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 10 December 2025.

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

6 months to
10 Dec 2025
Same period 2024 Same period 2023
Rank 122 62 67
Rank change year-on-year -60 +5 +63
Contract jobs requiring a Network Engineer 376 528 633
As % of all contract jobs in the UK excluding London 2.11% 3.33% 3.12%
As % of the Job Titles category 2.34% 3.61% 3.33%
Number of daily rates quoted 274 283 360
10th Percentile £313 £300 £263
25th Percentile £400 £400 £342
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £475 £475 £431
Median % change year-on-year - +10.14% -1.99%
75th Percentile £550 £550 £525
90th Percentile £596 £624 £600
UK median daily rate £475 £489 £450
% change year-on-year -2.81% +8.61% -
Number of hourly rates quoted 9 13 29
10th Percentile £20.40 £18.80 £24.90
25th Percentile £44.86 £20.00 £42.50
Median hourly rate £66.50 £20.38 £63.00
Median % change year-on-year +226.38% -67.66% +162.50%
75th Percentile £74.26 £53.75 £65.98
90th Percentile £84.33 £71.00 £75.45
UK median hourly rate £52.58 £30.20 £62.75
% change year-on-year +74.11% -51.87% +32.11%

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 16,071 14,630 18,984
% of contract IT jobs with a recognized job title 90.00% 92.33% 93.65%
Number of daily rates quoted 9,915 8,581 12,451
10th Percentile £209 £213 £214
25th Percentile £363 £369 £381
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £475 £495 £500
Median % change year-on-year -4.04% -1.00% -
75th Percentile £575 £594 £600
90th Percentile £675 £675 £688
UK median daily rate £500 £525 £525
% change year-on-year -4.76% - -4.55%
Number of hourly rates quoted 1,589 927 1,250
10th Percentile £13.80 £15.22 £14.36
25th Percentile £17.29 £20.12 £18.26
Median hourly rate £25.15 £32.50 £44.50
Median % change year-on-year -22.62% -26.97% +78.00%
75th Percentile £56.69 £65.00 £65.00
90th Percentile £70.16 £72.50 £77.05
UK median hourly rate £25.15 £34.75 £44.00
% change year-on-year -27.63% -21.02% +40.98%

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 10 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 10 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 10 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 -20 119 £500 - 120
North of England -65 113 £500 +5.26% 38
North West -30 87 £515 +5.10% 23
Midlands -28 69 £400 -8.05% 29
West Midlands -3 64 £385 -23.00% 28
Scotland +14 47 £425 +5.59% 20
East of England -11 24 £475 +72.73% 22
Yorkshire -67 24 £450 +10.43% 11
South West -52 14 £500 +5.82% 17
Wales -11 6 £550 +37.50% 14
East Midlands -36 5 £650 +73.33% 1
North East -2 3 £625 +28.21% 5
Northern Ireland -5 3 £475 -8.43% 1
South Coast - 1 £575 -
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 10 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 (66.22%) Cisco
2 176 (46.81%) Firewall
3 174 (46.28%) Security Cleared
4 115 (30.59%) Cisco Certification
5 113 (30.05%) SC Cleared
6 106 (28.19%) WAN
7 86 (22.87%) CCNP
8 84 (22.34%) Juniper
8 84 (22.34%) Palo Alto
9 75 (19.95%) LAN
10 67 (17.82%) VPN
11 64 (17.02%) BGP
12 60 (15.96%) DNS
12 60 (15.96%) Network Security
13 59 (15.69%) F5
14 57 (15.16%) CCNA
15 56 (14.89%) Cisco ISE
