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 15 June 2026.

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

6 months to
15 Jun 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 105 83 62
Rank change year-on-year -22 -21 +9
Contract jobs requiring a Network Engineer 585 385 630
As % of all contract jobs in the UK excluding London 2.29% 2.88% 2.95%
As % of the Job Titles category 2.49% 3.14% 3.19%
Number of daily rates quoted 371 262 384
10th Percentile £303 £300 £273
25th Percentile £400 £371 £350
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £463 £459 £450
Median % change year-on-year +0.82% +1.94% +2.86%
75th Percentile £538 £575 £536
90th Percentile £600 £625 £634
UK median daily rate £474 £475 £475
% change year-on-year -0.21% - +5.56%
Number of hourly rates quoted 21 5 12
10th Percentile £55.00 £22.22 £18.72
25th Percentile £67.50 £22.50 £23.56
Median hourly rate £73.00 £35.00 £72.50
Median % change year-on-year +108.57% -51.72% +16.94%
75th Percentile £78.75 £43.25 £74.12
90th Percentile - £63.05 £75.24
UK median hourly rate £73.00 £50.00 £40.00
% change year-on-year +46.00% +25.00% -36.12%

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 23,528 12,242 19,761
% of contract IT jobs with a recognized job title 91.93% 91.54% 92.46%
Number of daily rates quoted 13,512 7,716 11,756
10th Percentile £303 £217 £213
25th Percentile £405 £363 £363
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £475 £488
Median % change year-on-year +5.26% -2.56% -2.50%
75th Percentile £594 £575 £592
90th Percentile £688 £650 £678
UK median daily rate £515 £500 £525
% change year-on-year +3.00% -4.76% -2.33%
Number of hourly rates quoted 2,711 928 2,529
10th Percentile £14.87 £13.50 £12.62
25th Percentile £20.27 £16.95 £15.96
Median hourly rate £45.00 £25.15 £40.00
Median % change year-on-year +78.93% -37.13% -1.45%
75th Percentile £67.50 £58.75 £63.75
90th Percentile £78.75 £75.00 £74.00
UK median hourly rate £43.61 £27.52 £37.50
% change year-on-year +58.48% -26.63% -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 15 June 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 15 June 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 15 June 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 -29 189 £475 -3.46% 53
South East -4 164 £470 -6.00% 44
North West -7 139 £474 -4.17% 33
Midlands +8 112 £438 +6.06% 27
West Midlands +5 106 £438 +59.09% 14
Scotland +8 58 £413 +3.13% 25
East of England -8 46 £438 +14.38% 23
South West -40 41 £533 +1.52% 26
Yorkshire -48 37 £450 -9.27% 15
Wales -13 24 £425 +21.43% 10
North East -22 13 £600 +108.70% 5
East Midlands -31 3 £488 +8.33% 13
Northern Ireland +1 2 £468 -18.70% 16
Network Engineer
UK

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

For the 6 months to 15 June 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.

1 320 (54.70%) Cisco
2 260 (44.44%) Firewall
3 213 (36.41%) Security Cleared
4 169 (28.89%) LAN
5 168 (28.72%) WAN
6 162 (27.69%) Cisco Certification
7 153 (26.15%) SC Cleared
8 135 (23.08%) DNS
9 129 (22.05%) VPN
10 127 (21.71%) F5
10 127 (21.71%) Network Security
11 125 (21.37%) CCNP
12 124 (21.20%) BGP
13 119 (20.34%) Palo Alto
14 111 (18.97%) Load Balancing
15 95 (16.24%) Wireless
16 84 (14.36%) OSPF
17 79 (13.50%) VMware
18 78 (13.33%) CCNA
19 75 (12.82%) VLAN
20 70 (11.97%) Juniper
21 68 (11.62%) SD-WAN
21 68 (11.62%) Wi-Fi
22 66 (11.28%) DV Cleared
23 65 (11.11%) TCP/IP
24 63 (10.77%) High Availability
25 59 (10.09%) Windows
26 58 (9.91%) Migration
27 57 (9.74%) VMware Infrastructure
28 56 (9.57%) BIG-IP

