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

6 months to
15 May 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 207 215 163
Rank change year-on-year +8 -52 -9
Contract jobs citing LAN 563 362 645
As % of all contract jobs in the UK 1.18% 1.25% 1.51%
As % of the Communications & Networking category 12.37% 9.80% 11.91%
Number of daily rates quoted 355 215 380
10th Percentile £225 £243 £200
25th Percentile £338 £355 £300
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £450 £450 £450
Median % change year-on-year - - -2.33%
75th Percentile £537 £563 £638
90th Percentile £619 £625 £738
UK excluding London median daily rate £445 £430 £425
% change year-on-year +3.49% +1.18% -
Number of hourly rates quoted 24 10 42
10th Percentile £12.43 £14.99 £12.86
25th Percentile £18.36 £19.81 £15.75
Median hourly rate £22.50 £27.00 £22.50
Median % change year-on-year -16.67% +20.00% -65.38%
75th Percentile £52.94 £39.69 £40.00
90th Percentile £78.33 £50.20 -
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 4,553 3,694 5,417
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the UK 9.55% 12.71% 12.70%
Number of daily rates quoted 2,819 2,276 3,232
10th Percentile £263 £213 £205
25th Percentile £400 £362 £350
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £495 £488 £490
Median % change year-on-year +1.54% -0.51% -5.41%
75th Percentile £588 £591 £600
90th Percentile £675 £675 £694
UK excluding London median daily rate £475 £463 £475
% change year-on-year +2.70% -2.63% -
Number of hourly rates quoted 244 164 416
10th Percentile £16.01 £14.99 £13.50
25th Percentile £21.25 £17.30 £16.30
Median hourly rate £39.02 £31.79 £40.00
Median % change year-on-year +22.74% -20.53% +116.22%
75th Percentile £65.88 £57.80 £63.75
90th Percentile £75.00 £75.00 £70.00
UK excluding London median hourly rate £42.25 £24.66 £45.88
% change year-on-year +71.33% -46.25% +151.88%

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 15 May 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 15 May 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 15 May 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 -18 486 £450 -5.26% 192
UK excluding London +8 391 £445 +3.49% 175
South East +13 170 £456 -8.90% 71
Work from Home +9 125 £450 -10.10% 81
London -52 122 £500 - 48
North of England -50 64 £450 +12.50% 28
Midlands -37 54 £295 -41.00% 23
West Midlands -35 45 £318 -32.27% 17
East of England -8 44 £338 -21.05% 16
North West -36 34 £494 +9.72% 12
Scotland +15 33 £413 +6.45% 11
Yorkshire -37 30 £338 +16.55% 13
South West -44 15 £500 - 18
Wales -7 9 £475 +46.15% 14
East Midlands -28 6 £200 -61.90% 6
Northern Ireland - 3 £468 - 1

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 30 (5.33%) SharePoint
2 23 (4.09%) Microsoft Exchange
3 15 (2.66%) Confluence
4 5 (0.89%) Skype for Business
5 4 (0.71%) OpenStack
6 2 (0.36%) IIS
7 1 (0.18%) Apache
7 1 (0.18%) CMS
7 1 (0.18%) Oracle Workflow
Applications
1 20 (3.55%) MS Visio
2 16 (2.84%) Microsoft Office
3 6 (1.07%) Microsoft Excel
4 5 (0.89%) Microsoft PowerPoint
5 4 (0.71%) Acrobat
6 1 (0.18%) Microsoft Project
6 1 (0.18%) Spreadsheet
Business Applications
1 2 (0.36%) DELMIA
Cloud Services
1 132 (23.45%) Azure
2 80 (14.21%) Microsoft 365
3 58 (10.30%) AWS
4 36 (6.39%) Entra ID
5 18 (3.20%) SaaS
6 15 (2.66%) OneDrive
7 12 (2.13%) GCP
7 12 (2.13%) PaaS
8 7 (1.24%) Power Platform
8 7 (1.24%) PowerApps
