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 12 June 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
12 Jun 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 421 353 344
Rank change year-on-year -68 -9 +27
Contract jobs citing Azure SQL Database 188 136 192
As % of all contract jobs in England 0.44% 0.55% 0.51%
As % of the Database & Business Intelligence category 2.89% 2.94% 3.00%
Number of daily rates quoted 137 101 146
10th Percentile £400 £400 £400
25th Percentile £425 £444 £452
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £525 £523 £550
Median % change year-on-year +0.38% -4.91% -
75th Percentile £625 £625 £650
90th Percentile £730 £700 £725
UK median daily rate £523 £520 £540
% change year-on-year +0.48% -3.70% -1.82%

All Database & BI 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 6,498 4,631 6,404
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in England 15.24% 18.89% 17.09%
Number of daily rates quoted 4,418 3,206 4,613
10th Percentile £350 £359 £350
25th Percentile £413 £419 £425
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £525 £525
Median % change year-on-year -4.76% - -4.55%
75th Percentile £600 £650 £675
90th Percentile £700 £775 £800
UK median daily rate £500 £515 £525
% change year-on-year -2.91% -1.90% -3.67%
Number of hourly rates quoted 205 90 143
10th Percentile £14.00 £19.20 £14.00
25th Percentile £23.00 £23.69 £20.77
Median hourly rate £41.00 £33.50 £40.00
Median % change year-on-year +22.41% -16.26% -31.73%
75th Percentile £73.75 £65.62 £53.94
90th Percentile £82.25 £77.62 £72.50
UK median hourly rate £41.71 £34.99 £40.00
% change year-on-year +19.21% -12.53% -31.73%

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 12 June 2026.

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 12 June 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 -35 104 £575 -0.22% 53
Midlands -55 23 £550 +33.74% 17
North of England -60 23 £425 -17.07% 35
South East -77 17 £425 -15.00% 39
Yorkshire -43 13 £495 -5.71% 7
West Midlands -58 12 £525 +31.25% 12
South West -19 11 £550 +10.00% 10
East Midlands -14 10 £600 +21.83% 5
North West -33 6 £413 -15.38% 23
North East - 4 £425 - 5
East of England -24 1 £505 -12.25% 15
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 10 (5.32%) Apache Spark
2 8 (4.26%) SharePoint
3 4 (2.13%) Microsoft Exchange
4 3 (1.60%) Apache
5 2 (1.06%) Apache Airflow
5 2 (1.06%) ArcGIS
5 2 (1.06%) CMS
5 2 (1.06%) Confluence
6 1 (0.53%) IIS
6 1 (0.53%) Oracle Workflow
6 1 (0.53%) Tomcat
6 1 (0.53%) Umbraco
Applications
1 2 (1.06%) Microsoft Excel
2 1 (0.53%) InDesign
2 1 (0.53%) Microsoft PowerPoint
2 1 (0.53%) Spreadsheet
Business Applications
1 2 (1.06%) Payment Gateway
2 1 (0.53%) SAP S/4HANA
Cloud Services
1 188 (100.00%) Azure
2 85 (45.21%) Azure Data Factory
3 75 (39.89%) Azure DevOps
4 68 (36.17%) Azure Synapse Analytics
5 67 (35.64%) Power Platform
6 44 (23.40%) GitHub
7 34 (18.09%) Serverless
8 26 (13.83%) Azure Functions
