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 6 March 2026.

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

6 months to
6 Mar 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 31 30 28
Rank change year-on-year -1 -2 +24
Contract jobs requiring a Consultant 2,165 1,554 2,147
As % of all contract jobs in England 5.95% 6.08% 5.69%
As % of the Job Titles category 6.47% 6.55% 6.12%
Number of daily rates quoted 1,242 956 1,355
10th Percentile £400 £417 £400
25th Percentile £463 £495 £475
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £550 £550 £550
Median % change year-on-year - - -4.35%
75th Percentile £638 £650 £650
90th Percentile £716 £738 £738
UK median daily rate £550 £550 £550
% change year-on-year - - -0.45%
Number of hourly rates quoted 72 14 32
10th Percentile - £66.50 £42.50
25th Percentile £56.25 £72.08 £52.90
Median hourly rate £57.50 £83.75 £62.75
Median % change year-on-year -31.34% +33.47% -11.31%
75th Percentile £60.00 £86.00 £81.56
90th Percentile £73.71 £87.13 £90.03
UK median hourly rate £57.50 £85.00 £63.00
% change year-on-year -32.35% +34.92% -7.35%

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 33,481 23,742 35,057
% of contract IT jobs with a recognized job title 92.01% 92.91% 92.84%
Number of daily rates quoted 21,160 15,275 23,477
10th Percentile £306 £300 £270
25th Percentile £412 £409 £410
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £505 £525 £525
Median % change year-on-year -3.81% - -4.55%
75th Percentile £624 £638 £638
90th Percentile £725 £750 £750
UK median daily rate £500 £525 £525
% change year-on-year -4.76% - -4.55%
Number of hourly rates quoted 2,170 743 2,218
10th Percentile £15.25 £16.01 £13.15
25th Percentile £19.00 £21.48 £16.30
Median hourly rate £35.00 £35.89 £33.78
Median % change year-on-year -2.48% +6.26% -19.20%
75th Percentile £65.00 £65.00 £60.00
90th Percentile £75.00 £76.10 £71.87
UK median hourly rate £34.00 £34.00 £34.08
% change year-on-year - -0.23% -15.93%

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 6 March 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 6 March 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 6 March 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 -4 996 £550 -4.35% 560
South East -1 317 £520 -9.57% 332
North of England -10 273 £575 +6.48% 205
Midlands -8 220 £563 +7.14% 87
West Midlands +1 163 £563 +4.17% 51
North West -2 150 £626 +16.19% 116
South West +16 148 £550 - 156
Yorkshire +3 113 £500 -5.88% 66
East of England -5 96 £550 - 53
East Midlands -13 53 £500 -3.85% 36
North East -25 10 £525 -4.55% 24
South Coast - 1 £550 -
Consultant
UK

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

For the 6 months to 6 March 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.

1 502 (23.19%) Security Cleared
2 486 (22.45%) SAP
3 417 (19.26%) SC Cleared
4 323 (14.92%) Migration
5 258 (11.92%) SAP S/4HANA
6 256 (11.82%) Azure
7 238 (10.99%) Stakeholder Engagement
8 235 (10.85%) Problem-Solving
9 234 (10.81%) Stakeholder Management
10 230 (10.62%) Oracle
11 224 (10.35%) Microsoft
12 199 (9.19%) ERP
13 181 (8.36%) Workshop Facilitation
14 156 (7.21%) Agile
15 145 (6.70%) SQL
16 144 (6.65%) User Acceptance Testing
17 134 (6.19%) Analytics
18 133 (6.14%) Roadmaps
19 131 (6.05%) Data Migration
20 126 (5.82%) Business Intelligence
20 126 (5.82%) Cybersecurity
21 116 (5.36%) Validation
22 109 (5.03%) Continuous Improvement
23 108 (4.99%) Knowledge Transfer
24 104 (4.80%) Dynamics 365
25 102 (4.71%) Risk Management
26 98 (4.53%) AI
27 96 (4.43%) Change Management
28 95 (4.39%) AWS
29 91 (4.20%) DevOps

