Consultant Contract Job Trends in England

Consultant
UK > England

The median Consultant daily rate in England is £550, according to job vacancies posted in the 6 months leading up to 30 September 2026.

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

6 months to
30 Sep 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 33 28 29
Rank change year-on-year -5 +1 +5
Contract jobs requiring a Consultant 2,581 1,813 2,015
As % of all contract jobs in England 5.54% 6.53% 6.28%
As % of the Job Titles category 6.01% 7.16% 6.75%
Number of daily rates quoted 1,525 1,146 1,151
10th Percentile £413 £413 £413
25th Percentile £463 £488 £468
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £550 £558 £550
Median % change year-on-year -1.35% +1.36% -
75th Percentile £656 £660 £650
90th Percentile £750 £750 £763
UK median daily rate £550 £550 £550
Number of hourly rates quoted 57 22 22
10th Percentile £36.25 £27.73 £55.00
25th Percentile £45.00 £37.77 £61.53
Median hourly rate £76.00 £77.50 £62.30
Median % change year-on-year -1.94% +24.40% -1.11%
75th Percentile £86.11 £81.25 £72.59
90th Percentile £95.25 £86.65 £74.99
UK median hourly rate £76.00 £77.50 £62.30
% change year-on-year -1.94% +24.40% -2.66%

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 42,921 25,318 29,860
% of contract IT jobs with a recognized job title 92.20% 91.25% 93.00%
Number of daily rates quoted 25,434 16,345 18,286
10th Percentile £325 £275 £300
25th Percentile £425 £402 £413
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £525 £512 £525
Median % change year-on-year +2.54% -2.48% -3.85%
75th Percentile £638 £625 £638
90th Percentile £738 £730 £750
UK median daily rate £525 £500 £525
% change year-on-year +5.00% -4.76% -0.94%
Number of hourly rates quoted 3,595 1,381 1,357
10th Percentile £14.68 £13.78 £15.00
25th Percentile £20.51 £17.33 £21.37
Median hourly rate £42.50 £25.15 £45.00
Median % change year-on-year +68.99% -44.11% -1.92%
75th Percentile £67.84 £52.50 £67.75
90th Percentile £79.00 £70.00 £75.00
UK median hourly rate £41.71 £25.15 £43.00
% change year-on-year +65.84% -41.51% -3.37%

Consultant
Job Vacancy Trend in England

Historical trend showing the proportion of contract IT job postings featuring 'Consultant' in the job title relative to all contract IT jobs advertised in England.

Consultant job vacancy trend in England

Consultant
Daily Rate Trend in England

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for Consultant job vacancies in England.

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for Consultant job vacancies in England

Consultant
Daily Rate Histogram in England

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing Consultant in England over the 6 months to 30 September 2026.

Daily rate histogram for Consultant in England

Consultant
Hourly Rate Trend in England

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for Consultant job vacancies in England.

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for Consultant job vacancies in England

Consultant
Hourly Rate Histogram in England

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing Consultant in England over the 6 months to 30 September 2026.

Hourly rate histogram for Consultant in England

Consultant
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 Consultant within the England region over the 6 months to 30 September 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 -5 1,252 £550 -4.35% 1,576
South East -5 380 £540 -1.82% 387
North of England -23 328 £578 -0.43% 393
Midlands -3 227 £500 -9.09% 222
North West -13 217 £585 -5.65% 227
South West +13 193 £553 -5.06% 194
West Midlands -1 163 £500 -9.09% 170
East of England -12 105 £552 +0.36% 119
Yorkshire -20 90 £575 +21.05% 82
East Midlands -9 59 £525 -4.55% 52
North East -28 20 £750 +38.89% 84
Consultant
UK

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

For the 6 months to 30 September 2026, Consultant 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 Consultant in the job title.

