Firewall Contract Job Trends

Firewall
UK

The table below provides summary statistics and contractor rates for jobs requiring Firewall skills. It covers contract job vacancies from the 6 months leading up to 11 April 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
11 Apr 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 83 52 51
Rank change year-on-year -31 -1 +7
Contract jobs citing Firewall 1,376 1,226 1,645
As % of all contract jobs in the UK 3.01% 4.20% 3.74%
As % of the Communications & Networking category 30.45% 32.51% 28.11%
Number of daily rates quoted 898 748 1,037
10th Percentile £337 £313 £313
25th Percentile £413 £406 £413
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £511 £500
Median % change year-on-year -2.20% +2.25% -4.76%
75th Percentile £588 £600 £625
90th Percentile £650 £688 £762
UK excluding London median daily rate £500 £500 £500
Number of hourly rates quoted 31 18 40
10th Percentile £20.50 - £15.89
25th Percentile £37.25 £14.20 £23.92
Median hourly rate £48.72 £35.82 £68.25
Median % change year-on-year +36.00% -47.51% +10.08%
75th Percentile £74.26 £41.50 £85.99
90th Percentile £85.00 £53.63 £87.53
UK excluding London median hourly rate £52.36 £35.00 £83.77
% change year-on-year +49.60% -58.22% +35.10%

All Communications and Computer Networking Skills
UK

Firewall 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 4,519 3,771 5,852
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the UK 9.87% 12.90% 13.32%
Number of daily rates quoted 2,852 2,341 3,526
10th Percentile £231 £213 £205
25th Percentile £398 £363 £350
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £490 £485
Median % change year-on-year +2.04% +1.14% -6.74%
75th Percentile £588 £600 £600
90th Percentile £675 £675 £700
UK excluding London median daily rate £475 £468 £475
% change year-on-year +1.60% -1.58% -
Number of hourly rates quoted 203 164 421
10th Percentile £15.62 £14.99 £13.85
25th Percentile £20.41 £21.35 £17.72
Median hourly rate £42.71 £37.50 £40.00
Median % change year-on-year +13.88% -6.25% +110.53%
75th Percentile £70.00 £62.50 £61.75
90th Percentile £75.00 £75.00 £67.50
UK excluding London median hourly rate £54.00 £28.00 £45.88
% change year-on-year +92.86% -38.97% +148.00%

Firewall
Job Vacancy Trend

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

Firewall job vacancy trend in the UK

Firewall
Daily Rate Trend

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

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

Firewall
Daily Rate Histogram

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing Firewall over the 6 months to 11 April 2026.

Daily rate histogram for Firewall in the UK

Firewall
Hourly Rate Trend

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

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

Firewall
Hourly Rate Histogram

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing Firewall over the 6 months to 11 April 2026.

Hourly rate histogram for Firewall in the UK

Firewall
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 Firewall within the UK over the 6 months to 11 April 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 -34 1,153 £513 -1.54% 482
UK excluding London -17 781 £500 - 419
London -54 421 £515 -1.90% 122
Work from Home -20 393 £513 +2.50% 174
South East +4 237 £515 +3.00% 134
North of England -17 234 £500 +5.26% 105
North West -9 158 £528 +11.16% 67
Midlands -38 97 £425 -24.11% 62
West Midlands -21 85 £423 -18.83% 37
Yorkshire -19 74 £447 -12.78% 27
South West -43 64 £552 +0.91% 42
East of England -8 63 £488 -7.58% 51
Scotland +3 53 £425 - 22
Wales -12 31 £425 +9.68% 13
East Midlands -60 8 £475 -19.83% 25
North East -14 5 £548 -0.45% 12
Northern Ireland - 3 £500 - 5

