Software Engineer Contracts

Software Engineer
UK

The median Software Engineer daily rate in the UK is £625 according to job vacancies posted during the 6 months to 28 May 2024.

The first table below provides contractor rate benchmarking and summary statistics including a comparison to same period in the previous 2 years.

6 months to
28 May 2024
Same period 2023 Same period 2022
Rank 77 144 138
Rank change year-on-year +67 -6 -4
Contract jobs requiring a Software Engineer 1,156 1,044 1,751
As % of all contract jobs advertised in the UK 2.70% 1.86% 1.98%
As % of the Job Titles category 2.91% 1.96% 2.08%
Number of daily rates quoted 594 645 1,165
10th Percentile £432 £438 £425
25th Percentile £500 £500 £500
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £625 £600 £600
Median % change year-on-year +4.17% - +20.00%
75th Percentile £750 £688 £695
90th Percentile £850 £750 £750
UK excluding London median daily rate £525 £530 £525
% change year-on-year -0.94% +0.95% +16.67%
Number of hourly rates quoted 354 142 134
10th Percentile £46.25 £46.83 £44.68
25th Percentile £52.50 £52.22 £48.52
Median hourly rate £65.00 £60.00 £57.70
Median % change year-on-year +8.33% +4.00% +26.80%
75th Percentile £70.00 £70.23 £65.00
90th Percentile £80.00 £77.00 £65.76
UK excluding London median hourly rate £65.00 £65.00 £60.00
% change year-on-year - +8.33% +31.87%

All Contract IT Job Vacancies
UK

The following table is for comparison with the above and includes 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 39,738 53,234 84,137
% of contract IT jobs with a recognized job title 92.79% 94.60% 95.36%
Number of daily rates quoted 25,861 37,175 59,182
10th Percentile £280 £313 £313
25th Percentile £410 £425 £425
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £525 £540 £525
Median % change year-on-year -2.78% +2.86% +7.69%
75th Percentile £638 £650 £638
90th Percentile £750 £750 £738
UK excluding London median daily rate £488 £500 £475
% change year-on-year -2.50% +5.26% +10.47%
Number of hourly rates quoted 2,776 1,475 2,018
10th Percentile £12.81 £14.25 £12.50
25th Percentile £16.30 £19.06 £15.90
Median hourly rate £37.18 £45.00 £24.00
Median % change year-on-year -17.38% +87.50% +6.90%
75th Percentile £61.30 £65.75 £49.25
90th Percentile £73.50 £76.00 £65.00
UK excluding London median hourly rate £40.00 £42.50 £20.00
% change year-on-year -5.88% +112.50% +5.26%

Software Engineer
Job Vacancy Trend

Job postings that featured Software Engineer in the job title as a proportion of all IT jobs advertised.

Job vacancy trend for Software Engineer in the UK

Software Engineer
Contractor Daily Rate Trend

3-month moving average daily rate quoted in jobs citing Software Engineer.

Daily rate trend for Software Engineer in the UK

Software Engineer
Daily Rate Histogram

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing Software Engineer over the 6 months to 28 May 2024.

Daily rate histogram for Software Engineer in the UK

Software Engineer
Contractor Hourly Rate Trend

3-month moving average hourly rates quoted in jobs citing Software Engineer.

Hourly rate trend for Software Engineer in the UK

Software Engineer
Hourly Rate Histogram

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing Software Engineer over the 6 months to 28 May 2024.

Hourly rate histogram for Software Engineer in the UK

Software Engineer
Top 17 Contract Locations

The table below looks at the demand and provides a guide to the median contractor rates quoted in IT jobs citing Software Engineer within the UK over the 6 months to 28 May 2024. 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 +61 1,073 £634 +5.63% 1,208
UK excluding London +65 575 £525 -0.94% 823
London +47 485 £675 +8.00% 470
Work from Home +31 387 £650 +10.17% 872
East of England +29 160 £525 -5.41% 112
South East +40 139 £475 -8.65% 175
North of England +69 117 £463 -19.57% 171
South West +16 115 £550 +1.85% 154
North West +72 85 £525 -0.94% 113
Scotland +34 25 £320 -32.24% 76
Yorkshire +14 18 £400 -23.81% 43
North East +13 14 £390 -44.29% 17
Midlands -8 10 £513 -4.38% 112
West Midlands -14 7 £500 -15.25% 56
Wales +10 6 £458 -22.95% 17
Northern Ireland - 4 £675 - 22
East Midlands +6 3 £550 +29.41% 55

Software Engineer Skill Set
Top 30 Co-occurring Skills and Capabilities

For the 6 months to 28 May 2024, Software Engineer contract job roles required the following skills and capabilities in order of popularity. The figures indicate the absolute number co-occurrences and as a proportion of all contract job ads featuring Software Engineer in the job title.

