SANS Contract Job Trends

SANS Institute
UK

The table below provides summary statistics for contract job vacancies with a requirement for SANS qualifications. It includes a benchmarking guide to the contractor rates offered over the 6 months leading up to 27 May 2026, comparing them to the same period in the previous two years.

6 months to
27 May 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 600 486 530
Rank change year-on-year -114 +44 +82
Contract jobs citing SANS 28 36 50
As % of all contract jobs in the UK 0.057% 0.13% 0.12%
As % of the Qualifications category 0.18% 0.41% 0.39%
Number of daily rates quoted 18 13 37
10th Percentile £408 £490 -
25th Percentile £610 £606 £463
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £675 £700 £645
Median % change year-on-year -3.57% +8.53% -7.86%
75th Percentile £802 £750 £700
90th Percentile £825 - £825
UK excluding London median daily rate £630 £588 £500
% change year-on-year +7.23% +17.50% -28.57%
Number of hourly rates quoted 1 0 0
10th Percentile - - -
25th Percentile £51.25 - -
Median hourly rate £52.50 - -
75th Percentile £53.75 - -
90th Percentile - - -
UK excluding London median hourly rate £52.50 - -

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 requiring academic qualifications or professional certifications.

Contract vacancies requiring academic qualifications or professional certifications 15,427 8,877 12,756
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the UK 31.65% 31.07% 29.90%
Number of daily rates quoted 10,228 5,604 7,949
10th Percentile £350 £275 £307
25th Percentile £425 £413 £425
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £525 £523 £530
Median % change year-on-year +0.43% -1.37% -3.64%
75th Percentile £623 £619 £645
90th Percentile £719 £700 £738
UK excluding London median daily rate £500 £500 £528
% change year-on-year - -5.30% +0.57%
Number of hourly rates quoted 1,128 500 1,075
10th Percentile £16.35 £17.86 £13.69
25th Percentile £21.33 £21.28 £17.94
Median hourly rate £47.54 £32.50 £40.00
Median % change year-on-year +46.28% -18.75% -27.27%
75th Percentile £71.50 £65.00 £61.60
90th Percentile £85.25 £78.36 £75.00
UK excluding London median hourly rate £47.50 £32.50 £40.94
% change year-on-year +46.15% -20.62% -21.47%

SANS
Job Vacancy Trend

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

SANS job vacancy trend in the UK

SANS
Daily Rate Trend

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

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 27 May 2026.

Daily rate histogram for SANS in the UK

SANS
Hourly Rate Trend

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

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

SANS
Top 8 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 27 May 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 -120 27 £675 -3.57% 23
UK excluding London -106 15 £630 +7.23% 28
London -74 10 £800 +14.29% 7
South West - 8 £630 - 6
South East -55 6 £400 -27.27% 8
Work from Home -51 5 £415 -36.15% 5
North of England - 1 £675 - 3
Yorkshire - 1 £675 -

