Azure SQL Database Contract Job Trends in England

Microsoft Azure SQL Database (formerly SQL Azure)
UK > England

The table below provides summary statistics and contractor rates for jobs advertised in England requiring Azure SQL Database skills. It covers contract job vacancies from the 6 months leading up to 1 December 2025, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
1 Dec 2025
Same period 2024 Same period 2023
Rank 393 310 338
Rank change year-on-year -83 +28 +68
Contract jobs citing Azure SQL Database 146 211 250
As % of all contract jobs in England 0.48% 0.69% 0.65%
As % of the Database & Business Intelligence category 2.77% 3.81% 3.86%
Number of daily rates quoted 115 150 153
10th Percentile £378 £310 £407
25th Percentile £425 £433 £463
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £550 £550
Median % change year-on-year -9.09% - -
75th Percentile £581 £675 £650
90th Percentile £624 £700 £700
UK median daily rate £500 £525 £530
% change year-on-year -4.76% -0.94% -3.64%
Number of hourly rates quoted 0 1 0
Median hourly rate - £60.50 -
UK median hourly rate - £60.50 -

All Database and Business Intelligence Skills
England

Azure SQL Database falls under the Databases and Business Intelligence category. For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all contract job vacancies requiring database or business intelligence skills in England.

Contract vacancies with a requirement for database or business intelligence skills 5,268 5,531 6,480
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in England 17.30% 18.08% 16.73%
Number of daily rates quoted 3,671 3,699 4,619
10th Percentile £328 £350 £356
25th Percentile £411 £425 £450
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £550 £550
Median % change year-on-year -9.09% - -
75th Percentile £625 £663 £650
90th Percentile £725 £788 £750
UK median daily rate £500 £530 £535
% change year-on-year -5.66% -0.93% -2.73%
Number of hourly rates quoted 67 78 131
10th Percentile £22.40 £18.35 £18.57
25th Percentile £31.11 £24.88 £22.87
Median hourly rate £55.00 £38.00 £46.18
Median % change year-on-year +44.74% -17.71% -7.64%
75th Percentile £69.63 £60.55 £64.77
90th Percentile £85.40 £66.00 £77.50
UK median hourly rate £55.00 £31.55 £46.18
% change year-on-year +74.35% -31.69% -5.76%

Azure SQL Database
Job Vacancy Trend in England

Historical trend showing the proportion of contract IT job postings citing Azure SQL Database relative to all contract IT jobs advertised in England.

Azure SQL Database job vacancy trend in England

Azure SQL Database
Daily Rate Trend in England

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in England citing Azure SQL Database.

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in England citing Azure SQL Database

Azure SQL Database
Daily Rate Histogram in England

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing Azure SQL Database in England over the 6 months to 1 December 2025.

Daily rate histogram for Azure SQL Database in England

Azure SQL Database
Hourly Rate Trend in England

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in England citing Azure SQL Database.

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in England citing Azure SQL Database

Azure SQL Database
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 Azure SQL Database within the England region over the 6 months to 1 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 -57 87 £520 -9.57% 50
South East -11 17 £447 -14.86% 44
North of England -36 12 £450 +0.56% 29
Midlands -40 9 £478 -13.18% 25
North West -15 8 £450 +1.12% 16
East Midlands -8 7 £450 - 12
Yorkshire -38 3 £475 -3.06% 9
South West +2 2 £545 -5.22% 13
West Midlands -33 2 £613 +8.89% 13
East of England - 1 £505 - 16
North East - 1 £375 - 4
Azure SQL Database
UK

