SSL Contract Job Trends

Secure Socket Layer (SSL)
UK

The table below provides summary statistics and contractor rates for jobs requiring SSL skills. It covers contract job vacancies from the 6 months leading up to 13 March 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
13 Mar 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 449 355 368
Rank change year-on-year -94 +13 +83
Contract jobs citing SSL 164 178 234
As % of all contract jobs in the UK 0.38% 0.60% 0.53%
As % of the Communications & Networking category 3.78% 4.52% 3.90%
Number of daily rates quoted 98 112 119
10th Percentile £334 £376 £380
25th Percentile £364 £453 £432
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £549 £575
Median % change year-on-year -8.97% -4.47% +4.55%
75th Percentile £642 £638 £638
90th Percentile £688 £660 £690
UK excluding London median daily rate £500 £575 £600
% change year-on-year -13.04% -4.17% +20.30%
Number of hourly rates quoted 5 5 8
10th Percentile £52.15 - -
25th Percentile £55.00 £80.34 £45.88
Median hourly rate £65.00 £81.35 £62.75
Median % change year-on-year -20.10% +29.64% +1.21%
75th Percentile £75.00 £82.10 £66.05
90th Percentile £80.25 £83.24 £66.63
UK excluding London median hourly rate £65.00 £81.35 £62.75
% change year-on-year -20.10% +29.64% +1.21%

All Communications and Computer Networking Skills
UK

SSL falls under the Communications and Computer Networking category. For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all contract job vacancies requiring communications or computer networking skills.

Contract vacancies with a requirement for communications or computer networking skills 4,333 3,936 6,007
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the UK 10.12% 13.36% 13.48%
Number of daily rates quoted 2,797 2,406 3,608
10th Percentile £212 £208 £205
25th Percentile £364 £363 £350
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £485 £497 £475
Median % change year-on-year -2.46% +4.68% -9.09%
75th Percentile £588 £600 £600
90th Percentile £675 £675 £700
UK excluding London median daily rate £473 £470 £475
% change year-on-year +0.64% -1.05% -
Number of hourly rates quoted 180 139 395
10th Percentile £15.50 £15.31 £14.10
25th Percentile £20.13 £21.46 £18.93
Median hourly rate £40.02 £35.00 £37.50
Median % change year-on-year +14.34% -6.67% +97.37%
75th Percentile £67.58 £63.50 £65.00
90th Percentile £80.00 £75.00 £70.66
UK excluding London median hourly rate £42.25 £32.50 £46.39
% change year-on-year +30.00% -29.94% +145.32%

SSL
Job Vacancy Trend

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

SSL job vacancy trend in the UK

SSL
Daily Rate Trend

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

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in the UK citing SSL

SSL
Daily Rate Histogram

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing SSL over the 6 months to 13 March 2026.

Daily rate histogram for SSL in the UK

SSL
Hourly Rate Trend

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

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

SSL
Hourly Rate Histogram

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing SSL over the 6 months to 13 March 2026.

Hourly rate histogram for SSL in the UK

SSL
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 SSL within the UK over the 6 months to 13 March 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 -87 139 £500 -13.04% 38
UK excluding London -86 104 £500 -13.04% 38
North of England -23 64 £664 +20.71% 6
Work from Home -45 48 £454 -6.87% 27
North West 0 42 £598 +55.19% 5
West Midlands -31 37 £375 -18.03% 3
Midlands -35 37 £375 -18.03% 3
London -62 31 £515 +0.98% 9
Yorkshire -42 22 £675 +23.05%
South East -71 13 £428 -31.60% 12
East of England -35 8 £427 -28.83% 13
Scotland -3 3 £325 -36.89% 3
North East -18 1 - - 1
South West -29 1 £500 +17.65% 1

