Network Engineer Contract Job Trends in the UK excluding London

Network Engineer
UK > UK excluding London

The median Network Engineer daily rate in the UK excluding London is £463, according to job vacancies posted in the 6 months leading up to 14 September 2026.

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

6 months to
14 Sep 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 108 109 59
Rank change year-on-year +1 -50 +5
Contract jobs requiring a Network Engineer 633 345 556
As % of all contract jobs in the UK excluding London 2.27% 2.25% 3.11%
As % of the Job Titles category 2.48% 2.50% 3.37%
Number of daily rates quoted 352 250 303
10th Percentile £303 £300 £288
25th Percentile £400 £379 £400
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £463 £470 £490
Median % change year-on-year -1.65% -4.03% +15.29%
75th Percentile £538 £555 £550
90th Percentile £600 £638 £634
UK median daily rate £475 £475 £495
% change year-on-year - -4.04% +10.00%
Number of hourly rates quoted 47 8 16
10th Percentile £27.49 £21.65 £19.25
25th Percentile £64.38 £22.38 £20.00
Median hourly rate £74.00 £38.25 £35.48
Median % change year-on-year +93.46% +7.81% -42.77%
75th Percentile £91.00 £71.19 £75.00
90th Percentile £92.53 £84.99 £75.24
UK median hourly rate £74.00 £41.50 £45.00
% change year-on-year +78.31% -7.78% -25.00%

All Contract IT Job Roles
UK excluding London

For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all contract IT job vacancies in the UK excluding London. 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 excluding London with a recognized job title 25,554 13,780 16,500
% of contract IT jobs with a recognized job title 91.44% 89.86% 92.35%
Number of daily rates quoted 14,195 8,473 9,650
10th Percentile £304 £213 £222
25th Percentile £413 £361 £379
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £475 £500
Median % change year-on-year +5.26% -5.00% -
75th Percentile £600 £575 £600
90th Percentile £688 £652 £680
UK median daily rate £525 £500 £525
% change year-on-year +5.00% -4.76% -0.94%
Number of hourly rates quoted 3,244 1,243 1,460
10th Percentile £14.25 £13.29 £14.41
25th Percentile £20.00 £16.17 £19.50
Median hourly rate £42.50 £25.15 £45.00
Median % change year-on-year +68.99% -44.11% +8.43%
75th Percentile £67.84 £51.65 £66.61
90th Percentile £78.74 £70.83 £75.00
UK median hourly rate £42.00 £25.15 £43.00
% change year-on-year +67.00% -41.51% -1.71%

Network Engineer
Job Vacancy Trend in the UK excluding London

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

Network Engineer job vacancy trend in the UK excluding London

Network Engineer
Daily Rate Trend in the UK excluding London

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for Network Engineer job vacancies in the UK excluding London.

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for Network Engineer job vacancies in the UK excluding London

Network Engineer
Daily Rate Histogram in the UK excluding London

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing Network Engineer in the UK excluding London over the 6 months to 14 September 2026.

Daily rate histogram for Network Engineer in the UK excluding London

Network Engineer
Hourly Rate Trend in the UK excluding London

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for Network Engineer job vacancies in the UK excluding London.

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for Network Engineer job vacancies in the UK excluding London

Network Engineer
Hourly Rate Histogram in the UK excluding London

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing Network Engineer in the UK excluding London over the 6 months to 14 September 2026.

