Architect Contract Job Trends in England

Architect
UK > England

The median Architect daily rate in England is £620, according to job vacancies posted in the 6 months leading up to 23 September 2026.

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

6 months to
23 Sep 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 10 19 15
Rank change year-on-year +9 -4 +1
Contract jobs requiring an Architect 5,156 2,480 3,165
As % of all contract jobs in England 11.08% 8.98% 9.83%
As % of the Job Titles category 12.01% 9.84% 10.57%
Number of daily rates quoted 3,461 1,645 1,963
10th Percentile £481 £463 £475
25th Percentile £525 £525 £538
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £620 £625 £625
Median % change year-on-year -0.80% - -3.85%
75th Percentile £708 £713 £738
90th Percentile £788 £787 £813
UK median daily rate £618 £625 £625
% change year-on-year -1.20% - -3.85%
Number of hourly rates quoted 171 14 66
10th Percentile £46.00 £32.76 £60.00
25th Percentile £60.00 £61.56 £61.56
Median hourly rate £68.17 £71.25 £70.00
Median % change year-on-year -4.33% +1.79% -2.78%
75th Percentile £78.75 £85.63 £85.00
90th Percentile £95.00 £100.00 £90.00
UK median hourly rate £68.17 £71.25 £70.00
% change year-on-year -4.33% +1.79% -2.78%

All Contract IT Job Roles
England

For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all contract IT job vacancies in 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 England with a recognized job title 42,935 25,205 29,932
% of contract IT jobs with a recognized job title 92.25% 91.31% 92.99%
Number of daily rates quoted 25,501 16,241 18,594
10th Percentile £325 £278 £300
25th Percentile £425 £402 £413
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £525 £510 £525
Median % change year-on-year +2.94% -2.86% -3.98%
75th Percentile £638 £625 £638
90th Percentile £738 £738 £750
UK median daily rate £525 £500 £525
% change year-on-year +5.00% -4.76% -0.94%
Number of hourly rates quoted 3,554 1,371 1,420
10th Percentile £14.85 £13.75 £14.84
25th Percentile £20.75 £17.33 £21.25
Median hourly rate £42.58 £25.15 £46.18
Median % change year-on-year +69.28% -45.54% +2.62%
75th Percentile £68.00 £53.75 £67.50
90th Percentile £79.70 £70.16 £75.00
UK median hourly rate £42.30 £25.15 £43.00
% change year-on-year +68.19% -41.51% -3.37%

Architect
Job Vacancy Trend in England

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

Architect job vacancy trend in England

Architect
Daily Rate Trend in England

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for Architect job vacancies in England.

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for Architect job vacancies in England

Architect
Daily Rate Histogram in England

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing Architect in England over the 6 months to 23 September 2026.

Daily rate histogram for Architect in England

Architect
Hourly Rate Trend in England

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for Architect job vacancies in England.

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for Architect job vacancies in England

Architect
Hourly Rate Histogram in England

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing Architect in England over the 6 months to 23 September 2026.

Hourly rate histogram for Architect in England

Architect
Contract Job Locations in England

The table below looks at the demand and provides a guide to the median contractor rates quoted in IT jobs citing Architect within the England region over the 6 months to 23 September 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
London +7 2,656 £625 -2.72% 2,466
South East +2 736 £625 +4.17% 581
North of England +1 685 £591 -1.46% 502
Midlands +3 438 £626 +8.91% 283
North West +7 377 £600 +4.35% 280
South West +1 345 £638 -1.92% 226
West Midlands +2 327 £650 +8.33% 215
Yorkshire +10 243 £555 -8.49% 164
East of England +7 160 £622 +12.07% 137
East Midlands +4 106 £600 +19.40% 68
North East +1 64 £600 -18.64% 58
Architect
UK

Architect Skill Set
Top 30 Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities in England

For the 6 months to 23 September 2026, Architect 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 England region featuring Architect in the job title.

