LAN Contract Job Trends

Local Area Network (LAN)
UK

The table below provides summary statistics and contractor rates for jobs requiring LAN skills. It covers contract job vacancies from the 6 months leading up to 28 April 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
28 Apr 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 215 223 150
Rank change year-on-year +8 -73 +6
Contract jobs citing LAN 555 354 703
As % of all contract jobs in the UK 1.18% 1.21% 1.62%
As % of the Communications & Networking category 12.26% 9.47% 12.52%
Number of daily rates quoted 349 216 416
10th Percentile £223 £239 £203
25th Percentile £335 £344 £313
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £450 £450 £475
Median % change year-on-year - -5.26% +5.56%
75th Percentile £538 £550 £650
90th Percentile £625 £625 £745
UK excluding London median daily rate £444 £425 £465
% change year-on-year +4.41% -8.60% +9.41%
Number of hourly rates quoted 23 8 43
10th Percentile £12.43 £14.30 £12.86
25th Percentile £19.34 £17.71 £15.75
Median hourly rate £22.50 £27.00 £22.50
Median % change year-on-year -16.67% +20.00% -65.38%
75th Percentile £53.29 £45.31 £40.00
90th Percentile £79.24 £50.60 £47.20
UK excluding London median hourly rate £22.50 £15.33 £22.50
% change year-on-year +46.77% -31.87% -65.65%

All Communications and Computer Networking Skills
UK

LAN 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 4,527 3,740 5,616
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the UK 9.64% 12.74% 12.97%
Number of daily rates quoted 2,822 2,310 3,363
10th Percentile £250 £213 £205
25th Percentile £400 £363 £350
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £489 £490
Median % change year-on-year +2.30% -0.26% -5.59%
75th Percentile £588 £600 £600
90th Percentile £675 £675 £700
UK excluding London median daily rate £475 £464 £475
% change year-on-year +2.43% -2.37% -
Number of hourly rates quoted 218 172 420
10th Percentile £16.01 £14.99 £13.50
25th Percentile £20.82 £20.22 £17.00
Median hourly rate £41.24 £37.50 £38.00
Median % change year-on-year +9.97% -1.32% +100.00%
75th Percentile £68.44 £61.31 £62.50
90th Percentile £75.00 £75.00 £67.75
UK excluding London median hourly rate £48.72 £27.72 £45.88
% change year-on-year +75.76% -39.58% +148.00%

LAN
Job Vacancy Trend

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

LAN job vacancy trend in the UK

LAN
Daily Rate Trend

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

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

LAN
Daily Rate Histogram

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing LAN over the 6 months to 28 April 2026.

Daily rate histogram for LAN in the UK

LAN
Hourly Rate Trend

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

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

LAN
Hourly Rate Histogram

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing LAN over the 6 months to 28 April 2026.

Hourly rate histogram for LAN in the UK

LAN
Top 16 Contract Job Locations

The table below looks at the demand and provides a guide to the median contractor rates quoted in IT jobs citing LAN within the UK over the 6 months to 28 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 -4 473 £450 -1.64% 165
UK excluding London +9 383 £444 +4.41% 162
South East +7 157 £450 -5.26% 64
Work from Home +13 128 £458 -8.50% 79
London -40 125 £490 - 37
North of England -65 65 £450 +20.00% 31
Midlands -36 52 £298 -32.00% 25
East of England -9 43 £325 -24.42% 13
West Midlands -33 43 £340 -22.29% 23
Scotland +15 35 £406 +1.82% 7
North West -39 33 £500 +17.65% 16
Yorkshire -42 32 £382 +55.71% 12
South West -49 16 £500 +9.59% 14
Wales -4 12 £425 +6.25% 11
East Midlands -36 6 £200 -61.90% 2
Northern Ireland - 4 £468 - 6

