SDLC Contract Job Trends in the City of London

Systems or Software Development Life Cycle (SDLC)
Central London > City of London

The table below provides summary statistics and contractor rates for jobs advertised in the City of London requiring SDLC skills. It covers contract job vacancies from the 6 months leading up to 16 July 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
16 Jul 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 84 66 54
Rank change year-on-year -18 -12 -4
Contract jobs citing SDLC 54 63 83
As % of all contract jobs in the City of London 2.23% 3.39% 3.87%
As % of the Processes & Methodologies category 2.58% 3.61% 4.23%
Number of daily rates quoted 33 39 54
10th Percentile £410 £425 £454
25th Percentile £520 £524 £575
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £553 £650 £650
Median % change year-on-year -14.92% - -
75th Percentile £638 £750 £750
90th Percentile £784 £838 £875
Central London median daily rate £553 £631 £650
% change year-on-year -12.40% -2.88% +6.12%
Number of hourly rates quoted 0 1 0
Median hourly rate - £87.50 -
Central London median hourly rate - £87.50 -

All Process & Methodology Skills
City of London

SDLC falls under the Processes and Methodologies category. For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all contract job vacancies requiring process or methodology skills in the City of London.

Contract vacancies with a requirement for process or methodology skills 2,095 1,747 1,961
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the City of London 86.46% 93.87% 91.38%
Number of daily rates quoted 1,423 1,125 1,344
10th Percentile £368 £338 £363
25th Percentile £453 £438 £463
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £550 £550 £575
Median % change year-on-year - -4.35% -4.17%
75th Percentile £675 £681 £688
90th Percentile £775 £775 £800
Central London median daily rate £550 £550 £564
% change year-on-year - -2.44% -6.04%
Number of hourly rates quoted 30 21 19
10th Percentile £17.60 £17.08 £19.63
25th Percentile £18.75 £24.66 £20.36
Median hourly rate £20.25 £31.00 £27.00
Median % change year-on-year -34.68% +14.81% -22.86%
75th Percentile £42.56 £56.75 £55.75
90th Percentile £60.25 £63.75 £101.50
Central London median hourly rate £23.16 £32.50 £27.81
% change year-on-year -28.74% +16.86% -20.54%

SDLC
Job Vacancy Trend in the City of London

Historical trend showing the proportion of contract IT job postings citing SDLC relative to all contract IT jobs advertised in the City of London.

SDLC job vacancy trend in the City of London

SDLC
Daily Rate Trend in the City of London

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in the City of London citing SDLC.

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in the City of London citing SDLC

SDLC
Daily Rate Histogram in the City of London

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing SDLC in the City of London over the 6 months to 16 July 2026.

Daily rate histogram for SDLC in the City of London

SDLC
Hourly Rate Trend in the City of London

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in the City of London citing SDLC.

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in the City of London citing SDLC