Firewall
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 42 (3.05%) Microsoft Exchange
2 29 (2.11%) Confluence
3 18 (1.31%) SharePoint
4 13 (0.94%) Apache
4 13 (0.94%) nginx
5 10 (0.73%) CICS
6 7 (0.51%) SAS
7 5 (0.36%) IIS
8 4 (0.29%) OpenStack
9 3 (0.22%) WebSphere
10 2 (0.15%) Apache Pulsar
10 2 (0.15%) IBM HTTP Server
10 2 (0.15%) Oracle HTTP Server
10 2 (0.15%) Skype for Business
10 2 (0.15%) Tomcat
10 2 (0.15%) WebSphere Application Server
10 2 (0.15%) WebSphere Portal
11 1 (0.073%) Anypoint
11 1 (0.073%) JBoss
Applications
1 36 (2.62%) Microsoft Office
2 21 (1.53%) Microsoft Excel
3 19 (1.38%) MS Visio
4 17 (1.24%) Microsoft PowerPoint
5 6 (0.44%) Microsoft Project
6 1 (0.073%) Windchill
Business Applications
1 2 (0.15%) Remedy ITSM
2 1 (0.073%) Payment Gateway
2 1 (0.073%) Primavera
2 1 (0.073%) SAP S/4HANA
2 1 (0.073%) Sparx Enterprise Architect
Cloud Services
1 450 (32.70%) Azure
2 297 (21.58%) AWS
3 123 (8.94%) GCP
4 117 (8.50%) Entra ID
4 117 (8.50%) Microsoft 365
5 63 (4.58%) Virtual Private Cloud
6 62 (4.51%) GitHub
7 60 (4.36%) IaaS
8 54 (3.92%) PaaS
9 49 (3.56%) Azure DevOps
10 46 (3.34%) Serverless
11 45 (3.27%) Azure Monitor
12 43 (3.13%) SaaS
13 42 (3.05%) Azure Sentinel
14 39 (2.83%) Azure ExpressRoute
15 38 (2.76%) GitHub Actions
16 37 (2.69%) AWS Lambda
17 34 (2.47%) AWS CloudFormation
18 33 (2.40%) Amazon EC2
19 31 (2.25%) Amazon EKS
Communications & Networking
1 374 (27.18%) Network Security
2 347 (25.22%) WAN
3 341 (24.78%) VPN
4 287 (20.86%) DNS
5 261 (18.97%) LAN
6 227 (16.50%) BGP
7 200 (14.53%) OSPF
8 159 (11.56%) VLAN
9 151 (10.97%) TCP/IP
10 148 (10.76%) DHCP
11 133 (9.67%) SD-WAN
12 122 (8.87%) Wireless
13 101 (7.34%) Wi-Fi
14 97 (7.05%) MPLS
15 81 (5.89%) IPsec
16 76 (5.52%) Cisco ISE
17 68 (4.94%) VXLAN
18 66 (4.80%) Cisco ASA
19 60 (4.36%) SSL
20 59 (4.29%) Cisco Nexus
Database & Business Intelligence
1 27 (1.96%) SQL Server
2 20 (1.45%) PostgreSQL
3 18 (1.31%) Elasticsearch
4 17 (1.24%) Amazon RDS
5 11 (0.80%) Oracle Database
6 10 (0.73%) DataStage
7 9 (0.65%) Data Lake
7 9 (0.65%) Power BI
8 8 (0.58%) Data Warehouse
9 7 (0.51%) Azure SQL Database
9 7 (0.51%) MongoDB
10 6 (0.44%) MySQL
11 5 (0.36%) Amazon QuickSight
11 5 (0.36%) Relational Database
12 4 (0.29%) Amazon Athena
12 4 (0.29%) Amazon Redshift
12 4 (0.29%) NoSQL
12 4 (0.29%) SQL Server Integration Services
13 3 (0.22%) Delta Lake
13 3 (0.22%) Metadata
Development Applications
1 76 (5.52%) JIRA
2 54 (3.92%) Jenkins
3 47 (3.42%) Git
4 43 (3.13%) GitLab
5 22 (1.60%) Sonatype Nexus
6 19 (1.38%) Bitbucket
7 16 (1.16%) Burp Suite
7 16 (1.16%) Metasploit
8 9 (0.65%) Chocolatey
8 9 (0.65%) Jaeger
9 7 (0.51%) SonarQube
10 6 (0.44%) Artifactory
11 5 (0.36%) Browser DevTools
12 4 (0.29%) CircleCI
13 2 (0.15%) Introscope
14 1 (0.073%) Atlassian Bamboo
14 1 (0.073%) Maven
14 1 (0.073%) Postman
14 1 (0.073%) Subversion
14 1 (0.073%) Travis CI
General
1 354 (25.73%) Social Skills
2 164 (11.92%) Finance
3 140 (10.17%) Analytical Skills
4 107 (7.78%) Public Sector
5 99 (7.19%) Documentation Skills
6 56 (4.07%) Banking
7 43 (3.13%) Telecoms
8 32 (2.33%) Legal
