MPLS Contract Job Trends

Multiprotocol Label Switching (MPLS)
UK

The table below provides summary statistics and contractor rates for jobs requiring MPLS skills. It covers contract job vacancies from the 6 months leading up to 18 May 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
18 May 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 461 336 285
Rank change year-on-year -125 -51 +181
Contract jobs citing MPLS 170 193 325
As % of all contract jobs in the UK 0.35% 0.66% 0.76%
As % of the Communications & Networking category 3.71% 5.18% 6.03%
Number of daily rates quoted 108 113 165
10th Percentile £229 £305 £300
25th Percentile £377 £419 £350
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £460 £500 £400
Median % change year-on-year -8.00% +25.00% -17.70%
75th Percentile £540 £550 £588
90th Percentile £625 £630 £675
UK excluding London median daily rate £500 £450 £375
% change year-on-year +11.11% +20.00% -11.76%
Number of hourly rates quoted 3 3 17
10th Percentile £22.53 £22.05 £13.70
25th Percentile £29.88 £27.38 £18.50
Median hourly rate £42.25 £37.50 £25.00
Median % change year-on-year +12.67% +50.00% -59.68%
75th Percentile £42.38 £39.38 £40.00
90th Percentile - £39.75 -
UK excluding London median hourly rate £42.25 £19.00 £40.00
% change year-on-year +122.37% -52.50% -35.48%

All Communications and Computer Networking Skills
UK

MPLS 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 4,578 3,725 5,393
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the UK 9.55% 12.68% 12.66%
Number of daily rates quoted 2,829 2,299 3,215
10th Percentile £262 £213 £205
25th Percentile £400 £362 £350
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £495 £488 £490
Median % change year-on-year +1.54% -0.51% -5.50%
75th Percentile £588 £588 £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 247 165 417
10th Percentile £16.01 £14.99 £13.50
25th Percentile £21.04 £17.30 £16.30
Median hourly rate £37.50 £32.50 £40.00
Median % change year-on-year +15.38% -18.75% +116.22%
75th Percentile £65.88 £58.69 £63.75
90th Percentile £75.00 £75.00 £70.00
UK excluding London median hourly rate £42.25 £24.71 £45.88
% change year-on-year +70.98% -46.14% +158.48%

MPLS
Job Vacancy Trend

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

MPLS job vacancy trend in the UK

MPLS
Daily Rate Trend

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

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

MPLS
Daily Rate Histogram

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing MPLS over the 6 months to 18 May 2026.

Daily rate histogram for MPLS in the UK

MPLS
Hourly Rate Trend

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

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

MPLS
Hourly Rate Histogram

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing MPLS over the 6 months to 18 May 2026.

Hourly rate histogram for MPLS in the UK

MPLS
Top 14 Contract Job Locations

The table below looks at the demand and provides a guide to the median contractor rates quoted in IT jobs citing MPLS within the UK over the 6 months to 18 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 -128 145 £483 -3.50% 36
UK excluding London -97 91 £500 +11.11% 39
London -85 56 £400 -20.00% 11
Work from Home -39 54 £420 -16.00% 27
South East -59 48 £488 +8.33% 12
South West -22 11 £525 - 4
North of England -84 11 £490 +3.16% 6
North West -45 10 £490 +3.16% 5
Midlands -67 9 £413 +17.86% 4
Scotland +5 7 £440 +3.53% 13
West Midlands -64 6 £413 +17.86% 4
East of England -26 5 £500 +100.00%
Yorkshire -60 1 - - 1
Northern Ireland - 1 £385 -

