SANS Contract Job Trends

SANS Institute
UK

The table below provides summary statistics for contract job vacancies citing SANS qualifications. It includes a benchmarking guide to the contractor rates offered over the 6 months leading up to 11 November 2026, comparing them to the same period in the previous two years.

	6 months to 11 Nov 2026	Same period 2025	Same period 2024
Rank	668	531	534
Rank change year-on-year	-137	+3	-71
Contract jobs citing SANS	29	35	15
As % of all contract jobs in the UK	0.052%	0.10%	0.042%
As % of the Qualifications category	0.16%	0.30%	0.14%
Number of daily rates quoted	13	19	7
10^th Percentile	£566	£484	£225
25^th Percentile	£606	£511	£369
Median daily rate (50^th Percentile)	£620	£537	£600
Median % change year-on-year	+15.46%	-10.50%	-7.69%
75^th Percentile	£640	£684	£625
90^th Percentile	£806	£890	£685
UK excluding London median daily rate	£620	£537	£600
% change year-on-year	+15.46%	-10.50%	-6.98%
Number of hourly rates quoted	1	0	0
Median hourly rate	£51.00	-	-
UK excluding London median hourly rate	£51.00	-	-

All Academic and Professional Certifications
UK

SANS falls under the Academic Qualifications and Professional Certifications category. For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all contract job vacancies citing academic qualifications or professional certifications.

	6 months to 11 Nov 2026	Same period 2025	Same period 2024
Contract vacancies citing academic qualifications or professional certifications	18,387	11,480	10,551
As % of all contract jobs advertised in the UK	33.05%	32.89%	29.29%
Number of daily rates quoted	12,004	7,352	6,407
10^th Percentile	£356	£300	£310
25^th Percentile	£448	£413	£420
Median daily rate (50^th Percentile)	£537	£525	£525
Median % change year-on-year	+2.29%	-	-4.55%
75^th Percentile	£638	£625	£635
90^th Percentile	£715	£716	£725
UK excluding London median daily rate	£525	£500	£519
% change year-on-year	+5.00%	-3.66%	-2.49%
Number of hourly rates quoted	1,742	988	493
10^th Percentile	£16.25	£17.14	£18.75
25^th Percentile	£24.73	£19.20	£24.18
Median hourly rate	£43.96	£25.15	£45.00
Median % change year-on-year	+74.79%	-44.11%	-14.29%
75^th Percentile	£74.00	£43.75	£66.00
90^th Percentile	£89.08	£70.41	£75.00
UK excluding London median hourly rate	£43.96	£25.15	£46.18
% change year-on-year	+74.79%	-45.54%	-11.00%

SANS Job Vacancy Trend

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

SANS Daily Rate Trend

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

SANS Daily Rate Histogram

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing SANS over the 6 months to 11 November 2026.

SANS Hourly Rate Trend

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

SANS Top 11 Contract Job Locations

The table below looks at the demand and provides a guide to the median contractor rates quoted in IT jobs citing SANS within the UK over the 6 months to 11 November 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	Job Ads Past 6 Months	Median Daily Rate Past 6 Months	Median Daily Rate % Change on Same Period Last Year	Live Jobs
England	-119	28	£620	+15.46%	33
London	-89	14	£625	+2.04%	19
UK excluding London	-91	14	£620	+15.46%	13
South West	-26	8	£620	+15.46%	1
Work from Home	-96	8	£625	-	15
West Midlands	-36	2	-	-	1
Midlands	-44	2	-	-	1
South East	-67	2	-	-	1
North of England	-	2	£425	-	5
Yorkshire	-	1	£425	-	1
North West	-	1	-	-	3

SANS Top 30 Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities

For the 6 months to 11 November 2026, contractor job vacancies citing SANS also mentioned 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 citing SANS.

Rank	Skill	Share	Job Ads
1	Cybersecurity	69.0%	20
2	SIEM	55.2%	16
3	CISSP	48.3%	14
4	Degree	44.8%	13
4	Incident Response	44.8%	13
4	Security Cleared	44.8%	13
7	Information Security	41.4%	12
8	Analytics	37.9%	11
8	Azure	37.9%	11
8	Use Case	37.9%	11
11	Cloud Security	31.0%	9
11	DV Cleared	31.0%	9
11	GCP	31.0%	9
11	NIST	31.0%	9
15	Linux	27.6%	8
15	OSCP	27.6%	8
15	Security Architecture	27.6%	8
15	Vulnerability Management	27.6%	8
19	Application Security	24.1%	7
19	AWS	24.1%	7
19	CISM	24.1%	7
19	Microsoft	24.1%	7
19	Risk Management	24.1%	7
19	Security Operations	24.1%	7
19	Threat Modelling	24.1%	7
26	AI	20.7%	6
26	CEH	20.7%	6
26	Cyber Threat Intelligence	20.7%	6
26	GCIH	20.7%	6
26	GDPR	20.7%	6

SANS Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities by Category

The table below expands on the one above by listing co-occurrences one category at a time. It covers the same employment type, locality and period, with up to 20 co-occurrences in each category.

Qualifications

Rank	Skill	Share	Job Ads
1	CISSP	48.3%	14
2	Degree	44.8%	13
2	Security Cleared	44.8%	13
4	DV Cleared	31.0%	9
5	OSCP	27.6%	8
6	CISM	24.1%	7
7	CEH	20.7%	6
7	GCIH	20.7%	6
9	GIAC	17.2%	5
10	Computer Science Degree	13.8%	4
10	ECSA	13.8%	4
10	GCIA	13.8%	4
10	ISSAP	13.8%	4
14	CISA	10.3%	3
14	CRISC	10.3%	3
14	GCFA	10.3%	3
17	SC Cleared	6.9%	2
17	TOGAF Certification	6.9%	2
19	(ISC)2 CCSP	3.4%	1
19	CASP	3.4%	1