Network Design Contract Job Trends

Network Design
UK

The table below provides summary statistics and contractor rates for jobs requiring Network Design skills. It covers contract job vacancies from the 6 months leading up to 11 September 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
11 Sep 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 461 386 335
Rank change year-on-year -75 -51 +21
Contract jobs citing Network Design 211 182 242
As % of all contract jobs in the UK 0.39% 0.55% 0.63%
As % of the Processes & Methodologies category 0.46% 0.61% 0.73%
Number of daily rates quoted 137 121 133
10th Percentile £363 £400 £403
25th Percentile £418 £413 £450
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £513 £500 £520
Median % change year-on-year +2.50% -3.85% -9.57%
75th Percentile £588 £600 £588
90th Percentile £650 £688 £650
UK excluding London median daily rate £510 £500 £500
% change year-on-year +2.00% - -9.09%
Number of hourly rates quoted 7 2 4
10th Percentile £47.50 £56.13 £26.25
25th Percentile £55.00 £57.81 £31.88
Median hourly rate £71.00 £61.25 £55.00
Median % change year-on-year +15.92% +11.36% -17.91%
75th Percentile £76.50 £65.31 £75.00
90th Percentile £85.01 £67.38 -
UK excluding London median hourly rate £73.00 £55.00 £55.00
% change year-on-year +32.73% - -21.43%

All Process & Methodology Skills
UK

Network Design falls under the Processes and Methodologies category. For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all contract job vacancies requiring process or methodology skills.

Contract vacancies with a requirement for process or methodology skills 46,202 29,871 32,996
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the UK 84.62% 90.47% 85.56%
Number of daily rates quoted 28,118 18,549 20,447
10th Percentile £325 £300 £311
25th Percentile £425 £403 £413
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £525 £500 £525
Median % change year-on-year +5.00% -4.76% -2.78%
75th Percentile £625 £625 £638
90th Percentile £725 £725 £750
UK excluding London median daily rate £500 £475 £500
% change year-on-year +5.26% -5.00% -
Number of hourly rates quoted 3,059 1,786 1,512
10th Percentile £13.85 £14.23 £14.71
25th Percentile £17.36 £17.30 £20.09
Median hourly rate £40.00 £25.15 £43.00
Median % change year-on-year +59.05% -41.51% +3.61%
75th Percentile £67.50 £45.00 £65.00
90th Percentile £80.00 £67.00 £75.00
UK excluding London median hourly rate £40.00 £22.63 £43.00
% change year-on-year +76.76% -47.37% +8.72%

Network Design
Job Vacancy Trend

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

Network Design job vacancy trend in the UK

Network Design
Daily Rate Trend

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

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in the UK citing Network Design

Network Design
Daily Rate Histogram

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing Network Design over the 6 months to 11 September 2026.

Daily rate histogram for Network Design in the UK

Network Design
Hourly Rate Trend

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

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in the UK citing Network Design

Network Design
Hourly Rate Histogram

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing Network Design over the 6 months to 11 September 2026.

Hourly rate histogram for Network Design in the UK

Network Design
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 Network Design within the UK over the 6 months to 11 September 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 -98 178 £525 +5.00% 114
UK excluding London -103 112 £510 +2.00% 79
London -61 62 £525 +16.67% 50
Work from Home -69 62 £494 -17.71% 58
South East -64 35 £539 -2.05% 24
North of England -63 32 £575 +21.05% 13
North West -38 24 £575 +21.05% 8
Scotland -9 15 £378 -11.59% 6
South West -53 13 £533 -16.80% 11
Midlands -57 11 £425 - 20
West Midlands -57 10 £425 - 13
East of England -28 7 £473 +15.24% 3
Yorkshire -34 7 £519 -9.74% 4
North East -40 7 £650 +18.18% 2
Wales - 2 £363 - 4
East Midlands - 1 - - 7

