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 10 February 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
10 Feb 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 225 183 131
Rank change year-on-year -42 -52 +41
Contract jobs citing LAN 460 449 841
As % of all contract jobs in the UK 1.17% 1.46% 1.87%
As % of the Communications & Networking category 11.26% 11.16% 13.85%
Number of daily rates quoted 301 270 506
10th Percentile £206 £223 £200
25th Percentile £309 £350 £313
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £440 £461 £450
Median % change year-on-year -4.50% +2.39% -
75th Percentile £525 £575 £588
90th Percentile £600 £675 £734
UK excluding London median daily rate £425 £430 £450
% change year-on-year -1.16% -4.44% -
Number of hourly rates quoted 25 12 40
10th Percentile £12.84 £18.65 £15.84
25th Percentile £15.50 £20.00 £21.00
Median hourly rate £22.50 £20.19 £39.02
Median % change year-on-year +11.46% -48.26% +1.02%
75th Percentile £35.00 £34.06 £48.13
90th Percentile £68.90 £42.88 £63.00
UK excluding London median hourly rate £18.38 £20.00 £40.00
% change year-on-year -8.13% -50.00% +22.14%

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 4,087 4,022 6,074
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the UK 10.38% 13.10% 13.52%
Number of daily rates quoted 2,693 2,354 3,640
10th Percentile £204 £210 £205
25th Percentile £353 £360 £350
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £475 £500 £488
Median % change year-on-year -5.00% +2.56% -6.16%
75th Percentile £588 £600 £600
90th Percentile £675 £685 £700
UK excluding London median daily rate £450 £473 £475
% change year-on-year -4.76% -0.53% +0.80%
Number of hourly rates quoted 170 133 408
10th Percentile £15.50 £16.63 £14.44
25th Percentile £18.59 £21.46 £20.96
Median hourly rate £29.44 £32.50 £47.50
Median % change year-on-year -9.42% -31.58% +137.50%
75th Percentile £65.00 £53.75 £65.00
90th Percentile £75.00 £70.00 £74.00
UK excluding London median hourly rate £40.54 £29.00 £51.89
% change year-on-year +39.79% -44.11% +160.99%

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 10 February 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 10 February 2026.

Hourly rate histogram for LAN in the UK

LAN
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 LAN within the UK over the 6 months to 10 February 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 -60 385 £450 -5.26% 223
UK excluding London -49 297 £425 -1.16% 195
London -34 126 £463 -7.50% 76
Work from Home -5 118 £445 -11.00% 83
South East -2 92 £448 +8.48% 60
North of England -78 60 £420 -6.67% 42
Midlands -60 43 £340 -27.47% 27
Scotland +33 41 £275 -31.25% 17
