Hybrid/Remote Penetration Testing Contract Job Trends

Penetration Testing
UK > Work from Home

The table below provides summary statistics and contractor rates for remote or hybrid contract work requiring Penetration Testing skills. It covers contract job vacancies from the 6 months leading up to 14 December 2025, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
14 Dec 2025
Same period 2024 Same period 2023
Rank 212 264 216
Rank change year-on-year +52 -48 +184
Contract jobs citing Penetration Testing 96 61 161
As % of all contract jobs with remote/hybrid work options 0.94% 0.52% 0.93%
As % of the Processes & Methodologies category 1.04% 0.58% 1.05%
Number of daily rates quoted 70 37 54
10th Percentile £425 £406 £408
25th Percentile £480 £513 £500
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £588 £600 £545
Median % change year-on-year -2.08% +10.09% -9.17%
75th Percentile £600 £700 £624
90th Percentile £608 - £728
UK median daily rate £550 £585 £600
% change year-on-year -5.98% -2.50% -

All Process and Methodology Skills
Work from Home

Penetration Testing falls under the Processes and Methodologies category. For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all contract job vacancies with remote or hybrid options requiring process or methodology skills.

Contract vacancies with a requirement for process or methodology skills 9,254 10,475 15,370
As % of all contract jobs with a WFH option 91.04% 88.94% 88.79%
Number of daily rates quoted 6,117 6,583 10,495
10th Percentile £330 £325 £340
25th Percentile £413 £413 £425
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £513 £525 £525
Median % change year-on-year -2.38% - -4.55%
75th Percentile £619 £638 £638
90th Percentile £720 £750 £738
UK median daily rate £500 £525 £531
% change year-on-year -4.76% -1.13% -3.45%
Number of hourly rates quoted 331 216 369
10th Percentile £15.18 £17.50 £19.25
25th Percentile £20.43 £22.00 £26.25
Median hourly rate £42.50 £37.14 £53.00
Median % change year-on-year +14.43% -29.92% -3.64%
75th Percentile £65.00 £65.00 £70.07
90th Percentile £70.00 £75.00 £86.70
UK median hourly rate £25.15 £33.00 £42.50
% change year-on-year -23.79% -22.35% +21.43%

Penetration Testing
Job Vacancy Trend for Remote/Hybrid Jobs

Historical trend showing the proportion of contract IT job postings citing Penetration Testing and offering remote or hybrid work options relative to all contract IT jobs advertised.

Penetration Testing job vacancy trend for remote/hybrid jobs

Penetration Testing
Daily Rate Trend for Remote/Hybrid Jobs

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs with remote/hybrid work options citing Penetration Testing.

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs with remote/hybrid work options citing Penetration Testing

Penetration Testing
Daily Rate Histogram for Remote/Hybrid Jobs

Daily rate distribution for jobs with remote/hybrid work options citing Penetration Testing over the 6 months to 14 December 2025.

Penetration Testing daily rate histogram for jobs with remote/hybrid work options

Penetration Testing
Hourly Rate Trend for Remote/Hybrid Jobs

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs with remote/hybrid work options citing Penetration Testing.

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs with remote/hybrid work options citing Penetration Testing

