Network Engineer Contract Job Trends

Network Engineer
UK

The median Network Engineer daily rate in the UK is £475, according to job vacancies posted in the 6 months leading up to 12 September 2026.

The table below compares current contractor rates and summary statistics with the previous two years.

6 months to
12 Sep 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 129 153 97
Rank change year-on-year +24 -56 +11
Contract jobs requiring a Network Engineer 1,120 618 918
As % of all contract jobs in the UK 2.05% 1.87% 2.38%
As % of the Job Titles category 2.22% 2.06% 2.56%
Number of daily rates quoted 674 397 539
10th Percentile £306 £310 £308
25th Percentile £400 £400 £404
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £475 £475 £490
Median % change year-on-year - -3.06% +8.89%
75th Percentile £550 £575 £575
90th Percentile £624 £638 £638
UK excluding London median daily rate £463 £475 £490
% change year-on-year -2.63% -3.06% +15.29%
Number of hourly rates quoted 52 14 20
10th Percentile £28.10 £22.17 £19.85
25th Percentile £57.34 £32.63 £20.14
Median hourly rate £73.50 £49.50 £45.00
Median % change year-on-year +48.48% +10.00% -25.00%
75th Percentile £91.00 £68.38 £67.50
90th Percentile £92.53 £80.98 £75.24
UK excluding London median hourly rate £74.00 £41.50 £35.48
% change year-on-year +78.31% +16.97% -41.84%

All Contract IT Job Roles
UK

For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all contract IT job vacancies. Most job vacancies include a discernible job title that can be normalized. As such, the figures in the second row provide an indication of the number of contract jobs in our overall sample.

Contract vacancies in the UK with a recognized job title 50,382 30,069 35,903
% of contract IT jobs with a recognized job title 92.35% 91.09% 93.06%
Number of daily rates quoted 29,936 18,968 22,276
10th Percentile £325 £280 £300
25th Percentile £425 £400 £413
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £525 £500 £525
Median % change year-on-year +5.00% -4.76% -0.94%
75th Percentile £625 £621 £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 3,746 1,571 1,738
10th Percentile £14.58 £13.75 £14.73
25th Percentile £20.25 £17.04 £20.50
Median hourly rate £42.00 £25.15 £43.00
Median % change year-on-year +67.00% -41.51% -
75th Percentile £67.50 £52.33 £65.00
90th Percentile £78.88 £70.00 £75.00
UK excluding London median hourly rate £42.50 £25.15 £45.59
% change year-on-year +68.99% -44.83% +12.32%

Network Engineer
Job Vacancy Trend

Historical trend showing the proportion of contract IT job postings featuring 'Network Engineer' in the job title relative to all contract IT jobs advertised.

Network Engineer job vacancy trend in the UK

Network Engineer
Daily Rate Trend

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for Network Engineer job vacancies in the UK.

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for Network Engineer job vacancies in the UK

Network Engineer
Daily Rate Histogram

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing Network Engineer over the 6 months to 12 September 2026.

Daily rate histogram for Network Engineer in the UK

Network Engineer
Hourly Rate Trend

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for Network Engineer job vacancies in the UK.

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for Network Engineer job vacancies in the UK

Network Engineer
Hourly Rate Histogram

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing Network Engineer over the 6 months to 12 September 2026.

Hourly rate histogram for Network Engineer in the UK

Network Engineer
Top 18 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 Engineer within the UK over the 6 months to 12 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 +2 914 £475 - 462
UK excluding London -5 642 £463 -2.63% 327
London +7 346 £475 -1.81% 187
North of England +19 252 £492 +1.44% 76
Work from Home -32 219 £469 +1.41% 193
North West +29 174 £500 +5.26% 41
South East -47 108 £463 -7.50% 54
Midlands -17 107 £475 +21.79% 47
West Midlands -17 93 £475 +25.83% 25
Scotland +15 80 £400 -5.88% 22
Yorkshire -15 65 £450 -8.07% 24
South West -15 59 £550 -7.95% 52
East of England -5 42 £450 +17.65% 64
Wales +17 36 £363 -23.68% 15
North East -35 13 £600 - 11
East Midlands -13 12 £500 -16.67% 22
Northern Ireland +1 2 £488 -7.14% 5
Channel Islands -3 2 £600 +36.36%

Network Engineer Skill Set
Top 30 Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities

For the 6 months to 12 September 2026, Network Engineer contract job roles required the following skills and capabilities in order of popularity. The figures indicate the absolute number of co-occurrences and as a proportion of all contract job ads featuring Network Engineer in the job title.

