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 15 August 2026.

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

6 months to
15 Aug 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 10 18 14
Rank change year-on-year +8 -4 +2
Contract jobs requiring an Architect 5,014 2,594 3,390
As % of all contract jobs in England 10.94% 9.37% 10.19%
As % of the Job Titles category 11.83% 10.23% 10.97%
Number of daily rates quoted 3,361 1,714 2,253
10th Percentile £480 £475 £485
25th Percentile £525 £538 £550
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £620 £625 £650
Median % change year-on-year -0.80% -3.85% -1.89%
75th Percentile £725 £706 £738
90th Percentile £800 £788 £825
UK median daily rate £620 £625 £650
% change year-on-year -0.80% -3.85% -
Number of hourly rates quoted 162 18 76
10th Percentile £46.00 £36.30 -
25th Percentile £60.00 £62.50 £60.00
Median hourly rate £65.00 £72.50 £70.00
Median % change year-on-year -10.34% +3.57% -
75th Percentile £71.91 £87.00 £85.00
90th Percentile £94.48 £100.00 £90.00
UK median hourly rate £65.00 £72.50 £70.00
% change year-on-year -10.34% +3.57% -

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 42,382 25,355 30,894
% of contract IT jobs with a recognized job title 92.50% 91.59% 92.88%
Number of daily rates quoted 25,645 16,377 20,264
10th Percentile £325 £285 £300
25th Percentile £425 £400 £413
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £525 £510 £525
Median % change year-on-year +2.94% -2.86% -4.55%
75th Percentile £626 £625 £638
90th Percentile £738 £738 £750
UK median daily rate £525 £500 £525
% change year-on-year +5.00% -4.76% -1.87%
Number of hourly rates quoted 3,188 1,341 1,792
10th Percentile £15.25 £13.50 £14.25
25th Percentile £21.25 £17.48 £21.25
Median hourly rate £42.50 £25.30 £45.00
Median % change year-on-year +67.98% -43.78% +7.14%
75th Percentile £68.00 £55.00 £65.01
90th Percentile £80.00 £75.00 £75.00
UK median hourly rate £42.00 £25.15 £43.00
% change year-on-year +67.00% -41.51% +2.00%

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 15 August 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 15 August 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 15 August 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 2,556 £625 -3.85% 1,605
South East +1 736 £625 +4.17% 347
North of England +2 698 £600 - 303
Midlands +1 417 £625 +7.57% 152
North West +4 401 £600 - 168
South West -5 311 £625 -2.34% 193
West Midlands -2 304 £627 +4.42% 103
Yorkshire +4 234 £600 0.00% 101
East of England +12 157 £600 +8.11% 96
East Midlands +5 106 £600 +16.50% 49
North East -6 65 £600 -14.29% 34
Architect
UK

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

For the 6 months to 15 August 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 1,500 (29.92%) Security Cleared
2 1,282 (25.57%) Azure
3 1,075 (21.44%) SC Cleared
4 1,027 (20.48%) AWS
5 754 (15.04%) Roadmaps
6 732 (14.60%) Stakeholder Management
7 714 (14.24%) Migration
8 681 (13.58%) Microsoft
9 638 (12.72%) AI
10 630 (12.56%) Enterprise Architecture
11 556 (11.09%) Agile
12 549 (10.95%) DevOps
13 538 (10.73%) Technical Leadership
14 524 (10.45%) Data Modelling
15 518 (10.33%) CI/CD
16 513 (10.23%) Stakeholder Engagement
17 498 (9.93%) Data Architecture
18 487 (9.71%) Integration Patterns
19 454 (9.05%) Analytics
20 402 (8.02%) TOGAF
21 399 (7.96%) GCP
22 395 (7.88%) Architectural Patterns
23 370 (7.38%) Security Architecture
24 329 (6.56%) DV Cleared
25 321 (6.40%) Problem-Solving
26 320 (6.38%) Cybersecurity
27 312 (6.22%) Event-Driven
28 311 (6.20%) Microservices
29 301 (6.00%) Infrastructure as Code
30 300 (5.98%) Architectural Design

