Infrastructure Engineer Contract Job Trends

Infrastructure Engineer
UK

The median Infrastructure Engineer daily rate in the UK is £483, according to job vacancies posted in the 6 months leading up to 21 January 2026.

The table below compares current contractor rates and summary statistics with the previous two years.

6 months to
21 Jan 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 217 205 145
Rank change year-on-year -12 -60 +33
Contract jobs requiring an Infrastructure Engineer 468 391 754
As % of all contract jobs in the UK 1.24% 1.24% 1.74%
As % of the Job Titles category 1.36% 1.34% 1.87%
Number of daily rates quoted 340 269 548
10th Percentile £282 £310 £346
25th Percentile £363 £363 £400
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £483 £500 £480
Median % change year-on-year -3.50% +4.17% +1.05%
75th Percentile £575 £600 £600
90th Percentile £638 £675 £700
UK excluding London median daily rate £466 £475 £475
% change year-on-year -1.89% - +5.56%
Number of hourly rates quoted 15 4 18
10th Percentile £26.10 - £20.86
25th Percentile £26.25 £24.18 £21.25
Median hourly rate £34.00 £34.59 £23.00
Median % change year-on-year -1.71% +50.39% -63.31%
75th Percentile £45.20 £50.63 £72.35
90th Percentile £75.70 £56.25 £76.53
UK excluding London median hourly rate £41.25 £24.18 £23.00
% change year-on-year +70.60% +5.13% -54.00%

All Contract IT Job Roles
UK

For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all contract IT job vacancies. Most job vacancies include a discernible job title that can be normalized. As such, the figures in the second row provide an indication of the number of contract jobs in our overall sample.

Contract vacancies in the UK with a recognized job title 34,444 29,232 40,404
% of contract IT jobs with a recognized job title 91.42% 92.85% 93.09%
Number of daily rates quoted 21,829 17,869 26,812
10th Percentile £300 £290 £275
25th Percentile £405 £409 £413
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £525 £525
Median % change year-on-year -4.76% - -4.55%
75th Percentile £615 £638 £638
90th Percentile £719 £738 £738
UK excluding London median daily rate £475 £480 £500
% change year-on-year -1.04% -4.00% -
Number of hourly rates quoted 2,030 877 1,934
10th Percentile £14.38 £15.92 £13.50
25th Percentile £18.50 £21.25 £17.72
Median hourly rate £27.50 £32.50 £40.00
Median % change year-on-year -15.38% -18.75% +17.65%
75th Percentile £60.00 £62.50 £63.00
90th Percentile £70.00 £73.75 £74.81
UK excluding London median hourly rate £25.15 £32.50 £40.50
% change year-on-year -22.62% -19.75% +36.13%

Infrastructure Engineer
Job Vacancy Trend

Historical trend showing the proportion of contract IT job postings featuring 'Infrastructure Engineer' in the job title relative to all contract IT jobs advertised.

Infrastructure Engineer job vacancy trend in the UK

Infrastructure Engineer
Daily Rate Trend

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for Infrastructure Engineer job vacancies in the UK.

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for Infrastructure Engineer job vacancies in the UK

Infrastructure Engineer
Daily Rate Histogram

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing Infrastructure Engineer over the 6 months to 21 January 2026.

Daily rate histogram for Infrastructure Engineer in the UK

Infrastructure Engineer
Hourly Rate Trend

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for Infrastructure Engineer job vacancies in the UK.

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for Infrastructure Engineer job vacancies in the UK

Infrastructure Engineer
Hourly Rate Histogram

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing Infrastructure Engineer over the 6 months to 21 January 2026.

Hourly rate histogram for Infrastructure Engineer in the UK

Infrastructure Engineer
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 Infrastructure Engineer within the UK over the 6 months to 21 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 -7 419 £484 -3.25% 282
UK excluding London -7 315 £466 -1.89% 260
Work from Home +27 130 £450 +9.09% 114
London -54 109 £525 - 48
South East -8 86 £454 +0.97% 77
North of England -15 80 £431 +4.55% 60
South West +14 73 £550 -8.33% 43
Yorkshire -31 40 £350 -15.15% 29
North West -19 35 £459 +14.63% 20
East of England -1 28 £425 -4.66% 31
Midlands -46 28 £415 -17.00% 36
West Midlands -39 20 £413 -33.20% 18
Scotland +6 18 £465 -15.45% 11
East Midlands -28 8 £415 -17.00% 18
North East -11 5 £475 - 14
Wales -11 5 £550 +22.22% 5
Northern Ireland - 1 £375 - 2

Infrastructure Engineer Skill Set
Top 30 Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities

For the 6 months to 21 January 2026, Infrastructure Engineer contract job roles required the following skills and capabilities in order of popularity. The figures indicate the absolute number of co-occurrences and as a proportion of all contract job ads featuring Infrastructure Engineer in the job title.