1 612 (54.64%) Cisco
2 442 (39.46%) Firewall
3 310 (27.68%) WAN
4 257 (22.95%) BGP
5 251 (22.41%) Security Cleared
6 247 (22.05%) Network Security
7 241 (21.52%) VPN
8 234 (20.89%) Cisco Certification
8 234 (20.89%) LAN
9 228 (20.36%) Palo Alto
10 211 (18.84%) Wireless
11 182 (16.25%) CCNP
12 171 (15.27%) DNS
13 170 (15.18%) SC Cleared
14 163 (14.55%) OSPF
15 162 (14.46%) F5
16 158 (14.11%) Fortinet
17 155 (13.84%) VLAN
18 144 (12.86%) Python
19 137 (12.23%) Azure
20 133 (11.88%) Migration
21 129 (11.52%) Load Balancing
22 121 (10.80%) Wi-Fi
23 115 (10.27%) SD-WAN
24 105 (9.38%) Problem-Solving
25 100 (8.93%) TCP/IP
26 99 (8.84%) Ansible
27 95 (8.48%) Project Delivery
28 94 (8.39%) Terraform
29 90 (8.04%) CCNA

Network Engineer Skill Set
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 (0.71%) SAS
2 7 (0.63%) Confluence
3 6 (0.54%) Microsoft Exchange
3 6 (0.54%) SharePoint
4 1 (0.089%) ArcGIS
4 1 (0.089%) CMS
4 1 (0.089%) FactoryTalk
4 1 (0.089%) OpenStack
4 1 (0.089%) Skype for Business
Applications
1 14 (1.25%) MS Visio
2 12 (1.07%) Microsoft Office
3 4 (0.36%) Microsoft Excel
Cloud Services
1 137 (12.23%) Azure
2 87 (7.77%) AWS
3 42 (3.75%) GCP
4 37 (3.30%) GitHub
5 26 (2.32%) Azure ExpressRoute
6 17 (1.52%) Microsoft 365
7 13 (1.16%) AWS Direct Connect
8 11 (0.98%) AWS CloudFormation
8 11 (0.98%) Entra ID
9 10 (0.89%) IaaS
10 9 (0.80%) GitHub Actions
10 9 (0.80%) Virtual Private Cloud
11 6 (0.54%) Google Kubernetes Engine
11 6 (0.54%) Nutanix
11 6 (0.54%) OCI
12 5 (0.45%) Amazon CloudWatch
12 5 (0.45%) AWS Lambda
12 5 (0.45%) Azure Sentinel
12 5 (0.45%) Datadog
12 5 (0.45%) Serverless
Communications & Networking
1 442 (39.46%) Firewall
2 310 (27.68%) WAN
3 257 (22.95%) BGP
4 247 (22.05%) Network Security
5 241 (21.52%) VPN
6 234 (20.89%) LAN
7 211 (18.84%) Wireless
8 171 (15.27%) DNS
9 163 (14.55%) OSPF
10 155 (13.84%) VLAN
11 121 (10.80%) Wi-Fi
12 115 (10.27%) SD-WAN
13 100 (8.93%) TCP/IP
14 78 (6.96%) Multicast
15 76 (6.79%) MPLS
16 75 (6.70%) DHCP
17 73 (6.52%) Cisco Nexus
18 68 (6.07%) Cisco ASA
18 68 (6.07%) Cisco ISE
19 57 (5.09%) F5 BIG-IP LTM
Database & Business Intelligence
1 6 (0.54%) GIS
2 3 (0.27%) SQL Server
3 1 (0.089%) ClickHouse
3 1 (0.089%) Oracle Reports
3 1 (0.089%) QGIS
Development Applications
1 31 (2.77%) Git
2 24 (2.14%) JIRA
3 23 (2.05%) Jenkins
4 14 (1.25%) Fiddler
4 14 (1.25%) GitLab
5 6 (0.54%) Sonatype Nexus
6 2 (0.18%) Robot Framework
7 1 (0.089%) Artifactory
7 1 (0.089%) Browser DevTools
General
1 137 (12.23%) Social Skills
2 88 (7.86%) Finance
