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 11 January 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
11 Jan 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 189 132 148
Rank change year-on-year -57 +16 +101
Contract jobs citing Network Security 578 615 735
As % of all contract jobs in the UK 1.59% 1.93% 1.71%
As % of the Communications & Networking category 14.99% 15.15% 12.61%
Number of daily rates quoted 348 386 507
10th Percentile £350 £350 £400
25th Percentile £413 £425 £475
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £520 £550
Median % change year-on-year -3.85% -5.45% -
75th Percentile £582 £620 £649
90th Percentile £688 £700 £741
UK excluding London median daily rate £475 £500 £550
% change year-on-year -5.00% -9.09% +4.76%
Number of hourly rates quoted 14 12 6
10th Percentile £38.70 £20.15 £50.63
25th Percentile £46.31 £35.75 £64.06
Median hourly rate £65.50 £41.00 £72.50
Median % change year-on-year +59.76% -43.45% +93.33%
75th Percentile £81.56 £48.13 £76.25
90th Percentile £91.13 £57.88 -
UK excluding London median hourly rate £65.00 £41.00 £72.50
% change year-on-year +58.54% -43.45% +93.33%

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 3,855 4,060 5,827
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the UK 10.59% 12.77% 13.56%
Number of daily rates quoted 2,517 2,376 3,594
10th Percentile £205 £219 £210
25th Percentile £356 £368 £361
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £475 £500 £500
Median % change year-on-year -5.00% - -2.44%
75th Percentile £588 £600 £600
90th Percentile £675 £685 £700
UK excluding London median daily rate £450 £471 £475
% change year-on-year -4.51% -0.79% +3.26%
Number of hourly rates quoted 170 135 329
10th Percentile £15.50 £15.08 £17.95
25th Percentile £19.25 £21.13 £23.09
Median hourly rate £35.50 £32.50 £56.49
Median % change year-on-year +9.23% -42.47% +125.96%
75th Percentile £65.00 £53.13 £65.98
90th Percentile £75.25 £70.75 £75.05
UK excluding London median hourly rate £42.50 £31.79 £59.50
% change year-on-year +33.69% -46.57% +173.56%

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 11 January 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 11 January 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 11 January 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 -33 518 £500 -4.90% 460
UK excluding London -38 278 £475 -5.00% 456
London -7 234 £538 -0.09% 71
Work from Home -46 145 £515 +3.00% 138
North of England -27 100 £464 -7.25% 88
North West +3 70 £475 -4.52% 43
South East -9 68 £445 -19.09% 126
Midlands -22 59 £500 -14.24% 63
West Midlands -3 54 £500 -16.87% 26
Yorkshire -46 42 £205 -59.00% 34
East of England -21 24 £475 -14.80% 74
