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 31 March 2026.

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

6 months to
31 Mar 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 14 16 11
Rank change year-on-year +2 -5 +6
Contract jobs requiring an Architect 4,125 2,453 3,822
As % of all contract jobs in England 10.84% 10.11% 10.14%
As % of the Job Titles category 11.76% 10.87% 10.94%
Number of daily rates quoted 2,793 1,629 2,521
10th Percentile £463 £475 £500
25th Percentile £513 £538 £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 £799 £825
UK median daily rate £620 £625 £650
% change year-on-year -0.80% -3.85% -1.89%
Number of hourly rates quoted 104 33 45
10th Percentile £49.40 £53.10 £51.32
25th Percentile £60.00 £61.50 £60.00
Median hourly rate £71.89 £70.00 £83.77
Median % change year-on-year +2.69% -16.43% +19.66%
75th Percentile £90.09 £80.00 £87.53
90th Percentile £97.50 £85.50 £95.00
UK median hourly rate £71.27 £70.00 £83.50
% change year-on-year +1.81% -16.17% +19.29%

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 35,066 22,560 34,942
% of contract IT jobs with a recognized job title 92.17% 92.94% 92.73%
Number of daily rates quoted 22,087 15,093 23,351
10th Percentile £313 £300 £275
25th Percentile £413 £409 £410
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £505 £525 £525
Median % change year-on-year -3.81% - -4.55%
75th Percentile £621 £638 £638
90th Percentile £725 £750 £750
UK median daily rate £500 £520 £525
% change year-on-year -3.85% -0.95% -3.67%
Number of hourly rates quoted 2,320 837 2,307
10th Percentile £15.50 £14.99 £13.00
25th Percentile £19.91 £21.00 £16.25
Median hourly rate £41.77 £34.50 £32.50
Median % change year-on-year +21.07% +6.15% -24.14%
75th Percentile £65.00 £65.00 £59.95
90th Percentile £77.50 £77.31 £71.75
UK median hourly rate £38.63 £32.50 £32.90
% change year-on-year +18.86% -1.20% -25.00%

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 31 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 31 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 31 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 -1 1,865 £625 -3.85% 476
South East +4 701 £625 - 256
North of England +5 597 £600 - 194
Midlands 0 398 £575 -4.17% 95
North West +7 337 £610 +1.67% 100
West Midlands -2 298 £600 -0.50% 69
South West +1 281 £700 +15.46% 98
Yorkshire +7 236 £558 -10.72% 70
East of England +17 180 £545 -12.80% 71
East Midlands 0 96 £525 -7.49% 26
North East +5 33 £575 -7.95% 28
Architect
UK

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

For the 6 months to 31 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 1,320 (32.00%) Security Cleared
2 987 (23.93%) Azure
3 897 (21.75%) SC Cleared
4 823 (19.95%) AWS
5 601 (14.57%) Roadmaps
6 592 (14.35%) Microsoft
7 546 (13.24%) Agile
8 530 (12.85%) Migration
9 470 (11.39%) DevOps
10 452 (10.96%) Stakeholder Management
11 426 (10.33%) Enterprise Architecture
12 419 (10.16%) CI/CD
13 399 (9.67%) Stakeholder Engagement
14 389 (9.43%) Data Modelling
15 371 (8.99%) TOGAF
16 370 (8.97%) Technical Leadership
17 348 (8.44%) AI
18 347 (8.41%) Integration Patterns
19 346 (8.39%) GCP
20 342 (8.29%) Problem-Solving
21 338 (8.19%) Analytics
22 337 (8.17%) Data Architecture
23 312 (7.56%) DV Cleared
24 308 (7.47%) Architectural Patterns
25 304 (7.37%) Architectural Design
26 303 (7.35%) Python
27 291 (7.05%) Microservices
28 250 (6.06%) Security Architecture
29 242 (5.87%) ServiceNow
30 238 (5.77%) SAP