Network Design
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 12 (5.69%) OpenStack
2 3 (1.42%) Apache
2 3 (1.42%) CloudStack
3 2 (0.95%) Confluence
Applications
1 10 (4.74%) MS Visio
2 8 (3.79%) Microsoft PowerPoint
3 7 (3.32%) Microsoft Office
4 5 (2.37%) Microsoft Excel
5 3 (1.42%) AutoCAD
6 1 (0.47%) CPLEX
Business Applications
1 1 (0.47%) Sparx Enterprise Architect
Cloud Services
1 61 (28.91%) Azure
2 57 (27.01%) AWS
3 15 (7.11%) OCI
4 10 (4.74%) SaaS
5 9 (4.27%) GCP
5 9 (4.27%) GitHub
6 8 (3.79%) Entra ID
7 7 (3.32%) Azure ExpressRoute
7 7 (3.32%) OpenShift
8 6 (2.84%) IaaS
9 5 (2.37%) Nutanix
10 4 (1.90%) Azure Sentinel
11 3 (1.42%) AWS Control Tower
11 3 (1.42%) GitHub Actions
12 2 (0.95%) Azure Storage
12 2 (0.95%) Datadog
12 2 (0.95%) PaaS
13 1 (0.47%) Amazon GuardDuty
13 1 (0.47%) AWS Direct Connect
13 1 (0.47%) Virtual Private Cloud
Communications & Networking
1 94 (44.55%) Firewall
2 73 (34.60%) BGP
3 59 (27.96%) OSPF
4 56 (26.54%) WAN
5 42 (19.91%) VLAN
6 37 (17.54%) VPN
7 36 (17.06%) Network Security
8 31 (14.69%) LAN
8 31 (14.69%) SD-WAN
8 31 (14.69%) VXLAN
9 28 (13.27%) Wi-Fi
10 27 (12.80%) 5G
11 25 (11.85%) 4G
11 25 (11.85%) Ethernet VPN
12 24 (11.37%) MPLS
13 22 (10.43%) F5 BIG-IP LTM
14 21 (9.95%) Radio Access Network
15 18 (8.53%) BIG-IP
16 17 (8.06%) Wireless
17 16 (7.58%) DNS
Database & Business Intelligence
1 3 (1.42%) Metadata
Development Applications
1 13 (6.16%) GitLab
2 3 (1.42%) Jenkins
2 3 (1.42%) JIRA
3 2 (0.95%) Git
General
1 48 (22.75%) Social Skills
2 35 (16.59%) Telecoms
3 21 (9.95%) Analytical Skills
4 19 (9.00%) Public Sector
5 14 (6.64%) Manufacturing
6 11 (5.21%) Documentation Skills
7 9 (4.27%) Legal
8 7 (3.32%) Retail
9 5 (2.37%) Finance
10 4 (1.90%) Automotive
11 3 (1.42%) Inclusion and Diversity
12 2 (0.95%) Banking
12 2 (0.95%) Billing
12 2 (0.95%) Cyber-Physical System
12 2 (0.95%) Military
12 2 (0.95%) Police
13 1 (0.47%) Aviation
13 1 (0.47%) Local Government
13 1 (0.47%) Pharmaceutical
13 1 (0.47%) Polish Language
Job Titles
1 71 (33.65%) Network Engineer
2 49 (23.22%) Senior
3 48 (22.75%) Architect
4 27 (12.80%) Network Architect
4 27 (12.80%) Network Specialist
5 24 (11.37%) Senior Network Engineer
6 19 (9.00%) Designer
7 16 (7.58%) Infrastructure Engineer
7 16 (7.58%) Network Design Specialist
8 13 (6.16%) Design Engineer
8 13 (6.16%) Network Designer
8 13 (6.16%) Security Architect
8 13 (6.16%) Senior Infrastructure Engineer
9 11 (5.21%) Senior Data Warehouse Specialist
9 11 (5.21%) Senior Network Specialist
10 10 (4.74%) Consultant
11 8 (3.79%) Lead
11 8 (3.79%) Network Design Engineer
11 8 (3.79%) RAN Engineer
11 8 (3.79%) Senior Architect
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 41 (19.43%) Terraform
2 9 (4.27%) NETCONF
2 9 (4.27%) YANG
3 6 (2.84%) REST
4 5 (2.37%) 802.1X
5 4 (1.90%) Azure Blueprints
5 4 (1.90%) OpenConfig
5 4 (1.90%) RESTCONF
6 3 (1.42%) Elastic Stack
6 3 (1.42%) Kafka
7 1 (0.47%) eBPF
7 1 (0.47%) YAML
Miscellaneous
1 66 (31.28%) Data Centre
2 43 (20.38%) Hybrid Cloud
3 27 (12.80%) Cloud Native
4 12 (5.69%) Operational Technology
5 10 (4.74%) Management Information System
6 9 (4.27%) IoT
7 8 (3.79%) Public Cloud
8 7 (3.32%) Data Protection Act
8 7 (3.32%) Private Cloud
9 6 (2.84%) Analytical Mindset
10 5 (2.37%) PKI
10 5 (2.37%) Security Posture
11 4 (1.90%) CMDB
11 4 (1.90%) Data Fabric
