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 £457, according to job vacancies posted in the 6 months leading up to 12 May 2026.

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

6 months to
12 May 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 101 90 56
Rank change year-on-year -11 -34 +28
Contract jobs requiring a Network Engineer 567 353 638
As % of all contract jobs in the UK excluding London 2.34% 2.76% 3.12%
As % of the Job Titles category 2.55% 3.00% 3.37%
Number of daily rates quoted 361 238 385
10th Percentile £303 £300 £274
25th Percentile £388 £375 £335
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £457 £450 £450
Median % change year-on-year +1.44% - -
75th Percentile £538 £547 £525
90th Percentile £588 £613 £631
UK median daily rate £474 £475 £460
% change year-on-year -0.17% +3.26% -2.44%
Number of hourly rates quoted 20 2 14
10th Percentile £53.99 £23.53 £15.96
25th Percentile £56.44 £31.06 £21.62
Median hourly rate £75.25 £45.75 £72.50
Median % change year-on-year +64.48% -36.90% +16.94%
75th Percentile £78.75 £62.06 £73.75
90th Percentile - £70.58 £75.24
UK median hourly rate £73.00 £57.50 £40.00
% change year-on-year +26.96% +43.75% -36.74%

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 22,272 11,783 18,946
% of contract IT jobs with a recognized job title 91.96% 92.11% 92.51%
Number of daily rates quoted 12,936 7,530 11,551
10th Percentile £287 £213 £213
25th Percentile £400 £363 £363
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £495 £475 £490
Median % change year-on-year +4.21% -3.06% -2.00%
75th Percentile £588 £575 £597
90th Percentile £686 £650 £688
UK median daily rate £507 £513 £525
% change year-on-year -1.07% -2.38% -2.78%
Number of hourly rates quoted 2,511 844 2,261
10th Percentile £14.65 £14.00 £12.50
25th Percentile £20.00 £17.41 £15.75
Median hourly rate £45.56 £27.50 £40.00
Median % change year-on-year +65.65% -31.25% -5.73%
75th Percentile £67.25 £64.50 £61.60
90th Percentile £78.75 £75.00 £74.00
UK median hourly rate £44.00 £28.60 £37.50
% change year-on-year +53.85% -23.73% -16.67%

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 12 May 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 12 May 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 12 May 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
South East +11 185 £463 -7.50% 82
North of England -46 162 £472 -3.67% 72
North West -14 130 £474 -3.27% 39
Midlands +12 109 £431 +1.47% 36
West Midlands +15 102 £425 +54.55% 26
East of England +1 47 £450 -5.26% 27
Scotland +15 45 £413 +3.13% 23
South West -30 43 £533 +12.80% 26
Wales -6 26 £425 +21.43% 18
Yorkshire -63 24 £450 -8.54% 21
North East -12 8 £600 +108.70% 12
East Midlands -44 3 £500 +11.11% 10
Northern Ireland - 2 £468 - 4
South Coast - 1 £575 -
Network Engineer
UK

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

For the 6 months to 12 May 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.

1 316 (55.73%) Cisco
2 257 (45.33%) Firewall
3 226 (39.86%) Security Cleared
4 164 (28.92%) LAN
5 163 (28.75%) SC Cleared
6 161 (28.40%) Cisco Certification
6 161 (28.40%) WAN
7 136 (23.99%) DNS
8 132 (23.28%) BGP
9 131 (23.10%) Palo Alto
10 128 (22.57%) CCNP
11 127 (22.40%) VPN
12 125 (22.05%) F5
13 112 (19.75%) Network Security
14 107 (18.87%) Load Balancing
15 91 (16.05%) OSPF
16 80 (14.11%) VMware
17 77 (13.58%) CCNA
17 77 (13.58%) Wireless
18 75 (13.23%) Juniper
19 72 (12.70%) TCP/IP
20 71 (12.52%) VLAN
21 70 (12.35%) DV Cleared
22 57 (10.05%) BIG-IP
22 57 (10.05%) High Availability
22 57 (10.05%) VMware Infrastructure
23 56 (9.88%) Aruba
23 56 (9.88%) Wi-Fi
24 55 (9.70%) SD-WAN
25 54 (9.52%) CheckPoint