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
1 117 (2.84%) Confluence
2 101 (2.45%) SharePoint
3 62 (1.50%) Microsoft Exchange
4 26 (0.63%) SAS
5 23 (0.56%) CMS
6 21 (0.51%) Apache Spark
7 16 (0.39%) Anypoint
8 15 (0.36%) Appian
8 15 (0.36%) ArcGIS
9 14 (0.34%) Apache
9 14 (0.34%) Apache Airflow
10 12 (0.29%) nginx
11 11 (0.27%) WebLogic
12 9 (0.22%) Adobe Experience Manager
12 9 (0.22%) OpenStack
13 7 (0.17%) Oracle SOA Suite
13 7 (0.17%) Skype for Business
14 6 (0.15%) NetWeaver
14 6 (0.15%) Sitecore CMS
14 6 (0.15%) Smallworld
Applications
1 50 (1.21%) Microsoft Office
2 31 (0.75%) Microsoft Project
3 27 (0.65%) Microsoft PowerPoint
4 24 (0.58%) Microsoft Excel
5 18 (0.44%) MS Visio
6 6 (0.15%) Chatbot
7 1 (0.024%) ArchiCAD
7 1 (0.024%) AutoCAD
7 1 (0.024%) OrCAD
7 1 (0.024%) PlantUML
7 1 (0.024%) Siemens NX
7 1 (0.024%) Spreadsheet
7 1 (0.024%) Windchill
Business Applications
1 106 (2.57%) SAP S/4HANA
2 45 (1.09%) Sparx Enterprise Architect
3 21 (0.51%) Dynamics CRM
3 21 (0.51%) Workday HCM
4 19 (0.46%) Payment Gateway
5 14 (0.34%) Oracle EBS
5 14 (0.34%) SAP ERP
6 13 (0.32%) Salesforce CRM
7 10 (0.24%) NetSuite
7 10 (0.24%) Oracle Receivables
7 10 (0.24%) Remedy ITSM
7 10 (0.24%) SAP PM
8 9 (0.22%) Maximo
8 9 (0.22%) SAP EWM
8 9 (0.22%) Teamcenter
9 8 (0.19%) SAP PP
10 7 (0.17%) SAP QM
11 6 (0.15%) Oracle Payables
11 6 (0.15%) R3 Corda
11 6 (0.15%) SAP CRM
Cloud Services
1 987 (23.93%) Azure
2 823 (19.95%) AWS
3 346 (8.39%) GCP
4 183 (4.44%) Power Platform
5 162 (3.93%) Entra ID
6 135 (3.27%) SaaS
6 135 (3.27%) Serverless
7 130 (3.15%) Microsoft 365
8 102 (2.47%) IaaS
9 99 (2.40%) GitHub
10 91 (2.21%) PaaS
11 89 (2.16%) Azure DevOps
12 88 (2.13%) Dynamics 365
13 73 (1.77%) OpenShift
14 69 (1.67%) AWS Lambda
15 62 (1.50%) Microsoft Purview
16 60 (1.45%) Amazon S3
17 59 (1.43%) Azure Synapse Analytics
18 58 (1.41%) Snowflake
19 57 (1.38%) Virtual Private Cloud
Communications & Networking
1 183 (4.44%) Firewall
2 146 (3.54%) Network Security
3 123 (2.98%) WAN
4 121 (2.93%) DNS
5 112 (2.72%) VPN
6 82 (1.99%) LAN
7 66 (1.60%) SD-WAN
8 35 (0.85%) BGP
8 35 (0.85%) DHCP
9 31 (0.75%) OSPF
10 30 (0.73%) Wi-Fi
11 29 (0.70%) MPLS
12 27 (0.65%) TCP/IP
13 24 (0.58%) VLAN
14 23 (0.56%) SAN
15 20 (0.48%) VXLAN
16 19 (0.46%) Wireless
17 17 (0.41%) BIG-IP
17 17 (0.41%) VSAN
18 16 (0.39%) NAS
Database & Business Intelligence
1 141 (3.42%) Power BI
2 115 (2.79%) Data Warehouse
3 111 (2.69%) Metadata
4 85 (2.06%) Data Lake
5 69 (1.67%) SQL Server
6 54 (1.31%) NoSQL
7 50 (1.21%) PostgreSQL
8 45 (1.09%) Tableau
9 35 (0.85%) Azure SQL Database
10 33 (0.80%) Oracle Database
11 31 (0.75%) Big Data
12 25 (0.61%) Amazon Redshift
13 23 (0.56%) Delta Lake
13 23 (0.56%) GIS
14 21 (0.51%) BigQuery
15 20 (0.48%) Electronic Patient Records
15 20 (0.48%) Metadata Repository
16 19 (0.46%) Amazon Athena
17 18 (0.44%) Relational Database
18 16 (0.39%) Amazon Aurora
Development Applications
1 132 (3.20%) JIRA
2 88 (2.13%) Jenkins
3 45 (1.09%) Git
4 40 (0.97%) GitLab
5 20 (0.48%) ERwin
6 11 (0.27%) Bitbucket