1 581 (22.51%) Security Cleared
2 482 (18.67%) Stakeholder Management
3 474 (18.36%) SAP
4 391 (15.15%) SC Cleared
5 382 (14.80%) Microsoft
6 353 (13.68%) Migration
7 306 (11.86%) Oracle
8 268 (10.38%) Azure
9 245 (9.49%) Stakeholder Engagement
10 243 (9.41%) User Acceptance Testing
11 216 (8.37%) Cybersecurity
11 216 (8.37%) Problem-Solving
12 204 (7.90%) Workshop Facilitation
13 203 (7.87%) Validation
14 197 (7.63%) SAP S/4HANA
15 182 (7.05%) SQL
16 177 (6.86%) Analytics
16 177 (6.86%) Roadmaps
17 160 (6.20%) Data Migration
18 157 (6.08%) ERP
19 156 (6.04%) AWS
19 156 (6.04%) Continuous Improvement
20 153 (5.93%) Requirements Gathering
21 149 (5.77%) Agile
22 140 (5.42%) AI
23 138 (5.35%) DV Cleared
23 138 (5.35%) Power Platform
24 123 (4.77%) Business Intelligence
25 121 (4.69%) Dynamics 365
26 115 (4.46%) ServiceNow

Consultant 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 62 (2.40%) SharePoint
2 37 (1.43%) Confluence
3 30 (1.16%) Microsoft Exchange
4 9 (0.35%) WebSphere
5 8 (0.31%) Oracle Workflow
5 8 (0.31%) WebLogic
6 6 (0.23%) SAS
7 4 (0.15%) Apache Airflow
7 4 (0.15%) CMS
8 3 (0.12%) Adobe Experience Manager
8 3 (0.12%) Apache
8 3 (0.12%) IIS
8 3 (0.12%) OpenStack
8 3 (0.12%) TIBCO ActiveMatrix
9 2 (0.077%) Smallworld
9 2 (0.077%) WordPress
10 1 (0.039%) OpenEdge
10 1 (0.039%) Oracle Application Server
10 1 (0.039%) SAP Portal
10 1 (0.039%) Tomcat
Applications
1 41 (1.59%) Microsoft Excel
2 31 (1.20%) Microsoft Office
3 25 (0.97%) Microsoft PowerPoint
4 10 (0.39%) MS Visio
5 7 (0.27%) Spreadsheet
6 4 (0.15%) Microsoft Project
7 1 (0.039%) Adobe Captivate
7 1 (0.039%) Adobe Creative Suite
7 1 (0.039%) Chatbot
7 1 (0.039%) CPLEX
Business Applications
1 197 (7.63%) SAP S/4HANA
2 72 (2.79%) Oracle EBS
3 47 (1.82%) SAP FI
4 41 (1.59%) Oracle Payables
4 41 (1.59%) SAP PSCD
5 40 (1.55%) Oracle ERP
6 39 (1.51%) SAP Payroll
7 36 (1.39%) Oracle Receivables
8 34 (1.32%) Dynamics CRM
9 33 (1.28%) Oracle General Ledger
10 32 (1.24%) SAP CO
11 30 (1.16%) NetSuite
11 30 (1.16%) Workday HCM
12 29 (1.12%) SAP HCM
13 27 (1.05%) SAP FI/CO
13 27 (1.05%) SAP HR
14 26 (1.01%) SAP SD
15 23 (0.89%) SAP MM
16 22 (0.85%) SAP BRIM
17 20 (0.77%) Oracle Payroll
Cloud Services
1 268 (10.38%) Azure
2 156 (6.04%) AWS
3 138 (5.35%) Power Platform
4 121 (4.69%) Dynamics 365
5 89 (3.45%) SuccessFactors
6 86 (3.33%) GCP
7 74 (2.87%) OCI
8 73 (2.83%) Microsoft 365
9 59 (2.29%) Power Automate
10 56 (2.17%) Entra ID