LAN
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 29 (5.23%) Microsoft Exchange
2 28 (5.05%) SharePoint
3 15 (2.70%) Confluence
4 11 (1.98%) Skype for Business
5 3 (0.54%) OpenStack
6 2 (0.36%) IIS
7 1 (0.18%) Apache
7 1 (0.18%) Oracle Workflow
Applications
1 24 (4.32%) Microsoft Office
2 18 (3.24%) MS Visio
3 6 (1.08%) Microsoft Excel
4 5 (0.90%) Acrobat
4 5 (0.90%) Microsoft PowerPoint
5 1 (0.18%) Microsoft Project
5 1 (0.18%) Spreadsheet
Business Applications
1 2 (0.36%) DELMIA
Cloud Services
1 131 (23.60%) Azure
2 83 (14.95%) Microsoft 365
3 58 (10.45%) AWS
4 37 (6.67%) Entra ID
5 18 (3.24%) SaaS
6 15 (2.70%) OneDrive
7 13 (2.34%) PaaS
8 12 (2.16%) GCP
9 8 (1.44%) Power Platform
10 7 (1.26%) Azure DevOps
10 7 (1.26%) PowerApps
11 6 (1.08%) IaaS
12 5 (0.90%) Nutanix
12 5 (0.90%) Virtual Private Cloud
13 4 (0.72%) Azure ExpressRoute
13 4 (0.72%) Google Ads
14 3 (0.54%) Microsoft Purview
15 2 (0.36%) AWS Direct Connect
15 2 (0.36%) Azure Monitor
15 2 (0.36%) IBM Watson
Communications & Networking
1 460 (82.88%) WAN
2 269 (48.47%) Firewall
3 161 (29.01%) VPN
4 147 (26.49%) BGP
5 137 (24.68%) OSPF
5 137 (24.68%) Wi-Fi
6 127 (22.88%) SD-WAN
7 113 (20.36%) DNS
8 109 (19.64%) Network Security
9 89 (16.04%) DHCP
10 88 (15.86%) Wireless
11 75 (13.51%) VLAN
12 73 (13.15%) TCP/IP
13 68 (12.25%) WLAN
14 59 (10.63%) MPLS
15 51 (9.19%) IPsec
16 46 (8.29%) BIG-IP
17 44 (7.93%) Cisco ISE
18 43 (7.75%) Cisco Nexus
19 39 (7.03%) VXLAN
Database & Business Intelligence
1 7 (1.26%) SQL Server
2 2 (0.36%) MariaDB
2 2 (0.36%) PostgreSQL
3 1 (0.18%) Amazon RDS
3 1 (0.18%) Data Warehouse
3 1 (0.18%) DynamoDB
3 1 (0.18%) MongoDB
3 1 (0.18%) MySQL
3 1 (0.18%) NoSQL
3 1 (0.18%) Oracle Reports
3 1 (0.18%) Power BI
3 1 (0.18%) SQL Server Reporting Services
Development Applications
1 32 (5.77%) JIRA
2 4 (0.72%) Browser DevTools
3 3 (0.54%) Sonatype Nexus
4 2 (0.36%) GitLab
4 2 (0.36%) Jenkins
5 1 (0.18%) Bitbucket
5 1 (0.18%) Tricentis qTest
General
1 147 (26.49%) Social Skills
2 55 (9.91%) Public Sector
3 44 (7.93%) Analytical Skills
4 41 (7.39%) Finance
5 33 (5.95%) Documentation Skills
6 29 (5.23%) Manufacturing
7 25 (4.50%) Telecoms
8 20 (3.60%) Legal
9 19 (3.42%) Financial Institution
10 15 (2.70%) Military
11 11 (1.98%) Banking
12 10 (1.80%) Law
12 10 (1.80%) Organisational Skills
13 7 (1.26%) Retail
14 6 (1.08%) Local Government
15 5 (0.90%) Police
16 3 (0.54%) Billing
16 3 (0.54%) Marketing
17 2 (0.36%) German Language
17 2 (0.36%) Inclusion and Diversity
Job Titles
1 216 (38.92%) Network Engineer
2 88 (15.86%) Architect
3 65 (11.71%) Senior
4 59 (10.63%) Network Architect
5 42 (7.57%) IT Support
