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 £475, according to job vacancies posted in the 6 months leading up to 1 April 2026.

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

6 months to
1 Apr 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 107 82 58
Rank change year-on-year -25 -24 +38
Contract jobs requiring a Network Engineer 520 381 678
As % of all contract jobs in the UK excluding London 2.31% 3.03% 3.22%
As % of the Job Titles category 2.52% 3.27% 3.47%
Number of daily rates quoted 343 251 413
10th Percentile £301 £300 £283
25th Percentile £400 £382 £335
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £475 £450 £450
Median % change year-on-year +5.56% - -
75th Percentile £538 £575 £519
90th Percentile £588 £613 £625
UK median daily rate £475 £475 £450
% change year-on-year - +5.56% -4.91%
Number of hourly rates quoted 11 2 16
10th Percentile £44.86 £23.53 £17.81
25th Percentile £56.44 £31.06 £24.44
Median hourly rate £72.54 £45.75 £53.75
Median % change year-on-year +58.56% -14.88% -13.31%
75th Percentile £74.26 £62.06 £73.75
90th Percentile £78.75 £70.58 -
UK median hourly rate £71.94 £57.50 £40.00
% change year-on-year +25.10% +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 20,660 11,644 19,536
% of contract IT jobs with a recognized job title 91.85% 92.48% 92.76%
Number of daily rates quoted 12,240 7,582 12,131
10th Percentile £261 £213 £213
25th Percentile £400 £363 £363
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £485 £475 £488
Median % change year-on-year +2.11% -2.56% -2.50%
75th Percentile £582 £585 £595
90th Percentile £675 £656 £688
UK median daily rate £500 £520 £525
% change year-on-year -3.85% -0.95% -3.54%
Number of hourly rates quoted 2,252 747 2,113
10th Percentile £14.38 £14.84 £12.50
25th Percentile £19.08 £19.25 £15.50
Median hourly rate £40.00 £31.76 £32.90
Median % change year-on-year +25.94% -3.45% -21.68%
75th Percentile £65.00 £65.00 £60.00
90th Percentile £77.50 £76.25 £71.90
UK median hourly rate £38.63 £32.50 £32.90
% change year-on-year +18.86% -1.20% -25.00%

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 1 April 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 1 April 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 1 April 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 +2 174 £495 -1.00% 72
North of England -52 157 £478 -1.04% 53
North West -15 136 £479 -0.65% 31
Midlands -10 96 £438 +2.94% 53
West Midlands +10 90 £438 +59.09% 31
Scotland +16 41 £413 - 19
East of England -5 37 £450 -10.00% 25
South West -35 37 £513 +8.47% 31
Wales -8 25 £425 +9.68% 10
Yorkshire -58 21 £440 -4.86% 16
East Midlands -45 3 £500 +11.11% 22
Northern Ireland - 2 £468 - 5
North East -13 1 - - 6
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 1 April 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.

1 300 (57.69%) Cisco
2 246 (47.31%) Firewall
3 221 (42.50%) Security Cleared
4 155 (29.81%) SC Cleared
5 151 (29.04%) WAN
6 148 (28.46%) Cisco Certification
7 146 (28.08%) LAN
8 128 (24.62%) BGP
9 123 (23.65%) CCNP
10 118 (22.69%) VPN
11 117 (22.50%) DNS
12 115 (22.12%) Palo Alto
13 101 (19.42%) F5
14 100 (19.23%) Load Balancing
15 97 (18.65%) Network Security
16 91 (17.50%) OSPF
17 87 (16.73%) Juniper
18 74 (14.23%) TCP/IP
19 72 (13.85%) DV Cleared
19 72 (13.85%) VMware
20 70 (13.46%) CCNA
21 66 (12.69%) VLAN
22 64 (12.31%) Wireless
23 54 (10.38%) Aruba
24 53 (10.19%) Cisco ISE
25 52 (10.00%) BIG-IP
26 51 (9.81%) VMware Infrastructure
27 50 (9.62%) High Availability
27 50 (9.62%) Wi-Fi
27 50 (9.62%) Windows