Penetration Testing
Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities in Remote/Hybrid Jobs 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 2 (2.08%) Confluence
Applications
1 4 (4.17%) Microsoft Excel
1 4 (4.17%) Microsoft Office
1 4 (4.17%) Microsoft PowerPoint
2 1 (1.04%) GNU Octave
2 1 (1.04%) Microsoft Project
Cloud Services
1 24 (25.00%) Azure
2 17 (17.71%) AWS
3 9 (9.38%) GCP
4 4 (4.17%) Azure Sentinel
5 3 (3.13%) Azure DevOps
5 3 (3.13%) Cloudflare
5 3 (3.13%) OpenDNS
6 2 (2.08%) Entra ID
6 2 (2.08%) GitHub
6 2 (2.08%) Power Platform
6 2 (2.08%) SaaS
7 1 (1.04%) AWS CloudFormation
7 1 (1.04%) GitHub Actions
Communications & Networking
1 13 (13.54%) Firewall
2 9 (9.38%) Network Security
3 5 (5.21%) Wireless
4 4 (4.17%) Internet
4 4 (4.17%) Wireshark
5 3 (3.13%) Intrusion Detection
5 3 (3.13%) SD-WAN
6 2 (2.08%) TCP/IP
7 1 (1.04%) Cisco ASA
7 1 (1.04%) DNS
7 1 (1.04%) Intranet
7 1 (1.04%) IPsec
7 1 (1.04%) LAN
7 1 (1.04%) MQTT
7 1 (1.04%) NGFW
7 1 (1.04%) SSL
7 1 (1.04%) VPN
7 1 (1.04%) WAN
7 1 (1.04%) WLAN
Database & Business Intelligence
1 2 (2.08%) Power BI
Development Applications
1 14 (14.58%) Burp Suite
2 13 (13.54%) Metasploit
3 4 (4.17%) JIRA
4 3 (3.13%) GitLab
4 3 (3.13%) Jenkins
5 2 (2.08%) Selenium
5 2 (2.08%) SonarQube
5 2 (2.08%) sqlmap
General
1 54 (56.25%) Social Skills
2 13 (13.54%) Public Sector
3 10 (10.42%) Analytical Skills
4 6 (6.25%) Finance
5 2 (2.08%) Automotive
5 2 (2.08%) Banking
5 2 (2.08%) Electronics
5 2 (2.08%) Manufacturing
5 2 (2.08%) Marketing
5 2 (2.08%) Military
5 2 (2.08%) Telecoms
6 1 (1.04%) Documentation Skills
6 1 (1.04%) Investment Banking
Job Titles
1 54 (56.25%) Penetration Tester
2 52 (54.17%) Tester
3 7 (7.29%) Analyst
3 7 (7.29%) Security Analyst
4 6 (6.25%) Lead
4 6 (6.25%) Senior
5 5 (5.21%) Security Engineer
5 5 (5.21%) Security Manager
6 4 (4.17%) Consultant
6 4 (4.17%) IT Security Officer
6 4 (4.17%) Security Officer
7 3 (3.13%) Cybersecurity Manager
7 3 (3.13%) Network Engineer
7 3 (3.13%) Network Security Engineer
7 3 (3.13%) Operations Analyst
7 3 (3.13%) Project Manager
7 3 (3.13%) Project Manager - Cybersecurity
7 3 (3.13%) Security Operations Analyst
7 3 (3.13%) Security Project Manager
7 3 (3.13%) SOC Analyst
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 3 (3.13%) ADO
2 2 (2.08%) Node.js
3 1 (1.04%) LDAP
3 1 (1.04%) PyTorch
3 1 (1.04%) TensorFlow
Miscellaneous
1 13 (13.54%) Security Posture
2 7 (7.29%) Security Operations Centre
3 4 (4.17%) Cyber Threat
3 4 (4.17%) Management Information System
3 4 (4.17%) Operational Technology
4 2 (2.08%) Cloud Native
4 2 (2.08%) Mobile App
5 1 (1.04%) Analytical Mindset
5 1 (1.04%) CCTV
