Security Engineer Contract Job Trends

Security Engineer
UK

The median Security Engineer daily rate in the UK is £540, according to job vacancies posted in the 6 months leading up to 21 May 2026.

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

6 months to
21 May 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 220 285 265
Rank change year-on-year +65 -20 -44
Contract jobs requiring a Security Engineer 546 261 370
As % of all contract jobs in the UK 1.13% 0.90% 0.87%
As % of the Job Titles category 1.23% 0.97% 0.94%
Number of daily rates quoted 337 162 254
10th Percentile £410 £384 £413
25th Percentile £475 £414 £425
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £540 £525 £550
Median % change year-on-year +2.86% -4.55% -4.35%
75th Percentile £600 £647 £650
90th Percentile £680 £738 £750
UK excluding London median daily rate £550 £500 £550
% change year-on-year +10.00% -9.09% +4.76%
Number of hourly rates quoted 17 3 4
10th Percentile £84.00 £65.65 -
25th Percentile - £66.63 £30.70
Median hourly rate £85.40 £73.31 £55.90
Median % change year-on-year +16.49% +31.14% -32.97%
75th Percentile - £80.89 £80.85
90th Percentile £88.24 £82.40 £82.39
UK excluding London median hourly rate £85.40 £73.31 £55.90
% change year-on-year +16.49% +31.14% -32.94%

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 44,544 26,886 39,472
% of contract IT jobs with a recognized job title 92.32% 92.37% 92.79%
Number of daily rates quoted 27,258 17,494 25,719
10th Percentile £325 £293 £280
25th Percentile £413 £405 £410
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £513 £510 £525
Median % change year-on-year +0.49% -2.86% -3.23%
75th Percentile £615 £625 £638
90th Percentile £725 £738 £750
UK excluding London median daily rate £500 £475 £489
% change year-on-year +5.26% -2.86% -2.20%
Number of hourly rates quoted 2,901 1,057 2,674
10th Percentile £15.00 £14.00 £12.83
25th Percentile £20.35 £18.13 £16.30
Median hourly rate £42.69 £27.99 £36.50
Median % change year-on-year +52.50% -23.32% -18.89%
75th Percentile £66.50 £60.00 £61.30
90th Percentile £78.75 £75.00 £72.90
UK excluding London median hourly rate £45.00 £26.34 £40.00
% change year-on-year +70.88% -34.16% -5.88%

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 21 May 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 21 May 2026.

Hourly rate histogram for Security Engineer in the UK

Security Engineer
Top 16 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 21 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 +52 490 £538 +2.38% 358
UK excluding London +15 253 £550 +10.00% 298
London +41 235 £525 -4.28% 111
Work from Home +28 193 £550 +4.76% 96
North of England -4 110 £569 +8.33% 65
North West +26 89 £563 +7.14% 43
Midlands -14 58 £539 +5.12% 42
South East -31 56 £500 +11.11% 88
West Midlands -17 55 £555 +8.29% 26
South West -24 23 £525 +6.33% 38
Scotland +13 22 £675 +22.73% 33
East of England -13 19 £525 +7.14% 27
Yorkshire -42 17 £600 +14.29% 16
North East -27 4 £400 -23.81% 6
East Midlands - 3 £406 - 16
Wales - 2 £733 - 6

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

For the 6 months to 21 May 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.

1 196 (35.90%) Azure
2 166 (30.40%) Cybersecurity
3 147 (26.92%) AWS
4 138 (25.27%) Cloud Security
5 131 (23.99%) Python
6 121 (22.16%) Microsoft
7 120 (21.98%) SIEM
8 105 (19.23%) Firewall
9 104 (19.05%) CI/CD
9 104 (19.05%) Network Security
10 93 (17.03%) Security Cleared
11 88 (16.12%) PowerShell
12 86 (15.75%) Incident Response
13 85 (15.57%) Cisco
14 71 (13.00%) SC Cleared
14 71 (13.00%) VPN
15 70 (12.82%) Vulnerability Management
16 66 (12.09%) DNS
17 65 (11.90%) Data Loss Prevention
18 64 (11.72%) DevOps
19 62 (11.36%) NIST
19 62 (11.36%) Terraform
20 61 (11.17%) Threat Modelling
20 61 (11.17%) Windows
21 60 (10.99%) Information Security
22 59 (10.81%) Security Operations
23 56 (10.26%) CISSP
23 56 (10.26%) Security Architecture
24 55 (10.07%) F5
24 55 (10.07%) GCP

