Network Engineer Job Trends in the UK excluding London

Network Engineer
UK > UK excluding London

The median Network Engineer salary in the UK excluding London is £54,068 per year, according to job vacancies posted during the 6 months leading to 12 March 2026.

The table below compares current salary benchmarking and summary statistics with the previous two years.

6 months to
12 Mar 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 233 169 206
Rank change year-on-year -64 +37 +45
Permanent jobs requiring a Network Engineer 393 486 832
As % of all permanent jobs in the UK excluding London 0.75% 1.73% 1.43%
As % of the Job Titles category 0.81% 1.92% 1.51%
Number of salaries quoted 294 387 714
10th Percentile £30,000 £36,250 £29,825
25th Percentile £42,500 £45,375 £37,500
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £54,068 £53,000 £47,500
Median % change year-on-year +2.01% +11.58% -
75th Percentile £65,000 £59,000 £53,750
90th Percentile £74,550 £66,250 £61,250
UK median annual salary £57,500 £55,000 £49,000
% change year-on-year +4.55% +12.24% -2.00%

All Permanent IT Job Roles
UK excluding London

For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all permanent 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 permanent jobs in our overall sample.

Permanent vacancies in the UK excluding London with a recognized job title 48,400 25,371 55,019
% of permanent jobs with a recognized job title 91.91% 90.44% 94.75%
Number of salaries quoted 30,652 14,216 41,990
10th Percentile £28,250 £30,000 £26,700
25th Percentile £35,000 £40,000 £35,000
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £50,000 £54,983 £50,000
Median % change year-on-year -9.06% +9.97% -4.76%
75th Percentile £65,000 £68,750 £64,750
90th Percentile £80,000 £82,500 £77,500
UK median annual salary £55,000 £60,000 £55,000
% change year-on-year -8.33% +9.09% -8.33%

Network Engineer
Job Vacancy Trend in the UK excluding London

Historical trend showing the proportion of permanent IT job postings featuring 'Network Engineer' in the job title relative to all permanent IT jobs advertised in the UK excluding London.

Network Engineer job vacancy trend in the UK excluding London

Network Engineer
Salary Trend in the UK excluding London

Salary distribution trend for Network Engineer job vacancies in the UK excluding London.

Salary distribution trend for Network Engineer job vacancies in the UK excluding London

Network Engineer
Salary Histogram in the UK excluding London

Salary distribution for jobs citing Network Engineer in the UK excluding London over the 6 months to 12 March 2026.

Salary histogram for Network Engineer in the UK excluding London

Network Engineer
Job Locations in the UK excluding London

The table below looks at the demand and provides a guide to the median salaries quoted in IT jobs citing Network Engineer within the UK excluding London region over the 6 months to 12 March 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
Permanent
IT Job Ads
Median Salary
Past 6 Months
Median Salary
% Change
on Same Period
Last Year
Live
Jobs
South East -64 136 £52,500 -0.94% 74
North of England -45 84 £45,000 -5.26% 46
Midlands -2 76 £55,500 +8.29% 47
West Midlands +19 62 £60,000 +17.07% 24
North West -10 45 £45,000 -14.29% 25
South West -37 35 £50,000 - 31
Scotland 0 33 £45,000 -22.34% 14
Yorkshire -55 23 £45,000 +0.67% 15
East of England +2 22 £65,000 +27.45% 28
North East -19 16 £50,000 +12.36% 6
East Midlands -32 14 £55,000 -4.35% 23
Wales -26 5 £50,000 +13.64% 14
Northern Ireland - 3 £57,500 - 3
Network Engineer
UK

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

For the 6 months to 12 March 2026, Network Engineer 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 permanent job ads across the UK excluding London region featuring Network Engineer in the job title.