9 26 (1.89%) Financial Institution
10 23 (1.67%) Manufacturing
11 20 (1.45%) Influencing Skills
12 17 (1.24%) Military
13 15 (1.09%) Law
14 14 (1.02%) Presentation Skills
15 12 (0.87%) Inclusion and Diversity
15 12 (0.87%) Retail
16 11 (0.80%) Local Government
17 10 (0.73%) Organisational Skills
18 8 (0.58%) Front Office
19 7 (0.51%) Aerospace
Job Titles
1 393 (28.56%) Network Engineer
2 239 (17.37%) Architect
3 149 (10.83%) Senior
4 114 (8.28%) Security Engineer
5 92 (6.69%) Infrastructure Engineer
6 85 (6.18%) Network Architect
7 58 (4.22%) Azure Engineer
8 56 (4.07%) SC Cleared Network Engineer
9 55 (4.00%) Senior Network Engineer
10 49 (3.56%) Security Architect
11 45 (3.27%) Cloud Engineer
12 44 (3.20%) Solutions Architect
13 42 (3.05%) Analyst
14 41 (2.98%) Consultant
15 40 (2.91%) Network Security Engineer
16 39 (2.83%) Lead
16 39 (2.83%) Platform Engineer
16 39 (2.83%) Technical Architect
17 37 (2.69%) DevOps Engineer
18 36 (2.62%) Cisco Engineer
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 72 (5.23%) 802.1X
2 38 (2.76%) SAML
3 37 (2.69%) LDAP
4 36 (2.62%) Middleware
5 35 (2.54%) OpenID
6 20 (1.45%) Kafka
6 20 (1.45%) OAuth
7 19 (1.38%) OAuth2
8 14 (1.02%) REST
9 12 (0.87%) Node.js
10 11 (0.80%) OpenTelemetry
11 10 (0.73%) ARM Templates
11 10 (0.73%) JSON
11 10 (0.73%) Spring Boot
12 8 (0.58%) Elastic Stack
13 7 (0.51%) XML
14 6 (0.44%) HTML
14 6 (0.44%) LangChain
14 6 (0.44%) scikit-learn
14 6 (0.44%) YAML
Miscellaneous
1 298 (21.66%) Data Centre
2 78 (5.67%) Security Posture
3 73 (5.31%) Cloud Native
4 70 (5.09%) PKI
5 48 (3.49%) Hybrid Cloud
5 48 (3.49%) Onboarding
6 41 (2.98%) Operational Technology
7 37 (2.69%) Clustering
8 36 (2.62%) Management Information System
9 34 (2.47%) Public Cloud
10 29 (2.11%) IoT
11 22 (1.60%) Cyber Threat
11 22 (1.60%) Replication
11 22 (1.60%) SCADA
12 21 (1.53%) Data Protection Act
12 21 (1.53%) Private Cloud
12 21 (1.53%) Product Ownership
13 19 (1.38%) Enterprise Software
13 19 (1.38%) NHS
14 17 (1.24%) Enterprise Storage
Operating Systems
1 343 (24.93%) Windows
2 213 (15.48%) Linux
3 143 (10.39%) Windows Server
4 37 (2.69%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
5 34 (2.47%) Unix
6 28 (2.03%) VMS
7 12 (0.87%) Solaris
8 11 (0.80%) Windows Server 2019
9 10 (0.73%) AIX
10 9 (0.65%) Windows Server 2016
11 7 (0.51%) Windows Server 2003
12 6 (0.44%) Windows 10
12 6 (0.44%) Windows 7
13 5 (0.36%) Mac OS
14 4 (0.29%) CatOS
14 4 (0.29%) Windows Server 2012
15 3 (0.22%) Amazon Linux
15 3 (0.22%) Android
15 3 (0.22%) Data ONTAP
15 3 (0.22%) SUSE
Processes & Methodologies
1 225 (16.35%) Cybersecurity
2 216 (15.70%) DevOps
3 205 (14.90%) Problem-Solving
4 182 (13.23%) CI/CD
5 180 (13.08%) Infrastructure as Code
6 172 (12.50%) Load Balancing
7 167 (12.14%) Migration
8 163 (11.85%) ITIL
9 148 (10.76%) High Availability
10 138 (10.03%) Infrastructure Engineering
11 124 (9.01%) Agile
12 120 (8.72%) SIEM
13 118 (8.58%) Change Management
13 118 (8.58%) Cloud Security
14 117 (8.50%) Zero Trust
15 95 (6.90%) Incident Response
15 95 (6.90%) Roadmaps
16 93 (6.76%) Continuous Improvement
