Systems Engineer Contract Job Trends

System Engineer
UK

The median System Engineer daily rate in the UK is £475, according to job vacancies posted in the 6 months leading up to 20 February 2026.

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

6 months to
20 Feb 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 340 416 284
Rank change year-on-year +76 -132 +144
Contract jobs requiring a Systems Engineer 273 117 352
As % of all contract jobs in the UK 0.67% 0.38% 0.79%
As % of the Job Titles category 0.73% 0.41% 0.85%
Number of daily rates quoted 66 55 146
10th Percentile £263 £273 £328
25th Percentile £359 £374 £425
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £475 £500 £525
Median % change year-on-year -5.00% -4.76% +5.00%
75th Percentile £531 £638 £613
90th Percentile £575 £745 £650
UK excluding London median daily rate £475 £450 £545
% change year-on-year +5.56% -17.43% +9.00%
Number of hourly rates quoted 99 21 116
10th Percentile £42.00 £23.82 £40.63
25th Percentile £44.58 £26.25 £50.00
Median hourly rate £55.00 £43.00 £57.50
Median % change year-on-year +27.91% -25.22% -4.56%
75th Percentile £70.75 £73.75 £71.25
90th Percentile £78.75 £80.00 £75.16
UK excluding London median hourly rate £55.00 £43.00 £57.50
% change year-on-year +27.91% -25.22% -4.17%

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 37,463 28,656 41,321
% of contract IT jobs with a recognized job title 91.73% 92.90% 93.07%
Number of daily rates quoted 23,513 17,815 27,174
10th Percentile £305 £290 £275
25th Percentile £406 £406 £410
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £525 £525
Median % change year-on-year -4.76% - -4.55%
75th Percentile £613 £638 £638
90th Percentile £719 £738 £738
UK excluding London median daily rate £480 £475 £488
% change year-on-year +1.05% -2.56% -2.50%
Number of hourly rates quoted 2,286 832 2,325
10th Percentile £14.61 £16.23 £13.15
25th Percentile £18.87 £21.41 £16.50
Median hourly rate £31.36 £33.25 £35.00
Median % change year-on-year -5.70% -5.00% -10.26%
75th Percentile £63.69 £63.75 £60.75
90th Percentile £74.26 £75.00 £72.50
UK excluding London median hourly rate £30.00 £32.00 £35.50
% change year-on-year -6.25% -9.86% -0.84%

Systems Engineer
Job Vacancy Trend

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

Systems Engineer job vacancy trend in the UK

Systems Engineer
Daily Rate Trend

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

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

Systems Engineer
Daily Rate Histogram

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing Systems Engineer over the 6 months to 20 February 2026.

Daily rate histogram for Systems Engineer in the UK

Systems Engineer
Hourly Rate Trend

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

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

Systems Engineer
Hourly Rate Histogram

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing Systems Engineer over the 6 months to 20 February 2026.

Hourly rate histogram for Systems Engineer in the UK

Systems 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 Systems Engineer within the UK over the 6 months to 20 February 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 +30 247 £478 -4.50% 429
UK excluding London +58 230 £475 +5.56% 439
East of England +19 57 £452 +3.31% 46
South East -3 46 £490 -30.00% 148
South West +19 43 £500 -17.70% 75
Work from Home -10 42 £454 -9.20% 132
Midlands -25 40 £300 +9.09% 71
North of England -52 36 £450 - 69
London -56 25 £450 -13.04% 37
East Midlands -6 24 £497 - 14
North West -22 23 £350 -22.22% 47
West Midlands -39 16 £300 +9.09% 57
Scotland +13 11 £59 -91.33% 34
Yorkshire -58 8 £510 - 10
North East -12 5 £450 +38.46% 12
Wales - 1 - - 5

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

For the 6 months to 20 February 2026, Systems 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 Systems Engineer in the job title.

1 90 (32.97%) Security Cleared
2 53 (19.41%) SC Cleared
3 37 (13.55%) Degree
4 30 (10.99%) Problem-Solving
5 28 (10.26%) Systems Engineering
6 26 (9.52%) Validation
7 20 (7.33%) Siemens
7 20 (7.33%) Windows
8 19 (6.96%) Decision-Making
9 18 (6.59%) DV Cleared
10 17 (6.23%) Customer Service
10 17 (6.23%) Linux
10 17 (6.23%) Microsoft Office
10 17 (6.23%) ServiceNow
10 17 (6.23%) TCP/IP
11 16 (5.86%) Ethernet
11 16 (5.86%) Infrastructure Engineering
11 16 (5.86%) Risk Assessment
12 15 (5.49%) Creative Thinking
12 15 (5.49%) Fault Analysis
12 15 (5.49%) Mechatronics
12 15 (5.49%) Microsoft
12 15 (5.49%) Rational DOORS
12 15 (5.49%) VMware
13 14 (5.13%) Fortinet
13 14 (5.13%) NetApp
14 13 (4.76%) Firewall
14 13 (4.76%) Verification and Validation
15 12 (4.40%) PowerShell
15 12 (4.40%) VMware Infrastructure