SSL
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 12 (7.32%) Confluence
1 12 (7.32%) TPMS
2 3 (1.83%) Microsoft Exchange
3 1 (0.61%) ArcGIS
3 1 (0.61%) CMS
3 1 (0.61%) Drupal
3 1 (0.61%) IBM HTTP Server
3 1 (0.61%) IIS
3 1 (0.61%) Oracle HTTP Server
3 1 (0.61%) Umbraco
3 1 (0.61%) WebSphere
3 1 (0.61%) WebSphere Application Server
3 1 (0.61%) WebSphere Portal
Applications
1 8 (4.88%) MS Visio
2 1 (0.61%) Microsoft Office
Business Applications
1 1 (0.61%) RMDS
Cloud Services
1 38 (23.17%) AWS
2 35 (21.34%) Azure
3 14 (8.54%) GitHub
4 11 (6.71%) Amazon EKS
5 9 (5.49%) GCP
5 9 (5.49%) Serverless
6 8 (4.88%) Virtual Private Cloud
7 7 (4.27%) Entra ID
8 6 (3.66%) IaaS
8 6 (3.66%) SaaS
9 5 (3.05%) OpenShift
9 5 (3.05%) PaaS
10 4 (2.44%) GitHub Actions
11 3 (1.83%) Amazon CloudWatch
11 3 (1.83%) Amazon EC2
11 3 (1.83%) Amazon ELB
11 3 (1.83%) Amazon S3
11 3 (1.83%) Azure DevOps
11 3 (1.83%) Kong
11 3 (1.83%) Microsoft 365
Communications & Networking
1 83 (50.61%) DNS
2 69 (42.07%) TCP/IP
3 63 (38.41%) HTTP
4 54 (32.93%) Firewall
5 44 (26.83%) BIG-IP
6 39 (23.78%) Wireshark
7 34 (20.73%) VPN
8 29 (17.68%) Network Security
9 26 (15.85%) F5 BIG-IP GTM
9 26 (15.85%) F5 BIG-IP LTM
10 25 (15.24%) IPsec
11 23 (14.02%) WAN
12 17 (10.37%) SSH
13 16 (9.76%) LAN
13 16 (9.76%) SNMP
14 14 (8.54%) HTTPS
15 12 (7.32%) DHCP
15 12 (7.32%) Wireless
16 10 (6.10%) FTP
17 9 (5.49%) OSPF
Database & Business Intelligence
1 10 (6.10%) DocumentDB
1 10 (6.10%) MongoDB
1 10 (6.10%) NoSQL
2 8 (4.88%) SQL Server
3 5 (3.05%) PostgreSQL
4 3 (1.83%) Apache Cassandra
4 3 (1.83%) Redis
5 1 (0.61%) Amazon QuickSight
5 1 (0.61%) SQLite
Development Applications
1 32 (19.51%) Fiddler
2 16 (9.76%) JIRA
3 10 (6.10%) Git
4 7 (4.27%) Jenkins
5 6 (3.66%) GitLab
6 2 (1.22%) Browser DevTools
6 2 (1.22%) git-flow
6 2 (1.22%) Sonatype Nexus
7 1 (0.61%) Bitbucket
7 1 (0.61%) CircleCI
7 1 (0.61%) Crashlytics
7 1 (0.61%) fastlane
7 1 (0.61%) Introscope
7 1 (0.61%) JUnit
7 1 (0.61%) Subversion
7 1 (0.61%) Xcode
7 1 (0.61%) XCTest
7 1 (0.61%) XCUITest
General
1 30 (18.29%) Analytical Skills
2 27 (16.46%) Banking
3 26 (15.85%) Finance
4 24 (14.63%) Social Skills
5 21 (12.80%) Investment Banking
6 15 (9.15%) Documentation Skills
6 15 (9.15%) Public Sector
7 4 (2.44%) Telecoms
8 2 (1.22%) Financial Institution
8 2 (1.22%) Influencing Skills
8 2 (1.22%) Legal
8 2 (1.22%) Presentation Skills
9 1 (0.61%) Billing
9 1 (0.61%) Marketing
9 1 (0.61%) Military
Job Titles
1 59 (35.98%) Network Engineer
2 32 (19.51%) Web Engineer
