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 £487, according to job vacancies posted in the 6 months leading up to 26 November 2025.

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

6 months to
26 Nov 2025
Same period 2024 Same period 2023
Rank 120 63 72
Rank change year-on-year -57 +9 +54
Contract jobs requiring a Network Engineer 383 538 640
As % of all contract jobs in the UK excluding London 2.16% 3.28% 3.14%
As % of the Job Titles category 2.41% 3.55% 3.35%
Number of daily rates quoted 276 292 368
10th Percentile £303 £300 £258
25th Percentile £400 £400 £350
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £487 £475 £440
Median % change year-on-year +2.58% +7.95% -1.12%
75th Percentile £558 £550 £525
90th Percentile £622 £624 £600
UK median daily rate £475 £488 £450
% change year-on-year -2.56% +8.33% -
Number of hourly rates quoted 9 12 29
10th Percentile £20.40 - £24.90
25th Percentile £32.50 £20.00 £42.50
Median hourly rate £66.50 £21.39 £63.00
Median % change year-on-year +210.93% -66.05% +162.50%
75th Percentile £74.26 £54.06 £65.98
90th Percentile £84.33 £73.00 £75.45
UK median hourly rate £41.50 £38.00 £63.00
% change year-on-year +9.21% -39.68% +32.63%

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 15,912 15,145 19,086
% of contract IT jobs with a recognized job title 89.94% 92.31% 93.75%
Number of daily rates quoted 9,821 8,676 12,567
10th Percentile £210 £215 £213
25th Percentile £363 £375 £380
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £475 £494 £500
Median % change year-on-year -3.75% -1.30% -
75th Percentile £575 £594 £600
90th Percentile £675 £680 £688
UK median daily rate £500 £525 £525
% change year-on-year -4.76% - -4.55%
Number of hourly rates quoted 1,580 1,036 1,251
10th Percentile £13.80 £15.10 £14.50
25th Percentile £17.30 £20.00 £18.50
Median hourly rate £25.15 £35.00 £45.00
Median % change year-on-year -28.14% -22.22% +82.00%
75th Percentile £56.00 £65.00 £65.00
90th Percentile £70.24 £73.75 £77.50
UK median hourly rate £25.15 £35.00 £44.75
% change year-on-year -28.14% -21.79% +49.17%

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 26 November 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 26 November 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 26 November 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 -19 112 £500 - 108
North of England -70 108 £500 +5.26% 16
North West -38 80 £500 +2.04% 12
Midlands -22 73 £400 -10.61% 19
West Midlands +5 68 £395 -21.00% 14
Scotland +4 47 £425 +5.59% 20
East of England -11 29 £400 +33.33% 12
Yorkshire -61 26 £485 +19.02% 3
South West -38 23 £623 +31.75% 14
Wales -15 7 £550 +37.50% 6
East Midlands -31 5 £650 +73.33% 4
Northern Ireland -2 4 £475 -8.43%
North East -6 3 £625 +28.21% 1
Channel Islands - 1 £440 -
Network Engineer
UK

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

For the 6 months to 26 November 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.

1 255 (66.58%) Cisco
2 169 (44.13%) Firewall
2 169 (44.13%) Security Cleared
3 119 (31.07%) Cisco Certification
4 109 (28.46%) SC Cleared
5 97 (25.33%) WAN
6 86 (22.45%) CCNP
7 82 (21.41%) Juniper
8 75 (19.58%) Palo Alto
9 71 (18.54%) VPN
10 70 (18.28%) BGP
11 68 (17.75%) LAN
12 67 (17.49%) DNS
13 65 (16.97%) Network Security
14 60 (15.67%) CCNA
15 58 (15.14%) Cisco ISE
15 58 (15.14%) F5
16 57 (14.88%) Python
17 53 (13.84%) DV Cleared
17 53 (13.84%) Wireless
18 51 (13.32%) Load Balancing
18 51 (13.32%) SolarWinds
19 44 (11.49%) Ansible
19 44 (11.49%) Cisco IOS
20 43 (11.23%) Network Design
20 43 (11.23%) TCP/IP
21 39 (10.18%) MPLS
21 39 (10.18%) VMware
22 37 (9.66%) CheckPoint
23 36 (9.40%) OSPF

