NCSC Contract Job Trends

National Cyber Security Centre (NCSC)
UK

The table below provides summary statistics and contractor rates for jobs requiring NCSC skills. It covers contract job vacancies from the 6 months leading up to 2 July 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
2 Jul 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 355 405 490
Rank change year-on-year +50 +85 -71
Contract jobs citing NCSC 331 131 97
As % of all contract jobs in the UK 0.64% 0.42% 0.22%
As % of the Quality Assurance & Compliance category 3.82% 2.58% 1.63%
Number of daily rates quoted 247 83 63
10th Percentile £450 £500 £475
25th Percentile £516 £555 £525
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £625 £650 £650
Median % change year-on-year -3.85% - -3.70%
75th Percentile £713 £700 £731
90th Percentile £800 £738 £743
UK excluding London median daily rate £600 £645 £600
% change year-on-year -6.98% +7.50% -14.29%
Number of hourly rates quoted 6 12 2
10th Percentile £73.75 £60.75 £80.34
25th Percentile £80.48 £77.06 £80.85
Median hourly rate £83.65 £85.00 £81.71
Median % change year-on-year -1.59% +4.03% +2.13%
75th Percentile £85.40 £91.50 £82.56
90th Percentile - - £83.07
UK excluding London median hourly rate £85.40 £85.00 £80.00
% change year-on-year +0.47% +6.25% +1.07%

All Quality Assurance and Compliance Skills
UK

NCSC falls under the Quality Assurance and Compliance category. For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all contract job vacancies requiring quality assurance or compliance skills.

Contract vacancies with a requirement for quality assurance or compliance skills 8,659 5,068 5,942
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the UK 16.83% 16.37% 13.69%
Number of daily rates quoted 5,537 3,252 3,690
10th Percentile £340 £279 £282
25th Percentile £413 £400 £401
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £500 £510
Median % change year-on-year - -1.96% -2.86%
75th Percentile £600 £613 £625
90th Percentile £700 £725 £750
UK excluding London median daily rate £500 £473 £475
% change year-on-year +5.70% -0.42% -4.04%
Number of hourly rates quoted 533 211 433
10th Percentile £14.00 £14.78 £11.07
25th Percentile £19.33 £18.50 £13.50
Median hourly rate £36.07 £30.00 £23.80
Median % change year-on-year +20.23% +26.05% -38.52%
75th Percentile £67.50 £63.75 £50.00
90th Percentile £81.52 £83.41 £70.00
UK excluding London median hourly rate £36.07 £28.18 £21.64
% change year-on-year +28.00% +30.22% -42.29%

NCSC
Job Vacancy Trend

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

NCSC job vacancy trend in the UK

NCSC
Daily Rate Trend

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

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

NCSC
Daily Rate Histogram

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing NCSC over the 6 months to 2 July 2026.

Daily rate histogram for NCSC in the UK

NCSC
Hourly Rate Trend

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

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

NCSC
Hourly Rate Histogram

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing NCSC over the 6 months to 2 July 2026.

Hourly rate histogram for NCSC in the UK

NCSC
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 NCSC within the UK over the 6 months to 2 July 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 +28 285 £625 -3.85% 81
UK excluding London -35 169 £600 -6.98% 61
Work from Home +33 130 £625 -2.34% 47
London -3 106 £625 -3.85% 27
South East +2 90 £638 -5.56% 25
South West -17 37 £588 -8.91% 8
North of England -65 17 £662 +5.88% 11
Midlands -45 15 £492 -24.31% 9
West Midlands -54 15 £492 -24.31% 3
North West -40 14 £668 +14.84% 7
Scotland -6 8 £663 +32.50% 4
Wales - 4 £800 - 2
East of England -26 3 £450 +414.29% 3
Yorkshire -43 3 £600 -14.29% 4