1 1,609 (31.21%) Security Cleared
2 1,341 (26.01%) Azure
3 1,167 (22.63%) SC Cleared
4 1,028 (19.94%) AWS
5 959 (18.60%) Stakeholder Management
6 844 (16.37%) Roadmaps
7 759 (14.72%) Migration
8 726 (14.08%) Microsoft
9 691 (13.40%) Enterprise Architecture
10 686 (13.30%) AI
11 662 (12.84%) Technical Leadership
12 572 (11.09%) DevOps
13 553 (10.73%) Agile
14 541 (10.49%) CI/CD
15 532 (10.32%) Data Modelling
16 530 (10.28%) Data Architecture
17 515 (9.99%) Stakeholder Engagement
18 474 (9.19%) Integration Patterns
19 455 (8.82%) Analytics
20 417 (8.09%) Security Architecture
21 414 (8.03%) TOGAF
22 407 (7.89%) GCP
23 402 (7.80%) Architectural Patterns
24 369 (7.16%) DV Cleared
25 345 (6.69%) Architecture Governance
26 340 (6.59%) Cybersecurity
27 339 (6.57%) Event-Driven
28 327 (6.34%) Data Governance
29 325 (6.30%) Decision-Making
30 320 (6.21%) Infrastructure as Code

Architect Skill Set
Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities in 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:

Application Platforms
1 75 (1.45%) SAS
2 63 (1.22%) SharePoint
3 49 (0.95%) Confluence
4 43 (0.83%) Apache
5 38 (0.74%) Apache Spark
6 34 (0.66%) Apache Airflow
7 29 (0.56%) Microsoft Exchange
8 21 (0.41%) CMS
8 21 (0.41%) Palantir Foundry
9 14 (0.27%) OpenStack
10 7 (0.14%) Documentum
10 7 (0.14%) NetWeaver
11 6 (0.12%) Appian
11 6 (0.12%) ArcGIS
11 6 (0.12%) Headless CMS
11 6 (0.12%) IIS
12 5 (0.097%) SAP EP
13 4 (0.078%) Adobe Experience Manager
13 4 (0.078%) Camunda
13 4 (0.078%) Jupyter
Applications
1 20 (0.39%) MS Visio
2 14 (0.27%) Microsoft PowerPoint
3 11 (0.21%) Microsoft Excel
4 9 (0.17%) Microsoft Office
4 9 (0.17%) Revit
5 8 (0.16%) Chatbot
6 7 (0.14%) Navisworks
7 6 (0.12%) Spreadsheet
8 2 (0.039%) AutoCAD
8 2 (0.039%) Gliffy
8 2 (0.039%) Windchill
9 1 (0.019%) Notion
9 1 (0.019%) PlantUML
Business Applications
1 139 (2.70%) SAP S/4HANA
2 40 (0.78%) Dynamics CRM
3 33 (0.64%) Sparx Enterprise Architect
4 16 (0.31%) Teamcenter
5 15 (0.29%) Oracle ERP
6 14 (0.27%) Remedy ITSM
7 13 (0.25%) NetSuite
8 12 (0.23%) Oracle Payables
8 12 (0.23%) Oracle Receivables
8 12 (0.23%) SAP ERP
9 11 (0.21%) Oracle EBS
9 11 (0.21%) Payment Gateway
10 9 (0.17%) SAP MDG
11 8 (0.16%) SAP BRIM
11 8 (0.16%) Workday HCM
12 7 (0.14%) Maximo
12 7 (0.14%) Oracle Retail
12 7 (0.14%) SAP IBP
13 5 (0.097%) SAP CRM
13 5 (0.097%) SAP MM
Cloud Services
1 1,341 (26.01%) Azure
2 1,028 (19.94%) AWS
3 407 (7.89%) GCP
4 269 (5.22%) Power Platform
5 197 (3.82%) SaaS
6 190 (3.69%) Entra ID
7 157 (3.04%) Serverless
8 132 (2.56%) Dynamics 365
9 125 (2.42%) GitHub
10 114 (2.21%) Azure DevOps
10 114 (2.21%) Snowflake
11 112 (2.17%) Microsoft 365
12 83 (1.61%) PaaS
13 64 (1.24%) AWS Lambda
14 63 (1.22%) Amazon S3
14 63 (1.22%) OCI
15 59 (1.14%) Azure Synapse Analytics
15 59 (1.14%) GitHub Actions
16 56 (1.09%) IaaS
17 53 (1.03%) Azure Data Factory
Communications & Networking
1 131 (2.54%) Network Security
2 123 (2.39%) Firewall
3 93 (1.80%) WAN
4 69 (1.34%) DNS
5 61 (1.18%) LAN
6 55 (1.07%) VPN
7 45 (0.87%) SD-WAN
8 44 (0.85%) BGP
9 37 (0.72%) DHCP
9 37 (0.72%) MPLS
10 34 (0.66%) TCP/IP
11 28 (0.54%) VLAN
12 26 (0.50%) VXLAN
13 25 (0.48%) SAN
14 24 (0.47%) NX-OS
15 20 (0.39%) NAS
15 20 (0.39%) Wireless
16 19 (0.37%) BIG-IP
17 17 (0.33%) Ethernet VPN
17 17 (0.33%) OSPF
Database & Business Intelligence
1 200 (3.88%) Metadata
2 176 (3.41%) Data Lake
3 171 (3.32%) Power BI
4 157 (3.04%) Data Warehouse
5 54 (1.05%) NoSQL
6 48 (0.93%) SQL Server
7 43 (0.83%) BigQuery
8 37 (0.72%) Delta Lake
9 36 (0.70%) Amazon RDS
10 35 (0.68%) PostgreSQL
11 33 (0.64%) Amazon Redshift
11 33 (0.64%) Azure SQL Database
12 32 (0.62%) Big Data
13 29 (0.56%) Enterprise Data Warehouse
13 29 (0.56%) Oracle Database
14 26 (0.50%) Semantic Layer
15 22 (0.43%) GIS
15 22 (0.43%) Tableau
16 21 (0.41%) Star Schema
17 20 (0.39%) Data Vault
Development Applications
1 74 (1.44%) JIRA
2 63 (1.22%) Git
3 52 (1.01%) Jenkins
4 44 (0.85%) GitLab
5 13 (0.25%) ERwin
6 12 (0.23%) Claude Code
7 10 (0.19%) MSI
7 10 (0.19%) RStudio
