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 18 December 2025.

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

6 months to
18 Dec 2025
Same period 2024 Same period 2023
Rank 114 63 71
Rank change year-on-year -51 +8 +58
Contract jobs requiring a Network Engineer 386 520 621
As % of all contract jobs in the UK excluding London 2.14% 3.47% 3.16%
As % of the Job Titles category 2.37% 3.76% 3.38%
Number of daily rates quoted 276 287 348
10th Percentile £311 £300 £263
25th Percentile £400 £400 £340
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £475 £475 £431
Median % change year-on-year - +10.14% -3.09%
75th Percentile £538 £550 £525
90th Percentile £588 £621 £600
UK median daily rate £475 £485 £450
% change year-on-year -2.06% +7.78% -
Number of hourly rates quoted 11 12 29
10th Percentile £20.75 £18.65 £24.85
25th Percentile £32.81 £20.00 £42.50
Median hourly rate £56.44 £20.19 £63.00
Median % change year-on-year +179.58% -67.96% +162.50%
75th Percentile £74.26 £54.06 £65.98
90th Percentile £83.00 £73.00 £75.45
UK median hourly rate £52.58 £38.00 £62.75
% change year-on-year +38.37% -39.44% +23.65%

All Contract IT Job Vacancies
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 16,258 13,848 18,397
% of contract IT jobs with a recognized job title 90.05% 92.36% 93.52%
Number of daily rates quoted 10,006 8,265 12,022
10th Percentile £210 £213 £213
25th Percentile £369 £363 £381
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £475 £489 £500
Median % change year-on-year -2.86% -2.20% -
75th Percentile £575 £591 £600
90th Percentile £675 £676 £688
UK median daily rate £500 £525 £525
% change year-on-year -4.76% - -4.55%
Number of hourly rates quoted 1,634 795 1,208
10th Percentile £13.85 £15.41 £14.36
25th Percentile £17.50 £20.30 £18.35
Median hourly rate £25.15 £32.50 £45.00
Median % change year-on-year -22.62% -27.78% +80.76%
75th Percentile £57.50 £64.61 £65.00
90th Percentile £70.16 £71.25 £77.50
UK median hourly rate £25.47 £34.00 £44.50
% change year-on-year -25.09% -23.60% +48.33%

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 18 December 2025.

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 18 December 2025.

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 18 December 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
South East -16 133 £500 - 123
North of England -69 111 £515 +8.42% 61
North West -36 93 £515 +5.10% 30
Midlands -35 63 £395 -11.73% 55
West Midlands -12 57 £380 -24.00% 42
Scotland +14 47 £425 +6.25% 22
East of England -18 25 £475 +72.73% 39
South West -37 18 £488 +3.17% 23
Yorkshire -76 16 £435 +6.75% 26
Wales -5 8 £550 +41.94% 13
East Midlands -35 5 £650 +73.33% 12
North East -5 3 £625 +28.21% 7
Northern Ireland -5 3 £475 -8.43% 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 18 December 2025, 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.

1 249 (64.51%) Cisco
2 177 (45.85%) Firewall
2 177 (45.85%) Security Cleared
3 119 (30.83%) Cisco Certification
3 119 (30.83%) SC Cleared
4 107 (27.72%) WAN
5 94 (24.35%) CCNP
6 90 (23.32%) Palo Alto
7 82 (21.24%) Juniper
7 82 (21.24%) LAN
8 76 (19.69%) VPN
9 71 (18.39%) BGP
10 66 (17.10%) Network Security
11 62 (16.06%) DNS
12 57 (14.77%) CCNA
12 57 (14.77%) F5
13 54 (13.99%) DV Cleared
13 54 (13.99%) Load Balancing
14 50 (12.95%) Cisco ISE
14 50 (12.95%) TCP/IP
15 49 (12.69%) Network Design
16 46 (11.92%) Python
16 46 (11.92%) Wireless
17 45 (11.66%) OSPF
18 44 (11.40%) CheckPoint
19 42 (10.88%) SolarWinds
20 40 (10.36%) Cisco IOS
20 40 (10.36%) Wi-Fi
21 39 (10.10%) VMware
22 38 (9.84%) VLAN