6 33 (5.95%) Support Engineer
7 31 (5.59%) IT Engineer
7 31 (5.59%) Senior Network Engineer
8 30 (5.41%) Analyst
9 29 (5.23%) Lead
9 29 (5.23%) SC Cleared Network Engineer
10 28 (5.05%) Infrastructure Engineer
11 26 (4.68%) Technical Architect
12 25 (4.50%) IT Support Engineer
13 24 (4.32%) Cisco Engineer
13 24 (4.32%) Cisco Network Engineer
14 16 (2.88%) Network Manager
15 15 (2.70%) Project Manager
16 14 (2.52%) Firewall Specialist
16 14 (2.52%) Network Specialist
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 42 (7.57%) 802.1X
2 15 (2.70%) LDAP
3 13 (2.34%) SAML
4 10 (1.80%) Microsoft Graph
5 8 (1.44%) Middleware
6 3 (0.54%) NETCONF
6 3 (0.54%) REST
6 3 (0.54%) YANG
7 2 (0.36%) .NET
7 2 (0.36%) ARM Templates
7 2 (0.36%) CSS
7 2 (0.36%) Django
7 2 (0.36%) HTML
7 2 (0.36%) RFC 2544
7 2 (0.36%) Software Packaging
7 2 (0.36%) XMPP
8 1 (0.18%) EDI
8 1 (0.18%) LAMP
8 1 (0.18%) Node.js
8 1 (0.18%) YAML
Miscellaneous
1 109 (19.64%) Data Centre
2 29 (5.23%) PKI
3 26 (4.68%) Clustering
4 23 (4.14%) Onboarding
5 19 (3.42%) Hybrid Cloud
6 15 (2.70%) Data Protection Act
7 13 (2.34%) Public Cloud
8 11 (1.98%) Operational Technology
8 11 (1.98%) Security Posture
8 11 (1.98%) Self-Motivation
9 10 (1.80%) Enterprise Software
9 10 (1.80%) IoT
10 8 (1.44%) CMDB
10 8 (1.44%) Driving Licence
10 8 (1.44%) NHS
10 8 (1.44%) Virtual Team
11 6 (1.08%) Analytical Mindset
11 6 (1.08%) iPhone
11 6 (1.08%) Smartphone
11 6 (1.08%) Video Conferencing
Operating Systems
1 177 (31.89%) Windows
2 52 (9.37%) Windows Server
3 38 (6.85%) Linux
4 37 (6.67%) Windows 10
5 15 (2.70%) Windows Server 2019
6 12 (2.16%) Mac OS
6 12 (2.16%) Windows 7
7 10 (1.80%) Android
8 8 (1.44%) Apple iOS
9 6 (1.08%) Windows Server 2016
10 5 (0.90%) CatOS
10 5 (0.90%) Ubuntu
10 5 (0.90%) VMS
10 5 (0.90%) Windows Server 2012
11 4 (0.72%) Unix
12 3 (0.54%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
13 2 (0.36%) AIX
13 2 (0.36%) Windows Server 2003
14 1 (0.18%) CentOS
14 1 (0.18%) Solaris
Processes & Methodologies
1 87 (15.68%) ITIL
2 79 (14.23%) Problem-Solving
3 77 (13.87%) High Availability
4 61 (10.99%) Migration
5 55 (9.91%) Load Balancing
6 51 (9.19%) Change Management
6 51 (9.19%) ITSM
7 46 (8.29%) Stakeholder Management
8 43 (7.75%) Network Design
9 41 (7.39%) Network Architecture
10 38 (6.85%) Service Management
11 37 (6.67%) Infrastructure Engineering
12 35 (6.31%) Disaster Recovery
12 35 (6.31%) Technical Leadership
13 34 (6.13%) Network Monitoring
14 33 (5.95%) Continuous Improvement
14 33 (5.95%) Cybersecurity
15 30 (5.41%) Customer Service
15 30 (5.41%) Roadmaps
16 29 (5.23%) Project Delivery