8 9 (0.17%) Cypress.io
8 9 (0.17%) Oracle Forms
9 7 (0.14%) Postman
10 6 (0.12%) SonarQube
10 6 (0.12%) Storybook
11 5 (0.097%) ER Studio
11 5 (0.097%) MLflow
11 5 (0.097%) Rational DOORS
11 5 (0.097%) Selenium
12 4 (0.078%) Artifactory
12 4 (0.078%) Maven
13 3 (0.058%) PowerDesigner
General
1 1,072 (20.79%) Social Skills
2 754 (14.62%) Finance
3 556 (10.78%) Public Sector
4 281 (5.45%) Banking
5 266 (5.16%) Retail
6 255 (4.95%) Analytical Skills
7 157 (3.04%) Influencing Skills
8 125 (2.42%) Manufacturing
9 121 (2.35%) Documentation Skills
10 117 (2.27%) Telecoms
11 72 (1.40%) Legal
12 69 (1.34%) Marketing
13 61 (1.18%) Billing
14 60 (1.16%) Aerospace
15 52 (1.01%) Military
16 50 (0.97%) Inclusion and Diversity
17 37 (0.72%) Presentation Skills
18 30 (0.58%) Law
19 28 (0.54%) Aviation
20 27 (0.52%) Local Government
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 262 (5.08%) REST
2 220 (4.27%) Terraform
3 132 (2.56%) Kafka
3 132 (2.56%) Middleware
4 126 (2.44%) SOAP
5 115 (2.23%) .NET
6 100 (1.94%) OAuth
7 70 (1.36%) Oracle Fusion
8 59 (1.14%) JSON
9 55 (1.07%) SAML
10 54 (1.05%) OpenID
11 50 (0.97%) LDAP
12 49 (0.95%) OAuth2
13 45 (0.87%) PySpark
14 41 (0.80%) XML
15 40 (0.78%) .NET Framework
16 37 (0.72%) SailPoint
17 36 (0.70%) React
18 34 (0.66%) JWT
18 34 (0.66%) RESTful
Miscellaneous
1 424 (8.22%) Cloud Native
2 163 (3.16%) Onboarding
3 159 (3.08%) Data Centre
4 130 (2.52%) Product Ownership
5 124 (2.40%) Distributed Systems
6 123 (2.39%) Hybrid Cloud
7 119 (2.31%) Legacy Systems
8 118 (2.29%) AI Agents
9 117 (2.27%) Enterprise Software
10 108 (2.09%) Management Information System
11 100 (1.94%) CMDB
12 83 (1.61%) Data Protection Act
13 76 (1.47%) Operational Technology
14 72 (1.40%) Enterprise Cloud
15 70 (1.36%) Public Cloud
16 59 (1.14%) Private Cloud
17 57 (1.11%) Security Posture
18 55 (1.07%) Data Structures
19 42 (0.81%) PKI
19 42 (0.81%) Taxonomies
Operating Systems
1 107 (2.08%) Windows
2 85 (1.65%) Linux
3 42 (0.81%) Windows Server
4 21 (0.41%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
4 21 (0.41%) Unix
5 9 (0.17%) AIX
6 8 (0.16%) Ubuntu
7 7 (0.14%) Apple iOS
8 6 (0.12%) Android
8 6 (0.12%) zOS
9 5 (0.097%) Solaris
10 4 (0.078%) Alpine Linux
10 4 (0.078%) Data ONTAP
11 3 (0.058%) CentOS
11 3 (0.058%) VMS
12 2 (0.039%) HPUX
12 2 (0.039%) Mac OS
12 2 (0.039%) OpenWrt
12 2 (0.039%) Windows 10
13 1 (0.019%) CatOS
Processes & Methodologies
1 959 (18.60%) Stakeholder Management
2 844 (16.37%) Roadmaps
3 759 (14.72%) Migration
4 691 (13.40%) Enterprise Architecture
5 686 (13.30%) AI
6 662 (12.84%) Technical Leadership
7 572 (11.09%) DevOps
8 553 (10.73%) Agile
9 541 (10.49%) CI/CD
10 532 (10.32%) Data Modelling
11 530 (10.28%) Data Architecture
12 515 (9.99%) Stakeholder Engagement
13 474 (9.19%) Integration Patterns
14 455 (8.82%) Analytics
15 417 (8.09%) Security Architecture
16 414 (8.03%) TOGAF
17 402 (7.80%) Architectural Patterns
18 345 (6.69%) Architecture Governance
19 340 (6.59%) Cybersecurity
20 339 (6.57%) Event-Driven
