Network Security Contract Job Trends

Network Security
UK

The table below provides summary statistics and contractor rates for jobs requiring Network Security skills. It covers contract job vacancies from the 6 months leading up to 25 April 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
25 Apr 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 159 142 174
Rank change year-on-year -17 +32 +18
Contract jobs citing Network Security 787 581 620
As % of all contract jobs in the UK 1.69% 1.97% 1.42%
As % of the Communications & Networking category 17.49% 15.46% 10.87%
Number of daily rates quoted 536 351 428
10th Percentile £356 £363 £379
25th Percentile £425 £425 £464
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £521 £575
Median % change year-on-year -3.94% -9.48% -
75th Percentile £600 £613 £661
90th Percentile £700 £688 £750
UK excluding London median daily rate £500 £490 £575
% change year-on-year +2.04% -14.78% +5.75%
Number of hourly rates quoted 16 12 17
10th Percentile £32.00 £20.70 -
25th Percentile £42.13 £40.50 £7.43
Median hourly rate £65.50 £62.84 £19.00
Median % change year-on-year +4.24% +230.72% -63.55%
75th Percentile £74.07 £81.35 £41.25
90th Percentile £75.00 £82.03 -
UK excluding London median hourly rate £65.50 £80.68 £7.43
% change year-on-year -18.81% +985.80% -83.88%

All Communications and Computer Networking Skills
UK

Network Security falls under the Communications and Computer Networking category. For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all contract job vacancies requiring communications or computer networking skills.

Contract vacancies with a requirement for communications or computer networking skills 4,501 3,759 5,705
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the UK 9.65% 12.74% 13.07%
Number of daily rates quoted 2,813 2,321 3,431
10th Percentile £250 £213 £205
25th Percentile £400 £363 £350
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £490 £490
Median % change year-on-year +2.04% - -5.77%
75th Percentile £588 £600 £600
90th Percentile £675 £675 £700
UK excluding London median daily rate £475 £465 £475
% change year-on-year +2.15% -2.11% -
Number of hourly rates quoted 211 173 427
10th Percentile £16.01 £14.99 £13.71
25th Percentile £20.79 £20.30 £17.69
Median hourly rate £42.25 £37.50 £40.00
Median % change year-on-year +12.67% -6.25% +110.53%
75th Percentile £70.00 £61.25 £62.25
90th Percentile £75.00 £75.00 £67.21
UK excluding London median hourly rate £52.50 £27.50 £46.95
% change year-on-year +90.91% -41.42% +153.76%

Network Security
Job Vacancy Trend

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

Network Security job vacancy trend in the UK

Network Security
Daily Rate Trend

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

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

Network Security
Daily Rate Histogram

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing Network Security over the 6 months to 25 April 2026.

Daily rate histogram for Network Security in the UK

Network Security
Hourly Rate Trend

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

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

Network Security
Hourly Rate Histogram

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing Network Security over the 6 months to 25 April 2026.

Hourly rate histogram for Network Security in the UK

Network Security
Top 17 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 Security within the UK over the 6 months to 25 April 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 -14 683 £500 -7.41% 179
UK excluding London -9 400 £500 +2.04% 155
London -24 281 £525 -4.55% 69
Work from Home +18 220 £525 +5.00% 120
North of England -7 136 £475 -5.00% 42
South East -21 110 £500 +2.04% 52
North West +2 85 £481 -3.75% 26
Midlands -17 70 £500 -13.04% 20
Yorkshire -29 52 £436 +8.94% 11
West Midlands -30 51 £500 -9.09% 15
East of England -31 35 £525 -6.67% 13
South West -41 30 £550 - 8
Scotland +8 28 £475 +11.76% 8
East Midlands -19 18 £638 -1.92% 5
Wales -14 4 £600 +106.90% 7
North East -17 2 £538 -14.00% 5
Northern Ireland - 1 £500 - 8

