Software Engineer Contract Job Trends in the East of England

Software Engineer
England > East of England

The median Software Engineer daily rate in the East of England is £500, according to job vacancies posted in the 6 months leading up to 17 June 2026.

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

6 months to
17 Jun 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 14 65 12
Rank change year-on-year +51 -53 +34
Contract jobs requiring a Software Engineer 141 20 171
As % of all contract jobs in the East of England 6.36% 1.93% 8.64%
As % of the Job Titles category 6.97% 2.22% 9.67%
Number of daily rates quoted 39 3 18
10th Percentile £227 £350 £398
25th Percentile £413 £388 £448
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £485 £500
Median % change year-on-year +3.09% -3.00% -4.76%
75th Percentile £600 £518 £575
90th Percentile £640 £537 £600
England median daily rate £550 £625 £630
% change year-on-year -12.00% -0.79% +5.00%
Number of hourly rates quoted 82 11 119
10th Percentile £57.63 - £52.50
25th Percentile £62.13 £59.00 £60.63
Median hourly rate £68.21 £65.00 £65.00
Median % change year-on-year +4.94% - -
75th Percentile £73.46 - £70.00
90th Percentile £75.00 £65.75 £80.00
England median hourly rate £65.00 £65.00 £65.00

All Contract IT Job Roles
East of England

For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all contract IT job vacancies in the East of England. 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 East of England with a recognized job title 2,023 902 1,768
% of contract IT jobs with a recognized job title 91.25% 87.15% 89.29%
Number of daily rates quoted 948 450 753
10th Percentile £192 £200 £209
25th Percentile £363 £350 £306
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £490 £438
Median % change year-on-year +2.04% +12.00% -7.89%
75th Percentile £590 £596 £575
90th Percentile £688 £675 £650
England median daily rate £520 £513 £525
% change year-on-year +1.46% -2.38% -4.55%
Number of hourly rates quoted 540 181 623
10th Percentile £14.39 £14.99 £14.16
25th Percentile £17.87 £17.33 £16.30
Median hourly rate £36.50 £42.50 £43.00
Median % change year-on-year -14.12% -1.16% +30.30%
75th Percentile £66.38 £72.50 £64.00
90th Percentile £75.00 £85.00 £72.85
England median hourly rate £45.00 £28.75 £39.55
% change year-on-year +56.52% -27.31% -12.11%

Software Engineer
Job Vacancy Trend in the East of England

Historical trend showing the proportion of contract IT job postings featuring 'Software Engineer' in the job title relative to all contract IT jobs advertised in the East of England.

Software Engineer job vacancy trend in the East of England

Software Engineer
Daily Rate Trend in the East of England

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for Software Engineer job vacancies in the East of England.

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for Software Engineer job vacancies in the East of England

Software Engineer
Daily Rate Histogram in the East of England

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing Software Engineer in the East of England over the 6 months to 17 June 2026.

Daily rate histogram for Software Engineer in the East of England

Software Engineer
Hourly Rate Trend in the East of England

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for Software Engineer job vacancies in the East of England.

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for Software Engineer job vacancies in the East of England

Software Engineer
Hourly Rate Histogram in the East of England

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing Software Engineer in the East of England over the 6 months to 17 June 2026.

Hourly rate histogram for Software Engineer in the East of England

Software Engineer
Contract Job Locations in the East of England

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 East of England region over the 6 months to 17 June 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
Hertfordshire +21 63 £650 - 39
Bedfordshire - 33 £74 - 6
Essex +8 25 £505 +2.54% 12
Cambridgeshire +20 12 £425 +30.77% 96
Suffolk - 7 £625 - 7
Norfolk -21 1 - - 8
Software Engineer
England

Software Engineer Skill Set
Top 30 Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities in the East of England

For the 6 months to 17 June 2026, Software Engineer 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 across the East of England region featuring Software Engineer in the job title.