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 7 (1.23%) Confluence
2 5 (0.88%) Apache
2 5 (0.88%) IIS
3 1 (0.18%) CMS
3 1 (0.18%) Microsoft Exchange
3 1 (0.18%) Skype for Business
Applications
1 13 (2.29%) MS Visio
2 6 (1.06%) Microsoft Office
3 1 (0.18%) Microsoft Excel
Cloud Services
1 45 (7.94%) Azure
2 42 (7.41%) AWS
3 21 (3.70%) GCP
4 10 (1.76%) GitHub
5 8 (1.41%) Virtual Private Cloud
6 7 (1.23%) Entra ID
6 7 (1.23%) Google Kubernetes Engine
7 6 (1.06%) Nutanix
8 5 (0.88%) Azure Sentinel
9 4 (0.71%) Google Compute Engine
9 4 (0.71%) Mimecast
9 4 (0.71%) SaaS
10 3 (0.53%) AWS Direct Connect
10 3 (0.53%) Azure DevOps
10 3 (0.53%) Catchpoint
10 3 (0.53%) GitHub Actions
10 3 (0.53%) Google Ads
10 3 (0.53%) OCI
10 3 (0.53%) Route 53
11 2 (0.35%) Amazon EKS
Communications & Networking
1 257 (45.33%) Firewall
2 164 (28.92%) LAN
3 161 (28.40%) WAN
4 136 (23.99%) DNS
5 132 (23.28%) BGP
6 127 (22.40%) VPN
7 112 (19.75%) Network Security
8 91 (16.05%) OSPF
9 77 (13.58%) Wireless
10 72 (12.70%) TCP/IP
11 71 (12.52%) VLAN
12 57 (10.05%) BIG-IP
13 56 (9.88%) Wi-Fi
14 55 (9.70%) SD-WAN
15 50 (8.82%) Cisco Nexus
15 50 (8.82%) IPsec
16 46 (8.11%) DHCP
17 44 (7.76%) SSL
17 44 (7.76%) Wireshark
18 39 (6.88%) Cisco ISE
Database & Business Intelligence
1 1 (0.18%) Oracle Reports
1 1 (0.18%) SQL Server
Development Applications
1 28 (4.94%) Fiddler
2 17 (3.00%) JIRA
3 10 (1.76%) Jenkins
4 8 (1.41%) Git
5 7 (1.23%) Sonatype Nexus
6 6 (1.06%) GitLab
7 2 (0.35%) Browser DevTools
General
1 74 (13.05%) Social Skills
2 39 (6.88%) Banking
3 37 (6.53%) Investment Banking
4 32 (5.64%) Documentation Skills
5 29 (5.11%) Public Sector
6 28 (4.94%) Manufacturing
7 26 (4.59%) Telecoms
8 21 (3.70%) Analytical Skills
9 11 (1.94%) Finance
10 10 (1.76%) Aerospace
11 9 (1.59%) Legal
12 6 (1.06%) Military
13 5 (0.88%) Law
13 5 (0.88%) Police
14 3 (0.53%) Influencing Skills
14 3 (0.53%) Retail
15 2 (0.35%) Electronics
15 2 (0.35%) Marketing
15 2 (0.35%) Pharmaceutical
16 1 (0.18%) Back Office
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 34 (6.00%) 802.1X
2 10 (1.76%) LDAP
3 9 (1.59%) SAML
4 2 (0.35%) REST
4 2 (0.35%) RFC 2544
5 1 (0.18%) Django
5 1 (0.18%) Jinja
5 1 (0.18%) NETCONF
5 1 (0.18%) XMPP
Miscellaneous
1 110 (19.40%) Data Centre
2 23 (4.06%) Management Information System
3 17 (3.00%) PKI
4 11 (1.94%) Data Protection Act
4 11 (1.94%) Hybrid Cloud
4 11 (1.94%) NHS
4 11 (1.94%) Self-Motivation
5 10 (1.76%) Operational Technology
6 9 (1.59%) Clustering
7 7 (1.23%) Onboarding
7 7 (1.23%) Security Posture
8 5 (0.88%) Cloud Native
8 5 (0.88%) Public Cloud
9 4 (0.71%) Enterprise Software
10 3 (0.53%) Linux Command Line
10 3 (0.53%) Wiki
11 2 (0.35%) Fibre Optics
11 2 (0.35%) Life Science
11 2 (0.35%) SCADA
11 2 (0.35%) Video Conferencing
Operating Systems
1 53 (9.35%) Windows
2 29 (5.11%) Linux
3 13 (2.29%) Windows Server
4 4 (0.71%) Unix
5 3 (0.53%) CatOS
6 1 (0.18%) Data ONTAP
6 1 (0.18%) Mac OS
6 1 (0.18%) Solaris
6 1 (0.18%) Ubuntu
Processes & Methodologies