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 6 (1.15%) Confluence
2 5 (0.96%) Apache
2 5 (0.96%) IIS
2 5 (0.96%) SharePoint
3 1 (0.19%) Microsoft Exchange
Applications
1 15 (2.88%) MS Visio
2 7 (1.35%) Microsoft Office
3 2 (0.38%) Microsoft Excel
4 1 (0.19%) Microsoft PowerPoint
Business Applications
1 2 (0.38%) Remedy ITSM
Cloud Services
1 44 (8.46%) AWS
2 41 (7.88%) Azure
3 18 (3.46%) GCP
4 9 (1.73%) GitHub
5 8 (1.54%) Virtual Private Cloud
6 7 (1.35%) Entra ID
7 6 (1.15%) Google Kubernetes Engine
8 5 (0.96%) Nutanix
9 4 (0.77%) Mimecast
10 3 (0.58%) AWS Direct Connect
10 3 (0.58%) Azure Sentinel
10 3 (0.58%) Catchpoint
10 3 (0.58%) Google Ads
10 3 (0.58%) Google Compute Engine
10 3 (0.58%) Route 53
10 3 (0.58%) SaaS
11 2 (0.38%) Azure DevOps
11 2 (0.38%) Azure ExpressRoute
11 2 (0.38%) IaaS
11 2 (0.38%) PaaS
Communications & Networking
1 246 (47.31%) Firewall
2 151 (29.04%) WAN
3 146 (28.08%) LAN
4 128 (24.62%) BGP
5 118 (22.69%) VPN
6 117 (22.50%) DNS
7 97 (18.65%) Network Security
8 91 (17.50%) OSPF
9 74 (14.23%) TCP/IP
10 66 (12.69%) VLAN
11 64 (12.31%) Wireless
12 53 (10.19%) Cisco ISE
13 52 (10.00%) BIG-IP
14 50 (9.62%) Wi-Fi
15 45 (8.65%) SD-WAN
16 43 (8.27%) IPsec
16 43 (8.27%) Wireshark
17 42 (8.08%) DHCP
18 41 (7.88%) SSL
19 37 (7.12%) Cisco Nexus
Database & Business Intelligence
1 1 (0.19%) Oracle Database
1 1 (0.19%) Oracle Reports
1 1 (0.19%) SQL Server
Development Applications
1 29 (5.58%) Fiddler
2 15 (2.88%) JIRA
3 8 (1.54%) Jenkins
4 7 (1.35%) Sonatype Nexus
5 4 (0.77%) Git
6 3 (0.58%) GitLab
7 1 (0.19%) Browser DevTools
7 1 (0.19%) ClearCase
General
1 78 (15.00%) Social Skills
2 41 (7.88%) Banking
3 38 (7.31%) Investment Banking
4 35 (6.73%) Public Sector
5 33 (6.35%) Documentation Skills
6 22 (4.23%) Telecoms
7 19 (3.65%) Analytical Skills
7 19 (3.65%) Manufacturing
8 14 (2.69%) Finance
9 12 (2.31%) Legal
10 5 (0.96%) Law
11 4 (0.77%) Military
11 4 (0.77%) Police
12 3 (0.58%) Electronics
12 3 (0.58%) Marketing
13 2 (0.38%) Aerospace
13 2 (0.38%) Influencing Skills
13 2 (0.38%) Pharmaceutical
13 2 (0.38%) Retail
14 1 (0.19%) Inclusion and Diversity
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 33 (6.35%) 802.1X
2 8 (1.54%) LDAP
3 6 (1.15%) SAML
4 2 (0.38%) RFC 2544
5 1 (0.19%) Django
5 1 (0.19%) REST
Miscellaneous
1 108 (20.77%) Data Centre
2 22 (4.23%) Management Information System
3 15 (2.88%) PKI
4 13 (2.50%) NHS
5 12 (2.31%) Operational Technology
6 10 (1.92%) Data Protection Act
7 9 (1.73%) Clustering
7 9 (1.73%) Self-Motivation
8 8 (1.54%) Hybrid Cloud
8 8 (1.54%) Security Posture
9 7 (1.35%) Onboarding
10 5 (0.96%) Public Cloud
11 4 (0.77%) IoT
12 3 (0.58%) 3D Printing
12 3 (0.58%) Cloud Native
12 3 (0.58%) Enterprise Software
12 3 (0.58%) Linux Command Line
13 2 (0.38%) Enterprise Cloud
13 2 (0.38%) Product Ownership
13 2 (0.38%) Wiki
Operating Systems
1 50 (9.62%) Windows
2 26 (5.00%) Linux
3 18 (3.46%) Windows Server
4 3 (0.58%) CatOS
5 2 (0.38%) Unix
6 1 (0.19%) Data ONTAP
6 1 (0.19%) Solaris
6 1 (0.19%) Ubuntu
Processes & Methodologies
