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 17 August 2026.

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

6 months to
17 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 5,009 2,601 3,386
As % of all contract jobs in England 10.96% 9.36% 10.22%
As % of the Job Titles category 11.85% 10.22% 10.99%
Number of daily rates quoted 3,361 1,720 2,254
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 163 18 73
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 £93.95 £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 42,264 25,460 30,800
% of contract IT jobs with a recognized job title 92.48% 91.59% 92.92%
Number of daily rates quoted 25,561 16,436 20,203
10th Percentile £325 £281 £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 £630 £625 £638
90th Percentile £738 £738 £750
UK median daily rate £525 £500 £525
% change year-on-year +5.00% -4.76% -1.69%
Number of hourly rates quoted 3,196 1,351 1,763
10th Percentile £15.24 £13.50 £14.16
25th Percentile £21.25 £17.48 £21.15
Median hourly rate £42.50 £25.30 £45.00
Median % change year-on-year +67.98% -43.78% +8.43%
75th Percentile £68.00 £55.00 £66.00
90th Percentile £80.00 £75.00 £75.00
UK median hourly rate £41.74 £25.15 £43.00
% change year-on-year +65.94% -41.51% +2.87%

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 17 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 17 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 17 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 2,548 £625 -3.85% 334
South East +1 737 £625 +4.17% 171
North of England +5 700 £600 - 129
Midlands 0 415 £625 +7.57% 59
North West +7 402 £600 - 69
South West -3 313 £625 -2.34% 81
West Midlands -2 302 £627 +4.42% 44
Yorkshire +5 235 £588 -2.08% 42
East of England +13 159 £600 +8.11% 26
East Midlands +4 106 £600 +16.50% 15
North East -5 65 £600 -14.29% 18
Architect
UK

