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 £55,000 per year, according to job vacancies posted during the 6 months leading to 12 May 2026.

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

6 months to
12 May 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 131 249 205
Rank change year-on-year +118 -44 +34
Permanent jobs requiring a Network Engineer 891 346 935
As % of all permanent jobs in the UK excluding London 1.36% 1.20% 1.36%
As % of the Job Titles category 1.45% 1.35% 1.44%
Number of salaries quoted 434 305 783
10th Percentile £35,000 £36,250 £31,250
25th Percentile £45,000 £45,000 £37,500
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £55,000 £51,500 £47,500
Median % change year-on-year +6.80% +8.42% +5.56%
75th Percentile £65,000 £57,500 £55,000
90th Percentile £75,000 £63,750 £63,750
UK median annual salary £58,000 £52,500 £49,990
% change year-on-year +10.48% +5.02% -0.02%

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 61,261 25,599 65,135
% of permanent jobs with a recognized job title 93.60% 89.06% 94.72%
Number of salaries quoted 40,321 14,589 47,499
10th Percentile £30,000 £27,750 £26,750
25th Percentile £36,250 £36,250 £35,000
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £50,000 £52,500 £50,000
Median % change year-on-year -4.76% +5.00% -5.66%
75th Percentile £68,750 £67,500 £63,750
90th Percentile £85,000 £82,500 £77,446
UK median annual salary £55,000 £57,670 £52,550
% change year-on-year -4.63% +9.74% -12.42%

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 May 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 May 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
North of England +109 237 £50,000 -9.09% 71
South East +23 218 £50,000 -4.76% 80
Midlands +74 195 £55,500 +13.85% 37
West Midlands +52 137 £56,900 +16.12% 26
North West +81 110 £50,000 -9.09% 38
Yorkshire +15 100 £50,000 +11.86% 21
South West +4 88 £59,050 +7.36% 26
East of England +31 60 £55,000 +29.41% 26
East Midlands +18 58 £55,000 +29.41% 11
Scotland +38 50 £45,000 -11.57% 23
Wales +3 39 £50,000 +16.28% 17
North East -15 27 £55,000 -4.35% 12
Northern Ireland - 11 £50,000 - 4
Network Engineer
UK

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

For the 6 months to 12 May 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.

1 497 (55.78%) Cisco
2 416 (46.69%) Cisco Certification
3 391 (43.88%) Azure
4 360 (40.40%) Microsoft
5 359 (40.29%) CCNA
6 331 (37.15%) Network+ Certification
7 326 (36.59%) Azure Certification
8 324 (36.36%) ForeScout
9 150 (16.84%) Firewall
10 136 (15.26%) WAN
11 108 (12.12%) LAN
11 108 (12.12%) Security Cleared
12 92 (10.33%) VPN
13 81 (9.09%) Network Security
14 80 (8.98%) CCNP
15 64 (7.18%) SC Cleared
16 57 (6.40%) BGP
16 57 (6.40%) Infrastructure Engineering
16 57 (6.40%) Wireless
17 55 (6.17%) VLAN
18 53 (5.95%) SD-WAN
19 52 (5.84%) Fortinet
20 51 (5.72%) AWS
21 49 (5.50%) Python
22 46 (5.16%) DV Cleared
23 43 (4.83%) Problem-Solving
24 42 (4.71%) Network Monitoring
25 41 (4.60%) Cisco ASA
26 40 (4.49%) OSPF
27 39 (4.38%) VMware