15 56 (14.89%) DV Cleared
16 53 (14.10%) Wireless
17 52 (13.83%) Load Balancing
18 49 (13.03%) SolarWinds
19 47 (12.50%) Network Design
20 46 (12.23%) Python
21 45 (11.97%) TCP/IP
22 41 (10.90%) CheckPoint
22 41 (10.90%) Cisco IOS
23 39 (10.37%) OSPF
24 36 (9.57%) VMware
24 36 (9.57%) Wi-Fi
25 35 (9.31%) 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 8 (2.13%) SharePoint
2 2 (0.53%) Apache
2 2 (0.53%) Confluence
2 2 (0.53%) IIS
Applications
1 15 (3.99%) MS Visio
2 6 (1.60%) Microsoft Excel
3 4 (1.06%) Microsoft Office
3 4 (1.06%) Microsoft PowerPoint
Business Applications
1 2 (0.53%) Remedy ITSM
Cloud Services
1 23 (6.12%) AWS
2 22 (5.85%) Azure
3 6 (1.60%) Virtual Private Cloud
4 4 (1.06%) Nutanix
5 3 (0.80%) Amazon CloudWatch
5 3 (0.80%) Amazon EC2
5 3 (0.80%) Amazon ELB
5 3 (0.80%) Amazon S3
5 3 (0.80%) Entra ID
6 2 (0.53%) AWS Direct Connect
6 2 (0.53%) AWS IoT
6 2 (0.53%) GCP
6 2 (0.53%) Google Ads
6 2 (0.53%) Mimecast
7 1 (0.27%) Azure DevOps
7 1 (0.27%) Azure ExpressRoute
7 1 (0.27%) GitHub
7 1 (0.27%) IaaS
7 1 (0.27%) Lucidchart
7 1 (0.27%) SaaS
Communications & Networking
1 176 (46.81%) Firewall
2 106 (28.19%) WAN
3 75 (19.95%) LAN
4 67 (17.82%) VPN
5 64 (17.02%) BGP
6 60 (15.96%) DNS
6 60 (15.96%) Network Security
7 56 (14.89%) Cisco ISE
8 53 (14.10%) Wireless
9 45 (11.97%) TCP/IP
10 41 (10.90%) Cisco IOS
11 39 (10.37%) OSPF
12 36 (9.57%) Wi-Fi
13 34 (9.04%) MPLS
13 34 (9.04%) SD-WAN
14 33 (8.78%) VLAN
15 31 (8.24%) Cisco Firepower
15 31 (8.24%) IPsec
15 31 (8.24%) Junos
15 31 (8.24%) SSL
Database & Business Intelligence
1 1 (0.27%) Oracle Database
1 1 (0.27%) SQL Server
Development Applications
1 16 (4.26%) Fiddler
2 4 (1.06%) GitLab
2 4 (1.06%) Jenkins
2 4 (1.06%) JIRA
3 3 (0.80%) Git
3 3 (0.80%) Sonatype Nexus
4 1 (0.27%) ClearCase
4 1 (0.27%) Robot Framework
General
1 72 (19.15%) Social Skills
2 46 (12.23%) Public Sector
3 22 (5.85%) Telecoms
4 21 (5.59%) Banking
5 19 (5.05%) Analytical Skills
5 19 (5.05%) Investment Banking
6 17 (4.52%) Documentation Skills
7 16 (4.26%) Manufacturing
8 10 (2.66%) Finance
9 8 (2.13%) Legal
10 4 (1.06%) Inclusion and Diversity
10 4 (1.06%) Pharmaceutical
11 3 (0.80%) Organisational Skills
12 2 (0.53%) Electronics
12 2 (0.53%) Financial Institution
12 2 (0.53%) Marketing
12 2 (0.53%) Military
13 1 (0.27%) Aerospace
13 1 (0.27%) Automotive
13 1 (0.27%) French Language
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 24 (6.38%) 802.1X
2 4 (1.06%) RFC 2544
3 3 (0.80%) LDAP
3 3 (0.80%) SAML
4 1 (0.27%) CSS
4 1 (0.27%) gRPC
4 1 (0.27%) HTML
4 1 (0.27%) Jinja
4 1 (0.27%) JSON
4 1 (0.27%) Node.js
4 1 (0.27%) YANG
Miscellaneous
1 69 (18.35%) Data Centre
2 17 (4.52%) Management Information System
3 13 (3.46%) Onboarding
4 10 (2.66%) Operational Technology
4 10 (2.66%) PKI
5 9 (2.39%) Data Protection Act
6 7 (1.86%) Driving Licence
6 7 (1.86%) Security Posture
7 5 (1.33%) Fibre Optics
7 5 (1.33%) Hybrid Cloud
7 5 (1.33%) NHS
7 5 (1.33%) Self-Motivation
8 4 (1.06%) IoT
8 4 (1.06%) SCADA
9 3 (0.80%) 3D Printing
9 3 (0.80%) Legacy Systems
9 3 (0.80%) Virtual Team
10 2 (0.53%) Cloud Native
10 2 (0.53%) Enterprise Software
10 2 (0.53%) Product Ownership
Operating Systems
1 35 (9.31%) Windows
2 22 (5.85%) Windows Server