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

For the 6 months to 17 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 1,502 (29.99%) Security Cleared
2 1,283 (25.61%) Azure
3 1,078 (21.52%) SC Cleared
4 1,023 (20.42%) AWS
5 753 (15.03%) Roadmaps
6 730 (14.57%) Stakeholder Management
7 716 (14.29%) Migration
8 681 (13.60%) Microsoft
9 634 (12.66%) AI
10 631 (12.60%) Enterprise Architecture
11 552 (11.02%) Agile
12 544 (10.86%) DevOps
13 538 (10.74%) Technical Leadership
14 519 (10.36%) Data Modelling
15 514 (10.26%) CI/CD
16 509 (10.16%) Stakeholder Engagement
17 495 (9.88%) Data Architecture
18 484 (9.66%) Integration Patterns
19 455 (9.08%) Analytics
20 398 (7.95%) TOGAF
21 397 (7.93%) Architectural Patterns
22 396 (7.91%) GCP
23 368 (7.35%) Security Architecture
24 329 (6.57%) DV Cleared
25 322 (6.43%) Cybersecurity
26 319 (6.37%) Problem-Solving
27 312 (6.23%) Event-Driven
28 305 (6.09%) Infrastructure as Code
28 305 (6.09%) Microservices
29 303 (6.05%) 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 77 (1.54%) SharePoint
2 71 (1.42%) SAS
3 52 (1.04%) Confluence
4 42 (0.84%) Apache
5 40 (0.80%) 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 8 (0.16%) ArcGIS
12 7 (0.14%) Adobe Experience Manager
12 7 (0.14%) Appian
12 7 (0.14%) Camunda
12 7 (0.14%) Documentum
13 4 (0.080%) Jupyter
13 4 (0.080%) NetWeaver
13 4 (0.080%) nginx
14 3 (0.060%) Drupal
14 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 8 (0.16%) 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 (2.46%) 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%) Remedy ITSM
7 13 (0.26%) Oracle ERP
7 13 (0.26%) Payment Gateway
8 12 (0.24%) NetSuite
8 12 (0.24%) Oracle Payables
8 12 (0.24%) Oracle Receivables
9 11 (0.22%) SAP ERP
10 8 (0.16%) Oracle Retail
10 8 (0.16%) SAP BRIM
11 7 (0.14%) SAP IBP
11 7 (0.14%) Workday HCM
12 6 (0.12%) Endur
12 6 (0.12%) Maximo
13 5 (0.100%) SAP MM
13 5 (0.100%) SAP Oil and Gas
Cloud Services
1 1,283 (25.61%) Azure
2 1,023 (20.42%) AWS
3 396 (7.91%) GCP
4 271 (5.41%) Power Platform
5 185 (3.69%) Entra ID
6 180 (3.59%) SaaS
7 157 (3.13%) Serverless
8 125 (2.50%) Dynamics 365
9 124 (2.48%) GitHub
10 107 (2.14%) Microsoft 365
11 105 (2.10%) Azure DevOps
12 104 (2.08%) Snowflake
13 102 (2.04%) PaaS
14 72 (1.44%) AWS Lambda
15 70 (1.40%) IaaS
16 67 (1.34%) Amazon S3
17 59 (1.18%) OCI
18 58 (1.16%) GitHub Actions
19 56 (1.12%) Azure Data Factory
19 56 (1.12%) Azure Synapse Analytics
Communications & Networking
1 146 (2.91%) Firewall
2 145 (2.89%) Network Security
3 97 (1.94%) WAN
4 86 (1.72%) DNS
5 73 (1.46%) VPN
6 71 (1.42%) LAN
7 47 (0.94%) SD-WAN
8 45 (0.90%) BGP
9 40 (0.80%) DHCP
10 38 (0.76%) TCP/IP
11 37 (0.74%) MPLS
12 32 (0.64%) VLAN
13 28 (0.56%) SAN
14 27 (0.54%) VXLAN
15 25 (0.50%) Wireless
16 24 (0.48%) NAS
17 23 (0.46%) NX-OS
17 23 (0.46%) OSPF
18 21 (0.42%) Structured Cabling
19 20 (0.40%) Ethernet VPN
Database & Business Intelligence
1 190 (3.79%) Power BI
2 168 (3.35%) Data Lake
3 151 (3.01%) Metadata
4 146 (2.91%) Data Warehouse
5 64 (1.28%) NoSQL
6 53 (1.06%) SQL Server
7 43 (0.86%) 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
12 29 (0.58%) Amazon Redshift
12 29 (0.58%) Oracle Database
13 25 (0.50%) Enterprise Data Warehouse
14 24 (0.48%) GIS
15 19 (0.38%) MongoDB
15 19 (0.38%) Semantic Layer
15 19 (0.38%) Tableau
16 18 (0.36%) Amazon Athena
Development Applications
1 73 (1.46%) JIRA
2 67 (1.34%) Git
3 48 (0.96%) Jenkins
4 33 (0.66%) GitLab
5 19 (0.38%) 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%) PowerDesigner
9 6 (0.12%) Artifactory
9 6 (0.12%) MSI
9 6 (0.12%) Storybook
10 5 (0.100%) Maven
10 5 (0.100%) MLflow
11 4 (0.080%) ER Studio
11 4 (0.080%) Rational DOORS
11 4 (0.080%) Snyk
11 4 (0.080%) Sonatype Nexus
12 3 (0.060%) IBM UrbanCode
General
1 958 (19.13%) Social Skills
2 760 (15.17%) Finance
3 537 (10.72%) Public Sector
4 287 (5.73%) Banking
5 267 (5.33%) Analytical Skills
6 245 (4.89%) Retail
7 134 (2.68%) Influencing Skills
8 124 (2.48%) Documentation Skills
9 117 (2.34%) Telecoms
10 106 (2.12%) Manufacturing
11 78 (1.56%) Legal
12 61 (1.22%) 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%) Law
