PKI Contract Job Trends

Public-Key Infrastructure (PKI)
UK

The table below looks at the prevalence of the term PKI in contract job vacancies. Included is a benchmarking guide to the contractor rates offered in vacancies that cited PKI over the 6 months leading up to 20 June 2026, comparing them to the same period in the previous two years.

6 months to
20 Jun 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 385 335 221
Rank change year-on-year -50 -114 +112
Contract jobs citing PKI 271 195 471
As % of all contract jobs in the UK 0.54% 0.65% 1.07%
As % of the Miscellaneous category 1.64% 1.89% 3.59%
Number of daily rates quoted 183 153 331
10th Percentile £413 £358 £363
25th Percentile £463 £490 £450
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £550 £550 £550
Median % change year-on-year - - -5.98%
75th Percentile £638 £613 £625
90th Percentile £704 £683 £675
UK excluding London median daily rate £550 £550 £550
% change year-on-year - - -2.65%
Number of hourly rates quoted 3 0 4
10th Percentile £47.22 - -
25th Percentile £56.01 - -
Median hourly rate £71.33 - £23.80
75th Percentile £72.27 - £27.91
90th Percentile £72.43 - £35.32
UK excluding London median hourly rate £71.33 - £38.50
% change year-on-year - - +156.67%

All Generic Skills
UK

PKI falls under the General and Transferable Skills category. For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all contract job vacancies requiring generic IT skills.

Contract vacancies with a requirement for generic IT skills 16,503 10,314 13,130
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the UK 32.59% 34.54% 29.92%
Number of daily rates quoted 10,114 6,459 8,316
10th Percentile £315 £300 £275
25th Percentile £413 £406 £413
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £520 £525 £538
Median % change year-on-year -0.95% -2.33% -2.27%
75th Percentile £631 £650 £660
90th Percentile £750 £775 £800
UK excluding London median daily rate £500 £475 £500
% change year-on-year +5.26% -5.00% -
Number of hourly rates quoted 853 453 949
10th Percentile £16.01 £15.84 £12.25
25th Percentile £21.00 £19.97 £15.39
Median hourly rate £42.71 £32.81 £35.50
Median % change year-on-year +30.16% -7.58% +57.88%
75th Percentile £70.00 £60.00 £62.00
90th Percentile £85.90 £81.35 £72.50
UK excluding London median hourly rate £43.96 £31.76 £35.00
% change year-on-year +38.41% -9.26% +59.09%

PKI
Job Vacancy Trend

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

PKI job vacancy trend in the UK

PKI
Daily Rate Trend

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

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in the UK citing PKI

PKI
Daily Rate Histogram

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing PKI over the 6 months to 20 June 2026.

Daily rate histogram for PKI in the UK

PKI
Hourly Rate Trend

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

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in the UK citing PKI

PKI
Hourly Rate Histogram

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing PKI over the 6 months to 20 June 2026.

Hourly rate histogram for PKI in the UK

PKI
Top 14 Contract Job Locations

The table below looks at the demand and provides a guide to the median contractor rates quoted in IT jobs citing PKI within the UK over the 6 months to 20 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 -50 232 £560 -2.61% 48
UK excluding London -55 175 £550 - 53
South East 0 100 £590 +2.61% 20
London -60 71 £550 -3.72% 11
Work from Home -47 64 £555 +0.91% 21
North of England -57 30 £425 -13.62% 5
North West -33 21 £422 -14.33% 3
Scotland +3 19 £533 -0.47% 7
South West -57 13 £538 -6.52% 10
Midlands -65 11 £450 - 2
West Midlands -66 10 £400 -11.11% 1
Yorkshire - 9 £565 - 2
East of England -33 4 £400 -23.81% 2
East Midlands -17 1 £475 - 1