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 58 (2.68%) SharePoint
2 34 (1.57%) Confluence
3 26 (1.20%) Microsoft Exchange
4 6 (0.28%) Jupyter
4 6 (0.28%) Oracle Workflow
5 5 (0.23%) Apache Spark
5 5 (0.23%) NetWeaver
6 3 (0.14%) ArcGIS
6 3 (0.14%) CMS
6 3 (0.14%) MTS
6 3 (0.14%) Palantir Foundry
7 2 (0.092%) Adobe Experience Manager
7 2 (0.092%) Apache
7 2 (0.092%) IIS
7 2 (0.092%) OpenStack
8 1 (0.046%) nginx
8 1 (0.046%) SAP Portal
8 1 (0.046%) SharePoint 2010
8 1 (0.046%) Skype for Business
8 1 (0.046%) WebSphere
Applications
1 46 (2.12%) Microsoft Excel
2 20 (0.92%) Microsoft PowerPoint
3 9 (0.42%) Microsoft Office
3 9 (0.42%) MS Visio
4 7 (0.32%) Microsoft Project
5 6 (0.28%) Oracle Smart View
6 5 (0.23%) PTC Creo
7 4 (0.18%) Spreadsheet
8 2 (0.092%) Lectora
8 2 (0.092%) Navisworks
8 2 (0.092%) Revit
9 1 (0.046%) CATIA
9 1 (0.046%) Chatbot
9 1 (0.046%) InfoPath
9 1 (0.046%) ProjectWise
9 1 (0.046%) Siemens NX
9 1 (0.046%) Windchill
Business Applications
1 258 (11.92%) SAP S/4HANA
2 50 (2.31%) Oracle EBS
3 45 (2.08%) Oracle Payables
4 42 (1.94%) Oracle Receivables
4 42 (1.94%) SAP FI
5 39 (1.80%) SAP MM
6 36 (1.66%) Oracle General Ledger
7 34 (1.57%) Dynamics CRM
8 32 (1.48%) Oracle EBS R12
9 30 (1.39%) Oracle Assets
10 29 (1.34%) SAP HCM
11 28 (1.29%) SAP CO
12 26 (1.20%) SAP PSCD
13 25 (1.15%) Oracle Cash Management
13 25 (1.15%) SAP EWM
13 25 (1.15%) SAP FI/CO
13 25 (1.15%) SAP Payroll
13 25 (1.15%) SAP Travel Management
14 24 (1.11%) Oracle Procure-to-Pay
15 22 (1.02%) Teamcenter
Cloud Services
1 256 (11.82%) Azure
2 104 (4.80%) Dynamics 365
3 95 (4.39%) AWS
4 86 (3.97%) Power Platform
5 72 (3.33%) OCI
6 68 (3.14%) Microsoft 365
7 67 (3.09%) GCP
8 57 (2.63%) SaaS
9 53 (2.45%) Entra ID
10 38 (1.76%) SuccessFactors
11 33 (1.52%) Power Automate
12 28 (1.29%) Azure DevOps
13 27 (1.25%) Microsoft Copilot
14 24 (1.11%) PowerApps
15 22 (1.02%) GitHub
16 21 (0.97%) OneDrive
17 19 (0.88%) SAP Commerce Cloud
18 17 (0.79%) Microsoft Purview
19 15 (0.69%) Serverless
20 12 (0.55%) Azure Data Factory
Communications & Networking
1 34 (1.57%) Firewall
2 13 (0.60%) Network Security
2 13 (0.60%) SMS
2 13 (0.60%) VPN
3 12 (0.55%) Kerberos
3 12 (0.55%) VSAN
4 10 (0.46%) HTTP
5 9 (0.42%) DNS
5 9 (0.42%) FTP
6 8 (0.37%) WAN
7 7 (0.32%) Cisco IPT
7 7 (0.32%) SAN
8 6 (0.28%) DHCP
8 6 (0.28%) SSH
8 6 (0.28%) TCP/IP
8 6 (0.28%) VLAN
9 5 (0.23%) SD-WAN
9 5 (0.23%) SSL
10 4 (0.18%) Intranet
10 4 (0.18%) LAN
Database & Business Intelligence
1 66 (3.05%) Power BI
2 41 (1.89%) SAP HANA
3 36 (1.66%) Oracle Reports
4 22 (1.02%) Oracle BI Publisher
5 21 (0.97%) Metadata
5 21 (0.97%) SQL Server
6 13 (0.60%) NoSQL
7 11 (0.51%) Data Warehouse
8 9 (0.42%) PostgreSQL
8 9 (0.42%) SAP BW
8 9 (0.42%) SQL Server Reporting Services
8 9 (0.42%) Tableau
9 7 (0.32%) GIS
10 6 (0.28%) DynamoDB
10 6 (0.28%) Electronic Patient Records
10 6 (0.28%) MongoDB
10 6 (0.28%) Oracle Database
10 6 (0.28%) Oracle ODI
11 5 (0.23%) DB2
11 5 (0.23%) Spotfire
Development Applications
1 59 (2.73%) JIRA
2 16 (0.74%) Jenkins
3 11 (0.51%) Git
