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 17 June 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
17 Jun 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 428 370 351
Rank change year-on-year -58 -19 +84
Contract jobs citing Network Design 219 163 254
As % of all contract jobs in the UK 0.44% 0.55% 0.58%
As % of the Processes & Methodologies category 0.51% 0.60% 0.69%
Number of daily rates quoted 146 106 122
10th Percentile £388 £362 £363
25th Percentile £441 £441 £425
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £525 £550 £475
Median % change year-on-year -4.55% +15.79% -9.52%
75th Percentile £597 £625 £597
90th Percentile £675 £694 £638
UK excluding London median daily rate £515 £550 £450
% change year-on-year -6.36% +22.22% -10.00%
Number of hourly rates quoted 7 1 2
10th Percentile £31.45 - £24.43
25th Percentile £45.63 £66.25 £26.19
Median hourly rate £71.00 £67.50 £29.25
Median % change year-on-year +5.19% +130.77% -58.21%
75th Percentile £72.77 £68.75 £32.19
90th Percentile £75.80 - £33.88
UK excluding London median hourly rate £71.77 - £35.00
% change year-on-year - - -50.00%

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 42,679 27,009 37,072
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the UK 84.81% 91.00% 85.05%
Number of daily rates quoted 26,607 17,137 23,609
10th Percentile £325 £300 £300
25th Percentile £413 £406 £413
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £513 £508 £525
Median % change year-on-year +0.99% -3.33% -4.55%
75th Percentile £619 £625 £638
90th Percentile £725 £738 £750
UK excluding London median daily rate £500 £475 £500
% change year-on-year +5.26% -5.00% -
Number of hourly rates quoted 2,567 1,242 2,598
10th Percentile £14.82 £14.20 £12.75
25th Percentile £20.09 £17.87 £16.03
Median hourly rate £43.96 £26.27 £37.34
Median % change year-on-year +67.37% -29.66% +6.69%
75th Percentile £68.00 £55.25 £61.30
90th Percentile £81.25 £73.75 £72.50
UK excluding London median hourly rate £44.50 £25.15 £38.12
% change year-on-year +76.94% -34.02% +17.29%

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 17 June 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 17 June 2026.

Hourly rate histogram for Network Design in the UK

Network Design
Top 15 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 17 June 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 -71 186 £525 -4.55% 65
UK excluding London -87 123 £515 -6.36% 52
London -33 65 £525 +9.38% 20
Work from Home -37 60 £500 -4.76% 21
South East -53 45 £500 -13.04% 16
North of England -71 34 £575 +21.05% 11
North West -46 23 £575 +21.05% 8
Scotland -2 15 £450 +12.78% 3
South West -23 15 £565 -11.72% 9
West Midlands -51 10 £413 -25.00% 6
Yorkshire -52 10 £519 +3.80% 2
Midlands -54 10 £413 -25.00% 8
North East -26 7 £650 +18.18% 1
East of England -24 5 £525 +0.96% 3
Northern Ireland - 2 £600 -