Azure SQL Database
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 18 (12.33%) Apache Spark
2 5 (3.42%) SharePoint
3 2 (1.37%) Apache Airflow
3 2 (1.37%) ArcGIS
3 2 (1.37%) Confluence
4 1 (0.68%) CICS
Applications
1 7 (4.79%) Microsoft Excel
2 4 (2.74%) Microsoft Office
3 2 (1.37%) Microsoft PowerPoint
3 2 (1.37%) Trello
4 1 (0.68%) Microsoft Project
Business Applications
1 3 (2.05%) Aladdin
2 1 (0.68%) Payment Gateway
Cloud Services
1 146 (100.00%) Azure
2 65 (44.52%) Azure Data Factory
3 42 (28.77%) Power Platform
4 40 (27.40%) Azure DevOps
5 33 (22.60%) Azure Synapse Analytics
6 25 (17.12%) Serverless
7 22 (15.07%) Azure Functions
8 21 (14.38%) GitHub
9 20 (13.70%) Azure Service Bus
10 19 (13.01%) Azure Key Vault
11 18 (12.33%) Azure AKS
11 18 (12.33%) Azure Cosmos DB
12 17 (11.64%) GitHub Actions
13 15 (10.27%) Entra ID
14 14 (9.59%) Azure Monitor
14 14 (9.59%) PaaS
15 12 (8.22%) Azure Logic Apps
16 11 (7.53%) Azure Storage
17 9 (6.16%) IaaS
18 8 (5.48%) AWS
Communications & Networking
1 4 (2.74%) HTTP
2 3 (2.05%) Firewall
2 3 (2.05%) VPN
3 2 (1.37%) DNS
3 2 (1.37%) Network Security
4 1 (0.68%) NAS
Database & Business Intelligence
1 43 (29.45%) Data Warehouse
1 43 (29.45%) SQL Server
2 40 (27.40%) Power BI
3 29 (19.86%) Data Lake
4 22 (15.07%) NoSQL
5 11 (7.53%) Relational Database
6 9 (6.16%) PostgreSQL
7 8 (5.48%) Metadata
7 8 (5.48%) Power Query
7 8 (5.48%) Tableau
8 6 (4.11%) Amazon RDS
8 6 (4.11%) Big Data
8 6 (4.11%) Delta Lake
8 6 (4.11%) Snowflake Schema
8 6 (4.11%) SQL Server Integration Services
9 5 (3.42%) MySQL
10 4 (2.74%) MongoDB
11 3 (2.05%) RDBMS
11 3 (2.05%) SQL Server Reporting Services
11 3 (2.05%) Star Schema
Development Applications
1 27 (18.49%) Git
2 6 (4.11%) Jenkins
3 4 (2.74%) SonarQube
4 3 (2.05%) JIRA
5 1 (0.68%) GitLab
5 1 (0.68%) JMeter
5 1 (0.68%) Poetry
5 1 (0.68%) Postman
5 1 (0.68%) Pylint
5 1 (0.68%) SpecFlow
5 1 (0.68%) SQL Server Management Studio (SSMS)
5 1 (0.68%) Visual Studio
5 1 (0.68%) Visual Studio Code
General
1 49 (33.56%) Social Skills
2 28 (19.18%) Finance
3 23 (15.75%) Public Sector
4 16 (10.96%) Analytical Skills
5 11 (7.53%) Inclusion and Diversity
6 7 (4.79%) Banking
7 3 (2.05%) Documentation Skills
8 2 (1.37%) Billing
8 2 (1.37%) Manufacturing
8 2 (1.37%) Pharmaceutical
9 1 (0.68%) Advertising
9 1 (0.68%) Agriculture
9 1 (0.68%) Automotive
9 1 (0.68%) Aviation
9 1 (0.68%) Investment Banking
9 1 (0.68%) Legal
9 1 (0.68%) Local Government
9 1 (0.68%) Marketing
9 1 (0.68%) Telecoms
Job Titles
1 42 (28.77%) Developer
2 40 (27.40%) Data Engineer
3 38 (26.03%) Azure Engineer
4 24 (16.44%) Azure Data Engineer
5 19 (13.01%) Architect
6 15 (10.27%) Senior
7 13 (8.90%) Azure Developer
8 9 (6.16%) Technical Architect
9 8 (5.48%) .NET Developer
9 8 (5.48%) Azure Architect
9 8 (5.48%) DBA
9 8 (5.48%) DevOps Engineer
10 7 (4.79%) Lead
11 6 (4.11%) Azure DevOps Engineer
11 6 (4.11%) Cloud Engineer
11 6 (4.11%) Data Architect
11 6 (4.11%) Senior Developer
12 5 (3.42%) Full-Stack Developer
12 5 (3.42%) SQL DBA
12 5 (3.42%) Tester
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 27 (18.49%) .NET
2 25 (17.12%) PySpark
3 13 (8.90%) React
4 12 (8.22%) .NET Core
4 12 (8.22%) AngularJS
5 8 (5.48%) Kafka