6 11 (0.27%) SonarQube
7 10 (0.24%) Artifactory
8 9 (0.22%) MLflow
9 5 (0.12%) Postman
9 5 (0.12%) PowerDesigner
9 5 (0.12%) Rational DOORS
9 5 (0.12%) REST Assured
10 4 (0.097%) Cucumber
10 4 (0.097%) Selenium
10 4 (0.097%) Snyk
10 4 (0.097%) Sonatype Nexus
10 4 (0.097%) Terragrunt
11 3 (0.073%) Maven
11 3 (0.073%) MSI
General
1 856 (20.75%) Social Skills
2 672 (16.29%) Finance
3 470 (11.39%) Public Sector
4 280 (6.79%) Analytical Skills
5 263 (6.38%) Banking
6 136 (3.30%) Documentation Skills
7 98 (2.38%) Influencing Skills
8 94 (2.28%) Retail
9 85 (2.06%) Military
10 83 (2.01%) Legal
11 74 (1.79%) Telecoms
12 68 (1.65%) Presentation Skills
13 61 (1.48%) Law
14 58 (1.41%) Marketing
15 49 (1.19%) Manufacturing
16 47 (1.14%) Financial Institution
17 33 (0.80%) Billing
18 30 (0.73%) Inclusion and Diversity
18 30 (0.73%) Investment Banking
19 22 (0.53%) Local Government
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 211 (5.12%) REST
2 161 (3.90%) Middleware
3 102 (2.47%) SOAP
4 80 (1.94%) .NET
5 78 (1.89%) OpenID
6 76 (1.84%) LDAP
7 68 (1.65%) OAuth
8 61 (1.48%) Kafka
9 60 (1.45%) SAML
10 54 (1.31%) JSON
11 43 (1.04%) OAuth2
12 37 (0.90%) AngularJS
13 34 (0.82%) React
14 32 (0.78%) SailPoint
15 31 (0.75%) RESTful
16 27 (0.65%) Spring
17 26 (0.63%) Web Services
18 23 (0.56%) Oracle Fusion
19 22 (0.53%) PySpark
20 20 (0.48%) XML
Miscellaneous
1 325 (7.88%) Cloud Native
2 139 (3.37%) Product Ownership
3 117 (2.84%) Data Centre
4 109 (2.64%) Onboarding
5 104 (2.52%) Enterprise Software
6 102 (2.47%) Legacy Systems
7 88 (2.13%) Hybrid Cloud
8 83 (2.01%) PKI
9 76 (1.84%) Distributed Systems
10 66 (1.60%) Security Posture
11 64 (1.55%) Public Cloud
12 62 (1.50%) Data Protection Act
13 61 (1.48%) Management Information System
14 60 (1.45%) Operational Technology
15 53 (1.28%) CMDB
16 49 (1.19%) Self-Motivation
17 40 (0.97%) AI Agents
17 40 (0.97%) Data Structures
18 37 (0.90%) Private Cloud
19 31 (0.75%) Replication
Operating Systems
1 161 (3.90%) Windows
2 97 (2.35%) Linux
3 35 (0.85%) Windows Server
4 24 (0.58%) Android
4 24 (0.58%) Apple iOS
5 16 (0.39%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
6 15 (0.36%) Windows 7
7 14 (0.34%) Unix
7 14 (0.34%) Windows 10
8 10 (0.24%) zOS
9 9 (0.22%) Mac OS
10 8 (0.19%) VMS
10 8 (0.19%) Windows Server 2016
11 5 (0.12%) Windows Server 2019
12 3 (0.073%) Ubuntu
12 3 (0.073%) Windows Server 2012
13 2 (0.048%) CentOS
14 1 (0.024%) Data ONTAP
14 1 (0.024%) Kali Linux
14 1 (0.024%) Solaris
Processes & Methodologies
1 601 (14.57%) Roadmaps
2 546 (13.24%) Agile
3 530 (12.85%) Migration
4 470 (11.39%) DevOps
5 452 (10.96%) Stakeholder Management
6 426 (10.33%) Enterprise Architecture
7 419 (10.16%) CI/CD
8 399 (9.67%) Stakeholder Engagement
9 389 (9.43%) Data Modelling
10 371 (8.99%) TOGAF
11 370 (8.97%) Technical Leadership
12 348 (8.44%) AI
13 347 (8.41%) Integration Patterns
14 342 (8.29%) Problem-Solving
15 338 (8.19%) Analytics
16 337 (8.17%) Data Architecture
17 308 (7.47%) Architectural Patterns
18 304 (7.37%) Architectural Design
