Penetration Tester Contract Job Trends

Penetration Tester
UK

The median Penetration Tester daily rate in the UK is £675, according to job vacancies posted in the 6 months leading up to 15 October 2026.

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

6 months to
15 Oct 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 656 481 530
Rank change year-on-year -175 +49 +61
Contract jobs requiring a Penetration Tester 41 80 33
As % of all contract jobs in the UK 0.074% 0.24% 0.088%
As % of the Job Titles category 0.081% 0.27% 0.094%
Number of daily rates quoted 23 71 17
10th Percentile £553 £407 £418
25th Percentile £663 £500 £510
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £675 £550 £575
Median % change year-on-year +22.73% -4.35% +2.22%
75th Percentile £688 £600 £700
90th Percentile £785 - £749
UK excluding London median daily rate £466 £492 £481
% change year-on-year -5.23% +2.23% -19.79%
Number of hourly rates quoted 1 0 0
10th Percentile - - -
25th Percentile £38.75 - -
Median hourly rate £42.50 - -
75th Percentile £46.25 - -
90th Percentile - - -
UK excluding London median hourly rate £42.50 - -

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 50,841 30,184 35,017
% of contract IT jobs with a recognized job title 91.94% 90.90% 93.00%
Number of daily rates quoted 29,834 19,073 21,148
10th Percentile £325 £275 £300
25th Percentile £425 £400 £413
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £525 £500 £525
Median % change year-on-year +5.00% -4.76% -
75th Percentile £638 £623 £638
90th Percentile £738 £725 £738
UK excluding London median daily rate £500 £475 £490
% change year-on-year +5.26% -3.06% -2.00%
Number of hourly rates quoted 4,158 1,652 1,437
10th Percentile £14.31 £13.80 £15.09
25th Percentile £19.33 £17.30 £20.50
Median hourly rate £41.56 £25.15 £41.27
Median % change year-on-year +65.23% -39.05% -8.30%
75th Percentile £67.50 £50.00 £65.00
90th Percentile £79.30 £68.52 £73.75
UK excluding London median hourly rate £41.06 £25.00 £42.50
% change year-on-year +64.24% -41.18% -4.49%

Penetration Tester
Job Vacancy Trend

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

Penetration Tester job vacancy trend in the UK

Penetration Tester
Daily Rate Trend

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for Penetration Tester job vacancies in the UK.

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for Penetration Tester job vacancies in the UK

Penetration Tester
Daily Rate Histogram

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing Penetration Tester over the 6 months to 15 October 2026.

Daily rate histogram for Penetration Tester in the UK

Penetration Tester
Hourly Rate Trend

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for Penetration Tester job vacancies in the UK.

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for Penetration Tester job vacancies in the UK

Penetration Tester
Top 10 Contract Job Locations

The table below looks at the demand and provides a guide to the median contractor rates quoted in IT jobs citing Penetration Tester within the UK over the 6 months to 15 October 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
Work from Home -96 19 £675 +12.50% 6
England -188 15 £554 +0.68% 58
London -129 8 £575 - 10
UK excluding London -109 7 £466 -5.23% 59
Midlands - 5 £466 - 10
West Midlands - 4 £400 - 5
South East -74 2 - - 13
North of England -75 2 - - 15
Yorkshire - 2 - - 8
East Midlands - 1 £533 - 5

Penetration Tester Skill Set
Top 30 Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities

For the 6 months to 15 October 2026, Penetration Tester 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 Penetration Tester in the job title.

1 33 (80.49%) Penetration Testing
2 23 (56.10%) Azure
3 22 (53.66%) AWS
4 20 (48.78%) Security Cleared
5 19 (46.34%) Kubernetes
6 18 (43.90%) CHECK Team Leader
6 18 (43.90%) SC Cleared
7 17 (41.46%) Coaching
8 15 (36.59%) CHECK Team Member
9 14 (34.15%) CREST Certified
9 14 (34.15%) Security Testing
10 13 (31.71%) Cybersecurity
11 11 (26.83%) Cloud Security
11 11 (26.83%) DV Cleared
11 11 (26.83%) NCSC
12 10 (24.39%) CI/CD
13 9 (21.95%) OSCP
14 8 (19.51%) Mentoring
14 8 (19.51%) Offensive Security
15 7 (17.07%) Microsoft
15 7 (17.07%) Red Team
16 6 (14.63%) End-to-End Testing
17 5 (12.20%) Containerisation
17 5 (12.20%) Cyber Scheme
17 5 (12.20%) Docker
17 5 (12.20%) Security Architecture
18 4 (9.76%) Continuous Improvement
18 4 (9.76%) Ethical Hacking
18 4 (9.76%) Firewall
18 4 (9.76%) Identity Access Management

