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 12 May 2026.

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

6 months to
12 May 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 9 16 11
Rank change year-on-year +7 -5 +5
Contract jobs requiring an Architect 4,500 2,376 3,802
As % of all contract jobs in England 11.09% 9.77% 10.34%
As % of the Job Titles category 12.01% 10.56% 11.15%
Number of daily rates quoted 3,029 1,561 2,464
10th Percentile £463 £475 £500
25th Percentile £513 £548 £563
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £620 £625 £650
Median % change year-on-year -0.80% -3.85% -2.99%
75th Percentile £725 £716 £750
90th Percentile £788 £799 £825
UK median daily rate £617 £625 £650
% change year-on-year -1.28% -3.85% -0.76%
Number of hourly rates quoted 125 33 88
10th Percentile £49.40 £53.10 £60.00
25th Percentile £60.00 £61.50 £61.25
Median hourly rate £65.00 £72.50 £70.00
Median % change year-on-year -10.34% +3.57% -
75th Percentile £78.75 £80.59 £87.46
90th Percentile £97.50 £85.72 £90.60
UK median hourly rate £65.00 £71.25 £70.00
% change year-on-year -8.77% +1.79% -

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 37,472 22,498 34,093
% of contract IT jobs with a recognized job title 92.32% 92.54% 92.73%
Number of daily rates quoted 23,288 14,975 22,610
10th Percentile £313 £300 £281
25th Percentile £413 £408 £413
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £513 £525 £525
Median % change year-on-year -2.38% - -4.55%
75th Percentile £621 £638 £645
90th Percentile £725 £750 £750
UK median daily rate £507 £513 £525
% change year-on-year -1.07% -2.38% -2.78%
Number of hourly rates quoted 2,585 913 2,443
10th Percentile £15.77 £14.00 £12.87
25th Percentile £21.00 £18.51 £16.30
Median hourly rate £47.00 £30.32 £37.50
Median % change year-on-year +55.01% -19.15% -16.23%
75th Percentile £67.50 £63.75 £61.30
90th Percentile £78.75 £75.00 £73.75
UK median hourly rate £44.00 £28.60 £37.50
% change year-on-year +53.85% -23.73% -16.67%

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 12 May 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 12 May 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 12 May 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 +4 2,124 £625 -3.85% 439
South East +5 710 £625 - 182
North of England +1 634 £600 - 171
Midlands +2 438 £600 - 85
North West +5 360 £610 +2.31% 100
West Midlands 0 320 £613 +2.08% 56
South West +2 292 £693 +15.42% 84
Yorkshire +6 235 £550 -8.33% 45
East of England +19 200 £569 -5.21% 56
East Midlands -2 112 £538 -1.38% 29
North East +8 47 £575 -8.00% 26
Architect
UK

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

For the 6 months to 12 May 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 1,352 (30.04%) Security Cleared
2 1,028 (22.84%) Azure
3 939 (20.87%) SC Cleared
4 868 (19.29%) AWS
5 623 (13.84%) Roadmaps
6 607 (13.49%) Microsoft
7 597 (13.27%) Migration
8 557 (12.38%) Agile
9 509 (11.31%) DevOps
10 476 (10.58%) Stakeholder Management
11 465 (10.33%) CI/CD
12 441 (9.80%) Enterprise Architecture
13 414 (9.20%) AI
14 393 (8.73%) Data Modelling
15 385 (8.56%) Integration Patterns
15 385 (8.56%) Stakeholder Engagement
16 380 (8.44%) Technical Leadership
17 364 (8.09%) TOGAF
18 354 (7.87%) Analytics
19 346 (7.69%) Data Architecture
19 346 (7.69%) GCP
20 342 (7.60%) Architectural Patterns
21 328 (7.29%) Problem-Solving
22 318 (7.07%) Architectural Design
23 313 (6.96%) Microservices
24 307 (6.82%) DV Cleared
25 292 (6.49%) Python
26 278 (6.18%) ServiceNow
27 266 (5.91%) SAP
28 261 (5.80%) Security Architecture

