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 15 August 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
15 Aug 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 98 55 57
Rank change year-on-year -43 +2 -10
Contract jobs citing Firewall 1,432 1,383 1,360
As % of all contract jobs in the UK 2.67% 4.20% 3.50%
As % of the Communications & Networking category 28.32% 35.53% 28.58%
Number of daily rates quoted 894 817 865
10th Percentile £350 £325 £313
25th Percentile £419 £413 £413
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £500 £525
Median % change year-on-year - -4.76% -
75th Percentile £600 £600 £622
90th Percentile £650 £675 £688
UK excluding London median daily rate £500 £490 £515
% change year-on-year +2.09% -4.90% +8.42%
Number of hourly rates quoted 49 29 31
10th Percentile £29.00 £14.20 £22.40
25th Percentile £44.86 £15.33 £23.92
Median hourly rate £65.45 £30.00 £27.50
Median % change year-on-year +118.17% +9.09% -59.56%
75th Percentile £78.75 £43.25 £85.45
90th Percentile £98.82 £89.63 £87.46
UK excluding London median hourly rate £65.57 £30.00 £60.00
% change year-on-year +118.57% -50.00% -11.76%

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 5,056 3,893 4,759
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the UK 9.42% 11.81% 12.25%
Number of daily rates quoted 2,991 2,365 2,897
10th Percentile £250 £247 £220
25th Percentile £400 £375 £363
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £488 £500
Median % change year-on-year +2.56% -2.50% -
75th Percentile £588 £600 £608
90th Percentile £675 £675 £688
UK excluding London median daily rate £490 £475 £500
% change year-on-year +3.05% -5.00% +8.70%
Number of hourly rates quoted 366 201 321
10th Percentile £15.50 £14.99 £14.16
25th Percentile £19.33 £25.15 £20.00
Median hourly rate £26.14 £46.25 £48.56
Median % change year-on-year -43.48% -4.76% -10.07%
75th Percentile £65.00 £65.00 £65.00
90th Percentile £75.00 £82.10 £73.75
UK excluding London median hourly rate £26.40 £45.00 £54.88
% change year-on-year -41.33% -18.00% -3.58%

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 15 August 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 15 August 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 15 August 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 -42 1,253 £510 +2.00% 753
UK excluding London -32 814 £500 +2.09% 473
London -56 485 £500 - 350
Work from Home -34 392 £520 +4.00% 258
North of England -8 283 £500 +3.09% 105
South East -34 223 £520 +4.00% 179
North West -2 183 £525 +10.53% 56
South West -34 83 £550 +13.11% 42
Yorkshire -43 82 £450 -8.07% 36
East of England -6 77 £525 -4.55% 36
Midlands -73 75 £450 -5.26% 76
Scotland 0 63 £400 -13.51% 21
West Midlands -72 57 £440 -7.37% 45
North East -22 24 £625 +8.70% 16
Wales -13 17 £425 +61.90% 7
East Midlands -20 16 £488 +3.50% 31
Northern Ireland -6 1 - - 15

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 47 (3.28%) Microsoft Exchange
2 30 (2.09%) SharePoint
3 28 (1.96%) Confluence
4 15 (1.05%) Apache
5 11 (0.77%) nginx
6 9 (0.63%) SAS