Systems 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 5 (1.83%) Confluence
2 4 (1.47%) Microsoft Exchange
3 2 (0.73%) SharePoint
4 1 (0.37%) Apache
4 1 (0.37%) CMS
4 1 (0.37%) IIS
4 1 (0.37%) Tomcat
Applications
1 17 (6.23%) Microsoft Office
2 4 (1.47%) Simulink
3 2 (0.73%) Microsoft Excel
3 2 (0.73%) Microsoft PowerPoint
4 1 (0.37%) MS Visio
Business Applications
1 2 (0.73%) SAP Oil and Gas
2 1 (0.37%) SAP HCM
2 1 (0.37%) SAP HR
2 1 (0.37%) Sparx Enterprise Architect
2 1 (0.37%) Teamcenter
Cloud Services
1 10 (3.66%) Azure
2 8 (2.93%) AWS
3 5 (1.83%) Microsoft 365
4 4 (1.47%) Entra ID
4 4 (1.47%) Google Workspace
5 3 (1.10%) GCP
5 3 (1.10%) GitHub
6 2 (0.73%) Amazon EC2
6 2 (0.73%) Amazon S3
6 2 (0.73%) Cloud Computing
6 2 (0.73%) Cohesity
6 2 (0.73%) OpenShift
6 2 (0.73%) PaaS
7 1 (0.37%) Azure Sentinel
7 1 (0.37%) GitHub Actions
7 1 (0.37%) OneDrive
7 1 (0.37%) Power Platform
7 1 (0.37%) PowerApps
7 1 (0.37%) Slack
7 1 (0.37%) Virtual Private Cloud
Communications & Networking
1 17 (6.23%) TCP/IP
2 16 (5.86%) Ethernet
3 13 (4.76%) Firewall
4 6 (2.20%) LTE
5 5 (1.83%) SAN
5 5 (1.83%) TETRA
6 4 (1.47%) SNMP
6 4 (1.47%) VPN
7 3 (1.10%) NAS
7 3 (1.10%) Network Security
8 2 (0.73%) LAN
8 2 (0.73%) MIMO
8 2 (0.73%) SpaceWire
8 2 (0.73%) SSL
8 2 (0.73%) WAN
8 2 (0.73%) Wi-Fi
9 1 (0.37%) 3GPP
9 1 (0.37%) DHCP
9 1 (0.37%) PSTN
9 1 (0.37%) VoIP
Database & Business Intelligence
1 1 (0.37%) Amazon RDS
1 1 (0.37%) BusinessObjects
1 1 (0.37%) DB2
1 1 (0.37%) Electronic Patient Records
1 1 (0.37%) IBM InfoSphere
1 1 (0.37%) Oracle Database
1 1 (0.37%) Pentaho
Development Applications
1 15 (5.49%) Rational DOORS
2 6 (2.20%) JIRA
3 2 (0.73%) ClearCase
4 1 (0.37%) Git
4 1 (0.37%) Jenkins
4 1 (0.37%) Postman
4 1 (0.37%) Selenium
General
1 46 (16.85%) Aerospace
2 45 (16.48%) Social Skills
3 27 (9.89%) Military
4 20 (7.33%) Manufacturing
5 17 (6.23%) Inclusion and Diversity
5 17 (6.23%) Presentation Skills
6 12 (4.40%) Electronics
7 10 (3.66%) Analytical Skills
8 7 (2.56%) Public Sector
9 5 (1.83%) Banking
10 4 (1.47%) Avionics
10 4 (1.47%) Retail Banking
10 4 (1.47%) Telecoms
11 3 (1.10%) Documentation Skills
11 3 (1.10%) Finance
12 2 (0.73%) Legal
12 2 (0.73%) Retail
13 1 (0.37%) Games
13 1 (0.37%) Local Government
13 1 (0.37%) Police
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 3 (1.10%) REST
1 3 (1.10%) Software Packaging
2 2 (0.73%) ISPF
2 2 (0.73%) Middleware
3 1 (0.37%) GraphQL
3 1 (0.37%) JSON
3 1 (0.37%) Microsoft Graph
3 1 (0.37%) RabbitMQ
3 1 (0.37%) SAP Fiori
3 1 (0.37%) Unity (Game Engine)
3 1 (0.37%) Unreal Engine
3 1 (0.37%) XML
3 1 (0.37%) XSD
Miscellaneous
1 15 (5.49%) Industry 4.0
1 15 (5.49%) Robotics
2 8 (2.93%) Onboarding
2 8 (2.93%) SCADA
3 7 (2.56%) Data Centre
3 7 (2.56%) Operational Technology
4 6 (2.20%) Legacy Systems
5 4 (1.47%) Embedded Systems
6 3 (1.10%) Hybrid Cloud
7 2 (0.73%) Analytical Mindset
7 2 (0.73%) ASIC
7 2 (0.73%) CAN bus
7 2 (0.73%) Clustering
7 2 (0.73%) Cyber Threat
7 2 (0.73%) Enterprise Storage
7 2 (0.73%) IoT
7 2 (0.73%) Life Science
7 2 (0.73%) Mainframe