1 448 (95.73%) Infrastructure Engineering
2 178 (38.03%) Windows
3 172 (36.75%) Azure
4 163 (34.83%) Microsoft
5 137 (29.27%) VMware
6 135 (28.85%) Security Cleared
7 115 (24.57%) Active Directory
8 102 (21.79%) Linux
8 102 (21.79%) VMware Infrastructure
9 95 (20.30%) SC Cleared
10 90 (19.23%) Terraform
11 88 (18.80%) Windows Server
12 86 (18.38%) DevOps
12 86 (18.38%) Firewall
13 84 (17.95%) Problem-Solving
14 80 (17.09%) AWS
15 79 (16.88%) Microsoft 365
16 74 (15.81%) Infrastructure as Code
16 74 (15.81%) PowerShell
17 71 (15.17%) DNS
18 66 (14.10%) CI/CD
19 65 (13.89%) Ansible
19 65 (13.89%) Hyper-V
20 62 (13.25%) ITIL
20 62 (13.25%) Python
21 51 (10.90%) Infrastructure Automation
22 50 (10.68%) DHCP
23 49 (10.47%) SCCM
24 48 (10.26%) Microsoft Intune
25 47 (10.04%) TCP/IP

Infrastructure Engineer Skill Set
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 (8.97%) Microsoft Exchange
2 11 (2.35%) SharePoint
2 11 (2.35%) TPMS
3 8 (1.71%) Apache
4 7 (1.50%) IIS
5 5 (1.07%) Confluence
6 3 (0.64%) Exchange Server 2010
7 2 (0.43%) iPlanet
7 2 (0.43%) JBoss
7 2 (0.43%) nginx
7 2 (0.43%) Skype for Business
7 2 (0.43%) WebSphere
7 2 (0.43%) WebSphere Application Server
8 1 (0.21%) Apache Airflow
8 1 (0.21%) Apache Spark
8 1 (0.21%) CICS
8 1 (0.21%) Traefik
8 1 (0.21%) WebLogic
Applications
1 8 (1.71%) Microsoft Office
2 2 (0.43%) Microsoft Excel
Business Applications
1 3 (0.64%) Maximo
2 2 (0.43%) Dynamics CRM
3 1 (0.21%) NetSuite
Cloud Services
1 172 (36.75%) Azure
2 80 (17.09%) AWS
3 79 (16.88%) Microsoft 365
4 45 (9.62%) Entra ID
5 23 (4.91%) IaaS
6 20 (4.27%) PaaS
7 19 (4.06%) Azure DevOps
7 19 (4.06%) GCP
8 18 (3.85%) Azure Monitor
9 15 (3.21%) Amazon S3
9 15 (3.21%) GitHub
10 14 (2.99%) Amazon CloudWatch
10 14 (2.99%) Azure Sentinel
10 14 (2.99%) Google Kubernetes Engine
10 14 (2.99%) Nutanix
11 11 (2.35%) Mimecast
12 10 (2.14%) Amazon EC2
12 10 (2.14%) Amazon ELB
12 10 (2.14%) SaaS
12 10 (2.14%) Virtual Private Cloud
Communications & Networking
1 86 (18.38%) Firewall
2 71 (15.17%) DNS
3 50 (10.68%) DHCP
4 47 (10.04%) TCP/IP
5 44 (9.40%) VPN
6 32 (6.84%) WAN
7 27 (5.77%) SSL
7 27 (5.77%) VLAN
8 25 (5.34%) Wi-Fi
9 22 (4.70%) SAN
10 21 (4.49%) LAN
11 17 (3.63%) Network Security
12 11 (2.35%) SNMP
12 11 (2.35%) SSH
13 8 (1.71%) SD-WAN
14 7 (1.50%) MPLS
15 6 (1.28%) 4G
16 5 (1.07%) HTTP
17 4 (0.85%) BGP
18 3 (0.64%) Cisco IOS
Database & Business Intelligence
1 14 (2.99%) SQL Server
2 4 (0.85%) Elasticsearch
3 3 (0.64%) Amazon RDS
4 2 (0.43%) Amazon Aurora
4 2 (0.43%) MySQL
4 2 (0.43%) Oracle Database
4 2 (0.43%) Power BI
4 2 (0.43%) SAP HANA
5 1 (0.21%) Apache Iceberg
5 1 (0.21%) Azure SQL Database
5 1 (0.21%) Data Lake
5 1 (0.21%) Data Warehouse
5 1 (0.21%) Delta Lake
5 1 (0.21%) NoSQL
5 1 (0.21%) Parquet
5 1 (0.21%) PostgreSQL
5 1 (0.21%) SQL Server Reporting Services
Development Applications
1 19 (4.06%) GitLab
1 19 (4.06%) Jenkins