3 21 (12.80%) Blue Coat Engineer
4 20 (12.20%) IP Network Engineer
5 18 (10.98%) Senior
6 17 (10.37%) Architect
7 16 (9.76%) Developer
8 13 (7.93%) Junior
9 12 (7.32%) Cryptography Engineer
9 12 (7.32%) Infrastructure Engineer
9 12 (7.32%) Junior Network Engineer
10 10 (6.10%) Consultant
11 9 (5.49%) Full-Stack Developer
11 9 (5.49%) Security Engineer
12 6 (3.66%) Analyst
12 6 (3.66%) Senior Architect
12 6 (3.66%) Technical Architect
13 5 (3.05%) DevOps Engineer
13 5 (3.05%) Network Architect
13 5 (3.05%) Senior Technical Architect
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 23 (14.02%) LDAP
2 21 (12.80%) SAML
3 14 (8.54%) OAuth
4 13 (7.93%) REST
5 11 (6.71%) HTML
5 11 (6.71%) Kafka
5 11 (6.71%) OpenID
5 11 (6.71%) RESTful
6 10 (6.10%) OAuth2
6 10 (6.10%) Spring
6 10 (6.10%) Spring Boot
7 9 (5.49%) Node.js
8 6 (3.66%) Web Services
9 5 (3.05%) JSON
9 5 (3.05%) XACML
10 4 (2.44%) .NET
10 4 (2.44%) 802.1X
10 4 (2.44%) SOAP
10 4 (2.44%) XML
11 3 (1.83%) GraphQL
Miscellaneous
1 29 (17.68%) Management Information System
2 18 (10.98%) PKI
3 11 (6.71%) Analytical Mindset
4 10 (6.10%) Data Centre
5 7 (4.27%) Cyber Threat
6 6 (3.66%) Distributed Denial-of-Service
7 5 (3.05%) CSOC
7 5 (3.05%) Cyberattack
7 5 (3.05%) Security Operations Centre
7 5 (3.05%) Security Posture
8 4 (2.44%) Cloud Security Posture
8 4 (2.44%) Onboarding
9 3 (1.83%) Clustering
9 3 (1.83%) Enterprise Storage
10 2 (1.22%) Enterprise Software
10 2 (1.22%) Hybrid Cloud
10 2 (1.22%) Linux Command Line
10 2 (1.22%) Self-Motivation
11 1 (0.61%) Cloud Native
11 1 (0.61%) Cyber Defence
Operating Systems
1 40 (24.39%) Windows
2 32 (19.51%) Linux
3 13 (7.93%) Windows Server
4 5 (3.05%) Unix
5 4 (2.44%) CatOS
6 3 (1.83%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
7 2 (1.22%) Apple iOS
7 2 (1.22%) Mac OS
7 2 (1.22%) Windows Server 2019
8 1 (0.61%) Data ONTAP
8 1 (0.61%) Oracle Linux
8 1 (0.61%) Solaris
8 1 (0.61%) SUSE Linux Enterprise Server
8 1 (0.61%) Windows Server 2016
Processes & Methodologies
1 41 (25.00%) Load Balancing
2 32 (19.51%) CI/CD
2 32 (19.51%) Cybersecurity
2 32 (19.51%) Data Loss Prevention
3 30 (18.29%) Malware Detection/Protection
4 24 (14.63%) DevOps
5 22 (13.41%) Identity Access Management
5 22 (13.41%) Stakeholder Management
6 21 (12.80%) Observability
7 20 (12.20%) Change Management
7 20 (12.20%) Infrastructure Engineering
7 20 (12.20%) Migration
7 20 (12.20%) Problem-Solving
7 20 (12.20%) Roadmaps
8 19 (11.59%) ITIL
8 19 (11.59%) Key Management
9 18 (10.98%) Cloud Security
9 18 (10.98%) High Availability