Penetration Tester 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:

Cloud Services
1 23 (56.10%) Azure
2 22 (53.66%) AWS
3 4 (9.76%) OCI
4 3 (7.32%) GCP
5 1 (2.44%) Azure DevOps
5 1 (2.44%) Entra ID
5 1 (2.44%) GitHub
5 1 (2.44%) GitHub Actions
Communications & Networking
1 4 (9.76%) Firewall
2 2 (4.88%) Internet
Database & Business Intelligence
1 3 (7.32%) Oracle Reports
Development Applications
1 2 (4.88%) Claude Code
2 1 (2.44%) Burp Suite
2 1 (2.44%) Jenkins
2 1 (2.44%) Metasploit
2 1 (2.44%) Rational Performance Tester
General
1 19 (46.34%) Public Sector
2 18 (43.90%) Social Skills
3 3 (7.32%) Finance
4 2 (4.88%) Inclusion and Diversity
5 1 (2.44%) Automotive
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 2 (4.88%) Laravel
2 1 (2.44%) OAuth
2 1 (2.44%) OpenID
2 1 (2.44%) SAML
Miscellaneous
1 7 (17.07%) Cloud Native
1 7 (17.07%) Security Posture
2 3 (7.32%) Public Cloud
3 1 (2.44%) Cyber Security Posture
3 1 (2.44%) Embedded Systems
3 1 (2.44%) Mobile App
Processes & Methodologies
1 33 (80.49%) Penetration Testing
2 17 (41.46%) Coaching
3 14 (34.15%) Security Testing
4 13 (31.71%) Cybersecurity
5 11 (26.83%) Cloud Security
6 10 (24.39%) CI/CD
7 8 (19.51%) Mentoring
7 8 (19.51%) Offensive Security
8 7 (17.07%) Red Team
9 6 (14.63%) End-to-End Testing
10 5 (12.20%) Containerisation
10 5 (12.20%) Security Architecture
11 4 (9.76%) Continuous Improvement
11 4 (9.76%) Ethical Hacking
11 4 (9.76%) Identity Access Management
11 4 (9.76%) Technical Leadership
12 3 (7.32%) LLM
12 3 (7.32%) Project Delivery
12 3 (7.32%) Vulnerability Remediation
12 3 (7.32%) Vulnerability Research
Programming Languages
1 2 (4.88%) PHP
2 1 (2.44%) Python
Qualifications
1 20 (48.78%) Security Cleared
2 18 (43.90%) CHECK Team Leader
2 18 (43.90%) SC Cleared
3 15 (36.59%) CHECK Team Member
4 14 (34.15%) CREST Certified
5 11 (26.83%) DV Cleared
6 9 (21.95%) OSCP
7 5 (12.20%) Cyber Scheme
8 3 (7.32%) GPEN
9 2 (4.88%) CISSP
9 2 (4.88%) ECSA
10 1 (2.44%) CCSAM
10 1 (2.44%) CISM
10 1 (2.44%) CompTIA Security+
10 1 (2.44%) GIAC
10 1 (2.44%) GXPN
10 1 (2.44%) OSCE
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 11 (26.83%) NCSC
2 1 (2.44%) Actionable Recommendations
System Software
1 5 (12.20%) Docker
2 1 (2.44%) Active Directory
Systems Management
1 19 (46.34%) Kubernetes
2 1 (2.44%) Nmap
Vendors
1 7 (17.07%) Microsoft
2 4 (9.76%) Oracle
3 1 (2.44%) CrowdStrike
3 1 (2.44%) Splunk