (0.47%) SAP HANA
12 4 (0.31%) Metadata
12 4 (0.31%) NoSQL
12 4 (0.31%) RDBMS
13 3 (0.24%) Amazon Aurora
13 3 (0.24%) Apache Hive
13 3 (0.24%) Data Lake
Development Applications
1 40 (3.14%) JIRA
2 35 (2.75%) GitLab
3 29 (2.28%) Git
3 29 (2.28%) Jenkins
4 17 (1.34%) SonarQube
5 14 (1.10%) Artifactory
5 14 (1.10%) Maven
6 11 (0.86%) Sonatype Nexus
7 8 (0.63%) Bitbucket
7 8 (0.63%) Cypress.io
8 7 (0.55%) Selenium
9 6 (0.47%) Postman
10 5 (0.39%) CircleCI
10 5 (0.39%) Gradle
10 5 (0.39%) JUnit
10 5 (0.39%) Snyk
10 5 (0.39%) webpack
11 4 (0.31%) Robot Framework
12 3 (0.24%) Oracle APEX
13 2 (0.16%) SQL Server Management Studio (SSMS)
General
1 258 (20.28%) Social Skills
2 177 (13.92%) Public Sector
3 104 (8.18%) Analytical Skills
4 62 (4.87%) Finance
5 50 (3.93%) Military
6 30 (2.36%) Legal
6 30 (2.36%) Manufacturing
7 29 (2.28%) Documentation Skills
8 27 (2.12%) Telecoms
9 25 (1.97%) Presentation Skills
10 20 (1.57%) Organisational Skills
11 19 (1.49%) Marketing
12 18 (1.42%) Electronics
12 18 (1.42%) Law
13 15 (1.18%) Banking
14 11 (0.86%) Aerospace
14 11 (0.86%) Police
15 8 (0.63%) Inclusion and Diversity
16 2 (0.16%) Influencing Skills
16 2 (0.16%) Multimedia
Job Titles
1 224 (17.61%) Architect
2 81 (6.37%) Consultant
3 80 (6.29%) Analyst
4 71 (5.58%) Senior
5 63 (4.95%) Network Engineer
6 57 (4.48%) DevOps Engineer
6 57 (4.48%) Support Engineer
7 53 (4.17%) Lead
8 48 (3.77%) Developer
8 48 (3.77%) DV Cleared Network Engineer
9 46 (3.62%) Technical Architect
10 42 (3.30%) 3rd Line Engineer
11 38 (2.99%) Solutions Architect
12 36 (2.83%) Cloud Engineer
13 35 (2.75%) Project Manager
14 33 (2.59%) Infrastructure Architect
14 33 (2.59%) Infrastructure Engineer
14 33 (2.59%) SOC Analyst
15 29 (2.28%) Administrator
15 29 (2.28%) Tester
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 36 (2.83%) Apache NiFi
2 32 (2.52%) REST
3 21 (1.65%) Kafka
3 21 (1.65%) React
4 20 (1.57%) OAuth
5 18 (1.42%) OpenID
6 17 (1.34%) SAML
7 16 (1.26%) OAuth2
8 15 (1.18%) YAML
9 14 (1.10%) .NET
9 14 (1.10%) Elastic Stack
9 14 (1.10%) Node.js
10 13 (1.02%) RabbitMQ
11 11 (0.86%) FastAPI
11 11 (0.86%) Flask
12 9 (0.71%) JSON
12 9 (0.71%) LDAP
12 9 (0.71%) Web Services
13 8 (0.63%) gRPC
13 8 (0.63%) WebSockets
Miscellaneous
1 88 (6.92%) PKI
2 44 (3.46%) Data Centre
3 32 (2.52%) Security Operations Centre
4 31 (2.44%) Management Information System
5 30 (2.36%) Cyber Threat
6 19 (1.49%) Replication
7 18 (1.42%) Cloud Native
8 17 (1.34%) Analytical Mindset
8 17 (1.34%) Onboarding
8 17 (1.34%) Private Cloud
9 16 (1.26%) Cyberattack
10 14 (1.10%) CSOC
10 14 (1.10%) Product Ownership
11 13 (1.02%) Cyber Defence
12 12 (0.94%) Driving Licence
12 12 (0.94%) Enterprise Software
12 12 (0.94%) Fat Client
12 12 (0.94%) Thin Client
13 11 (0.86%) Hybrid Cloud
14 10 (0.79%) Insider Threat
Operating Systems
1 236 (18.55%) Windows
2 138 (10.85%) Linux
3 71 (5.58%) Windows Server
4 38 (2.99%) Windows 10
5 24 (1.89%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
6 16 (1.26%) Windows 7
7 13 (1.02%) Android
7 13 (1.02%) Mac OS
8 11 (0.86%) Unix
9 10 (0.79%) Ubuntu
9 10 (0.79%) Windows Server 2003
10 8 (0.63%) Windows Server 2019
11 6 (0.47%) CentOS
12 3 (0.24%) Debian
13 2 (0.16%) VMS
13 2 (0.16%) Windows Server 2016
14 1 (0.079%) Data ONTAP
14 1 (0.079%) Mac OS X
14 1 (0.079%) Rocky
14 1 (0.079%) Windows Server 2008
Processes & Methodologies
1 228 (17.92%) Agile
2 147 (11.56%) Cybersecurity
3 140 (11.01%) Problem-Solving