MPLS
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 7 (4.12%) Microsoft Exchange
2 4 (2.35%) OpenStack
3 3 (1.76%) Confluence
4 1 (0.59%) SharePoint
Applications
1 8 (4.71%) MS Visio
2 5 (2.94%) Microsoft Excel
2 5 (2.94%) Microsoft Office
3 3 (1.76%) Microsoft PowerPoint
4 2 (1.18%) AutoCAD
Business Applications
1 2 (1.18%) Teamcenter
Cloud Services
1 29 (17.06%) Azure
2 15 (8.82%) AWS
3 13 (7.65%) Entra ID
4 10 (5.88%) Microsoft 365
5 8 (4.71%) IaaS
6 6 (3.53%) GCP
7 2 (1.18%) AWS Direct Connect
7 2 (1.18%) Azure ExpressRoute
7 2 (1.18%) Azure Sentinel
7 2 (1.18%) IBM Watson
7 2 (1.18%) Mimecast
7 2 (1.18%) Power Platform
8 1 (0.59%) Amazon ELB
8 1 (0.59%) Amazon GuardDuty
8 1 (0.59%) Amazon Macie
8 1 (0.59%) AWS CloudFormation
8 1 (0.59%) AWS CloudTrail
8 1 (0.59%) Azure DevOps
8 1 (0.59%) Route 53
8 1 (0.59%) Virtual Private Cloud
Communications & Networking
1 91 (53.53%) WAN
2 88 (51.76%) BGP
3 87 (51.18%) Firewall
4 59 (34.71%) LAN
5 55 (32.35%) OSPF
6 52 (30.59%) VPN
7 47 (27.65%) SD-WAN
8 46 (27.06%) Network Security
9 27 (15.88%) IPsec
9 27 (15.88%) VLAN
10 25 (14.71%) Cisco ASA
11 22 (12.94%) Ethernet VPN
12 18 (10.59%) VXLAN
13 17 (10.00%) EIGRP
13 17 (10.00%) Internet
13 17 (10.00%) Multicast
14 16 (9.41%) Cisco IOS
14 16 (9.41%) Cisco Nexus
14 16 (9.41%) Wireless
14 16 (9.41%) Wireshark
Database & Business Intelligence
1 2 (1.18%) Power BI
1 2 (1.18%) Tableau
Development Applications
1 6 (3.53%) Git
2 5 (2.94%) JIRA
3 2 (1.18%) Sonatype Nexus
4 1 (0.59%) AppScan
4 1 (0.59%) Burp Suite
4 1 (0.59%) Metasploit
General
1 37 (21.76%) Telecoms
2 34 (20.00%) Social Skills
3 24 (14.12%) Finance
4 18 (10.59%) Analytical Skills
5 10 (5.88%) Public Sector
6 9 (5.29%) Documentation Skills
6 9 (5.29%) Financial Institution
7 8 (4.71%) Law
8 7 (4.12%) Legal
9 3 (1.76%) Billing
9 3 (1.76%) Manufacturing
10 2 (1.18%) Aviation
10 2 (1.18%) Banking
10 2 (1.18%) Influencing Skills
10 2 (1.18%) Investment Banking
10 2 (1.18%) Presentation Skills
10 2 (1.18%) Retail
11 1 (0.59%) Aerospace
11 1 (0.59%) Inclusion and Diversity
11 1 (0.59%) Police
Job Titles
1 67 (39.41%) Network Engineer
2 25 (14.71%) Architect
3 19 (11.18%) Senior
4 15 (8.82%) Network Architect
5 10 (5.88%) SC Cleared Network Engineer
6 9 (5.29%) Design Engineer
6 9 (5.29%) Security Engineer
7 7 (4.12%) Integration Engineer
7 7 (4.12%) Network Manager
7 7 (4.12%) Solutions Architect
8 6 (3.53%) Infrastructure Engineer
8 6 (3.53%) IP Engineer
8 6 (3.53%) Network Design Engineer
8 6 (3.53%) Project Manager
8 6 (3.53%) Test Engineer
9 5 (2.94%) Cisco Engineer
9 5 (2.94%) Core Network Engineer
9 5 (2.94%) Juniper Engineer
10 4 (2.35%) IP Specialist
10 4 (2.35%) SC Cleared Project Manager
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 9 (5.29%) REST
2 8 (4.71%) NETCONF
2 8 (4.71%) YANG
3 7 (4.12%) 802.1X
4 6 (3.53%) LDAP
5 4 (2.35%) Jinja
6 3 (1.76%) OpenConfig
6 3 (1.76%) RESTCONF
7 2 (1.18%) Django
7 2 (1.18%) RFC 2544
8 1 (0.59%) JSON
8 1 (0.59%) XML
Miscellaneous
1 30 (17.65%) Data Centre
2 18 (10.59%) Data Protection Act
3 11 (6.47%) Hybrid Cloud
4 10 (5.88%) PKI
5 7 (4.12%) Operational Technology
5 7 (4.12%) Security Posture
6 6 (3.53%) Analytical Mindset
6 6 (3.53%) Cloud Native