South West -26 20 £533 +1.43% 63
Scotland +1 19 £475 +18.75% 18
East Midlands -30 5 £650 +114.88% 37
Northern Ireland - 3 £500 - 14
Wales -7 2 £700 +139.32% 21
North East -9 2 £475 -41.72% 11

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 7 (1.21%) Confluence
2 6 (1.04%) SharePoint
3 5 (0.87%) Microsoft Exchange
4 4 (0.69%) Apache
5 1 (0.17%) IIS
5 1 (0.17%) nginx
5 1 (0.17%) Skype for Business
Applications
1 16 (2.77%) Microsoft Office
2 10 (1.73%) MS Visio
3 4 (0.69%) Microsoft PowerPoint
4 2 (0.35%) Microsoft Excel
5 1 (0.17%) Microsoft Project
5 1 (0.17%) Windchill
Cloud Services
1 172 (29.76%) Azure
2 137 (23.70%) AWS
3 51 (8.82%) GCP
4 32 (5.54%) Entra ID
5 25 (4.33%) Virtual Private Cloud
6 24 (4.15%) Amazon S3
6 24 (4.15%) Microsoft 365
7 22 (3.81%) GitHub
8 20 (3.46%) Amazon EC2
8 20 (3.46%) GitHub Actions
9 19 (3.29%) Azure DevOps
10 16 (2.77%) Amazon CloudWatch
10 16 (2.77%) Amazon ELB
10 16 (2.77%) Azure Sentinel
11 15 (2.60%) Azure Key Vault
12 13 (2.25%) Serverless
13 12 (2.08%) IaaS
14 11 (1.90%) Azure Monitor
14 11 (1.90%) Google Workspace
15 10 (1.73%) Azure ExpressRoute
Communications & Networking
1 296 (51.21%) Firewall
2 125 (21.63%) VPN
3 92 (15.92%) WAN
4 90 (15.57%) DNS
5 65 (11.25%) LAN
6 61 (10.55%) TCP/IP
7 56 (9.69%) BGP
8 55 (9.52%) SSL
9 54 (9.34%) VLAN
10 43 (7.44%) OSPF
11 41 (7.09%) SD-WAN
12 36 (6.23%) F5 BIG-IP LTM
13 34 (5.88%) DMZ
13 34 (5.88%) F5 BIG-IP GTM
14 33 (5.71%) Wireless
15 28 (4.84%) Internet
16 22 (3.81%) Intrusion Detection
17 18 (3.11%) HTTP
18 17 (2.94%) Wi-Fi
19 16 (2.77%) IPsec
Database & Business Intelligence
1 4 (0.69%) Amazon RDS
1 4 (0.69%) Azure SQL Database
1 4 (0.69%) InfluxDB
1 4 (0.69%) Relational Database
2 3 (0.52%) Amazon Athena
3 2 (0.35%) Data Lake
3 2 (0.35%) Power BI
3 2 (0.35%) SQL Server Integration Services
4 1 (0.17%) Redis
4 1 (0.17%) SQL Server
4 1 (0.17%) Tableau
Development Applications
1 28 (4.84%) Jenkins
2 22 (3.81%) GitLab
3 21 (3.63%) Git
4 5 (0.87%) JIRA
5 1 (0.17%) Metasploit
5 1 (0.17%) Sonatype Nexus
5 1 (0.17%) Subversion
General
1 177 (30.62%) Social Skills
2 91 (15.74%) Analytical Skills
3 62 (10.73%) Finance
4 50 (8.65%) Public Sector
5 34 (5.88%) Banking
6 22 (3.81%) Telecoms
7 21 (3.63%) Documentation Skills
8 15 (2.60%) Investment Banking
9 13 (2.25%) Inclusion and Diversity
10 9 (1.56%) Manufacturing
11 8 (1.38%) Military
11 8 (1.38%) Pharmaceutical
12 7 (1.21%) Legal
12 7 (1.21%) Presentation Skills
13 5 (0.87%) Financial Institution
13 5 (0.87%) Influencing Skills
13 5 (0.87%) Organisational Skills
14 4 (0.69%) Marketing
15 3 (0.52%) Electronics
15 3 (0.52%) Local Government
Job Titles
1 124 (21.45%) Network Engineer
