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 September 2025, comparing them to the same period in the previous two years.

6 months to
19 Sep 2025
Same period 2024 Same period 2023
Rank 111 67 76
Rank change year-on-year -44 +9 +10
Contract jobs citing Telecoms 814 1,225 1,450
As % of all contract jobs advertised in the UK 2.47% 3.18% 2.93%
As % of the General category 3.88% 5.48% 4.95%
Number of daily rates quoted 476 554 928
10th Percentile £253 £232 £227
25th Percentile £373 £367 £400
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £450 £500 £500
Median % change year-on-year -10.00% - +2.04%
75th Percentile £570 £600 £625
90th Percentile £675 £725 £713
UK excluding London median daily rate £450 £500 £460
% change year-on-year -10.00% +8.70% +2.22%
Number of hourly rates quoted 47 89 30
10th Percentile £14.00 £12.75 £14.00
25th Percentile £14.75 £35.00 £18.88
Median hourly rate £21.25 £57.50 £52.50
Median % change year-on-year -63.04% +9.52% +116.49%
75th Percentile £49.38 £72.50 £78.44
90th Percentile £70.15 £77.75 £80.75
UK excluding London median hourly rate £16.88 £66.25 £52.50
% change year-on-year -74.53% +26.19% +133.33%

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 common skills.

Contract vacancies with a requirement for common skills 20,972 22,348 29,321
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the UK 63.65% 58.00% 59.16%
Number of daily rates quoted 13,001 13,375 19,847
10th Percentile £275 £281 £305
25th Percentile £400 £413 £425
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £525 £550
Median % change year-on-year -4.76% -4.55% -
75th Percentile £625 £650 £671
90th Percentile £738 £775 £775
UK excluding London median daily rate £475 £500 £500
% change year-on-year -5.00% - -
Number of hourly rates quoted 1,207 1,105 1,076
10th Percentile £13.50 £14.71 £13.96
25th Percentile £16.17 £17.08 £16.35
Median hourly rate £25.15 £35.36 £27.50
Median % change year-on-year -28.87% +28.58% +12.43%
75th Percentile £49.13 £60.00 £57.50
90th Percentile £67.50 £70.39 £70.66
UK excluding London median hourly rate £21.30 £35.36 £27.08
% change year-on-year -39.76% +30.56% +28.96%

Telecoms
Job Vacancy Trend

Job postings citing Telecoms as a proportion of all IT jobs advertised.

Job vacancy trend for Telecoms 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 September 2025.

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 September 2025.

Hourly rate histogram for Telecoms in the UK

Telecoms
Top 18 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 September 2025. 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 -35 730 £465 -7.00% 923
UK excluding London -45 452 £450 -10.00% 761
London -5 290 £475 -5.00% 320
Work from Home -54 206 £500 - 329
South East -11 196 £484 -3.25% 320
South West -15 91 £525 -2.33% 92
Midlands -25 56 £380 -24.00% 117
West Midlands -9 53 £380 -26.21% 84
North of England -31 47 £321 -28.61% 119
North West -3 32 £368 +45.98% 68
East of England -25 27 £388 -3.13% 79
Scotland -9 24 £250 -38.27% 42
Yorkshire -25 14 £243 -51.50% 34
Northern Ireland 0 9 £140 -24.32% 12
Wales -7 3 £168 -54.11% 11
East Midlands -15 3 £375 +11.11% 32
North East -2 1 - - 21
Channel Islands -6 1 - -

Telecoms
Co-occurring Skills and Capabilities by Category

The follow tables expand on the table above by listing co-occurrences grouped by category. The same employment type, locality and period is covered with up to 20 co-occurrences shown in each of the following categories:

Application Platforms
1 19 (2.33%) SharePoint
2 17 (2.09%) Confluence
2 17 (2.09%) OpenStack
3 12 (1.47%) Apache Spark
4 11 (1.35%) Microsoft Exchange
5 8 (0.98%) CMS
6 5 (0.61%) Headless CMS
7 4 (0.49%) Apache Airflow
7 4 (0.49%) Appian
7 4 (0.49%) Camunda
8 2 (0.25%) Gunicorn
8 2 (0.25%) Smallworld
9 1 (0.12%) Drupal
9 1 (0.12%) Jupyter
9 1 (0.12%) SAS
Applications
1 21 (2.58%) Microsoft Office
2 20 (2.46%) Microsoft Excel
3 9 (1.11%) Microsoft PowerPoint
4 7 (0.86%) Microsoft Project
4 7 (0.86%) MS Visio
5 2 (0.25%) Autodesk Inventor
5 2 (0.25%) Chatbot
5 2 (0.25%) Sketch
6 1 (0.12%) Adobe Creative Suite
6 1 (0.12%) AutoCAD
6 1 (0.12%) InVision
6 1 (0.12%) Simulink
6 1 (0.12%) Spreadsheet
Business Applications
1 8 (0.98%) SAP BRIM
1 8 (0.98%) SAP Hybris
1 8 (0.98%) SAP PSCD
2 7 (0.86%) Oracle Assets
2 7 (0.86%) Oracle EBS R12
2 7 (0.86%) Oracle ERP
3 5 (0.61%) Endur
4 4 (0.49%) SAP ERP
5 3 (0.37%) Primavera
5 3 (0.37%) Remedy ITSM
6 2 (0.25%) Dynamics CRM
6 2 (0.25%) Oracle EBS
6 2 (0.25%) Salesforce CRM
7 1 (0.12%) Oracle Procure-to-Pay
7 1 (0.12%) Remedy AR System
7 1 (0.12%) SAP CO
7 1 (0.12%) SAP FI
7 1 (0.12%) SAP FI/CO
7 1 (0.12%) SAP S/4HANA
Cloud Services
1 69 (8.48%) Azure
2 64 (7.86%) AWS
3 37 (4.55%) GCP
4 33 (4.05%) SaaS
5 32 (3.93%) Microsoft 365
6 20 (2.46%) Power Platform
7 9 (1.11%) Azure DevOps
7 9 (1.11%) Entra ID
7 9 (1.11%) GitHub
8 8 (0.98%) PaaS
8 8 (0.98%) SAP Commerce Cloud
9 7 (0.86%) OpenShift
10 6 (0.74%) Cloud Computing
10 6 (0.74%) dbt
11 5 (0.61%) Figma
11 5 (0.61%) IaaS
11 5 (0.61%) Salesforce Sales Cloud
11 5 (0.61%) Salesforce Service Cloud
12 4 (0.49%) Apigee
12 4 (0.49%) Stackdriver
Communications & Networking
1 68 (8.35%) Firewall
2 46 (5.65%) LAN
3 44 (5.41%) 5G
4 43 (5.28%) VPN
4 43 (5.28%) WAN
5 33 (4.05%) LTE
6 32 (3.93%) Radio Access Network
6 32 (3.93%) Wireless
7 31 (3.81%) 4G
7 31 (3.81%) BGP
7 31 (3.81%) Network Security
8 29 (3.56%) MPLS
9 27 (3.32%) Wireshark
10 24 (2.95%) DNS
10 24 (2.95%) OSPF
11 22 (2.70%) Broadband
11 22 (2.70%) VoIP
12 18 (2.21%) Wi-Fi
13 17 (2.09%) SD-WAN
13 17 (2.09%) TCP/IP
Database & Business Intelligence
1 22 (2.70%) Relational Database
2 21 (2.58%) PostgreSQL
2 21 (2.58%) Tableau
3 19 (2.33%) Power BI
4 13 (1.60%) Big Data
4 13 (1.60%) GIS
5 10 (1.23%) Geospatial Data
6 7 (0.86%) Data Warehouse
6 7 (0.86%) SQL Server
7 6 (0.74%) MongoDB
8 5 (0.61%) BigQuery
8 5 (0.61%) Oracle Database
8 5 (0.61%) QGIS
9 4 (0.49%) Metadata
9 4 (0.49%) SAP BW
10 2 (0.25%) Electronic Patient Records
10 2 (0.25%) MySQL
10 2 (0.25%) Oracle Database 12c
10 2 (0.25%) Power Query
11 1 (0.12%) Looker
Development Applications
1 27 (3.32%) GitLab
2 25 (3.07%) JIRA
3 23 (2.83%) Jenkins
4 20 (2.46%) Gradle
5 17 (2.09%) JUnit
5 17 (2.09%) Liquibase
5 17 (2.09%) Mockito
6 15 (1.84%) Git
7 9 (1.11%) Postman
8 5 (0.61%) Robot Framework
8 5 (0.61%) Selenium
9 4 (0.49%) Clang
9 4 (0.49%) Cucumber
9 4 (0.49%) Cypress.io
9 4 (0.49%) GCC