10 17 (10.37%) Microservices
10 17 (10.37%) Test Automation
Programming Languages
1 39 (23.78%) Python
2 18 (10.98%) SQL
3 16 (9.76%) JavaScript
4 14 (8.54%) PowerShell
5 10 (6.10%) Java
6 9 (5.49%) Bash
7 3 (1.83%) C#
8 2 (1.22%) Perl
8 2 (1.22%) PHP
8 2 (1.22%) Swift
9 1 (0.61%) C
9 1 (0.61%) Jython
9 1 (0.61%) Objective-C
Qualifications
1 46 (28.05%) Security Cleared
2 35 (21.34%) SC Cleared
3 18 (10.98%) Degree
4 15 (9.15%) CISSP
5 12 (7.32%) DV Cleared
5 12 (7.32%) FFIEC
6 11 (6.71%) Cisco Certification
7 9 (5.49%) CCNP
8 7 (4.27%) CISM
8 7 (4.27%) Microsoft Certification
9 5 (3.05%) CompTIA Security+
10 4 (2.44%) Computer Science Degree
10 4 (2.44%) MCSA
10 4 (2.44%) MCSE
11 3 (1.83%) TOGAF Certification
12 2 (1.22%) (ISC)2 CCSP
12 2 (1.22%) CCSP
12 2 (1.22%) HND
12 2 (1.22%) Master's Degree
12 2 (1.22%) Postgraduate
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 21 (12.80%) GDPR
2 16 (9.76%) PCI DSS
3 14 (8.54%) NIST
4 12 (7.32%) GLBA
5 6 (3.66%) HIPAA
6 4 (2.44%) Sarbanes-Oxley
7 3 (1.83%) ISO/IEC 27001
8 2 (1.22%) Accessibility
8 2 (1.22%) Data Quality
9 1 (0.61%) Actionable Recommendations
9 1 (0.61%) NCSC
9 1 (0.61%) RMADS
9 1 (0.61%) SLA
System Software
1 32 (19.51%) VMware Infrastructure
2 29 (17.68%) Active Directory
3 21 (12.80%) Docker
4 20 (12.20%) Firmware
5 18 (10.98%) VMware NSX
6 5 (3.05%) NDS
6 5 (3.05%) NetIQ eDirectory
6 5 (3.05%) RACF
6 5 (3.05%) Virtual Machines
7 4 (2.44%) ProxySG
8 3 (1.83%) VMware ESXi
9 2 (1.22%) Hyper-V
9 2 (1.22%) vSphere
10 1 (0.61%) Slurm Workload Manager
10 1 (0.61%) Squid
10 1 (0.61%) XenApp
10 1 (0.61%) XenDesktop
Systems Management
1 28 (17.07%) Ansible
2 25 (15.24%) Kubernetes
3 17 (10.37%) Single Sign-On
4 15 (9.15%) Terraform
5 5 (3.05%) FortiGate
6 4 (2.44%) CASB
6 4 (2.44%) Nessus
7 2 (1.22%) Grafana
7 2 (1.22%) SCCM
7 2 (1.22%) vCenter Server
8 1 (0.61%) CA Wily
8 1 (0.61%) Failover Clustering
8 1 (0.61%) Microsoft Intune
8 1 (0.61%) Progress Chef
8 1 (0.61%) Prometheus
8 1 (0.61%) Puppet
8 1 (0.61%) QRadar
8 1 (0.61%) Red Hat Satellite
8 1 (0.61%) SCOM
8 1 (0.61%) SCOrch
Vendors
1 58 (35.37%) F5
2 45 (27.44%) VMware
3 42 (25.61%) Blue Coat
4 35 (21.34%) McAfee
5 30 (18.29%) Microsoft
6 28 (17.07%) Cisco
7 23 (14.02%) CheckPoint
7 23 (14.02%) NetApp
8 21 (12.80%) Palo Alto
9 18 (10.98%) Splunk
10 15 (9.15%) Thales
11 10 (6.10%) Juniper
12 9 (5.49%) OpenText
13 8 (4.88%) Oracle
14 6 (3.66%) Citrix
14 6 (3.66%) Fortinet
15 5 (3.05%) Micro Focus
15 5 (3.05%) NetIQ
15 5 (3.05%) SolarWinds
15 5 (3.05%) Symantec