11 52 (2.01%) Azure DevOps
12 42 (1.63%) SaaS
13 38 (1.47%) Microsoft Copilot
14 29 (1.12%) PowerApps
15 25 (0.97%) Microsoft Purview
16 23 (0.89%) GitHub
17 21 (0.81%) Snowflake
18 16 (0.62%) Copilot Studio
18 16 (0.62%) SAP Commerce Cloud
19 15 (0.58%) Amazon S3
Communications & Networking
1 62 (2.40%) Firewall
2 57 (2.21%) Network Security
3 32 (1.24%) WAN
4 28 (1.08%) BGP
5 24 (0.93%) VPN
6 17 (0.66%) DNS
7 15 (0.58%) LAN
7 15 (0.58%) SNMP
8 13 (0.50%) TCP/IP
9 11 (0.43%) Ethernet VPN
9 11 (0.43%) SAN
10 10 (0.39%) 3GPP
10 10 (0.39%) 5G
10 10 (0.39%) IPsec
10 10 (0.39%) MPLS
10 10 (0.39%) Radio Access Network
11 9 (0.35%) VXLAN
12 8 (0.31%) NGFW
12 8 (0.31%) SD-WAN
12 8 (0.31%) X.509
Database & Business Intelligence
1 78 (3.02%) Power BI
2 36 (1.39%) Oracle Reports
3 31 (1.20%) Oracle BI Publisher
4 28 (1.08%) Data Warehouse
4 28 (1.08%) SAP BW
5 25 (0.97%) Metadata
5 25 (0.97%) SQL Server
5 25 (0.97%) Tableau
6 24 (0.93%) SAP HANA
7 16 (0.62%) BusinessObjects
8 12 (0.46%) Power Query
9 9 (0.35%) Oracle Database
10 8 (0.31%) DynamoDB
10 8 (0.31%) Relational Database
11 7 (0.27%) Amazon RDS
11 7 (0.27%) Oracle ODI
12 5 (0.19%) Amazon Athena
12 5 (0.19%) SAP Data Services
12 5 (0.19%) Snowflake Schema
12 5 (0.19%) SQL Server Reporting Services
Development Applications
1 77 (2.98%) JIRA
2 24 (0.93%) Git
3 14 (0.54%) Jenkins
4 12 (0.46%) Oracle Forms
5 10 (0.39%) GitLab
6 7 (0.27%) Hudson
6 7 (0.27%) PowerBuilder
7 5 (0.19%) SonarQube
8 4 (0.15%) Cypress.io
8 4 (0.15%) Sonatype Nexus
9 3 (0.12%) Browser DevTools
9 3 (0.12%) JDeveloper
9 3 (0.12%) LoadRunner
9 3 (0.12%) Maven
9 3 (0.12%) MLflow
9 3 (0.12%) Snyk
9 3 (0.12%) Toad
9 3 (0.12%) Zephyr
10 2 (0.077%) Postman
10 2 (0.077%) TestRail
General
1 577 (22.36%) Finance
2 571 (22.12%) Social Skills
3 198 (7.67%) Public Sector
4 179 (6.94%) Analytical Skills
5 94 (3.64%) Banking
6 93 (3.60%) Manufacturing
7 75 (2.91%) Legal
8 64 (2.48%) Documentation Skills
9 62 (2.40%) Telecoms
10 57 (2.21%) Billing
11 53 (2.05%) Retail
12 48 (1.86%) General Ledger
13 46 (1.78%) Presentation Skills
14 43 (1.67%) Marketing
15 34 (1.32%) Influencing Skills
16 33 (1.28%) Inclusion and Diversity
17 24 (0.93%) Law
18 23 (0.89%) Pharmaceutical
19 21 (0.81%) Local Government
20 17 (0.66%) Financial Institution
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 94 (3.64%) Oracle Fusion
2 67 (2.60%) REST
3 51 (1.98%) Terraform
4 38 (1.47%) SAP Fiori