8 26 (13.83%) Azure Key Vault
9 23 (12.23%) Azure Monitor
10 22 (11.70%) Azure Storage
11 21 (11.17%) Azure Cosmos DB
12 16 (8.51%) Entra ID
13 14 (7.45%) AWS
14 13 (6.91%) Azure AKS
14 13 (6.91%) Azure Service Bus
15 11 (5.85%) GitHub Actions
16 9 (4.79%) Azure ExpressRoute
17 8 (4.26%) Azure Logic Apps
17 8 (4.26%) PowerApps
Communications & Networking
1 10 (5.32%) DNS
2 8 (4.26%) Firewall
3 6 (3.19%) Network Security
4 4 (2.13%) WAN
5 2 (1.06%) VPN
6 1 (0.53%) HTTP
6 1 (0.53%) Internet
6 1 (0.53%) SMTP
Database & Business Intelligence
1 62 (32.98%) Data Lake
2 56 (29.79%) Power BI
3 54 (28.72%) SQL Server
4 44 (23.40%) Data Warehouse
5 19 (10.11%) Delta Lake
5 19 (10.11%) SQL Server Integration Services
6 12 (6.38%) NoSQL
7 10 (5.32%) Metadata
7 10 (5.32%) SQL Server Analysis Services
7 10 (5.32%) SQL Server Reporting Services
8 8 (4.26%) PostgreSQL
8 8 (4.26%) Power Query
9 7 (3.72%) Star Schema
10 6 (3.19%) Relational Database
11 5 (2.66%) Azure SQL Data Warehouse
11 5 (2.66%) MySQL
11 5 (2.66%) Parquet
11 5 (2.66%) Spark SQL
12 4 (2.13%) Amazon RDS
12 4 (2.13%) Metadata Repository
Development Applications
1 41 (21.81%) Git
2 2 (1.06%) Jenkins
2 2 (1.06%) SQL Server Management Studio (SSMS)
3 1 (0.53%) Bitbucket
3 1 (0.53%) Cypress.io
3 1 (0.53%) git-flow
3 1 (0.53%) GitLab
3 1 (0.53%) JIRA
3 1 (0.53%) JMeter
3 1 (0.53%) MSI
3 1 (0.53%) Postman
3 1 (0.53%) REST Assured
3 1 (0.53%) Selenium
3 1 (0.53%) Team Foundation Server
3 1 (0.53%) Visual Studio
3 1 (0.53%) webpack
General
1 43 (22.87%) Social Skills
2 39 (20.74%) Finance
3 17 (9.04%) Public Sector
4 16 (8.51%) Analytical Skills
5 10 (5.32%) Banking
6 7 (3.72%) Documentation Skills
6 7 (3.72%) Inclusion and Diversity
7 4 (2.13%) Investment Banking
8 3 (1.60%) Military
9 2 (1.06%) Aviation
9 2 (1.06%) Influencing Skills
10 1 (0.53%) Agriculture
10 1 (0.53%) Games
10 1 (0.53%) Legal
10 1 (0.53%) Local Government
10 1 (0.53%) Organisational Skills
10 1 (0.53%) Presentation Skills
10 1 (0.53%) Publishing
10 1 (0.53%) Retail
10 1 (0.53%) Retail Banking
Job Titles
1 72 (38.30%) Data Engineer
2 34 (18.09%) Architect
3 30 (15.96%) Senior
4 29 (15.43%) Developer
5 26 (13.83%) Azure Engineer
6 18 (9.57%) Senior Data Engineer
7 15 (7.98%) Azure Architect
8 14 (7.45%) Azure Data Engineer
9 13 (6.91%) Data Architect
9 13 (6.91%) DBA
10 11 (5.85%) Azure Developer
10 11 (5.85%) SQL DBA
11 10 (5.32%) .NET Developer
12 9 (4.79%) Informatica Engineer
12 9 (4.79%) Platform Engineer
13 8 (4.26%) Senior Developer
14 7 (3.72%) Azure Data Architect
14 7 (3.72%) Full-Stack Developer
14 7 (3.72%) Solutions Architect
15 6 (3.19%) Lead
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 29 (15.43%) .NET
1 29 (15.43%) PySpark
2 22 (11.70%) REST
3 10 (5.32%) JSON
4 8 (4.26%) ARM Templates
4 8 (4.26%) OAuth
4 8 (4.26%) React
5 7 (3.72%) Kafka
6 5 (2.66%) .NET Core
6 5 (2.66%) .NET Framework
6 5 (2.66%) AngularJS
6 5 (2.66%) CSS
6 5 (2.66%) HTML
6 5 (2.66%) OAuth2
6 5 (2.66%) XML
6 5 (2.66%) YAML