Hourly rate histogram for Network Engineer in the UK excluding London

Network Engineer
Contract Job Locations in the UK excluding London

The table below looks at the demand and provides a guide to the median contractor rates quoted in IT jobs citing Network Engineer within the UK excluding London region over the 6 months to 14 September 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
North of England +18 247 £499 +2.84% 82
North West +19 169 £500 +5.26% 43
South East -39 106 £463 -7.50% 79
Midlands -12 104 £475 +23.38% 64
West Midlands -16 89 £475 +25.83% 33
Scotland +16 79 £400 -5.88% 29
Yorkshire -3 65 £450 -8.07% 28
South West -21 58 £550 -7.95% 61
East of England -14 42 £450 +17.65% 75
Wales +20 36 £363 -23.68% 14
East Midlands -10 13 £500 -16.67% 31
North East -29 13 £600 - 11
Northern Ireland +2 2 £488 -7.14% 12
Channel Islands -4 2 £600 +36.36%
Network Engineer
UK

Network Engineer Skill Set
Top 30 Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities in the UK excluding London

For the 6 months to 14 September 2026, Network 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 across the UK excluding London region featuring Network Engineer in the job title.

1 350 (55.29%) Cisco
2 231 (36.49%) Firewall
3 187 (29.54%) Security Cleared
4 181 (28.59%) WAN
5 172 (27.17%) LAN
6 150 (23.70%) Cisco Certification
7 144 (22.75%) Network Security
7 144 (22.75%) VPN
8 139 (21.96%) Wireless
9 127 (20.06%) BGP
10 123 (19.43%) SC Cleared
11 118 (18.64%) DNS
12 114 (18.01%) Palo Alto
13 109 (17.22%) CCNP
14 104 (16.43%) F5
15 88 (13.90%) Load Balancing
16 87 (13.74%) OSPF
17 85 (13.43%) Wi-Fi
18 72 (11.37%) VLAN
19 69 (10.90%) CCNA
19 69 (10.90%) Problem-Solving
19 69 (10.90%) SD-WAN
20 68 (10.74%) VMware
21 60 (9.48%) Fortinet
22 59 (9.32%) DV Cleared
22 59 (9.32%) TCP/IP
23 56 (8.85%) Infrastructure Engineering
24 55 (8.69%) CheckPoint
25 53 (8.37%) Cisco ASA
25 53 (8.37%) Python