5 36 (1.39%) Middleware
6 33 (1.28%) SOAP
7 30 (1.16%) Web Services
8 27 (1.05%) XML
9 23 (0.89%) SailPoint
10 19 (0.74%) OAuth
11 18 (0.70%) LDAP
12 17 (0.66%) JSON
13 16 (0.62%) HTML
14 14 (0.54%) CSS
15 13 (0.50%) NETCONF
15 13 (0.50%) SAML
15 13 (0.50%) YANG
16 12 (0.46%) ADO
16 12 (0.46%) SAPUI5
17 11 (0.43%) SAP PI
Miscellaneous
1 107 (4.15%) Onboarding
2 52 (2.01%) CMDB
3 47 (1.82%) Operational Technology
4 39 (1.51%) Data Centre
5 34 (1.32%) Product Ownership
6 33 (1.28%) Data Structures
7 29 (1.12%) Security Posture
8 27 (1.05%) Data Protection Act
9 26 (1.01%) Legacy Systems
10 25 (0.97%) Enterprise Software
11 21 (0.81%) AI Agents
11 21 (0.81%) Cloud Native
12 19 (0.74%) Replication
13 17 (0.66%) Management Information System
14 16 (0.62%) Greenfield Project
15 15 (0.58%) PKI
15 15 (0.58%) Public Cloud
16 14 (0.54%) Hybrid Cloud
17 12 (0.46%) Life Science
17 12 (0.46%) SCADA
Operating Systems
1 78 (3.02%) Windows
2 61 (2.36%) Linux
3 23 (0.89%) Unix
4 21 (0.81%) Solaris
5 20 (0.77%) Windows Server
6 10 (0.39%) AIX
6 10 (0.39%) VMS
7 6 (0.23%) Android
7 6 (0.23%) Windows 10
8 5 (0.19%) Apple iOS
8 5 (0.19%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
9 4 (0.15%) Windows Server 2016
10 1 (0.039%) Data ONTAP
10 1 (0.039%) Mac OS
10 1 (0.039%) Windows Server 2012
10 1 (0.039%) zOS
Processes & Methodologies
1 482 (18.67%) Stakeholder Management
2 353 (13.68%) Migration
3 245 (9.49%) Stakeholder Engagement
4 243 (9.41%) User Acceptance Testing
5 216 (8.37%) Cybersecurity
5 216 (8.37%) Problem-Solving
6 204 (7.90%) Workshop Facilitation
7 203 (7.87%) Validation
8 177 (6.86%) Analytics
8 177 (6.86%) Roadmaps
9 160 (6.20%) Data Migration
10 157 (6.08%) ERP
11 156 (6.04%) Continuous Improvement
12 153 (5.93%) Requirements Gathering
13 149 (5.77%) Agile
14 140 (5.42%) AI
15 123 (4.77%) Business Intelligence
16 114 (4.42%) Knowledge Transfer
17 110 (4.26%) Translating Business Requirements
18 107 (4.15%) Project Delivery
Programming Languages
1 182 (7.05%) SQL
2 88 (3.41%) Python
3 48 (1.86%) ABAP
4 47 (1.82%) PowerShell
5 35 (1.36%) JavaScript
6 30 (1.16%) PL/SQL
7 26 (1.01%) Java
8 17 (0.66%) Bash
9 15 (0.58%) Data Analysis Expressions
10 12 (0.46%) Kusto Query Language
11 10 (0.39%) C#
11 10 (0.39%) T-SQL
12 9 (0.35%) Search Processing Language
13 7 (0.27%) TypeScript
14 6 (0.23%) R
15 5 (0.19%) Groovy
15 5 (0.19%) Korn
15 5 (0.19%) Perl
16 4 (0.15%) Shell Script
17 3 (0.12%) Bicep