PKI
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 11 (4.06%) SharePoint
2 9 (3.32%) Confluence
3 7 (2.58%) IIS
4 6 (2.21%) Microsoft Exchange
5 3 (1.11%) Apache
5 3 (1.11%) Tomcat
5 3 (1.11%) WebSphere
6 1 (0.37%) ArcGIS
Applications
1 4 (1.48%) Microsoft Office
Business Applications
1 10 (3.69%) Remedy ITSM
2 1 (0.37%) Cloudability
2 1 (0.37%) Dynamics GP
Cloud Services
1 86 (31.73%) Azure
2 59 (21.77%) AWS
3 47 (17.34%) Entra ID
4 21 (7.75%) GCP
4 21 (7.75%) Microsoft 365
5 17 (6.27%) Power Platform
6 11 (4.06%) Azure Key Vault
7 10 (3.69%) IaaS
8 9 (3.32%) PaaS
9 7 (2.58%) Azure DevOps
10 6 (2.21%) AWS KMS
11 5 (1.85%) GitHub
11 5 (1.85%) OpenShift
12 3 (1.11%) Amazon EKS
12 3 (1.11%) SaaS
13 2 (0.74%) Azure Monitor
13 2 (0.74%) Azure Sentinel
13 2 (0.74%) GitHub Actions
13 2 (0.74%) OneDrive
13 2 (0.74%) Power Automate
Communications & Networking
1 72 (26.57%) DNS
2 59 (21.77%) Firewall
3 50 (18.45%) DHCP
4 37 (13.65%) BGP
5 36 (13.28%) WAN
6 32 (11.81%) VPN
7 31 (11.44%) LAN
8 28 (10.33%) Network Security
8 28 (10.33%) OSPF
9 25 (9.23%) Ethernet VPN
9 25 (9.23%) VXLAN
10 24 (8.86%) BIG-IP
10 24 (8.86%) Cisco ISE
11 23 (8.49%) Junos
12 19 (7.01%) SSL
13 11 (4.06%) MPLS
14 10 (3.69%) Cisco ASA
14 10 (3.69%) SMTP
14 10 (3.69%) SSH
15 9 (3.32%) IPsec
Database & Business Intelligence
1 14 (5.17%) SQL Server
2 12 (4.43%) Power BI
3 9 (3.32%) Elasticsearch
4 5 (1.85%) PostgreSQL
5 4 (1.48%) Amazon RDS
5 4 (1.48%) MongoDB
5 4 (1.48%) MySQL
6 3 (1.11%) Big Data
7 2 (0.74%) Metadata
7 2 (0.74%) NoSQL
8 1 (0.37%) RDBMS
8 1 (0.37%) Relational Database
8 1 (0.37%) SQL Server Reporting Services
Development Applications
1 11 (4.06%) JIRA
2 8 (2.95%) GitLab
3 6 (2.21%) Git
3 6 (2.21%) Jenkins
4 5 (1.85%) Robot Framework
4 5 (1.85%) Sonatype Nexus
5 3 (1.11%) Terragrunt
6 2 (0.74%) Burp Suite
6 2 (0.74%) Cucumber
6 2 (0.74%) Gatling
6 2 (0.74%) Gradle
6 2 (0.74%) LoadRunner
6 2 (0.74%) MSI
6 2 (0.74%) REST Assured
6 2 (0.74%) SonarQube
General
1 35 (12.92%) Social Skills
2 33 (12.18%) Finance
3 28 (10.33%) Public Sector
4 11 (4.06%) Analytical Skills
5 10 (3.69%) Banking
6 8 (2.95%) Documentation Skills
7 6 (2.21%) Legal
8 4 (1.48%) Military
8 4 (1.48%) Retail
9 3 (1.11%) Local Government
10 2 (0.74%) Corporate Banking
10 2 (0.74%) Financial Institution
10 2 (0.74%) Inclusion and Diversity
10 2 (0.74%) Influencing Skills
10 2 (0.74%) Investment Banking
10 2 (0.74%) Retail Banking
11 1 (0.37%) Back Office
11 1 (0.37%) Law
11 1 (0.37%) Manufacturing
11 1 (0.37%) Wearables
Job Titles
1 46 (16.97%) Senior
2 42 (15.50%) Infrastructure Engineer
3 33 (12.18%) Architect
4 23 (8.49%) Network Engineer
5 20 (7.38%) 3rd Line Engineer