19 291 (7.05%) Microservices
20 250 (6.06%) Security Architecture
Programming Languages
1 303 (7.35%) Python
2 212 (5.14%) SQL
3 177 (4.29%) PowerShell
4 150 (3.64%) Java
5 63 (1.53%) JavaScript
6 48 (1.16%) C#
7 39 (0.95%) Bash
8 35 (0.85%) Bicep
9 29 (0.70%) TypeScript
10 16 (0.39%) Apex Code
10 16 (0.39%) Ruby
11 14 (0.34%) PL/SQL
12 13 (0.32%) Kusto Query Language
12 13 (0.32%) Scala
13 11 (0.27%) R
14 8 (0.19%) Kotlin
14 8 (0.19%) T-SQL
14 8 (0.19%) VB
15 7 (0.17%) VBScript
16 6 (0.15%) C++
Qualifications
1 1,320 (32.00%) Security Cleared
2 897 (21.75%) SC Cleared
3 312 (7.56%) DV Cleared
4 174 (4.22%) Degree
5 111 (2.69%) TOGAF Certification
6 110 (2.67%) Azure Certification
7 109 (2.64%) CISSP
8 98 (2.38%) AWS Certification
9 76 (1.84%) Cisco Certification
10 65 (1.58%) Computer Science Degree
11 60 (1.45%) BPSS Clearance
12 56 (1.36%) CISM
13 51 (1.24%) Microsoft Certification
14 44 (1.07%) AWS Certified Solutions Architect
14 44 (1.07%) CCNP
15 37 (0.90%) Master's Degree
16 33 (0.80%) ITIL Certification
17 31 (0.75%) ISEB
18 30 (0.73%) (ISC)2 CCSP
19 29 (0.70%) CCIE
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 170 (4.12%) GDPR
2 158 (3.83%) NIST
3 132 (3.20%) ISO/IEC 27001
4 125 (3.03%) Data Quality
5 90 (2.18%) NCSC
6 62 (1.50%) QA
7 53 (1.28%) PCI DSS
8 38 (0.92%) COBIT
9 30 (0.73%) GRC
10 29 (0.70%) ISO 20022
11 28 (0.68%) Cyber Essentials
12 18 (0.44%) Sarbanes-Oxley
13 15 (0.36%) HL7
14 14 (0.34%) Accessibility
14 14 (0.34%) JSP 440
14 14 (0.34%) MiFID
15 13 (0.32%) FINRA
15 13 (0.32%) NIST 800
15 13 (0.32%) PSD2
15 13 (0.32%) SEPA
System Software
1 179 (4.34%) Active Directory
2 116 (2.81%) Docker
3 97 (2.35%) VMware Infrastructure
4 67 (1.62%) VMware NSX
5 33 (0.80%) vSphere
6 22 (0.53%) Virtual Desktop
7 17 (0.41%) Hyper-V
8 15 (0.36%) Virtual Machines
9 12 (0.29%) VMware ESXi
10 9 (0.22%) Squid
10 9 (0.22%) vCloud
11 7 (0.17%) BitLocker
12 5 (0.12%) NFS
12 5 (0.12%) Oracle RAC
12 5 (0.12%) RACF
12 5 (0.12%) Varnish
13 4 (0.097%) Firmware
14 3 (0.073%) Active Directory Lightweight Directory Services
14 3 (0.073%) IAG
14 3 (0.073%) Postfix
Systems Management
1 236 (5.72%) Terraform
2 216 (5.24%) Kubernetes
3 103 (2.50%) Ansible
4 55 (1.33%) Single Sign-On
5 40 (0.97%) Microsoft Intune
6 34 (0.82%) Grafana
7 33 (0.80%) vCenter Server
8 30 (0.73%) OPNET
9 22 (0.53%) SCCM
10 21 (0.51%) FortiGate
10 21 (0.51%) Prometheus
11 18 (0.44%) Active Directory Federation Services
11 18 (0.44%) Argo
12 14 (0.34%) WMI
13 9 (0.22%) Istio
14 7 (0.17%) Consul
14 7 (0.17%) Puppet
15 5 (0.12%) Endace
15 5 (0.12%) Kibana
15 5 (0.12%) Progress Chef
Vendors
1 592 (14.35%) Microsoft
2 242 (5.87%) ServiceNow
3 238 (5.77%) SAP
4 184 (4.46%) VMware
5 166 (4.02%) Oracle
6 159 (3.85%) Salesforce
7 146 (3.54%) Databricks
8 115 (2.79%) Cisco
9 93 (2.25%) CyberArk
10 91 (2.21%) Google
11 62 (1.50%) MuleSoft
12 55 (1.33%) Palo Alto
12 55 (1.33%) Splunk
13 51 (1.24%) Remedy
14 49 (1.19%) Centrify
14 49 (1.19%) Red Hat
15 48 (1.16%) IBM
16 46 (1.12%) Atlassian
17 45 (1.09%) Workday
18 44 (1.07%) Sparx