5 8 (5.48%) Node.js
6 7 (4.79%) JSON
7 6 (4.11%) ADO
8 5 (3.42%) ARM Templates
8 5 (3.42%) Express.js
8 5 (3.42%) RESTful
8 5 (3.42%) SOAP
8 5 (3.42%) WebSockets
8 5 (3.42%) YAML
9 4 (2.74%) Next.js
9 4 (2.74%) pytest
9 4 (2.74%) SignalR
10 3 (2.05%) .NET Framework
10 3 (2.05%) REST
Miscellaneous
1 11 (7.53%) Cloud Native
2 6 (4.11%) Greenfield Project
2 6 (4.11%) Legacy Systems
3 5 (3.42%) Data Structures
4 4 (2.74%) AI Agents
4 4 (2.74%) Clustering
4 4 (2.74%) Onboarding
4 4 (2.74%) Replication
5 3 (2.05%) Distributed Systems
6 2 (1.37%) Data Centre
6 2 (1.37%) Distributed Computing
6 2 (1.37%) FMCG
6 2 (1.37%) Hybrid Cloud
6 2 (1.37%) Product Ownership
6 2 (1.37%) Self-Motivation
7 1 (0.68%) Enterprise Software
7 1 (0.68%) Life Science
7 1 (0.68%) Mobile App
7 1 (0.68%) Reference Data
7 1 (0.68%) Social Media
Operating Systems
1 6 (4.11%) VMS
2 3 (2.05%) Windows
3 2 (1.37%) Linux
4 1 (0.68%) AIX
4 1 (0.68%) Solaris
4 1 (0.68%) Windows Server
Processes & Methodologies
1 59 (40.41%) DevOps
2 57 (39.04%) CI/CD
3 47 (32.19%) Data Modelling
4 43 (29.45%) Analytics
5 40 (27.40%) Business Intelligence
5 40 (27.40%) Data Pipeline
6 38 (26.03%) Data Governance
7 37 (25.34%) Agile
8 34 (23.29%) ETL
9 32 (21.92%) Data Engineering
10 31 (21.23%) Data Integration
10 31 (21.23%) Infrastructure as Code
11 26 (17.81%) Migration
12 22 (15.07%) Problem-Solving
13 21 (14.38%) Data Architecture
13 21 (14.38%) Performance Tuning
14 20 (13.70%) RBAC
15 19 (13.01%) Containerisation
16 16 (10.96%) Event-Driven
16 16 (10.96%) Integration Patterns
Programming Languages
1 144 (98.63%) SQL
2 57 (39.04%) Python
3 25 (17.12%) C#
4 17 (11.64%) Scala
5 14 (9.59%) JavaScript
5 14 (9.59%) T-SQL
6 12 (8.22%) PowerShell
7 11 (7.53%) Bicep
7 11 (7.53%) Data Analysis Expressions
8 9 (6.16%) Java
8 9 (6.16%) TypeScript
9 3 (2.05%) Bash
10 2 (1.37%) R
10 2 (1.37%) VBA
11 1 (0.68%) ANSI SQL
11 1 (0.68%) COBOL
11 1 (0.68%) PL/SQL
Qualifications
1 43 (29.45%) Security Cleared
2 34 (23.29%) SC Cleared
3 13 (8.90%) Azure Certification
4 6 (4.11%) Microsoft Certification
5 5 (3.42%) Degree
6 4 (2.74%) CTC Cleared
7 2 (1.37%) AWS Certification
7 2 (1.37%) BPSS Clearance
7 2 (1.37%) Computer Science Degree
7 2 (1.37%) OCP
7 2 (1.37%) Oracle Certification
8 1 (0.68%) BC Cleared
8 1 (0.68%) DV Cleared
8 1 (0.68%) Master's Degree
8 1 (0.68%) MCSE
8 1 (0.68%) PMI Certification
8 1 (0.68%) PMP
8 1 (0.68%) Tableau Certification
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 23 (15.75%) Data Quality
2 9 (6.16%) GDPR
2 9 (6.16%) QA
3 4 (2.74%) HIPAA
4 2 (1.37%) Accessibility
4 2 (1.37%) ISO/IEC 27001
5 1 (0.68%) PCI DSS
5 1 (0.68%) Sarbanes-Oxley
5 1 (0.68%) SLA
System Software
1 14 (9.59%) Active Directory
1 14 (9.59%) Docker
2 4 (2.74%) Virtual Desktop
3 3 (2.05%) Virtual Machines
Systems Management
1 30 (20.55%) Terraform
2 19 (13.01%) Kubernetes
3 1 (0.68%) Ansible
3 1 (0.68%) Grafana
3 1 (0.68%) Prometheus
3 1 (0.68%) Single Sign-On
Vendors
1 53 (36.30%) Microsoft
2 48 (32.88%) Databricks
3 7 (4.79%) Oracle
4 6 (4.11%) OpenAI
5 3 (2.05%) ForgeRock
6 2 (1.37%) Google
6 2 (1.37%) Qualtrics
6 2 (1.37%) SAP
6 2 (1.37%) ServiceNow
6 2 (1.37%) Virgin Media
7 1 (0.68%) Atlassian
7 1 (0.68%) NetApp