West Midlands -36 36 £450 -10.00% 24
East of England -19 34 £350 -34.88% 17
North West -44 32 £483 +5.12% 24
Yorkshire -54 27 £313 +39.11% 16
South West -35 15 £513 +24.24% 26
Wales -1 7 £468 +133.75% 8
East Midlands -47 7 £200 -40.30% 3
Northern Ireland 0 4 £475 - 1
North East -12 1 £550 - 2

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 35 (7.61%) SharePoint
2 26 (5.65%) Microsoft Exchange
3 13 (2.83%) Confluence
4 10 (2.17%) OpenStack
4 10 (2.17%) Skype for Business
5 1 (0.22%) Apache
5 1 (0.22%) IIS
Applications
1 41 (8.91%) Microsoft Office
2 24 (5.22%) MS Visio
3 16 (3.48%) Microsoft Excel
4 15 (3.26%) Microsoft PowerPoint
5 5 (1.09%) Acrobat
6 4 (0.87%) Microsoft Project
7 1 (0.22%) Spreadsheet
Business Applications
1 2 (0.43%) DELMIA
2 1 (0.22%) Remedy ITSM
Cloud Services
1 101 (21.96%) Azure
2 64 (13.91%) Microsoft 365
3 54 (11.74%) AWS
4 33 (7.17%) Entra ID
5 18 (3.91%) GCP
6 15 (3.26%) SaaS
7 12 (2.61%) OneDrive
8 9 (1.96%) Virtual Private Cloud
9 7 (1.52%) Power Platform
10 6 (1.30%) PaaS
11 5 (1.09%) PowerApps
12 4 (0.87%) Azure DevOps
12 4 (0.87%) Azure ExpressRoute
12 4 (0.87%) Microsoft Purview
12 4 (0.87%) OpenShift
13 3 (0.65%) AWS Direct Connect
13 3 (0.65%) Nutanix
13 3 (0.65%) Serverless
14 2 (0.43%) Azure Sentinel
14 2 (0.43%) Azure Service Bus
Communications & Networking
1 379 (82.39%) WAN
2 177 (38.48%) Firewall
3 146 (31.74%) VPN
4 101 (21.96%) Wi-Fi
5 95 (20.65%) BGP
6 89 (19.35%) SD-WAN
7 79 (17.17%) OSPF
8 78 (16.96%) DNS
9 77 (16.74%) Network Security
10 73 (15.87%) TCP/IP
10 73 (15.87%) Wireless
11 69 (15.00%) MPLS
12 60 (13.04%) DHCP
12 60 (13.04%) VLAN
13 49 (10.65%) WLAN
14 42 (9.13%) IPsec
15 30 (6.52%) Cisco Nexus
16 29 (6.30%) Cisco ASA
16 29 (6.30%) Structured Cabling
17 20 (4.35%) Internet
Database & Business Intelligence
1 6 (1.30%) SQL Server
2 4 (0.87%) MS Access
3 2 (0.43%) MariaDB
3 2 (0.43%) PostgreSQL
3 2 (0.43%) Power BI
4 1 (0.22%) Amazon RDS
4 1 (0.22%) Apache Cassandra
4 1 (0.22%) Data Warehouse
4 1 (0.22%) DynamoDB
4 1 (0.22%) MongoDB
4 1 (0.22%) MySQL
4 1 (0.22%) NoSQL
4 1 (0.22%) Oracle Database
4 1 (0.22%) SQL Server Reporting Services
Development Applications
1 24 (5.22%) JIRA
2 2 (0.43%) Sonatype Nexus
3 1 (0.22%) Bitbucket
3 1 (0.22%) Git
3 1 (0.22%) GitLab
3 1 (0.22%) Jenkins
3 1 (0.22%) Tricentis qTest
General
1 146 (31.74%) Social Skills
2 53 (11.52%) Public Sector
3 52 (11.30%) Analytical Skills
4 40 (8.70%) Finance
5 39 (8.48%) Telecoms
6 37 (8.04%) Documentation Skills
7 26 (5.65%) Manufacturing
8 16 (3.48%) Military
9 14 (3.04%) Legal
10 11 (2.39%) Organisational Skills
11 10 (2.17%) Banking
12 9 (1.96%) Presentation Skills
13 8 (1.74%) Financial Institution
14 7 (1.52%) Local Government
