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 25 December 2025.

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

6 months to
25 Dec 2025
Same period 2024 Same period 2023
Rank 19 16 16
Rank change year-on-year -3 0 +6
Contract jobs requiring an Architect 2,984 2,781 3,382
As % of all contract jobs in England 9.41% 9.68% 9.22%
As % of the Job Titles category 10.31% 10.41% 9.88%
Number of daily rates quoted 2,057 1,678 2,320
10th Percentile £461 £479 £500
25th Percentile £520 £547 £563
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £625 £625 £650
Median % change year-on-year - -3.85% -
75th Percentile £720 £735 £730
90th Percentile £788 £799 £775
UK median daily rate £625 £625 £650
% change year-on-year - -3.85% -
Number of hourly rates quoted 39 28 32
10th Percentile £64.25 £59.48 £57.65
25th Percentile £66.13 £62.25 £71.50
Median hourly rate £83.82 £71.25 £76.53
Median % change year-on-year +17.64% -6.90% +9.33%
75th Percentile £95.00 £81.00 £83.49
90th Percentile - £87.50 £93.25
UK median hourly rate £83.82 £72.50 £76.53
% change year-on-year +15.61% -5.27% +9.33%

All Contract IT Job Vacancies
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 28,956 26,703 34,238
% of contract IT jobs with a recognized job title 91.32% 92.91% 93.33%
Number of daily rates quoted 18,454 16,603 23,422
10th Percentile £295 £300 £283
25th Percentile £406 £413 £413
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £508 £525 £528
Median % change year-on-year -3.33% -0.47% -4.09%
75th Percentile £625 £638 £650
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 1,777 840 1,400
10th Percentile £14.38 £15.75 £15.16
25th Percentile £18.22 £21.25 £20.00
Median hourly rate £26.30 £35.50 £45.88
Median % change year-on-year -25.92% -22.62% +41.17%
75th Percentile £60.25 £65.00 £65.00
90th Percentile £72.20 £74.47 £77.00
UK median hourly rate £25.20 £33.00 £45.00
% change year-on-year -23.64% -26.67% +45.77%

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 25 December 2025.

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 25 December 2025.

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 25 December 2025. 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 -1 1,350 £640 +1.99% 486
South East +8 546 £600 -4.00% 400
North of England -7 389 £600 -3.89% 355
Midlands -5 258 £574 -4.38% 236
South West -1 253 £700 +12.00% 160
North West -7 235 £598 -4.02% 190
West Midlands -7 196 £582 -3.04% 136
Yorkshire -13 136 £600 -5.51% 138
East of England 0 98 £553 -7.92% 215
East Midlands -3 62 £519 -9.78% 89
North East -10 19 £700 +16.74% 28
Architect
UK

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

For the 6 months to 25 December 2025, 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.

1 969 (32.47%) Security Cleared
2 811 (27.18%) Azure
3 665 (22.29%) SC Cleared
4 609 (20.41%) AWS
5 469 (15.72%) Roadmaps
6 440 (14.75%) Agile
7 430 (14.41%) Microsoft
8 397 (13.30%) Stakeholder Management
9 344 (11.53%) Enterprise Architecture
10 332 (11.13%) Migration
11 326 (10.92%) Data Modelling
12 321 (10.76%) TOGAF
13 315 (10.56%) Stakeholder Engagement
14 314 (10.52%) DevOps
15 292 (9.79%) Problem-Solving
16 284 (9.52%) Technical Leadership
17 268 (8.98%) CI/CD
18 251 (8.41%) GCP
19 239 (8.01%) DV Cleared
19 239 (8.01%) Microservices
20 236 (7.91%) AI
21 232 (7.77%) Data Architecture
22 227 (7.61%) Analytics
22 227 (7.61%) Python
23 203 (6.80%) Integration Patterns
24 201 (6.74%) Terraform
25 197 (6.60%) Architectural Design
25 197 (6.60%) ITIL
26 187 (6.27%) Mentoring
27 184 (6.17%) Data Governance