Programming Languages
1 47 (8.47%) PowerShell
2 32 (5.77%) Python
3 15 (2.70%) SQL
4 10 (1.80%) VBScript
5 9 (1.62%) VB
6 3 (0.54%) JavaScript
7 2 (0.36%) Bash
7 2 (0.36%) Perl
8 1 (0.18%) Bicep
8 1 (0.18%) C
8 1 (0.18%) C#
8 1 (0.18%) C++
8 1 (0.18%) Java
8 1 (0.18%) Ruby
8 1 (0.18%) Shell Script
8 1 (0.18%) T-SQL
Qualifications
1 206 (37.12%) Security Cleared
2 161 (29.01%) Cisco Certification
3 149 (26.85%) SC Cleared
4 122 (21.98%) CCNP
5 62 (11.17%) DV Cleared
6 54 (9.73%) Degree
7 50 (9.01%) CCNA
8 41 (7.39%) CCIE
9 17 (3.06%) JNCIS
10 14 (2.52%) JNCIP
11 13 (2.34%) PMP
12 12 (2.16%) JNCIA
13 10 (1.80%) Azure Certification
13 10 (1.80%) CCSE
13 10 (1.80%) Computer Science Degree
13 10 (1.80%) Microsoft Certification
13 10 (1.80%) Network+ Certification
14 9 (1.62%) PMI Certification
15 8 (1.44%) JNCIE
16 5 (0.90%) ITIL Certification
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 16 (2.88%) QA
2 14 (2.52%) SLA
3 7 (1.26%) ISO/IEC 27001
3 7 (1.26%) NIST
4 6 (1.08%) Disclosure Scotland
4 6 (1.08%) NCSC
5 5 (0.90%) GDPR
6 4 (0.72%) JSP 440
7 3 (0.54%) Cyber Essentials
8 2 (0.36%) PMO
8 2 (0.36%) RMADS
9 1 (0.18%) DICOM
9 1 (0.18%) GRC
9 1 (0.18%) Sarbanes-Oxley
System Software
1 105 (18.92%) Active Directory
2 51 (9.19%) VMware Infrastructure
3 21 (3.78%) VMware NSX
4 14 (2.52%) vSphere
5 9 (1.62%) BitLocker
6 7 (1.26%) Hyper-V
7 5 (0.90%) Virtual Desktop
8 4 (0.72%) Docker
8 4 (0.72%) Virtual Machines
8 4 (0.72%) VMware ESXi
9 3 (0.54%) Virtual Servers
10 2 (0.36%) Firmware
10 2 (0.36%) KVM
11 1 (0.18%) Ceph
11 1 (0.18%) Citrix Presentation Server
11 1 (0.18%) Microsoft Virtual Server
11 1 (0.18%) NFS
11 1 (0.18%) RHEV
11 1 (0.18%) Samba
11 1 (0.18%) Xen
Systems Management
1 48 (8.65%) FortiGate
2 36 (6.49%) Microsoft Intune
3 29 (5.23%) Ansible
4 23 (4.14%) SCCM
5 19 (3.42%) Terraform
6 14 (2.52%) Single Sign-On
7 12 (2.16%) Jamf Pro
8 7 (1.26%) Nagios
9 6 (1.08%) Cisco Prime
10 5 (0.90%) Endace
10 5 (0.90%) WSUS
11 4 (0.72%) Progress Chef
11 4 (0.72%) vRealize Orchestrator
12 3 (0.54%) vCenter Server
13 2 (0.36%) AirWatch
13 2 (0.36%) Check_MK
13 2 (0.36%) Cisco CUCM
13 2 (0.36%) Grafana
13 2 (0.36%) Nessus
13 2 (0.36%) SCOM
Vendors
1 267 (48.11%) Cisco
2 118 (21.26%) Microsoft
3 115 (20.72%) Palo Alto
4 87 (15.68%) F5
5 83 (14.95%) Juniper
6 74 (13.33%) CheckPoint
7 69 (12.43%) Aruba
8 66 (11.89%) VMware
9 57 (10.27%) Fortinet
10 55 (9.91%) SolarWinds
11 32 (5.77%) ServiceNow
12 31 (5.59%) Extreme Networks
13 29 (5.23%) Splunk
14 25 (4.50%) Meraki
15 23 (4.14%) Zscaler
16 16 (2.88%) Dell
17 15 (2.70%) Ekahau
17 15 (2.70%) Veeam
18 9 (1.62%) Arista
18 9 (1.62%) Citrix