1 1,144 (98.96%) Software Engineering
2 461 (39.88%) Agile
3 392 (33.91%) AWS
4 321 (27.77%) Python
5 284 (24.57%) Finance
6 278 (24.05%) Java
7 262 (22.66%) TypeScript
8 244 (21.11%) JavaScript
9 238 (20.59%) Azure
10 218 (18.86%) React
10 218 (18.86%) C#
11 216 (18.69%) C++
12 215 (18.60%) Front Office
13 190 (16.44%) Asset Management
14 189 (16.35%) C
15 184 (15.92%) Fixed Income
16 175 (15.14%) GCP
17 172 (14.88%) DevOps
18 167 (14.45%) Banking
19 164 (14.19%) Investment Management
19 164 (14.19%) gRPC
20 159 (13.75%) Apache
20 159 (13.75%) Apache Airflow
20 159 (13.75%) Protocol Buffers
21 158 (13.67%) Full Stack Development
22 157 (13.58%) Security Cleared
23 153 (13.24%) Apache Ignite
24 150 (12.98%) Hedge funds
25 146 (12.63%) Social Skills
26 140 (12.11%) Linux

Software Engineer Skill Set
Co-occurring Skills and Capabilities by Category

The follow tables expand on the table above by listing co-occurrences grouped by category. The same employment type, locality and period is covered with up to 20 co-occurrences shown in each of the following categories:

Application Platforms
1 159 (13.75%) Apache
1 159 (13.75%) Apache Airflow
2 22 (1.90%) Confluence
3 8 (0.69%) Apache Spark
4 6 (0.52%) IIS
5 3 (0.26%) SAS
6 2 (0.17%) Apache Solr
6 2 (0.17%) Drupal
6 2 (0.17%) JBoss
6 2 (0.17%) WildFly
7 1 (0.087%) Cloud Foundry
7 1 (0.087%) Ethereum
7 1 (0.087%) Headless CMS
7 1 (0.087%) MetaMask
7 1 (0.087%) Microsoft Exchange
7 1 (0.087%) MTS
7 1 (0.087%) nginx
7 1 (0.087%) Tomcat
7 1 (0.087%) WebSphere
7 1 (0.087%) WordPress
Applications
1 29 (2.51%) Simulink
2 22 (1.90%) Stateflow
3 3 (0.26%) Adobe After Effects
3 3 (0.26%) Blender
3 3 (0.26%) Maya
3 3 (0.26%) Photoshop
4 1 (0.087%) Microsoft Excel
4 1 (0.087%) Microsoft Office
4 1 (0.087%) Microsoft PowerPoint
Business Applications
1 8 (0.69%) Misys Midas
2 5 (0.43%) Salesforce CRM
3 2 (0.17%) FLEXCUBE
3 2 (0.17%) Oracle BPM
4 1 (0.087%) Sparx Enterprise Architect
4 1 (0.087%) Teamcenter
Cloud Services
1 392 (33.91%) AWS
2 238 (20.59%) Azure
3 175 (15.14%) GCP
4 79 (6.83%) dbt
5 66 (5.71%) Snowflake
6 52 (4.50%) GitHub
7 37 (3.20%) Serverless
8 36 (3.11%) Azure DevOps
9 22 (1.90%) AWS Lambda
10 17 (1.47%) Azure Service Bus
11 16 (1.38%) Amazon CloudWatch
12 14 (1.21%) Amazon EC2
12 14 (1.21%) Amazon S3
13 12 (1.04%) Azure Cosmos DB
14 11 (0.95%) Azure App Service
15 9 (0.78%) OpenShift
16 8 (0.69%) Cloud Computing
17 7 (0.61%) AWS CloudFormation
17 7 (0.61%) Entra ID
17 7 (0.61%) npm
Communications & Networking
1 36 (3.11%) RS-485
2 35 (3.03%) Modbus
2 35 (3.03%) RS-422
3 24 (2.08%) Software-Defined Radio
4 17 (1.47%) HTTP
5 15 (1.30%) SNMP
6 14 (1.21%) TCP/IP
7 13 (1.12%) Internet
8 10 (0.87%) Ethernet
9 8 (0.69%) Wi-Fi
10 7 (0.61%) 802.11
10 7 (0.61%) Diameter Protocol
11 6 (0.52%) Wireless
12 5 (0.43%) J1939
12 5 (0.43%) Link 16
13 4 (0.35%) Firewall
13 4 (0.35%) Radio Access Network
13 4 (0.35%) RS-232
13 4 (0.35%) Tactical Data Link
13 4 (0.35%) VPN
Database & Business Intelligence
1 153 (13.24%) Apache Ignite
2 90 (7.79%) PostgreSQL
3 79 (6.83%) Amazon Athena
3 79 (6.83%) Apache Arrow
3 79 (6.83%) Dremio
4 61 (5.28%) Data Lake
5 45 (3.89%) Apache Cassandra
6 32 (2.77%) SQL Server
7 26 (2.25%) MySQL
7 26 (2.25%) NoSQL
8 13 (1.12%) MongoDB
9 11 (0.95%) Relational Database
10 9 (0.78%) Couchbase
11 7 (0.61%) DynamoDB
11 7 (0.61%) SQL Server Integration Services
11 7 (0.61%) SQL Server Reporting Services
12 6 (0.52%) SQLite
13 5 (0.43%) Big Data
13 5 (0.43%) Data Warehouse
13 5 (0.43%) Oracle Reports
Development Applications
1 93 (8.04%) Git
2 72 (6.23%) Cypress.io
3 66 (5.71%) Jenkins
4 65 (5.62%) JIRA
5 28 (2.42%) Visual Studio
6 26 (2.25%) Eclipse
6 26 (2.25%) GoogleTest
7 19 (1.64%) Rational DOORS
7 19 (1.64%) Selenium
8 18 (1.56%) Bitbucket
9 17 (1.47%) SonarQube
10 16 (1.38%) GitLab
11 14 (1.21%) Rational Rhapsody
12 13 (1.12%) Cucumber
13 12 (1.04%) Maven
13 12 (1.04%) Robot Framework
14 7 (0.61%) REST Assured
15 6 (0.52%) CircleCI
15 6 (0.52%) Sonatype Nexus
15 6 (0.52%) Subversion
General
1 284 (24.57%) Finance
2 215 (18.60%) Front Office
3 167 (14.45%) Banking
4 146 (12.63%) Social Skills
5 81 (7.01%) Electronics
6 74 (6.40%) Investment Banking
7 68 (5.88%) Aerospace
8 42 (3.63%) Automotive
9 24 (2.08%) Analytical Skills
10 23 (1.99%) Military
10 23 (1.99%) Public Sector
11 22 (1.90%) Inclusion and Diversity
11 22 (1.90%) Manufacturing
12 21 (1.82%) Telecoms
13 20 (1.73%) Legal
14 14 (1.21%) Law
15 13 (1.12%) Aviation
16 12 (1.04%) Presentation Skills
17 11 (0.95%) Games
18 10 (0.87%) Retail
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 218 (18.86%) React
2 164 (14.19%) gRPC
3 159 (13.75%) Protocol Buffers
4 132 (11.42%) .NET
5 117 (10.12%) Redux
6 91 (7.87%) Pandas
7 88 (7.61%) Node.js
8 86 (7.44%) Kafka
8 86 (7.44%) NumPy
9 80 (6.92%) SciPy
10 79 (6.83%) Material-UI
11 67 (5.80%) AngularJS
12 54 (4.67%) REST
13 53 (4.58%) .NET Core
14 51 (4.41%) Spring
15 48 (4.15%) CSS
16 47 (4.07%) HTML
