Security Engineer Contract Job Trends

Security Engineer
UK

The median Security Engineer daily rate in the UK is £538, according to job vacancies posted in the 6 months leading up to 9 January 2026.

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

6 months to
9 Jan 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 218 249 280
Rank change year-on-year +31 +31 -15
Contract jobs requiring a Security Engineer 447 323 356
As % of all contract jobs in the UK 1.22% 1.01% 0.84%
As % of the Job Titles category 1.33% 1.09% 0.90%
Number of daily rates quoted 252 207 228
10th Percentile £380 £400 £413
25th Percentile £456 £436 £485
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £538 £550 £600
Median % change year-on-year -2.27% -8.33% +5.73%
75th Percentile £625 £625 £700
90th Percentile £700 £700 £775
UK excluding London median daily rate £525 £525 £568
% change year-on-year - -7.49% +10.09%
Number of hourly rates quoted 12 3 25
10th Percentile - £42.00 £58.80
25th Percentile - £43.13 £82.17
Median hourly rate £85.40 £45.00 £83.40
Median % change year-on-year +89.78% -46.04% +43.18%
75th Percentile £90.38 £61.68 -
90th Percentile £91.50 £71.69 £83.41
UK excluding London median hourly rate £85.40 £73.31 £83.40
% change year-on-year +16.49% -12.10% +43.18%

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 33,508 29,606 39,607
% of contract IT jobs with a recognized job title 91.31% 92.68% 93.31%
Number of daily rates quoted 21,195 18,121 26,431
10th Percentile £300 £291 £281
25th Percentile £405 £408 £413
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £525 £525
Median % change year-on-year -4.76% - -4.55%
75th Percentile £618 £638 £638
90th Percentile £719 £738 £738
UK excluding London median daily rate £475 £479 £500
% change year-on-year -0.89% -4.15% -
Number of hourly rates quoted 1,969 900 1,622
10th Percentile £14.25 £15.52 £14.18
25th Percentile £18.22 £21.05 £19.06
Median hourly rate £26.50 £32.50 £44.50
Median % change year-on-year -18.46% -26.97% +34.85%
75th Percentile £60.00 £62.24 £65.00
90th Percentile £71.46 £73.75 £76.53
UK excluding London median hourly rate £25.15 £31.50 £45.11
% change year-on-year -20.16% -30.16% +67.04%

Security Engineer
Job Vacancy Trend

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

Security Engineer job vacancy trend in the UK

Security Engineer
Daily Rate Trend

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

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

Security Engineer
Daily Rate Histogram

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing Security Engineer over the 6 months to 9 January 2026.

Daily rate histogram for Security Engineer in the UK

Security Engineer
Hourly Rate Trend

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

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

Security Engineer
Hourly Rate Histogram

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing Security Engineer over the 6 months to 9 January 2026.

Hourly rate histogram for Security Engineer in the UK

Security Engineer
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 Engineer within the UK over the 6 months to 9 January 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 +15 386 £538 -2.27% 357
London +37 209 £548 -4.78% 83
UK excluding London 0 180 £525 - 336
Work from Home +3 126 £536 +1.34% 125
North of England -37 46 £575 +11.11% 68
South East -19 41 £475 -9.52% 99
North West -22 30 £575 +4.55% 40
Midlands -29 27 £488 +15.38% 41
South West +8 26 £522 -16.52% 53
Scotland +8 23 £525 -6.67% 28
West Midlands -28 23 £543 +28.40% 19
East of England -12 19 £500 +81.82% 35
Yorkshire -44 13 £570 +42.50% 19
Northern Ireland -2 5 - - 4
East Midlands - 4 £413 - 21
North East -10 3 £400 - 9
Wales 0 2 £600 +34.83% 17

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

For the 6 months to 9 January 2026, Security Engineer 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 Engineer in the job title.

