Security Architect Contract Job Trends

Security Architect
UK

The median Security Architect daily rate in the UK is £650, according to job vacancies posted in the 6 months leading up to 22 December 2025.

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

6 months to
22 Dec 2025
Same period 2024 Same period 2023
Rank 285 247 259
Rank change year-on-year -38 +12 +61
Contract jobs requiring a Security Architect 346 341 418
As % of all contract jobs in the UK 0.94% 1.01% 0.96%
As % of the Job Titles category 1.03% 1.09% 1.03%
Number of daily rates quoted 230 215 266
10th Percentile £480 £525 £516
25th Percentile £538 £600 £600
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £650 £675 £675
Median % change year-on-year -3.70% - -1.82%
75th Percentile £738 £767 £750
90th Percentile £788 £810 £800
UK excluding London median daily rate £650 £669 £675
% change year-on-year -2.84% -0.89% -0.74%
Number of hourly rates quoted 7 1 3
10th Percentile £79.75 - £74.63
25th Percentile £83.13 £68.26 £75.02
Median hourly rate £85.00 £73.31 £78.74
Median % change year-on-year +15.95% -6.90% +12.49%
75th Percentile £94.38 £78.36 £84.36
90th Percentile £99.20 - £85.11
UK excluding London median hourly rate £85.00 £73.31 £78.74
% change year-on-year +15.95% -6.90% +12.49%

All Contract IT Job Vacancies
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 33,457 31,336 40,748
% of contract IT jobs with a recognized job title 91.03% 92.78% 93.39%
Number of daily rates quoted 21,148 19,251 27,411
10th Percentile £291 £300 £285
25th Percentile £404 £409 £413
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £525 £525
Median % change year-on-year -4.76% - -4.55%
75th Percentile £618 £638 £640
90th Percentile £720 £738 £738
UK excluding London median daily rate £475 £488 £500
% change year-on-year -2.56% -2.50% -
Number of hourly rates quoted 1,983 978 1,439
10th Percentile £14.25 £15.52 £15.16
25th Percentile £18.18 £21.05 £19.21
Median hourly rate £25.25 £33.00 £45.00
Median % change year-on-year -23.48% -26.67% +50.00%
75th Percentile £57.50 £62.54 £65.00
90th Percentile £70.60 £72.99 £77.50
UK excluding London median hourly rate £25.15 £32.50 £45.88
% change year-on-year -22.62% -29.16% +84.29%

Security Architect
Job Vacancy Trend

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

Security Architect job vacancy trend in the UK

Security Architect
Daily Rate Trend

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for Security Architect job vacancies in the UK.

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for Security Architect job vacancies in the UK

Security Architect
Daily Rate Histogram

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing Security Architect over the 6 months to 22 December 2025.

Daily rate histogram for Security Architect in the UK

Security Architect
Hourly Rate Trend

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for Security Architect job vacancies in the UK.

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for Security Architect job vacancies in the UK

Security Architect
Hourly Rate Histogram

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing Security Architect over the 6 months to 22 December 2025.

Hourly rate histogram for Security Architect in the UK

Security Architect
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 Security Architect within the UK over the 6 months to 22 December 2025. 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 -11 296 £650 -3.70% 147
UK excluding London +2 178 £650 -2.84% 137
London -11 125 £650 -5.45% 27
Work from Home -19 99 £650 -3.70% 118
South East -1 62 £650 +1.96% 31
North of England -10 61 £650 -13.33% 36
Yorkshire -19 33 £544 -22.32% 14
South West -3 22 £650 - 19
North West -30 17 £701 -6.60% 15
Midlands -40 13 £675 -3.57% 28
North East - 12 £738 - 7
West Midlands -31 11 £675 -3.57% 17
Wales +7 9 £725 - 3
Scotland -2 9 £675 +12.50% 4
East of England -16 7 £510 +13.33% 13
Northern Ireland -7 2 £500 - 3
East Midlands - 2 £450 - 9

Security Architect Skill Set
Top 30 Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities

For the 6 months to 22 December 2025, Security Architect 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 Security Architect in the job title.

1 163 (47.11%) Security Architecture
2 118 (34.10%) Security Cleared
3 116 (33.53%) Cybersecurity
4 109 (31.50%) Azure
5 107 (30.92%) AWS
6 92 (26.59%) NIST
7 90 (26.01%) CISSP
8 86 (24.86%) SC Cleared
9 85 (24.57%) Cloud Security
10 77 (22.25%) Threat Modelling
11 72 (20.81%) ISO/IEC 27001
12 65 (18.79%) TOGAF
13 62 (17.92%) Firewall
14 60 (17.34%) Microsoft
15 59 (17.05%) Network Security
16 53 (15.32%) Zero Trust
17 51 (14.74%) SABSA
18 50 (14.45%) Incident Response
19 49 (14.16%) Identity Access Management
19 49 (14.16%) SIEM
20 46 (13.29%) Risk Management
20 46 (13.29%) Vulnerability Management
21 44 (12.72%) CISM
22 40 (11.56%) DevSecOps
22 40 (11.56%) GCP
23 39 (11.27%) CI/CD
23 39 (11.27%) Roadmaps
23 39 (11.27%) Stakeholder Engagement
24 37 (10.69%) GDPR
25 34 (9.83%) Information Security