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 88 (2.95%) Confluence
2 53 (1.78%) SharePoint
3 32 (1.07%) Microsoft Exchange
4 18 (0.60%) OpenStack
4 18 (0.60%) SAS
5 16 (0.54%) CMS
6 15 (0.50%) Apache Airflow
7 14 (0.47%) ArcGIS
8 13 (0.44%) Apache Spark
9 9 (0.30%) Anypoint
9 9 (0.30%) Apache
10 7 (0.23%) Smallworld
11 5 (0.17%) Oracle Workflow
11 5 (0.17%) WebSphere
12 4 (0.13%) Documentum
12 4 (0.13%) Ethereum
12 4 (0.13%) GeoServer
12 4 (0.13%) Hyperledger
12 4 (0.13%) Tomcat
12 4 (0.13%) WebLogic
Applications
1 46 (1.54%) Microsoft Office
2 33 (1.11%) Microsoft Project
3 23 (0.77%) Microsoft Excel
4 18 (0.60%) Microsoft PowerPoint
4 18 (0.60%) MS Visio
5 11 (0.37%) Siemens NX
6 3 (0.10%) Chatbot
6 3 (0.10%) Spreadsheet
7 1 (0.034%) AutoCAD
7 1 (0.034%) FrameMaker
7 1 (0.034%) Revit
7 1 (0.034%) Trello
Business Applications
1 81 (2.71%) SAP S/4HANA
2 34 (1.14%) Sparx Enterprise Architect
3 28 (0.94%) Dynamics CRM
4 25 (0.84%) Workday HCM
5 18 (0.60%) Salesforce CRM
6 17 (0.57%) Maximo
7 16 (0.54%) SAP PM
8 13 (0.44%) Payment Gateway
8 13 (0.44%) SAP CO
8 13 (0.44%) Teamcenter
9 12 (0.40%) NetSuite
10 11 (0.37%) SAP FI
10 11 (0.37%) SAP FI/CO
11 10 (0.34%) Remedy ITSM
12 9 (0.30%) Endur
13 8 (0.27%) SAP PP
14 7 (0.23%) Aladdin
14 7 (0.23%) Oracle EBS
14 7 (0.23%) Oracle Receivables
15 6 (0.20%) SAP EWM
Cloud Services
1 811 (27.18%) Azure
2 609 (20.41%) AWS
3 251 (8.41%) GCP
4 123 (4.12%) Power Platform
5 120 (4.02%) SaaS
6 101 (3.38%) Entra ID
7 93 (3.12%) Serverless
8 89 (2.98%) Microsoft 365
9 72 (2.41%) IaaS
10 69 (2.31%) GitHub
11 68 (2.28%) Dynamics 365
12 66 (2.21%) Azure DevOps
13 58 (1.94%) PaaS
14 57 (1.91%) AWS Lambda
15 50 (1.68%) OpenShift
16 49 (1.64%) Azure Synapse Analytics
16 49 (1.64%) Microsoft Purview
17 45 (1.51%) Amazon S3
17 45 (1.51%) Azure Data Factory
17 45 (1.51%) Snowflake
Communications & Networking
1 181 (6.07%) Firewall
2 110 (3.69%) WAN
3 94 (3.15%) LAN
4 86 (2.88%) Network Security
5 80 (2.68%) VPN
6 71 (2.38%) DNS
6 71 (2.38%) SD-WAN
7 43 (1.44%) Wi-Fi
8 33 (1.11%) BGP
9 27 (0.90%) MPLS
10 25 (0.84%) Cisco Nexus
11 23 (0.77%) SAN
12 22 (0.74%) DHCP
12 22 (0.74%) VSAN
13 21 (0.70%) Internet
14 20 (0.67%) SSL
15 17 (0.57%) OSPF
16 14 (0.47%) VLAN
17 13 (0.44%) IPsec
18 12 (0.40%) TCP/IP
Database & Business Intelligence
1 99 (3.32%) Data Warehouse
2 83 (2.78%) Power BI
3 72 (2.41%) Metadata
4 65 (2.18%) Data Lake
5 53 (1.78%) PostgreSQL
6 48 (1.61%) SQL Server
7 34 (1.14%) NoSQL
8 32 (1.07%) Tableau
9 25 (0.84%) Amazon Redshift
10 23 (0.77%) Relational Database
11 22 (0.74%) Azure SQL Database
12 21 (0.70%) MongoDB
13 20 (0.67%) Delta Lake
13 20 (0.67%) DynamoDB
13 20 (0.67%) GIS
14 19 (0.64%) BigQuery
14 19 (0.64%) Data Vault
15 18 (0.60%) Big Data
16 16 (0.54%) Amazon RDS
16 16 (0.54%) Oracle Database
Development Applications
1 108 (3.62%) JIRA
2 64 (2.14%) Jenkins
3 46 (1.54%) Git
4 31 (1.04%) GitLab
5 13 (0.44%) ERwin
6 9 (0.30%) SonarQube
7 8 (0.27%) Artifactory
8 7 (0.23%) Oracle Forms
9 6 (0.20%) Bitbucket