1 169 (43.00%) Cisco
2 130 (33.08%) Firewall
3 111 (28.24%) WAN
4 92 (23.41%) LAN
5 84 (21.37%) Cisco Certification
6 72 (18.32%) Security Cleared
7 70 (17.81%) CCNP
8 64 (16.28%) Azure
9 57 (14.50%) Wireless
10 54 (13.74%) VPN
11 53 (13.49%) Network Security
12 52 (13.23%) BGP
12 52 (13.23%) SD-WAN
13 49 (12.47%) Fortinet
14 48 (12.21%) Palo Alto
15 45 (11.45%) SC Cleared
15 45 (11.45%) SolarWinds
16 41 (10.43%) Juniper
17 40 (10.18%) CheckPoint
17 40 (10.18%) VLAN
18 36 (9.16%) Infrastructure Engineering
19 35 (8.91%) OSPF
20 33 (8.40%) AWS
20 33 (8.40%) Network Monitoring
21 32 (8.14%) F5
22 31 (7.89%) Cisco ASA
22 31 (7.89%) DV Cleared
22 31 (7.89%) Python
23 30 (7.63%) CCNA
23 30 (7.63%) Customer Service

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 2 (0.51%) Microsoft Exchange
1 2 (0.51%) SharePoint
Applications
1 8 (2.04%) MS Visio
2 4 (1.02%) Microsoft Excel
3 3 (0.76%) Microsoft PowerPoint
Cloud Services
1 64 (16.28%) Azure
2 33 (8.40%) AWS
3 11 (2.80%) Microsoft 365
4 8 (2.04%) Azure Sentinel
4 8 (2.04%) OpenShift
5 7 (1.78%) GCP
6 5 (1.27%) Entra ID
7 4 (1.02%) Apigee
7 4 (1.02%) Kong
8 3 (0.76%) Amazon CloudWatch
9 2 (0.51%) GitHub
9 2 (0.51%) Mimecast
10 1 (0.25%) Azure DevOps
10 1 (0.25%) Nutanix
Communications & Networking
1 130 (33.08%) Firewall
2 111 (28.24%) WAN
3 92 (23.41%) LAN
4 57 (14.50%) Wireless
5 54 (13.74%) VPN
6 53 (13.49%) Network Security
7 52 (13.23%) BGP
7 52 (13.23%) SD-WAN
8 40 (10.18%) VLAN
9 35 (8.91%) OSPF
10 31 (7.89%) Cisco ASA
11 29 (7.38%) Cisco ISE
12 25 (6.36%) EIGRP
13 24 (6.11%) Wi-Fi
14 22 (5.60%) Cisco Firepower
15 20 (5.09%) Cisco Nexus
16 18 (4.58%) Cisco IOS
16 18 (4.58%) MPLS
17 17 (4.33%) Wireshark
18 15 (3.82%) Junos
Development Applications
1 8 (2.04%) GitLab
2 7 (1.78%) Git
3 2 (0.51%) Jenkins
3 2 (0.51%) JIRA
4 1 (0.25%) Sonatype Nexus
General
1 64 (16.28%) Social Skills
2 28 (7.12%) Public Sector
3 25 (6.36%) Telecoms
4 23 (5.85%) Analytical Skills
5 15 (3.82%) Finance
6 12 (3.05%) Retail
7 11 (2.80%) Law
8 8 (2.04%) Manufacturing
9 7 (1.78%) Inclusion and Diversity
10 6 (1.53%) Police
11 5 (1.27%) Documentation Skills
12 4 (1.02%) Banking
12 4 (1.02%) Marketing
13 3 (0.76%) Aerospace
13 3 (0.76%) Military
14 2 (0.51%) Advertising
14 2 (0.51%) Welsh Language
15 1 (0.25%) Electronics
15 1 (0.25%) Fire and Rescue
15 1 (0.25%) Pharmaceutical
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 11 (2.80%) Jinja
2 8 (2.04%) JSON
2 8 (2.04%) YAML
3 7 (1.78%) YANG
4 5 (1.27%) REST
5 4 (1.02%) XML
6 3 (0.76%) NETCONF
7 2 (0.51%) 802.1X
7 2 (0.51%) Apache NiFi
Miscellaneous
1 44 (11.20%) Data Centre
2 11 (2.80%) PKI
3 10 (2.54%) Driving Licence
4 9 (2.29%) Management Information System
5 8 (2.04%) Security Posture
6 6 (1.53%) Enterprise Software
7 5 (1.27%) Data Protection Act
7 5 (1.27%) Public Cloud
7 5 (1.27%) Self-Motivation