15 6 (1.30%) Inclusion and Diversity
15 6 (1.30%) Law
15 6 (1.30%) Marketing
16 5 (1.09%) Electronics
17 4 (0.87%) Influencing Skills
17 4 (0.87%) Retail
Job Titles
1 153 (33.26%) Network Engineer
2 78 (16.96%) Architect
3 55 (11.96%) Network Architect
4 41 (8.91%) Senior
5 37 (8.04%) Analyst
6 33 (7.17%) IT Support
7 31 (6.74%) Support Engineer
8 25 (5.43%) Infrastructure Engineer
9 23 (5.00%) IT Engineer
9 23 (5.00%) SC Cleared Network Engineer
10 22 (4.78%) Lead
11 20 (4.35%) Cisco Engineer
11 20 (4.35%) Support Analyst
12 19 (4.13%) 2nd Line Support
12 19 (4.13%) Cisco Network Engineer
12 19 (4.13%) Project Manager
13 18 (3.91%) IT Support Engineer
14 17 (3.70%) Field Engineer
14 17 (3.70%) Senior Network Engineer
14 17 (3.70%) Technical Architect
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 10 (2.17%) LDAP
2 8 (1.74%) Microsoft Graph
3 7 (1.52%) Middleware
4 6 (1.30%) NETCONF
4 6 (1.30%) REST
4 6 (1.30%) SAML
4 6 (1.30%) YANG
5 3 (0.65%) 802.1X
6 2 (0.43%) ARM Templates
6 2 (0.43%) CSS
6 2 (0.43%) Django
6 2 (0.43%) HTML
6 2 (0.43%) XMPP
6 2 (0.43%) YAML
7 1 (0.22%) .NET
7 1 (0.22%) EDI
7 1 (0.22%) Java RMI
7 1 (0.22%) LAMP
7 1 (0.22%) Node.js
7 1 (0.22%) SOAP
Miscellaneous
1 89 (19.35%) Data Centre
2 21 (4.57%) Hybrid Cloud
3 20 (4.35%) Driving Licence
3 20 (4.35%) Onboarding
4 17 (3.70%) CMDB
5 14 (3.04%) Data Protection Act
6 13 (2.83%) NHS
7 9 (1.96%) Management Information System
8 8 (1.74%) IoT
8 8 (1.74%) Operational Technology
8 8 (1.74%) Virtual Team
9 7 (1.52%) Cloud Native
9 7 (1.52%) PKI
9 7 (1.52%) Security Posture
9 7 (1.52%) Self-Motivation
10 6 (1.30%) SCADA
11 5 (1.09%) Enterprise Software
11 5 (1.09%) iPhone
11 5 (1.09%) Public Cloud
11 5 (1.09%) Video Conferencing
Operating Systems
1 121 (26.30%) Windows
2 45 (9.78%) Windows Server
3 40 (8.70%) Windows 10
4 20 (4.35%) Linux
5 16 (3.48%) Windows Server 2019
6 13 (2.83%) Windows Server 2016
7 11 (2.39%) Android
8 10 (2.17%) Windows 7
9 7 (1.52%) Apple iOS
9 7 (1.52%) Mac OS
10 5 (1.09%) Windows Server 2012
11 4 (0.87%) CatOS
12 3 (0.65%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
12 3 (0.65%) Ubuntu
13 2 (0.43%) VMS
13 2 (0.43%) Windows Server 2003
14 1 (0.22%) AIX
14 1 (0.22%) Unix
Processes & Methodologies
1 69 (15.00%) Problem-Solving
2 62 (13.48%) ITIL
3 58 (12.61%) Migration
4 55 (11.96%) Network Design
5 49 (10.65%) Stakeholder Management
6 46 (10.00%) Network Architecture
7 41 (8.91%) Cybersecurity
8 39 (8.48%) Infrastructure Engineering
8 39 (8.48%) ITSM
9 36 (7.83%) Project Delivery
10 34 (7.39%) Change Management
11 32 (6.96%) High Availability
12 31 (6.74%) Network Monitoring
13 28 (6.09%) Customer Service
14 26 (5.65%) Continuous Improvement
14 26 (5.65%) Zero Trust