3 11 (0.51%) Hudson
3 11 (0.51%) Oracle Forms
4 8 (0.37%) GitLab
5 3 (0.14%) JUnit
5 3 (0.14%) LSMW
5 3 (0.14%) Oracle APEX
6 2 (0.092%) Bitbucket
6 2 (0.092%) git-flow
6 2 (0.092%) Mockito
6 2 (0.092%) Postman
6 2 (0.092%) Sonatype Nexus
6 2 (0.092%) TeamCity
6 2 (0.092%) Visual Studio
7 1 (0.046%) Burp Suite
7 1 (0.046%) SonarQube
7 1 (0.046%) Tricentis qTest
7 1 (0.046%) Visual Studio Code
General
1 562 (25.96%) Social Skills
2 501 (23.14%) Finance
3 194 (8.96%) Public Sector
4 184 (8.50%) Analytical Skills
5 85 (3.93%) Manufacturing
6 79 (3.65%) Banking
7 60 (2.77%) Documentation Skills
7 60 (2.77%) Marketing
8 55 (2.54%) Legal
9 48 (2.22%) Billing
10 39 (1.80%) General Ledger
10 39 (1.80%) Presentation Skills
11 35 (1.62%) Telecoms
12 32 (1.48%) Retail
13 26 (1.20%) Law
14 24 (1.11%) Organisational Skills
15 23 (1.06%) Pharmaceutical
16 20 (0.92%) Financial Institution
17 18 (0.83%) Aerospace
18 16 (0.74%) Inclusion and Diversity
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 86 (3.97%) Oracle Fusion
2 57 (2.63%) REST
3 44 (2.03%) Web Services
4 43 (1.99%) XML
5 42 (1.94%) SAP Fiori
6 32 (1.48%) SAP TM
6 32 (1.48%) SOAP
7 25 (1.15%) Node.js
8 23 (1.06%) LDAP
9 21 (0.97%) BAPI
10 18 (0.83%) Middleware
11 16 (0.74%) GraphQL
12 14 (0.65%) JSON
13 13 (0.60%) Kafka
13 13 (0.60%) SAML
13 13 (0.60%) SAP Basis
14 12 (0.55%) IDoc
15 11 (0.51%) .NET
15 11 (0.51%) HTML
15 11 (0.51%) OAuth
Miscellaneous
1 55 (2.54%) Onboarding
2 51 (2.36%) Legacy Systems
3 38 (1.76%) Product Ownership
4 36 (1.66%) Security Posture
5 33 (1.52%) Data Protection Act
6 26 (1.20%) Replication
7 23 (1.06%) Cloud Native
8 22 (1.02%) Data Centre
9 20 (0.92%) Operational Technology
10 18 (0.83%) NHS
11 17 (0.79%) AI Agents
11 17 (0.79%) Greenfield Project
11 17 (0.79%) Management Information System
12 14 (0.65%) Data Structures
12 14 (0.65%) Life Science
12 14 (0.65%) Public Cloud
12 14 (0.65%) Self-Motivation
13 11 (0.51%) Analytical Mindset
14 10 (0.46%) CMDB
14 10 (0.46%) Hybrid Cloud
Operating Systems
1 62 (2.86%) Windows
2 30 (1.39%) Linux
3 10 (0.46%) Windows 10
3 10 (0.46%) Windows Server
4 7 (0.32%) Unix
5 6 (0.28%) AIX
5 6 (0.28%) Mac OS
5 6 (0.28%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
6 5 (0.23%) VMS
7 4 (0.18%) Solaris
7 4 (0.18%) zOS
8 3 (0.14%) Ubuntu
9 2 (0.092%) Apple iOS
9 2 (0.092%) SUSE Linux Enterprise Server
9 2 (0.092%) Windows Server 2003
9 2 (0.092%) Windows Server 2008
10 1 (0.046%) Android
10 1 (0.046%) CentOS
10 1 (0.046%) CoreOS
10 1 (0.046%) Data ONTAP
Processes & Methodologies
1 323 (14.92%) Migration
2 238 (10.99%) Stakeholder Engagement
3 235 (10.85%) Problem-Solving
4 234 (10.81%) Stakeholder Management
5 199 (9.19%) ERP
6 181 (8.36%) Workshop Facilitation
7 156 (7.21%) Agile
8 144 (6.65%) User Acceptance Testing
9 134 (6.19%) Analytics
10 133 (6.14%) Roadmaps
11 131 (6.05%) Data Migration
12 126 (5.82%) Business Intelligence
12 126 (5.82%) Cybersecurity
13 116 (5.36%) Validation
14 109 (5.03%) Continuous Improvement
15 108 (4.99%) Knowledge Transfer
16 102 (4.71%) Risk Management