2 16 (3.42%) Git
3 9 (1.92%) JIRA
4 4 (0.85%) Artifactory
4 4 (0.85%) Sonatype Nexus
5 2 (0.43%) Bitbucket Server
5 2 (0.43%) CA Release Automation
5 2 (0.43%) GoCD
5 2 (0.43%) Robot Framework
6 1 (0.21%) Bitbucket
6 1 (0.21%) MSI
General
1 91 (19.44%) Social Skills
2 52 (11.11%) Public Sector
3 49 (10.47%) Finance
4 42 (8.97%) Analytical Skills
5 23 (4.91%) Documentation Skills
6 10 (2.14%) Inclusion and Diversity
6 10 (2.14%) Military
7 9 (1.92%) Banking
7 9 (1.92%) Billing
8 8 (1.71%) Local Government
9 7 (1.50%) Telecoms
10 6 (1.28%) Aerospace
10 6 (1.28%) Aviation
10 6 (1.28%) Spanish Language
11 5 (1.07%) Manufacturing
12 4 (0.85%) Financial Institution
12 4 (0.85%) Legal
13 3 (0.64%) Marketing
13 3 (0.64%) Organisational Skills
13 3 (0.64%) Retail
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 9 (1.92%) SAML
2 8 (1.71%) ARM Templates
2 8 (1.71%) Middleware
3 7 (1.50%) LDAP
3 7 (1.50%) OpenID
3 7 (1.50%) REST
4 5 (1.07%) Microsoft Graph
5 4 (0.85%) OAuth
5 4 (0.85%) SOAP
5 4 (0.85%) Web Services
6 3 (0.64%) ADO
6 3 (0.64%) AWS CDK
6 3 (0.64%) Keycloak
6 3 (0.64%) YAML
7 2 (0.43%) .NET
7 2 (0.43%) .NET Core
7 2 (0.43%) Apache NiFi
7 2 (0.43%) Elastic Stack
7 2 (0.43%) OAuth2
7 2 (0.43%) WPF
Miscellaneous
1 29 (6.20%) Data Centre
2 25 (5.34%) PKI
3 17 (3.63%) Hybrid Cloud
4 13 (2.78%) Analytical Mindset
5 12 (2.56%) Private Cloud
6 11 (2.35%) Replication
7 9 (1.92%) Enterprise Software
7 9 (1.92%) Public Cloud
8 8 (1.71%) Clustering
9 7 (1.50%) Onboarding
9 7 (1.50%) Self-Motivation
10 6 (1.28%) NHS
11 5 (1.07%) Cloud Native
11 5 (1.07%) Data Protection Act
11 5 (1.07%) Management Information System
12 4 (0.85%) Mobile App
13 3 (0.64%) Cyber Threat
13 3 (0.64%) Enterprise Storage
13 3 (0.64%) Legacy Systems
13 3 (0.64%) Linux Command Line
Operating Systems
1 178 (38.03%) Windows
2 102 (21.79%) Linux
3 88 (18.80%) Windows Server
4 17 (3.63%) Windows 10
5 13 (2.78%) Ubuntu
6 12 (2.56%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
7 11 (2.35%) Unix
8 10 (2.14%) Windows Server 2012
9 9 (1.92%) VMS
10 7 (1.50%) Windows Server 2019
11 6 (1.28%) Android
11 6 (1.28%) Apple iOS
11 6 (1.28%) Windows Server 2016
12 4 (0.85%) Windows Server 2003
13 3 (0.64%) CentOS
14 2 (0.43%) Debian
14 2 (0.43%) Mac OS
14 2 (0.43%) SUSE
14 2 (0.43%) SUSE Linux Enterprise Server
14 2 (0.43%) Windows 7
Processes & Methodologies
1 448 (95.73%) Infrastructure Engineering
2 86 (18.38%) DevOps
3 84 (17.95%) Problem-Solving
4 74 (15.81%) Infrastructure as Code
5 66 (14.10%) CI/CD
6 62 (13.25%) ITIL
7 51 (10.90%) Infrastructure Automation
8 43 (9.19%) Cybersecurity
9 39 (8.33%) Disaster Recovery
9 39 (8.33%) Migration
10 37 (7.91%) High Availability
11 34 (7.26%) Agile
11 34 (7.26%) Observability
12 24 (5.13%) Containerisation
12 24 (5.13%) Service Management
13 23 (4.91%) Roadmaps
14 22 (4.70%) Stakeholder Management
15 19 (4.06%) Business Continuity