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 (0.56%) Microsoft Exchange
1 5 (0.56%) SharePoint
2 2 (0.22%) Confluence
3 1 (0.11%) Skype for Business
Applications
1 9 (1.01%) MS Visio
2 4 (0.45%) Microsoft Excel
3 3 (0.34%) Microsoft PowerPoint
Cloud Services
1 391 (43.88%) Azure
2 51 (5.72%) AWS
3 23 (2.58%) Microsoft 365
4 20 (2.24%) Azure Sentinel
5 10 (1.12%) OpenShift
6 9 (1.01%) GCP
7 8 (0.90%) Entra ID
8 5 (0.56%) Apigee
8 5 (0.56%) Kong
9 4 (0.45%) Cloudflare
10 3 (0.34%) Mimecast
11 2 (0.22%) Azure ExpressRoute
11 2 (0.22%) GitHub
12 1 (0.11%) OCI
Communications & Networking
1 150 (16.84%) Firewall
2 136 (15.26%) WAN
3 108 (12.12%) LAN
4 92 (10.33%) VPN
5 81 (9.09%) Network Security
6 57 (6.40%) BGP
6 57 (6.40%) Wireless
7 55 (6.17%) VLAN
8 53 (5.95%) SD-WAN
9 41 (4.60%) Cisco ASA
10 40 (4.49%) OSPF
11 27 (3.03%) DNS
11 27 (3.03%) TCP/IP
12 24 (2.69%) Wi-Fi
13 23 (2.58%) Cisco Firepower
14 22 (2.47%) DHCP
15 20 (2.24%) EIGRP
15 20 (2.24%) MPLS
15 20 (2.24%) WLAN
16 19 (2.13%) Cisco ISE
Development Applications
1 10 (1.12%) GitLab
2 8 (0.90%) Git
3 2 (0.22%) Jenkins
3 2 (0.22%) JIRA
3 2 (0.22%) Sonatype Nexus
General
1 382 (42.87%) Social Skills
2 53 (5.95%) Public Sector
3 35 (3.93%) Analytical Skills
4 32 (3.59%) Telecoms
5 17 (1.91%) Law
6 14 (1.57%) Manufacturing
7 13 (1.46%) Inclusion and Diversity
7 13 (1.46%) Retail
8 11 (1.23%) Documentation Skills
8 11 (1.23%) Finance
9 8 (0.90%) Marketing
10 7 (0.79%) Banking
10 7 (0.79%) Police
11 5 (0.56%) Aerospace
11 5 (0.56%) Back Office
12 4 (0.45%) Welsh Language
13 3 (0.34%) Influencing Skills
13 3 (0.34%) Military
14 1 (0.11%) Digital Health
14 1 (0.11%) Local Government
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 13 (1.46%) Jinja
2 10 (1.12%) JSON
2 10 (1.12%) YAML
3 8 (0.90%) YANG
4 5 (0.56%) 802.1X
4 5 (0.56%) REST
4 5 (0.56%) XML
5 4 (0.45%) ModSecurity
6 3 (0.34%) Apache NiFi
6 3 (0.34%) NETCONF
6 3 (0.34%) XMPP
7 1 (0.11%) gRPC
Miscellaneous
1 48 (5.39%) Data Centre
2 17 (1.91%) Driving Licence
3 14 (1.57%) PKI
4 13 (1.46%) Hybrid Cloud
5 9 (1.01%) Security Posture
5 9 (1.01%) Self-Motivation
6 8 (0.90%) Operational Technology
7 6 (0.67%) CMDB
7 6 (0.67%) Public Cloud
8 5 (0.56%) Video Conferencing
9 4 (0.45%) Enterprise Software
9 4 (0.45%) Fibre Optics
9 4 (0.45%) Private Cloud
10 3 (0.34%) Enterprise Cloud
10 3 (0.34%) FlexPod
10 3 (0.34%) Linux Command Line
10 3 (0.34%) Onboarding
10 3 (0.34%) Social Media
11 2 (0.22%) Algorithms
11 2 (0.22%) Life Science
Operating Systems
1 28 (3.14%) Linux
1 28 (3.14%) Windows
2 11 (1.23%) Windows Server
3 5 (0.56%) Unix
4 2 (0.22%) Windows 10