7 2 (0.73%) Management Information System
7 2 (0.73%) Replication
Operating Systems
1 20 (7.33%) Windows
2 17 (6.23%) Linux
3 8 (2.93%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
4 5 (1.83%) Mac OS
5 2 (0.73%) Android
5 2 (0.73%) Windows Server
5 2 (0.73%) zOS
6 1 (0.37%) FreeRTOS
6 1 (0.37%) SUSE Linux Enterprise Server
6 1 (0.37%) VMS
Processes & Methodologies
1 30 (10.99%) Problem-Solving
2 28 (10.26%) Systems Engineering
3 26 (9.52%) Validation
4 19 (6.96%) Decision-Making
5 17 (6.23%) Customer Service
6 16 (5.86%) Infrastructure Engineering
6 16 (5.86%) Risk Assessment
7 15 (5.49%) Creative Thinking
7 15 (5.49%) Fault Analysis
7 15 (5.49%) Mechatronics
8 13 (4.76%) Verification and Validation
9 11 (4.03%) Agile
9 11 (4.03%) High Availability
9 11 (4.03%) Migration
10 10 (3.66%) Asset Management
10 10 (3.66%) Cybersecurity
10 10 (3.66%) Disaster Recovery
11 9 (3.30%) Model-Based Systems Engineering
12 8 (2.93%) Computer Science
12 8 (2.93%) Continuous Improvement
Programming Languages
1 12 (4.40%) PowerShell
2 7 (2.56%) Python
3 6 (2.20%) MATLAB
4 4 (1.47%) C
5 3 (1.10%) C++
5 3 (1.10%) JavaScript
6 2 (0.73%) Bash
6 2 (0.73%) Java
6 2 (0.73%) JCL
6 2 (0.73%) REXX
6 2 (0.73%) Shell Script
6 2 (0.73%) SQL
7 1 (0.37%) C#
7 1 (0.37%) Embedded C
7 1 (0.37%) Embedded C++
7 1 (0.37%) Go
7 1 (0.37%) Groovy
7 1 (0.37%) Korn
7 1 (0.37%) Lua
Qualifications
1 90 (32.97%) Security Cleared
2 53 (19.41%) SC Cleared
3 37 (13.55%) Degree
4 18 (6.59%) DV Cleared
5 11 (4.03%) BPSS Clearance
6 2 (0.73%) CCNA
6 2 (0.73%) Cisco Certification
7 1 (0.37%) Computer Science Degree
7 1 (0.37%) Master's Degree
7 1 (0.37%) Network+ Certification
7 1 (0.37%) RHCE
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 3 (1.10%) IEC 61131
2 2 (0.73%) Data Quality
2 2 (0.73%) MIL-STD-1553
3 1 (0.37%) Def Stans
3 1 (0.37%) Disclosure Scotland
3 1 (0.37%) DO-254
3 1 (0.37%) IEC 61508
3 1 (0.37%) ISO 26262
3 1 (0.37%) ISO/IEC 27001
3 1 (0.37%) NIST
System Software
1 12 (4.40%) VMware Infrastructure
2 11 (4.03%) Active Directory
3 4 (1.47%) Virtual Desktop
4 3 (1.10%) KVM
4 3 (1.10%) Virtual Machines
4 3 (1.10%) VMware ESXi
5 2 (0.73%) Docker
5 2 (0.73%) Hyper-V
5 2 (0.73%) Slurm Workload Manager
5 2 (0.73%) vSphere
6 1 (0.37%) Embedded Firmware
6 1 (0.37%) Firmware
6 1 (0.37%) Job Entry Subsystem
6 1 (0.37%) Virtual Servers
6 1 (0.37%) VMware NSX
Systems Management
1 8 (2.93%) Ansible
2 7 (2.56%) Microsoft Intune
2 7 (2.56%) Terraform
3 4 (1.47%) SCCM
4 3 (1.10%) Kubernetes
5 2 (0.73%) Jamf Pro
5 2 (0.73%) Single Sign-On
6 1 (0.37%) FortiGate
6 1 (0.37%) MOM
6 1 (0.37%) Red Hat Satellite
6 1 (0.37%) ZABBIX
Vendors
1 20 (7.33%) Siemens
2 17 (6.23%) ServiceNow
3 15 (5.49%) Microsoft
3 15 (5.49%) VMware
4 14 (5.13%) Fortinet
4 14 (5.13%) NetApp
5 8 (2.93%) IBM
5 8 (2.93%) Oracle
6 7 (2.56%) Cisco
7 6 (2.20%) Red Hat
8 5 (1.83%) Google
8 5 (1.83%) Rockwell
9 4 (1.47%) EMC
9 4 (1.47%) SAP
9 4 (1.47%) Veeam
10 3 (1.10%) Citrix
10 3 (1.10%) Splunk
10 3 (1.10%) Wonderware
11 2 (0.73%) Broadcom
11 2 (0.73%) Brocade