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 (2.09%) Confluence
1 8 (2.09%) SharePoint
2 2 (0.52%) Apache
2 2 (0.52%) IIS
Applications
1 13 (3.39%) Microsoft Office
2 12 (3.13%) MS Visio
3 6 (1.57%) Microsoft Excel
4 4 (1.04%) Microsoft PowerPoint
Business Applications
1 2 (0.52%) Remedy ITSM
Cloud Services
1 25 (6.53%) Azure
2 24 (6.27%) AWS
3 7 (1.83%) Virtual Private Cloud
4 3 (0.78%) Amazon CloudWatch
4 3 (0.78%) Amazon EC2
4 3 (0.78%) Amazon ELB
4 3 (0.78%) Amazon S3
4 3 (0.78%) AWS Direct Connect
4 3 (0.78%) Entra ID
4 3 (0.78%) Nutanix
5 2 (0.52%) AWS IoT
5 2 (0.52%) Azure ExpressRoute
5 2 (0.52%) GCP
5 2 (0.52%) Mimecast
6 1 (0.26%) Azure DevOps
6 1 (0.26%) GitHub
6 1 (0.26%) IaaS
6 1 (0.26%) Lucidchart
6 1 (0.26%) PaaS
6 1 (0.26%) SaaS
Communications & Networking
1 169 (44.13%) Firewall
2 97 (25.33%) WAN
3 71 (18.54%) VPN
4 70 (18.28%) BGP
5 68 (17.75%) LAN
6 67 (17.49%) DNS
7 65 (16.97%) Network Security
8 58 (15.14%) Cisco ISE
9 53 (13.84%) Wireless
10 44 (11.49%) Cisco IOS
11 43 (11.23%) TCP/IP
12 39 (10.18%) MPLS
13 36 (9.40%) OSPF
13 36 (9.40%) SD-WAN
14 35 (9.14%) VLAN
15 33 (8.62%) Wi-Fi
16 32 (8.36%) Cisco Firepower
17 31 (8.09%) DHCP
18 30 (7.83%) Junos
19 27 (7.05%) IPsec
Database & Business Intelligence
1 1 (0.26%) Oracle Database
Development Applications
1 14 (3.66%) Fiddler
1 14 (3.66%) JIRA
2 4 (1.04%) GitLab
2 4 (1.04%) Jenkins
2 4 (1.04%) Robot Framework
2 4 (1.04%) Sonatype Nexus
3 3 (0.78%) Git
4 1 (0.26%) ClearCase
General
1 74 (19.32%) Social Skills
2 44 (11.49%) Public Sector
3 26 (6.79%) Analytical Skills
4 25 (6.53%) Telecoms
5 20 (5.22%) Banking
6 18 (4.70%) Investment Banking
7 14 (3.66%) Manufacturing
8 11 (2.87%) Finance
9 10 (2.61%) Documentation Skills
10 9 (2.35%) Legal
11 5 (1.31%) Inclusion and Diversity
12 4 (1.04%) Pharmaceutical
13 2 (0.52%) Electronics
13 2 (0.52%) Financial Institution
13 2 (0.52%) Marketing
13 2 (0.52%) Organisational Skills
14 1 (0.26%) Aerospace
14 1 (0.26%) Automotive
14 1 (0.26%) French Language
14 1 (0.26%) Police
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 21 (5.48%) 802.1X
2 8 (2.09%) RFC 2544
3 7 (1.83%) NETCONF
3 7 (1.83%) RESTCONF
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%) REST
4 1 (0.26%) YANG
Miscellaneous
1 66 (17.23%) Data Centre
2 17 (4.44%) Management Information System
3 16 (4.18%) PKI
4 14 (3.66%) Onboarding
5 9 (2.35%) Data Protection Act
5 9 (2.35%) Fibre Optics
5 9 (2.35%) Operational Technology
6 8 (2.09%) Driving Licence
7 7 (1.83%) Security Posture
8 5 (1.31%) Hybrid Cloud
8 5 (1.31%) NHS
8 5 (1.31%) Self-Motivation
9 4 (1.04%) IoT
9 4 (1.04%) SCADA
10 3 (0.78%) 3D Printing
10 3 (0.78%) Cloud Native
10 3 (0.78%) Legacy Systems
10 3 (0.78%) Virtual Team
11 2 (0.52%) Enterprise Software
11 2 (0.52%) Life Science
Operating Systems
1 34 (8.88%) Windows
2 22 (5.74%) Windows Server
3 11 (2.87%) Linux
4 2 (0.52%) Mac OS
4 2 (0.52%) Unix
5 1 (0.26%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
