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

6 months to
5 Jun 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 439 368 338
Rank change year-on-year -71 -30 +99
Contract jobs citing Network Design 212 157 260
As % of all contract jobs in the UK 0.43% 0.54% 0.61%
As % of the Processes & Methodologies category 0.51% 0.60% 0.71%
Number of daily rates quoted 143 100 127
10th Percentile £394 £362 £363
25th Percentile £459 £456 £425
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £525 £550 £475
Median % change year-on-year -4.55% +15.79% -9.52%
75th Percentile £588 £625 £600
90th Percentile £675 £689 £638
UK excluding London median daily rate £513 £550 £450
% change year-on-year -6.82% +22.22% -10.00%
Number of hourly rates quoted 6 1 2
10th Percentile £30.25 - £24.43
25th Percentile £40.94 £66.25 £26.19
Median hourly rate £65.50 £67.50 £29.25
Median % change year-on-year -2.96% +130.77% -58.21%
75th Percentile £72.28 £68.75 £32.19
90th Percentile £76.27 - £33.88
UK excluding London median hourly rate £71.00 - £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 41,594 26,332 36,644
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the UK 84.70% 91.01% 85.41%
Number of daily rates quoted 25,970 16,762 23,491
10th Percentile £325 £300 £300
25th Percentile £413 £406 £413
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £513 £510 £525
Median % change year-on-year +0.49% -2.86% -4.55%
75th Percentile £614 £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 2,502 1,133 2,525
10th Percentile £14.68 £14.20 £12.75
25th Percentile £20.00 £17.87 £16.00
Median hourly rate £43.96 £27.53 £36.50
Median % change year-on-year +59.68% -24.58% +1.39%
75th Percentile £68.00 £56.25 £60.75
90th Percentile £81.24 £73.75 £72.50
UK excluding London median hourly rate £45.29 £25.15 £38.12
% change year-on-year +80.09% -34.02% +8.91%

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 5 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 5 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 5 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 -65 179 £525 -4.55% 62
UK excluding London -94 119 £513 -6.82% 49
London -43 62 £525 +9.38% 18
Work from Home -24 58 £516 -1.76% 26
South East -61 43 £500 -14.89% 19
North of England -80 34 £575 +15.00% 8
North West -42 23 £575 +21.05% 5
Scotland +4 15 £425 +6.52% 6
South West -25 15 £565 -11.72% 7
Yorkshire -46 11 £519 +3.80% 1
Midlands -50 7 £425 -22.73% 6
West Midlands -54 7 £425 -22.73% 5
North East -23 6 £650 +18.18% 2
East of England - 6 £525 - 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 8 (3.77%) OpenStack
2 3 (1.42%) Confluence
3 2 (0.94%) Apache
3 2 (0.94%) CloudStack
3 2 (0.94%) Microsoft Exchange
3 2 (0.94%) Skype for Business
4 1 (0.47%) ArcGIS
4 1 (0.47%) Smallworld
Applications
1 9 (4.25%) MS Visio
2 6 (2.83%) Microsoft Office
2 6 (2.83%) Microsoft PowerPoint
3 4 (1.89%) Microsoft Excel
4 2 (0.94%) AutoCAD
5 1 (0.47%) Autodesk Inventor
5 1 (0.47%) MicroStation
Business Applications
1 2 (0.94%) DELMIA
Cloud Services
1 63 (29.72%) Azure
2 49 (23.11%) AWS
3 14 (6.60%) OCI