1 170 (38.03%) Azure
2 169 (37.81%) Cybersecurity
3 130 (29.08%) SIEM
4 124 (27.74%) Microsoft
5 120 (26.85%) AWS
6 116 (25.95%) Firewall
7 106 (23.71%) Cloud Security
8 99 (22.15%) Security Cleared
9 93 (20.81%) Incident Response
9 93 (20.81%) Network Security
10 84 (18.79%) Python
11 77 (17.23%) SC Cleared
12 75 (16.78%) NIST
13 74 (16.55%) Security Operations
14 71 (15.88%) PowerShell
15 68 (15.21%) Windows
16 67 (14.99%) Infrastructure as Code
17 64 (14.32%) CI/CD
18 62 (13.87%) CISSP
19 61 (13.65%) Linux
20 56 (12.53%) GCP
21 54 (12.08%) Active Directory
21 54 (12.08%) ISO/IEC 27001
22 53 (11.86%) Entra ID
22 53 (11.86%) Microsoft 365
23 52 (11.63%) DevOps
24 49 (10.96%) Degree
25 47 (10.51%) Problem-Solving
26 46 (10.29%) Splunk
26 46 (10.29%) Vulnerability Management

Security Engineer 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 11 (2.46%) Microsoft Exchange
2 6 (1.34%) SharePoint
3 4 (0.89%) Confluence
4 2 (0.45%) Apache
4 2 (0.45%) Apache Spark
5 1 (0.22%) Apache Airflow
Applications
1 5 (1.12%) Microsoft Office
2 4 (0.89%) Microsoft Excel
2 4 (0.89%) Microsoft PowerPoint
Business Applications
1 2 (0.45%) NetSuite
Cloud Services
1 170 (38.03%) Azure
2 120 (26.85%) AWS
3 56 (12.53%) GCP
4 53 (11.86%) Entra ID
4 53 (11.86%) Microsoft 365
5 45 (10.07%) Azure Sentinel
6 36 (8.05%) Microsoft Purview
7 26 (5.82%) GitHub
8 17 (3.80%) OpenShift
9 15 (3.36%) AWS CloudFormation
10 14 (3.13%) Azure Monitor
11 12 (2.68%) Azure Key Vault
12 11 (2.46%) GitHub Actions
12 11 (2.46%) Mimecast
13 10 (2.24%) SaaS
14 8 (1.79%) Amazon GuardDuty
15 7 (1.57%) Amazon EKS
15 7 (1.57%) Azure DevOps
15 7 (1.57%) Serverless
16 6 (1.34%) Amazon ECS
Communications & Networking
1 116 (25.95%) Firewall
2 93 (20.81%) Network Security
3 36 (8.05%) VPN
4 33 (7.38%) DNS
5 21 (4.70%) WAN
6 16 (3.58%) SSL
6 16 (3.58%) TCP/IP
6 16 (3.58%) Wireless
7 13 (2.91%) BGP
8 11 (2.46%) Intrusion Detection
9 10 (2.24%) IPsec
9 10 (2.24%) OSPF
10 8 (1.79%) Cisco IPT
10 8 (1.79%) DMVPN
11 7 (1.57%) DHCP
11 7 (1.57%) Wi-Fi
12 5 (1.12%) Internet
12 5 (1.12%) SD-WAN
13 4 (0.89%) DMARC
13 4 (0.89%) NGFW
Database & Business Intelligence
1 11 (2.46%) Data Lake
2 8 (1.79%) BigQuery
3 7 (1.57%) Oracle Database
4 5 (1.12%) Elasticsearch
5 4 (0.89%) Power BI
6 3 (0.67%) Amazon Athena
7 2 (0.45%) Amazon RDS
7 2 (0.45%) Azure SQL Data Warehouse
7 2 (0.45%) Big Data
7 2 (0.45%) Data Warehouse
7 2 (0.45%) Mixpanel
7 2 (0.45%) OLAP
7 2 (0.45%) OLTP
8 1 (0.22%) Amazon Redshift
8 1 (0.22%) DynamoDB
Development Applications
1 15 (3.36%) GitLab
2 9 (2.01%) JIRA
3 7 (1.57%) Jenkins
3 7 (1.57%) SonarQube
4 6 (1.34%) ClearCase
5 5 (1.12%) Snyk
6 4 (0.89%) Bitbucket