NCSC
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 14 (4.23%) Confluence
2 3 (0.91%) SharePoint
3 2 (0.60%) WebLogic
3 2 (0.60%) WebSphere
4 1 (0.30%) Camunda
4 1 (0.30%) Microsoft Exchange
4 1 (0.30%) SharePoint 2010
4 1 (0.30%) SharePoint 2013
Applications
1 2 (0.60%) PlantUML
2 1 (0.30%) Microsoft Excel
2 1 (0.30%) Microsoft Office
2 1 (0.30%) Microsoft PowerPoint
Business Applications
1 9 (2.72%) Oracle ERP
2 4 (1.21%) Sparx Enterprise Architect
3 2 (0.60%) SAP GRC
3 2 (0.60%) SAP S/4HANA
Cloud Services
1 117 (35.35%) Azure
2 83 (25.08%) AWS
3 31 (9.37%) Entra ID
4 29 (8.76%) GCP
5 21 (6.34%) SaaS
6 19 (5.74%) OpenShift
7 18 (5.44%) Azure DevOps
7 18 (5.44%) Microsoft 365
8 10 (3.02%) IaaS
8 10 (3.02%) PaaS
9 9 (2.72%) OCI
10 8 (2.42%) Amazon EKS
10 8 (2.42%) Azure AKS
10 8 (2.42%) Azure Monitor
10 8 (2.42%) GitHub
11 7 (2.11%) Serverless
12 6 (1.81%) Virtual Private Cloud
13 5 (1.51%) AWS Lambda
13 5 (1.51%) Azure Sentinel
13 5 (1.51%) Power Platform
Communications & Networking
1 35 (10.57%) Firewall
2 30 (9.06%) Network Security
3 18 (5.44%) VPN
4 13 (3.93%) BGP
4 13 (3.93%) DNS
5 12 (3.63%) IPsec
5 12 (3.63%) OSPF
5 12 (3.63%) WAN
6 11 (3.32%) MPLS
6 11 (3.32%) SD-WAN
7 10 (3.02%) LAN
7 10 (3.02%) VLAN
8 9 (2.72%) TCP/IP
9 6 (1.81%) Cisco ASA
9 6 (1.81%) Cisco Nexus
9 6 (1.81%) VSAN
10 5 (1.51%) BIG-IP
10 5 (1.51%) Cisco Firepower
10 5 (1.51%) DHCP
10 5 (1.51%) F5 BIG-IP LTM
Database & Business Intelligence
1 9 (2.72%) Geospatial Data
2 6 (1.81%) Azure SQL Database
3 3 (0.91%) Amazon RDS
3 3 (0.91%) Oracle Reports
3 3 (0.91%) Power BI
4 2 (0.60%) DynamoDB
4 2 (0.60%) Relational Database
5 1 (0.30%) Amazon Redshift
5 1 (0.30%) BigQuery
5 1 (0.30%) Metadata
5 1 (0.30%) MySQL
5 1 (0.30%) NoSQL
5 1 (0.30%) PostgreSQL
5 1 (0.30%) SAP HANA
Development Applications
1 17 (5.14%) JIRA
2 14 (4.23%) Jenkins
3 12 (3.63%) Git
4 7 (2.11%) MSI
5 3 (0.91%) Sonatype Nexus
6 2 (0.60%) GitLab
7 1 (0.30%) Ant
7 1 (0.30%) Cucumber
7 1 (0.30%) Cypress.io
7 1 (0.30%) Gradle
7 1 (0.30%) JUnit
7 1 (0.30%) Maven
7 1 (0.30%) Mockito
General
1 99 (29.91%) Public Sector
2 92 (27.79%) Social Skills
3 36 (10.88%) Finance
4 23 (6.95%) Influencing Skills
5 20 (6.04%) Documentation Skills
6 19 (5.74%) Analytical Skills
6 19 (5.74%) Telecoms
7 12 (3.63%) Military
8 8 (2.42%) Inclusion and Diversity
9 7 (2.11%) Law
9 7 (2.11%) Legal
9 7 (2.11%) Local Government
9 7 (2.11%) Police
10 6 (1.81%) Manufacturing
11 4 (1.21%) Aerospace
11 4 (1.21%) Organisational Skills
12 2 (0.60%) Aviation
12 2 (0.60%) Banking
12 2 (0.60%) Electronics
12 2 (0.60%) Marketing