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 (2.07%) SharePoint
2 3 (0.78%) Confluence
3 2 (0.52%) Apache
3 2 (0.52%) IIS
Applications
1 16 (4.15%) MS Visio
2 6 (1.55%) Microsoft Excel
3 4 (1.04%) Microsoft Office
3 4 (1.04%) Microsoft PowerPoint
Business Applications
1 2 (0.52%) Remedy ITSM
Cloud Services
1 27 (6.99%) AWS
2 26 (6.74%) Azure
3 8 (2.07%) Virtual Private Cloud
4 4 (1.04%) Nutanix
5 3 (0.78%) Amazon CloudWatch
5 3 (0.78%) Amazon EC2
5 3 (0.78%) Amazon ELB
5 3 (0.78%) Amazon S3
5 3 (0.78%) Entra ID
5 3 (0.78%) GCP
6 2 (0.52%) AWS Direct Connect
6 2 (0.52%) AWS IoT
6 2 (0.52%) Google Ads
6 2 (0.52%) Mimecast
7 1 (0.26%) Azure DevOps
7 1 (0.26%) Azure ExpressRoute
7 1 (0.26%) GitHub
7 1 (0.26%) IaaS
7 1 (0.26%) Lucidchart
7 1 (0.26%) SaaS
Communications & Networking
1 177 (45.85%) Firewall
2 107 (27.72%) WAN
3 82 (21.24%) LAN
4 76 (19.69%) VPN
5 71 (18.39%) BGP
6 66 (17.10%) Network Security
7 62 (16.06%) DNS
8 50 (12.95%) Cisco ISE
8 50 (12.95%) TCP/IP
9 46 (11.92%) Wireless
10 45 (11.66%) OSPF
11 40 (10.36%) Cisco IOS
11 40 (10.36%) Wi-Fi
12 38 (9.84%) VLAN
13 35 (9.07%) MPLS
14 34 (8.81%) SSL
15 31 (8.03%) Junos
15 31 (8.03%) SD-WAN
16 30 (7.77%) IPsec
17 26 (6.74%) Wireshark
Database & Business Intelligence
1 1 (0.26%) Oracle Database
1 1 (0.26%) SQL Server
Development Applications
1 18 (4.66%) Fiddler
2 5 (1.30%) JIRA
3 4 (1.04%) GitLab
3 4 (1.04%) Jenkins
3 4 (1.04%) Sonatype Nexus
4 3 (0.78%) Git
5 1 (0.26%) ClearCase
5 1 (0.26%) Robot Framework
General
1 78 (20.21%) Social Skills
2 47 (12.18%) Public Sector
3 24 (6.22%) Analytical Skills
4 23 (5.96%) Banking
4 23 (5.96%) Telecoms
5 22 (5.70%) Documentation Skills
6 21 (5.44%) Investment Banking
7 17 (4.40%) Manufacturing
8 11 (2.85%) Finance
9 8 (2.07%) Legal
10 4 (1.04%) Pharmaceutical
11 3 (0.78%) Electronics
11 3 (0.78%) Inclusion and Diversity
11 3 (0.78%) Marketing
11 3 (0.78%) Organisational Skills
12 2 (0.52%) Financial Institution
12 2 (0.52%) Military
13 1 (0.26%) Aerospace
13 1 (0.26%) Automotive
13 1 (0.26%) Publishing
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 23 (5.96%) 802.1X
2 4 (1.04%) RFC 2544
3 3 (0.78%) LDAP
3 3 (0.78%) SAML
4 1 (0.26%) CSS
4 1 (0.26%) gRPC
4 1 (0.26%) HTML
4 1 (0.26%) Jinja
4 1 (0.26%) JSON
4 1 (0.26%) Node.js
4 1 (0.26%) YANG
Miscellaneous
1 66 (17.10%) Data Centre
2 18 (4.66%) Management Information System
3 13 (3.37%) Onboarding
4 11 (2.85%) Operational Technology
4 11 (2.85%) PKI
5 9 (2.33%) Data Protection Act
6 6 (1.55%) NHS
6 6 (1.55%) Security Posture
7 5 (1.30%) Fibre Optics
7 5 (1.30%) Hybrid Cloud
7 5 (1.30%) Self-Motivation
8 4 (1.04%) Driving Licence
8 4 (1.04%) IoT
8 4 (1.04%) SCADA
9 3 (0.78%) 3D Printing
9 3 (0.78%) Legacy Systems
9 3 (0.78%) Virtual Team
10 2 (0.52%) Enterprise Software
10 2 (0.52%) Life Science
10 2 (0.52%) Linux Command Line
Operating Systems
1 34 (8.81%) Windows
2 21 (5.44%) Windows Server
3 13 (3.37%) Linux
4 2 (0.52%) CatOS
4 2 (0.52%) Mac OS
4 2 (0.52%) Unix
5 1 (0.26%) Data ONTAP
5 1 (0.26%) Windows 10
5 1 (0.26%) Windows 7