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 21 (3.85%) Confluence
2 4 (0.73%) Apache Spark
3 3 (0.55%) Microsoft Exchange
4 2 (0.37%) Apache
5 1 (0.18%) SharePoint
Applications
1 3 (0.55%) Microsoft Office
Business Applications
1 6 (1.10%) Remedy ITSM
2 2 (0.37%) Maximo
3 1 (0.18%) SAP ERP
3 1 (0.18%) SAP S/4HANA
Cloud Services
1 196 (35.90%) Azure
2 147 (26.92%) AWS
3 55 (10.07%) GCP
4 53 (9.71%) Microsoft 365
4 53 (9.71%) Microsoft Purview
5 39 (7.14%) Entra ID
6 24 (4.40%) GitHub
7 23 (4.21%) Azure Sentinel
8 21 (3.85%) SaaS
9 20 (3.66%) AWS CloudFormation
10 17 (3.11%) Mimecast
11 15 (2.75%) Amazon GuardDuty
12 14 (2.56%) Virtual Private Cloud
13 11 (2.01%) AWS CloudTrail
13 11 (2.01%) Azure DevOps
13 11 (2.01%) OpenShift
13 11 (2.01%) Serverless
14 10 (1.83%) AWS KMS
14 10 (1.83%) Azure Key Vault
14 10 (1.83%) GitHub Actions
Communications & Networking
1 105 (19.23%) Firewall
2 104 (19.05%) Network Security
3 71 (13.00%) VPN
4 66 (12.09%) DNS
5 45 (8.24%) BGP
6 34 (6.23%) DMZ
7 33 (6.04%) Multicast
8 26 (4.76%) TCP/IP
9 25 (4.58%) SSL
10 21 (3.85%) WAN
11 16 (2.93%) HTTP
11 16 (2.93%) SD-WAN
12 11 (2.01%) Internet
12 11 (2.01%) Wireless
13 9 (1.65%) DHCP
13 9 (1.65%) IPsec
13 9 (1.65%) MPLS
13 9 (1.65%) NGFW
13 9 (1.65%) TACACS
14 8 (1.47%) Cisco ASA
Database & Business Intelligence
1 9 (1.65%) Power BI
2 7 (1.28%) Data Lake
3 5 (0.92%) SQL Server
4 4 (0.73%) Amazon Athena
4 4 (0.73%) Amazon RDS
4 4 (0.73%) Elasticsearch
4 4 (0.73%) MongoDB
4 4 (0.73%) PostgreSQL
5 2 (0.37%) Amazon Redshift
5 2 (0.37%) Apache Cassandra
5 2 (0.37%) Big Data
5 2 (0.37%) BigQuery
5 2 (0.37%) Mixpanel
5 2 (0.37%) NoSQL
5 2 (0.37%) OLAP
5 2 (0.37%) OLTP
5 2 (0.37%) RDBMS
5 2 (0.37%) Relational Database
6 1 (0.18%) Data Warehouse
6 1 (0.18%) DB2
Development Applications
1 25 (4.58%) JIRA
2 12 (2.20%) GitLab
3 7 (1.28%) Git
3 7 (1.28%) Jenkins
4 6 (1.10%) Snyk
5 2 (0.37%) Browser DevTools
5 2 (0.37%) Burp Suite
5 2 (0.37%) Claude Code
5 2 (0.37%) SonarQube
5 2 (0.37%) Sonatype Nexus
6 1 (0.18%) Artifactory
6 1 (0.18%) Atlassian Bamboo
6 1 (0.18%) Bitbucket
6 1 (0.18%) Metasploit
6 1 (0.18%) sqlmap
6 1 (0.18%) Travis CI
6 1 (0.18%) TruffleHog
General
1 108 (19.78%) Social Skills
2 76 (13.92%) Finance
3 49 (8.97%) Analytical Skills
4 41 (7.51%) Banking
5 33 (6.04%) Public Sector
6 23 (4.21%) Investment Banking
7 13 (2.38%) Documentation Skills
8 8 (1.47%) Legal
8 8 (1.47%) Telecoms
9 7 (1.28%) Presentation Skills
10 6 (1.10%) Marketing
11 5 (0.92%) Cyber-Physical System
11 5 (0.92%) Health Technology