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 10 (4.57%) OpenStack
2 3 (1.37%) Confluence
3 2 (0.91%) Apache
3 2 (0.91%) CloudStack
3 2 (0.91%) Microsoft Exchange
3 2 (0.91%) Skype for Business
4 1 (0.46%) ArcGIS
4 1 (0.46%) Smallworld
Applications
1 7 (3.20%) MS Visio
2 6 (2.74%) Microsoft PowerPoint
3 5 (2.28%) Microsoft Office
4 4 (1.83%) Microsoft Excel
5 3 (1.37%) AutoCAD
6 1 (0.46%) Autodesk Inventor
6 1 (0.46%) MicroStation
Business Applications
1 2 (0.91%) DELMIA
Cloud Services
1 72 (32.88%) Azure
2 58 (26.48%) AWS
3 15 (6.85%) OCI
4 10 (4.57%) GCP
4 10 (4.57%) SaaS
5 8 (3.65%) GitHub
6 7 (3.20%) Azure ExpressRoute
7 6 (2.74%) IaaS
8 5 (2.28%) Azure Sentinel
8 5 (2.28%) Entra ID
9 3 (1.37%) AWS Control Tower
9 3 (1.37%) PaaS
10 2 (0.91%) Azure Storage
10 2 (0.91%) Datadog
10 2 (0.91%) GitHub Actions
10 2 (0.91%) IBM Watson
10 2 (0.91%) Microsoft 365
10 2 (0.91%) Nutanix
10 2 (0.91%) OpenShift
11 1 (0.46%) AWS CloudFormation
Communications & Networking
1 89 (40.64%) Firewall
2 75 (34.25%) WAN
3 64 (29.22%) BGP
4 52 (23.74%) OSPF
5 40 (18.26%) VPN
6 39 (17.81%) SD-WAN
7 37 (16.89%) LAN
8 36 (16.44%) Network Security
9 31 (14.16%) VLAN
10 30 (13.70%) VXLAN
10 30 (13.70%) Wi-Fi
11 27 (12.33%) MPLS
12 24 (10.96%) Ethernet VPN
13 22 (10.05%) 5G
14 21 (9.59%) F5 BIG-IP LTM
15 18 (8.22%) 4G
15 18 (8.22%) BIG-IP
16 17 (7.76%) DNS
16 17 (7.76%) Radio Access Network
17 16 (7.31%) Wireless
Database & Business Intelligence
1 3 (1.37%) Metadata
2 1 (0.46%) GIS
Development Applications
1 13 (5.94%) GitLab
2 5 (2.28%) JIRA
3 3 (1.37%) Jenkins
4 1 (0.46%) Git
4 1 (0.46%) Sonatype Nexus
General
1 51 (23.29%) Social Skills
2 23 (10.50%) Telecoms
3 22 (10.05%) Analytical Skills
4 19 (8.68%) Legal
4 19 (8.68%) Public Sector
5 14 (6.39%) Finance
6 11 (5.02%) Documentation Skills
7 4 (1.83%) Banking
7 4 (1.83%) Manufacturing
7 4 (1.83%) Police
7 4 (1.83%) Retail
8 3 (1.37%) Inclusion and Diversity
9 2 (0.91%) Influencing Skills
9 2 (0.91%) Military
9 2 (0.91%) Retail Banking
10 1 (0.46%) Aviation
10 1 (0.46%) German Language
10 1 (0.46%) Polish Language
10 1 (0.46%) Presentation Skills
Job Titles
1 63 (28.77%) Network Engineer
2 50 (22.83%) Architect
3 46 (21.00%) Senior
4 32 (14.61%) Network Architect
5 31 (14.16%) Network Specialist
6 23 (10.50%) Designer
7 21 (9.59%) Network Design Specialist
8 18 (8.22%) Senior Network Engineer
9 17 (7.76%) Network Designer
10 16 (7.31%) Infrastructure Engineer
11 13 (5.94%) Senior Infrastructure Engineer
12 8 (3.65%) Lead
12 8 (3.65%) SC Cleared Network Engineer
12 8 (3.65%) Security Architect
12 8 (3.65%) Senior Data Warehouse Specialist
12 8 (3.65%) Senior Network Specialist
12 8 (3.65%) Technical Architect
13 7 (3.20%) Consultant
13 7 (3.20%) Design Engineer
13 7 (3.20%) IP Architect
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 9 (4.11%) NETCONF
1 9 (4.11%) YANG
2 8 (3.65%) 802.1X
2 8 (3.65%) REST
3 4 (1.83%) Azure Blueprints
3 4 (1.83%) Kafka
4 2 (0.91%) Django
4 2 (0.91%) Elastic Stack
4 2 (0.91%) OpenConfig
4 2 (0.91%) RESTCONF
Miscellaneous
1 62 (28.31%) Data Centre
2 41 (18.72%) Hybrid Cloud
3 29 (13.24%) Cloud Native
4 15 (6.85%) Management Information System
5 8 (3.65%) Data Protection Act
6 6 (2.74%) Operational Technology
6 6 (2.74%) PKI
7 5 (2.28%) Security Posture
8 4 (1.83%) CMDB
8 4 (1.83%) IoT
9 3 (1.37%) CCTV
9 3 (1.37%) Data Fabric