1 107 (18.87%) Load Balancing
2 57 (10.05%) High Availability
3 52 (9.17%) Network Monitoring
4 47 (8.29%) Problem-Solving
5 46 (8.11%) Migration
6 42 (7.41%) ITIL
7 38 (6.70%) Infrastructure Engineering
8 33 (5.82%) Network Design
9 29 (5.11%) Project Delivery
10 28 (4.94%) Data Loss Prevention
10 28 (4.94%) Malware Detection/Protection
11 26 (4.59%) Network Management
12 24 (4.23%) Change Management
12 24 (4.23%) ITSM
12 24 (4.23%) Service Management
12 24 (4.23%) Validation
13 23 (4.06%) Network Architecture
14 22 (3.88%) Collaborative Working
14 22 (3.88%) Technical Leadership
15 20 (3.53%) DevOps
Programming Languages
1 33 (5.82%) Python
2 7 (1.23%) SQL
3 4 (0.71%) Bash
4 1 (0.18%) Perl
4 1 (0.18%) PHP
4 1 (0.18%) Ruby
Qualifications
1 226 (39.86%) Security Cleared
2 163 (28.75%) SC Cleared
3 161 (28.40%) Cisco Certification
4 128 (22.57%) CCNP
5 77 (13.58%) CCNA
6 70 (12.35%) DV Cleared
7 25 (4.41%) Degree
8 19 (3.35%) JNCIS
9 16 (2.82%) JNCIA
10 15 (2.65%) CCIE
11 13 (2.29%) Network+ Certification
12 11 (1.94%) JNCIP
13 7 (1.23%) Computer Science Degree
14 5 (0.88%) CompTIA Security+
15 4 (0.71%) Azure Certification
15 4 (0.71%) CCSE
16 3 (0.53%) CWNA
16 3 (0.53%) CWNE
16 3 (0.53%) CWSP
16 3 (0.53%) Server+ Certification
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 9 (1.59%) SLA
2 8 (1.41%) QA
3 7 (1.23%) Disclosure Scotland
4 5 (0.88%) NIST
5 3 (0.53%) JSP 440
5 3 (0.53%) PCI DSS
6 2 (0.35%) ISO/IEC 20000
6 2 (0.35%) ISO/IEC 27001
6 2 (0.35%) NCSC
6 2 (0.35%) PMO
7 1 (0.18%) Actionable Recommendations
7 1 (0.18%) Cyber Essentials
7 1 (0.18%) Cyber Essentials PLUS
7 1 (0.18%) GDPR
7 1 (0.18%) GRC
7 1 (0.18%) HMG Security Policy Framework
System Software
1 57 (10.05%) VMware Infrastructure
2 37 (6.53%) VMware NSX
3 26 (4.59%) Firmware
4 21 (3.70%) Active Directory
5 6 (1.06%) VMware ESXi
6 5 (0.88%) Hyper-V
6 5 (0.88%) vSphere
7 2 (0.35%) KVM
7 2 (0.35%) vCloud
8 1 (0.18%) Citrix Presentation Server
8 1 (0.18%) Docker
8 1 (0.18%) RHEV
8 1 (0.18%) Snort
8 1 (0.18%) Virtual Machines
8 1 (0.18%) Virtual Servers
8 1 (0.18%) Xen
Systems Management
1 39 (6.88%) Ansible
2 28 (4.94%) Terraform
3 27 (4.76%) FortiGate
4 9 (1.59%) Single Sign-On
5 6 (1.06%) Cisco Prime
5 6 (1.06%) Nagios
6 5 (0.88%) Kubernetes
7 3 (0.53%) vCenter Server
7 3 (0.53%) WSUS
8 2 (0.35%) Microsoft Intune
9 1 (0.18%) Avamar
9 1 (0.18%) Backup Exec
9 1 (0.18%) CASB
9 1 (0.18%) Cisco CUCM
9 1 (0.18%) Iperf
9 1 (0.18%) Proxmox
9 1 (0.18%) SCOM
9 1 (0.18%) SolarWinds Orion
9 1 (0.18%) Suricata
9 1 (0.18%) WhatsUp Gold
Vendors
1 316 (55.73%) Cisco
2 131 (23.10%) Palo Alto
3 125 (22.05%) F5
4 80 (14.11%) VMware
5 75 (13.23%) Juniper
6 56 (9.88%) Aruba
7 54 (9.52%) CheckPoint
8 39 (6.88%) Fortinet
9 37 (6.53%) SolarWinds
10 30 (5.29%) Blue Coat
10 30 (5.29%) McAfee
11 26 (4.59%) Microsoft
12 24 (4.23%) Meraki
13 21 (3.70%) NetApp
14 17 (3.00%) Extreme Networks
14 17 (3.00%) Google
14 17 (3.00%) ServiceNow
15 13 (2.29%) Ekahau
16 12 (2.12%) Arista
16 12 (2.12%) Splunk