11 5 (0.92%) Manufacturing
12 4 (0.73%) Local Government
13 3 (0.55%) Aerospace
13 3 (0.55%) Financial Institution
13 3 (0.55%) Inclusion and Diversity
14 2 (0.37%) Military
15 1 (0.18%) Retail
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 15 (2.75%) Elastic Stack
2 10 (1.83%) LDAP
3 6 (1.10%) 802.1X
3 6 (1.10%) LangChain
3 6 (1.10%) Microsoft Graph
3 6 (1.10%) PyTorch
3 6 (1.10%) REST
3 6 (1.10%) SAML
3 6 (1.10%) scikit-learn
4 5 (0.92%) SLSA
5 4 (0.73%) .NET
5 4 (0.73%) JSON
5 4 (0.73%) Kafka
5 4 (0.73%) OAuth
6 3 (0.55%) ADO
6 3 (0.55%) AWS CDK
6 3 (0.55%) Node.js
6 3 (0.55%) SailPoint
7 2 (0.37%) GraphQL
7 2 (0.37%) NestJS
Miscellaneous
1 69 (12.64%) Security Posture
2 47 (8.61%) Cloud Native
3 26 (4.76%) Management Information System
4 22 (4.03%) Cloud Security Posture
4 22 (4.03%) Data Centre
5 17 (3.11%) Operational Technology
6 16 (2.93%) Distributed Denial-of-Service
7 14 (2.56%) Onboarding
8 12 (2.20%) PKI
9 11 (2.01%) Data Protection Act
9 11 (2.01%) Hybrid Cloud
10 9 (1.65%) Cyber Threat
11 8 (1.47%) AI Agents
12 7 (1.28%) Cyber Defence
12 7 (1.28%) Public Cloud
13 6 (1.10%) Linux Command Line
14 5 (0.92%) Cyber Kill Chain
14 5 (0.92%) Greenfield Project
14 5 (0.92%) Security Operations Centre
15 4 (0.73%) Enterprise Cloud
Operating Systems
1 61 (11.17%) Windows
2 51 (9.34%) Linux
3 14 (2.56%) Windows Server
4 12 (2.20%) Mac OS
5 9 (1.65%) Apple iOS
6 8 (1.47%) Windows 10
7 7 (1.28%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
7 7 (1.28%) Ubuntu
8 4 (0.73%) Android
8 4 (0.73%) Unix
9 1 (0.18%) Rocky
9 1 (0.18%) VMS
Processes & Methodologies
1 166 (30.40%) Cybersecurity
2 138 (25.27%) Cloud Security
3 120 (21.98%) SIEM
4 104 (19.05%) CI/CD
5 86 (15.75%) Incident Response
6 70 (12.82%) Vulnerability Management
7 65 (11.90%) Data Loss Prevention
8 64 (11.72%) DevOps
9 61 (11.17%) Threat Modelling
10 60 (10.99%) Information Security
11 59 (10.81%) Security Operations
12 56 (10.26%) Security Architecture
13 55 (10.07%) Infrastructure as Code
14 53 (9.71%) DevSecOps
15 47 (8.61%) Continuous Improvement
15 47 (8.61%) Load Balancing
15 47 (8.61%) Zero Trust
16 42 (7.69%) AI
17 41 (7.51%) Validation
18 40 (7.33%) Agile
Programming Languages
1 131 (23.99%) Python
2 88 (16.12%) PowerShell
3 48 (8.79%) Bash
4 17 (3.11%) Kusto Query Language
5 16 (2.93%) Java
6 11 (2.01%) SQL
7 5 (0.92%) JavaScript
7 5 (0.92%) PHP
8 3 (0.55%) C#
8 3 (0.55%) Go
8 3 (0.55%) Search Processing Language
8 3 (0.55%) Shell Script
9 2 (0.37%) Bicep
9 2 (0.37%) Ruby
9 2 (0.37%) TypeScript