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 78 (1.56%) SharePoint
2 71 (1.42%) SAS
3 53 (1.06%) Confluence
4 41 (0.82%) Apache
5 39 (0.78%) Apache Spark
6 29 (0.58%) Microsoft Exchange
7 26 (0.52%) Apache Airflow
8 22 (0.44%) Palantir Foundry
9 17 (0.34%) CMS
10 15 (0.30%) OpenStack
11 9 (0.18%) ArcGIS
12 7 (0.14%) Adobe Experience Manager
12 7 (0.14%) Appian
12 7 (0.14%) Camunda
12 7 (0.14%) Documentum
13 5 (0.100%) nginx
14 4 (0.080%) Jupyter
14 4 (0.080%) NetWeaver
15 3 (0.060%) Anypoint
15 3 (0.060%) SAP EP
Applications
1 19 (0.38%) MS Visio
2 12 (0.24%) Microsoft Excel
3 11 (0.22%) Microsoft PowerPoint
4 9 (0.18%) Chatbot
5 7 (0.14%) Navisworks
5 7 (0.14%) Revit
6 6 (0.12%) Microsoft Office
6 6 (0.12%) Spreadsheet
7 2 (0.040%) PlantUML
7 2 (0.040%) Windchill
8 1 (0.020%) Gliffy
8 1 (0.020%) Microsoft Project
8 1 (0.020%) Notion
Business Applications
1 123 (2.45%) SAP S/4HANA
2 35 (0.70%) Sparx Enterprise Architect
3 30 (0.60%) Dynamics CRM
4 17 (0.34%) Oracle EBS
5 15 (0.30%) Teamcenter
6 14 (0.28%) Oracle ERP
6 14 (0.28%) Remedy ITSM
7 13 (0.26%) Payment Gateway
8 12 (0.24%) NetSuite
8 12 (0.24%) Oracle Payables
8 12 (0.24%) Oracle Receivables
8 12 (0.24%) SAP ERP
9 8 (0.16%) Oracle Retail
9 8 (0.16%) SAP BRIM
9 8 (0.16%) SAP IBP
10 7 (0.14%) Workday HCM
11 6 (0.12%) Endur
11 6 (0.12%) Maximo
12 5 (0.100%) SAP MM
12 5 (0.100%) SAP Oil and Gas
Cloud Services
1 1,282 (25.57%) Azure
2 1,027 (20.48%) AWS
3 399 (7.96%) GCP
4 269 (5.36%) Power Platform
5 185 (3.69%) Entra ID
6 182 (3.63%) SaaS
7 156 (3.11%) Serverless
8 124 (2.47%) Dynamics 365
8 124 (2.47%) GitHub
9 108 (2.15%) Microsoft 365
10 105 (2.09%) Azure DevOps
11 104 (2.07%) Snowflake
12 102 (2.03%) PaaS
13 73 (1.46%) AWS Lambda
14 72 (1.44%) IaaS
15 69 (1.38%) Amazon S3
16 59 (1.18%) OCI
17 58 (1.16%) GitHub Actions
18 56 (1.12%) Azure Data Factory
18 56 (1.12%) Azure Synapse Analytics
Communications & Networking
1 149 (2.97%) Network Security
2 148 (2.95%) Firewall
3 99 (1.97%) WAN
4 88 (1.76%) DNS
5 74 (1.48%) VPN
6 73 (1.46%) LAN
7 48 (0.96%) SD-WAN
8 46 (0.92%) BGP
9 41 (0.82%) DHCP
10 38 (0.76%) TCP/IP
11 36 (0.72%) MPLS
12 33 (0.66%) VLAN
13 28 (0.56%) SAN
14 26 (0.52%) VXLAN
15 25 (0.50%) OSPF
15 25 (0.50%) Wireless
16 24 (0.48%) NAS
17 21 (0.42%) NX-OS
17 21 (0.42%) Structured Cabling
18 19 (0.38%) Ethernet VPN
Database & Business Intelligence
1 190 (3.79%) Power BI
2 167 (3.33%) Data Lake
3 153 (3.05%) Metadata
4 148 (2.95%) Data Warehouse
5 64 (1.28%) NoSQL
6 53 (1.06%) SQL Server
7 42 (0.84%) Big Data
8 38 (0.76%) Azure SQL Database
8 38 (0.76%) BigQuery
9 37 (0.74%) PostgreSQL
10 36 (0.72%) Delta Lake
11 30 (0.60%) Amazon RDS
11 30 (0.60%) Amazon Redshift
12 29 (0.58%) Oracle Database
13 25 (0.50%) Enterprise Data Warehouse
13 25 (0.50%) GIS
14 19 (0.38%) MongoDB
14 19 (0.38%) Semantic Layer
14 19 (0.38%) Tableau
15 18 (0.36%) Star Schema
Development Applications
1 74 (1.48%) JIRA
2 67 (1.34%) Git
3 50 (1.00%) Jenkins
4 33 (0.66%) GitLab
5 20 (0.40%) ERwin
6 10 (0.20%) Claude Code