17 98 (4.53%) AI
18 96 (4.43%) Change Management
19 91 (4.20%) DevOps
Programming Languages
1 145 (6.70%) SQL
2 90 (4.16%) Python
3 60 (2.77%) PowerShell
4 56 (2.59%) ABAP
5 49 (2.26%) JavaScript
6 27 (1.25%) Java
7 24 (1.11%) TypeScript
8 20 (0.92%) PL/SQL
9 17 (0.79%) T-SQL
10 16 (0.74%) Groovy
11 12 (0.55%) Bash
12 10 (0.46%) C#
13 8 (0.37%) Apex Code
14 7 (0.32%) Kusto Query Language
14 7 (0.32%) Shell Script
15 6 (0.28%) C++
16 5 (0.23%) Bicep
16 5 (0.23%) Data Analysis Expressions
16 5 (0.23%) Korn
17 4 (0.18%) Go
Qualifications
1 502 (23.19%) Security Cleared
2 417 (19.26%) SC Cleared
3 85 (3.93%) Degree
4 62 (2.86%) DV Cleared
5 50 (2.31%) BPSS Clearance
6 48 (2.22%) CISSP
7 33 (1.52%) CISM
8 19 (0.88%) VMware Certified Professional (VCP)
9 16 (0.74%) Master's Degree
10 15 (0.69%) CIMA
11 12 (0.55%) SAP Certification
12 11 (0.51%) Cisco Certification
12 11 (0.51%) Computer Science Degree
12 11 (0.51%) Microsoft Certification
13 9 (0.42%) ITIL Certification
14 8 (0.37%) CESG Certified Professional
15 7 (0.32%) AWS Certification
15 7 (0.32%) CISA
15 7 (0.32%) CRISC
16 6 (0.28%) PMP
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 87 (4.02%) ISO/IEC 27001
2 84 (3.88%) NIST
3 64 (2.96%) GDPR
4 38 (1.76%) Data Quality
5 37 (1.71%) GRC
6 35 (1.62%) QA
7 22 (1.02%) NCSC
8 19 (0.88%) Actionable Recommendations
9 18 (0.83%) PCI DSS
10 16 (0.74%) PMO
11 15 (0.69%) Sarbanes-Oxley
12 13 (0.60%) SLA
13 11 (0.51%) COBIT
13 11 (0.51%) PERC
14 8 (0.37%) Cyber Essentials
14 8 (0.37%) Cyber Essentials PLUS
15 7 (0.32%) ISO/IEC 27005
15 7 (0.32%) JSP 440
16 5 (0.23%) ITGC
16 5 (0.23%) SOC 2
System Software
1 65 (3.00%) Active Directory
2 29 (1.34%) Docker
3 24 (1.11%) VMware Infrastructure
4 23 (1.06%) VMware NSX
5 14 (0.65%) vSphere
6 6 (0.28%) Slurm Workload Manager
6 6 (0.28%) Virtual Desktop
6 6 (0.28%) Virtual Machines
7 2 (0.092%) NDS
7 2 (0.092%) NetIQ eDirectory
7 2 (0.092%) NFS
8 1 (0.046%) Ceph
8 1 (0.046%) Job Entry Subsystem
8 1 (0.046%) KVM
8 1 (0.046%) Microsoft App-V
8 1 (0.046%) QEMU
8 1 (0.046%) Terminal Services
8 1 (0.046%) VMware ESXi
Systems Management
1 42 (1.94%) Kubernetes
2 26 (1.20%) Terraform
3 22 (1.02%) Microsoft Intune
4 16 (0.74%) vRealize
5 15 (0.69%) Ansible
6 14 (0.65%) Single Sign-On
7 10 (0.46%) PingFederate
8 7 (0.32%) Active Directory Federation Services
9 6 (0.28%) Podman
10 5 (0.23%) SCCM
11 4 (0.18%) NetBackup
11 4 (0.18%) vCenter Server
12 3 (0.14%) CEMLI
12 3 (0.14%) Grafana
12 3 (0.14%) Puppet
12 3 (0.14%) vMotion
13 2 (0.092%) FortiGate
13 2 (0.092%) OpenView
13 2 (0.092%) Red Hat Satellite
13 2 (0.092%) ZABBIX
Vendors
1 486 (22.45%) SAP
2 230 (10.62%) Oracle
3 224 (10.35%) Microsoft
4 70 (3.23%) ServiceNow
5 59 (2.73%) VMware
6 53 (2.45%) Siemens
7 48 (2.22%) Salesforce
7 48 (2.22%) Workday
8 39 (1.80%) Cisco
9 35 (1.62%) Aruba
9 35 (1.62%) CyberArk
9 35 (1.62%) Google
10 31 (1.43%) Adobe
11 21 (0.97%) Ariba
12 16 (0.74%) Databricks
12 16 (0.74%) OpenText
13 15 (0.69%) Sage
14 13 (0.60%) Murex
14 13 (0.60%) Splunk
15 11 (0.51%) Atlassian