9 6 (0.20%) MLflow
10 5 (0.17%) Gradle
10 5 (0.17%) Maven
10 5 (0.17%) Rational DOORS
10 5 (0.17%) SonarLint
10 5 (0.17%) Sonatype Nexus
11 4 (0.13%) MSI
11 4 (0.13%) Postman
11 4 (0.13%) Terragrunt
12 3 (0.10%) PowerDesigner
12 3 (0.10%) Visual Studio Code
General
1 798 (26.74%) Social Skills
2 491 (16.45%) Finance
3 363 (12.16%) Public Sector
4 247 (8.28%) Analytical Skills
5 183 (6.13%) Banking
6 91 (3.05%) Telecoms
7 78 (2.61%) Retail
8 72 (2.41%) Marketing
9 68 (2.28%) Military
10 67 (2.25%) Presentation Skills
11 64 (2.14%) Documentation Skills
11 64 (2.14%) Legal
12 60 (2.01%) Manufacturing
13 59 (1.98%) Influencing Skills
14 39 (1.31%) Inclusion and Diversity
15 34 (1.14%) Financial Institution
16 28 (0.94%) Billing
17 26 (0.87%) Back Office
18 19 (0.64%) Aerospace
18 19 (0.64%) Pharmaceutical
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 152 (5.09%) REST
2 91 (3.05%) Middleware
3 90 (3.02%) SOAP
4 66 (2.21%) .NET
5 58 (1.94%) JSON
6 47 (1.58%) OAuth
7 45 (1.51%) Kafka
8 41 (1.37%) SAML
9 38 (1.27%) RESTful
10 37 (1.24%) LDAP
11 33 (1.11%) Lightning Web Components
12 28 (0.94%) Web Services
13 27 (0.90%) OpenID
14 26 (0.87%) AngularJS
15 25 (0.84%) OAuth2
15 25 (0.84%) PySpark
15 25 (0.84%) React
16 24 (0.80%) Spring Boot
17 22 (0.74%) Visualforce
18 20 (0.67%) SailPoint
Miscellaneous
1 221 (7.41%) Cloud Native
2 129 (4.32%) Product Ownership
3 110 (3.69%) Legacy Systems
4 105 (3.52%) Data Centre
5 81 (2.71%) PKI
6 80 (2.68%) Onboarding
7 72 (2.41%) Hybrid Cloud
8 61 (2.04%) Enterprise Software
9 47 (1.58%) Security Posture
10 46 (1.54%) Operational Technology
11 43 (1.44%) Management Information System
12 42 (1.41%) Self-Motivation
13 41 (1.37%) CMDB
14 35 (1.17%) Data Protection Act
14 35 (1.17%) Public Cloud
15 33 (1.11%) Distributed Systems
16 30 (1.01%) Data Structures
17 29 (0.97%) Private Cloud
18 28 (0.94%) NHS
19 27 (0.90%) SCADA
Operating Systems
1 128 (4.29%) Windows
2 79 (2.65%) Linux
3 41 (1.37%) Windows Server
4 20 (0.67%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
5 17 (0.57%) Windows Server 2019
6 15 (0.50%) Windows 10
7 13 (0.44%) Windows 7
8 10 (0.34%) Mac OS
9 9 (0.30%) Unix
10 8 (0.27%) VMS
11 7 (0.23%) Windows Server 2016
12 6 (0.20%) Ubuntu
13 5 (0.17%) Android
13 5 (0.17%) Apple iOS
14 3 (0.10%) CentOS
14 3 (0.10%) Solaris
14 3 (0.10%) Windows Server 2008
14 3 (0.10%) zOS
15 1 (0.034%) AIX
15 1 (0.034%) MVS
Processes & Methodologies
1 469 (15.72%) Roadmaps
2 440 (14.75%) Agile
3 397 (13.30%) Stakeholder Management
4 344 (11.53%) Enterprise Architecture
5 332 (11.13%) Migration
6 326 (10.92%) Data Modelling
7 321 (10.76%) TOGAF
8 315 (10.56%) Stakeholder Engagement
9 314 (10.52%) DevOps
10 292 (9.79%) Problem-Solving
11 284 (9.52%) Technical Leadership
12 268 (8.98%) CI/CD
13 239 (8.01%) Microservices
14 236 (7.91%) AI
15 232 (7.77%) Data Architecture
16 227 (7.61%) Analytics
17 203 (6.80%) Integration Patterns
18 197 (6.60%) Architectural Design
18 197 (6.60%) ITIL
19 187 (6.27%) Mentoring