4 9 (4.25%) SaaS
5 8 (3.77%) GCP
6 7 (3.30%) GitHub
7 6 (2.83%) Azure ExpressRoute
7 6 (2.83%) IaaS
8 5 (2.36%) Azure Sentinel
8 5 (2.36%) Entra ID
9 3 (1.42%) AWS Control Tower
9 3 (1.42%) PaaS
10 2 (0.94%) Azure Storage
10 2 (0.94%) Datadog
10 2 (0.94%) GitHub Actions
10 2 (0.94%) IBM Watson
10 2 (0.94%) Microsoft 365
10 2 (0.94%) Nutanix
10 2 (0.94%) OpenShift
11 1 (0.47%) AWS CloudFormation
Communications & Networking
1 87 (41.04%) Firewall
2 75 (35.38%) WAN
3 60 (28.30%) BGP
4 51 (24.06%) OSPF
5 41 (19.34%) VPN
6 38 (17.92%) LAN
6 38 (17.92%) SD-WAN
7 35 (16.51%) Network Security
8 32 (15.09%) VLAN
9 31 (14.62%) Wi-Fi
10 29 (13.68%) VXLAN
11 23 (10.85%) MPLS
12 22 (10.38%) 5G
12 22 (10.38%) Ethernet VPN
13 19 (8.96%) F5 BIG-IP LTM
14 17 (8.02%) 4G
14 17 (8.02%) BIG-IP
14 17 (8.02%) DNS
14 17 (8.02%) Radio Access Network
15 16 (7.55%) TCP/IP
Database & Business Intelligence
1 1 (0.47%) GIS
Development Applications
1 12 (5.66%) GitLab
2 5 (2.36%) JIRA
3 3 (1.42%) Jenkins
4 1 (0.47%) Sonatype Nexus
General
1 44 (20.75%) Social Skills
2 25 (11.79%) Telecoms
3 21 (9.91%) Analytical Skills
4 20 (9.43%) Public Sector
5 18 (8.49%) Legal
6 14 (6.60%) Finance
7 10 (4.72%) Documentation Skills
8 4 (1.89%) Banking
8 4 (1.89%) Police
9 3 (1.42%) Manufacturing
9 3 (1.42%) Retail
10 2 (0.94%) Inclusion and Diversity
10 2 (0.94%) Influencing Skills
10 2 (0.94%) Military
10 2 (0.94%) Retail Banking
11 1 (0.47%) Aviation
11 1 (0.47%) German Language
11 1 (0.47%) Polish Language
11 1 (0.47%) Presentation Skills
Job Titles
1 62 (29.25%) Network Engineer
2 48 (22.64%) Senior
3 47 (22.17%) Architect
4 32 (15.09%) Network Specialist
5 30 (14.15%) Network Architect
6 26 (12.26%) Designer
7 22 (10.38%) Network Design Specialist
8 20 (9.43%) Network Designer
9 17 (8.02%) Senior Network Engineer
10 16 (7.55%) Infrastructure Engineer
11 13 (6.13%) Senior Infrastructure Engineer
12 11 (5.19%) Design Engineer
13 10 (4.72%) Network Design Engineer
14 9 (4.25%) SC Cleared Network Engineer
14 9 (4.25%) Security Architect
14 9 (4.25%) Senior Designer
14 9 (4.25%) Senior Network Designer
15 8 (3.77%) Senior Data Warehouse Specialist
15 8 (3.77%) Senior Network Specialist
15 8 (3.77%) Technical Architect
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 7 (3.30%) 802.1X
1 7 (3.30%) NETCONF
1 7 (3.30%) YANG
2 6 (2.83%) REST
3 4 (1.89%) Azure Blueprints
3 4 (1.89%) Kafka
4 2 (0.94%) Django
4 2 (0.94%) Elastic Stack
4 2 (0.94%) OpenConfig
4 2 (0.94%) RESTCONF
Miscellaneous
1 61 (28.77%) Data Centre
2 34 (16.04%) Hybrid Cloud
3 26 (12.26%) Cloud Native
4 14 (6.60%) Management Information System
5 9 (4.25%) Data Protection Act
6 6 (2.83%) PKI
7 5 (2.36%) Security Posture
8 4 (1.89%) CMDB
8 4 (1.89%) IoT
8 4 (1.89%) Operational Technology
9 3 (1.42%) CCTV
9 3 (1.42%) Distributed Denial-of-Service
9 3 (1.42%) Public Cloud
10 2 (0.94%) Analytical Mindset
10 2 (0.94%) EMC VMAX
10 2 (0.94%) EMC VNX
10 2 (0.94%) Enterprise Storage
10 2 (0.94%) Greenfield Project
10 2 (0.94%) Hedge funds
10 2 (0.94%) Private Cloud
Operating Systems
1 17 (8.02%) Linux
1 17 (8.02%) Windows
2 12 (5.66%) Windows Server