7 3 (0.67%) Artifactory
8 2 (0.45%) Git
9 1 (0.22%) Travis CI
General
1 113 (25.28%) Social Skills
2 62 (13.87%) Finance
3 41 (9.17%) Public Sector
4 36 (8.05%) Analytical Skills
5 15 (3.36%) Banking
6 14 (3.13%) Documentation Skills
7 11 (2.46%) Telecoms
8 10 (2.24%) Military
9 9 (2.01%) Legal
10 8 (1.79%) Inclusion and Diversity
11 6 (1.34%) Financial Institution
11 6 (1.34%) Spanish Language
12 5 (1.12%) Manufacturing
13 4 (0.89%) Cyber-Physical System
13 4 (0.89%) Investment Banking
13 4 (0.89%) Organisational Skills
13 4 (0.89%) Pharmaceutical
14 3 (0.67%) Local Government
15 2 (0.45%) Aerospace
15 2 (0.45%) Retail
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 20 (4.47%) REST
2 11 (2.46%) Elastic Stack
3 10 (2.24%) SAML
4 9 (2.01%) 802.1X
5 7 (1.57%) Node.js
5 7 (1.57%) OAuth
5 7 (1.57%) SailPoint
6 6 (1.34%) JSON
6 6 (1.34%) OpenID
7 5 (1.12%) Kafka
7 5 (1.12%) NestJS
8 4 (0.89%) Microsoft Graph
8 4 (0.89%) Regular Expression
8 4 (0.89%) SOAP
9 3 (0.67%) LDAP
9 3 (0.67%) YAML
10 2 (0.45%) gRPC
10 2 (0.45%) Oracle Fusion
10 2 (0.45%) RESTful
10 2 (0.45%) Smart Contracts
Miscellaneous
1 52 (11.63%) Security Posture
2 27 (6.04%) Data Centre
3 23 (5.15%) Management Information System
4 22 (4.92%) Onboarding
5 20 (4.47%) Cloud Native
6 13 (2.91%) Cyber Threat
7 12 (2.68%) Data Protection Act
8 10 (2.24%) Cyber Defence
8 10 (2.24%) Operational Technology
9 8 (1.79%) Cloud Security Posture
10 7 (1.57%) Greenfield Project
10 7 (1.57%) Hybrid Cloud
10 7 (1.57%) Security Operations Centre
11 6 (1.34%) BYOD
11 6 (1.34%) Cyber Kill Chain
11 6 (1.34%) Cyber Security Posture
12 5 (1.12%) Life Science
12 5 (1.12%) Mobile App
12 5 (1.12%) PKI
12 5 (1.12%) YARA
Operating Systems
1 68 (15.21%) Windows
2 61 (13.65%) Linux
3 12 (2.68%) Windows Server
4 10 (2.24%) Mac OS
5 8 (1.79%) Unix
6 6 (1.34%) Android
7 5 (1.12%) Apple iOS
8 3 (0.67%) VMS
8 3 (0.67%) Windows 10
9 2 (0.45%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
10 1 (0.22%) Rocky
10 1 (0.22%) Ubuntu
10 1 (0.22%) Windows Server 2012
Processes & Methodologies
1 169 (37.81%) Cybersecurity
2 130 (29.08%) SIEM
3 106 (23.71%) Cloud Security
4 93 (20.81%) Incident Response
5 74 (16.55%) Security Operations
6 67 (14.99%) Infrastructure as Code
7 64 (14.32%) CI/CD
8 52 (11.63%) DevOps
9 47 (10.51%) Problem-Solving
10 46 (10.29%) Vulnerability Management
11 44 (9.84%) Threat Detection
12 41 (9.17%) DevSecOps
12 41 (9.17%) SOAR
12 41 (9.17%) Threat Modelling
13 39 (8.72%) Information Security
13 39 (8.72%) Security Monitoring
14 35 (7.83%) Analytics
15 34 (7.61%) Continuous Improvement
16 33 (7.38%) Agile
16 33 (7.38%) Vulnerability Scanning
Programming Languages