4 136 (10.69%) DevOps
5 115 (9.04%) CI/CD
6 92 (7.23%) ITIL
7 85 (6.68%) Stakeholder Engagement
8 76 (5.97%) SIEM
9 75 (5.90%) Continuous Improvement
10 74 (5.82%) Infrastructure as Code
11 71 (5.58%) Stakeholder Management
12 70 (5.50%) Service Management
13 65 (5.11%) ITSM
14 63 (4.95%) Containerisation
15 61 (4.80%) Infrastructure Engineering
16 60 (4.72%) Incident Response
17 58 (4.56%) Risk Management
18 55 (4.32%) Project Management
18 55 (4.32%) Scrum
19 53 (4.17%) Software Engineering
Programming Languages
1 144 (11.32%) Python
2 118 (9.28%) PowerShell
3 64 (5.03%) SQL
4 43 (3.38%) Java
5 34 (2.67%) JavaScript
6 31 (2.44%) Bash
7 18 (1.42%) Go
8 17 (1.34%) C#
9 15 (1.18%) C++
9 15 (1.18%) TypeScript
10 14 (1.10%) Shell Script
11 9 (0.71%) Bicep
11 9 (0.71%) C
12 8 (0.63%) VBScript
13 6 (0.47%) VB
14 5 (0.39%) ABAP
15 4 (0.31%) PL/SQL
16 3 (0.24%) T-SQL
17 2 (0.16%) Kusto Query Language
17 2 (0.16%) Ruby
Qualifications
1 1,272 (100.00%) Security Cleared
2 420 (33.02%) SC Cleared
3 54 (4.25%) CISSP
3 54 (4.25%) Degree
4 37 (2.91%) CISM
5 33 (2.59%) Microsoft Certification
6 29 (2.28%) Cisco Certification
7 20 (1.57%) CCNP
8 18 (1.42%) CompTIA Security+
8 18 (1.42%) GIAC
9 16 (1.26%) CEH
10 15 (1.18%) Computer Science Degree
11 14 (1.10%) CESG Certified Professional
12 13 (1.02%) CompTIA CySA+
12 13 (1.02%) CTC Cleared
13 12 (0.94%) Azure Certification
13 12 (0.94%) BPSS Clearance
14 11 (0.86%) CCNA
15 10 (0.79%) PMI Certification
16 9 (0.71%) PMP
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 65 (5.11%) NIST
2 50 (3.93%) ISO/IEC 27001
3 49 (3.85%) NCSC
4 25 (1.97%) QA
5 21 (1.65%) JSP 440
6 20 (1.57%) PMO
7 19 (1.49%) SLA
8 18 (1.42%) GDPR
9 16 (1.26%) NIST 800
10 13 (1.02%) Data Quality
11 11 (0.86%) GRC
12 8 (0.63%) RMADS
13 4 (0.31%) Cyber Essentials
13 4 (0.31%) ISO/IEC 20000
13 4 (0.31%) P3O
14 3 (0.24%) Actionable Recommendations
14 3 (0.24%) COBIT
14 3 (0.24%) EU AI Act
14 3 (0.24%) HMG Security Policy Framework
14 3 (0.24%) ISO/IEC 42001
System Software
1 110 (8.65%) Active Directory
2 75 (5.90%) Docker
3 63 (4.95%) VMware Infrastructure
4 41 (3.22%) VMware NSX
5 28 (2.20%) VMware ESXi
6 18 (1.42%) vSphere
7 11 (0.86%) Virtual Machines
8 8 (0.63%) BitLocker
8 8 (0.63%) Firmware
9 6 (0.47%) Brightmail
9 6 (0.47%) ISA Server
9 6 (0.47%) NFS
9 6 (0.47%) vCloud
10 5 (0.39%) Hyper-V
11 3 (0.24%) Microsoft App-V
11 3 (0.24%) Oracle RAC
11 3 (0.24%) Virtual Desktop
12 2 (0.16%) GPFS
12 2 (0.16%) Lustre
12 2 (0.16%) Virtual Servers
Systems Management
1 122 (9.59%) Kubernetes
2 106 (8.33%) Terraform
3 77 (6.05%) Ansible
4 50 (3.93%) vCenter Server
5 36 (2.83%) Grafana
6 30 (2.36%) Prometheus
7 28 (2.20%) Single Sign-On
8 27 (2.12%) Active Directory Federation Services
9 22 (1.73%) SCCM
10 15 (1.18%) WMI
11 14 (1.10%) Progress Chef
12 13 (1.02%) Puppet
13 11 (0.86%) Podman
14 8 (0.63%) Argo
14 8 (0.63%) Microsoft Clustering
14 8 (0.63%) Microsoft Intune
14 8 (0.63%) SCOM
15 7 (0.55%) Nessus
15 7 (0.55%) vRealize
16 6 (0.47%) Proxmox
Vendors
1 201 (15.80%) Microsoft
2 130 (10.22%) VMware
3 100 (7.86%) Cisco
4 50 (3.93%) Splunk
5 47 (3.69%) Juniper
5 47 (3.69%) SAP
6 37 (2.91%) Red Hat
7 33 (2.59%) Oracle
8 32 (2.52%) Palantir
9 29 (2.28%) SolarWinds
10 24 (1.89%) Foundry
11 22 (1.73%) NetApp
12 21 (1.65%) Dell
13 18 (1.42%) ServiceNow
14 14 (1.10%) Atlassian
14 14 (1.10%) HP
14 14 (1.10%) Remedy
14 14 (1.10%) Sparx
14 14 (1.10%) Veeam
15 13 (1.02%) Google