9 3 (1.37%) Distributed Denial-of-Service
9 3 (1.37%) Product Ownership
9 3 (1.37%) Public Cloud
9 3 (1.37%) SCADA
10 2 (0.91%) Enterprise Software
10 2 (0.91%) Enterprise Storage
10 2 (0.91%) Hedge funds
10 2 (0.91%) Replication
Operating Systems
1 18 (8.22%) Linux
2 17 (7.76%) Windows
3 12 (5.48%) Windows Server
4 6 (2.74%) Ubuntu
5 4 (1.83%) Alpine Linux
5 4 (1.83%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
6 2 (0.91%) Data ONTAP
6 2 (0.91%) Windows Server 2016
Processes & Methodologies
1 47 (21.46%) Network Architecture
2 37 (16.89%) High Availability
2 37 (16.89%) Problem-Solving
3 36 (16.44%) Infrastructure as Code
4 31 (14.16%) Migration
4 31 (14.16%) Zero Trust
5 30 (13.70%) Roadmaps
6 29 (13.24%) DevOps
7 27 (12.33%) Load Balancing
8 26 (11.87%) CI/CD
9 22 (10.05%) Infrastructure Engineering
9 22 (10.05%) Stakeholder Management
10 21 (9.59%) Continuous Improvement
10 21 (9.59%) Project Delivery
10 21 (9.59%) Validation
11 20 (9.13%) Stakeholder Engagement
12 18 (8.22%) Cybersecurity
13 16 (7.31%) Technical Leadership
14 15 (6.85%) Capacity Planning
14 15 (6.85%) Network Segmentation
Programming Languages
1 40 (18.26%) Python
2 10 (4.57%) PowerShell
3 7 (3.20%) Bicep
4 5 (2.28%) Bash
5 2 (0.91%) SQL
6 1 (0.46%) ActionScript
Qualifications
1 74 (33.79%) Security Cleared
2 57 (26.03%) Cisco Certification
3 47 (21.46%) SC Cleared
4 41 (18.72%) CCNP
5 22 (10.05%) DV Cleared
6 20 (9.13%) CCIE
7 14 (6.39%) Degree
8 11 (5.02%) AWS Certification
8 11 (5.02%) Azure Certification
8 11 (5.02%) CCNA
8 11 (5.02%) JNCIE
9 5 (2.28%) AWS Certified Solutions Architect
9 5 (2.28%) CISSP
9 5 (2.28%) VMware Certified Professional (VCP)
10 4 (1.83%) CISM
10 4 (1.83%) JNCIS
11 3 (1.37%) CEH
11 3 (1.37%) RIBA
12 2 (0.91%) ISSAP
12 2 (0.91%) Project+ Certification
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 12 (5.48%) NIST
2 5 (2.28%) ISO/IEC 27001
3 3 (1.37%) JSP 440
3 3 (1.37%) NCSC
3 3 (1.37%) SLA
4 2 (0.91%) GDPR
4 2 (0.91%) HIPAA
4 2 (0.91%) NIST 800
4 2 (0.91%) QA
4 2 (0.91%) SOC 2
5 1 (0.46%) Actionable Recommendations
5 1 (0.46%) Cyber Essentials
5 1 (0.46%) Def Stans
5 1 (0.46%) Disclosure Scotland
System Software
1 18 (8.22%) VMware Infrastructure
2 11 (5.02%) VMware NSX
3 10 (4.57%) Hyper-V
4 9 (4.11%) Active Directory
5 6 (2.74%) vSphere
6 3 (1.37%) Firmware
7 2 (0.91%) EMC RecoverPoint
7 2 (0.91%) KVM
7 2 (0.91%) NFS
7 2 (0.91%) SRDF
7 2 (0.91%) VMware ESXi
8 1 (0.46%) Docker
Systems Management
1 40 (18.26%) Ansible
2 35 (15.98%) Terraform
3 13 (5.94%) FortiGate
4 10 (4.57%) Kubernetes
5 5 (2.28%) Grafana
5 5 (2.28%) Prometheus
6 3 (1.37%) Nagios
6 3 (1.37%) vCenter Server
7 2 (0.91%) Active Directory Federation Services
7 2 (0.91%) Argo
7 2 (0.91%) Check_MK
7 2 (0.91%) Cisco Prime
7 2 (0.91%) EMC NetWorker
7 2 (0.91%) EMC VPLEX
7 2 (0.91%) McAfee ePO
7 2 (0.91%) NetBackup
7 2 (0.91%) Network Intrusion Detection System
7 2 (0.91%) SCCM
7 2 (0.91%) SnapMirror
7 2 (0.91%) SnapVault
Vendors
1 89 (40.64%) Cisco
2 52 (23.74%) Palo Alto
3 35 (15.98%) F5
4 31 (14.16%) Fortinet
5 29 (13.24%) Microsoft
6 24 (10.96%) Aruba
6 24 (10.96%) Juniper
6 24 (10.96%) VMware
7 21 (9.59%) Arista
8 16 (7.31%) Nokia
9 14 (6.39%) CheckPoint
9 14 (6.39%) Ericsson
10 13 (5.94%) Huawei
11 9 (4.11%) Meraki
11 9 (4.11%) SolarWinds
12 8 (3.65%) Zscaler
13 7 (3.20%) Splunk
14 5 (2.28%) EMC
14 5 (2.28%) Google
15 4 (1.83%) Qualys