3 12 (3.19%) Linux
4 2 (0.53%) CatOS
4 2 (0.53%) Mac OS
4 2 (0.53%) Unix
5 1 (0.27%) Data ONTAP
5 1 (0.27%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
5 1 (0.27%) Windows 10
5 1 (0.27%) Windows 7
5 1 (0.27%) Windows 8
Processes & Methodologies
1 52 (13.83%) Load Balancing
2 47 (12.50%) Network Design
3 33 (8.78%) Problem-Solving
4 28 (7.45%) ITSM
5 27 (7.18%) Network Management
6 26 (6.91%) Cybersecurity
6 26 (6.91%) Migration
7 25 (6.65%) Service Management
8 23 (6.12%) High Availability
8 23 (6.12%) Network Architecture
9 21 (5.59%) Collaborative Working
10 19 (5.05%) Incident Response
11 18 (4.79%) Network Monitoring
11 18 (4.79%) Project Delivery
12 17 (4.52%) Change Management
13 16 (4.26%) Network Segmentation
14 15 (3.99%) Agile
14 15 (3.99%) DevOps
14 15 (3.99%) Infrastructure Engineering
15 13 (3.46%) Impact Assessments
Programming Languages
1 46 (12.23%) Python
2 15 (3.99%) Bash
3 10 (2.66%) Perl
4 9 (2.39%) PowerShell
5 8 (2.13%) Lisp
6 4 (1.06%) SQL
7 2 (0.53%) Java
7 2 (0.53%) VB
8 1 (0.27%) C
8 1 (0.27%) C++
8 1 (0.27%) JavaScript
8 1 (0.27%) Kotlin
8 1 (0.27%) Ruby
8 1 (0.27%) Shell Script
Qualifications
1 174 (46.28%) Security Cleared
2 115 (30.59%) Cisco Certification
3 113 (30.05%) SC Cleared
4 86 (22.87%) CCNP
5 57 (15.16%) CCNA
6 56 (14.89%) DV Cleared
7 15 (3.99%) Degree
8 10 (2.66%) CCIE
9 7 (1.86%) BPSS Clearance
9 7 (1.86%) JNCIS
10 6 (1.60%) CCDP
10 6 (1.60%) JNCIA
11 5 (1.33%) JNCIP
11 5 (1.33%) Network+ Certification
12 3 (0.80%) CCSA
12 3 (0.80%) CompTIA Security+
12 3 (0.80%) Computer Science Degree
13 2 (0.53%) A+ Certification
13 2 (0.53%) CCDA
13 2 (0.53%) Microsoft Certification
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 4 (1.06%) Cyber Essentials
1 4 (1.06%) GDPR
1 4 (1.06%) ISO/IEC 27001
2 3 (0.80%) SLA
3 2 (0.53%) QA
4 1 (0.27%) Def Stans
4 1 (0.27%) Disclosure Scotland
4 1 (0.27%) GRC
4 1 (0.27%) ISO/IEC 27002 (supersedes ISO/IEC 17799)
4 1 (0.27%) JSP 440
4 1 (0.27%) NIST
4 1 (0.27%) PCI DSS
System Software
1 31 (8.24%) VMware NSX
2 26 (6.91%) Active Directory
3 22 (5.85%) VMware Infrastructure
4 15 (3.99%) Firmware
5 11 (2.93%) Docker
6 4 (1.06%) Hyper-V
7 3 (0.80%) VMware ESXi
8 1 (0.27%) BitLocker
8 1 (0.27%) ProxySG
8 1 (0.27%) Virtual Machines
8 1 (0.27%) vSphere
Systems Management
1 32 (8.51%) Ansible
1 32 (8.51%) FortiGate
2 24 (6.38%) vCenter Server
3 10 (2.66%) Terraform
4 4 (1.06%) Cisco CUCM
4 4 (1.06%) Kubernetes
5 3 (0.80%) Single Sign-On
5 3 (0.80%) WhatsUp Gold
6 2 (0.53%) Cisco Prime
6 2 (0.53%) Dell DRAC
6 2 (0.53%) HP ALM
7 1 (0.27%) Amdocs OSS
7 1 (0.27%) Failover Clustering
7 1 (0.27%) Grafana
7 1 (0.27%) Microsoft Intune
7 1 (0.27%) Norton AntiVirus
7 1 (0.27%) OpenView
7 1 (0.27%) SCCM
7 1 (0.27%) SCOM
7 1 (0.27%) WSUS
Vendors
1 249 (66.22%) Cisco
2 84 (22.34%) Juniper
2 84 (22.34%) Palo Alto
3 59 (15.69%) F5
4 49 (13.03%) SolarWinds
5 41 (10.90%) CheckPoint
6 36 (9.57%) VMware
7 32 (8.51%) Meraki
7 32 (8.51%) Microsoft
8 30 (7.98%) Fortinet
9 29 (7.71%) Blue Coat
10 25 (6.65%) Aruba
11 24 (6.38%) McAfee
12 15 (3.99%) ServiceNow
12 15 (3.99%) Zscaler
13 14 (3.72%) NetApp
14 11 (2.93%) Nokia
15 9 (2.39%) LogicMonitor
15 9 (2.39%) Remedy
16 8 (2.13%) Ekahau