17 45 (0.90%) Financial Institution
18 33 (0.66%) Presentation Skills
19 30 (0.60%) Local Government
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 244 (4.87%) REST
2 154 (3.07%) Middleware
3 115 (2.30%) .NET
4 112 (2.24%) SOAP
5 106 (2.12%) Kafka
6 100 (2.00%) OAuth
7 69 (1.38%) Oracle Fusion
8 55 (1.10%) SAML
9 54 (1.08%) JSON
10 53 (1.06%) OpenID
11 50 (1.00%) OAuth2
12 40 (0.80%) React
12 40 (0.80%) RESTful
13 36 (0.72%) .NET Framework
13 36 (0.72%) SailPoint
14 35 (0.70%) PySpark
15 32 (0.64%) XML
16 30 (0.60%) JWT
16 30 (0.60%) LDAP
17 26 (0.52%) GraphQL
Miscellaneous
1 427 (8.52%) Cloud Native
2 153 (3.05%) Data Centre
3 130 (2.60%) Onboarding
4 127 (2.54%) Hybrid Cloud
4 127 (2.54%) Legacy Systems
5 124 (2.48%) Product Ownership
6 119 (2.38%) Distributed Systems
7 111 (2.22%) Management Information System
8 109 (2.18%) AI Agents
9 101 (2.02%) Enterprise Software
10 95 (1.90%) Data Protection Act
11 83 (1.66%) Operational Technology
12 81 (1.62%) CMDB
13 66 (1.32%) Enterprise Cloud
14 65 (1.30%) Public Cloud
15 61 (1.22%) Security Posture
16 56 (1.12%) Data Structures
17 47 (0.94%) Private Cloud
18 44 (0.88%) Mainframe
19 41 (0.82%) IoT
Operating Systems
1 113 (2.26%) Windows
2 86 (1.72%) Linux
3 35 (0.70%) Windows Server
4 21 (0.42%) Apple iOS
4 21 (0.42%) Unix
5 20 (0.40%) Android
6 16 (0.32%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
7 9 (0.18%) AIX
8 8 (0.16%) 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%) Windows Server 2012
Processes & Methodologies
1 753 (15.03%) Roadmaps
2 730 (14.57%) Stakeholder Management
3 716 (14.29%) Migration
4 634 (12.66%) AI
5 631 (12.60%) Enterprise Architecture
6 552 (11.02%) Agile
7 544 (10.86%) DevOps
8 538 (10.74%) Technical Leadership
9 519 (10.36%) Data Modelling
10 514 (10.26%) CI/CD
11 509 (10.16%) Stakeholder Engagement
12 495 (9.88%) Data Architecture
13 484 (9.66%) Integration Patterns
14 455 (9.08%) Analytics
15 398 (7.95%) TOGAF
16 397 (7.93%) Architectural Patterns
17 368 (7.35%) Security Architecture
18 322 (6.43%) Cybersecurity
19 319 (6.37%) Problem-Solving
20 312 (6.23%) Event-Driven
Programming Languages
1 236 (4.71%) Python
2 231 (4.61%) SQL
3 203 (4.05%) Java
4 113 (2.26%) JavaScript
5 89 (1.78%) PowerShell
6 48 (0.96%) C#
7 44 (0.88%) Bash
8 43 (0.86%) Bicep
9 40 (0.80%) 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 1,502 (29.99%) Security Cleared
2 1,078 (21.52%) SC Cleared
3 329 (6.57%) DV Cleared
4 151 (3.01%) Degree
5 128 (2.56%) CISSP
6 110 (2.20%) Azure Certification
7 95 (1.90%) AWS Certification
8 84 (1.68%) Cisco Certification
9 80 (1.60%) TOGAF Certification
10 70 (1.40%) BPSS Clearance
11 61 (1.22%) CISM
12 59 (1.18%) Computer Science Degree
13 40 (0.80%) Microsoft Certification
14 38 (0.76%) CCNP
15 34 (0.68%) (ISC)2 CCSP
16 31 (0.62%) AWS Certified Solutions Architect
17 23 (0.46%) Master's Degree
18 21 (0.42%) CCSP
19 18 (0.36%) CCIE
19 18 (0.36%) DBS Check
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 180 (3.59%) Data Quality
1 180 (3.59%) NIST
2 146 (2.91%) GDPR
3 137 (2.74%) ISO/IEC 27001
4 99 (1.98%) NCSC
5 63 (1.26%) GRC
6 54 (1.08%) QA
7 38 (0.76%) 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 19 (0.38%) IFRS
12 19 (0.38%) SEPA
13 16 (0.32%) ISO 20022
13 16 (0.32%) JSP 440
14 15 (0.30%) ISO/IEC 20000
15 14 (0.28%) HL7
15 14 (0.28%) SLA
16 13 (0.26%) Government Security Classifications
System Software
1 152 (3.03%) Active Directory
2 93 (1.86%) Docker
3 64 (1.28%) VMware Infrastructure
4 43 (0.86%) 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
1 236 (4.71%) Kubernetes
2 213 (4.25%) Terraform
3 92 (1.84%) 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 9 (0.18%) 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 (13.60%) Microsoft
2 286 (5.71%) SAP
3 268 (5.35%) Oracle
4 255 (5.09%) ServiceNow
5 231 (4.61%) Databricks
6 163 (3.25%) Salesforce
7 150 (2.99%) Google
8 131 (2.62%) Cisco
9 127 (2.54%) VMware
10 60 (1.20%) CyberArk
11 56 (1.12%) 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
18 34 (0.68%) Splunk
19 33 (0.66%) Adobe
20 32 (0.64%) F5