2 104 (17.99%) Architect
3 90 (15.57%) Security Engineer
4 63 (10.90%) Security Architect
5 46 (7.96%) Network Architect
6 44 (7.61%) Senior
7 42 (7.27%) Network Security Engineer
8 36 (6.23%) Analyst
9 22 (3.81%) Network Security Architect
10 21 (3.63%) Cybersecurity Engineer
11 20 (3.46%) Lead
12 19 (3.29%) Administrator
12 19 (3.29%) Security Analyst
13 18 (3.11%) Cloud Engineer
13 18 (3.11%) Consultant
14 16 (2.77%) Operations Engineer
14 16 (2.77%) SC Cleared Network Engineer
15 15 (2.60%) IT Support
15 15 (2.60%) Platform Manager
15 15 (2.60%) Systems Administrator
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 14 (2.42%) 802.1X
2 12 (2.08%) LDAP
3 8 (1.38%) .NET
3 8 (1.38%) Node.js
4 6 (1.04%) SAML
5 5 (0.87%) .NET Core
5 5 (0.87%) AngularJS
5 5 (0.87%) Elastic Stack
5 5 (0.87%) PyTorch
5 5 (0.87%) RabbitMQ
5 5 (0.87%) React
5 5 (0.87%) TensorFlow
6 4 (0.69%) ARM Templates
7 3 (0.52%) Lambda Expressions
7 3 (0.52%) Plotly
8 2 (0.35%) HTML
8 2 (0.35%) OAuth
8 2 (0.35%) OAuth2
8 2 (0.35%) OpenID
8 2 (0.35%) REST
Miscellaneous
1 67 (11.59%) Data Centre
2 40 (6.92%) Management Information System
3 35 (6.06%) Hybrid Cloud
4 34 (5.88%) Security Posture
5 28 (4.84%) Cloud Native
6 23 (3.98%) PKI
7 21 (3.63%) Cyber Threat
8 19 (3.29%) Analytical Mindset
8 19 (3.29%) Public Cloud
8 19 (3.29%) Security Operations Centre
9 18 (3.11%) Operational Technology
10 17 (2.94%) Onboarding
11 14 (2.42%) Cyber Security Posture
12 13 (2.25%) CSOC
13 11 (1.90%) Cyberattack
13 11 (1.90%) IoT
14 10 (1.73%) Cloud Security Posture
14 10 (1.73%) Virtual Team
15 9 (1.56%) Data Protection Act
16 7 (1.21%) Clustering
Operating Systems
1 90 (15.57%) Windows
2 66 (11.42%) Linux
3 28 (4.84%) Windows Server
4 14 (2.42%) Unix
5 8 (1.38%) VMS
6 4 (0.69%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
7 3 (0.52%) Mac OS
8 2 (0.35%) Windows Server 2019
9 1 (0.17%) Data ONTAP
9 1 (0.17%) Ubuntu
9 1 (0.17%) Windows 10
9 1 (0.17%) Windows Server 2016
Processes & Methodologies
1 139 (24.05%) Cybersecurity
2 114 (19.72%) Problem-Solving
3 113 (19.55%) SIEM
4 100 (17.30%) Incident Response
5 93 (16.09%) Cloud Security
6 82 (14.19%) CI/CD
7 75 (12.98%) DevOps
7 75 (12.98%) Infrastructure as Code
8 69 (11.94%) Zero Trust
9 63 (10.90%) Migration
10 60 (10.38%) Change Management
10 60 (10.38%) Security Architecture
11 57 (9.86%) Threat Modelling
12 53 (9.17%) Identity Access Management
13 51 (8.82%) Network Architecture
14 50 (8.65%) Load Balancing
15 49 (8.48%) Security Operations
16 47 (8.13%) Continuous Improvement
17 46 (7.96%) Infrastructure Automation
18 45 (7.79%) Vulnerability Management
Programming Languages
1 115 (19.90%) Python
2 73 (12.63%) PowerShell
3 36 (6.23%) Bash
