Data Engineering Contract Job Trends in England

Data Engineering
UK > England

The table below provides summary statistics and contractor rates for jobs advertised in England requiring Data Engineering skills. It covers contract job vacancies from the 6 months leading up to 19 February 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
19 Feb 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 94 156 207
Rank change year-on-year +62 +51 +19
Contract jobs citing Data Engineering 956 461 422
As % of all contract jobs in England 2.75% 1.78% 1.13%
As % of the Processes & Methodologies category 3.15% 1.98% 1.29%
Number of daily rates quoted 655 326 316
10th Percentile £363 £400 £413
25th Percentile £431 £463 £463
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £525 £550 £550
Median % change year-on-year -4.55% - -8.33%
75th Percentile £625 £676 £675
90th Percentile £738 £838 £738
UK median daily rate £520 £550 £550
% change year-on-year -5.45% - -8.33%
Number of hourly rates quoted 6 11 9
10th Percentile £46.00 £22.00 £32.35
25th Percentile £58.81 £22.36 £35.00
Median hourly rate £69.72 £26.50 £42.31
Median % change year-on-year +163.09% -37.36% -14.96%
75th Percentile £74.82 £29.38 £65.00
90th Percentile £79.38 £65.00 £78.00
UK median hourly rate £64.00 £25.97 £42.31
% change year-on-year +146.49% -38.62% +20.87%

All Process & Methodology Skills
England

Data Engineering falls under the Processes and Methodologies category. For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all contract job vacancies requiring process or methodology skills in England.

Contract vacancies with a requirement for process or methodology skills 30,349 23,302 32,721
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in England 87.42% 89.94% 87.33%
Number of daily rates quoted 19,395 14,514 21,728
10th Percentile £311 £308 £300
25th Percentile £413 £413 £413
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £525 £525
Median % change year-on-year -4.76% - -4.55%
75th Percentile £619 £638 £650
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 1,903 732 1,999
10th Percentile £15.18 £15.62 £13.39
25th Percentile £18.26 £21.20 £16.25
Median hourly rate £26.78 £35.00 £35.00
Median % change year-on-year -23.49% - -
75th Percentile £61.18 £64.79 £60.13
90th Percentile £70.00 £75.23 £73.05
UK median hourly rate £25.50 £32.50 £35.00
% change year-on-year -21.54% -7.14% -

Data Engineering
Job Vacancy Trend in England

Historical trend showing the proportion of contract IT job postings citing Data Engineering relative to all contract IT jobs advertised in England.

Data Engineering job vacancy trend in England

Data Engineering
Daily Rate Trend in England

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in England citing Data Engineering.

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in England citing Data Engineering

Data Engineering
Daily Rate Histogram in England

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing Data Engineering in England over the 6 months to 19 February 2026.

Daily rate histogram for Data Engineering in England

Data Engineering
Hourly Rate Trend in England

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in England citing Data Engineering.

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in England citing Data Engineering

Data Engineering
Hourly Rate Histogram in England

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing Data Engineering in England over the 6 months to 19 February 2026.

Hourly rate histogram for Data Engineering in England

Data Engineering
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 Data Engineering within the England region over the 6 months to 19 February 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 +57 643 £550 -4.35% 205
North of England -17 97 £450 -10.00% 102
Midlands -3 85 £513 +2.50% 55
West Midlands -9 65 £520 +4.00% 43
North West +3 54 £445 +0.28% 58
South West 0 48 £550 -15.38% 36
South East -14 41 £538 -0.46% 97
Yorkshire -44 24 £500 -16.67% 34
East Midlands -11 20 £445 -13.10% 12
North East +1 19 £450 -23.08% 11
East of England -24 15 £551 +72.45% 15
Data Engineering
UK