1 134 (95.04%) Software Engineering
2 49 (34.75%) Security Cleared
3 40 (28.37%) C++
4 39 (27.66%) SC Cleared
5 27 (19.15%) Agile
6 26 (18.44%) C#
7 23 (16.31%) Ada
7 23 (16.31%) Software-Defined Radio
8 22 (15.60%) C
9 17 (12.06%) CI/CD
9 17 (12.06%) Rational DOORS
9 17 (12.06%) Software Testing
9 17 (12.06%) Windows
10 16 (11.35%) Test Automation
11 15 (10.64%) DevOps
11 15 (10.64%) Embedded C
12 14 (9.93%) Java
12 14 (9.93%) Linux
12 14 (9.93%) Test Scripting
13 13 (9.22%) Ethernet
14 12 (8.51%) JIRA
14 12 (8.51%) Problem-Solving
14 12 (8.51%) Python
15 11 (7.80%) .NET
15 11 (7.80%) Digital Signal Processing
15 11 (7.80%) Git
15 11 (7.80%) Signal Processing
15 11 (7.80%) UML
15 11 (7.80%) Validation
15 11 (7.80%) Verification and Validation

Software Engineer Skill Set
Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities in the East of England 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:

Applications
1 2 (1.42%) Microsoft Excel
Cloud Services
1 8 (5.67%) GCP
2 4 (2.84%) Azure
2 4 (2.84%) GitHub
3 3 (2.13%) Azure DevOps
4 1 (0.71%) Anthropic Claude
4 1 (0.71%) AWS
4 1 (0.71%) Azure AKS
4 1 (0.71%) ChatGPT
4 1 (0.71%) Google Ads
4 1 (0.71%) Google Gemini
Communications & Networking
1 23 (16.31%) Software-Defined Radio
2 13 (9.22%) Ethernet
3 8 (5.67%) Wireless
4 5 (3.55%) Firewall
4 5 (3.55%) VPN
5 4 (2.84%) TCP/IP
6 1 (0.71%) Modbus
6 1 (0.71%) RS-232
6 1 (0.71%) RS-422
6 1 (0.71%) RS-485
Database & Business Intelligence
1 4 (2.84%) Relational Database
2 2 (1.42%) Metadata
3 1 (0.71%) SQL Server
Development Applications
1 17 (12.06%) Rational DOORS
2 12 (8.51%) JIRA
3 11 (7.80%) Git
4 9 (6.38%) Visual Studio
5 5 (3.55%) Eclipse
5 5 (3.55%) Rational Rhapsody
6 4 (2.84%) IntelliJ
6 4 (2.84%) JUnit
6 4 (2.84%) SonarQube
7 3 (2.13%) LabVIEW
7 3 (2.13%) PVCS
8 2 (1.42%) VectorCAST
9 1 (0.71%) GitLab
9 1 (0.71%) Gradle
General
1 12 (8.51%) Aerospace
2 11 (7.80%) Manufacturing
3 10 (7.09%) Finance
4 8 (5.67%) Social Skills
5 7 (4.96%) Banking
6 6 (4.26%) Law
7 5 (3.55%) Analytical Skills
7 5 (3.55%) Electronics
8 4 (2.84%) Military
9 3 (2.13%) Presentation Skills
10 2 (1.42%) Automotive
10 2 (1.42%) Publishing
11 1 (0.71%) Influencing Skills
11 1 (0.71%) Public Sector
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 11 (7.80%) .NET
2 8 (5.67%) React
3 7 (4.96%) Node.js
4 5 (3.55%) Spring Boot
5 4 (2.84%) Spring
5 4 (2.84%) Web Services
5 4 (2.84%) WPF
6 3 (2.13%) WinForms
7 1 (0.71%) .NET Framework
7 1 (0.71%) AngularJS