1 100 (19.23%) Load Balancing
2 50 (9.62%) High Availability
3 43 (8.27%) Problem-Solving
4 41 (7.88%) Network Monitoring
5 40 (7.69%) ITIL
6 39 (7.50%) Network Design
7 38 (7.31%) Migration
8 29 (5.58%) Collaborative Working
8 29 (5.58%) Data Loss Prevention
8 29 (5.58%) ITSM
8 29 (5.58%) Malware Detection/Protection
9 27 (5.19%) Service Management
10 26 (5.00%) Network Architecture
11 25 (4.81%) Change Management
12 23 (4.42%) Project Delivery
13 22 (4.23%) Infrastructure Engineering
13 22 (4.23%) Validation
14 21 (4.04%) Network Management
15 20 (3.85%) Cybersecurity
16 19 (3.65%) Technical Leadership
Programming Languages
1 43 (8.27%) Python
2 10 (1.92%) Bash
3 8 (1.54%) SQL
4 7 (1.35%) Perl
5 6 (1.15%) PowerShell
6 5 (0.96%) Lisp
7 1 (0.19%) C
7 1 (0.19%) C++
7 1 (0.19%) Java
7 1 (0.19%) PHP
7 1 (0.19%) Ruby
7 1 (0.19%) Shell Script
Qualifications
1 221 (42.50%) Security Cleared
2 155 (29.81%) SC Cleared
3 148 (28.46%) Cisco Certification
4 123 (23.65%) CCNP
5 72 (13.85%) DV Cleared
6 70 (13.46%) CCNA
7 21 (4.04%) Degree
7 21 (4.04%) JNCIS
8 17 (3.27%) CCIE
8 17 (3.27%) JNCIA
9 12 (2.31%) JNCIP
10 11 (2.12%) Network+ Certification
11 6 (1.15%) Computer Science Degree
12 3 (0.58%) AWS Certification
12 3 (0.58%) CCSE
13 2 (0.38%) CWNA
13 2 (0.38%) CWSP
13 2 (0.38%) ISTQB
13 2 (0.38%) Microsoft Certification
13 2 (0.38%) Server+ Certification
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 5 (0.96%) SLA
2 4 (0.77%) ISO/IEC 27001
2 4 (0.77%) NIST
3 3 (0.58%) Disclosure Scotland
3 3 (0.58%) PCI DSS
3 3 (0.58%) QA
4 2 (0.38%) Cyber Essentials
4 2 (0.38%) GDPR
4 2 (0.38%) NCSC
4 2 (0.38%) PMO
5 1 (0.19%) Actionable Recommendations
5 1 (0.19%) Cyber Essentials PLUS
5 1 (0.19%) GRC
5 1 (0.19%) HMG Security Policy Framework
5 1 (0.19%) ISO/IEC 20000
5 1 (0.19%) JSP 440
System Software
1 51 (9.81%) VMware Infrastructure
2 42 (8.08%) VMware NSX
3 27 (5.19%) Firmware
4 24 (4.62%) Active Directory
5 5 (0.96%) Docker
5 5 (0.96%) vSphere
6 4 (0.77%) Hyper-V
6 4 (0.77%) VMware ESXi
7 2 (0.38%) KVM
7 2 (0.38%) vCloud
8 1 (0.19%) Citrix Presentation Server
8 1 (0.19%) ProxySG
8 1 (0.19%) RHEV
8 1 (0.19%) Snort
8 1 (0.19%) Xen
Systems Management
1 39 (7.50%) Ansible
2 29 (5.58%) FortiGate
3 23 (4.42%) Terraform
4 10 (1.92%) vCenter Server
5 6 (1.15%) Nagios
5 6 (1.15%) Single Sign-On
6 5 (0.96%) Cisco Prime
6 5 (0.96%) Kubernetes
7 3 (0.58%) Microsoft Intune
8 2 (0.38%) WSUS
9 1 (0.19%) Backup Exec
9 1 (0.19%) CASB
9 1 (0.19%) Iperf
9 1 (0.19%) Nessus
9 1 (0.19%) Norton AntiVirus
9 1 (0.19%) Proxmox
9 1 (0.19%) SCOM
9 1 (0.19%) Suricata
9 1 (0.19%) WhatsUp Gold
Vendors
1 300 (57.69%) Cisco
2 115 (22.12%) Palo Alto
3 101 (19.42%) F5
4 87 (16.73%) Juniper
5 72 (13.85%) VMware
6 54 (10.38%) Aruba
7 48 (9.23%) CheckPoint
8 40 (7.69%) SolarWinds
9 34 (6.54%) Blue Coat
9 34 (6.54%) McAfee
10 32 (6.15%) Fortinet
11 29 (5.58%) Meraki
12 24 (4.62%) Microsoft
13 21 (4.04%) NetApp
14 19 (3.65%) ServiceNow
15 16 (3.08%) Ekahau
16 14 (2.69%) Google
17 12 (2.31%) Extreme Networks
18 11 (2.12%) Splunk
19 10 (1.92%) Arista