Telecoms Contract Job Trends

Telecommunications
UK

The table below looks at the prevalence of the term Telecoms in contract job vacancies. Included is a benchmarking guide to the contractor rates offered in vacancies that cited Telecoms over the 6 months leading up to 19 February 2026, comparing them to the same period in the previous two years.

6 months to
19 Feb 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 144 70 65
Rank change year-on-year -74 -5 +15
Contract jobs citing Telecoms 793 1,016 1,370
As % of all contract jobs in the UK 1.95% 3.30% 3.11%
As % of the General category 3.32% 5.31% 5.29%
Number of daily rates quoted 504 482 797
10th Percentile £170 £281 £200
25th Percentile £315 £399 £363
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £450 £510 £465
Median % change year-on-year -11.76% +9.68% -2.11%
75th Percentile £570 £605 £608
90th Percentile £675 £675 £725
UK excluding London median daily rate £450 £504 £450
% change year-on-year -10.63% +11.89% +2.97%
Number of hourly rates quoted 60 26 42
10th Percentile £16.90 £18.35 £12.79
25th Percentile £20.50 £22.50 £22.69
Median hourly rate £23.79 £28.75 £55.00
Median % change year-on-year -17.26% -47.73% +10.00%
75th Percentile £24.50 £59.38 £73.94
90th Percentile £43.70 £68.62 £94.50
UK excluding London median hourly rate £23.75 £24.18 £60.00
% change year-on-year -1.78% -59.70% +43.71%

All General Skills
UK

Telecoms falls under the General Skills category. For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all contract job vacancies requiring general skills.

Contract vacancies with a requirement for general skills 23,869 19,117 25,904
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the UK 58.63% 62.06% 58.75%
Number of daily rates quoted 14,927 11,591 16,674
10th Percentile £300 £285 £265
25th Percentile £403 £406 £413
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £525 £525
Median % change year-on-year -4.76% - -4.55%
75th Percentile £625 £640 £650
90th Percentile £738 £763 £750
UK excluding London median daily rate £475 £476 £500
% change year-on-year -0.21% -4.80% -
Number of hourly rates quoted 1,472 605 1,651
10th Percentile £13.64 £15.62 £13.00
25th Percentile £16.36 £20.12 £15.16
Median hourly rate £23.00 £29.00 £26.00
Median % change year-on-year -20.69% +11.54% -3.70%
75th Percentile £50.00 £57.50 £52.64
90th Percentile £72.50 £75.00 £67.50
UK excluding London median hourly rate £22.00 £27.13 £25.00
% change year-on-year -18.89% +8.50% -

Telecoms
Job Vacancy Trend

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

Telecoms job vacancy trend in the UK

Telecoms
Daily Rate Trend

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

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

Telecoms
Daily Rate Histogram

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing Telecoms over the 6 months to 19 February 2026.

Daily rate histogram for Telecoms in the UK

Telecoms
Hourly Rate Trend

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

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

Telecoms
Hourly Rate Histogram

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing Telecoms over the 6 months to 19 February 2026.

Hourly rate histogram for Telecoms in the UK

Telecoms
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 Telecoms within the UK over the 6 months to 19 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 -78 701 £475 -7.32% 486
UK excluding London -70 450 £450 -10.63% 446
London -39 281 £475 -9.95% 110
Work from Home -61 184 £475 -7.32% 162
South East -44 160 £470 -6.00% 150
Midlands -51 77 £500 -2.44% 50
North of England -56 76 £375 -21.05% 90
South West -45 62 £525 -7.89% 54
West Midlands -59 53 £550 +7.32% 31
East of England -30 37 £513 - 67
North West -25 36 £310 -37.06% 58
Scotland +22 25 £330 -40.00% 29
East Midlands -11 24 £158 -60.63% 19
North East -3 23 £175 -51.72% 13
Yorkshire -55 16 £447 -10.63% 22
Northern Ireland +7 11 £150 - 5
Wales -1 9 £160 -56.16% 13