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 5 (0.85%) Confluence
2 3 (0.51%) Apache
2 3 (0.51%) IIS
3 2 (0.34%) Microsoft Exchange
4 1 (0.17%) CMS
4 1 (0.17%) Skype for Business
Applications
1 12 (2.05%) MS Visio
2 7 (1.20%) Microsoft Office
3 2 (0.34%) Microsoft Excel
Cloud Services
1 49 (8.38%) Azure
2 38 (6.50%) AWS
3 22 (3.76%) GCP
4 16 (2.74%) GitHub
5 8 (1.37%) IaaS
5 8 (1.37%) Virtual Private Cloud
6 7 (1.20%) Azure Sentinel
6 7 (1.20%) Entra ID
6 7 (1.20%) Google Kubernetes Engine
7 4 (0.68%) Google Compute Engine
7 4 (0.68%) Nutanix
7 4 (0.68%) SaaS
8 3 (0.51%) AWS Direct Connect
8 3 (0.51%) Azure DevOps
8 3 (0.51%) Catchpoint
8 3 (0.51%) GitHub Actions
8 3 (0.51%) OCI
8 3 (0.51%) Route 53
9 2 (0.34%) Amazon EKS
9 2 (0.34%) Azure ExpressRoute
Communications & Networking
1 260 (44.44%) Firewall
2 169 (28.89%) LAN
3 168 (28.72%) WAN
4 135 (23.08%) DNS
5 129 (22.05%) VPN
6 127 (21.71%) Network Security
7 124 (21.20%) BGP
8 95 (16.24%) Wireless
9 84 (14.36%) OSPF
10 75 (12.82%) VLAN
11 68 (11.62%) SD-WAN
11 68 (11.62%) Wi-Fi
12 65 (11.11%) TCP/IP
13 56 (9.57%) BIG-IP
14 51 (8.72%) Cisco Nexus
15 45 (7.69%) SSL
16 44 (7.52%) DHCP
17 43 (7.35%) IPsec
18 39 (6.67%) F5 BIG-IP LTM
18 39 (6.67%) Multicast
Database & Business Intelligence
1 1 (0.17%) Oracle Reports
Development Applications
1 24 (4.10%) Fiddler
2 22 (3.76%) JIRA
3 17 (2.91%) Jenkins
4 9 (1.54%) Git
5 7 (1.20%) Sonatype Nexus
6 6 (1.03%) GitLab
7 2 (0.34%) Browser DevTools
General
1 73 (12.48%) Social Skills
2 37 (6.32%) Banking
3 35 (5.98%) Investment Banking
4 24 (4.10%) Analytical Skills
4 24 (4.10%) Telecoms
5 23 (3.93%) Manufacturing
5 23 (3.93%) Public Sector
6 22 (3.76%) Documentation Skills
7 14 (2.39%) Finance
7 14 (2.39%) Legal
8 9 (1.54%) Aerospace
9 6 (1.03%) Retail
10 5 (0.85%) Law
10 5 (0.85%) Military
10 5 (0.85%) Police
11 3 (0.51%) Influencing Skills
12 1 (0.17%) Back Office
12 1 (0.17%) Pharmaceutical
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 36 (6.15%) 802.1X
2 7 (1.20%) LDAP
3 6 (1.03%) SAML
4 3 (0.51%) REST
5 2 (0.34%) RFC 2544
6 1 (0.17%) Django
6 1 (0.17%) Java RMI
6 1 (0.17%) Jinja
6 1 (0.17%) NETCONF
6 1 (0.17%) XMPP
Miscellaneous
1 116 (19.83%) Data Centre
2 21 (3.59%) Management Information System
3 19 (3.25%) PKI
4 13 (2.22%) Onboarding
5 12 (2.05%) Security Posture
6 11 (1.88%) Data Protection Act
6 11 (1.88%) Hybrid Cloud
7 10 (1.71%) Cloud Native
8 9 (1.54%) Clustering
8 9 (1.54%) NHS
8 9 (1.54%) Operational Technology
8 9 (1.54%) Self-Motivation
9 5 (0.85%) Public Cloud
10 4 (0.68%) Linux Command Line
11 3 (0.51%) Driving Licence
11 3 (0.51%) Fibre Optics
11 3 (0.51%) SCADA
12 2 (0.34%) Enterprise Cloud
12 2 (0.34%) Legacy Systems
12 2 (0.34%) Wiki
Operating Systems
1 59 (10.09%) Windows
2 37 (6.32%) Linux
3 12 (2.05%) Windows Server
4 4 (0.68%) Unix
5 1 (0.17%) CatOS
5 1 (0.17%) Mac OS
5 1 (0.17%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
5 1 (0.17%) Solaris
5 1 (0.17%) Ubuntu
5 1 (0.17%) Windows 10
5 1 (0.17%) Windows 7
5 1 (0.17%) Windows Server 2008
5 1 (0.17%) Windows Server 2012