Job Titles
1 128 (38.67%) Architect
2 57 (17.22%) Security Architect
3 37 (11.18%) Lead
4 33 (9.97%) Technical Architect
5 29 (8.76%) Senior
6 28 (8.46%) Consultant
7 18 (5.44%) Security Consultant
8 16 (4.83%) Security Manager
9 15 (4.53%) Solutions Architect
10 14 (4.23%) Lead Architect
11 13 (3.93%) Cybersecurity Manager
11 13 (3.93%) Technical Leader
12 12 (3.63%) CyberArk Architect
13 11 (3.32%) Analyst
13 11 (3.32%) Network Architect
13 11 (3.32%) Tester
14 10 (3.02%) Developer
14 10 (3.02%) Penetration Tester
14 10 (3.02%) Senior Architect
15 9 (2.72%) Cloud Engineer
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 21 (6.34%) OpenID
1 21 (6.34%) SAML
2 20 (6.04%) LDAP
3 13 (3.93%) .NET
4 12 (3.63%) REST
5 9 (2.72%) GeoJSON
5 9 (2.72%) RESTful
6 8 (2.42%) .NET Framework
6 8 (2.42%) CSS
6 8 (2.42%) HTML
6 8 (2.42%) OAuth
7 7 (2.11%) .NET Core
7 7 (2.11%) ATL
7 7 (2.11%) COM
7 7 (2.11%) CSS3
7 7 (2.11%) HTML5
7 7 (2.11%) MFC
7 7 (2.11%) WPF
8 5 (1.51%) SailPoint
9 4 (1.21%) OpenAPI
Miscellaneous
1 40 (12.08%) Cloud Native
2 33 (9.97%) Onboarding
3 22 (6.65%) Management Information System
4 18 (5.44%) Security Posture
5 17 (5.14%) Cyber Threat
5 17 (5.14%) Data Centre
5 17 (5.14%) Operational Technology
5 17 (5.14%) Security Operations Centre
6 15 (4.53%) PKI
7 14 (4.23%) Public Cloud
8 13 (3.93%) Hybrid Cloud
9 12 (3.63%) Private Cloud
9 12 (3.63%) SCADA
10 11 (3.32%) CSOC
11 10 (3.02%) Legacy Systems
11 10 (3.02%) Product Ownership
12 5 (1.51%) Data Protection Act
12 5 (1.51%) NHS
13 4 (1.21%) CESG
13 4 (1.21%) Enterprise Software
Operating Systems
1 23 (6.95%) Linux
2 21 (6.34%) Windows
3 6 (1.81%) Windows Server
4 5 (1.51%) Mac OS
5 3 (0.91%) Android
5 3 (0.91%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
5 3 (0.91%) VMS
6 2 (0.60%) Apple iOS
6 2 (0.60%) Unix
7 1 (0.30%) CentOS
7 1 (0.30%) Rocky
7 1 (0.30%) Ubuntu
7 1 (0.30%) Windows 10
7 1 (0.30%) Windows Server 2019
Processes & Methodologies
1 151 (45.62%) Cybersecurity
2 83 (25.08%) CI/CD
3 74 (22.36%) Agile
3 74 (22.36%) Cloud Security
3 74 (22.36%) Infrastructure as Code
4 70 (21.15%) DevOps
5 60 (18.13%) Stakeholder Management
6 59 (17.82%) Security Architecture
7 57 (17.22%) Risk Management
8 52 (15.71%) Incident Response
9 51 (15.41%) Stakeholder Engagement
9 51 (15.41%) Threat Modelling
10 50 (15.11%) Continuous Improvement
11 46 (13.90%) Zero Trust
12 45 (13.60%) SIEM
12 45 (13.60%) TOGAF
13 40 (12.08%) DevSecOps
14 39 (11.78%) Architectural Patterns
14 39 (11.78%) Vulnerability Management
15 38 (11.48%) Containerisation
Programming Languages