5 1 (0.26%) Windows 10
5 1 (0.26%) Windows 7
5 1 (0.26%) Windows 8
Processes & Methodologies
1 51 (13.32%) Load Balancing
2 43 (11.23%) Network Design
3 36 (9.40%) Service Management
4 31 (8.09%) Problem-Solving
5 29 (7.57%) Migration
6 26 (6.79%) ITSM
7 23 (6.01%) Network Management
8 22 (5.74%) Cybersecurity
8 22 (5.74%) High Availability
9 20 (5.22%) Agile
9 20 (5.22%) Collaborative Working
10 19 (4.96%) Incident Response
10 19 (4.96%) Network Architecture
11 17 (4.44%) Change Management
11 17 (4.44%) Network Monitoring
12 16 (4.18%) DevOps
12 16 (4.18%) Infrastructure Engineering
12 16 (4.18%) Network Segmentation
12 16 (4.18%) Network Virtualisation
12 16 (4.18%) Project Delivery
Programming Languages
1 57 (14.88%) Python
2 16 (4.18%) Bash
3 13 (3.39%) PowerShell
4 10 (2.61%) Perl
5 8 (2.09%) Lisp
6 3 (0.78%) SQL
6 3 (0.78%) VB
7 2 (0.52%) Java
8 1 (0.26%) C
8 1 (0.26%) C++
8 1 (0.26%) JavaScript
8 1 (0.26%) Kotlin
8 1 (0.26%) Ruby
8 1 (0.26%) Shell Script
Qualifications
1 169 (44.13%) Security Cleared
2 119 (31.07%) Cisco Certification
3 109 (28.46%) SC Cleared
4 86 (22.45%) CCNP
5 60 (15.67%) CCNA
6 53 (13.84%) DV Cleared
7 22 (5.74%) Degree
8 9 (2.35%) CCIE
9 7 (1.83%) BPSS Clearance
10 6 (1.57%) CCDP
10 6 (1.57%) Computer Science Degree
10 6 (1.57%) JNCIA
10 6 (1.57%) JNCIS
10 6 (1.57%) Network+ Certification
11 5 (1.31%) JNCIP
12 3 (0.78%) CCSA
12 3 (0.78%) CompTIA Security+
13 2 (0.52%) A+ Certification
13 2 (0.52%) CCDA
13 2 (0.52%) Microsoft Certification
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 5 (1.31%) QA
2 4 (1.04%) Cyber Essentials
2 4 (1.04%) GDPR
2 4 (1.04%) ISO/IEC 27001
2 4 (1.04%) SLA
3 1 (0.26%) Def Stans
3 1 (0.26%) Disclosure Scotland
3 1 (0.26%) GRC
3 1 (0.26%) ISO/IEC 27002 (supersedes ISO/IEC 17799)
3 1 (0.26%) NCSC
3 1 (0.26%) NIST
3 1 (0.26%) PCI DSS
System Software
1 25 (6.53%) VMware NSX
2 24 (6.27%) VMware Infrastructure
3 22 (5.74%) Active Directory
4 14 (3.66%) Firmware
5 11 (2.87%) Docker
6 10 (2.61%) VMware ESXi
7 4 (1.04%) Hyper-V
8 1 (0.26%) BitLocker
8 1 (0.26%) ProxySG
8 1 (0.26%) Virtual Machines
8 1 (0.26%) vSphere
Systems Management
1 44 (11.49%) Ansible
2 33 (8.62%) FortiGate
3 24 (6.27%) vCenter Server
4 12 (3.13%) Terraform
5 5 (1.31%) Cisco CUCM
6 4 (1.04%) Kubernetes
7 3 (0.78%) Cisco Prime
7 3 (0.78%) HP ALM
8 2 (0.52%) Dell DRAC
8 2 (0.52%) OpenView
8 2 (0.52%) WhatsUp Gold
9 1 (0.26%) Amdocs OSS
9 1 (0.26%) Failover Clustering
9 1 (0.26%) Grafana
9 1 (0.26%) Microsoft Intune
9 1 (0.26%) SCCM
Vendors
1 255 (66.58%) Cisco
2 82 (21.41%) Juniper
3 75 (19.58%) Palo Alto
4 58 (15.14%) F5
5 51 (13.32%) SolarWinds
6 39 (10.18%) VMware
7 37 (9.66%) CheckPoint
8 30 (7.83%) Microsoft
9 29 (7.57%) Fortinet
9 29 (7.57%) Meraki
10 27 (7.05%) Blue Coat
11 22 (5.74%) ServiceNow
12 21 (5.48%) McAfee
13 20 (5.22%) Aruba
14 15 (3.92%) Zscaler
15 12 (3.13%) NetApp
16 10 (2.61%) Nokia
17 9 (2.35%) Remedy
18 8 (2.09%) Ekahau
18 8 (2.09%) LogicMonitor