8 7 (1.24%) Virtual Private Cloud
9 6 (1.07%) Azure DevOps
10 5 (0.89%) IaaS
10 5 (0.89%) Nutanix
11 4 (0.71%) Azure ExpressRoute
11 4 (0.71%) Google Ads
12 2 (0.36%) AWS Direct Connect
12 2 (0.36%) IBM Watson
13 1 (0.18%) Azure Monitor
13 1 (0.18%) Microsoft Purview
Communications & Networking
1 465 (82.59%) WAN
2 273 (48.49%) Firewall
3 161 (28.60%) VPN
4 151 (26.82%) BGP
5 138 (24.51%) OSPF
6 134 (23.80%) Wi-Fi
7 128 (22.74%) SD-WAN
8 112 (19.89%) Network Security
9 110 (19.54%) DNS
10 97 (17.23%) Wireless
11 86 (15.28%) DHCP
12 73 (12.97%) WLAN
13 72 (12.79%) VLAN
14 69 (12.26%) TCP/IP
15 62 (11.01%) MPLS
16 53 (9.41%) IPsec
17 46 (8.17%) BIG-IP
18 45 (7.99%) Cisco ISE
18 45 (7.99%) Cisco Nexus
19 39 (6.93%) VXLAN
Database & Business Intelligence
1 7 (1.24%) 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
Development Applications
1 32 (5.68%) JIRA
2 4 (0.71%) Browser DevTools
3 3 (0.53%) Sonatype Nexus
4 2 (0.36%) GitLab
4 2 (0.36%) Jenkins
5 1 (0.18%) Bitbucket
5 1 (0.18%) Tricentis qTest
General
1 140 (24.87%) Social Skills
2 49 (8.70%) Public Sector
3 40 (7.10%) Analytical Skills
4 36 (6.39%) Finance
5 34 (6.04%) Documentation Skills
6 26 (4.62%) Manufacturing
7 24 (4.26%) Telecoms
8 21 (3.73%) Legal
9 16 (2.84%) Financial Institution
10 13 (2.31%) Military
11 10 (1.78%) Law
11 10 (1.78%) Organisational Skills
12 9 (1.60%) Banking
13 8 (1.42%) Retail
14 6 (1.07%) Local Government
15 5 (0.89%) Police
16 2 (0.36%) German Language
16 2 (0.36%) Inclusion and Diversity
16 2 (0.36%) Influencing Skills
16 2 (0.36%) Presentation Skills
Job Titles
1 227 (40.32%) Network Engineer
2 85 (15.10%) Architect
3 64 (11.37%) Senior
4 58 (10.30%) Network Architect
5 41 (7.28%) IT Support
6 34 (6.04%) Support Engineer
7 33 (5.86%) SC Cleared Network Engineer
8 30 (5.33%) Infrastructure Engineer
8 30 (5.33%) Lead
9 29 (5.15%) Analyst
9 29 (5.15%) IT Engineer
9 29 (5.15%) Senior Network Engineer
10 28 (4.97%) Cisco Engineer
11 27 (4.80%) Cisco Network Engineer
12 25 (4.44%) IT Support Engineer
13 23 (4.09%) Technical Architect
14 16 (2.84%) Network Manager
15 15 (2.66%) Project Manager
16 14 (2.49%) Firewall Specialist
16 14 (2.49%) Network Specialist
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 43 (7.64%) 802.1X
2 15 (2.66%) LDAP
3 13 (2.31%) SAML
4 10 (1.78%) Microsoft Graph
5 8 (1.42%) Middleware
6 4 (0.71%) NETCONF
6 4 (0.71%) REST
6 4 (0.71%) YANG
7 3 (0.53%) XMPP
8 2 (0.36%) .NET
8 2 (0.36%) CSS
8 2 (0.36%) Django
8 2 (0.36%) HTML
8 2 (0.36%) RFC 2544
8 2 (0.36%) Software Packaging
9 1 (0.18%) Apache NiFi
9 1 (0.18%) ARM Templates
9 1 (0.18%) LAPP Stack
9 1 (0.18%) libvirt
9 1 (0.18%) React
Miscellaneous
1 117 (20.78%) Data Centre
2 29 (5.15%) PKI
3 26 (4.62%) Clustering
4 21 (3.73%) Onboarding
5 20 (3.55%) Hybrid Cloud
6 14 (2.49%) Data Protection Act
7 13 (2.31%) Public Cloud
7 13 (2.31%) Security Posture
8 11 (1.95%) Self-Motivation
9 10 (1.78%) Operational Technology
10 9 (1.60%) Enterprise Software
11 8 (1.42%) Driving Licence
11 8 (1.42%) NHS
11 8 (1.42%) Virtual Team
12 7 (1.24%) CMDB
12 7 (1.24%) IoT
12 7 (1.24%) Video Conferencing
13 6 (1.07%) Cloud Native
13 6 (1.07%) Smartphone
14 5 (0.89%) iPhone
Operating Systems
1 170 (30.20%) Windows
2 50 (8.88%) Windows Server
3 40 (7.10%) Linux
4 31 (5.51%) Windows 10
5 16 (2.84%) Windows Server 2019
6 12 (2.13%) Mac OS
7 9 (1.60%) Android
8 8 (1.42%) Apple iOS