17 92 (6.69%) Observability
18 91 (6.61%) Mentoring
Programming Languages
1 201 (14.61%) Python
2 192 (13.95%) PowerShell
3 95 (6.90%) Bash
4 58 (4.22%) SQL
5 39 (2.83%) Bicep
6 33 (2.40%) Java
7 25 (1.82%) Perl
8 11 (0.80%) Kusto Query Language
9 10 (0.73%) COBOL
9 10 (0.73%) JavaScript
9 10 (0.73%) Ruby
10 8 (0.58%) Rust
11 6 (0.44%) PL/SQL
12 5 (0.36%) Shell Script
13 4 (0.29%) C#
13 4 (0.29%) Go
14 2 (0.15%) C++
14 2 (0.15%) Jython
14 2 (0.15%) PHP
15 1 (0.073%) ActionScript
Qualifications
1 490 (35.61%) Security Cleared
2 342 (24.85%) SC Cleared
3 261 (18.97%) Cisco Certification
4 210 (15.26%) CCNP
5 126 (9.16%) DV Cleared
6 122 (8.87%) Degree
7 109 (7.92%) CCNA
8 82 (5.96%) CISSP
9 60 (4.36%) Azure Certification
10 49 (3.56%) CCIE
11 46 (3.34%) AWS Certification
11 46 (3.34%) CISM
12 38 (2.76%) Microsoft Certification
13 26 (1.89%) CompTIA Security+
14 24 (1.74%) JNCIS
15 23 (1.67%) Computer Science Degree
15 23 (1.67%) JNCIP
16 19 (1.38%) JNCIA
16 19 (1.38%) Network+ Certification
17 18 (1.31%) CREST Certified
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 97 (7.05%) ISO/IEC 27001
2 77 (5.60%) NIST
3 67 (4.87%) GDPR
4 45 (3.27%) PCI DSS
5 37 (2.69%) NCSC
6 31 (2.25%) SLA
7 26 (1.89%) Cyber Essentials
8 21 (1.53%) QA
9 16 (1.16%) PMO
10 7 (0.51%) JSP 440
11 6 (0.44%) Actionable Recommendations
11 6 (0.44%) GRC
11 6 (0.44%) HMG Security Policy Framework
11 6 (0.44%) RMADS
12 5 (0.36%) ISO/IEC 27002 (supersedes ISO/IEC 17799)
13 4 (0.29%) Data Quality
13 4 (0.29%) Sarbanes-Oxley
14 3 (0.22%) Disclosure Scotland
14 3 (0.22%) HIPAA
14 3 (0.22%) SOC 2
System Software
1 242 (17.59%) Active Directory
2 180 (13.08%) VMware Infrastructure
3 85 (6.18%) Docker
4 72 (5.23%) VMware NSX
5 43 (3.13%) Hyper-V
6 38 (2.76%) vSphere
7 33 (2.40%) Virtual Machines
8 30 (2.18%) VMware ESXi
9 20 (1.45%) Firmware
9 20 (1.45%) Virtual Desktop
10 11 (0.80%) Squid
11 10 (0.73%) BitLocker
12 8 (0.58%) Microsoft App-V
12 8 (0.58%) Virtual Servers
13 3 (0.22%) DFS Replication
13 3 (0.22%) Oracle RAC
14 2 (0.15%) Citrix Hypervisor
14 2 (0.15%) EMC RecoverPoint
14 2 (0.15%) KVM
14 2 (0.15%) NetIQ eDirectory
Systems Management
1 208 (15.12%) Terraform
2 152 (11.05%) Ansible
3 124 (9.01%) Kubernetes
4 100 (7.27%) FortiGate
5 61 (4.43%) Microsoft Intune
6 45 (3.27%) Grafana
7 44 (3.20%) Single Sign-On
8 39 (2.83%) Prometheus
9 34 (2.47%) SCCM
10 32 (2.33%) vCenter Server
11 27 (1.96%) Active Directory Federation Services
12 18 (1.31%) Nmap
13 14 (1.02%) CASB
13 14 (1.02%) Nagios
14 13 (0.94%) QRadar
15 12 (0.87%) Cisco Prime
15 12 (0.87%) Puppet
16 11 (0.80%) VxRail
17 10 (0.73%) Fluentd
17 10 (0.73%) Progress Chef
Vendors
1 471 (34.23%) Cisco
2 306 (22.24%) Microsoft
3 279 (20.28%) Palo Alto
4 222 (16.13%) VMware
5 163 (11.85%) Fortinet
6 155 (11.26%) F5
7 149 (10.83%) Juniper
8 129 (9.38%) CheckPoint
9 90 (6.54%) Splunk
10 84 (6.10%) Aruba
11 72 (5.23%) SolarWinds
12 57 (4.14%) Google
12 57 (4.14%) ServiceNow
13 56 (4.07%) Meraki
14 46 (3.34%) Citrix
15 42 (3.05%) Arista
15 42 (3.05%) Zscaler
16 41 (2.98%) Red Hat
17 39 (2.83%) Oracle
18 26 (1.89%) Extreme Networks