10 1 (0.18%) BeanShell
10 1 (0.18%) C
10 1 (0.18%) Perl
10 1 (0.18%) Scala
Qualifications
1 93 (17.03%) Security Cleared
2 71 (13.00%) SC Cleared
3 56 (10.26%) CISSP
4 48 (8.79%) Degree
5 30 (5.49%) Cisco Certification
6 29 (5.31%) CISM
7 20 (3.66%) AWS Certification
8 19 (3.48%) DV Cleared
9 15 (2.75%) Azure Certification
9 15 (2.75%) CCNP
10 14 (2.56%) (ISC)2 CCSP
11 12 (2.20%) CompTIA Security+
12 11 (2.01%) Computer Science Degree
13 10 (1.83%) Microsoft Certification
14 8 (1.47%) GIAC
15 7 (1.28%) CEH
16 6 (1.10%) CCSP
16 6 (1.10%) CESG Certified Professional
17 5 (0.92%) ISO 27001 Lead Auditor
17 5 (0.92%) ISO 27001 Lead Implementer
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 62 (11.36%) NIST
2 53 (9.71%) ISO/IEC 27001
3 35 (6.41%) GDPR
4 28 (5.13%) Cyber Essentials
5 22 (4.03%) PCI DSS
6 16 (2.93%) Cyber Essentials PLUS
7 10 (1.83%) GRC
8 9 (1.65%) NCSC
9 8 (1.47%) SLA
10 7 (1.28%) HIPAA
11 6 (1.10%) California Consumer Privacy Act
11 6 (1.10%) NIST 800
12 5 (0.92%) RMADS
12 5 (0.92%) SOC 2
13 4 (0.73%) JSP 440
14 3 (0.55%) Actionable Recommendations
14 3 (0.55%) Government Security Classifications
14 3 (0.55%) ISA99
15 2 (0.37%) Data Quality
15 2 (0.37%) ISO/IEC 27002 (supersedes ISO/IEC 17799)
System Software
1 29 (5.31%) Active Directory
2 20 (3.66%) Docker
3 11 (2.01%) VMware Infrastructure
4 9 (1.65%) Virtual Machines
5 7 (1.28%) VMware ESXi
6 5 (0.92%) VMware NSX
6 5 (0.92%) vSphere
7 4 (0.73%) Firmware
8 3 (0.55%) Virtual Servers
9 2 (0.37%) Hyper-V
9 2 (0.37%) Squid
9 2 (0.37%) Virtual Desktop
10 1 (0.18%) GPFS
10 1 (0.18%) Lustre
10 1 (0.18%) RACF
10 1 (0.18%) Slurm Workload Manager
Systems Management
1 62 (11.36%) Terraform
2 49 (8.97%) Kubernetes
3 20 (3.66%) Microsoft Intune
4 16 (2.93%) Ansible
5 9 (1.65%) Single Sign-On
6 7 (1.28%) CASB
6 7 (1.28%) SCCM
6 7 (1.28%) vCenter Server
7 6 (1.10%) Nessus
8 5 (0.92%) FortiGate
8 5 (0.92%) Functional Safety
8 5 (0.92%) Kibana
9 4 (0.73%) AirWatch
9 4 (0.73%) logstash
9 4 (0.73%) Progress Chef
9 4 (0.73%) WSUS
10 3 (0.55%) Icinga
10 3 (0.55%) SCOM
11 2 (0.37%) Grafana
11 2 (0.37%) QRadar
Vendors
1 121 (22.16%) Microsoft
2 85 (15.57%) Cisco
3 55 (10.07%) F5
4 38 (6.96%) CrowdStrike
4 38 (6.96%) Palo Alto
5 29 (5.31%) Fortinet
6 24 (4.40%) Zscaler
7 23 (4.21%) CyberArk
8 21 (3.85%) ServiceNow
8 21 (3.85%) Splunk
9 20 (3.66%) Google
9 20 (3.66%) Tenable
10 18 (3.30%) VMware
11 17 (3.11%) Netskope
12 16 (2.93%) CheckPoint
13 15 (2.75%) Qualys
14 12 (2.20%) BeyondTrust
15 10 (1.83%) Blue Coat
15 10 (1.83%) Juniper
16 8 (1.47%) Oracle