7 4 (2.13%) Entity Framework
7 4 (2.13%) RESTful
7 4 (2.13%) SOAP
7 4 (2.13%) Web Services
Miscellaneous
1 18 (9.57%) Cloud Native
2 10 (5.32%) Replication
3 5 (2.66%) IoT
3 5 (2.66%) Product Ownership
4 4 (2.13%) Clustering
4 4 (2.13%) Data Structures
4 4 (2.13%) Hybrid Cloud
5 3 (1.60%) Distributed Computing
5 3 (1.60%) Distributed Systems
5 3 (1.60%) Enterprise Software
5 3 (1.60%) Legacy Systems
5 3 (1.60%) Onboarding
5 3 (1.60%) SCADA
5 3 (1.60%) Security Posture
6 2 (1.06%) Data Fabric
6 2 (1.06%) Data Protection Act
6 2 (1.06%) Low-Code
6 2 (1.06%) Wiki
7 1 (0.53%) Smart Meter
7 1 (0.53%) VSAM
Operating Systems
1 5 (2.66%) Linux
1 5 (2.66%) Windows
2 3 (1.60%) VMS
3 2 (1.06%) Ubuntu
4 1 (0.53%) Data ONTAP
Processes & Methodologies
1 88 (46.81%) DevOps
2 81 (43.09%) ETL
3 80 (42.55%) Data Modelling
4 79 (42.02%) CI/CD
5 64 (34.04%) Analytics
6 62 (32.98%) Data Pipeline
7 53 (28.19%) Business Intelligence
8 51 (27.13%) Data Engineering
9 38 (20.21%) Data Governance
10 35 (18.62%) Infrastructure as Code
11 31 (16.49%) Agile
12 30 (15.96%) Performance Tuning
13 29 (15.43%) Data Architecture
13 29 (15.43%) High Availability
14 28 (14.89%) AI
15 23 (12.23%) Data Science
15 23 (12.23%) Migration
15 23 (12.23%) RBAC
16 22 (11.70%) Disaster Recovery
17 21 (11.17%) Problem-Solving
Programming Languages
1 188 (100.00%) SQL
2 63 (33.51%) Python
3 26 (13.83%) C#
4 23 (12.23%) PowerShell
5 18 (9.57%) T-SQL
6 17 (9.04%) Bicep
6 17 (9.04%) Scala
7 15 (7.98%) Data Analysis Expressions
8 10 (5.32%) JavaScript
9 7 (3.72%) TypeScript
10 4 (2.13%) Bash
11 3 (1.60%) Java
12 2 (1.06%) Kusto Query Language
13 1 (0.53%) C
13 1 (0.53%) C++
13 1 (0.53%) Korn
13 1 (0.53%) PL/SQL
13 1 (0.53%) X++
Qualifications
1 47 (25.00%) Security Cleared
2 36 (19.15%) SC Cleared
3 17 (9.04%) Azure Certification
4 9 (4.79%) Microsoft Certification
5 5 (2.66%) Degree
6 3 (1.60%) BPSS Clearance
6 3 (1.60%) Computer Science Degree
7 1 (0.53%) DBS Check
7 1 (0.53%) ISTQB
7 1 (0.53%) Master's Degree
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 48 (25.53%) Data Quality
2 16 (8.51%) QA
3 14 (7.45%) GDPR
4 8 (4.26%) ISO/IEC 27001
5 3 (1.60%) Accessibility
5 3 (1.60%) NCSC
6 2 (1.06%) Cyber Essentials
6 2 (1.06%) NIST
7 1 (0.53%) California Consumer Privacy Act
7 1 (0.53%) HIPAA
7 1 (0.53%) IFRS
7 1 (0.53%) IFRS 17
7 1 (0.53%) IFRS 9
7 1 (0.53%) ISO 22301
7 1 (0.53%) Sarbanes-Oxley
7 1 (0.53%) SOC 2
System Software
1 11 (5.85%) Virtual Machines
2 10 (5.32%) Active Directory
3 8 (4.26%) Docker
4 6 (3.19%) Virtual Desktop
Systems Management
1 40 (21.28%) Terraform
2 7 (3.72%) Kubernetes
3 3 (1.60%) Failover Clustering
4 2 (1.06%) Ansible
5 1 (0.53%) Single Sign-On
Vendors
1 101 (53.72%) Microsoft
2 56 (29.79%) Databricks
3 14 (7.45%) Informatica
4 10 (5.32%) Oracle
5 9 (4.79%) ServiceNow
6 3 (1.60%) Google
6 3 (1.60%) SAP
7 2 (1.06%) Palo Alto
8 1 (0.53%) Adobe
8 1 (0.53%) Alteryx
8 1 (0.53%) IBM
8 1 (0.53%) NetApp
8 1 (0.53%) Salesforce
8 1 (0.53%) Salesforce Marketing Cloud