7 8 (0.16%) Cypress.io
7 8 (0.16%) Oracle Forms
7 8 (0.16%) SonarQube
8 7 (0.14%) Artifactory
8 7 (0.14%) PowerDesigner
9 6 (0.12%) Maven
9 6 (0.12%) MSI
9 6 (0.12%) Storybook
10 5 (0.100%) MLflow
11 4 (0.080%) ER Studio
11 4 (0.080%) Postman
11 4 (0.080%) Rational DOORS
11 4 (0.080%) Snyk
11 4 (0.080%) Sonatype Nexus
General
1 965 (19.25%) Social Skills
2 765 (15.26%) Finance
3 535 (10.67%) Public Sector
4 292 (5.82%) Banking
5 269 (5.36%) Analytical Skills
6 244 (4.87%) Retail
7 135 (2.69%) Influencing Skills
8 125 (2.49%) Documentation Skills
9 118 (2.35%) Telecoms
10 106 (2.11%) Manufacturing
11 78 (1.56%) Legal
12 62 (1.24%) Marketing
13 55 (1.10%) Billing
14 49 (0.98%) Inclusion and Diversity
15 47 (0.94%) Military
16 46 (0.92%) Aerospace
16 46 (0.92%) Financial Institution
16 46 (0.92%) Law
17 35 (0.70%) Presentation Skills
18 29 (0.58%) Local Government
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 245 (4.89%) REST
2 156 (3.11%) Middleware
3 119 (2.37%) .NET
4 112 (2.23%) SOAP
5 106 (2.11%) Kafka
6 100 (1.99%) OAuth
7 69 (1.38%) Oracle Fusion
8 55 (1.10%) SAML
9 53 (1.06%) JSON
9 53 (1.06%) OpenID
10 50 (1.00%) OAuth2
11 41 (0.82%) React
11 41 (0.82%) RESTful
12 36 (0.72%) .NET Framework
12 36 (0.72%) SailPoint
13 35 (0.70%) PySpark
14 32 (0.64%) XML
15 30 (0.60%) JWT
15 30 (0.60%) LDAP
16 26 (0.52%) GraphQL
Miscellaneous
1 424 (8.46%) Cloud Native
2 153 (3.05%) Data Centre
3 130 (2.59%) Onboarding
4 126 (2.51%) Hybrid Cloud
5 125 (2.49%) Legacy Systems
6 124 (2.47%) Product Ownership
7 119 (2.37%) Distributed Systems
8 112 (2.23%) AI Agents
9 111 (2.21%) Management Information System
10 101 (2.01%) Enterprise Software
11 97 (1.93%) Data Protection Act
12 83 (1.66%) Operational Technology
13 81 (1.62%) CMDB
14 66 (1.32%) Enterprise Cloud
15 65 (1.30%) Public Cloud
16 61 (1.22%) Security Posture
17 56 (1.12%) Data Structures
18 47 (0.94%) Private Cloud
19 45 (0.90%) Mainframe
20 41 (0.82%) IoT
Operating Systems
1 112 (2.23%) Windows
2 87 (1.74%) Linux
3 35 (0.70%) Windows Server
4 21 (0.42%) Apple iOS
5 20 (0.40%) Android
6 19 (0.38%) Unix
7 17 (0.34%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
8 9 (0.18%) AIX
8 9 (0.18%) zOS
9 7 (0.14%) Ubuntu
10 5 (0.100%) Data ONTAP
10 5 (0.100%) Solaris
11 4 (0.080%) Alpine Linux
12 3 (0.060%) VMS
13 2 (0.040%) CentOS
13 2 (0.040%) HPUX
13 2 (0.040%) Mac OS
13 2 (0.040%) Windows 10
13 2 (0.040%) Windows Server 2019
14 1 (0.020%) CatOS
Processes & Methodologies
1 754 (15.04%) Roadmaps
2 732 (14.60%) Stakeholder Management
3 714 (14.24%) Migration
4 638 (12.72%) AI
5 630 (12.56%) Enterprise Architecture
6 556 (11.09%) Agile
7 549 (10.95%) DevOps
8 538 (10.73%) Technical Leadership
9 524 (10.45%) Data Modelling
10 518 (10.33%) CI/CD
11 513 (10.23%) Stakeholder Engagement
12 498 (9.93%) Data Architecture
13 487 (9.71%) Integration Patterns
14 454 (9.05%) Analytics
15 402 (8.02%) TOGAF
16 395 (7.88%) Architectural Patterns
17 370 (7.38%) Security Architecture
18 321 (6.40%) Problem-Solving