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
1 109 (2.42%) SharePoint
2 98 (2.18%) Confluence
3 55 (1.22%) Microsoft Exchange
4 23 (0.51%) Apache
4 23 (0.51%) Apache Spark
5 18 (0.40%) SAS
6 16 (0.36%) Anypoint
6 16 (0.36%) Appian
6 16 (0.36%) CMS
7 14 (0.31%) Apache Airflow
8 13 (0.29%) nginx
9 11 (0.24%) OpenStack
9 11 (0.24%) Palantir Foundry
9 11 (0.24%) WebLogic
10 10 (0.22%) ArcGIS
11 9 (0.20%) Adobe Experience Manager
12 8 (0.18%) Camunda
13 7 (0.16%) Oracle SOA Suite
14 6 (0.13%) NetWeaver
14 6 (0.13%) Sitecore CMS
Applications
1 44 (0.98%) Microsoft Office
2 30 (0.67%) Microsoft Project
3 19 (0.42%) Microsoft PowerPoint
4 16 (0.36%) MS Visio
5 14 (0.31%) Microsoft Excel
6 7 (0.16%) Navisworks
6 7 (0.16%) Revit
7 4 (0.089%) Chatbot
8 2 (0.044%) PlantUML
8 2 (0.044%) Spreadsheet
9 1 (0.022%) ArchiCAD
9 1 (0.022%) AutoCAD
9 1 (0.022%) OrCAD
9 1 (0.022%) Siemens NX
9 1 (0.022%) Windchill
Business Applications
1 112 (2.49%) SAP S/4HANA
2 43 (0.96%) Sparx Enterprise Architect
3 19 (0.42%) Payment Gateway
3 19 (0.42%) Workday HCM
4 15 (0.33%) Teamcenter
5 14 (0.31%) Dynamics CRM
5 14 (0.31%) SAP ERP
6 13 (0.29%) Oracle EBS
7 10 (0.22%) Oracle Receivables
7 10 (0.22%) Remedy ITSM
8 9 (0.20%) Salesforce CRM
8 9 (0.20%) SAP EWM
9 8 (0.18%) Oracle ERP
9 8 (0.18%) SAP PM
10 7 (0.16%) SAP PP
10 7 (0.16%) SAP QM
11 6 (0.13%) NetSuite
11 6 (0.13%) Oracle Payables
11 6 (0.13%) R3 Corda
11 6 (0.13%) SAP BRIM
Cloud Services
1 1,028 (22.84%) Azure
2 868 (19.29%) AWS
3 346 (7.69%) GCP
4 208 (4.62%) Power Platform
5 173 (3.84%) Entra ID
6 154 (3.42%) Serverless
7 148 (3.29%) SaaS
8 124 (2.76%) Microsoft 365
9 100 (2.22%) GitHub
9 100 (2.22%) PaaS
10 97 (2.16%) Dynamics 365
11 87 (1.93%) Azure DevOps
12 74 (1.64%) AWS Lambda
12 74 (1.64%) Snowflake
13 73 (1.62%) Amazon S3
13 73 (1.62%) IaaS
14 69 (1.53%) OpenShift
15 59 (1.31%) Microsoft Purview
16 55 (1.22%) AWS CloudFormation
17 54 (1.20%) Azure Data Factory
Communications & Networking
1 157 (3.49%) Firewall
2 148 (3.29%) Network Security
3 106 (2.36%) WAN
4 102 (2.27%) DNS
5 94 (2.09%) VPN
6 79 (1.76%) LAN
7 52 (1.16%) SD-WAN
8 35 (0.78%) BGP
9 29 (0.64%) DHCP
9 29 (0.64%) OSPF
10 26 (0.58%) TCP/IP
11 25 (0.56%) MPLS
12 23 (0.51%) Wi-Fi
13 21 (0.47%) VLAN
14 20 (0.44%) BIG-IP
14 20 (0.44%) SAN
15 19 (0.42%) NAS
16 18 (0.40%) VXLAN
16 18 (0.40%) Wireless
17 16 (0.36%) VSAN
Database & Business Intelligence
1 154 (3.42%) Power BI
2 109 (2.42%) Metadata
3 99 (2.20%) Data Lake
4 92 (2.04%) Data Warehouse
5 64 (1.42%) SQL Server
6 56 (1.24%) NoSQL
7 50 (1.11%) PostgreSQL
8 38 (0.84%) Azure SQL Database
8 38 (0.84%) Tableau
9 29 (0.64%) Amazon Redshift
9 29 (0.64%) Big Data
10 28 (0.62%) Delta Lake
11 26 (0.58%) BigQuery
12 24 (0.53%) Oracle Database
13 21 (0.47%) GIS
14 20 (0.44%) Electronic Patient Records
15 19 (0.42%) Amazon Athena
16 16 (0.36%) Amazon Aurora
16 16 (0.36%) MongoDB
16 16 (0.36%) Star Schema
Development Applications
1 111 (2.47%) JIRA
2 80 (1.78%) Jenkins
3 54 (1.20%) Git
4 47 (1.04%) GitLab
5 20 (0.44%) ERwin
