Architect Contract Job Trends in England

Architect
UK > England

The median Architect daily rate in England is £625, according to job vacancies posted in the 6 months leading up to 13 March 2026.

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

6 months to
13 Mar 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 15 16 13
Rank change year-on-year +1 -3 +4
Contract jobs requiring an Architect 3,861 2,490 3,752
As % of all contract jobs in England 10.57% 10.09% 9.89%
As % of the Job Titles category 11.48% 10.85% 10.66%
Number of daily rates quoted 2,611 1,608 2,481
10th Percentile £461 £478 £500
25th Percentile £513 £548 £563
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £625 £625 £650
Median % change year-on-year - -3.85% -3.70%
75th Percentile £725 £725 £738
90th Percentile £800 £800 £800
UK median daily rate £623 £625 £650
% change year-on-year -0.40% -3.85% -1.14%
Number of hourly rates quoted 93 29 42
10th Percentile £49.40 £57.70 £50.72
25th Percentile £60.00 £61.50 £60.00
Median hourly rate £71.27 £72.50 £76.53
Median % change year-on-year -1.70% -5.27% +9.33%
75th Percentile £90.09 £80.59 £87.53
90th Percentile £95.00 £86.12 £95.00
UK median hourly rate £71.27 £72.50 £76.53
% change year-on-year -1.70% -5.27% +9.33%

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 33,621 22,950 35,200
% of contract IT jobs with a recognized job title 92.03% 93.03% 92.75%
Number of daily rates quoted 21,202 15,047 23,545
10th Percentile £310 £300 £270
25th Percentile £413 £409 £410
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £505 £525 £525
Median % change year-on-year -3.81% - -4.55%
75th Percentile £623 £638 £638
90th Percentile £725 £750 £750
UK median daily rate £500 £525 £525
% change year-on-year -4.76% - -4.55%
Number of hourly rates quoted 2,216 759 2,280
10th Percentile £15.50 £15.28 £13.00
25th Percentile £19.34 £21.25 £16.25
Median hourly rate £36.86 £35.00 £32.50
Median % change year-on-year +5.30% +7.69% -23.53%
75th Percentile £65.00 £65.00 £58.75
90th Percentile £76.25 £77.50 £71.25
UK median hourly rate £35.00 £33.40 £32.50
% change year-on-year +4.79% +2.77% -23.53%

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 13 March 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 13 March 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 13 March 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 -2 1,737 £626 -3.69% 411
South East +4 662 £625 - 253
North of England +1 546 £600 - 158
Midlands -1 385 £575 -4.37% 99
North West +1 299 £600 - 83
West Midlands -1 286 £600 -3.61% 62
South West -1 265 £700 +12.00% 117
Yorkshire +6 224 £563 -6.25% 53
East of England +14 165 £540 -13.60% 66
East Midlands 0 95 £513 -9.69% 36
North East -4 29 £625 - 24
Architect
UK

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

For the 6 months to 13 March 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 1,232 (31.91%) Security Cleared
2 961 (24.89%) Azure
3 849 (21.99%) SC Cleared
4 768 (19.89%) AWS
5 568 (14.71%) Roadmaps
6 549 (14.22%) Microsoft
7 523 (13.55%) Agile
8 492 (12.74%) Migration
9 460 (11.91%) Stakeholder Management
10 450 (11.66%) DevOps
11 401 (10.39%) Enterprise Architecture
12 394 (10.20%) CI/CD
13 374 (9.69%) Data Modelling
14 363 (9.40%) TOGAF
15 357 (9.25%) Stakeholder Engagement
16 345 (8.94%) Technical Leadership
17 327 (8.47%) Problem-Solving
18 326 (8.44%) GCP
19 324 (8.39%) Analytics
20 323 (8.37%) AI
20 323 (8.37%) Data Architecture
21 316 (8.18%) Integration Patterns
22 284 (7.36%) DV Cleared
23 282 (7.30%) Python
24 275 (7.12%) Microservices
25 271 (7.02%) Architectural Patterns
26 255 (6.60%) Architectural Design
27 228 (5.91%) ServiceNow
28 225 (5.83%) Data Governance
28 225 (5.83%) Terraform