Network Security
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 18 (2.29%) Confluence
2 11 (1.40%) Microsoft Exchange
3 6 (0.76%) Apache
4 4 (0.51%) SharePoint
5 1 (0.13%) nginx
5 1 (0.13%) Skype for Business
Applications
1 21 (2.67%) Microsoft Office
2 11 (1.40%) MS Visio
3 4 (0.51%) Microsoft PowerPoint
4 1 (0.13%) Microsoft Excel
Business Applications
1 5 (0.64%) SAP S/4HANA
Cloud Services
1 244 (31.00%) Azure
2 167 (21.22%) AWS
3 94 (11.94%) GCP
4 59 (7.50%) Entra ID
5 35 (4.45%) GitHub
6 30 (3.81%) GitHub Actions
7 28 (3.56%) Azure DevOps
7 28 (3.56%) Azure Sentinel
8 21 (2.67%) Azure ExpressRoute
9 20 (2.54%) Azure Key Vault
10 19 (2.41%) Azure AKS
11 18 (2.29%) AWS CloudFormation
12 17 (2.16%) Azure Monitor
12 17 (2.16%) Virtual Private Cloud
13 15 (1.91%) Microsoft 365
14 14 (1.78%) Google Kubernetes Engine
15 13 (1.65%) Akamai
15 13 (1.65%) AWS Direct Connect
15 13 (1.65%) Serverless
16 12 (1.52%) Amazon S3
Communications & Networking
1 367 (46.63%) Firewall
2 154 (19.57%) VPN
3 134 (17.03%) WAN
4 107 (13.60%) LAN
5 98 (12.45%) BGP
6 91 (11.56%) DNS
7 87 (11.05%) OSPF
8 76 (9.66%) SD-WAN
9 74 (9.40%) VLAN
10 59 (7.50%) TCP/IP
11 55 (6.99%) Wireless
12 44 (5.59%) MPLS
13 43 (5.46%) DHCP
14 38 (4.83%) Wi-Fi
15 37 (4.70%) Cisco ASA
16 34 (4.32%) Internet
17 33 (4.19%) F5 BIG-IP LTM
18 31 (3.94%) Cisco ISE
18 31 (3.94%) IPsec
19 29 (3.68%) SSL
Database & Business Intelligence
1 8 (1.02%) Azure SQL Database
2 6 (0.76%) Amazon RDS
3 5 (0.64%) InfluxDB
3 5 (0.64%) Relational Database
3 5 (0.64%) SQL Server
4 3 (0.38%) Amazon Athena
4 3 (0.38%) Data Lake
4 3 (0.38%) Power BI
5 2 (0.25%) Oracle Database
5 2 (0.25%) SQL Server Integration Services
Development Applications
1 32 (4.07%) JIRA
2 23 (2.92%) Jenkins
3 16 (2.03%) GitLab
4 9 (1.14%) Git
5 8 (1.02%) Sonatype Nexus
6 7 (0.89%) Snyk
7 5 (0.64%) Browser DevTools
8 2 (0.25%) Postman
9 1 (0.13%) Burp Suite
9 1 (0.13%) Claude Code
9 1 (0.13%) JUnit
9 1 (0.13%) SoapUI
9 1 (0.13%) Zephyr
General
1 185 (23.51%) Social Skills
2 110 (13.98%) Finance
3 78 (9.91%) Analytical Skills
4 63 (8.01%) Public Sector
5 37 (4.70%) Banking
6 32 (4.07%) Documentation Skills
7 27 (3.43%) Telecoms
8 20 (2.54%) Financial Institution
9 11 (1.40%) Legal
10 8 (1.02%) Inclusion and Diversity
10 8 (1.02%) Manufacturing
11 7 (0.89%) Organisational Skills
12 5 (0.64%) Local Government
13 4 (0.51%) Electronics
13 4 (0.51%) Influencing Skills
13 4 (0.51%) Law
13 4 (0.51%) Military
14 3 (0.38%) Pharmaceutical
14 3 (0.38%) Police
14 3 (0.38%) Presentation Skills
Job Titles
1 194 (24.65%) Network Engineer
2 175 (22.24%) Architect
3 96 (12.20%) Security Engineer
4 88 (11.18%) Security Architect
5 66 (8.39%) Senior
6 60 (7.62%) Network Architect