6 15 (0.33%) SonarQube
7 12 (0.27%) Artifactory
8 11 (0.24%) Bitbucket
8 11 (0.24%) MLflow
9 7 (0.16%) Postman
10 6 (0.13%) PowerDesigner
11 5 (0.11%) JUnit
11 5 (0.11%) Maven
11 5 (0.11%) REST Assured
12 4 (0.089%) Cucumber
12 4 (0.089%) MSI
12 4 (0.089%) Selenium
12 4 (0.089%) Snyk
12 4 (0.089%) Sonatype Nexus
12 4 (0.089%) Terragrunt
General
1 847 (18.82%) Social Skills
2 708 (15.73%) Finance
3 463 (10.29%) Public Sector
4 266 (5.91%) Banking
5 243 (5.40%) Analytical Skills
6 136 (3.02%) Retail
7 131 (2.91%) Documentation Skills
8 98 (2.18%) Influencing Skills
9 92 (2.04%) Legal
10 82 (1.82%) Military
10 82 (1.82%) Telecoms
11 72 (1.60%) Manufacturing
12 60 (1.33%) Law
12 60 (1.33%) Presentation Skills
13 53 (1.18%) Marketing
14 51 (1.13%) Billing
15 42 (0.93%) Financial Institution
16 35 (0.78%) Investment Banking
17 30 (0.67%) Aerospace
18 29 (0.64%) Inclusion and Diversity
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 205 (4.56%) REST
2 170 (3.78%) Middleware
3 115 (2.56%) SOAP
4 101 (2.24%) .NET
5 81 (1.80%) LDAP
6 78 (1.73%) OpenID
7 69 (1.53%) OAuth
8 66 (1.47%) Kafka
9 57 (1.27%) SAML
10 46 (1.02%) Oracle Fusion
11 41 (0.91%) OAuth2
12 40 (0.89%) SailPoint
13 37 (0.82%) React
14 33 (0.73%) JSON
15 32 (0.71%) RESTful
16 31 (0.69%) AngularJS
17 30 (0.67%) Web Services
18 25 (0.56%) PySpark
19 23 (0.51%) Spring
20 22 (0.49%) Node.js
Miscellaneous
1 368 (8.18%) Cloud Native
2 135 (3.00%) Product Ownership
3 124 (2.76%) Data Centre
4 120 (2.67%) Onboarding
5 103 (2.29%) Enterprise Software
5 103 (2.29%) Legacy Systems
6 94 (2.09%) Distributed Systems
7 91 (2.02%) Hybrid Cloud
8 82 (1.82%) Management Information System
9 73 (1.62%) Security Posture
10 72 (1.60%) Public Cloud
11 71 (1.58%) Operational Technology
12 70 (1.56%) Data Protection Act
13 59 (1.31%) CMDB
14 53 (1.18%) AI Agents
15 45 (1.00%) PKI
16 42 (0.93%) Data Structures
17 40 (0.89%) Private Cloud
18 36 (0.80%) Mainframe
19 30 (0.67%) NHS
Operating Systems
1 140 (3.11%) Windows
2 91 (2.02%) Linux
3 28 (0.62%) Windows Server
4 26 (0.58%) Android
4 26 (0.58%) Apple iOS
5 21 (0.47%) Unix
6 14 (0.31%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
7 11 (0.24%) zOS
8 10 (0.22%) Windows 10
9 9 (0.20%) VMS
10 8 (0.18%) Windows 7
10 8 (0.18%) Windows Server 2016
11 7 (0.16%) Mac OS
12 5 (0.11%) Windows Server 2019
13 3 (0.067%) CentOS
13 3 (0.067%) Data ONTAP
13 3 (0.067%) Solaris
13 3 (0.067%) Windows Server 2012
14 2 (0.044%) AIX
14 2 (0.044%) Ubuntu
Processes & Methodologies
1 623 (13.84%) Roadmaps
2 597 (13.27%) Migration
3 557 (12.38%) Agile
4 509 (11.31%) DevOps
5 476 (10.58%) Stakeholder Management
6 465 (10.33%) CI/CD
7 441 (9.80%) Enterprise Architecture
8 414 (9.20%) AI
9 393 (8.73%) Data Modelling
10 385 (8.56%) Integration Patterns
10 385 (8.56%) Stakeholder Engagement
11 380 (8.44%) Technical Leadership
12 364 (8.09%) TOGAF
13 354 (7.87%) Analytics
14 346 (7.69%) Data Architecture
15 342 (7.60%) Architectural Patterns
16 328 (7.29%) Problem-Solving
17 318 (7.07%) Architectural Design