Telecoms
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 13 (1.64%) Confluence
2 12 (1.51%) Appian
3 11 (1.39%) SharePoint
4 10 (1.26%) Microsoft Exchange
5 8 (1.01%) Apache Spark
6 4 (0.50%) Apache
6 4 (0.50%) IIS
6 4 (0.50%) OpenStack
7 3 (0.38%) JBoss
7 3 (0.38%) Oracle SOA Suite
7 3 (0.38%) Tomcat
7 3 (0.38%) WebLogic
8 2 (0.25%) ArcGIS
8 2 (0.25%) CMS
8 2 (0.25%) Oracle Spatial
9 1 (0.13%) Apache Airflow
9 1 (0.13%) Headless CMS
Applications
1 56 (7.06%) Microsoft Office
2 25 (3.15%) Microsoft Excel
3 13 (1.64%) Microsoft Project
4 12 (1.51%) Microsoft PowerPoint
5 7 (0.88%) MS Visio
6 4 (0.50%) Autodesk Inventor
7 3 (0.38%) Spreadsheet
8 2 (0.25%) AutoCAD
8 2 (0.25%) Chatbot
9 1 (0.13%) FrameMaker
9 1 (0.13%) MadCap Flare
9 1 (0.13%) MicroStation
9 1 (0.13%) Trello
Business Applications
1 18 (2.27%) SAP BRIM
1 18 (2.27%) SAP Hybris
1 18 (2.27%) SAP PSCD
2 10 (1.26%) Remedy ITSM
3 6 (0.76%) Oracle Procure-to-Pay
4 3 (0.38%) Dynamics CRM
4 3 (0.38%) Primavera
5 2 (0.25%) SAP CO
5 2 (0.25%) SAP FI
5 2 (0.25%) SAP FI/CO
5 2 (0.25%) SAP S/4HANA
6 1 (0.13%) Remedy AR System
6 1 (0.13%) SmartPlant
Cloud Services
1 66 (8.32%) Azure
2 53 (6.68%) Microsoft 365
3 48 (6.05%) AWS
4 31 (3.91%) GCP
5 18 (2.27%) SAP Commerce Cloud
6 13 (1.64%) SaaS
7 11 (1.39%) Power Platform
8 10 (1.26%) Dynamics 365
8 10 (1.26%) GitHub
9 9 (1.13%) Azure DevOps
10 8 (1.01%) GitHub Actions
11 6 (0.76%) Tricentis Tosca
12 5 (0.63%) Entra ID
13 4 (0.50%) Miro
14 3 (0.38%) IaaS
14 3 (0.38%) Salesforce Service Cloud
14 3 (0.38%) Slack
14 3 (0.38%) Smartsheet
15 2 (0.25%) Asana
15 2 (0.25%) Lucidchart
Communications & Networking
1 48 (6.05%) Firewall
2 46 (5.80%) WAN
3 40 (5.04%) LAN
4 38 (4.79%) Wireless
5 34 (4.29%) MPLS
6 29 (3.66%) 5G
7 25 (3.15%) Network Security
7 25 (3.15%) VPN
8 24 (3.03%) 4G
8 24 (3.03%) Radio Access Network
9 22 (2.77%) SD-WAN
10 20 (2.52%) BGP
10 20 (2.52%) LTE
11 19 (2.40%) Broadband
11 19 (2.40%) DNS
11 19 (2.40%) VoIP
12 16 (2.02%) 3GPP
12 16 (2.02%) SDH
12 16 (2.02%) VLAN
13 15 (1.89%) Wireshark
Database & Business Intelligence
1 10 (1.26%) MySQL
1 10 (1.26%) Power BI
2 7 (0.88%) Oracle Database
3 6 (0.76%) GIS
3 6 (0.76%) Relational Database
3 6 (0.76%) SQL Server
3 6 (0.76%) Tableau
4 5 (0.63%) Data Warehouse
5 4 (0.50%) Big Data
6 3 (0.38%) Electronic Patient Records
6 3 (0.38%) PostgreSQL
6 3 (0.38%) RDBMS
7 2 (0.25%) BigQuery
7 2 (0.25%) Data Lake
7 2 (0.25%) Metadata
8 1 (0.13%) Amazon Athena
8 1 (0.13%) Apache Hudi
8 1 (0.13%) Apache Iceberg
8 1 (0.13%) Geospatial Data
8 1 (0.13%) Power Query
Development Applications
1 29 (3.66%) JIRA
2 16 (2.02%) GitLab
3 9 (1.13%) Jenkins
4 7 (0.88%) Selenium
5 6 (0.76%) Cucumber
5 6 (0.76%) Git
5 6 (0.76%) Robot Framework
5 6 (0.76%) SonarQube
6 4 (0.50%) JUnit
7 3 (0.38%) Rational DOORS
7 3 (0.38%) Storybook
8 2 (0.25%) Appium
8 2 (0.25%) CircleCI
8 2 (0.25%) Cypress.io