12 3 (1.42%) Enterprise Software
12 3 (1.42%) Onboarding
12 3 (1.42%) Product Ownership
12 3 (1.42%) SCADA
13 2 (0.95%) EMC VNX
13 2 (0.95%) Enterprise Storage
Operating Systems
1 15 (7.11%) Linux
2 12 (5.69%) Windows
3 8 (3.79%) Ubuntu
3 8 (3.79%) Windows Server
4 4 (1.90%) Alpine Linux
4 4 (1.90%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
5 2 (0.95%) Data ONTAP
Processes & Methodologies
1 42 (19.91%) Zero Trust
2 41 (19.43%) Migration
2 41 (19.43%) Stakeholder Management
3 38 (18.01%) High Availability
3 38 (18.01%) Network Architecture
4 34 (16.11%) Project Delivery
5 33 (15.64%) Infrastructure as Code
6 32 (15.17%) Problem-Solving
7 30 (14.22%) Validation
8 29 (13.74%) DevOps
8 29 (13.74%) Roadmaps
9 28 (13.27%) Technical Leadership
10 25 (11.85%) Load Balancing
11 23 (10.90%) Cybersecurity
11 23 (10.90%) Infrastructure Engineering
12 22 (10.43%) CI/CD
13 17 (8.06%) Capacity Planning
13 17 (8.06%) Cloud Security
13 17 (8.06%) Continuous Improvement
13 17 (8.06%) Stakeholder Engagement
Programming Languages
1 41 (19.43%) Python
2 6 (2.84%) Bicep
3 5 (2.37%) PowerShell
4 2 (0.95%) Bash
5 1 (0.47%) ActionScript
5 1 (0.47%) JavaScript
Qualifications
1 63 (29.86%) Security Cleared
2 56 (26.54%) Cisco Certification
3 42 (19.91%) CCNP
4 40 (18.96%) SC Cleared
5 18 (8.53%) CCIE
6 15 (7.11%) CCNA
6 15 (7.11%) DV Cleared
7 12 (5.69%) Degree
8 11 (5.21%) JNCIE
9 9 (4.27%) AWS Certification
10 8 (3.79%) Azure Certification
11 6 (2.84%) CISSP
11 6 (2.84%) VMware Certified Professional (VCP)
12 5 (2.37%) AWS Certified Solutions Architect
13 4 (1.90%) CISM
14 2 (0.95%) GIAC
14 2 (0.95%) ISSAP
14 2 (0.95%) Microsoft Certification
14 2 (0.95%) NCDA
14 2 (0.95%) NCIE
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 14 (6.64%) NIST
2 12 (5.69%) ISO/IEC 27001
3 5 (2.37%) Cyber Essentials
4 4 (1.90%) Cyber Essentials PLUS
5 3 (1.42%) GxP
5 3 (1.42%) NIST 800
5 3 (1.42%) Sarbanes-Oxley
5 3 (1.42%) SOC 2
6 2 (0.95%) Actionable Recommendations
6 2 (0.95%) Def Stans
6 2 (0.95%) GDPR
6 2 (0.95%) HIPAA
6 2 (0.95%) NCSC
6 2 (0.95%) QA
7 1 (0.47%) Disclosure Scotland
7 1 (0.47%) SLA
System Software
1 19 (9.00%) VMware Infrastructure
2 10 (4.74%) vSphere
3 9 (4.27%) Hyper-V
4 8 (3.79%) Active Directory
4 8 (3.79%) VMware NSX
5 5 (2.37%) Firmware
6 3 (1.42%) VMware ESXi
7 2 (0.95%) EMC RecoverPoint
7 2 (0.95%) FreeRADIUS
7 2 (0.95%) NFS
7 2 (0.95%) SRDF
8 1 (0.47%) Docker
8 1 (0.47%) KVM
Systems Management
1 43 (20.38%) Ansible
2 12 (5.69%) Kubernetes
3 7 (3.32%) FortiGate
4 6 (2.84%) Grafana
4 6 (2.84%) Prometheus
5 3 (1.42%) Check_MK
5 3 (1.42%) Cisco Prime
5 3 (1.42%) SolarWinds Orion
5 3 (1.42%) vCenter Server
6 2 (0.95%) Argo
6 2 (0.95%) EMC NetWorker
6 2 (0.95%) EMC VPLEX
6 2 (0.95%) NetBackup
6 2 (0.95%) SnapMirror
6 2 (0.95%) SnapVault
7 1 (0.47%) Cisco CUCM
7 1 (0.47%) QRadar
7 1 (0.47%) SCCM
7 1 (0.47%) Suricata
7 1 (0.47%) vRealize
Vendors
1 91 (43.13%) Cisco
2 50 (23.70%) Palo Alto
3 39 (18.48%) Fortinet
4 38 (18.01%) F5
5 26 (12.32%) Microsoft
6 24 (11.37%) VMware
7 23 (10.90%) Nokia
8 22 (10.43%) Juniper
9 21 (9.95%) Arista
9 21 (9.95%) Aruba
10 19 (9.00%) Ericsson
11 12 (5.69%) CheckPoint
11 12 (5.69%) Zscaler
12 10 (4.74%) Huawei
13 9 (4.27%) Splunk
14 7 (3.32%) Meraki
15 6 (2.84%) ServiceNow
15 6 (2.84%) SolarWinds
16 5 (2.37%) Google
16 5 (2.37%) Veeam