18 313 (6.96%) Microservices
19 261 (5.80%) Security Architecture
Programming Languages
1 292 (6.49%) Python
2 228 (5.07%) SQL
3 165 (3.67%) Java
4 146 (3.24%) PowerShell
5 77 (1.71%) JavaScript
6 51 (1.13%) C#
7 42 (0.93%) Bicep
8 31 (0.69%) Bash
8 31 (0.69%) TypeScript
9 18 (0.40%) Apex Code
9 18 (0.40%) PL/SQL
9 18 (0.40%) Ruby
10 16 (0.36%) Scala
11 13 (0.29%) Kusto Query Language
12 10 (0.22%) Shell Script
13 9 (0.20%) Kotlin
13 9 (0.20%) T-SQL
14 7 (0.16%) R
14 7 (0.16%) VBA
15 6 (0.13%) C++
Qualifications
1 1,352 (30.04%) Security Cleared
2 939 (20.87%) SC Cleared
3 307 (6.82%) DV Cleared
4 181 (4.02%) Degree
5 116 (2.58%) TOGAF Certification
6 106 (2.36%) Azure Certification
7 95 (2.11%) CISSP
8 93 (2.07%) AWS Certification
9 74 (1.64%) Cisco Certification
10 73 (1.62%) Computer Science Degree
11 70 (1.56%) BPSS Clearance
12 47 (1.04%) CISM
13 44 (0.98%) Microsoft Certification
14 41 (0.91%) CCNP
15 39 (0.87%) Master's Degree
16 36 (0.80%) AWS Certified Solutions Architect
17 26 (0.58%) (ISC)2 CCSP
18 23 (0.51%) ITIL Certification
19 20 (0.44%) CCIE
19 20 (0.44%) ISEB
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 165 (3.67%) NIST
2 151 (3.36%) GDPR
3 125 (2.78%) ISO/IEC 27001
4 121 (2.69%) Data Quality
5 92 (2.04%) NCSC
6 61 (1.36%) QA
7 40 (0.89%) PCI DSS
8 27 (0.60%) COBIT
8 27 (0.60%) GRC
9 25 (0.56%) ISO 20022
10 24 (0.53%) Cyber Essentials
11 20 (0.44%) Accessibility
12 19 (0.42%) NIST 800
12 19 (0.42%) SEPA
13 17 (0.38%) Sarbanes-Oxley
14 16 (0.36%) HL7
15 13 (0.29%) FINRA
15 13 (0.29%) MiFID
16 12 (0.27%) PSD2
17 9 (0.20%) IFRS
System Software
1 180 (4.00%) Active Directory
2 96 (2.13%) Docker
3 84 (1.87%) VMware Infrastructure
4 65 (1.44%) VMware NSX
5 25 (0.56%) Virtual Desktop
5 25 (0.56%) vSphere
6 20 (0.44%) Virtual Machines
7 17 (0.38%) Hyper-V
8 13 (0.29%) VMware ESXi
9 10 (0.22%) vCloud
10 9 (0.20%) NFS
10 9 (0.20%) Squid
11 8 (0.18%) Varnish
12 6 (0.13%) Postfix
13 5 (0.11%) RACF
14 4 (0.089%) BitLocker
14 4 (0.089%) Firmware
14 4 (0.089%) Oracle RAC
14 4 (0.089%) Sendmail
15 3 (0.067%) Slurm Workload Manager
Systems Management
1 224 (4.98%) Terraform
2 203 (4.51%) Kubernetes
3 94 (2.09%) Ansible
4 47 (1.04%) Single Sign-On
5 38 (0.84%) Microsoft Intune
6 34 (0.76%) Grafana
7 29 (0.64%) OPNET
8 27 (0.60%) vCenter Server
9 23 (0.51%) Prometheus
10 22 (0.49%) FortiGate
11 17 (0.38%) SCCM
12 13 (0.29%) Active Directory Federation Services
12 13 (0.29%) Argo
13 10 (0.22%) Istio
14 9 (0.20%) WMI
15 8 (0.18%) Puppet
16 7 (0.16%) Consul
17 6 (0.13%) HAProxy
17 6 (0.13%) Progress Chef
18 5 (0.11%) Endace
Vendors
1 607 (13.49%) Microsoft
2 278 (6.18%) ServiceNow
3 266 (5.91%) SAP
4 189 (4.20%) Oracle
5 176 (3.91%) VMware
6 168 (3.73%) Databricks
7 164 (3.64%) Salesforce
8 101 (2.24%) Cisco
9 94 (2.09%) Google
10 85 (1.89%) CyberArk
11 67 (1.49%) MuleSoft
12 55 (1.22%) Splunk
13 47 (1.04%) Workday
14 46 (1.02%) Remedy
15 45 (1.00%) Sparx
16 42 (0.93%) Atlassian
17 41 (0.91%) Palo Alto
17 41 (0.91%) Red Hat
18 39 (0.87%) BeyondTrust
18 39 (0.87%) IBM