1 84 (18.79%) Python
2 71 (15.88%) PowerShell
3 32 (7.16%) Kusto Query Language
4 25 (5.59%) Bash
5 15 (3.36%) Java
6 11 (2.46%) SQL
7 6 (1.34%) Bicep
7 6 (1.34%) C
8 5 (1.12%) JavaScript
8 5 (1.12%) Shell Script
9 4 (0.89%) BeanShell
10 3 (0.67%) C#
10 3 (0.67%) Kotlin
10 3 (0.67%) Perl
11 2 (0.45%) C++
11 2 (0.45%) Rust
11 2 (0.45%) TypeScript
12 1 (0.22%) Go
12 1 (0.22%) Scala
12 1 (0.22%) Swift
Qualifications
1 99 (22.15%) Security Cleared
2 77 (17.23%) SC Cleared
3 62 (13.87%) CISSP
4 49 (10.96%) Degree
5 34 (7.61%) CISM
6 26 (5.82%) Cisco Certification
7 23 (5.15%) DV Cleared
8 17 (3.80%) Azure Certification
9 16 (3.58%) CompTIA Security+
10 15 (3.36%) CEH
11 13 (2.91%) CCNP
12 11 (2.46%) (ISC)2 CCSP
12 11 (2.46%) AWS Certification
13 10 (2.24%) Microsoft Certification
14 9 (2.01%) SANS
15 7 (1.57%) GIAC
16 6 (1.34%) CCSP
16 6 (1.34%) CompTIA CySA+
16 6 (1.34%) Network+ Certification
16 6 (1.34%) OSCP
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 75 (16.78%) NIST
2 54 (12.08%) ISO/IEC 27001
3 29 (6.49%) GDPR
4 18 (4.03%) NCSC
5 14 (3.13%) Cyber Essentials
6 12 (2.68%) NIST 800
7 11 (2.46%) HIPAA
8 9 (2.01%) GRC
8 9 (2.01%) JSP 440
9 7 (1.57%) Cyber Essentials PLUS
10 6 (1.34%) PCI DSS
10 6 (1.34%) RMADS
11 5 (1.12%) SOC 2
12 3 (0.67%) ISO/IEC 27002 (supersedes ISO/IEC 17799)
12 3 (0.67%) ISO/IEC 42001
13 2 (0.45%) Data Quality
13 2 (0.45%) EU AI Act
13 2 (0.45%) GxP
14 1 (0.22%) Sarbanes-Oxley
14 1 (0.22%) SLA
System Software
1 54 (12.08%) Active Directory
2 17 (3.80%) Virtual Machines
3 13 (2.91%) Docker
4 10 (2.24%) Firmware
5 7 (1.57%) Hyper-V
6 2 (0.45%) Snort
6 2 (0.45%) Virtual Desktop
6 2 (0.45%) VMware Infrastructure
7 1 (0.22%) GPFS
7 1 (0.22%) Lustre
7 1 (0.22%) Slurm Workload Manager
7 1 (0.22%) Virtual Servers
Systems Management
1 44 (9.84%) Terraform
2 32 (7.16%) Kubernetes
3 19 (4.25%) Microsoft Intune
3 19 (4.25%) SCCM
4 13 (2.91%) Fluentd
4 13 (2.91%) Single Sign-On
5 10 (2.24%) Ansible
5 10 (2.24%) CASB
6 7 (1.57%) logstash
6 7 (1.57%) WSUS
7 6 (1.34%) Kibana
7 6 (1.34%) SCOrch
8 5 (1.12%) Nessus
9 4 (0.89%) CSIRT
9 4 (0.89%) Functional Safety
10 3 (0.67%) AirWatch
10 3 (0.67%) Argo
10 3 (0.67%) FortiGate
10 3 (0.67%) Icinga
10 3 (0.67%) QRadar
Vendors
1 124 (27.74%) Microsoft
2 46 (10.29%) Splunk
3 44 (9.84%) Cisco
4 36 (8.05%) Palo Alto
5 30 (6.71%) CrowdStrike
6 26 (5.82%) F5
6 26 (5.82%) Tenable
7 21 (4.70%) CheckPoint
8 19 (4.25%) Google
8 19 (4.25%) Juniper
9 18 (4.03%) Fortinet
10 16 (3.58%) Qualys
11 13 (2.91%) Cribl.io
12 11 (2.46%) ServiceNow
12 11 (2.46%) Zscaler
13 9 (2.01%) Blue Coat
13 9 (2.01%) Oracle
14 8 (1.79%) CyberArk
14 8 (1.79%) Forcepoint
15 6 (1.34%) NetApp