9 4 (0.49%) SonarQube
10 3 (0.37%) Maven
10 3 (0.37%) Subversion
11 2 (0.25%) Mercurial
11 2 (0.25%) Team Foundation Server
General
1 265 (32.56%) Social Skills
2 261 (32.06%) Finance
3 203 (24.94%) Public Sector
4 168 (20.64%) Marketing
5 161 (19.78%) Manufacturing
6 159 (19.53%) Electronics
7 109 (13.39%) Analytical Skills
8 32 (3.93%) Legal
9 28 (3.44%) Billing
10 23 (2.83%) Documentation Skills
11 20 (2.46%) Organisational Skills
12 12 (1.47%) Law
13 11 (1.35%) Automotive
13 11 (1.35%) Retail
14 10 (1.23%) Banking
14 10 (1.23%) Influencing Skills
15 9 (1.11%) French Language
16 7 (0.86%) Back Office
16 7 (0.86%) Inclusion and Diversity
16 7 (0.86%) Presentation Skills
Job Titles
1 89 (10.93%) Architect
2 72 (8.85%) Analyst
3 54 (6.63%) Consultant
3 54 (6.63%) Developer
4 51 (6.27%) Project Manager
5 49 (6.02%) Senior
6 48 (5.90%) Network Engineer
7 36 (4.42%) Lead
7 36 (4.42%) Test Engineer
8 29 (3.56%) Telecoms Manager
9 27 (3.32%) Business Analyst
10 18 (2.21%) Delivery Manager
10 18 (2.21%) Solutions Architect
11 16 (1.97%) Desktop Support
11 16 (1.97%) IT Support
11 16 (1.97%) Network Architect
11 16 (1.97%) Security Consultant
11 16 (1.97%) Support Engineer
11 16 (1.97%) Telecoms Project Manager
12 14 (1.72%) Data Engineer
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 33 (4.05%) React
2 23 (2.83%) Swagger
3 21 (2.58%) Kafka
4 20 (2.46%) OpenAPI
4 20 (2.46%) REST
5 18 (2.21%) Spring
6 17 (2.09%) Spring Boot
7 15 (1.84%) HTML
8 14 (1.72%) CSS
9 11 (1.35%) JSON
9 11 (1.35%) XML
10 10 (1.23%) RFC 2544
11 9 (1.11%) .NET
11 9 (1.11%) Node.js
11 9 (1.11%) SailPoint
11 9 (1.11%) Web Services
12 8 (0.98%) Next.js
12 8 (0.98%) SOAP
13 7 (0.86%) AngularJS
14 6 (0.74%) 802.1X
Miscellaneous
1 49 (6.02%) Data Centre
2 35 (4.30%) Cloud Native
3 27 (3.32%) Fibre Optics
3 27 (3.32%) Onboarding
4 26 (3.19%) Self-Motivation
5 21 (2.58%) Legacy Systems
5 21 (2.58%) Product Ownership
6 15 (1.84%) Data Protection Act
7 14 (1.72%) Management Information System
8 13 (1.60%) CMDB
8 13 (1.60%) Driving Licence
9 11 (1.35%) Algorithms
10 10 (1.23%) Analytical Mindset
10 10 (1.23%) TM Forum
11 9 (1.11%) NHS
11 9 (1.11%) Virtual Team
12 8 (0.98%) Cyber Threat
12 8 (0.98%) Video Conferencing
13 6 (0.74%) CCTV
13 6 (0.74%) Cyber Defence
Operating Systems
1 46 (5.65%) Windows
2 43 (5.28%) Linux
3 16 (1.97%) Unix
4 11 (1.35%) Windows Server
5 7 (0.86%) Windows 10
6 6 (0.74%) Check Point GAiA
7 4 (0.49%) Apple iOS
8 3 (0.37%) Android
9 2 (0.25%) Mac OS
9 2 (0.25%) Mac OS X
9 2 (0.25%) VMS
9 2 (0.25%) Windows 8
9 2 (0.25%) Windows XP
Processes & Methodologies
1 184 (22.60%) Problem-Solving
2 179 (21.99%) Business Intelligence
3 161 (19.78%) Programme Management
4 154 (18.92%) Digital Marketing
5 143 (17.57%) Agile
6 96 (11.79%) Stakeholder Management
7 84 (10.32%) Stakeholder Engagement
8 82 (10.07%) Migration
9 75 (9.21%) DevOps
10 74 (9.09%) CI/CD
11 70 (8.60%) Project Management
12 66 (8.11%) ITIL