7 1 (0.71%) CSS
7 1 (0.71%) HTML
7 1 (0.71%) Kafka
7 1 (0.71%) PyTorch
7 1 (0.71%) RESTful
7 1 (0.71%) TensorFlow
7 1 (0.71%) WCF
7 1 (0.71%) Yocto
Miscellaneous
1 15 (10.64%) Embedded Systems
2 8 (5.67%) FPGA
2 8 (5.67%) PCIe
3 6 (4.26%) Product Ownership
4 4 (2.84%) Legacy Applications
5 3 (2.13%) Cloud Native
5 3 (2.13%) Cyber Threat
5 3 (2.13%) Legacy Systems
5 3 (2.13%) Life Science
6 2 (1.42%) Genomics
6 2 (1.42%) Management Information System
6 2 (1.42%) Reference Data
6 2 (1.42%) Self-Motivation
7 1 (0.71%) Augmented Reality
7 1 (0.71%) Data Centre
7 1 (0.71%) Device Driver
7 1 (0.71%) Distributed Computing
7 1 (0.71%) Distributed Systems
7 1 (0.71%) Reinsurance
7 1 (0.71%) Virtual Reality
Operating Systems
1 17 (12.06%) Windows
2 14 (9.93%) Linux
3 8 (5.67%) FreeRTOS
4 2 (1.42%) VxWorks
5 1 (0.71%) Embedded Linux
5 1 (0.71%) Robot Operating System
Processes & Methodologies
1 134 (95.04%) Software Engineering
2 27 (19.15%) Agile
3 17 (12.06%) CI/CD
3 17 (12.06%) Software Testing
4 16 (11.35%) Test Automation
5 15 (10.64%) DevOps
6 14 (9.93%) Test Scripting
7 12 (8.51%) Problem-Solving
8 11 (7.80%) Digital Signal Processing
8 11 (7.80%) Signal Processing
8 11 (7.80%) UML
8 11 (7.80%) Validation
8 11 (7.80%) Verification and Validation
9 10 (7.09%) SDLC
10 9 (6.38%) Continuous Integration
10 9 (6.38%) TDD
10 9 (6.38%) Unit Testing
11 8 (5.67%) Application Security
11 8 (5.67%) SysML
12 7 (4.96%) Visualisation
Programming Languages
1 40 (28.37%) C++
2 26 (18.44%) C#
3 23 (16.31%) Ada
4 22 (15.60%) C
5 15 (10.64%) Embedded C
6 14 (9.93%) Java
7 12 (8.51%) Python
8 8 (5.67%) Embedded C++
9 6 (4.26%) JavaScript
9 6 (4.26%) TypeScript
10 4 (2.84%) SQL
11 3 (2.13%) Go
12 2 (1.42%) Perl
12 2 (1.42%) PowerShell
12 2 (1.42%) Shell Script
Qualifications
1 49 (34.75%) Security Cleared
2 39 (27.66%) SC Cleared
3 3 (2.13%) DV Cleared
3 3 (2.13%) ISTQB
3 3 (2.13%) ISTQB Foundation Certification
4 2 (1.42%) BPSS Clearance
4 2 (1.42%) Degree
5 1 (0.71%) Computer Science Degree
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 4 (2.84%) QA
2 2 (1.42%) DO-178B
System Software
1 4 (2.84%) Firmware
2 3 (2.13%) Virtual Machines
2 3 (2.13%) VMware Infrastructure
Systems Management
1 1 (0.71%) Ansible
1 1 (0.71%) Kubernetes
1 1 (0.71%) Terraform
Vendors
1 5 (3.55%) Google
1 5 (3.55%) Microsoft
2 4 (2.84%) Checkmarx
3 3 (2.13%) ANSYS
3 3 (2.13%) IBM
3 3 (2.13%) VMware
4 1 (0.71%) NVIDIA
4 1 (0.71%) OpenAI
4 1 (0.71%) OpenText
4 1 (0.71%) Remedy
4 1 (0.71%) Serena