Network Engineer Skill Set
Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities in the UK excluding London 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 8 (1.26%) SAS
2 3 (0.47%) Confluence
3 1 (0.16%) CMS
3 1 (0.16%) FactoryTalk
3 1 (0.16%) Microsoft Exchange
3 1 (0.16%) Skype for Business
Applications
1 12 (1.90%) MS Visio
2 6 (0.95%) Microsoft Office
3 1 (0.16%) Microsoft Excel
Cloud Services
1 52 (8.21%) Azure
2 44 (6.95%) AWS
3 26 (4.11%) GCP
4 18 (2.84%) GitHub
5 8 (1.26%) Microsoft 365
6 7 (1.11%) IaaS
7 6 (0.95%) AWS Direct Connect
7 6 (0.95%) Azure ExpressRoute
7 6 (0.95%) Nutanix
7 6 (0.95%) OCI
8 5 (0.79%) Azure Sentinel
8 5 (0.79%) GitHub Actions
9 4 (0.63%) Azure DevOps
10 3 (0.47%) Cloudflare
10 3 (0.47%) Entra ID
10 3 (0.47%) Virtual Private Cloud
11 2 (0.32%) Google Kubernetes Engine
11 2 (0.32%) Route 53
12 1 (0.16%) AWS Control Tower
12 1 (0.16%) AWS KMS
Communications & Networking
1 231 (36.49%) Firewall
2 181 (28.59%) WAN
3 172 (27.17%) LAN
4 144 (22.75%) Network Security
4 144 (22.75%) VPN
5 139 (21.96%) Wireless
6 127 (20.06%) BGP
7 118 (18.64%) DNS
8 87 (13.74%) OSPF
9 85 (13.43%) Wi-Fi
10 72 (11.37%) VLAN
11 69 (10.90%) SD-WAN
12 59 (9.32%) TCP/IP
13 53 (8.37%) Cisco ASA
14 48 (7.58%) Cisco Nexus
15 46 (7.27%) DHCP
15 46 (7.27%) MPLS
16 44 (6.95%) Cisco Firepower
17 40 (6.32%) SSL
18 39 (6.16%) IPsec
Database & Business Intelligence
1 5 (0.79%) GIS
2 1 (0.16%) Oracle Reports
Development Applications
1 16 (2.53%) Git
1 16 (2.53%) Jenkins
2 15 (2.37%) JIRA
3 13 (2.05%) Fiddler
4 9 (1.42%) GitLab
5 2 (0.32%) Sonatype Nexus
6 1 (0.16%) Artifactory
6 1 (0.16%) Browser DevTools
General
1 81 (12.80%) Social Skills
2 40 (6.32%) Telecoms
3 39 (6.16%) Analytical Skills
4 38 (6.00%) Public Sector
5 36 (5.69%) Banking
6 28 (4.42%) Finance
7 26 (4.11%) Investment Banking
8 19 (3.00%) Manufacturing
9 15 (2.37%) Documentation Skills
10 13 (2.05%) Legal
11 9 (1.42%) Aerospace
12 8 (1.26%) Police
13 5 (0.79%) Retail
14 4 (0.63%) Inclusion and Diversity
14 4 (0.63%) Military
15 3 (0.47%) Influencing Skills
15 3 (0.47%) Organisational Skills
16 2 (0.32%) Law
16 2 (0.32%) Pharmaceutical
17 1 (0.16%) Advertising
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 35 (5.53%) Terraform
2 24 (3.79%) 802.1X
3 9 (1.42%) NETCONF
3 9 (1.42%) REST
4 6 (0.95%) SAML
5 5 (0.79%) XML
6 3 (0.47%) Java RMI
6 3 (0.47%) JSON
6 3 (0.47%) YAML
7 2 (0.32%) LDAP
8 1 (0.16%) Jinja
8 1 (0.16%) ModSecurity
8 1 (0.16%) RESTCONF
8 1 (0.16%) XMPP
8 1 (0.16%) YANG
Miscellaneous
1 88 (13.90%) Data Centre
2 21 (3.32%) Driving Licence
3 20 (3.16%) Hybrid Cloud
3 20 (3.16%) PKI
4 16 (2.53%) Management Information System
5 15 (2.37%) Onboarding
5 15 (2.37%) Operational Technology
6 12 (1.90%) Cloud Native
7 11 (1.74%) Self-Motivation
8 10 (1.58%) SCADA
9 7 (1.11%) Data Protection Act
9 7 (1.11%) Fibre Optics
9 7 (1.11%) Public Cloud
10 5 (0.79%) Private Cloud
10 5 (0.79%) Security Posture
11 4 (0.63%) CMDB
11 4 (0.63%) NHS
12 3 (0.47%) Distributed Systems
12 3 (0.47%) Handset
13 2 (0.32%) Product Ownership
Operating Systems
1 40 (6.32%) Windows
2 31 (4.90%) Linux
3 6 (0.95%) Windows Server
4 5 (0.79%) Unix