Qualifications
1 581 (22.51%) Security Cleared
2 391 (15.15%) SC Cleared
3 138 (5.35%) DV Cleared
4 83 (3.22%) BPSS Clearance
5 62 (2.40%) CISSP
6 56 (2.17%) Degree
7 51 (1.98%) CISM
8 39 (1.51%) Cisco Certification
9 29 (1.12%) (ISC)2 CCSP
10 25 (0.97%) CCSP
11 16 (0.62%) AWS Certification
12 15 (0.58%) ACCA
12 15 (0.58%) CRISC
13 13 (0.50%) CIMA
13 13 (0.50%) PMP
14 10 (0.39%) CompTIA Security+
14 10 (0.39%) ISO 27001 Lead Auditor
15 9 (0.35%) Azure Certification
15 9 (0.35%) CISA
16 8 (0.31%) CCIE
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 92 (3.56%) NIST
2 87 (3.37%) Data Quality
3 72 (2.79%) GRC
4 68 (2.63%) ISO/IEC 27001
5 42 (1.63%) NCSC
6 40 (1.55%) QA
7 28 (1.08%) GDPR
8 27 (1.05%) SLA
9 25 (0.97%) PMO
10 17 (0.66%) Actionable Recommendations
11 15 (0.58%) Accessibility
12 12 (0.46%) PCI DSS
13 11 (0.43%) Sarbanes-Oxley
14 10 (0.39%) Cyber Essentials
15 9 (0.35%) NIST 800
16 8 (0.31%) Cyber Essentials PLUS
16 8 (0.31%) GxP
17 6 (0.23%) COBIT
17 6 (0.23%) IFRS
17 6 (0.23%) WCAG
System Software
1 64 (2.48%) Active Directory
2 29 (1.12%) VMware Infrastructure
3 26 (1.01%) VMware NSX
4 15 (0.58%) Docker
4 15 (0.58%) vSphere
5 11 (0.43%) VMware ESXi
6 10 (0.39%) Hyper-V
7 9 (0.35%) IAG
8 6 (0.23%) Virtual Machines
9 5 (0.19%) Firmware
10 4 (0.15%) Virtual Desktop
11 2 (0.077%) BitLocker
11 2 (0.077%) PowerHA
12 1 (0.039%) NFS
12 1 (0.039%) Oracle RAC
12 1 (0.039%) oVirt
12 1 (0.039%) ProxySG
12 1 (0.039%) RHEV
12 1 (0.039%) SRDF
12 1 (0.039%) Time Sharing Option
Systems Management
1 43 (1.67%) Kubernetes
2 24 (0.93%) Ansible
3 19 (0.74%) Microsoft Intune
4 17 (0.66%) SCCM
5 12 (0.46%) vRealize
6 11 (0.43%) FortiGate
7 10 (0.39%) Grafana
7 10 (0.39%) vCenter Server
8 9 (0.35%) Single Sign-On
9 8 (0.31%) Nagios
9 8 (0.31%) ZABBIX
10 6 (0.23%) Netcool
10 6 (0.23%) Tivoli
10 6 (0.23%) VxRail
11 5 (0.19%) OpenView
11 5 (0.19%) Prometheus
11 5 (0.19%) Tivoli Monitoring
12 4 (0.15%) CEMLI
12 4 (0.15%) logstash
13 3 (0.12%) Failover Clustering
Vendors
1 474 (18.36%) SAP
2 382 (14.80%) Microsoft
3 306 (11.86%) Oracle
4 115 (4.46%) ServiceNow
5 66 (2.56%) Workday
6 53 (2.05%) VMware
7 39 (1.51%) Salesforce
8 37 (1.43%) Databricks
9 29 (1.12%) Splunk
10 26 (1.01%) Palo Alto
11 24 (0.93%) BMC
11 24 (0.93%) CyberArk
12 23 (0.89%) Google
13 22 (0.85%) Cisco
14 18 (0.70%) Ariba
14 18 (0.70%) IBM
14 18 (0.70%) OpenText
15 17 (0.66%) Zscaler
16 16 (0.62%) Dell
16 16 (0.62%) Veeam