8 4 (1.02%) CCTV
8 4 (1.02%) Hybrid Cloud
8 4 (1.02%) Private Cloud
8 4 (1.02%) Product Ownership
9 3 (0.76%) CMDB
9 3 (0.76%) Social Media
10 2 (0.51%) Algorithms
10 2 (0.51%) Cyber Defence
10 2 (0.51%) EPoS
11 1 (0.25%) Linux Command Line
11 1 (0.25%) Operational Technology
Operating Systems
1 25 (6.36%) Windows
2 18 (4.58%) Linux
3 13 (3.31%) Windows Server
4 4 (1.02%) Unix
5 1 (0.25%) Windows 10
5 1 (0.25%) Windows Server 2012
Processes & Methodologies
1 36 (9.16%) Infrastructure Engineering
2 33 (8.40%) Network Monitoring
3 30 (7.63%) Customer Service
3 30 (7.63%) Load Balancing
4 27 (6.87%) Change Management
4 27 (6.87%) Service Management
5 26 (6.62%) ITSM
5 26 (6.62%) Network Design
5 26 (6.62%) Problem-Solving
6 22 (5.60%) Cybersecurity
7 19 (4.83%) Problem Management
8 18 (4.58%) Continuous Improvement
9 17 (4.33%) ITIL
10 15 (3.82%) Network Virtualisation
10 15 (3.82%) Root Cause Analysis
11 13 (3.31%) CI/CD
11 13 (3.31%) High Availability
11 13 (3.31%) Project Delivery
11 13 (3.31%) Stakeholder Engagement
12 12 (3.05%) Capacity Planning
Programming Languages
1 31 (7.89%) Python
2 5 (1.27%) PowerShell
3 4 (1.02%) JavaScript
4 1 (0.25%) SQL
Qualifications
1 84 (21.37%) Cisco Certification
2 72 (18.32%) Security Cleared
3 70 (17.81%) CCNP
4 45 (11.45%) SC Cleared
5 31 (7.89%) DV Cleared
6 30 (7.63%) CCNA
7 18 (4.58%) CCIE
8 11 (2.80%) Degree
9 9 (2.29%) Computer Science Degree
10 5 (1.27%) Azure Certification
10 5 (1.27%) JNCIS
11 4 (1.02%) BPSS Clearance
12 1 (0.25%) A+ Certification
12 1 (0.25%) CCIE Data Center
12 1 (0.25%) CCIE Security
12 1 (0.25%) CCSE
12 1 (0.25%) CCSM
12 1 (0.25%) ITIL Foundation Certificate
12 1 (0.25%) JNCIP
12 1 (0.25%) Network+ Certification
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 8 (2.04%) ISO/IEC 20000
2 7 (1.78%) PMO
3 6 (1.53%) ISO/IEC 27001
4 5 (1.27%) QA
5 4 (1.02%) GDPR
6 2 (0.51%) NIST
6 2 (0.51%) SLA
7 1 (0.25%) ISO 9001
System Software
1 19 (4.83%) VMware NSX
2 16 (4.07%) Active Directory
3 15 (3.82%) VMware Infrastructure
4 11 (2.80%) Firmware
5 7 (1.78%) ProxySG
6 4 (1.02%) Hyper-V
6 4 (1.02%) VMware ESXi
7 1 (0.25%) iptables
Systems Management
1 12 (3.05%) FortiGate
2 11 (2.80%) vCenter Server
3 10 (2.54%) Terraform
4 8 (2.04%) Ansible
5 3 (0.76%) Grafana
5 3 (0.76%) Nagios
5 3 (0.76%) Prometheus
6 2 (0.51%) Dell DRAC
7 1 (0.25%) OpenView
7 1 (0.25%) Proxmox
7 1 (0.25%) Tivoli
7 1 (0.25%) vRealize
Vendors
1 169 (43.00%) Cisco
2 49 (12.47%) Fortinet
3 48 (12.21%) Palo Alto
4 45 (11.45%) SolarWinds
5 41 (10.43%) Juniper
6 40 (10.18%) CheckPoint
7 32 (8.14%) F5
8 30 (7.63%) Meraki
9 27 (6.87%) Microsoft
10 26 (6.62%) VMware
11 11 (2.80%) Infoblox
12 10 (2.54%) Broadcom
12 10 (2.54%) ServiceNow
12 10 (2.54%) Zscaler
13 9 (2.29%) Blue Coat
13 9 (2.29%) CrowdStrike
14 8 (2.04%) Aruba
14 8 (2.04%) Red Hat
15 7 (1.78%) Avaya
15 7 (1.78%) Motorola