7 4 (0.28%) CICS
7 4 (0.28%) FactoryTalk
7 4 (0.28%) IIS
7 4 (0.28%) Tomcat
8 3 (0.21%) CloudStack
8 3 (0.21%) Skype for Business
9 2 (0.14%) CMS
9 2 (0.14%) IBM HTTP Server
9 2 (0.14%) Oracle HTTP Server
9 2 (0.14%) Umbraco
9 2 (0.14%) WebSphere
9 2 (0.14%) WebSphere Application Server
9 2 (0.14%) WebSphere Portal
10 1 (0.070%) MTS
Applications
1 23 (1.61%) Microsoft Excel
2 22 (1.54%) MS Visio
3 21 (1.47%) Microsoft Office
4 10 (0.70%) Microsoft Project
5 6 (0.42%) Spreadsheet
6 3 (0.21%) Microsoft PowerPoint
7 1 (0.070%) Windchill
Business Applications
1 5 (0.35%) Dynamics CRM
2 2 (0.14%) Dynamics GP
2 2 (0.14%) Teamcenter
3 1 (0.070%) Bloomberg TOMS
3 1 (0.070%) Eikon
3 1 (0.070%) Primavera
3 1 (0.070%) Remedy ITSM
Cloud Services
1 532 (37.15%) Azure
2 331 (23.11%) AWS
3 163 (11.38%) Entra ID
4 128 (8.94%) Microsoft 365
5 116 (8.10%) GCP
6 77 (5.38%) GitHub
7 68 (4.75%) IaaS
8 66 (4.61%) Azure DevOps
9 63 (4.40%) SaaS
10 53 (3.70%) Virtual Private Cloud
11 51 (3.56%) Azure Monitor
12 47 (3.28%) Azure ExpressRoute
13 41 (2.86%) Azure Sentinel
13 41 (2.86%) PaaS
14 37 (2.58%) OCI
14 37 (2.58%) Serverless
15 36 (2.51%) GitHub Actions
16 31 (2.16%) Google Kubernetes Engine
17 25 (1.75%) AWS CloudFormation
18 24 (1.68%) Amazon EC2
Communications & Networking
1 423 (29.54%) VPN
2 399 (27.86%) WAN
3 386 (26.96%) Network Security
4 376 (26.26%) DNS
5 295 (20.60%) LAN
6 264 (18.44%) BGP
7 219 (15.29%) DHCP
8 214 (14.94%) TCP/IP
9 209 (14.59%) OSPF
10 201 (14.04%) VLAN
11 167 (11.66%) Wireless
12 146 (10.20%) SD-WAN
13 132 (9.22%) Wi-Fi
14 92 (6.42%) BIG-IP
14 92 (6.42%) MPLS
15 87 (6.08%) IPsec
16 82 (5.73%) Cisco ASA
16 82 (5.73%) F5 BIG-IP LTM
16 82 (5.73%) VXLAN
17 75 (5.24%) Cisco ISE
Database & Business Intelligence
1 34 (2.37%) SQL Server
2 19 (1.33%) PostgreSQL
3 17 (1.19%) Power BI
4 14 (0.98%) Amazon RDS
5 10 (0.70%) Azure SQL Database
5 10 (0.70%) Relational Database
6 9 (0.63%) Elasticsearch
6 9 (0.63%) Oracle Database
7 8 (0.56%) Data Lake
7 8 (0.56%) MySQL
8 5 (0.35%) Amazon Aurora
8 5 (0.35%) Delta Lake
8 5 (0.35%) NoSQL
9 4 (0.28%) Data Warehouse
9 4 (0.28%) DataStage
9 4 (0.28%) Db2
10 3 (0.21%) Amazon Athena
10 3 (0.21%) Amazon Redshift
10 3 (0.21%) Big Data
10 3 (0.21%) Metadata
Development Applications
1 94 (6.56%) JIRA
2 60 (4.19%) Jenkins
3 49 (3.42%) GitLab
4 47 (3.28%) Git
5 13 (0.91%) Sonatype Nexus
6 10 (0.70%) Bitbucket
7 8 (0.56%) Artifactory
7 8 (0.56%) Chocolatey
8 6 (0.42%) Atlassian Bamboo
8 6 (0.42%) Browser DevTools
9 4 (0.28%) MSI
9 4 (0.28%) SonarQube
10 3 (0.21%) Burp Suite
11 2 (0.14%) Gatling
11 2 (0.14%) Gradle
11 2 (0.14%) Introscope
11 2 (0.14%) LoadRunner
11 2 (0.14%) REST Assured
11 2 (0.14%) SQL Server Management Studio (SSMS)
11 2 (0.14%) Team Foundation Server
General
1 311 (21.72%) Social Skills
2 174 (12.15%) Finance
3 146 (10.20%) Analytical Skills
4 123 (8.59%) Public Sector
5 80 (5.59%) Banking
6 61 (4.26%) Documentation Skills
7 52 (3.63%) Telecoms
8 27 (1.89%) Legal
9 25 (1.75%) Manufacturing
10 21 (1.47%) Financial Institution
11 19 (1.33%) Military
11 19 (1.33%) Retail