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
1 113 (2.93%) Confluence
2 101 (2.62%) SharePoint
3 61 (1.58%) Microsoft Exchange
4 27 (0.70%) SAS
5 22 (0.57%) CMS
6 21 (0.54%) Apache Spark
7 15 (0.39%) Anypoint
7 15 (0.39%) Appian
8 14 (0.36%) Apache Airflow
8 14 (0.36%) ArcGIS
9 12 (0.31%) Apache
10 11 (0.28%) nginx
10 11 (0.28%) WebLogic
11 9 (0.23%) Adobe Experience Manager
11 9 (0.23%) OpenStack
11 9 (0.23%) Smallworld
12 7 (0.18%) Oracle SOA Suite
12 7 (0.18%) Skype for Business
13 6 (0.16%) GeoServer
13 6 (0.16%) Sitecore CMS
Applications
1 50 (1.30%) Microsoft Office
2 31 (0.80%) Microsoft Project
3 26 (0.67%) Microsoft PowerPoint
4 25 (0.65%) Microsoft Excel
5 18 (0.47%) MS Visio
6 7 (0.18%) Chatbot
7 1 (0.026%) ArchiCAD
7 1 (0.026%) AutoCAD
7 1 (0.026%) OrCAD
7 1 (0.026%) PlantUML
7 1 (0.026%) Siemens NX
Business Applications
1 101 (2.62%) SAP S/4HANA
2 40 (1.04%) Sparx Enterprise Architect
3 23 (0.60%) Workday HCM
4 19 (0.49%) Dynamics CRM
5 18 (0.47%) Payment Gateway
6 16 (0.41%) Salesforce CRM
7 12 (0.31%) Oracle EBS
8 11 (0.28%) NetSuite
9 10 (0.26%) SAP PM
10 9 (0.23%) Maximo
10 9 (0.23%) Oracle Receivables
10 9 (0.23%) SAP EWM
11 8 (0.21%) Remedy ITSM
11 8 (0.21%) SAP ERP
11 8 (0.21%) Teamcenter
12 7 (0.18%) SAP PP
13 6 (0.16%) R3 Corda
13 6 (0.16%) SAP QM
14 5 (0.13%) Distributed Ledger
14 5 (0.13%) SAP CO
Cloud Services
1 961 (24.89%) Azure
2 768 (19.89%) AWS
3 326 (8.44%) GCP
4 154 (3.99%) Power Platform
5 149 (3.86%) Entra ID
6 128 (3.32%) Microsoft 365
7 125 (3.24%) SaaS
7 125 (3.24%) Serverless
8 92 (2.38%) IaaS
9 91 (2.36%) GitHub
10 85 (2.20%) Azure DevOps
11 80 (2.07%) PaaS
12 70 (1.81%) OpenShift
13 67 (1.74%) AWS Lambda
14 62 (1.61%) Amazon S3
14 62 (1.61%) Microsoft Purview
15 59 (1.53%) Dynamics 365
16 58 (1.50%) Azure Synapse Analytics
17 56 (1.45%) AWS CloudFormation
17 56 (1.45%) Azure Data Factory
Communications & Networking
1 172 (4.45%) Firewall
2 131 (3.39%) Network Security
3 110 (2.85%) DNS
3 110 (2.85%) WAN
4 99 (2.56%) VPN
5 71 (1.84%) LAN
6 57 (1.48%) SD-WAN
7 33 (0.85%) BGP
8 31 (0.80%) DHCP
9 28 (0.73%) MPLS
9 28 (0.73%) Wi-Fi
10 27 (0.70%) OSPF
11 24 (0.62%) TCP/IP
12 20 (0.52%) VXLAN
13 19 (0.49%) SAN
13 19 (0.49%) VLAN
14 17 (0.44%) VSAN
15 15 (0.39%) Internet
15 15 (0.39%) SSL
15 15 (0.39%) Wireless
Database & Business Intelligence
1 121 (3.13%) Data Warehouse
2 114 (2.95%) Metadata
3 112 (2.90%) Power BI
4 76 (1.97%) Data Lake
5 68 (1.76%) SQL Server
6 52 (1.35%) NoSQL
7 51 (1.32%) PostgreSQL
8 45 (1.17%) Tableau
9 34 (0.88%) Azure SQL Database
10 31 (0.80%) Oracle Database
11 27 (0.70%) Big Data
12 26 (0.67%) Amazon Redshift
13 25 (0.65%) GIS
14 22 (0.57%) Delta Lake
15 20 (0.52%) Metadata Repository
16 18 (0.47%) Relational Database
17 17 (0.44%) Amazon Athena
17 17 (0.44%) Amazon Aurora
18 16 (0.41%) Electronic Patient Records
19 15 (0.39%) BigQuery
Development Applications
1 126 (3.26%) JIRA
2 85 (2.20%) Jenkins
3 44 (1.14%) GitLab
4 43 (1.11%) Git
5 17 (0.44%) ERwin
6 11 (0.28%) Bitbucket
7 10 (0.26%) SonarQube