SDLC
Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities in the City of 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 4 (7.41%) Confluence
2 3 (5.56%) SharePoint
3 2 (3.70%) IIS
4 1 (1.85%) Anypoint
4 1 (1.85%) CMS
Business Applications
1 1 (1.85%) Aladdin
1 1 (1.85%) Summit
Cloud Services
1 13 (24.07%) Azure
2 7 (12.96%) AWS
3 5 (9.26%) Power Platform
4 4 (7.41%) GitHub
5 3 (5.56%) Azure DevOps
5 3 (5.56%) Azure Stack
5 3 (5.56%) Power Automate
5 3 (5.56%) PowerApps
6 2 (3.70%) Entra ID
6 2 (3.70%) GitHub Actions
6 2 (3.70%) Microsoft 365
7 1 (1.85%) Dynamics 365
7 1 (1.85%) GCP
7 1 (1.85%) GitHub Copilot
7 1 (1.85%) Microsoft Copilot
7 1 (1.85%) Salesforce Sales Cloud
7 1 (1.85%) Salesforce Service Cloud
7 1 (1.85%) Virtual Private Cloud
Communications & Networking
1 2 (3.70%) Internet
1 2 (3.70%) Intranet
2 1 (1.85%) DHCP
2 1 (1.85%) DNS
2 1 (1.85%) TCP/IP
Database & Business Intelligence
1 5 (9.26%) Relational Database
1 5 (9.26%) SQL Server
2 3 (5.56%) Oracle Database
2 3 (5.56%) RDBMS
3 2 (3.70%) Metadata
3 2 (3.70%) NoSQL
3 2 (3.70%) PostgreSQL
3 2 (3.70%) Power BI
3 2 (3.70%) SQLPlus
4 1 (1.85%) DynamoDB
4 1 (1.85%) MySQL
Development Applications
1 6 (11.11%) JIRA
2 4 (7.41%) Git
2 4 (7.41%) Jenkins
2 4 (7.41%) Selenium
3 3 (5.56%) Zephyr
4 2 (3.70%) Artifactory
4 2 (3.70%) Bitbucket
4 2 (3.70%) Cypress.io
4 2 (3.70%) REST Assured
4 2 (3.70%) SQL Server Management Studio (SSMS)
4 2 (3.70%) TeamCity
4 2 (3.70%) Visual Studio
5 1 (1.85%) GitLab
5 1 (1.85%) Postman
General
1 27 (50.00%) Finance
2 26 (48.15%) Social Skills
3 14 (25.93%) Banking
4 12 (22.22%) Analytical Skills
5 7 (12.96%) Inclusion and Diversity
6 4 (7.41%) Front Office
7 3 (5.56%) Documentation Skills
7 3 (5.56%) Investment Banking
7 3 (5.56%) Public Sector
8 2 (3.70%) Financial Institution
8 2 (3.70%) Influencing Skills
8 2 (3.70%) Legal
8 2 (3.70%) Local Government
8 2 (3.70%) Presentation Skills
9 1 (1.85%) Back Office
Job Titles
1 10 (18.52%) Developer
2 9 (16.67%) Architect
2 9 (16.67%) Senior
3 7 (12.96%) Security Engineer
4 6 (11.11%) Analyst
4 6 (11.11%) Senior Security Engineer
5 5 (9.26%) Business Analyst
5 5 (9.26%) Lead
5 5 (9.26%) Technical Architect
6 4 (7.41%) Applications Engineer
6 4 (7.41%) Senior Applications Engineer
6 4 (7.41%) Solutions Architect
7 3 (5.56%) Applications Tester
7 3 (5.56%) Full-Stack Developer
7 3 (5.56%) Full-Stack Engineer
7 3 (5.56%) Java Engineer
7 3 (5.56%) Tester
8 2 (3.70%) Automation Engineer
8 2 (3.70%) Product Engineer
8 2 (3.70%) Salesforce Architect
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 10 (18.52%) .NET
2 6 (11.11%) Middleware
2 6 (11.11%) React
2 6 (11.11%) REST
3 4 (7.41%) XML
4 3 (5.56%) ASP.NET
4 3 (5.56%) Playwright
5 2 (3.70%) .NET Framework
5 2 (3.70%) ADO.NET
5 2 (3.70%) Ajax
5 2 (3.70%) ASP.NET Web Forms
5 2 (3.70%) SOAP
5 2 (3.70%) Web Services
5 2 (3.70%) XSL
5 2 (3.70%) XSLT
6 1 (1.85%) Django
6 1 (1.85%) JSON
6 1 (1.85%) Node.js
6 1 (1.85%) OAuth
6 1 (1.85%) RESTful
Miscellaneous
1 5 (9.26%) Cloud Native
2 2 (3.70%) Credit Risk
2 2 (3.70%) Derivative
2 2 (3.70%) Distributed Systems
2 2 (3.70%) Enterprise Software
2 2 (3.70%) Legacy Systems
2 2 (3.70%) Market Risk
2 2 (3.70%) Product Ownership
2 2 (3.70%) Self-Motivation
2 2 (3.70%) Virtual Team
3 1 (1.85%) Analytical Mindset
3 1 (1.85%) Data Centre
3 1 (1.85%) Distributed Denial-of-Service
3 1 (1.85%) Fixed Income
3 1 (1.85%) Foreign Exchange (FX)
3 1 (1.85%) Management Information System
3 1 (1.85%) PKI
3 1 (1.85%) PMI
3 1 (1.85%) Security Posture
Operating Systems
1 7 (12.96%) Linux
1 7 (12.96%) Unix
2 1 (1.85%) Android
2 1 (1.85%) Apple iOS
2 1 (1.85%) Windows
2 1 (1.85%) Windows Server
Processes & Methodologies
1 27 (50.00%) Agile
2 19 (35.19%) CI/CD
3 16 (29.63%) Stakeholder Management
4 12 (22.22%) Root Cause Analysis
5 11 (20.37%) Test Automation
6 10 (18.52%) Risk Management
6 10 (18.52%) TOGAF
7 9 (16.67%) Problem-Solving
8 8 (14.81%) Full-Stack Development
8 8 (14.81%) Software Testing
8 8 (14.81%) Threat Modelling
9 7 (12.96%) Business Intelligence
9 7 (12.96%) Computer Science
9 7 (12.96%) Programme Management
9 7 (12.96%) Regulatory Compliance
9 7 (12.96%) Roadmaps
9 7 (12.96%) Scrum
9 7 (12.96%) Test Scripting
9 7 (12.96%) Vulnerability Management
10 6 (11.11%) DevOps
Programming Languages
1 12 (22.22%) Python
2 11 (20.37%) SQL
3 8 (14.81%) Java
4 7 (12.96%) C#
5 4 (7.41%) PL/SQL
6 2 (3.70%) C
6 2 (3.70%) JavaScript
6 2 (3.70%) ProC
6 2 (3.70%) TypeScript
7 1 (1.85%) Kotlin
Qualifications
1 9 (16.67%) Degree
1 9 (16.67%) Security Cleared
2 7 (12.96%) SC Cleared
3 2 (3.70%) PMI Certification
4 1 (1.85%) CISM
4 1 (1.85%) CISSP
4 1 (1.85%) Computer Science Degree
4 1 (1.85%) CTC Cleared
4 1 (1.85%) DV Cleared
4 1 (1.85%) Master's Degree
4 1 (1.85%) PMP
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 12 (22.22%) QA
2 7 (12.96%) GDPR
3 6 (11.11%) SLA
4 2 (3.70%) Cyber Essentials
5 1 (1.85%) Accessibility
5 1 (1.85%) Basel III
5 1 (1.85%) Cyber Essentials PLUS
5 1 (1.85%) Government Security Classifications
5 1 (1.85%) GRC
5 1 (1.85%) ISO/IEC 27001
5 1 (1.85%) PCI DSS
System Software
1 3 (5.56%) Active Directory
2 2 (3.70%) Docker
3 1 (1.85%) VMware Infrastructure
Systems Management
1 2 (3.70%) Kubernetes
Vendors
1 13 (24.07%) Microsoft
2 7 (12.96%) Oracle
3 6 (11.11%) Databricks
3 6 (11.11%) Salesforce
4 4 (7.41%) Sitecore
5 2 (3.70%) SAP
6 1 (1.85%) Atlassian
6 1 (1.85%) Cisco
6 1 (1.85%) MuleSoft
6 1 (1.85%) Planon
6 1 (1.85%) ServiceNow
6 1 (1.85%) VMware