8 2 (0.25%) JMeter
9 1 (0.13%) Maven
9 1 (0.13%) Mockito
9 1 (0.13%) Postman
9 1 (0.13%) Rational Rhapsody
9 1 (0.13%) Sonatype Nexus
General
1 260 (32.79%) Finance
2 249 (31.40%) Social Skills
3 229 (28.88%) Public Sector
4 181 (22.82%) Marketing
5 169 (21.31%) Electronics
6 164 (20.68%) Manufacturing
7 88 (11.10%) Analytical Skills
8 37 (4.67%) Billing
9 23 (2.90%) Organisational Skills
10 21 (2.65%) Documentation Skills
11 15 (1.89%) Banking
12 12 (1.51%) Legal
12 12 (1.51%) Retail
13 9 (1.13%) Influencing Skills
14 8 (1.01%) Military
15 6 (0.76%) Law
16 5 (0.63%) Presentation Skills
17 4 (0.50%) Inclusion and Diversity
18 3 (0.38%) Aviation
19 2 (0.25%) Health Technology
Job Titles
1 83 (10.47%) Analyst
2 78 (9.84%) Architect
3 49 (6.18%) Business Analyst
4 43 (5.42%) IT Support
4 43 (5.42%) Lead
4 43 (5.42%) Senior
5 40 (5.04%) Consultant
5 40 (5.04%) Project Manager
6 37 (4.67%) Network Engineer
7 36 (4.54%) Desktop Support
8 26 (3.28%) 2nd Line Support
8 26 (3.28%) Developer
9 25 (3.15%) 2nd Line Desktop Support
9 25 (3.15%) SC Cleared Desktop Support
9 25 (3.15%) Solutions Architect
10 20 (2.52%) Coordinator
10 20 (2.52%) Migration Engineer
10 20 (2.52%) Support Engineer
11 19 (2.40%) IT Engineer
11 19 (2.40%) Network Specialist
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 26 (3.28%) REST
2 22 (2.77%) SOAP
3 9 (1.13%) .NET
3 9 (1.13%) XML
4 8 (1.01%) Web Services
5 7 (0.88%) JSON
5 7 (0.88%) React
6 6 (0.76%) Jinja
6 6 (0.76%) Kafka
6 6 (0.76%) NETCONF
6 6 (0.76%) RESTful
6 6 (0.76%) RFC 2544
6 6 (0.76%) SailPoint
7 5 (0.63%) Elastic Stack
7 5 (0.63%) YANG
8 4 (0.50%) 802.1X
8 4 (0.50%) HTML
8 4 (0.50%) Node.js
8 4 (0.50%) Spring
8 4 (0.50%) Spring Boot
Miscellaneous
1 52 (6.56%) Data Centre
2 32 (4.04%) Driving Licence
3 30 (3.78%) Data Protection Act
4 26 (3.28%) Product Ownership
5 19 (2.40%) CMDB
5 19 (2.40%) Onboarding
6 17 (2.14%) NHS
7 15 (1.89%) IoT
8 14 (1.77%) Cloud Native
8 14 (1.77%) Legacy Systems
9 12 (1.51%) Fibre Optics
9 12 (1.51%) Mobile App
10 8 (1.01%) Virtual Team
11 7 (0.88%) Analytical Mindset
11 7 (0.88%) Cyber Threat
11 7 (0.88%) Enterprise Cloud
11 7 (0.88%) Management Information System
11 7 (0.88%) SCADA
11 7 (0.88%) Self-Motivation
12 6 (0.76%) TM Forum
Operating Systems
1 41 (5.17%) Windows
2 38 (4.79%) Android
3 32 (4.04%) Mac OS
4 19 (2.40%) Windows 10
5 18 (2.27%) Linux
6 7 (0.88%) Apple iOS
6 7 (0.88%) Unix
7 6 (0.76%) Windows Server
8 4 (0.50%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
9 3 (0.38%) Debian
9 3 (0.38%) Ubuntu
9 3 (0.38%) VMS
10 1 (0.13%) CentOS
10 1 (0.13%) Oracle Linux
10 1 (0.13%) Windows Server 2016
10 1 (0.13%) Windows Server 2019
Processes & Methodologies
1 169 (21.31%) Business Intelligence
1 169 (21.31%) Programme Management
2 164 (20.68%) Digital Marketing
3 120 (15.13%) Stakeholder Management
4 117 (14.75%) Problem-Solving