Programming Languages
1 227 (4.40%) Python
2 223 (4.33%) SQL
3 199 (3.86%) Java
4 113 (2.19%) JavaScript
5 91 (1.76%) PowerShell
6 51 (0.99%) TypeScript
7 50 (0.97%) C#
8 39 (0.76%) Bash
9 36 (0.70%) Bicep
10 29 (0.56%) Apex Code
11 24 (0.47%) ABAP
12 15 (0.29%) Data Analysis Expressions
12 15 (0.29%) Shell Script
13 11 (0.21%) Groovy
14 10 (0.19%) C++
14 10 (0.19%) R
15 8 (0.16%) PL/SQL
15 8 (0.16%) Ruby
16 7 (0.14%) Rust
16 7 (0.14%) Scala
Qualifications
1 1,609 (31.21%) Security Cleared
2 1,167 (22.63%) SC Cleared
3 369 (7.16%) DV Cleared
4 157 (3.04%) Degree
5 137 (2.66%) CISSP
6 108 (2.09%) BPSS Clearance
7 107 (2.08%) Azure Certification
8 98 (1.90%) AWS Certification
9 92 (1.78%) Cisco Certification
10 85 (1.65%) TOGAF Certification
11 61 (1.18%) CISM
12 59 (1.14%) Computer Science Degree
13 45 (0.87%) Microsoft Certification
14 40 (0.78%) CCNP
15 37 (0.72%) (ISC)2 CCSP
16 36 (0.70%) AWS Certified Solutions Architect
17 26 (0.50%) CCSP
18 24 (0.47%) Master's Degree
19 20 (0.39%) CCIE
20 19 (0.37%) CISA
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 217 (4.21%) Data Quality
2 193 (3.74%) NIST
3 157 (3.04%) ISO/IEC 27001
4 131 (2.54%) GDPR
5 102 (1.98%) NCSC
6 71 (1.38%) GRC
7 53 (1.03%) QA
8 39 (0.76%) Accessibility
9 33 (0.64%) PCI DSS
10 31 (0.60%) NIST 800
11 26 (0.50%) Sarbanes-Oxley
12 22 (0.43%) SLA
13 20 (0.39%) JSP 440
14 19 (0.37%) ISO/IEC 20000
14 19 (0.37%) SEPA
15 18 (0.35%) IFRS
16 17 (0.33%) ISO 20022
17 16 (0.31%) Cyber Essentials
18 15 (0.29%) ISO 19650
19 13 (0.25%) Government Security Classifications
System Software
1 174 (3.37%) Active Directory
2 85 (1.65%) Docker
3 64 (1.24%) VMware Infrastructure
4 39 (0.76%) VMware NSX
5 26 (0.50%) Virtual Desktop
6 17 (0.33%) vSphere
7 16 (0.31%) Virtual Machines
7 16 (0.31%) VMware ESXi
8 12 (0.23%) Hyper-V
9 5 (0.097%) NFS
10 4 (0.078%) EMC RecoverPoint
10 4 (0.078%) ISA Server
10 4 (0.078%) KVM
10 4 (0.078%) Postfix
10 4 (0.078%) Varnish
11 3 (0.058%) Microsoft Virtual Server
11 3 (0.058%) Sendmail
11 3 (0.058%) SRDF
11 3 (0.058%) vCloud
11 3 (0.058%) Virtual Servers
Systems Management
1 239 (4.64%) Kubernetes
2 93 (1.80%) Ansible
3 41 (0.80%) Single Sign-On
4 39 (0.76%) Grafana
5 30 (0.58%) Prometheus
6 27 (0.52%) Microsoft Intune
7 14 (0.27%) Jamf Pro
8 13 (0.25%) Active Directory Federation Services
8 13 (0.25%) Argo
9 11 (0.21%) WMI
10 9 (0.17%) CASB
10 9 (0.17%) FortiGate
10 9 (0.17%) vCenter Server
11 7 (0.14%) SCCM
12 6 (0.12%) NetBackup
12 6 (0.12%) Progress Chef
12 6 (0.12%) Puppet
13 5 (0.097%) EMC VPLEX
13 5 (0.097%) Istio
14 4 (0.078%) SnapMirror
Vendors
1 726 (14.08%) Microsoft
2 286 (5.55%) SAP
3 268 (5.20%) Oracle
4 266 (5.16%) ServiceNow
5 258 (5.00%) Databricks
6 178 (3.45%) Salesforce
7 173 (3.36%) Google
8 132 (2.56%) Cisco
9 118 (2.29%) VMware
10 87 (1.69%) CyberArk
11 62 (1.20%) MuleSoft
12 55 (1.07%) IBM
13 53 (1.03%) Workday
14 47 (0.91%) Foundry
15 45 (0.87%) Palo Alto
16 36 (0.70%) Splunk
17 35 (0.68%) Sparx
18 34 (0.66%) F5
18 34 (0.66%) Informatica
18 34 (0.66%) OpenAI