5 1 (0.17%) Windows Server 2019
Processes & Methodologies
1 111 (18.97%) Load Balancing
2 63 (10.77%) High Availability
3 58 (9.91%) Migration
4 55 (9.40%) Network Monitoring
5 50 (8.55%) Problem-Solving
6 47 (8.03%) ITIL
7 44 (7.52%) Infrastructure Engineering
8 39 (6.67%) Project Delivery
9 31 (5.30%) Network Design
10 29 (4.96%) Technical Leadership
11 26 (4.44%) ITSM
11 26 (4.44%) Validation
12 25 (4.27%) Change Management
12 25 (4.27%) Data Loss Prevention
12 25 (4.27%) Network Management
13 24 (4.10%) Agile
13 24 (4.10%) Malware Detection/Protection
13 24 (4.10%) Service Management
14 23 (3.93%) CI/CD
15 22 (3.76%) Network Architecture
Programming Languages
1 40 (6.84%) Python
2 6 (1.03%) ActionScript
2 6 (1.03%) SQL
3 4 (0.68%) Bash
3 4 (0.68%) PowerShell
4 1 (0.17%) Groovy
4 1 (0.17%) Perl
4 1 (0.17%) PHP
Qualifications
1 213 (36.41%) Security Cleared
2 162 (27.69%) Cisco Certification
3 153 (26.15%) SC Cleared
4 125 (21.37%) CCNP
5 78 (13.33%) CCNA
6 66 (11.28%) DV Cleared
7 21 (3.59%) Degree
8 19 (3.25%) CCIE
9 13 (2.22%) JNCIS
10 12 (2.05%) JNCIA
11 10 (1.71%) Network+ Certification
12 9 (1.54%) JNCIP
13 6 (1.03%) CCSE
14 5 (0.85%) CCSM
14 5 (0.85%) CompTIA Security+
14 5 (0.85%) Computer Science Degree
14 5 (0.85%) Server+ Certification
15 4 (0.68%) Azure Certification
15 4 (0.68%) CCIE Wireless
15 4 (0.68%) CWDP
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 12 (2.05%) SLA
2 10 (1.71%) QA
3 9 (1.54%) NIST
4 8 (1.37%) Disclosure Scotland
5 3 (0.51%) GDPR
5 3 (0.51%) PCI DSS
6 2 (0.34%) ISO/IEC 20000
6 2 (0.34%) ISO/IEC 27001
6 2 (0.34%) JSP 440
6 2 (0.34%) NCSC
7 1 (0.17%) Actionable Recommendations
7 1 (0.17%) Cyber Essentials
7 1 (0.17%) Cyber Essentials PLUS
7 1 (0.17%) GRC
7 1 (0.17%) HMG Security Policy Framework
7 1 (0.17%) PMO
System Software
1 57 (9.74%) VMware Infrastructure
2 33 (5.64%) VMware NSX
3 27 (4.62%) Firmware
4 22 (3.76%) Active Directory
5 9 (1.54%) VMware ESXi
6 7 (1.20%) vSphere
7 4 (0.68%) Hyper-V
8 2 (0.34%) vCloud
8 2 (0.34%) Virtual Machines
9 1 (0.17%) Citrix Presentation Server
9 1 (0.17%) Docker
9 1 (0.17%) FreeRADIUS
9 1 (0.17%) KVM
9 1 (0.17%) Snort
9 1 (0.17%) Squid
9 1 (0.17%) Virtual Servers
Systems Management
1 39 (6.67%) Ansible
2 28 (4.79%) FortiGate
2 28 (4.79%) Terraform
3 6 (1.03%) Single Sign-On
4 5 (0.85%) Cisco Prime
4 5 (0.85%) Kubernetes
5 2 (0.34%) Avamar
5 2 (0.34%) CASB
5 2 (0.34%) Cisco CUCM
5 2 (0.34%) Microsoft Intune
5 2 (0.34%) Nagios
5 2 (0.34%) WSUS
6 1 (0.17%) Iperf
6 1 (0.17%) Nessus
6 1 (0.17%) Packer
6 1 (0.17%) Puppet
6 1 (0.17%) SCOM
6 1 (0.17%) SolarWinds Orion
6 1 (0.17%) Suricata
6 1 (0.17%) vCenter Server
Vendors
1 320 (54.70%) Cisco
2 127 (21.71%) F5
3 119 (20.34%) Palo Alto
4 79 (13.50%) VMware
5 70 (11.97%) Juniper
6 50 (8.55%) Aruba
7 46 (7.86%) CheckPoint
8 43 (7.35%) Fortinet
9 32 (5.47%) SolarWinds
10 30 (5.13%) Microsoft
11 26 (4.44%) Blue Coat
11 26 (4.44%) McAfee
12 21 (3.59%) ServiceNow
13 20 (3.42%) Meraki
14 19 (3.25%) Google
14 19 (3.25%) NetApp
15 17 (2.91%) Extreme Networks
16 14 (2.39%) Ekahau
16 14 (2.39%) Splunk
17 13 (2.22%) Arista