17 43 (3.72%) Spring Boot
18 42 (3.63%) RESTful
19 33 (2.85%) Web Services
Miscellaneous
1 184 (15.92%) Fixed Income
2 150 (12.98%) Hedge funds
3 125 (10.81%) Equities
4 108 (9.34%) Foreign Exchange (FX)
5 102 (8.82%) Derivative
6 37 (3.20%) Algorithms
7 31 (2.68%) Self-Motivation
8 21 (1.82%) Distributed Systems
9 20 (1.73%) ARM Cortex
10 19 (1.64%) Greenfield Project
11 15 (1.30%) Embedded Systems
11 15 (1.30%) IoT
12 13 (1.12%) Legacy Systems
13 12 (1.04%) Linux Command Line
13 12 (1.04%) Pricing Data
14 11 (0.95%) Product Ownership
15 10 (0.87%) Data Protection Act
15 10 (0.87%) Data Structures
16 9 (0.78%) Renewable Energy
17 8 (0.69%) Mobile App
Operating Systems
1 140 (12.11%) Linux
2 51 (4.41%) Windows
3 24 (2.08%) FreeRTOS
4 16 (1.38%) Embedded Linux
5 11 (0.95%) Android
6 10 (0.87%) Apple iOS
6 10 (0.87%) Unix
7 4 (0.35%) SafeRTOS
7 4 (0.35%) VxWorks
8 3 (0.26%) Windows 10
9 1 (0.087%) CentOS
9 1 (0.087%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
9 1 (0.087%) Windows Server
9 1 (0.087%) Windows Server 2008
Processes & Methodologies
1 1,144 (98.96%) Software Engineering
2 461 (39.88%) Agile
3 190 (16.44%) Asset Management
4 172 (14.88%) DevOps
5 164 (14.19%) Investment Management
6 158 (13.67%) Full Stack Development
7 128 (11.07%) TDD
8 124 (10.73%) CI/CD
9 114 (9.86%) Fintech
10 94 (8.13%) Computer Science
11 93 (8.04%) Machine Learning
12 92 (7.96%) Artificial Intelligence
13 90 (7.79%) Problem-Solving
14 87 (7.53%) Test Automation
15 85 (7.35%) Validation
16 79 (6.83%) Continuous Integration
17 75 (6.49%) Scrum
18 74 (6.40%) Microservices
19 73 (6.31%) SDLC
19 73 (6.31%) User Experience
Programming Languages
1 321 (27.77%) Python
2 278 (24.05%) Java
3 262 (22.66%) TypeScript
4 244 (21.11%) JavaScript
5 218 (18.86%) C#
6 216 (18.69%) C++
7 189 (16.35%) C
8 116 (10.03%) SQL
9 55 (4.76%) Embedded C
10 53 (4.58%) Go
11 37 (3.20%) Ada
12 34 (2.94%) MATLAB
13 22 (1.90%) PHP
14 21 (1.82%) Perl
15 20 (1.73%) Rust
16 18 (1.56%) PowerShell
17 17 (1.47%) Scala
18 16 (1.38%) Kotlin
19 14 (1.21%) Bash
20 13 (1.12%) T-SQL
Qualifications
1 157 (13.58%) Security Cleared
2 105 (9.08%) Degree
3 100 (8.65%) SC Cleared
4 54 (4.67%) DV Cleared
5 46 (3.98%) Computer Science Degree
6 33 (2.85%) Master's Degree
7 12 (1.04%) PhD
8 6 (0.52%) BPSS Clearance
9 2 (0.17%) HND
10 1 (0.087%) Azure Certification
10 1 (0.087%) Chartered Engineer
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 39 (3.37%) QA
2 22 (1.90%) Data Quality
2 22 (1.90%) MISRA
3 7 (0.61%) Accessibility
3 7 (0.61%) MISRA C
4 6 (0.52%) AUTOSAR
4 6 (0.52%) JTAG
5 2 (0.17%) MiFID
5 2 (0.17%) SLA
6 1 (0.087%) HL7
6 1 (0.087%) ISO 13485
6 1 (0.087%) ISO 20022
6 1 (0.087%) Sarbanes-Oxley
6 1 (0.087%) SEPA
6 1 (0.087%) WCAG
System Software
1 114 (9.86%) Docker
2 30 (2.60%) Firmware
3 14 (1.21%) Active Directory
4 10 (0.87%) Virtual Machines
5 5 (0.43%) ACF2
5 5 (0.43%) IAG
5 5 (0.43%) RACF
5 5 (0.43%) VirtualBox
6 4 (0.35%) Embedded Firmware
7 3 (0.26%) VMware Infrastructure
7 3 (0.26%) zsh
8 1 (0.087%) Hyper-V
8 1 (0.087%) VMware ESXi
8 1 (0.087%) VMware NSX
Systems Management
1 117 (10.12%) Kubernetes
2 33 (2.85%) Terraform
3 16 (1.38%) Ansible
4 8 (0.69%) Podman
5 6 (0.52%) Functional Safety
5 6 (0.52%) Grafana
6 5 (0.43%) Docker Swarm
7 4 (0.35%) Single Sign-On
8 2 (0.17%) Argo
9 1 (0.087%) HP ALM
9 1 (0.087%) Microsoft Intune
9 1 (0.087%) Packer
9 1 (0.087%) Progress Chef
9 1 (0.087%) Puppet
9 1 (0.087%) vCenter Server
Vendors
1 105 (9.08%) Google
2 49 (4.24%) Microsoft
3 38 (3.29%) Oracle
4 31 (2.68%) IBM
5 20 (1.73%) Lauterbach
6 19 (1.64%) Atlassian
7 6 (0.52%) Salesforce
8 5 (0.43%) NVIDIA
8 5 (0.43%) SAP
8 5 (0.43%) ServiceNow
8 5 (0.43%) Sybase
9 4 (0.35%) Adobe
9 4 (0.35%) Databricks
9 4 (0.35%) Intel
9 4 (0.35%) ION Trading
9 4 (0.35%) Okta
9 4 (0.35%) Roku
9 4 (0.35%) Splunk
10 3 (0.26%) MathWorks
10 3 (0.26%) VMware