1 22 (6.65%) Bicep
2 18 (5.44%) Python
3 12 (3.63%) SQL
4 8 (2.42%) C#
4 8 (2.42%) PowerShell
5 7 (2.11%) Java
5 7 (2.11%) JavaScript
5 7 (2.11%) TypeScript
6 3 (0.91%) Bash
7 2 (0.60%) Groovy
8 1 (0.30%) Go
8 1 (0.30%) Kotlin
8 1 (0.30%) Swift
Qualifications
1 242 (73.11%) Security Cleared
2 195 (58.91%) SC Cleared
3 68 (20.54%) DV Cleared
4 42 (12.69%) CISSP
5 39 (11.78%) CISM
6 32 (9.67%) Cisco Certification
7 22 (6.65%) Degree
8 17 (5.14%) CCNP
9 13 (3.93%) (ISC)2 CCSP
10 12 (3.63%) AWS Certification
10 12 (3.63%) Azure Certification
11 11 (3.32%) CHECK Team Leader
12 10 (3.02%) CESG Certified Professional
12 10 (3.02%) GIAC
13 9 (2.72%) CCIE
13 9 (2.72%) CHECK Team Member
14 8 (2.42%) CCSP
14 8 (2.42%) CEH
14 8 (2.42%) CompTIA Security+
14 8 (2.42%) Microsoft Certification
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 112 (33.84%) NIST
2 95 (28.70%) ISO/IEC 27001
3 48 (14.50%) GDPR
4 32 (9.67%) Cyber Essentials
5 25 (7.55%) NIST 800
6 23 (6.95%) JSP 440
7 16 (4.83%) Cyber Essentials PLUS
7 16 (4.83%) GRC
7 16 (4.83%) RMADS
8 15 (4.53%) Government Security Classifications
9 12 (3.63%) HMG Security Policy Framework
10 11 (3.32%) Accessibility
11 10 (3.02%) ISO/IEC 27002 (supersedes ISO/IEC 17799)
12 9 (2.72%) COBIT
13 8 (2.42%) PCI DSS
14 7 (2.11%) ISO/IEC 20000
14 7 (2.11%) QA
14 7 (2.11%) WCAG
15 6 (1.81%) IASME
15 6 (1.81%) ISO/IEC 27005
System Software
1 27 (8.16%) Active Directory
2 18 (5.44%) Docker
3 15 (4.53%) VMware Infrastructure
4 14 (4.23%) VMware NSX
5 5 (1.51%) Hyper-V
6 4 (1.21%) VMware ESXi
7 3 (0.91%) vSphere
8 1 (0.30%) GPFS
8 1 (0.30%) KVM
8 1 (0.30%) Lustre
8 1 (0.30%) Slurm Workload Manager
8 1 (0.30%) UAG
Systems Management
1 54 (16.31%) Kubernetes
2 42 (12.69%) Terraform
3 11 (3.32%) Ansible
4 6 (1.81%) Active Directory Federation Services
5 5 (1.51%) Jamf Pro
6 3 (0.91%) Istio
7 2 (0.60%) Cisco Prime
7 2 (0.60%) Grafana
7 2 (0.60%) Iperf
7 2 (0.60%) Microsoft Intune
7 2 (0.60%) Nmap
7 2 (0.60%) Prometheus
7 2 (0.60%) Single Sign-On
8 1 (0.30%) Cisco CUCM
8 1 (0.30%) CloudForms
8 1 (0.30%) FortiGate
8 1 (0.30%) FreeIPA
8 1 (0.30%) McAfee ePO
8 1 (0.30%) SELinux
8 1 (0.30%) VxRail
Vendors
1 66 (19.94%) Microsoft
2 27 (8.16%) VMware
3 20 (6.04%) Cisco
4 16 (4.83%) Palo Alto
4 16 (4.83%) Splunk
5 14 (4.23%) CyberArk
6 9 (2.72%) Oracle
6 9 (2.72%) ServiceNow
7 8 (2.42%) Fortinet
7 8 (2.42%) SAP
8 7 (2.11%) Google
8 7 (2.11%) SolarWinds
9 6 (1.81%) F5
10 5 (1.51%) CheckPoint
10 5 (1.51%) Zscaler
11 4 (1.21%) Apple
11 4 (1.21%) Juniper
11 4 (1.21%) Red Hat
11 4 (1.21%) Sparx
12 3 (0.91%) Citrix