Data Engineering
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
1 143 (14.96%) Apache Spark
2 100 (10.46%) Apache Airflow
3 67 (7.01%) Apache
4 19 (1.99%) Palantir Foundry
5 11 (1.15%) Confluence
5 11 (1.15%) SAS
6 8 (0.84%) Appian
7 3 (0.31%) Microsoft Exchange
8 2 (0.21%) Apache Superset
8 2 (0.21%) Jupyter
8 2 (0.21%) SharePoint
9 1 (0.10%) Apache Pig
9 1 (0.10%) Apache Synapse
9 1 (0.10%) ArcGIS
9 1 (0.10%) Camunda
9 1 (0.10%) CMS
9 1 (0.10%) IBM HTTP Server
9 1 (0.10%) Luigi
Applications
1 18 (1.88%) Microsoft Excel
2 10 (1.05%) Microsoft PowerPoint
3 6 (0.63%) Chatbot
4 5 (0.52%) Microsoft Office
5 4 (0.42%) MS Visio
6 3 (0.31%) Microsoft Project
6 3 (0.31%) Trello
7 1 (0.10%) Adobe XD
7 1 (0.10%) Spreadsheet
Business Applications
1 4 (0.42%) Aladdin
2 2 (0.21%) Dynamics CRM
2 2 (0.21%) Markit EDM
2 2 (0.21%) Salesforce CRM
3 1 (0.10%) Actimize
3 1 (0.10%) Eagle PACE
3 1 (0.10%) Maximo
3 1 (0.10%) Misys Midas
3 1 (0.10%) SAP BPC
3 1 (0.10%) SAP ERP
3 1 (0.10%) SAP S/4HANA
3 1 (0.10%) Workday HCM
Cloud Services
1 457 (47.80%) Azure
2 336 (35.15%) AWS
3 209 (21.86%) Power Platform
4 184 (19.25%) Azure Data Factory
5 141 (14.75%) GCP
6 118 (12.34%) Snowflake
7 107 (11.19%) Azure Synapse Analytics
8 102 (10.67%) Amazon S3
9 99 (10.36%) GitHub
10 91 (9.52%) Serverless
11 87 (9.10%) dbt
12 79 (8.26%) Azure DevOps
13 75 (7.85%) AWS Lambda
14 66 (6.90%) GitHub Actions
15 39 (4.08%) AWS CloudFormation
16 26 (2.72%) AWS Step Functions
17 24 (2.51%) Azure Machine Learning
18 23 (2.41%) Amazon SageMaker
19 22 (2.30%) Amazon EMR
19 22 (2.30%) Microsoft Purview
Communications & Networking
1 5 (0.52%) Network Security
2 4 (0.42%) Cisco IPT
2 4 (0.42%) Kerberos
3 3 (0.31%) RTP
3 3 (0.31%) VPN
4 1 (0.10%) 4G
4 1 (0.10%) 5G
4 1 (0.10%) Firewall
4 1 (0.10%) SAN
4 1 (0.10%) SMS
4 1 (0.10%) TCP/IP
Database & Business Intelligence
1 192 (20.08%) Power BI
2 187 (19.56%) Data Warehouse
3 134 (14.02%) Data Lake
4 82 (8.58%) Metadata
5 67 (7.01%) SQL Server
6 63 (6.59%) Big Data
7 58 (6.07%) NoSQL
8 56 (5.86%) Delta Lake
9 53 (5.54%) Azure SQL Database
9 53 (5.54%) Snowflake Schema
10 50 (5.23%) Amazon Redshift
10 50 (5.23%) Relational Database
11 43 (4.50%) BigQuery
12 39 (4.08%) Tableau
13 38 (3.97%) PostgreSQL
14 36 (3.77%) Amazon Athena
15 32 (3.35%) SQL Server Integration Services
16 31 (3.24%) Hadoop
17 26 (2.72%) Spark SQL
18 23 (2.41%) Elasticsearch
Development Applications
1 139 (14.54%) Git
2 45 (4.71%) GitLab
3 39 (4.08%) Jenkins
4 37 (3.87%) MLflow
5 22 (2.30%) JIRA
6 6 (0.63%) Visual Studio Code
7 5 (0.52%) Selenium
8 3 (0.31%) JUnit
8 3 (0.31%) Maven
8 3 (0.31%) Postman
8 3 (0.31%) Robot Framework
8 3 (0.31%) SonarQube
8 3 (0.31%) Terragrunt
9 2 (0.21%) Cucumber
9 2 (0.21%) ERwin
9 2 (0.21%) Mockito
9 2 (0.21%) Poetry
9 2 (0.21%) TeamCity
9 2 (0.21%) Visual Studio
10 1 (0.10%) SoapUI
General
1 268 (28.03%) Social Skills
2 223 (23.33%) Finance
3 137 (14.33%) Analytical Skills
4 81 (8.47%) Public Sector
5 61 (6.38%) Banking
6 23 (2.41%) Inclusion and Diversity
7 17 (1.78%) Investment Banking
8 15 (1.57%) Influencing Skills
8 15 (1.57%) Retail
9 14 (1.46%) Front Office
10 13 (1.36%) Marketing
11 11 (1.15%) Documentation Skills
12 10 (1.05%) Publishing
13 9 (0.94%) Legal
13 9 (0.94%) Pharmaceutical
14 8 (0.84%) Financial Institution
15 6 (0.63%) Back Office
15 6 (0.63%) Military
15 6 (0.63%) Presentation Skills
16 4 (0.42%) Organisational Skills
Job Titles
1 440 (46.03%) Data Engineer
2 118 (12.34%) Senior
3 116 (12.13%) Lead
4 83 (8.68%) Senior Data Engineer
5 72 (7.53%) Azure Engineer
