Security Operations Manager Contract Job Trends

Security Operations Manager
UK

The median Security Operations Manager daily rate in the UK is £625, according to job vacancies posted in the 6 months leading up to 29 August 2026.

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

6 months to
29 Aug 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 658 550 543
Rank change year-on-year -108 -7 +81
Contract jobs requiring a Security Operations Manager 27 10 14
As % of all contract jobs in the UK 0.050% 0.030% 0.036%
As % of the Job Titles category 0.054% 0.033% 0.039%
Number of daily rates quoted 16 7 11
10th Percentile - £536 £525
25th Percentile £513 £556 £556
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £625 £600 £750
Median % change year-on-year +4.17% -20.00% +28.21%
75th Percentile £800 £794 £775
90th Percentile £813 £818 -
UK excluding London median daily rate £525 £536 £600
% change year-on-year -2.05% -10.67% -14.29%

All Contract IT Job Roles
UK

For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all contract IT job vacancies. 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 with a recognized job title 49,838 30,062 35,859
% of contract IT jobs with a recognized job title 92.47% 91.24% 93.07%
Number of daily rates quoted 29,768 18,992 22,689
10th Percentile £325 £280 £300
25th Percentile £425 £400 £413
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £525 £500 £525
Median % change year-on-year +5.00% -4.76% -1.69%
75th Percentile £625 £621 £638
90th Percentile £725 £725 £750
UK excluding London median daily rate £500 £475 £500
% change year-on-year +5.26% -5.00% -
Number of hourly rates quoted 3,565 1,567 1,847
10th Percentile £14.96 £13.75 £14.16
25th Percentile £20.51 £17.04 £20.00
Median hourly rate £42.00 £25.15 £43.00
Median % change year-on-year +67.00% -41.51% +1.18%
75th Percentile £67.84 £53.81 £65.00
90th Percentile £80.00 £70.50 £75.00
UK excluding London median hourly rate £42.50 £25.15 £44.00
% change year-on-year +68.99% -42.84% +10.00%

Security Operations Manager
Job Vacancy Trend

Historical trend showing the proportion of contract IT job postings featuring 'Security Operations Manager' in the job title relative to all contract IT jobs advertised.

Security Operations Manager job vacancy trend in the UK

Security Operations Manager
Daily Rate Trend

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for Security Operations Manager job vacancies in the UK.

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for Security Operations Manager job vacancies in the UK

Security Operations Manager
Daily Rate Histogram

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing Security Operations Manager over the 6 months to 29 August 2026.

Daily rate histogram for Security Operations Manager in the UK

Security Operations Manager
Top 6 Contract Job Locations

The table below looks at the demand and provides a guide to the median contractor rates quoted in IT jobs citing Security Operations Manager within the UK over the 6 months to 29 August 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
England -98 25 £625 +4.17% 14
UK excluding London -78 18 £525 -2.05% 8
South West - 11 £800 - 2
Work from Home -55 9 £625 -2.80% 4
South East -61 7 £525 -2.05% 3
London -75 7 £625 -7.41% 7

Security Operations Manager Skill Set
Top 30 Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities

For the 6 months to 29 August 2026, Security Operations Manager 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 featuring Security Operations Manager in the job title.

1 24 (88.89%) Security Operations
2 21 (77.78%) Cybersecurity
3 14 (51.85%) Cyber Resilience
4 12 (44.44%) CISM
4 12 (44.44%) CISSP
5 11 (40.74%) Incident Response
6 10 (37.04%) ITIL
6 10 (37.04%) Threat Intelligence
7 9 (33.33%) Programme Delivery
7 9 (33.33%) Security Monitoring
8 8 (29.63%) Security Cleared
8 8 (29.63%) Service Management
8 8 (29.63%) Stakeholder Management
9 7 (25.93%) AWS
9 7 (25.93%) Azure
9 7 (25.93%) Continuous Improvement
9 7 (25.93%) Cyber Threat Intelligence
9 7 (25.93%) GDPR
9 7 (25.93%) MITRE ATT&CK
10 6 (22.22%) Budget Management
10 6 (22.22%) Cloud Security
10 6 (22.22%) Incident Management
10 6 (22.22%) NCSC
10 6 (22.22%) SC Cleared
10 6 (22.22%) SIEM
10 6 (22.22%) Storytelling
10 6 (22.22%) Use Case
11 5 (18.52%) NIST
12 4 (14.81%) Microsoft
12 4 (14.81%) OSINT

Security Operations Manager Skill Set
Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities 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:

Cloud Services
1 7 (25.93%) AWS
1 7 (25.93%) Azure
2 1 (3.70%) Azure Sentinel
2 1 (3.70%) Entra ID
2 1 (3.70%) Microsoft 365
Communications & Networking
1 3 (11.11%) Intrusion Detection
General
1 8 (29.63%) Public Sector
2 7 (25.93%) Social Skills
3 3 (11.11%) Finance
3 3 (11.11%) Manufacturing
4 1 (3.70%) Military
Miscellaneous
1 11 (40.74%) Security Operations Centre
2 8 (29.63%) Cyber Threat
3 6 (22.22%) CSOC
4 4 (14.81%) Management Information System
4 4 (14.81%) Operational Technology
5 1 (3.70%) Cyber Defence
Processes & Methodologies
1 24 (88.89%) Security Operations
2 21 (77.78%) Cybersecurity
3 14 (51.85%) Cyber Resilience
4 11 (40.74%) Incident Response
5 10 (37.04%) ITIL
5 10 (37.04%) Threat Intelligence
6 9 (33.33%) Programme Delivery
6 9 (33.33%) Security Monitoring
7 8 (29.63%) Service Management
7 8 (29.63%) Stakeholder Management
8 7 (25.93%) Continuous Improvement
8 7 (25.93%) Cyber Threat Intelligence
8 7 (25.93%) MITRE ATT&CK
9 6 (22.22%) Budget Management
9 6 (22.22%) Cloud Security
9 6 (22.22%) Incident Management
9 6 (22.22%) SIEM
9 6 (22.22%) Storytelling
9 6 (22.22%) Use Case
10 4 (14.81%) Vulnerability Management
Qualifications
1 12 (44.44%) CISM
1 12 (44.44%) CISSP
2 8 (29.63%) Security Cleared
3 6 (22.22%) SC Cleared
4 3 (11.11%) PMI Certification
4 3 (11.11%) PMP
5 1 (3.70%) (ISC)2 CCSP
5 1 (3.70%) Cisco Certification
5 1 (3.70%) DV Cleared
5 1 (3.70%) SSCP
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 7 (25.93%) GDPR
2 6 (22.22%) NCSC
3 5 (18.52%) NIST
4 3 (11.11%) ISO/IEC 27001
5 2 (7.41%) QA
5 2 (7.41%) SOC 2
6 1 (3.70%) Cyber Essentials
6 1 (3.70%) Cyber Essentials PLUS
6 1 (3.70%) PMO
Systems Management
1 1 (3.70%) CASB
1 1 (3.70%) QRadar
Vendors
1 4 (14.81%) Microsoft
2 1 (3.70%) Splunk