12 18 (1.26%) Local Government
13 15 (1.05%) Influencing Skills
14 13 (0.91%) Inclusion and Diversity
14 13 (0.91%) Law
14 13 (0.91%) Organisational Skills
14 13 (0.91%) Police
15 10 (0.70%) Investment Banking
16 8 (0.56%) Front Office
Job Titles
1 464 (32.40%) Network Engineer
2 218 (15.22%) Senior
3 192 (13.41%) Architect
4 150 (10.47%) Infrastructure Engineer
5 109 (7.61%) Security Engineer
6 98 (6.84%) Senior Network Engineer
7 80 (5.59%) Cloud Engineer
8 64 (4.47%) Network Architect
9 62 (4.33%) Azure Engineer
10 60 (4.19%) Consultant
11 52 (3.63%) Senior Infrastructure Engineer
12 51 (3.56%) Network Security Engineer
13 48 (3.35%) SC Cleared Network Engineer
14 47 (3.28%) Security Architect
15 46 (3.21%) Lead
16 45 (3.14%) DevOps Engineer
17 44 (3.07%) Technical Architect
18 42 (2.93%) Cisco Engineer
19 40 (2.79%) Cisco Network Engineer
20 37 (2.58%) Analyst
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 69 (4.82%) 802.1X
2 39 (2.72%) Middleware
3 30 (2.09%) SAML
4 23 (1.61%) ARM Templates
5 19 (1.33%) OpenID
6 17 (1.19%) LDAP
7 14 (0.98%) OAuth
7 14 (0.98%) REST
8 11 (0.77%) Kafka
8 11 (0.77%) OAuth2
8 11 (0.77%) YAML
9 10 (0.70%) React
10 9 (0.63%) LangChain
10 9 (0.63%) PyTorch
10 9 (0.63%) scikit-learn
11 8 (0.56%) .NET
12 7 (0.49%) Elastic Stack
12 7 (0.49%) JSON
12 7 (0.49%) OpenTelemetry
12 7 (0.49%) SailPoint
Miscellaneous
1 313 (21.86%) Data Centre
2 95 (6.63%) Hybrid Cloud
3 93 (6.49%) Cloud Native
4 90 (6.28%) PKI
5 62 (4.33%) Security Posture
6 58 (4.05%) Onboarding
7 57 (3.98%) Management Information System
8 45 (3.14%) Operational Technology
9 39 (2.72%) Clustering
10 31 (2.16%) Data Protection Act
11 30 (2.09%) Distributed Denial-of-Service
11 30 (2.09%) Public Cloud
12 26 (1.82%) IoT
13 25 (1.75%) SCADA
14 24 (1.68%) Self-Motivation
15 23 (1.61%) Enterprise Software
16 22 (1.54%) Driving Licence
17 21 (1.47%) Enterprise Storage
17 21 (1.47%) Replication
18 20 (1.40%) Linux Command Line
Operating Systems
1 361 (25.21%) Windows
2 221 (15.43%) Linux
3 141 (9.85%) Windows Server
4 49 (3.42%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
5 29 (2.03%) Unix
6 20 (1.40%) Ubuntu
6 20 (1.40%) VMS
7 15 (1.05%) Mac OS
8 13 (0.91%) Windows Server 2019
9 11 (0.77%) CentOS
10 10 (0.70%) Windows Server 2016
11 7 (0.49%) Rocky
11 7 (0.49%) Windows 10
12 6 (0.42%) Windows Server 2012
13 5 (0.35%) Amazon Linux
13 5 (0.35%) Android
13 5 (0.35%) Solaris
13 5 (0.35%) Windows Server 2003
14 4 (0.28%) AIX
14 4 (0.28%) SUSE
Processes & Methodologies
1 249 (17.39%) DevOps
2 240 (16.76%) CI/CD
3 239 (16.69%) Infrastructure as Code
4 214 (14.94%) Infrastructure Engineering
5 203 (14.18%) Load Balancing
6 200 (13.97%) Cybersecurity
7 198 (13.83%) Problem-Solving
8 194 (13.55%) ITIL
9 181 (12.64%) Migration
10 176 (12.29%) High Availability
11 158 (11.03%) Agile
12 152 (10.61%) Zero Trust
13 143 (9.99%) SIEM
14 133 (9.29%) Project Delivery
15 129 (9.01%) Change Management
16 125 (8.73%) Stakeholder Management
17 118 (8.24%) Observability
18 115 (8.03%) Validation
19 111 (7.75%) Cloud Security
20 108 (7.54%) Technical Leadership