SANS
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 2 (7.14%) Confluence
Cloud Services
1 13 (46.43%) Azure
2 8 (28.57%) AWS
3 7 (25.00%) IaaS
3 7 (25.00%) PaaS
4 5 (17.86%) Entra ID
4 5 (17.86%) Microsoft 365
5 3 (10.71%) GCP
5 3 (10.71%) SaaS
6 2 (7.14%) Amazon ECS
6 2 (7.14%) AWS CloudFormation
6 2 (7.14%) GitHub
6 2 (7.14%) OCI
Communications & Networking
1 2 (7.14%) Network Security
1 2 (7.14%) Reverse Proxy
2 1 (3.57%) Firewall
2 1 (3.57%) Modbus
2 1 (3.57%) TCP/IP
2 1 (3.57%) Wireless
Development Applications
1 2 (7.14%) Git
1 2 (7.14%) JIRA
2 1 (3.57%) Burp Suite
General
1 8 (28.57%) Social Skills
2 6 (21.43%) Analytical Skills
3 4 (14.29%) Presentation Skills
4 3 (10.71%) Military
4 3 (10.71%) Public Sector
5 2 (7.14%) Banking
5 2 (7.14%) Finance
5 2 (7.14%) Retail Banking
6 1 (3.57%) Influencing Skills
6 1 (3.57%) Organisational Skills
Job Titles
1 10 (35.71%) Architect
1 10 (35.71%) Security Architect
2 8 (28.57%) Security Specialist
3 7 (25.00%) Analyst
4 6 (21.43%) Cybersecurity Specialist
5 5 (17.86%) Information Architect
5 5 (17.86%) Information Security Architect
5 5 (17.86%) Security Technical Architect
5 5 (17.86%) Technical Architect
6 4 (14.29%) Cybersecurity Analyst
6 4 (14.29%) Security Analyst
6 4 (14.29%) SOC Analyst
7 2 (7.14%) Cloud Engineer
7 2 (7.14%) Cloud Security Engineer
7 2 (7.14%) Information Security Specialist
7 2 (7.14%) Information Specialist
7 2 (7.14%) Network Architect
7 2 (7.14%) Network Security Architect
7 2 (7.14%) Security Engineer
8 1 (3.57%) Cybersecurity Architect
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 2 (7.14%) .NET
Miscellaneous
1 5 (17.86%) Cyber Defence
1 5 (17.86%) Operational Technology
2 4 (14.29%) SCADA
3 2 (7.14%) Cyber Threat
3 2 (7.14%) Distributed Denial-of-Service
3 2 (7.14%) Hedge funds
3 2 (7.14%) Mobile App
3 2 (7.14%) Security Posture
4 1 (3.57%) Analytical Mindset
4 1 (3.57%) CAN bus
4 1 (3.57%) Onboarding
Operating Systems
1 7 (25.00%) Linux
2 5 (17.86%) Unix
2 5 (17.86%) Windows
3 2 (7.14%) Android
3 2 (7.14%) Apple iOS
4 1 (3.57%) Kali Linux
Processes & Methodologies
1 18 (64.29%) Cybersecurity
2 15 (53.57%) Security Architecture
3 13 (46.43%) SIEM
4 10 (35.71%) Information Security
5 8 (28.57%) Cyber Threat Intelligence
5 8 (28.57%) OWASP
5 8 (28.57%) Risk Assessment
5 8 (28.57%) SABSA
5 8 (28.57%) Stakeholder Engagement
5 8 (28.57%) Threat Intelligence
6 7 (25.00%) Analytics
6 7 (25.00%) CI/CD
6 7 (25.00%) Threat Modelling
6 7 (25.00%) Use Case
7 6 (21.43%) Architectural Patterns
7 6 (21.43%) Incident Management
7 6 (21.43%) Vulnerability Assessment
7 6 (21.43%) Vulnerability Management
8 5 (17.86%) Change Control
8 5 (17.86%) SDLC
Programming Languages
1 2 (7.14%) Java
1 2 (7.14%) Kotlin
1 2 (7.14%) Python
1 2 (7.14%) Swift
Qualifications
1 17 (60.71%) CISSP
2 14 (50.00%) Degree
3 13 (46.43%) Security Cleared
4 8 (28.57%) CISM
4 8 (28.57%) GIAC
5 7 (25.00%) (ISC)2 CCSP
5 7 (25.00%) CISA
5 7 (25.00%) Cisco Certification
5 7 (25.00%) OSCP
6 6 (21.43%) CRISC
6 6 (21.43%) DV Cleared
7 5 (17.86%) CESG Certified Professional
7 5 (17.86%) GSEC
8 4 (14.29%) SC Cleared
8 4 (14.29%) SSCP
9 3 (10.71%) CCSP
9 3 (10.71%) Computer Science Degree
10 2 (7.14%) CEH
10 2 (7.14%) Master's Degree
11 1 (3.57%) ISSAP
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 11 (39.29%) NIST
2 7 (25.00%) ISO/IEC 27001
3 5 (17.86%) Cyber Essentials
3 5 (17.86%) GRC
3 5 (17.86%) ISO 31000
4 3 (10.71%) GDPR
4 3 (10.71%) NCSC
5 2 (7.14%) PCI DSS
6 1 (3.57%) RMADS
System Software
1 5 (17.86%) Active Directory
2 2 (7.14%) Docker
Systems Management
1 2 (7.14%) Kubernetes
1 2 (7.14%) Network Intrusion Detection System
1 2 (7.14%) Terraform
2 1 (3.57%) Nessus
2 1 (3.57%) Nmap
Vendors
1 6 (21.43%) Microsoft
2 5 (17.86%) ArcSight
3 2 (7.14%) BiZZdesign
3 2 (7.14%) Google
3 2 (7.14%) Rapid7
4 1 (3.57%) Siemens