16 18 (3.85%) DevSecOps
16 18 (3.85%) Project Delivery
Programming Languages
1 74 (15.81%) PowerShell
2 62 (13.25%) Python
3 28 (5.98%) Bash
4 15 (3.21%) Bicep
5 12 (2.56%) SQL
6 11 (2.35%) Perl
7 7 (1.50%) Java
7 7 (1.50%) JavaScript
8 6 (1.28%) PHP
9 5 (1.07%) Go
9 5 (1.07%) Shell Script
10 2 (0.43%) C#
10 2 (0.43%) Groovy
11 1 (0.21%) ActionScript
11 1 (0.21%) C++
11 1 (0.21%) PL/SQL
11 1 (0.21%) Ruby
11 1 (0.21%) Scala
11 1 (0.21%) TypeScript
11 1 (0.21%) VBScript
Qualifications
1 135 (28.85%) Security Cleared
2 95 (20.30%) SC Cleared
3 44 (9.40%) DV Cleared
4 28 (5.98%) Azure Certification
5 22 (4.70%) Microsoft Certification
6 14 (2.99%) Network+ Certification
7 13 (2.78%) Degree
8 12 (2.56%) Server+ Certification
9 11 (2.35%) FFIEC
10 7 (1.50%) AWS Certification
11 6 (1.28%) BPSS Clearance
11 6 (1.28%) Cisco Certification
11 6 (1.28%) Computer Science Degree
12 5 (1.07%) CCNA
12 5 (1.07%) CISSP
12 5 (1.07%) VMware Certified Professional (VCP)
13 4 (0.85%) AWS Certified Solutions Architect
13 4 (0.85%) CISM
13 4 (0.85%) CompTIA Security+
14 3 (0.64%) ISO 27001 Lead Implementer
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 19 (4.06%) NIST
2 15 (3.21%) GDPR
3 12 (2.56%) SLA
4 11 (2.35%) GLBA
4 11 (2.35%) PCI DSS
5 7 (1.50%) ISO/IEC 27001
6 6 (1.28%) Cyber Essentials
7 3 (0.64%) NIST 800
8 2 (0.43%) HIPAA
8 2 (0.43%) QA
8 2 (0.43%) SOC 2
9 1 (0.21%) Accessibility
9 1 (0.21%) Cyber Essentials PLUS
9 1 (0.21%) HMG Security Policy Framework
System Software
1 115 (24.57%) Active Directory
2 102 (21.79%) VMware Infrastructure
3 65 (13.89%) Hyper-V
4 43 (9.19%) Docker
5 20 (4.27%) vSphere
6 13 (2.78%) VMware ESXi
7 10 (2.14%) Virtual Machines
8 9 (1.92%) Virtual Desktop
8 9 (1.92%) VMware NSX
9 4 (0.85%) BitLocker
10 3 (0.64%) DFS Replication
10 3 (0.64%) Sendmail
10 3 (0.64%) Virtual Servers
11 2 (0.43%) Firmware
11 2 (0.43%) Microsoft App-V
11 2 (0.43%) QEMU
11 2 (0.43%) Tivoli Directory Server
12 1 (0.21%) etcd
12 1 (0.21%) Slurm Workload Manager
12 1 (0.21%) XenApp
Systems Management
1 90 (19.23%) Terraform
2 65 (13.89%) Ansible
3 49 (10.47%) SCCM
4 48 (10.26%) Microsoft Intune
5 41 (8.76%) Kubernetes
6 17 (3.63%) Single Sign-On
6 17 (3.63%) vCenter Server
7 8 (1.71%) FortiGate
8 7 (1.50%) VxRail
9 6 (1.28%) AirWatch
9 6 (1.28%) CASB
9 6 (1.28%) Grafana
9 6 (1.28%) Prometheus
9 6 (1.28%) Red Hat Satellite
9 6 (1.28%) SCOrch
10 5 (1.07%) Istio
10 5 (1.07%) Packer
10 5 (1.07%) SCOM
11 4 (0.85%) Nessus
11 4 (0.85%) WSUS
Vendors
1 163 (34.83%) Microsoft
2 137 (29.27%) VMware
3 29 (6.20%) Cisco
4 25 (5.34%) Palo Alto
5 22 (4.70%) F5
6 19 (4.06%) Dell
7 18 (3.85%) Veeam
8 16 (3.42%) Red Hat
8 16 (3.42%) Splunk
9 15 (3.21%) Google
10 14 (2.99%) Citrix
11 13 (2.78%) ServiceNow
11 13 (2.78%) Thales
12 12 (2.56%) CheckPoint
13 11 (2.35%) SolarWinds
14 10 (2.14%) Aruba
15 8 (1.71%) HP
16 7 (1.50%) NetApp
16 7 (1.50%) Oracle
17 6 (1.28%) Fortinet