6 14 (5.17%) Firewall Specialist
6 14 (5.17%) Network Specialist
6 14 (5.17%) Storage Engineer
6 14 (5.17%) Support Engineer
7 12 (4.43%) Senior Network Engineer
8 11 (4.06%) 3rd Line Infrastructure Engineer
8 11 (4.06%) DevOps Engineer
8 11 (4.06%) Security Engineer
8 11 (4.06%) Senior Infrastructure Engineer
9 10 (3.69%) Lead
9 10 (3.69%) Senior Architect
10 9 (3.32%) Analyst
10 9 (3.32%) Linux Engineer
11 7 (2.58%) Administrator
12 6 (2.21%) Infrastructure Support Engineer
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 34 (12.55%) 802.1X
2 21 (7.75%) OpenID
3 18 (6.64%) SAML
4 16 (5.90%) LDAP
5 14 (5.17%) OAuth
5 14 (5.17%) REST
6 7 (2.58%) JSON
6 7 (2.58%) OAuth2
6 7 (2.58%) RabbitMQ
7 5 (1.85%) Kafka
8 4 (1.48%) Keycloak
8 4 (1.48%) SailPoint
9 3 (1.11%) FIDO
9 3 (1.11%) Microsoft Graph
9 3 (1.11%) SPIFFE
10 2 (0.74%) .NET Core
10 2 (0.74%) eBPF
10 2 (0.74%) Loki
10 2 (0.74%) Quarkus
10 2 (0.74%) WebAuthn
Miscellaneous
1 45 (16.61%) Clustering
2 29 (10.70%) Data Centre
3 12 (4.43%) Onboarding
4 10 (3.69%) Cloud Native
4 10 (3.69%) Enterprise Storage
4 10 (3.69%) Hybrid Cloud
5 9 (3.32%) Linux Command Line
6 8 (2.95%) Public Cloud
7 7 (2.58%) Algorithms
7 7 (2.58%) Management Information System
8 6 (2.21%) Operational Technology
9 5 (1.85%) Distributed Systems
9 5 (1.85%) Enterprise Software
9 5 (1.85%) Legacy Systems
9 5 (1.85%) Private Cloud
10 4 (1.48%) Enterprise Cloud
11 3 (1.11%) Data Protection Act
11 3 (1.11%) Security Posture
11 3 (1.11%) Smartcard
11 3 (1.11%) Tandem
Operating Systems
1 128 (47.23%) Windows
2 71 (26.20%) Linux
3 64 (23.62%) Windows Server
4 9 (3.32%) Ubuntu
5 8 (2.95%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
6 7 (2.58%) Windows Server 2003
7 6 (2.21%) Debian
8 5 (1.85%) Unix
8 5 (1.85%) Windows Server 2019
9 4 (1.48%) Android
9 4 (1.48%) Windows Server 2012
10 3 (1.11%) Apple iOS
10 3 (1.11%) Mac OS
10 3 (1.11%) Windows Server 2016
11 2 (0.74%) CentOS
11 2 (0.74%) Windows 10
12 1 (0.37%) Data ONTAP
12 1 (0.37%) VMS
12 1 (0.37%) Windows 7
12 1 (0.37%) zOS
Processes & Methodologies
1 74 (27.31%) Identity Access Management
2 47 (17.34%) ITIL
3 45 (16.61%) Infrastructure Engineering
4 44 (16.24%) High Availability
5 42 (15.50%) Agile
6 40 (14.76%) Cybersecurity
7 37 (13.65%) Problem-Solving
8 36 (13.28%) Observability
8 36 (13.28%) Zero Trust
9 33 (12.18%) DevOps
10 31 (11.44%) Load Balancing
11 29 (10.70%) Key Management
12 28 (10.33%) ITSM
13 27 (9.96%) Infrastructure as Code
13 27 (9.96%) RBAC
13 27 (9.96%) Service Management
14 26 (9.59%) CI/CD
14 26 (9.59%) Cryptography
15 22 (8.12%) Change Management
16 21 (7.75%) Project Delivery
Programming Languages
1 67 (24.72%) PowerShell
2 42 (15.50%) Python