6 6 (3.53%) Management Information System
7 5 (2.94%) Onboarding
8 4 (2.35%) SCADA
8 4 (2.35%) Virtual Team
9 3 (1.76%) CESG
9 3 (1.76%) Public Cloud
9 3 (1.76%) Self-Motivation
9 3 (1.76%) Wiki
10 2 (1.18%) Algorithms
10 2 (1.18%) Distributed Denial-of-Service
10 2 (1.18%) Fibre Optics
11 1 (0.59%) Legacy Systems
Operating Systems
1 15 (8.82%) Linux
2 11 (6.47%) Windows
3 7 (4.12%) Windows Server
4 6 (3.53%) Ubuntu
5 4 (2.35%) Unix
6 1 (0.59%) Kali Linux
6 1 (0.59%) VMS
Processes & Methodologies
1 23 (13.53%) Change Management
1 23 (13.53%) Migration
1 23 (13.53%) Network Design
1 23 (13.53%) Problem-Solving
2 21 (12.35%) Technical Leadership
3 19 (11.18%) Data Protection
3 19 (11.18%) Network Segmentation
4 17 (10.00%) ITIL
5 16 (9.41%) DevOps
5 16 (9.41%) Network Architecture
5 16 (9.41%) Project Delivery
5 16 (9.41%) Roadmaps
5 16 (9.41%) Zero Trust
6 15 (8.82%) Cybersecurity
6 15 (8.82%) Project Management
6 15 (8.82%) Root Cause Analysis
7 14 (8.24%) Agile
7 14 (8.24%) Incident Management
7 14 (8.24%) Infrastructure Engineering
7 14 (8.24%) Stakeholder Management
Programming Languages
1 33 (19.41%) Python
2 4 (2.35%) PHP
3 3 (1.76%) SQL
4 2 (1.18%) Bash
4 2 (1.18%) C
5 1 (0.59%) Lisp
Qualifications
1 67 (39.41%) Security Cleared
2 53 (31.18%) SC Cleared
3 41 (24.12%) Cisco Certification
4 28 (16.47%) CCNP
5 22 (12.94%) CCIE
6 18 (10.59%) DV Cleared
7 12 (7.06%) CCNA
8 9 (5.29%) JNCIE
9 5 (2.94%) Degree
9 5 (2.94%) GIAC
10 4 (2.35%) APMG
10 4 (2.35%) CompTIA Security+
10 4 (2.35%) ISTQB
10 4 (2.35%) JNCIS
10 4 (2.35%) PMP
10 4 (2.35%) SSCP
11 3 (1.76%) AWS Certification
11 3 (1.76%) BC Cleared
11 3 (1.76%) Computer Science Degree
11 3 (1.76%) ITIL Certification
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 8 (4.71%) ISO/IEC 27001
1 8 (4.71%) NCSC
2 7 (4.12%) NIST
3 5 (2.94%) SLA
4 4 (2.35%) Cyber Essentials
4 4 (2.35%) Cyber Essentials PLUS
4 4 (2.35%) QA
5 3 (1.76%) RMADS
6 2 (1.18%) Government Security Classifications
6 2 (1.18%) JSP 440
6 2 (1.18%) PCI DSS
7 1 (0.59%) Actionable Recommendations
7 1 (0.59%) COBIT
7 1 (0.59%) GDPR
7 1 (0.59%) GRC
7 1 (0.59%) HMG Security Policy Framework
System Software
1 12 (7.06%) Active Directory
2 9 (5.29%) VMware Infrastructure
3 7 (4.12%) VMware ESXi
4 2 (1.18%) Hyper-V
4 2 (1.18%) VMware NSX
4 2 (1.18%) VMware Workstation
Systems Management
1 33 (19.41%) Ansible
2 10 (5.88%) Cisco Prime
3 8 (4.71%) Microsoft Intune
4 6 (3.53%) vCenter Server
5 5 (2.94%) FortiGate
6 4 (2.35%) Grafana
6 4 (2.35%) Prometheus
7 3 (1.76%) Salt
7 3 (1.76%) SCOM
7 3 (1.76%) Terraform
8 2 (1.18%) Cisco CUCM
8 2 (1.18%) Iperf
8 2 (1.18%) Nmap
9 1 (0.59%) Avamar
9 1 (0.59%) CASB
9 1 (0.59%) Failover Clustering
9 1 (0.59%) Nessus
9 1 (0.59%) Progress Chef
9 1 (0.59%) SolarWinds Orion
Vendors
1 96 (56.47%) Cisco
2 43 (25.29%) Palo Alto
3 30 (17.65%) Juniper
4 29 (17.06%) F5
4 29 (17.06%) Fortinet
5 23 (13.53%) CheckPoint
6 22 (12.94%) Microsoft
7 19 (11.18%) Nokia
8 16 (9.41%) VMware
9 15 (8.82%) Aruba
10 13 (7.65%) Arista
11 12 (7.06%) Meraki
12 10 (5.88%) SolarWinds
13 7 (4.12%) ADVA
13 7 (4.12%) ServiceNow
13 7 (4.12%) Splunk
14 6 (3.53%) Zscaler
15 5 (2.94%) NetScout
16 4 (2.35%) LogicMonitor
16 4 (2.35%) Tufin