Security Operations Centre Contract Job Trends

Security Operations Centre
UK

The table below looks at the prevalence of the term Security Operations Centre in contract job vacancies. Included is a benchmarking guide to the contractor rates offered in vacancies that cited Security Operations Centre over the 6 months leading up to 16 July 2026, comparing them to the same period in the previous two years.

6 months to
16 Jul 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 511 414 452
Rank change year-on-year -97 +38 +60
Contract jobs citing Security Operations Centre 141 123 140
As % of all contract jobs in the UK 0.27% 0.38% 0.33%
As % of the Miscellaneous category 0.81% 1.09% 1.08%
Number of daily rates quoted 107 72 96
10th Percentile £412 £329 £406
25th Percentile £475 £442 £500
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £525 £575 £600
Median % change year-on-year -8.70% -4.17% -0.99%
75th Percentile £620 £775 £688
90th Percentile £688 - £769
UK excluding London median daily rate £540 £563 £600
% change year-on-year -4.00% -6.25% -
Number of hourly rates quoted 0 12 0
Median hourly rate - £65.00 -
UK excluding London median hourly rate - £65.00 -

All Generic Skills
UK

Security Operations Centre falls under the General and Transferable Skills category. For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all contract job vacancies requiring generic IT skills.

Contract vacancies with a requirement for generic IT skills 17,477 11,249 13,009
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the UK 33.21% 34.62% 30.52%
Number of daily rates quoted 10,713 6,956 8,273
10th Percentile £318 £300 £282
25th Percentile £415 £406 £413
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £525 £525 £538
Median % change year-on-year - -2.33% -2.27%
75th Percentile £627 £649 £663
90th Percentile £749 £775 £800
UK excluding London median daily rate £500 £475 £500
% change year-on-year +5.26% -5.00% -
Number of hourly rates quoted 888 533 862
10th Percentile £16.01 £15.48 £12.25
25th Percentile £20.97 £18.87 £15.50
Median hourly rate £43.96 £30.81 £36.50
Median % change year-on-year +42.70% -15.60% +15.87%
75th Percentile £70.23 £58.75 £63.44
90th Percentile £87.64 £77.50 £72.50
UK excluding London median hourly rate £43.96 £31.49 £36.50
% change year-on-year +39.60% -13.73% -7.57%

Security Operations Centre
Job Vacancy Trend

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

Security Operations Centre job vacancy trend in the UK

Security Operations Centre
Daily Rate Trend

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in the UK citing Security Operations Centre.

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in the UK citing Security Operations Centre

Security Operations Centre
Daily Rate Histogram

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing Security Operations Centre over the 6 months to 16 July 2026.

Daily rate histogram for Security Operations Centre in the UK

Security Operations Centre
Hourly Rate Trend

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in the UK citing Security Operations Centre.

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in the UK citing Security Operations Centre

Security Operations Centre
Top 14 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 Operations Centre within the UK over the 6 months to 16 July 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 -92 129 £525 -8.70% 48
UK excluding London -68 95 £540 -4.00% 33
South East -37 42 £450 -18.18% 10
Work from Home -70 40 £500 -13.04% 18
London -82 36 £538 -6.52% 17
South West -16 19 £613 +58.06% 8
Midlands -47 14 £583 - 3
West Midlands -44 13 £540 - 1
East of England -36 7 £550 -10.20% 8
North of England -83 7 £540 -18.49% 3
Scotland -8 6 £650 - 1
Yorkshire -48 5 £540 +14.27% 1
North West -56 2 £620 -17.33% 2
East Midlands - 1 £625 - 2

Security Operations Centre
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:

Applications
1 1 (0.71%) Microsoft Project
Business Applications
1 7 (4.96%) Oracle ERP
Cloud Services
1 23 (16.31%) Azure
2 17 (12.06%) AWS
3 8 (5.67%) OCI
4 7 (4.96%) SaaS
5 6 (4.26%) Microsoft Purview
6 5 (3.55%) Microsoft 365
7 4 (2.84%) Amazon ECS
8 3 (2.13%) Azure Sentinel
8 3 (2.13%) Entra ID
8 3 (2.13%) GCP
9 1 (0.71%) Anthropic Claude
9 1 (0.71%) Azure DevOps
9 1 (0.71%) ChatGPT
9 1 (0.71%) GitHub
9 1 (0.71%) GitHub Copilot
9 1 (0.71%) IaaS
9 1 (0.71%) Microsoft Copilot
9 1 (0.71%) PaaS
9 1 (0.71%) Power Platform
Communications & Networking
1 18 (12.77%) Network Security
2 14 (9.93%) DNS
2 14 (9.93%) TCP/IP
3 13 (9.22%) Firewall
4 11 (7.80%) Intrusion Detection
5 2 (1.42%) 4G
5 2 (1.42%) DHCP
5 2 (1.42%) HTTP
5 2 (1.42%) LAN
5 2 (1.42%) VPN
5 2 (1.42%) WAN
5 2 (1.42%) Wireless
6 1 (0.71%) VoIP
Database & Business Intelligence
1 2 (1.42%) Oracle Reports
2 1 (0.71%) Power BI
Development Applications
1 1 (0.71%) Claude Code
1 1 (0.71%) JIRA
General
1 44 (31.21%) Social Skills
2 28 (19.86%) Public Sector
3 12 (8.51%) Analytical Skills
4 8 (5.67%) Finance
5 3 (2.13%) Telecoms
6 2 (1.42%) Military
7 1 (0.71%) Documentation Skills
7 1 (0.71%) Legal
7 1 (0.71%) Local Government
Job Titles
1 62 (43.97%) Analyst
2 51 (36.17%) SOC Analyst
3 31 (21.99%) Senior
4 24 (17.02%) SOC Engineer
5 15 (10.64%) Consultant
5 15 (10.64%) Security Analyst
6 13 (9.22%) Lead
6 13 (9.22%) Senior Analyst
7 12 (8.51%) Operations Analyst
7 12 (8.51%) Security Operations Analyst
8 11 (7.80%) Security Manager
9 10 (7.09%) SOC Manager
10 9 (6.38%) Security Engineer
10 9 (6.38%) SOC Consultant
11 7 (4.96%) Cybersecurity Engineer
11 7 (4.96%) Cybersecurity Manager
12 6 (4.26%) Operational Security Manager
12 6 (4.26%) Operations Manager
12 6 (4.26%) Security Operations Manager
13 5 (3.55%) Information Security Engineer
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 13 (9.22%) Elastic Stack
2 4 (2.84%) Kafka
Miscellaneous
1 22 (15.60%) Security Posture
2 21 (14.89%) Cyber Threat
3 19 (13.48%) CSOC
3 19 (13.48%) Cyber Defence
4 11 (7.80%) Management Information System
5 10 (7.09%) Onboarding
6 9 (6.38%) Cyberattack
7 5 (3.55%) Operational Technology
8 4 (2.84%) Cloud Native
9 2 (1.42%) CESG
9 2 (1.42%) Cyber Security Posture
10 1 (0.71%) Analytical Mindset
10 1 (0.71%) Distributed Denial-of-Service
10 1 (0.71%) Enterprise Software
10 1 (0.71%) PKI
10 1 (0.71%) Self-Motivation
Operating Systems
1 29 (20.57%) Windows
2 24 (17.02%) Linux
3 2 (1.42%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
Processes & Methodologies
1 141 (100.00%) Security Operations
2 91 (64.54%) Cybersecurity
3 81 (57.45%) SIEM
4 71 (50.35%) Incident Response
5 39 (27.66%) Continuous Improvement
6 30 (21.28%) MITRE ATT&CK
6 30 (21.28%) Threat Intelligence
7 29 (20.57%) Use Case
8 24 (17.02%) Threat Detection
9 23 (16.31%) Cyber Threat Intelligence
9 23 (16.31%) Vulnerability Management
10 21 (14.89%) Cloud Security
11 20 (14.18%) Security Monitoring
11 20 (14.18%) Stakeholder Management
12 19 (13.48%) Information Security
13 18 (12.77%) SOAR
14 16 (11.35%) Problem-Solving
15 15 (10.64%) Cyber Resilience
16 13 (9.22%) Incident Management
16 13 (9.22%) Penetration Testing
Programming Languages
1 15 (10.64%) Kusto Query Language
2 10 (7.09%) Search Processing Language
3 9 (6.38%) Python
4 7 (4.96%) PowerShell
5 3 (2.13%) Bash
5 3 (2.13%) Perl
6 1 (0.71%) C
6 1 (0.71%) Groovy
6 1 (0.71%) Objective-C
6 1 (0.71%) SQL
Qualifications
1 87 (61.70%) Security Cleared
2 53 (37.59%) DV Cleared
3 47 (33.33%) SC Cleared
4 22 (15.60%) CISSP
5 17 (12.06%) CISM
5 17 (12.06%) CompTIA Security+
6 15 (10.64%) CompTIA CySA+
7 12 (8.51%) Degree
8 8 (5.67%) Computer Science Degree
9 7 (4.96%) Cisco Certification
10 6 (4.26%) CEH
10 6 (4.26%) GCIA
10 6 (4.26%) GCIH
10 6 (4.26%) GIAC
11 5 (3.55%) (ISC)2 CCSP
12 4 (2.84%) CCSP
12 4 (2.84%) GSEC
13 3 (2.13%) Azure Certification
13 3 (2.13%) Network+ Certification
14 2 (1.42%) CESG Certified Professional
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 24 (17.02%) NCSC
2 23 (16.31%) ISO/IEC 27001
3 17 (12.06%) GDPR
4 7 (4.96%) Cyber Essentials
4 7 (4.96%) NIST
5 4 (2.84%) GRC
5 4 (2.84%) PCI DSS
6 2 (1.42%) Cyber Essentials PLUS
6 2 (1.42%) Def Stans
7 1 (0.71%) Data Quality
7 1 (0.71%) JSP 440
7 1 (0.71%) NIST 800
7 1 (0.71%) PMO
7 1 (0.71%) SOC 2
System Software
1 7 (4.96%) Active Directory
2 4 (2.84%) Snort
Systems Management
1 6 (4.26%) QRadar
2 5 (3.55%) Terraform
3 4 (2.84%) Ansible
3 4 (2.84%) CSIRT
3 4 (2.84%) Kubernetes
4 2 (1.42%) Computer Emergency Response Teams
4 2 (1.42%) Computer Incident Response Team
4 2 (1.42%) FortiGate
Vendors
1 39 (27.66%) Splunk
2 27 (19.15%) Microsoft
3 10 (7.09%) CrowdStrike
4 7 (4.96%) Oracle
5 6 (4.26%) Cisco
6 5 (3.55%) Qualys
7 3 (2.13%) Clearswift
7 3 (2.13%) SolarWinds
7 3 (2.13%) Tanium
7 3 (2.13%) Tenable
7 3 (2.13%) Trend Micro
7 3 (2.13%) Tripwire
8 2 (1.42%) CheckPoint
8 2 (1.42%) Cribl.io
8 2 (1.42%) IBM
8 2 (1.42%) ServiceNow
9 1 (0.71%) Carbon Black
9 1 (0.71%) F5
9 1 (0.71%) Palo Alto
9 1 (0.71%) Rapid7