3 13 (4.80%) SQL
4 11 (4.06%) JavaScript
5 10 (3.69%) Bash
6 8 (2.95%) C#
6 8 (2.95%) Java
7 4 (1.48%) PHP
8 3 (1.11%) C++
8 3 (1.11%) Go
9 2 (0.74%) Shell Script
Qualifications
1 145 (53.51%) Security Cleared
2 94 (34.69%) DV Cleared
3 51 (18.82%) SC Cleared
4 30 (11.07%) Cisco Certification
5 19 (7.01%) Degree
6 13 (4.80%) CISSP
7 11 (4.06%) Microsoft Certification
8 10 (3.69%) Azure Certification
8 10 (3.69%) GIAC
9 9 (3.32%) CISM
10 8 (2.95%) CCNP
10 8 (2.95%) CompTIA Security+
10 8 (2.95%) MCSE
11 7 (2.58%) JNCIA
11 7 (2.58%) JNCIP
11 7 (2.58%) JNCIS
12 5 (1.85%) SSCP
13 4 (1.48%) APMG
13 4 (1.48%) CCNA
13 4 (1.48%) Network+ Certification
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 30 (11.07%) NIST
2 21 (7.75%) ISO/IEC 27001
3 14 (5.17%) NCSC
4 10 (3.69%) Cyber Essentials
5 8 (2.95%) SLA
6 7 (2.58%) QA
7 5 (1.85%) PCI DSS
8 4 (1.48%) Cyber Essentials PLUS
8 4 (1.48%) GDPR
9 2 (0.74%) Government Security Classifications
9 2 (0.74%) ISA99
9 2 (0.74%) ISO/IEC 27002 (supersedes ISO/IEC 17799)
9 2 (0.74%) NIST 800
9 2 (0.74%) RMADS
9 2 (0.74%) SOC 2
10 1 (0.37%) GMP
10 1 (0.37%) GRC
10 1 (0.37%) GxP
10 1 (0.37%) HMG Security Policy Framework
10 1 (0.37%) JSP 440
System Software
1 90 (33.21%) Active Directory
2 51 (18.82%) VMware Infrastructure
3 24 (8.86%) Docker
4 19 (7.01%) Hyper-V
5 17 (6.27%) VMware ESXi
5 17 (6.27%) VMware NSX
6 11 (4.06%) BitLocker
7 10 (3.69%) Microsoft App-V
8 8 (2.95%) Virtual Machines
9 6 (2.21%) Firmware
10 4 (1.48%) Terminal Services
10 4 (1.48%) Virtual Desktop
11 3 (1.11%) KVM
11 3 (1.11%) OpenSSH
12 2 (0.74%) vSphere
12 2 (0.74%) XenApp
12 2 (0.74%) XenDesktop
13 1 (0.37%) Active Directory Lightweight Directory Services
13 1 (0.37%) iptables
13 1 (0.37%) OpenAM
Systems Management
1 47 (17.34%) Ansible
2 38 (14.02%) Kubernetes
3 36 (13.28%) Terraform
4 26 (9.59%) vCenter Server
5 24 (8.86%) Single Sign-On
6 23 (8.49%) FortiGate
7 17 (6.27%) Microsoft Intune
8 14 (5.17%) Puppet
9 12 (4.43%) SCOM
10 10 (3.69%) Prometheus
10 10 (3.69%) vMotion
11 9 (3.32%) Grafana
12 8 (2.95%) Avamar
12 8 (2.95%) SCCM
13 5 (1.85%) Active Directory Federation Services
13 5 (1.85%) WMI
14 3 (1.11%) CA Single Sign-On
14 3 (1.11%) Istio
14 3 (1.11%) Nagios
15 2 (0.74%) Cilium
Vendors
1 91 (33.58%) Microsoft
2 70 (25.83%) VMware
3 54 (19.93%) Cisco
4 36 (13.28%) Splunk
5 30 (11.07%) Juniper
6 28 (10.33%) F5
7 27 (9.96%) SolarWinds
8 23 (8.49%) ServiceNow
9 22 (8.12%) Extreme Networks
10 20 (7.38%) Citrix
11 18 (6.64%) Thales
12 15 (5.54%) Okta
13 12 (4.43%) Palo Alto
14 10 (3.69%) BMC
14 10 (3.69%) Dell
14 10 (3.69%) Remedy
15 9 (3.32%) NetApp
16 8 (2.95%) BeyondTrust
16 8 (2.95%) ForeScout
17 7 (2.58%) IBM