13 62 (7.62%) Continuous Improvement
14 60 (7.37%) Project Delivery
14 60 (7.37%) Service Management
15 51 (6.27%) Service Delivery
16 47 (5.77%) Customer Service
17 46 (5.65%) Artificial Intelligence
17 46 (5.65%) Change Management
17 46 (5.65%) Microservices
Programming Languages
1 84 (10.32%) Python
2 73 (8.97%) SQL
3 43 (5.28%) Java
4 29 (3.56%) TypeScript
5 24 (2.95%) JavaScript
6 21 (2.58%) PowerShell
7 15 (1.84%) C#
7 15 (1.84%) C++
8 14 (1.72%) Bash
9 12 (1.47%) C
10 5 (0.61%) Go
11 4 (0.49%) ABAP
11 4 (0.49%) PHP
12 3 (0.37%) PL/SQL
12 3 (0.37%) SystemVerilog
13 2 (0.25%) Kotlin
13 2 (0.25%) MATLAB
14 1 (0.12%) BeanShell
14 1 (0.12%) Groovy
14 1 (0.12%) R
Qualifications
1 193 (23.71%) Security Cleared
2 151 (18.55%) SC Cleared
3 72 (8.85%) Degree
4 45 (5.53%) DV Cleared
5 44 (5.41%) Cisco Certification
6 29 (3.56%) CCNP
7 22 (2.70%) Master's Degree
8 21 (2.58%) CISSP
9 15 (1.84%) PMI Certification
10 14 (1.72%) CCIE
10 14 (1.72%) PMP
11 13 (1.60%) CCNA
12 12 (1.47%) CISM
13 11 (1.35%) ISTQB
13 11 (1.35%) ISTQB Foundation Certification
14 10 (1.23%) BPSS Clearance
14 10 (1.23%) CESG Certified Professional
14 10 (1.23%) Computer Science Degree
14 10 (1.23%) ISEB
15 9 (1.11%) CCSE
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 32 (3.93%) QA
2 31 (3.81%) SLA
3 21 (2.58%) ISO/IEC 27001
4 15 (1.84%) NIST
5 12 (1.47%) GDPR
6 11 (1.35%) Data Quality
6 11 (1.35%) Sarbanes-Oxley
7 10 (1.23%) Accessibility
7 10 (1.23%) RMADS
8 9 (1.11%) NCSC
9 8 (0.98%) JSP 440
10 7 (0.86%) GRC
11 6 (0.74%) PMO
12 5 (0.61%) P3O
13 4 (0.49%) ISO 9001
13 4 (0.49%) NEBOSH
13 4 (0.49%) WCAG
14 3 (0.37%) Def Stans
15 2 (0.25%) ISO 26262
15 2 (0.25%) ISO/IEC 27002 (supersedes ISO/IEC 17799)
System Software
1 43 (5.28%) Docker
2 24 (2.95%) Active Directory
3 15 (1.84%) VMware Infrastructure
4 13 (1.60%) vSphere
5 6 (0.74%) Virtual Machines
6 5 (0.61%) VMware ESXi
7 4 (0.49%) Ceph
7 4 (0.49%) Firmware
8 3 (0.37%) Hyper-V
8 3 (0.37%) XenApp
9 2 (0.25%) iptables
9 2 (0.25%) Oracle RAC
10 1 (0.12%) BitLocker
Systems Management
1 41 (5.04%) Ansible
1 41 (5.04%) Kubernetes
2 30 (3.69%) Terraform
3 13 (1.60%) NSN NetAct
4 8 (0.98%) Amdocs OSS
5 7 (0.86%) Puppet
6 6 (0.74%) FortiGate
7 5 (0.61%) HP ALM
8 4 (0.49%) Single Sign-On
9 3 (0.37%) Argo
9 3 (0.37%) Data Guard
9 3 (0.37%) Grafana
9 3 (0.37%) Istio
9 3 (0.37%) Microsoft Intune
9 3 (0.37%) Oracle Enterprise Manager
9 3 (0.37%) Oracle RMAN
9 3 (0.37%) SCCM
9 3 (0.37%) vCenter Server
10 2 (0.25%) Cisco Prime
10 2 (0.25%) OpenView
Vendors
1 184 (22.60%) SAP
2 111 (13.64%) Microsoft
3 93 (11.43%) Cisco
4 45 (5.53%) Nokia
5 42 (5.16%) Ericsson
6 34 (4.18%) Salesforce
7 30 (3.69%) Juniper
8 27 (3.32%) ServiceNow
9 26 (3.19%) Oracle
10 23 (2.83%) Fortinet
11 20 (2.46%) Remedy
11 20 (2.46%) VMware
12 19 (2.33%) CheckPoint
12 19 (2.33%) F5
12 19 (2.33%) Google
13 13 (1.60%) Databricks
14 11 (1.35%) Splunk
15 10 (1.23%) BT
15 10 (1.23%) NetCracker
16 9 (1.11%) Hitachi