5 1 (0.16%) Mac OS
5 1 (0.16%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
5 1 (0.16%) Solaris
5 1 (0.16%) Windows 10
5 1 (0.16%) Windows 7
5 1 (0.16%) Windows Server 2008
5 1 (0.16%) Windows Server 2012
5 1 (0.16%) Windows Server 2019
Processes & Methodologies
1 88 (13.90%) Load Balancing
2 69 (10.90%) Problem-Solving
3 56 (8.85%) Infrastructure Engineering
4 52 (8.21%) ITIL
5 51 (8.06%) Migration
6 48 (7.58%) Project Delivery
7 46 (7.27%) High Availability
8 43 (6.79%) Network Monitoring
9 39 (6.16%) Change Management
10 36 (5.69%) Validation
11 34 (5.37%) Continuous Improvement
11 34 (5.37%) Network Design
12 30 (4.74%) Network Management
13 29 (4.58%) Stakeholder Engagement
13 29 (4.58%) Technical Leadership
14 25 (3.95%) Incident Management
15 24 (3.79%) CI/CD
15 24 (3.79%) Infrastructure as Code
15 24 (3.79%) Network Segmentation
16 22 (3.48%) Agile
Programming Languages
1 53 (8.37%) Python
2 11 (1.74%) Bash
2 11 (1.74%) PowerShell
3 7 (1.11%) ActionScript
4 6 (0.95%) SQL
5 3 (0.47%) C++
5 3 (0.47%) Perl
6 2 (0.32%) Search Processing Language
7 1 (0.16%) Go
7 1 (0.16%) Groovy
7 1 (0.16%) Shell Script
Qualifications
1 187 (29.54%) Security Cleared
2 150 (23.70%) Cisco Certification
3 123 (19.43%) SC Cleared
4 109 (17.22%) CCNP
5 69 (10.90%) CCNA
6 59 (9.32%) DV Cleared
7 24 (3.79%) CCIE
8 22 (3.48%) Degree
9 8 (1.26%) CISSP
10 6 (0.95%) Network+ Certification
11 5 (0.79%) CCSE
11 5 (0.79%) DBS Check
11 5 (0.79%) JNCIS
12 4 (0.63%) AWS Certification
12 4 (0.63%) BPSS Clearance
12 4 (0.63%) CCIE Wireless
12 4 (0.63%) CCSM
12 4 (0.63%) Computer Science Degree
12 4 (0.63%) CWNA
12 4 (0.63%) JNCIA
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 15 (2.37%) SLA
2 14 (2.21%) QA
3 10 (1.58%) NIST
4 7 (1.11%) Disclosure Scotland
5 4 (0.63%) ISO/IEC 27001
6 2 (0.32%) Data Quality
6 2 (0.32%) GDPR
6 2 (0.32%) JSP 440
6 2 (0.32%) NIST 800
6 2 (0.32%) PCI DSS
7 1 (0.16%) ISO/IEC 20000
System Software
1 52 (8.21%) VMware Infrastructure
2 26 (4.11%) VMware NSX
3 24 (3.79%) Firmware
4 17 (2.69%) Active Directory
5 10 (1.58%) vSphere
6 8 (1.26%) VMware ESXi
7 6 (0.95%) Hyper-V
8 4 (0.63%) FreeRADIUS
9 2 (0.32%) Docker
9 2 (0.32%) Virtual Machines
9 2 (0.32%) Virtual Servers
10 1 (0.16%) Snort
10 1 (0.16%) Squid
Systems Management
1 41 (6.48%) Ansible
2 20 (3.16%) FortiGate
3 11 (1.74%) Kubernetes
4 6 (0.95%) Cisco Prime
5 5 (0.79%) Cisco CUCM
6 4 (0.63%) Nagios
6 4 (0.63%) Progress Chef
7 3 (0.47%) Prometheus
7 3 (0.47%) Single Sign-On
8 2 (0.32%) Avamar
8 2 (0.32%) Grafana
8 2 (0.32%) Puppet
8 2 (0.32%) SolarWinds Orion
9 1 (0.16%) CASB
9 1 (0.16%) Iperf
9 1 (0.16%) Istio
9 1 (0.16%) Packer
9 1 (0.16%) SCOM
9 1 (0.16%) TrustSec
9 1 (0.16%) WSUS
Vendors
1 350 (55.29%) Cisco
2 114 (18.01%) Palo Alto
3 104 (16.43%) F5
4 68 (10.74%) VMware
5 60 (9.48%) Fortinet
6 55 (8.69%) CheckPoint
7 46 (7.27%) Juniper
8 39 (6.16%) Meraki
9 34 (5.37%) Aruba
10 33 (5.21%) Microsoft
11 27 (4.27%) SolarWinds
12 22 (3.48%) Nokia
13 19 (3.00%) ServiceNow
14 18 (2.84%) Blue Coat
15 16 (2.53%) McAfee
16 15 (2.37%) NetApp
17 13 (2.05%) Arista
17 13 (2.05%) Google
18 12 (1.90%) Zscaler
19 11 (1.74%) Infoblox