7 47 (5.97%) Network Security Engineer
8 27 (3.43%) Infrastructure Engineer
9 26 (3.30%) Analyst
9 26 (3.30%) Lead
10 25 (3.18%) Consultant
10 25 (3.18%) Network Security Architect
11 21 (2.67%) SC Cleared Network Engineer
12 20 (2.54%) Azure Architect
12 20 (2.54%) Project Manager
12 20 (2.54%) Senior Network Engineer
13 19 (2.41%) Solutions Architect
14 18 (2.29%) Cloud Architect
14 18 (2.29%) Cloud Engineer
15 17 (2.16%) Security Specialist
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 28 (3.56%) 802.1X
2 13 (1.65%) LDAP
3 10 (1.27%) SAML
4 8 (1.02%) Node.js
5 6 (0.76%) .NET
5 6 (0.76%) REST
6 5 (0.64%) .NET Core
6 5 (0.64%) AngularJS
6 5 (0.64%) OAuth
6 5 (0.64%) PyTorch
6 5 (0.64%) RabbitMQ
6 5 (0.64%) React
6 5 (0.64%) TensorFlow
7 4 (0.51%) ARM Templates
7 4 (0.51%) AWS CDK
7 4 (0.51%) HTML
7 4 (0.51%) OpenID
8 3 (0.38%) CSS
8 3 (0.38%) Elastic Stack
8 3 (0.38%) Lambda Expressions
Miscellaneous
1 112 (14.23%) Data Centre
2 44 (5.59%) Cloud Native
3 43 (5.46%) Security Posture
4 39 (4.96%) Hybrid Cloud
5 30 (3.81%) Onboarding
6 27 (3.43%) PKI
7 26 (3.30%) IoT
7 26 (3.30%) Public Cloud
8 25 (3.18%) Management Information System
9 23 (2.92%) Data Protection Act
10 22 (2.80%) Operational Technology
11 19 (2.41%) Cyber Threat
11 19 (2.41%) Distributed Denial-of-Service
12 16 (2.03%) Product Ownership
13 14 (1.78%) Virtual Team
14 12 (1.52%) Analytical Mindset
14 12 (1.52%) Cyber Security Posture
14 12 (1.52%) Security Operations Centre
15 9 (1.14%) Clustering
16 8 (1.02%) Self-Motivation
Operating Systems
1 79 (10.04%) Windows
2 65 (8.26%) Linux
3 28 (3.56%) Windows Server
4 13 (1.65%) Unix
5 10 (1.27%) VMS
6 7 (0.89%) Mac OS
7 6 (0.76%) Ubuntu
8 5 (0.64%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
8 5 (0.64%) Windows 10
9 3 (0.38%) SUSE
10 1 (0.13%) Android
10 1 (0.13%) Data ONTAP
Processes & Methodologies
1 166 (21.09%) Cybersecurity
2 127 (16.14%) Cloud Security
3 119 (15.12%) Zero Trust
4 114 (14.49%) Security Architecture
5 108 (13.72%) Problem-Solving
6 104 (13.21%) Migration
7 99 (12.58%) CI/CD
7 99 (12.58%) Infrastructure as Code
8 96 (12.20%) SIEM
9 95 (12.07%) DevOps
10 76 (9.66%) Continuous Improvement
10 76 (9.66%) High Availability
10 76 (9.66%) Threat Modelling
11 72 (9.15%) Incident Response
11 72 (9.15%) Network Segmentation
12 70 (8.89%) Change Management
13 66 (8.39%) Agile
13 66 (8.39%) Stakeholder Management
14 64 (8.13%) Identity Access Management
15 63 (8.01%) Security Operations
Programming Languages
1 111 (14.10%) Python
2 63 (8.01%) PowerShell
3 27 (3.43%) Bash
3 27 (3.43%) Bicep
4 25 (3.18%) JavaScript
4 25 (3.18%) SQL
5 15 (1.91%) Kusto Query Language
6 9 (1.14%) Go
7 8 (1.02%) Shell Script
8 7 (0.89%) Java