5 1 (1.04%) Cloud Security Posture
5 1 (1.04%) CMDB
5 1 (1.04%) Driving Licence
5 1 (1.04%) Enterprise Software
Operating Systems
1 10 (10.42%) Windows
2 5 (5.21%) Kali Linux
2 5 (5.21%) Linux
3 4 (4.17%) Unix
4 3 (3.13%) Android
Processes & Methodologies
1 55 (57.29%) Cybersecurity
2 17 (17.71%) Vulnerability Assessment
3 16 (16.67%) Incident Response
4 15 (15.63%) OWASP
5 12 (12.50%) Test Automation
6 11 (11.46%) Application Security
6 11 (11.46%) Cloud Security
6 11 (11.46%) Red Team
6 11 (11.46%) Vulnerability Management
7 10 (10.42%) MITRE ATT&CK
7 10 (10.42%) SIEM
8 9 (9.38%) Agile
9 8 (8.33%) Mentoring
9 8 (8.33%) Regulatory Compliance
9 8 (8.33%) Security Operations
9 8 (8.33%) Security Testing
10 7 (7.29%) Coaching
10 7 (7.29%) Ethical Hacking
10 7 (7.29%) Information Security
10 7 (7.29%) Risk Management
Programming Languages
1 15 (15.63%) Python
2 13 (13.54%) PowerShell
3 11 (11.46%) Bash
4 5 (5.21%) Go
5 3 (3.13%) Kusto Query Language
6 2 (2.08%) C-shell
6 2 (2.08%) Java
6 2 (2.08%) Korn
Qualifications
1 54 (56.25%) Security Cleared
2 51 (53.13%) SC Cleared
3 34 (35.42%) CHECK Team Member
4 30 (31.25%) CHECK Team Leader
5 10 (10.42%) CISSP
5 10 (10.42%) CREST Certified
5 10 (10.42%) OSCP
6 7 (7.29%) CEH
6 7 (7.29%) DV Cleared
6 7 (7.29%) GPEN
7 6 (6.25%) CISM
7 6 (6.25%) Degree
8 4 (4.17%) Cyber Scheme
8 4 (4.17%) Postgraduate
9 3 (3.13%) CCNP
9 3 (3.13%) Cisco Certification
9 3 (3.13%) OSCE
10 2 (2.08%) CESG Certified Professional
10 2 (2.08%) CompTIA Security+
11 1 (1.04%) GXPN
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 16 (16.67%) ISO/IEC 27001
2 12 (12.50%) NIST
3 8 (8.33%) NCSC
4 7 (7.29%) GDPR
5 5 (5.21%) PCI DSS
5 5 (5.21%) PMO
6 4 (4.17%) QA
7 3 (3.13%) NIST 800
8 2 (2.08%) Actionable Recommendations
8 2 (2.08%) Cyber Essentials
8 2 (2.08%) Cyber Essentials PLUS
8 2 (2.08%) ISO 9001
9 1 (1.04%) GRC
9 1 (1.04%) HIPAA
System Software
1 5 (5.21%) Active Directory
2 4 (4.17%) Docker
3 3 (3.13%) Snort
3 3 (3.13%) Squid
Systems Management
1 13 (13.54%) Nmap
2 10 (10.42%) Kubernetes
2 10 (10.42%) Nessus
3 4 (4.17%) Nexpose
4 3 (3.13%) Suricata
5 2 (2.08%) Ansible
6 1 (1.04%) CASB
6 1 (1.04%) CSIRT
6 1 (1.04%) HP Fortify
6 1 (1.04%) Microsoft Intune
6 1 (1.04%) Terraform
Vendors
1 7 (7.29%) Microsoft
2 6 (6.25%) Cisco
2 6 (6.25%) Palo Alto
2 6 (6.25%) Qualys
3 5 (5.21%) Zscaler
4 4 (4.17%) Splunk
5 3 (3.13%) Blue Coat
5 3 (3.13%) Carbon Black
5 3 (3.13%) CrowdStrike
5 3 (3.13%) FireEye
5 3 (3.13%) Google
5 3 (3.13%) SAP
5 3 (3.13%) ServiceNow
6 2 (2.08%) Tenable
7 1 (1.04%) BiZZdesign
7 1 (1.04%) Cadence
7 1 (1.04%) CheckPoint
7 1 (1.04%) Fortinet
7 1 (1.04%) Remedy
7 1 (1.04%) Tanium