3 67 (5.98%) Analytical Skills
4 66 (5.89%) Telecoms
5 61 (5.45%) Banking
6 52 (4.64%) Public Sector
7 32 (2.86%) Investment Banking
8 28 (2.50%) Documentation Skills
9 22 (1.96%) Legal
10 21 (1.88%) Retail
11 19 (1.70%) Manufacturing
12 9 (0.80%) Aerospace
12 9 (0.80%) Police
13 8 (0.71%) Financial Institution
14 7 (0.63%) Pharmaceutical
15 6 (0.54%) Inclusion and Diversity
16 5 (0.45%) Organisational Skills
17 4 (0.36%) Automotive
17 4 (0.36%) Local Government
17 4 (0.36%) Military
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 94 (8.39%) Terraform
2 42 (3.75%) 802.1X
3 18 (1.61%) REST
4 11 (0.98%) NETCONF
5 7 (0.63%) JSON
5 7 (0.63%) SAML
5 7 (0.63%) YAML
6 5 (0.45%) XML
7 3 (0.27%) Java RMI
8 2 (0.18%) eBPF
8 2 (0.18%) Jinja
8 2 (0.18%) LDAP
8 2 (0.18%) RESTCONF
8 2 (0.18%) RFC 2544
8 2 (0.18%) YANG
9 1 (0.089%) AWS CDK
9 1 (0.089%) Django
9 1 (0.089%) ModSecurity
9 1 (0.089%) XMPP
Miscellaneous
1 198 (17.68%) Data Centre
2 39 (3.48%) Hybrid Cloud
3 27 (2.41%) PKI
4 25 (2.23%) Driving Licence
5 24 (2.14%) Onboarding
6 23 (2.05%) Cloud Native
7 20 (1.79%) Operational Technology
8 18 (1.61%) Management Information System
9 13 (1.16%) IoT
10 11 (0.98%) Data Protection Act
10 11 (0.98%) Public Cloud
10 11 (0.98%) Security Posture
10 11 (0.98%) Self-Motivation
11 10 (0.89%) Linux Command Line
11 10 (0.89%) SCADA
12 9 (0.80%) Fibre Optics
13 8 (0.71%) Digital Signage
14 7 (0.63%) CCTV
14 7 (0.63%) Distributed Denial-of-Service
14 7 (0.63%) Distributed Systems
Operating Systems
1 67 (5.98%) Windows
2 52 (4.64%) Linux
3 13 (1.16%) Windows Server
4 6 (0.54%) VMS
4 6 (0.54%) zOS
5 5 (0.45%) Ubuntu
5 5 (0.45%) Unix
5 5 (0.45%) Windows Server 2019
6 4 (0.36%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
7 3 (0.27%) Windows Server 2012
8 2 (0.18%) Mac OS
8 2 (0.18%) Windows Server 2016
9 1 (0.089%) Solaris
9 1 (0.089%) Windows 10
9 1 (0.089%) Windows 7
9 1 (0.089%) Windows Server 2008
Processes & Methodologies
1 133 (11.88%) Migration
2 129 (11.52%) Load Balancing
3 105 (9.38%) Problem-Solving
4 95 (8.48%) Project Delivery
5 81 (7.23%) High Availability
5 81 (7.23%) Infrastructure Engineering
6 75 (6.70%) Validation
7 73 (6.52%) ITIL
7 73 (6.52%) Network Design
8 72 (6.43%) Infrastructure as Code
9 66 (5.89%) Change Management
10 56 (5.00%) Network Monitoring
11 50 (4.46%) Zero Trust
12 45 (4.02%) CI/CD
13 42 (3.75%) Continuous Improvement
13 42 (3.75%) Network Segmentation
13 42 (3.75%) Technical Leadership
14 39 (3.48%) Stakeholder Management
15 38 (3.39%) Stakeholder Engagement