5 1 (0.11%) Windows Server 2012
Processes & Methodologies
1 57 (6.40%) Infrastructure Engineering
2 43 (4.83%) Problem-Solving
3 42 (4.71%) Network Monitoring
4 31 (3.48%) Continuous Improvement
4 31 (3.48%) High Availability
5 30 (3.37%) Cybersecurity
6 29 (3.25%) ITIL
7 28 (3.14%) ITSM
7 28 (3.14%) Service Management
8 26 (2.92%) Network Design
9 22 (2.47%) Load Balancing
9 22 (2.47%) Project Delivery
10 21 (2.36%) Customer Service
11 20 (2.24%) Mentoring
12 18 (2.02%) Computer Science
13 17 (1.91%) Root Cause Analysis
14 16 (1.80%) Stakeholder Engagement
15 15 (1.68%) CI/CD
15 15 (1.68%) Network Architecture
15 15 (1.68%) Technical Leadership
Programming Languages
1 49 (5.50%) Python
2 11 (1.23%) PowerShell
3 5 (0.56%) JavaScript
4 4 (0.45%) Bash
5 2 (0.22%) SQL
6 1 (0.11%) Bicep
Qualifications
1 416 (46.69%) Cisco Certification
2 359 (40.29%) CCNA
3 331 (37.15%) Network+ Certification
4 326 (36.59%) Azure Certification
5 108 (12.12%) Security Cleared
6 80 (8.98%) CCNP
7 64 (7.18%) SC Cleared
8 46 (5.16%) DV Cleared
9 25 (2.81%) CCIE
10 19 (2.13%) Degree
11 16 (1.80%) Computer Science Degree
12 5 (0.56%) DBS Check
13 4 (0.45%) BPSS Clearance
13 4 (0.45%) JNCIP
14 2 (0.22%) AWS Certification
14 2 (0.22%) CCIE Data Center
14 2 (0.22%) VMware Certified Professional (VCP)
15 1 (0.11%) CCIE Security
15 1 (0.11%) CCSE
15 1 (0.11%) CCSM
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 16 (1.80%) ISO/IEC 20000
2 10 (1.12%) SLA
3 9 (1.01%) ISO/IEC 27001
4 8 (0.90%) PMO
5 7 (0.79%) QA
6 6 (0.67%) NIST
7 4 (0.45%) GDPR
System Software
1 29 (3.25%) VMware Infrastructure
2 22 (2.47%) VMware NSX
3 16 (1.80%) Active Directory
4 12 (1.35%) Firmware
5 9 (1.01%) Hyper-V
6 8 (0.90%) ProxySG
7 4 (0.45%) KVM
7 4 (0.45%) VMware ESXi
8 3 (0.34%) Docker
8 3 (0.34%) vSphere
9 1 (0.11%) iptables
Systems Management
1 15 (1.68%) Ansible
2 12 (1.35%) Terraform
3 11 (1.23%) FortiGate
4 6 (0.67%) vCenter Server
5 5 (0.56%) Proxmox
6 4 (0.45%) Grafana
6 4 (0.45%) Graylog
6 4 (0.45%) ZABBIX
7 3 (0.34%) Cisco CUCM
7 3 (0.34%) Nagios
8 2 (0.22%) Microsoft Intune
8 2 (0.22%) vRealize
9 1 (0.11%) Cisco Prime
9 1 (0.11%) Dell DRAC
9 1 (0.11%) OpenView
9 1 (0.11%) Tivoli
Vendors
1 497 (55.78%) Cisco
2 360 (40.40%) Microsoft
3 324 (36.36%) ForeScout
4 52 (5.84%) Fortinet
5 39 (4.38%) VMware
6 35 (3.93%) Palo Alto
7 34 (3.82%) Juniper
8 33 (3.70%) SolarWinds
9 26 (2.92%) CheckPoint
10 25 (2.81%) F5
11 16 (1.80%) Aruba
12 15 (1.68%) Zscaler
13 14 (1.57%) Avaya
13 14 (1.57%) Meraki
14 13 (1.46%) Infoblox
15 10 (1.12%) Blue Coat
15 10 (1.12%) Dell
15 10 (1.12%) Red Hat
16 8 (0.90%) Motorola
16 8 (0.90%) Veeam