3 6 (2.83%) Ubuntu
4 4 (1.89%) Alpine Linux
4 4 (1.89%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
5 2 (0.94%) Data ONTAP
5 2 (0.94%) Windows Server 2016
Processes & Methodologies
1 41 (19.34%) Network Architecture
2 37 (17.45%) High Availability
3 35 (16.51%) Problem-Solving
4 32 (15.09%) Infrastructure as Code
5 31 (14.62%) Migration
6 29 (13.68%) Zero Trust
7 26 (12.26%) DevOps
7 26 (12.26%) Load Balancing
8 25 (11.79%) CI/CD
9 24 (11.32%) Roadmaps
10 20 (9.43%) Infrastructure Engineering
10 20 (9.43%) Project Delivery
11 17 (8.02%) Stakeholder Engagement
11 17 (8.02%) Stakeholder Management
11 17 (8.02%) Validation
12 16 (7.55%) Continuous Improvement
12 16 (7.55%) Cybersecurity
13 15 (7.08%) Capacity Planning
13 15 (7.08%) Technical Leadership
14 14 (6.60%) Network Segmentation
Programming Languages
1 36 (16.98%) Python
2 10 (4.72%) PowerShell
3 7 (3.30%) Bicep
4 5 (2.36%) Bash
5 2 (0.94%) SQL
6 1 (0.47%) ActionScript
Qualifications
1 77 (36.32%) Security Cleared
2 57 (26.89%) Cisco Certification
3 48 (22.64%) SC Cleared
4 43 (20.28%) CCNP
5 23 (10.85%) DV Cleared
6 19 (8.96%) CCIE
7 13 (6.13%) CCNA
7 13 (6.13%) Degree
8 11 (5.19%) Azure Certification
9 10 (4.72%) AWS Certification
10 9 (4.25%) JNCIE
11 6 (2.83%) JNCIS
11 6 (2.83%) VMware Certified Professional (VCP)
12 5 (2.36%) AWS Certified Solutions Architect
12 5 (2.36%) CISSP
13 3 (1.42%) CEH
13 3 (1.42%) CISM
13 3 (1.42%) RIBA
14 2 (0.94%) NCDA
14 2 (0.94%) VCDX
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 12 (5.66%) NIST
2 5 (2.36%) ISO/IEC 27001
3 3 (1.42%) JSP 440
3 3 (1.42%) NCSC
3 3 (1.42%) SLA
4 2 (0.94%) GDPR
4 2 (0.94%) HIPAA
4 2 (0.94%) NIST 800
4 2 (0.94%) QA
4 2 (0.94%) SOC 2
5 1 (0.47%) Actionable Recommendations
5 1 (0.47%) Cyber Essentials
5 1 (0.47%) Def Stans
5 1 (0.47%) Disclosure Scotland
System Software
1 20 (9.43%) VMware Infrastructure
2 12 (5.66%) VMware NSX
3 10 (4.72%) Hyper-V
4 9 (4.25%) Active Directory
5 6 (2.83%) vSphere
6 3 (1.42%) Firmware
6 3 (1.42%) KVM
7 2 (0.94%) EMC RecoverPoint
7 2 (0.94%) NFS
7 2 (0.94%) SRDF
7 2 (0.94%) VMware ESXi
8 1 (0.47%) Docker
8 1 (0.47%) RHEV
8 1 (0.47%) Xen
Systems Management
1 35 (16.51%) Ansible
2 29 (13.68%) Terraform
3 13 (6.13%) FortiGate
4 10 (4.72%) Kubernetes
5 5 (2.36%) Nagios
6 4 (1.89%) Grafana
6 4 (1.89%) Prometheus
7 3 (1.42%) vCenter Server
8 2 (0.94%) Active Directory Federation Services
8 2 (0.94%) Argo
8 2 (0.94%) Check_MK
8 2 (0.94%) Cisco Prime
8 2 (0.94%) EMC NetWorker
8 2 (0.94%) EMC VPLEX
8 2 (0.94%) McAfee ePO
8 2 (0.94%) NetBackup
8 2 (0.94%) Network Intrusion Detection System
8 2 (0.94%) SCCM
8 2 (0.94%) SnapMirror
8 2 (0.94%) SnapVault
Vendors
1 95 (44.81%) Cisco
2 49 (23.11%) Palo Alto
3 34 (16.04%) F5
4 32 (15.09%) Fortinet
5 29 (13.68%) Microsoft
6 27 (12.74%) VMware
7 26 (12.26%) Juniper
8 25 (11.79%) Aruba
9 19 (8.96%) Arista
10 17 (8.02%) Nokia
11 14 (6.60%) CheckPoint
11 14 (6.60%) Ericsson
12 13 (6.13%) Huawei
13 11 (5.19%) Meraki
13 11 (5.19%) SolarWinds
14 7 (3.30%) Splunk
14 7 (3.30%) Zscaler
15 5 (2.36%) Ekahau
16 4 (1.89%) CrowdStrike
16 4 (1.89%) Okta