19 320 (6.38%) Cybersecurity
20 312 (6.22%) Event-Driven
Programming Languages
1 238 (4.75%) Python
2 233 (4.65%) SQL
3 206 (4.11%) Java
4 116 (2.31%) JavaScript
5 89 (1.78%) PowerShell
6 52 (1.04%) C#
7 44 (0.88%) Bash
8 43 (0.86%) Bicep
9 41 (0.82%) TypeScript
10 26 (0.52%) Apex Code
11 16 (0.32%) Shell Script
12 15 (0.30%) Data Analysis Expressions
13 14 (0.28%) Ruby
14 13 (0.26%) C++
15 11 (0.22%) Groovy
16 10 (0.20%) ABAP
16 10 (0.20%) Scala
17 9 (0.18%) PL/SQL
18 7 (0.14%) Kotlin
18 7 (0.14%) Rust
Qualifications
1 1,500 (29.92%) Security Cleared
2 1,075 (21.44%) SC Cleared
3 329 (6.56%) DV Cleared
4 157 (3.13%) Degree
5 130 (2.59%) CISSP
6 112 (2.23%) Azure Certification
7 95 (1.89%) AWS Certification
8 85 (1.70%) Cisco Certification
9 81 (1.62%) TOGAF Certification
10 70 (1.40%) BPSS Clearance
11 63 (1.26%) Computer Science Degree
12 62 (1.24%) CISM
13 40 (0.80%) Microsoft Certification
14 38 (0.76%) CCNP
15 33 (0.66%) (ISC)2 CCSP
16 31 (0.62%) AWS Certified Solutions Architect
17 24 (0.48%) Master's Degree
18 20 (0.40%) CCSP
19 19 (0.38%) CCIE
20 18 (0.36%) DBS Check
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 180 (3.59%) Data Quality
1 180 (3.59%) NIST
2 148 (2.95%) GDPR
3 135 (2.69%) ISO/IEC 27001
4 99 (1.97%) NCSC
5 63 (1.26%) GRC
6 55 (1.10%) QA
7 36 (0.72%) PCI DSS
8 34 (0.68%) Accessibility
9 31 (0.62%) NIST 800
10 29 (0.58%) Sarbanes-Oxley
11 21 (0.42%) Cyber Essentials
12 20 (0.40%) SEPA
13 19 (0.38%) IFRS
13 19 (0.38%) ISO 20022
14 16 (0.32%) JSP 440
15 15 (0.30%) HL7
15 15 (0.30%) ISO/IEC 20000
16 14 (0.28%) SLA
17 13 (0.26%) Government Security Classifications
System Software
1 152 (3.03%) Active Directory
2 94 (1.87%) Docker
3 63 (1.26%) VMware Infrastructure
4 42 (0.84%) VMware NSX
5 26 (0.52%) Virtual Desktop
6 16 (0.32%) Virtual Machines
7 15 (0.30%) Hyper-V
7 15 (0.30%) vSphere
8 14 (0.28%) VMware ESXi
9 8 (0.16%) NFS
10 7 (0.14%) Varnish
11 6 (0.12%) Postfix
11 6 (0.12%) vCloud
12 4 (0.080%) EMC RecoverPoint
12 4 (0.080%) IAG
12 4 (0.080%) KVM
12 4 (0.080%) Sendmail
13 3 (0.060%) Ceph
13 3 (0.060%) SRDF
14 2 (0.040%) Firmware
Systems Management
1 239 (4.77%) Kubernetes
2 214 (4.27%) Terraform
3 92 (1.83%) Ansible
4 41 (0.82%) Grafana
5 38 (0.76%) Single Sign-On
6 35 (0.70%) Microsoft Intune
7 33 (0.66%) Prometheus
8 16 (0.32%) Argo
9 15 (0.30%) Active Directory Federation Services
9 15 (0.30%) Jamf Pro
9 15 (0.30%) vCenter Server
10 10 (0.20%) FortiGate
11 7 (0.14%) Istio
12 6 (0.12%) HAProxy
12 6 (0.12%) SCCM
12 6 (0.12%) WMI
13 5 (0.100%) CASB
13 5 (0.100%) EMC VPLEX
13 5 (0.100%) MOM
13 5 (0.100%) NetBackup
Vendors
1 681 (13.58%) Microsoft
2 287 (5.72%) SAP
3 270 (5.38%) Oracle
4 256 (5.11%) ServiceNow
5 231 (4.61%) Databricks
6 163 (3.25%) Salesforce
7 151 (3.01%) Google
8 128 (2.55%) Cisco
9 126 (2.51%) VMware
10 60 (1.20%) CyberArk
11 57 (1.14%) IBM
12 54 (1.08%) MuleSoft
13 53 (1.06%) Workday
14 48 (0.96%) Palo Alto
15 43 (0.86%) Foundry
16 37 (0.74%) Sparx
17 35 (0.70%) Ariba
17 35 (0.70%) Splunk
18 33 (0.66%) Adobe
18 33 (0.66%) F5