Security Architect 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:

Application Platforms
1 15 (4.34%) Confluence
2 3 (0.87%) Microsoft Exchange
3 2 (0.58%) SharePoint
4 1 (0.29%) Jupyter
4 1 (0.29%) nginx
Applications
1 1 (0.29%) Microsoft PowerPoint
1 1 (0.29%) MS Visio
Business Applications
1 7 (2.02%) Sparx Enterprise Architect
Cloud Services
1 109 (31.50%) Azure
2 107 (30.92%) AWS
3 40 (11.56%) GCP
4 21 (6.07%) Entra ID
5 12 (3.47%) Microsoft 365
5 12 (3.47%) SaaS
6 11 (3.18%) Microsoft Purview
7 10 (2.89%) Amazon GuardDuty
8 9 (2.60%) AWS KMS
8 9 (2.60%) PaaS
9 8 (2.31%) AWS CloudFormation
9 8 (2.31%) Azure Sentinel
9 8 (2.31%) GitHub
9 8 (2.31%) Virtual Private Cloud
10 7 (2.02%) IaaS
11 4 (1.16%) Azure Key Vault
12 3 (0.87%) Amazon EKS
12 3 (0.87%) AWS CloudTrail
13 2 (0.58%) Amazon CloudWatch
13 2 (0.58%) Cloud Computing
Communications & Networking
1 62 (17.92%) Firewall
2 59 (17.05%) Network Security
3 13 (3.76%) VPN
4 10 (2.89%) SD-WAN
5 9 (2.60%) WAN
6 8 (2.31%) LAN
6 8 (2.31%) NGFW
7 6 (1.73%) DNS
8 5 (1.45%) IPsec
9 4 (1.16%) BGP
9 4 (1.16%) DHCP
9 4 (1.16%) Intrusion Detection
9 4 (1.16%) SSL
9 4 (1.16%) Wi-Fi
10 3 (0.87%) Internet
10 3 (0.87%) Kerberos
10 3 (0.87%) OSPF
10 3 (0.87%) Skype
10 3 (0.87%) TCP/IP
10 3 (0.87%) VSAN
Database & Business Intelligence
1 10 (2.89%) MongoDB
1 10 (2.89%) PostgreSQL
2 2 (0.58%) BigQuery
3 1 (0.29%) Elasticsearch
3 1 (0.29%) Metadata
3 1 (0.29%) Oracle Database
Development Applications
1 13 (3.76%) JIRA
2 5 (1.45%) Git
3 3 (0.87%) Jenkins
4 2 (0.58%) GitLab
5 1 (0.29%) MLflow
General
1 82 (23.70%) Social Skills
2 57 (16.47%) Finance
3 47 (13.58%) Public Sector
4 20 (5.78%) Analytical Skills
5 17 (4.91%) Banking
6 10 (2.89%) Legal
7 8 (2.31%) Financial Institution
8 7 (2.02%) Inclusion and Diversity
8 7 (2.02%) Influencing Skills
9 6 (1.73%) Documentation Skills
9 6 (1.73%) Presentation Skills
10 5 (1.45%) Telecoms
11 4 (1.16%) Aerospace
11 4 (1.16%) Military
11 4 (1.16%) Pharmaceutical
12 3 (0.87%) Electronics
12 3 (0.87%) Manufacturing
12 3 (0.87%) Marketing
13 1 (0.29%) Automotive
13 1 (0.29%) Retail
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 8 (2.31%) SAML
2 6 (1.73%) OAuth
3 5 (1.45%) ModSecurity
3 5 (1.45%) OpenID
3 5 (1.45%) PyTorch
3 5 (1.45%) TensorFlow
4 4 (1.16%) .NET
4 4 (1.16%) Google JAX
4 4 (1.16%) JAX
4 4 (1.16%) scikit-learn
5 3 (0.87%) OAuth2
6 2 (0.58%) ARM Templates
6 2 (0.58%) Kafka
6 2 (0.58%) Middleware
6 2 (0.58%) React
7 1 (0.29%) AWS CDK
7 1 (0.29%) Elastic Stack
7 1 (0.29%) JAAS
7 1 (0.29%) JWT
7 1 (0.29%) OpenTelemetry
Miscellaneous
1 31 (8.96%) Security Posture
2 30 (8.67%) Cloud Native
3 16 (4.62%) Onboarding
4 15 (4.34%) Management Information System
4 15 (4.34%) PKI
5 14 (4.05%) Data Centre
5 14 (4.05%) Operational Technology
6 11 (3.18%) Product Ownership
7 9 (2.60%) Cyber Threat
7 9 (2.60%) Private Cloud
8 8 (2.31%) Cloud Security Posture
8 8 (2.31%) Hybrid Cloud
8 8 (2.31%) Public Cloud
9 7 (2.02%) Enterprise Software
9 7 (2.02%) Security Operations Centre
9 7 (2.02%) Taxonomies
10 6 (1.73%) Cyber Defence
11 5 (1.45%) Legacy Systems
11 5 (1.45%) SCADA
12 4 (1.16%) NHS