9 5 (0.64%) C#
10 4 (0.51%) C
10 4 (0.51%) PHP
11 3 (0.38%) C++
12 2 (0.25%) C-shell
12 2 (0.25%) Korn
12 2 (0.25%) Ruby
13 1 (0.13%) ActionScript
13 1 (0.13%) AppleScript
13 1 (0.13%) Perl
Qualifications
1 235 (29.86%) Security Cleared
2 173 (21.98%) SC Cleared
3 145 (18.42%) Cisco Certification
4 107 (13.60%) CCNP
5 94 (11.94%) CISSP
6 72 (9.15%) DV Cleared
7 57 (7.24%) CCNA
8 50 (6.35%) CISM
8 50 (6.35%) Degree
9 32 (4.07%) Azure Certification
10 27 (3.43%) CCIE
11 24 (3.05%) CCSP
11 24 (3.05%) GIAC
12 23 (2.92%) (ISC)2 CCSP
13 20 (2.54%) CEH
14 19 (2.41%) AWS Certification
14 19 (2.41%) CompTIA Security+
15 12 (1.52%) BPSS Clearance
15 12 (1.52%) TOGAF Certification
16 11 (1.40%) Network+ Certification
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 85 (10.80%) NIST
2 71 (9.02%) ISO/IEC 27001
3 44 (5.59%) GDPR
4 28 (3.56%) PCI DSS
5 21 (2.67%) NCSC
6 15 (1.91%) GRC
7 14 (1.78%) Cyber Essentials
7 14 (1.78%) SLA
8 10 (1.27%) QA
9 9 (1.14%) SOC 2
10 8 (1.02%) Actionable Recommendations
10 8 (1.02%) ISO/IEC 27002 (supersedes ISO/IEC 17799)
10 8 (1.02%) Sarbanes-Oxley
11 6 (0.76%) PMO
12 5 (0.64%) Cyber Essentials PLUS
12 5 (0.64%) Disclosure Scotland
12 5 (0.64%) ISO/IEC 42001
13 4 (0.51%) RMADS
14 3 (0.38%) ISA99
14 3 (0.38%) JSP 440
System Software
1 55 (6.99%) VMware Infrastructure
2 50 (6.35%) Active Directory
3 23 (2.92%) VMware NSX
4 18 (2.29%) Docker
5 14 (1.78%) Virtual Machines
6 13 (1.65%) Hyper-V
7 12 (1.52%) vSphere
8 10 (1.27%) VMware ESXi
9 7 (0.89%) Firmware
10 5 (0.64%) Virtual Desktop
11 2 (0.25%) NFS
11 2 (0.25%) Postfix
11 2 (0.25%) ProxySG
11 2 (0.25%) Sendmail
11 2 (0.25%) Varnish
12 1 (0.13%) KVM
12 1 (0.13%) RHEV
12 1 (0.13%) Virtual Servers
12 1 (0.13%) XenApp
12 1 (0.13%) XenDesktop
Systems Management
1 120 (15.25%) Terraform
2 76 (9.66%) Ansible
3 59 (7.50%) Kubernetes
4 30 (3.81%) FortiGate
5 15 (1.91%) Single Sign-On
6 14 (1.78%) Nagios
7 12 (1.52%) Kibana
7 12 (1.52%) Microsoft Intune
8 11 (1.40%) vCenter Server
9 9 (1.14%) Microsoft Clustering
10 7 (0.89%) Grafana
11 6 (0.76%) Prometheus
12 5 (0.64%) Active Directory Federation Services
12 5 (0.64%) Istio
12 5 (0.64%) Progress Chef
12 5 (0.64%) WSUS
13 4 (0.51%) CASB
13 4 (0.51%) Puppet
14 3 (0.38%) Docker Swarm
14 3 (0.38%) VxRail
Vendors
1 218 (27.70%) Cisco
2 122 (15.50%) Palo Alto
3 121 (15.37%) Microsoft
4 76 (9.66%) F5
5 70 (8.89%) VMware
6 59 (7.50%) Fortinet
7 57 (7.24%) Juniper
8 52 (6.61%) CheckPoint
9 45 (5.72%) Zscaler
10 31 (3.94%) ServiceNow
11 26 (3.30%) Splunk
12 24 (3.05%) Google
13 22 (2.80%) ForeScout
14 20 (2.54%) SolarWinds
15 19 (2.41%) Aruba
16 16 (2.03%) Meraki
17 15 (1.91%) Citrix
17 15 (1.91%) Tenable
18 14 (1.78%) Okta
19 12 (1.52%) OpenAI