5 112 (14.12%) Agile
6 91 (11.48%) Migration
7 78 (9.84%) Continuous Improvement
8 71 (8.95%) Stakeholder Engagement
9 69 (8.70%) ITIL
10 57 (7.19%) Logistics
11 54 (6.81%) Customer Service
11 54 (6.81%) Workflow
12 49 (6.18%) Project Management
13 41 (5.17%) DevOps
14 40 (5.04%) Change Management
14 40 (5.04%) CI/CD
15 38 (4.79%) AI
15 38 (4.79%) Decision-Making
15 38 (4.79%) Roadmaps
Programming Languages
1 54 (6.81%) Python
2 34 (4.29%) SQL
3 33 (4.16%) JavaScript
4 19 (2.40%) Java
5 11 (1.39%) Bash
5 11 (1.39%) TypeScript
6 10 (1.26%) PowerShell
7 5 (0.63%) C#
7 5 (0.63%) C++
7 5 (0.63%) Go
8 4 (0.50%) C
8 4 (0.50%) Shell Script
9 3 (0.38%) PHP
9 3 (0.38%) PL/SQL
9 3 (0.38%) R
10 2 (0.25%) BeanShell
11 1 (0.13%) Bicep
11 1 (0.13%) Cypher
11 1 (0.13%) Kotlin
11 1 (0.13%) Tcl
Qualifications
1 193 (24.34%) Security Cleared
2 159 (20.05%) SC Cleared
3 60 (7.57%) Degree
4 25 (3.15%) DV Cleared
5 19 (2.40%) BPSS Clearance
5 19 (2.40%) Cisco Certification
6 14 (1.77%) CCNP
7 12 (1.51%) PMP
8 10 (1.26%) ACCA
8 10 (1.26%) Computer Science Degree
9 9 (1.13%) PMI Certification
10 8 (1.01%) CCIE
10 8 (1.01%) ITIL Certification
11 7 (0.88%) CCNA
11 7 (0.88%) CIMA
11 7 (0.88%) Microsoft Certification
12 6 (0.76%) ISTQB
13 5 (0.63%) Azure Certification
13 5 (0.63%) JNCIP
13 5 (0.63%) Master's Degree
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 32 (4.04%) QA
2 31 (3.91%) SLA
3 20 (2.52%) PMO
4 18 (2.27%) GDPR
5 15 (1.89%) Data Quality
6 11 (1.39%) ISO/IEC 27001
7 9 (1.13%) GRC
7 9 (1.13%) NCSC
8 7 (0.88%) Accessibility
8 7 (0.88%) NIST
8 7 (0.88%) RMADS
9 5 (0.63%) JSP 440
10 4 (0.50%) IFRS
10 4 (0.50%) Sarbanes-Oxley
11 3 (0.38%) GAAP
12 2 (0.25%) California Consumer Privacy Act
12 2 (0.25%) HIPAA
12 2 (0.25%) WCAG
13 1 (0.13%) COSO
13 1 (0.13%) IEC 61508
System Software
1 22 (2.77%) Active Directory
2 13 (1.64%) Docker
3 3 (0.38%) QEMU
3 3 (0.38%) Virtual Machines
4 2 (0.25%) Hyper-V
4 2 (0.25%) VMware Infrastructure
5 1 (0.13%) Firmware
Systems Management
1 20 (2.52%) Ansible
1 20 (2.52%) Kubernetes
2 10 (1.26%) Terraform
3 7 (0.88%) SCCM
4 5 (0.63%) Grafana
4 5 (0.63%) Iperf
4 5 (0.63%) Microsoft Intune
5 4 (0.50%) Argo
5 4 (0.50%) Nmap
6 3 (0.38%) Cisco Prime
6 3 (0.38%) Podman
7 2 (0.25%) EMC NetWorker
7 2 (0.25%) Prometheus
7 2 (0.25%) Single Sign-On
7 2 (0.25%) vRealize
8 1 (0.13%) Cisco CUCM
8 1 (0.13%) Data Guard
8 1 (0.13%) FortiGate
8 1 (0.13%) HAProxy
8 1 (0.13%) Systems Management Server (SMS)
Vendors
1 191 (24.09%) SAP
2 116 (14.63%) Cisco
3 95 (11.98%) Microsoft
4 45 (5.67%) ServiceNow
5 32 (4.04%) Nokia
6 27 (3.40%) Juniper
7 25 (3.15%) HP
7 25 (3.15%) Oracle
8 24 (3.03%) Apple
8 24 (3.03%) Dell
9 22 (2.77%) Fortinet
10 17 (2.14%) Remedy
11 16 (2.02%) Ericsson
11 16 (2.02%) Salesforce
12 15 (1.89%) CheckPoint
13 13 (1.64%) F5
13 13 (1.64%) Palo Alto
14 11 (1.39%) Meraki
15 10 (1.26%) BT
16 9 (1.13%) Google