8 8 (1.42%) Windows 7
9 5 (0.89%) CatOS
9 5 (0.89%) Ubuntu
9 5 (0.89%) VMS
9 5 (0.89%) Windows Server 2012
9 5 (0.89%) Windows Server 2016
10 4 (0.71%) Unix
11 3 (0.53%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
11 3 (0.53%) Windows Server 2003
12 2 (0.36%) AIX
13 1 (0.18%) Data ONTAP
13 1 (0.18%) Solaris
Processes & Methodologies
1 88 (15.63%) ITIL
2 78 (13.85%) High Availability
3 77 (13.68%) Problem-Solving
4 60 (10.66%) Migration
5 59 (10.48%) Load Balancing
6 46 (8.17%) Change Management
6 46 (8.17%) ITSM
7 44 (7.82%) Stakeholder Management
8 41 (7.28%) Network Architecture
9 40 (7.10%) Infrastructure Engineering
10 39 (6.93%) Network Design
11 37 (6.57%) Technical Leadership
12 35 (6.22%) Continuous Improvement
12 35 (6.22%) Network Monitoring
12 35 (6.22%) Project Delivery
12 35 (6.22%) Roadmaps
13 34 (6.04%) Disaster Recovery
13 34 (6.04%) Service Management
14 30 (5.33%) Cybersecurity
15 29 (5.15%) Customer Service
Programming Languages
1 38 (6.75%) PowerShell
2 33 (5.86%) Python
3 15 (2.66%) SQL
4 5 (0.89%) VBScript
5 4 (0.71%) VB
6 3 (0.53%) JavaScript
7 2 (0.36%) Bash
7 2 (0.36%) Perl
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
1 207 (36.77%) Security Cleared
2 169 (30.02%) Cisco Certification
3 147 (26.11%) SC Cleared
4 122 (21.67%) CCNP
5 56 (9.95%) DV Cleared
6 53 (9.41%) Degree
7 52 (9.24%) CCNA
8 45 (7.99%) CCIE
9 16 (2.84%) JNCIS
10 14 (2.49%) JNCIP
10 14 (2.49%) PMP
11 12 (2.13%) JNCIA
12 11 (1.95%) Microsoft Certification
13 10 (1.78%) Azure Certification
13 10 (1.78%) CCSE
13 10 (1.78%) Computer Science Degree
13 10 (1.78%) PMI Certification
14 9 (1.60%) JNCIE
15 6 (1.07%) AWS Certification
15 6 (1.07%) Network+ Certification
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 18 (3.20%) QA
2 11 (1.95%) SLA
3 7 (1.24%) Disclosure Scotland
3 7 (1.24%) ISO/IEC 27001
3 7 (1.24%) NIST
4 6 (1.07%) NCSC
5 5 (0.89%) GDPR
6 4 (0.71%) JSP 440
7 3 (0.53%) 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
1 103 (18.29%) Active Directory
2 53 (9.41%) VMware Infrastructure
3 21 (3.73%) VMware NSX
4 17 (3.02%) vSphere
5 8 (1.42%) Hyper-V
6 7 (1.24%) Virtual Machines
7 4 (0.71%) BitLocker
7 4 (0.71%) Firmware
7 4 (0.71%) VMware ESXi
8 3 (0.53%) Docker
8 3 (0.53%) Virtual Desktop
8 3 (0.53%) Virtual Servers
9 2 (0.36%) KVM
10 1 (0.18%) Ceph
10 1 (0.18%) iptables
10 1 (0.18%) Microsoft Virtual Server
10 1 (0.18%) RHEV
10 1 (0.18%) Samba
10 1 (0.18%) Slurm Workload Manager
10 1 (0.18%) Xen
Systems Management
1 46 (8.17%) FortiGate
2 34 (6.04%) Microsoft Intune
3 31 (5.51%) Ansible
4 20 (3.55%) Terraform
5 16 (2.84%) SCCM
6 14 (2.49%) Single Sign-On
7 12 (2.13%) Jamf Pro
8 7 (1.24%) Nagios
9 6 (1.07%) Cisco Prime
10 5 (0.89%) Endace
10 5 (0.89%) WSUS
11 4 (0.71%) Progress Chef
11 4 (0.71%) vCenter Server
11 4 (0.71%) vRealize Orchestrator
12 3 (0.53%) Cisco CUCM
13 2 (0.36%) AirWatch
13 2 (0.36%) Backup Exec
13 2 (0.36%) Check_MK
13 2 (0.36%) Grafana
13 2 (0.36%) Nessus
Vendors
1 281 (49.91%) Cisco
2 117 (20.78%) Palo Alto
3 113 (20.07%) Microsoft
4 87 (15.45%) F5
5 83 (14.74%) Juniper
6 74 (13.14%) CheckPoint
7 71 (12.61%) Aruba
8 69 (12.26%) VMware
9 60 (10.66%) SolarWinds
10 56 (9.95%) Fortinet
11 31 (5.51%) Extreme Networks
12 29 (5.15%) Meraki
12 29 (5.15%) ServiceNow
12 29 (5.15%) Splunk
13 22 (3.91%) Zscaler
14 16 (2.84%) Dell
14 16 (2.84%) Veeam
15 15 (2.66%) Ekahau
16 9 (1.60%) Arista
16 9 (1.60%) Citrix