5 1 (0.26%) Windows 8
Processes & Methodologies
1 54 (13.99%) Load Balancing
2 49 (12.69%) Network Design
3 35 (9.07%) Problem-Solving
4 28 (7.25%) Migration
4 28 (7.25%) Network Management
5 27 (6.99%) Cybersecurity
6 26 (6.74%) ITSM
7 25 (6.48%) Service Management
8 24 (6.22%) High Availability
8 24 (6.22%) Network Monitoring
9 22 (5.70%) Network Architecture
10 21 (5.44%) Project Delivery
11 20 (5.18%) Collaborative Working
11 20 (5.18%) Incident Response
12 17 (4.40%) Change Management
13 16 (4.15%) Infrastructure Engineering
13 16 (4.15%) Network Segmentation
14 14 (3.63%) Data Loss Prevention
14 14 (3.63%) DevOps
14 14 (3.63%) Malware Detection/Protection
Programming Languages
1 46 (11.92%) Python
2 15 (3.89%) Bash
3 10 (2.59%) Perl
4 8 (2.07%) Lisp
4 8 (2.07%) PowerShell
5 4 (1.04%) SQL
6 2 (0.52%) Java
7 1 (0.26%) C
7 1 (0.26%) C++
7 1 (0.26%) JavaScript
7 1 (0.26%) Kotlin
7 1 (0.26%) Ruby
7 1 (0.26%) Shell Script
7 1 (0.26%) VB
Qualifications
1 177 (45.85%) Security Cleared
2 119 (30.83%) Cisco Certification
2 119 (30.83%) SC Cleared
3 94 (24.35%) CCNP
4 57 (14.77%) CCNA
5 54 (13.99%) DV Cleared
6 18 (4.66%) Degree
7 11 (2.85%) CCIE
8 9 (2.33%) Network+ Certification
9 8 (2.07%) JNCIA
9 8 (2.07%) JNCIS
10 7 (1.81%) CCDP
11 6 (1.55%) BPSS Clearance
11 6 (1.55%) JNCIP
12 4 (1.04%) Computer Science Degree
13 3 (0.78%) CCSA
13 3 (0.78%) CompTIA Security+
14 2 (0.52%) A+ Certification
14 2 (0.52%) CCDA
14 2 (0.52%) Microsoft Certification
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 4 (1.04%) Cyber Essentials
1 4 (1.04%) ISO/IEC 27001
2 3 (0.78%) GDPR
2 3 (0.78%) SLA
3 2 (0.52%) NIST
3 2 (0.52%) PCI DSS
3 2 (0.52%) QA
4 1 (0.26%) Disclosure Scotland
4 1 (0.26%) GRC
4 1 (0.26%) ISO/IEC 27002 (supersedes ISO/IEC 17799)
4 1 (0.26%) JSP 440
4 1 (0.26%) PMO
System Software
1 32 (8.29%) VMware NSX
2 26 (6.74%) Active Directory
3 25 (6.48%) VMware Infrastructure
4 16 (4.15%) Firmware
5 11 (2.85%) Docker
6 4 (1.04%) Hyper-V
7 2 (0.52%) VMware ESXi
8 1 (0.26%) BitLocker
8 1 (0.26%) KVM
8 1 (0.26%) ProxySG
8 1 (0.26%) RHEV
8 1 (0.26%) Virtual Machines
8 1 (0.26%) vSphere
8 1 (0.26%) Xen
Systems Management
1 34 (8.81%) Ansible
2 31 (8.03%) FortiGate
3 24 (6.22%) vCenter Server
4 12 (3.11%) Terraform
5 4 (1.04%) Kubernetes
5 4 (1.04%) Nagios
6 3 (0.78%) Cisco CUCM
6 3 (0.78%) Single Sign-On
6 3 (0.78%) WhatsUp Gold
7 2 (0.52%) Dell DRAC
8 1 (0.26%) Amdocs OSS
8 1 (0.26%) Backup Exec
8 1 (0.26%) Failover Clustering
8 1 (0.26%) Grafana
8 1 (0.26%) Microsoft Intune
8 1 (0.26%) Norton AntiVirus
8 1 (0.26%) Proxmox
8 1 (0.26%) SCCM
8 1 (0.26%) SCOM
8 1 (0.26%) WSUS
Vendors
1 249 (64.51%) Cisco
2 90 (23.32%) Palo Alto
3 82 (21.24%) Juniper
4 57 (14.77%) F5
5 44 (11.40%) CheckPoint
6 42 (10.88%) SolarWinds
7 39 (10.10%) VMware
8 36 (9.33%) Meraki
9 31 (8.03%) Blue Coat
9 31 (8.03%) Fortinet
10 28 (7.25%) Aruba
11 26 (6.74%) McAfee
12 25 (6.48%) Microsoft
13 15 (3.89%) NetApp
13 15 (3.89%) ServiceNow
14 14 (3.63%) Zscaler
15 12 (3.11%) Nokia
16 9 (2.33%) Remedy
17 8 (2.07%) Ekahau
18 5 (1.30%) Broadcom