8 8 (0.21%) Artifactory
8 8 (0.21%) MLflow
9 5 (0.13%) Oracle Forms
9 5 (0.13%) Postman
9 5 (0.13%) REST Assured
10 4 (0.10%) Cucumber
10 4 (0.10%) PowerDesigner
10 4 (0.10%) Selenium
10 4 (0.10%) Snyk
10 4 (0.10%) Terragrunt
11 3 (0.078%) JUnit
11 3 (0.078%) MSI
11 3 (0.078%) Rational DOORS
General
1 847 (21.94%) Social Skills
2 624 (16.16%) Finance
3 455 (11.78%) Public Sector
4 275 (7.12%) Analytical Skills
5 236 (6.11%) Banking
6 128 (3.32%) Documentation Skills
7 90 (2.33%) Influencing Skills
8 86 (2.23%) Retail
9 81 (2.10%) Military
10 80 (2.07%) Telecoms
11 77 (1.99%) Legal
12 69 (1.79%) Presentation Skills
13 62 (1.61%) Marketing
14 50 (1.30%) Manufacturing
15 39 (1.01%) Financial Institution
16 37 (0.96%) Billing
17 35 (0.91%) Inclusion and Diversity
18 33 (0.85%) Law
19 28 (0.73%) Investment Banking
20 19 (0.49%) Local Government
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 210 (5.44%) REST
2 154 (3.99%) Middleware
3 110 (2.85%) SOAP
4 77 (1.99%) OpenID
5 74 (1.92%) .NET
6 73 (1.89%) LDAP
7 68 (1.76%) OAuth
8 63 (1.63%) SAML
9 58 (1.50%) Kafka
10 48 (1.24%) JSON
11 43 (1.11%) OAuth2
12 35 (0.91%) AngularJS
13 31 (0.80%) SailPoint
14 28 (0.73%) React
14 28 (0.73%) RESTful
15 25 (0.65%) Oracle Fusion
15 25 (0.65%) PySpark
15 25 (0.65%) Spring
16 24 (0.62%) Web Services
17 22 (0.57%) Microsoft Graph
Miscellaneous
1 299 (7.74%) Cloud Native
2 132 (3.42%) Product Ownership
3 112 (2.90%) Legacy Systems
3 112 (2.90%) Onboarding
4 109 (2.82%) Data Centre
5 94 (2.43%) Enterprise Software
6 86 (2.23%) PKI
7 75 (1.94%) Hybrid Cloud
8 62 (1.61%) Data Protection Act
8 62 (1.61%) Public Cloud
9 61 (1.58%) Distributed Systems
10 60 (1.55%) Security Posture
11 56 (1.45%) Management Information System
12 53 (1.37%) Operational Technology
13 52 (1.35%) CMDB
14 46 (1.19%) Self-Motivation
15 40 (1.04%) Data Structures
16 36 (0.93%) AI Agents
17 32 (0.83%) Private Cloud
18 30 (0.78%) Replication
Operating Systems
1 157 (4.07%) Windows
2 88 (2.28%) Linux
3 34 (0.88%) Windows Server
4 21 (0.54%) Android
4 21 (0.54%) Apple iOS
5 16 (0.41%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
5 16 (0.41%) Windows 7
6 14 (0.36%) Windows 10
7 10 (0.26%) Unix
7 10 (0.26%) zOS
8 9 (0.23%) Mac OS
9 8 (0.21%) VMS
9 8 (0.21%) Windows Server 2016
10 5 (0.13%) Windows Server 2019
11 4 (0.10%) Ubuntu
12 3 (0.078%) Windows Server 2012
13 2 (0.052%) CentOS
14 1 (0.026%) Data ONTAP
14 1 (0.026%) Kali Linux
14 1 (0.026%) Solaris
Processes & Methodologies
1 568 (14.71%) Roadmaps
2 523 (13.55%) Agile
3 492 (12.74%) Migration
4 460 (11.91%) Stakeholder Management
5 450 (11.66%) DevOps
6 401 (10.39%) Enterprise Architecture
7 394 (10.20%) CI/CD
8 374 (9.69%) Data Modelling
9 363 (9.40%) TOGAF
10 357 (9.25%) Stakeholder Engagement
11 345 (8.94%) Technical Leadership
12 327 (8.47%) Problem-Solving
13 324 (8.39%) Analytics
14 323 (8.37%) AI
14 323 (8.37%) Data Architecture
15 316 (8.18%) Integration Patterns
16 275 (7.12%) Microservices
17 271 (7.02%) Architectural Patterns
18 255 (6.60%) Architectural Design