Operating Systems
1 11 (3.18%) Windows
2 8 (2.31%) Linux
3 3 (0.87%) Windows 10
3 3 (0.87%) Windows Server
3 3 (0.87%) Windows Server 2008
4 2 (0.58%) Unix
4 2 (0.58%) Windows Server 2019
5 1 (0.29%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
Processes & Methodologies
1 163 (47.11%) Security Architecture
2 116 (33.53%) Cybersecurity
3 85 (24.57%) Cloud Security
4 77 (22.25%) Threat Modelling
5 65 (18.79%) TOGAF
6 53 (15.32%) Zero Trust
7 51 (14.74%) SABSA
8 50 (14.45%) Incident Response
9 49 (14.16%) Identity Access Management
9 49 (14.16%) SIEM
10 46 (13.29%) Risk Management
10 46 (13.29%) Vulnerability Management
11 40 (11.56%) DevSecOps
12 39 (11.27%) CI/CD
12 39 (11.27%) Roadmaps
12 39 (11.27%) Stakeholder Engagement
13 34 (9.83%) Information Security
14 32 (9.25%) Architectural Patterns
15 31 (8.96%) DevOps
15 31 (8.96%) Regulatory Compliance
Programming Languages
1 15 (4.34%) Python
2 12 (3.47%) Java
3 6 (1.73%) PowerShell
4 5 (1.45%) C
4 5 (1.45%) R
5 4 (1.16%) C++
5 4 (1.16%) SQL
6 3 (0.87%) Bash
6 3 (0.87%) Bicep
7 2 (0.58%) PHP
7 2 (0.58%) PL/SQL
7 2 (0.58%) TypeScript
8 1 (0.29%) JavaScript
8 1 (0.29%) Kusto Query Language
8 1 (0.29%) ProC
Qualifications
1 118 (34.10%) Security Cleared
2 90 (26.01%) CISSP
3 86 (24.86%) SC Cleared
4 44 (12.72%) CISM
5 29 (8.38%) Cisco Certification
6 22 (6.36%) Degree
7 21 (6.07%) DV Cleared
8 20 (5.78%) AWS Certification
9 18 (5.20%) (ISC)2 CCSP
10 15 (4.34%) TOGAF Certification
11 14 (4.05%) Azure Certification
12 11 (3.18%) CCNP
12 11 (3.18%) CCSP
13 7 (2.02%) CCIE
13 7 (2.02%) Master's Degree
14 6 (1.73%) GIAC
15 5 (1.45%) CISA
15 5 (1.45%) Microsoft Certification
15 5 (1.45%) PhD
16 4 (1.16%) SSCP
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 92 (26.59%) NIST
2 72 (20.81%) ISO/IEC 27001
3 37 (10.69%) GDPR
4 26 (7.51%) NCSC
4 26 (7.51%) PCI DSS
5 10 (2.89%) EU AI Act
6 8 (2.31%) PSD2
6 8 (2.31%) QA
7 7 (2.02%) Cyber Essentials
7 7 (2.02%) JSP 440
7 7 (2.02%) NIST 800
8 6 (1.73%) HIPAA
9 5 (1.45%) GRC
10 3 (0.87%) California Consumer Privacy Act
10 3 (0.87%) Cyber Essentials PLUS
10 3 (0.87%) Def Stans
10 3 (0.87%) HMG Security Policy Framework
11 2 (0.58%) COBIT
11 2 (0.58%) RMADS
11 2 (0.58%) SOC 1
System Software
1 8 (2.31%) Active Directory
1 8 (2.31%) Docker
2 3 (0.87%) VMware ESXi
2 3 (0.87%) VMware Infrastructure
3 1 (0.29%) Hyper-V
3 1 (0.29%) Virtual Machines
3 1 (0.29%) VMware NSX
Systems Management
1 23 (6.65%) Terraform
2 18 (5.20%) Kubernetes
3 6 (1.73%) Single Sign-On
4 5 (1.45%) Ansible
5 3 (0.87%) Active Directory Federation Services
5 3 (0.87%) OPNET
5 3 (0.87%) SCCM
5 3 (0.87%) vCenter Server
6 2 (0.58%) FortiGate
7 1 (0.29%) Kibana
7 1 (0.29%) Kubeflow
7 1 (0.29%) logstash
Vendors
1 60 (17.34%) Microsoft
2 25 (7.23%) CyberArk
3 16 (4.62%) Palo Alto
4 15 (4.34%) Splunk
5 11 (3.18%) BiZZdesign
5 11 (3.18%) Centrify
5 11 (3.18%) Cisco
6 10 (2.89%) Fortinet
7 8 (2.31%) Darktrace
7 8 (2.31%) Zscaler
8 7 (2.02%) CheckPoint
8 7 (2.02%) Google
8 7 (2.02%) Sparx
8 7 (2.02%) Virgin Media
9 6 (1.73%) Thycotic
9 6 (1.73%) VMware
10 5 (1.45%) F5
11 4 (1.16%) Oracle
11 4 (1.16%) SAP
11 4 (1.16%) ServiceNow