4 19 (3.29%) SQL
5 13 (2.25%) Bicep
5 13 (2.25%) JavaScript
6 12 (2.08%) Kusto Query Language
7 10 (1.73%) Java
8 9 (1.56%) Go
9 5 (0.87%) C
9 5 (0.87%) C#
9 5 (0.87%) C++
10 4 (0.69%) Perl
10 4 (0.69%) Shell Script
11 2 (0.35%) C-shell
11 2 (0.35%) Korn
12 1 (0.17%) Rust
12 1 (0.17%) TypeScript
Qualifications
1 186 (32.18%) Security Cleared
2 138 (23.88%) SC Cleared
3 111 (19.20%) Cisco Certification
4 88 (15.22%) CCNP
5 77 (13.32%) CISSP
6 56 (9.69%) DV Cleared
7 42 (7.27%) Degree
8 35 (6.06%) CCNA
9 31 (5.36%) CISM
10 30 (5.19%) CCIE
11 25 (4.33%) CEH
12 24 (4.15%) GIAC
13 23 (3.98%) Azure Certification
14 16 (2.77%) AWS Certification
14 16 (2.77%) CompTIA Security+
15 14 (2.42%) Computer Science Degree
16 13 (2.25%) CCSP
17 12 (2.08%) (ISC)2 CCSP
18 10 (1.73%) Microsoft Certification
19 9 (1.56%) CCSE
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 67 (11.59%) ISO/IEC 27001
2 65 (11.25%) NIST
3 40 (6.92%) GDPR
4 26 (4.50%) PCI DSS
5 16 (2.77%) Cyber Essentials
6 14 (2.42%) NCSC
7 8 (1.38%) HIPAA
8 6 (1.04%) GRC
8 6 (1.04%) SLA
9 5 (0.87%) PSD2
9 5 (0.87%) Sarbanes-Oxley
10 4 (0.69%) Cyber Essentials PLUS
10 4 (0.69%) JSP 440
10 4 (0.69%) SOC 2
11 2 (0.35%) Actionable Recommendations
11 2 (0.35%) GxP
11 2 (0.35%) ISO/IEC 27005
11 2 (0.35%) ISO/IEC 42001
11 2 (0.35%) PMO
12 1 (0.17%) HMG Security Policy Framework
System Software
1 42 (7.27%) VMware Infrastructure
2 38 (6.57%) Active Directory
2 38 (6.57%) Docker
3 11 (1.90%) VMware NSX
4 10 (1.73%) Hyper-V
5 8 (1.38%) Virtual Machines
6 5 (0.87%) Firmware
6 5 (0.87%) vSphere
7 4 (0.69%) ProxySG
8 3 (0.52%) Virtual Servers
9 2 (0.35%) KVM
9 2 (0.35%) Virtual Desktop
10 1 (0.17%) RACF
10 1 (0.17%) RHEV
10 1 (0.17%) Xen
10 1 (0.17%) XenApp
10 1 (0.17%) XenDesktop
Systems Management
1 100 (17.30%) Terraform
2 68 (11.76%) Ansible
3 36 (6.23%) Kubernetes
4 21 (3.63%) FortiGate
5 13 (2.25%) Nagios
6 11 (1.90%) QRadar
7 10 (1.73%) Kibana
8 9 (1.56%) Microsoft Intune
9 7 (1.21%) Grafana
9 7 (1.21%) Prometheus
10 6 (1.04%) Microsoft Clustering
10 6 (1.04%) Single Sign-On
11 4 (0.69%) CASB
11 4 (0.69%) Progress Chef
12 3 (0.52%) Icinga
12 3 (0.52%) Puppet
12 3 (0.52%) SCCM
13 2 (0.35%) Docker Swarm
13 2 (0.35%) Jamf Pro
14 1 (0.17%) vCenter Server
Vendors
1 149 (25.78%) Cisco
2 115 (19.90%) Palo Alto
3 92 (15.92%) Microsoft
4 84 (14.53%) F5
5 58 (10.03%) CheckPoint
6 51 (8.82%) VMware
7 46 (7.96%) Juniper
8 44 (7.61%) Zscaler
9 43 (7.44%) Fortinet
10 29 (5.02%) Splunk
11 25 (4.33%) Google
12 22 (3.81%) SolarWinds
13 21 (3.63%) Meraki
14 16 (2.77%) ServiceNow
15 15 (2.60%) CrowdStrike
16 13 (2.25%) Blue Coat
16 13 (2.25%) Tenable
17 12 (2.08%) Aruba
18 10 (1.73%) ArcSight
18 10 (1.73%) Qualys