19 225 (5.83%) Data Governance
Programming Languages
1 282 (7.30%) Python
2 205 (5.31%) SQL
3 174 (4.51%) PowerShell
4 128 (3.32%) Java
5 59 (1.53%) JavaScript
6 46 (1.19%) C#
7 38 (0.98%) Bash
8 35 (0.91%) Bicep
9 29 (0.75%) TypeScript
10 18 (0.47%) Apex Code
11 16 (0.41%) PL/SQL
12 14 (0.36%) Kusto Query Language
13 13 (0.34%) R
14 12 (0.31%) Scala
15 11 (0.28%) Ruby
16 9 (0.23%) T-SQL
17 8 (0.21%) Kotlin
17 8 (0.21%) VB
18 7 (0.18%) VBScript
19 6 (0.16%) C++
Qualifications
1 1,232 (31.91%) Security Cleared
2 849 (21.99%) SC Cleared
3 284 (7.36%) DV Cleared
4 177 (4.58%) Degree
5 116 (3.00%) TOGAF Certification
6 111 (2.87%) Azure Certification
7 104 (2.69%) AWS Certification
8 97 (2.51%) CISSP
9 75 (1.94%) Computer Science Degree
10 69 (1.79%) Cisco Certification
11 57 (1.48%) BPSS Clearance
12 54 (1.40%) Microsoft Certification
13 51 (1.32%) CISM
14 46 (1.19%) AWS Certified Solutions Architect
15 41 (1.06%) CCNP
15 41 (1.06%) Master's Degree
16 32 (0.83%) ITIL Certification
17 28 (0.73%) CCIE
17 28 (0.73%) ISEB
18 26 (0.67%) (ISC)2 CCSP
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 172 (4.45%) GDPR
2 129 (3.34%) Data Quality
3 126 (3.26%) NIST
4 112 (2.90%) ISO/IEC 27001
5 83 (2.15%) NCSC
6 57 (1.48%) QA
7 52 (1.35%) PCI DSS
8 33 (0.85%) COBIT
9 28 (0.73%) GRC
10 26 (0.67%) ISO 20022
11 25 (0.65%) Cyber Essentials
12 16 (0.41%) Accessibility
13 15 (0.39%) MiFID
14 14 (0.36%) JSP 440
15 13 (0.34%) FINRA
15 13 (0.34%) Sarbanes-Oxley
16 12 (0.31%) HIPAA
16 12 (0.31%) PSD2
17 11 (0.28%) HL7
17 11 (0.28%) SEPA
System Software
1 172 (4.45%) Active Directory
2 118 (3.06%) Docker
3 88 (2.28%) VMware Infrastructure
4 62 (1.61%) VMware NSX
5 33 (0.85%) vSphere
6 19 (0.49%) Virtual Desktop
7 15 (0.39%) Hyper-V
8 13 (0.34%) Virtual Machines
9 11 (0.28%) VMware ESXi
10 8 (0.21%) Squid
11 7 (0.18%) BitLocker
11 7 (0.18%) vCloud
12 5 (0.13%) Oracle RAC
12 5 (0.13%) RACF
12 5 (0.13%) Varnish
13 4 (0.10%) Firmware
13 4 (0.10%) NFS
14 3 (0.078%) Active Directory Lightweight Directory Services
14 3 (0.078%) IAG
14 3 (0.078%) Postfix
Systems Management
1 225 (5.83%) Terraform
2 205 (5.31%) Kubernetes
3 99 (2.56%) Ansible
4 52 (1.35%) Single Sign-On
5 40 (1.04%) Microsoft Intune
6 31 (0.80%) vCenter Server
7 30 (0.78%) Grafana
7 30 (0.78%) OPNET
8 23 (0.60%) Prometheus
9 22 (0.57%) SCCM
10 21 (0.54%) FortiGate
11 17 (0.44%) Argo
12 16 (0.41%) Active Directory Federation Services
13 15 (0.39%) WMI
14 8 (0.21%) Istio
15 7 (0.18%) Consul
16 6 (0.16%) Puppet
17 5 (0.13%) Kibana
17 5 (0.13%) Progress Chef
18 3 (0.078%) Endace
Vendors
1 549 (14.22%) Microsoft
2 228 (5.91%) ServiceNow
3 216 (5.59%) SAP
4 167 (4.33%) VMware
5 160 (4.14%) Oracle
6 159 (4.12%) Salesforce
7 129 (3.34%) Databricks
8 103 (2.67%) Cisco
9 90 (2.33%) Google
10 89 (2.31%) CyberArk
11 61 (1.58%) MuleSoft
12 54 (1.40%) Splunk
13 49 (1.27%) Centrify
13 49 (1.27%) Palo Alto
13 49 (1.27%) Remedy
14 48 (1.24%) Red Hat
15 46 (1.19%) Atlassian
16 45 (1.17%) Workday
17 41 (1.06%) IBM
18 39 (1.01%) Sparx