16 37 (3.30%) Network Management
Programming Languages
1 144 (12.86%) Python
2 28 (2.50%) Bash
3 19 (1.70%) PowerShell
4 7 (0.63%) ActionScript
4 7 (0.63%) SQL
5 6 (0.54%) C++
6 3 (0.27%) C
6 3 (0.27%) Java
6 3 (0.27%) Perl
7 2 (0.18%) Bicep
7 2 (0.18%) Go
7 2 (0.18%) Groovy
7 2 (0.18%) Search Processing Language
7 2 (0.18%) Shell Script
8 1 (0.089%) Lisp
Qualifications
1 251 (22.41%) Security Cleared
2 234 (20.89%) Cisco Certification
3 182 (16.25%) CCNP
4 170 (15.18%) SC Cleared
5 90 (8.04%) CCNA
6 74 (6.61%) DV Cleared
7 46 (4.11%) CCIE
8 34 (3.04%) Degree
9 14 (1.25%) CISSP
10 11 (0.98%) JNCIS
11 9 (0.80%) Network+ Certification
12 8 (0.71%) CCSE
12 8 (0.71%) JNCIP
13 7 (0.63%) Computer Science Degree
14 6 (0.54%) CCIE Security
14 6 (0.54%) DBS Check
15 5 (0.45%) Azure Certification
15 5 (0.45%) CWNA
15 5 (0.45%) JNCIA
16 4 (0.36%) CCSA
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 23 (2.05%) SLA
2 16 (1.43%) QA
3 12 (1.07%) NIST
4 8 (0.71%) ISO/IEC 27001
5 7 (0.63%) Disclosure Scotland
6 4 (0.36%) PCI DSS
7 2 (0.18%) Data Quality
7 2 (0.18%) GDPR
7 2 (0.18%) JSP 440
7 2 (0.18%) NIST 800
8 1 (0.089%) Actionable Recommendations
8 1 (0.089%) Cyber Essentials
8 1 (0.089%) GRC
8 1 (0.089%) ISO/IEC 20000
System Software
1 64 (5.71%) VMware Infrastructure
2 31 (2.77%) Firmware
3 29 (2.59%) Active Directory
4 27 (2.41%) VMware NSX
5 11 (0.98%) vSphere
6 10 (0.89%) VMware ESXi
7 8 (0.71%) Hyper-V
8 5 (0.45%) Virtual Machines
9 4 (0.36%) Docker
9 4 (0.36%) FreeRADIUS
10 3 (0.27%) Virtual Servers
11 2 (0.18%) Squid
12 1 (0.089%) iptables
12 1 (0.089%) Snort
12 1 (0.089%) Virtual Desktop
Systems Management
1 99 (8.84%) Ansible
2 70 (6.25%) FortiGate
3 29 (2.59%) Kubernetes
4 16 (1.43%) Cisco Prime
5 9 (0.80%) Istio
6 6 (0.54%) Cisco CUCM
6 6 (0.54%) Puppet
7 5 (0.45%) Cilium
7 5 (0.45%) Grafana
8 4 (0.36%) Microsoft Intune
8 4 (0.36%) Nagios
8 4 (0.36%) Packer
8 4 (0.36%) Progress Chef
8 4 (0.36%) Prometheus
8 4 (0.36%) systemd
8 4 (0.36%) vRealize
9 3 (0.27%) Single Sign-On
9 3 (0.27%) TrustSec
10 2 (0.18%) Avamar
10 2 (0.18%) SCCM
Vendors
1 612 (54.64%) Cisco
2 228 (20.36%) Palo Alto
3 162 (14.46%) F5
4 158 (14.11%) Fortinet
5 89 (7.95%) VMware
6 86 (7.68%) Juniper
7 82 (7.32%) CheckPoint
8 75 (6.70%) Meraki
9 74 (6.61%) Arista
10 62 (5.54%) Aruba
11 54 (4.82%) Microsoft
12 50 (4.46%) Zscaler
13 35 (3.13%) SolarWinds
14 26 (2.32%) Nokia
15 25 (2.23%) Blue Coat
15 25 (2.23%) Infoblox
16 23 (2.05%) Google
16 23 (2.05%) ServiceNow
17 18 (1.61%) NetApp
18 17 (1.52%) McAfee