15 24 (5.22%) Stakeholder Engagement
16 23 (5.00%) Agile
16 23 (5.00%) Disaster Recovery
16 23 (5.00%) Mentoring
Programming Languages
1 42 (9.13%) PowerShell
2 41 (8.91%) Python
3 11 (2.39%) SQL
4 10 (2.17%) VBScript
5 9 (1.96%) VB
6 5 (1.09%) Perl
7 3 (0.65%) JavaScript
8 2 (0.43%) Bash
8 2 (0.43%) Bicep
9 1 (0.22%) C#
9 1 (0.22%) Ruby
9 1 (0.22%) Shell Script
9 1 (0.22%) T-SQL
Qualifications
1 135 (29.35%) Security Cleared
2 130 (28.26%) Cisco Certification
3 110 (23.91%) SC Cleared
4 106 (23.04%) CCNP
5 58 (12.61%) Degree
6 43 (9.35%) CCNA
7 42 (9.13%) CCIE
8 34 (7.39%) DV Cleared
9 17 (3.70%) JNCIE
10 12 (2.61%) AWS Certification
10 12 (2.61%) JNCIS
11 11 (2.39%) JNCIP
11 11 (2.39%) Network+ Certification
12 10 (2.17%) Azure Certification
12 10 (2.17%) CCSE
12 10 (2.17%) PMI Certification
12 10 (2.17%) PMP
13 8 (1.74%) Microsoft Certification
14 7 (1.52%) BPSS Clearance
14 7 (1.52%) CISSP
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 14 (3.04%) ISO/IEC 27001
2 10 (2.17%) NIST
2 10 (2.17%) SLA
3 9 (1.96%) GDPR
4 7 (1.52%) PCI DSS
4 7 (1.52%) QA
5 5 (1.09%) PMO
6 4 (0.87%) Cyber Essentials
6 4 (0.87%) NCSC
7 3 (0.65%) JSP 440
8 2 (0.43%) RMADS
9 1 (0.22%) Accessibility
9 1 (0.22%) Disclosure Scotland
9 1 (0.22%) GRC
9 1 (0.22%) MiFID
9 1 (0.22%) Sarbanes-Oxley
System Software
1 87 (18.91%) Active Directory
2 34 (7.39%) VMware Infrastructure
3 21 (4.57%) VMware NSX
4 9 (1.96%) BitLocker
5 8 (1.74%) vSphere
6 6 (1.30%) Hyper-V
6 6 (1.30%) Virtual Desktop
7 4 (0.87%) Docker
8 3 (0.65%) VMware ESXi
9 2 (0.43%) Firmware
9 2 (0.43%) KVM
9 2 (0.43%) ProxySG
10 1 (0.22%) Ceph
10 1 (0.22%) iptables
10 1 (0.22%) Microsoft Virtual Server
10 1 (0.22%) RHEV
10 1 (0.22%) Samba
10 1 (0.22%) Slurm Workload Manager
10 1 (0.22%) VMware Workstation
10 1 (0.22%) Xen
Systems Management
1 38 (8.26%) Ansible
2 35 (7.61%) Microsoft Intune
3 29 (6.30%) Terraform
4 22 (4.78%) SCCM
5 20 (4.35%) FortiGate
6 11 (2.39%) Jamf Pro
7 10 (2.17%) Single Sign-On
8 5 (1.09%) Cisco Prime
9 4 (0.87%) Nagios
9 4 (0.87%) SCOM
10 3 (0.65%) Cisco CUCM
10 3 (0.65%) Endace
10 3 (0.65%) Grafana
10 3 (0.65%) WSUS
11 2 (0.43%) Check_MK
11 2 (0.43%) Nessus
11 2 (0.43%) vCenter Server
12 1 (0.22%) Backup Exec
12 1 (0.22%) Norton AntiVirus
12 1 (0.22%) WhatsUp Gold
Vendors
1 207 (45.00%) Cisco
2 102 (22.17%) Microsoft
3 91 (19.78%) Palo Alto
4 57 (12.39%) CheckPoint
5 54 (11.74%) Fortinet
6 50 (10.87%) VMware
7 49 (10.65%) Aruba
8 48 (10.43%) Juniper
9 42 (9.13%) F5
10 33 (7.17%) Meraki
11 31 (6.74%) ServiceNow
11 31 (6.74%) SolarWinds
12 20 (4.35%) Zscaler
13 14 (3.04%) Veeam
14 11 (2.39%) Arista
14 11 (2.39%) Citrix
15 10 (2.17%) Dell
16 8 (1.74%) SAP
17 6 (1.30%) Nokia
17 6 (1.30%) Remedy