Programming Languages
1 281 (19.62%) Python
2 211 (14.73%) PowerShell
3 135 (9.43%) Bash
4 50 (3.49%) SQL
5 49 (3.42%) Bicep
6 35 (2.44%) Java
7 11 (0.77%) ActionScript
7 11 (0.77%) Perl
8 10 (0.70%) Kusto Query Language
9 8 (0.56%) Groovy
10 6 (0.42%) Go
10 6 (0.42%) Search Processing Language
11 5 (0.35%) C++
12 4 (0.28%) COBOL
12 4 (0.28%) JavaScript
12 4 (0.28%) Shell Script
12 4 (0.28%) TypeScript
13 3 (0.21%) PL/SQL
14 2 (0.14%) Jython
14 2 (0.14%) T-SQL
Qualifications
1 489 (34.15%) Security Cleared
2 338 (23.60%) SC Cleared
3 263 (18.37%) Cisco Certification
4 192 (13.41%) CCNP
5 129 (9.01%) DV Cleared
6 116 (8.10%) Degree
7 109 (7.61%) CCNA
8 72 (5.03%) CISSP
9 70 (4.89%) Azure Certification
10 50 (3.49%) AWS Certification
11 39 (2.72%) CCIE
12 33 (2.30%) Microsoft Certification
13 30 (2.09%) CISM
13 30 (2.09%) Computer Science Degree
14 21 (1.47%) JNCIS
14 21 (1.47%) Network+ Certification
15 16 (1.12%) JNCIP
15 16 (1.12%) VMware Certified Professional (VCP)
16 15 (1.05%) Server+ Certification
17 14 (0.98%) PMP
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 68 (4.75%) ISO/IEC 27001
2 60 (4.19%) NIST
3 45 (3.14%) GDPR
4 31 (2.16%) NCSC
5 26 (1.82%) SLA
6 25 (1.75%) PCI DSS
7 23 (1.61%) QA
8 19 (1.33%) Cyber Essentials
9 11 (0.77%) JSP 440
10 9 (0.63%) Data Quality
10 9 (0.63%) NIST 800
10 9 (0.63%) Sarbanes-Oxley
11 8 (0.56%) Disclosure Scotland
12 7 (0.49%) GxP
13 6 (0.42%) Cyber Essentials PLUS
13 6 (0.42%) HIPAA
14 5 (0.35%) ISO/IEC 27002 (supersedes ISO/IEC 17799)
15 4 (0.28%) 21 CFR Part 11
15 4 (0.28%) SOC 2
16 3 (0.21%) GRC
System Software
1 239 (16.69%) Active Directory
2 178 (12.43%) VMware Infrastructure
3 70 (4.89%) Docker
4 67 (4.68%) Hyper-V
5 59 (4.12%) VMware NSX
6 45 (3.14%) vSphere
7 41 (2.86%) Virtual Machines
8 40 (2.79%) VMware ESXi
9 27 (1.89%) Firmware
10 16 (1.12%) Virtual Desktop
11 10 (0.70%) BitLocker
12 9 (0.63%) Squid
13 7 (0.49%) Microsoft App-V
14 6 (0.42%) NFS
15 5 (0.35%) Virtual Servers
16 4 (0.28%) Terminal Services
17 3 (0.21%) Dovecot
17 3 (0.21%) FreeRADIUS
17 3 (0.21%) Postfix
17 3 (0.21%) VirtualBox
Systems Management
1 288 (20.11%) Terraform
2 209 (14.59%) Ansible
3 127 (8.87%) Kubernetes
4 110 (7.68%) FortiGate
5 74 (5.17%) Microsoft Intune
6 54 (3.77%) Grafana
7 52 (3.63%) Prometheus
8 39 (2.72%) SCCM
9 35 (2.44%) Single Sign-On
10 28 (1.96%) Progress Chef
11 24 (1.68%) vCenter Server
12 18 (1.26%) VxRail
13 17 (1.19%) CASB
13 17 (1.19%) Puppet
14 14 (0.98%) Cisco Prime
15 10 (0.70%) Argo
15 10 (0.70%) Packer
16 8 (0.56%) Active Directory Federation Services
16 8 (0.56%) QRadar
16 8 (0.56%) vMotion
Vendors
1 521 (36.38%) Cisco
2 344 (24.02%) Microsoft
3 303 (21.16%) Palo Alto
4 228 (15.92%) VMware
5 200 (13.97%) Fortinet
6 194 (13.55%) F5
7 151 (10.54%) Juniper
8 121 (8.45%) CheckPoint
9 85 (5.94%) Splunk
10 74 (5.17%) Google
11 73 (5.10%) ServiceNow
12 71 (4.96%) Aruba
13 70 (4.89%) SolarWinds
14 66 (4.61%) Arista
15 63 (4.40%) Zscaler
16 45 (3.14%) Meraki
17 42 (2.93%) Citrix
18 41 (2.86%) Red Hat
19 33 (2.30%) Infoblox
20 31 (2.16%) Dynatrace