Programming Languages
1 227 (7.61%) Python
2 147 (4.93%) SQL
3 133 (4.46%) PowerShell
4 128 (4.29%) Java
5 55 (1.84%) JavaScript
6 39 (1.31%) C#
7 34 (1.14%) Bash
7 34 (1.14%) TypeScript
8 29 (0.97%) Apex Code
9 27 (0.90%) Bicep
10 16 (0.54%) R
11 14 (0.47%) PL/SQL
12 10 (0.34%) C
13 9 (0.30%) C++
14 7 (0.23%) T-SQL
15 6 (0.20%) ABAP
15 6 (0.20%) Korn
15 6 (0.20%) PHP
16 5 (0.17%) Kusto Query Language
16 5 (0.17%) Ruby
Qualifications
1 969 (32.47%) Security Cleared
2 665 (22.29%) SC Cleared
3 239 (8.01%) DV Cleared
4 168 (5.63%) Degree
5 94 (3.15%) AWS Certification
6 93 (3.12%) TOGAF Certification
7 92 (3.08%) CISSP
8 90 (3.02%) Azure Certification
9 65 (2.18%) Computer Science Degree
10 61 (2.04%) Cisco Certification
11 59 (1.98%) Microsoft Certification
12 40 (1.34%) Master's Degree
13 38 (1.27%) AWS Certified Solutions Architect
13 38 (1.27%) CISM
14 35 (1.17%) BPSS Clearance
14 35 (1.17%) CCNP
15 31 (1.04%) CCIE
16 24 (0.80%) ITIL Certification
17 23 (0.77%) ISEB
18 20 (0.67%) (ISC)2 CCSP
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 145 (4.86%) GDPR
2 113 (3.79%) ISO/IEC 27001
3 111 (3.72%) NIST
4 90 (3.02%) Data Quality
5 56 (1.88%) QA
6 55 (1.84%) NCSC
7 43 (1.44%) PCI DSS
8 30 (1.01%) ISO/IEC 20000
9 27 (0.90%) COBIT
10 21 (0.70%) Cyber Essentials
11 20 (0.67%) California Consumer Privacy Act
11 20 (0.67%) GRC
12 18 (0.60%) HIPAA
12 18 (0.60%) JSP 440
13 15 (0.50%) Accessibility
14 12 (0.40%) ISO 20022
15 11 (0.37%) EU AI Act
15 11 (0.37%) Sarbanes-Oxley
15 11 (0.37%) SLA
16 10 (0.34%) HMG Security Policy Framework
System Software
1 126 (4.22%) Active Directory
2 107 (3.59%) Docker
3 88 (2.95%) VMware Infrastructure
4 35 (1.17%) VMware NSX
5 33 (1.11%) vSphere
6 22 (0.74%) VMware ESXi
7 19 (0.64%) Virtual Desktop
8 14 (0.47%) Virtual Machines
9 11 (0.37%) NFS
10 10 (0.34%) Hyper-V
11 4 (0.13%) Dovecot
11 4 (0.13%) Postfix
12 3 (0.10%) BitLocker
12 3 (0.10%) Lustre
12 3 (0.10%) Slurm Workload Manager
12 3 (0.10%) vCloud
13 2 (0.067%) Ceph
13 2 (0.067%) Firmware
13 2 (0.067%) KVM
14 1 (0.034%) RACF
Systems Management
1 201 (6.74%) Terraform
2 154 (5.16%) Kubernetes
3 87 (2.92%) Ansible
4 43 (1.44%) Single Sign-On
5 33 (1.11%) OPNET
6 22 (0.74%) Microsoft Intune
7 21 (0.70%) vCenter Server
8 20 (0.67%) SCCM
9 14 (0.47%) Active Directory Federation Services
9 14 (0.47%) WMI
10 11 (0.37%) Prometheus
11 10 (0.34%) Grafana
12 9 (0.30%) Argo
13 6 (0.20%) FortiGate
14 5 (0.17%) Kibana
15 4 (0.13%) Istio
15 4 (0.13%) vRealize
16 3 (0.10%) Karpenter
16 3 (0.10%) Puppet
16 3 (0.10%) RSA Archer
Vendors
1 430 (14.41%) Microsoft
2 184 (6.17%) SAP
3 183 (6.13%) ServiceNow
4 166 (5.56%) Salesforce
5 141 (4.73%) VMware
6 137 (4.59%) Oracle
7 117 (3.92%) Cisco
8 93 (3.12%) Databricks
9 74 (2.48%) Google
10 64 (2.14%) CyberArk
11 51 (1.71%) Fortinet
12 50 (1.68%) Palo Alto
13 48 (1.61%) Remedy
13 48 (1.61%) Workday
14 45 (1.51%) Splunk
15 40 (1.34%) IBM
16 38 (1.27%) MuleSoft
17 37 (1.24%) Atlassian
18 36 (1.21%) Centrify
19 35 (1.17%) Juniper