6 71 (7.43%) Architect
7 62 (6.49%) Developer
8 56 (5.86%) Azure Data Engineer
9 50 (5.23%) Analyst
10 43 (4.50%) Snowflake Engineer
11 41 (4.29%) Data Scientist
12 39 (4.08%) Lead Data Engineer
13 37 (3.87%) AWS Engineer
14 36 (3.77%) Data Architect
15 35 (3.66%) Snowflake Data Engineer
16 33 (3.45%) Artificial Intelligence Engineer
17 29 (3.03%) Data Analyst
18 26 (2.72%) Python Engineer
19 24 (2.51%) DevOps Engineer
19 24 (2.51%) Principal Engineer
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 163 (17.05%) PySpark
2 121 (12.66%) Kafka
3 54 (5.65%) Pandas
4 50 (5.23%) PyTorch
5 42 (4.39%) NumPy
5 42 (4.39%) scikit-learn
6 41 (4.29%) TensorFlow
7 32 (3.35%) FastAPI
8 29 (3.03%) Flask
8 29 (3.03%) JSON
8 29 (3.03%) RESTful
9 25 (2.62%) pytest
10 24 (2.51%) React
10 24 (2.51%) YAML
11 22 (2.30%) LangChain
12 19 (1.99%) REST
13 16 (1.67%) Hugging Face
14 15 (1.57%) Django
15 14 (1.46%) Great Expectations
15 14 (1.46%) OAuth
Miscellaneous
1 105 (10.98%) Cloud Native
2 33 (3.45%) Algorithms
3 31 (3.24%) Product Ownership
4 29 (3.03%) Distributed Computing
5 27 (2.82%) Distributed Systems
6 22 (2.30%) Data Structures
7 21 (2.20%) Hybrid Cloud
8 19 (1.99%) Data Protection Act
8 19 (1.99%) Legacy Systems
9 17 (1.78%) AI Agents
9 17 (1.78%) Onboarding
10 15 (1.57%) Analytical Mindset
11 12 (1.26%) Clustering
12 11 (1.15%) Foreign Exchange (FX)
13 10 (1.05%) Enterprise Software
13 10 (1.05%) Fixed Income
13 10 (1.05%) Greenfield Project
13 10 (1.05%) Hedge funds
14 9 (0.94%) Management Information System
14 9 (0.94%) NHS
Operating Systems
1 24 (2.51%) Linux
2 6 (0.63%) VMS
3 5 (0.52%) Unix
4 2 (0.21%) Ubuntu
5 1 (0.10%) CentOS
5 1 (0.10%) Debian
5 1 (0.10%) Windows
Processes & Methodologies
1 426 (44.56%) Data Pipeline
2 416 (43.51%) Analytics
3 382 (39.96%) ETL
4 370 (38.70%) Data Modelling
5 330 (34.52%) CI/CD
6 249 (26.05%) AI
7 243 (25.42%) DevOps
8 242 (25.31%) Agile
9 230 (24.06%) Data Governance
10 229 (23.95%) Business Intelligence
11 211 (22.07%) Machine Learning
12 200 (20.92%) Data Science
13 197 (20.61%) Problem-Solving
14 157 (16.42%) Data Architecture
15 119 (12.45%) Infrastructure as Code
16 102 (10.67%) Decision-Making
17 100 (10.46%) Visualisation
18 98 (10.25%) Data Integration
19 97 (10.15%) Validation
20 96 (10.04%) Data Transformation
Programming Languages
1 588 (61.51%) Python
2 513 (53.66%) SQL
3 69 (7.22%) Java
4 62 (6.49%) Scala
5 43 (4.50%) C#
6 31 (3.24%) JavaScript
7 26 (2.72%) Data Analysis Expressions
7 26 (2.72%) PowerShell
8 24 (2.51%) Bicep
9 22 (2.30%) Bash
10 20 (2.09%) T-SQL
11 19 (1.99%) TypeScript
12 17 (1.78%) R
13 16 (1.67%) C++
14 15 (1.57%) Go
15 11 (1.15%) PL/SQL
16 9 (0.94%) Rust
17 8 (0.84%) Korn
18 7 (0.73%) Shell Script
19 1 (0.10%) VBA
Qualifications
1 197 (20.61%) Security Cleared
2 161 (16.84%) SC Cleared
3 79 (8.26%) Degree
4 50 (5.23%) Azure Certification
5 37 (3.87%) Computer Science Degree
6 36 (3.77%) Master's Degree
7 22 (2.30%) DV Cleared
8 13 (1.36%) AWS Certification
8 13 (1.36%) BPSS Clearance
9 11 (1.15%) Microsoft Certification
9 11 (1.15%) PhD
10 4 (0.42%) DBS Check
10 4 (0.42%) Microsoft Certified Professional
11 2 (0.21%) ISTQB
11 2 (0.21%) SnowPro
12 1 (0.10%) CBAP
12 1 (0.10%) CCSP
12 1 (0.10%) CISSP
12 1 (0.10%) OCP
12 1 (0.10%) Oracle Certification
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 264 (27.62%) Data Quality
2 81 (8.47%) GDPR
3 34 (3.56%) QA
4 13 (1.36%) Accessibility
5 12 (1.26%) Sarbanes-Oxley
6 9 (0.94%) HIPAA
7 6 (0.63%) California Consumer Privacy Act
7 6 (0.63%) ISO/IEC 27001
8 5 (0.52%) PERC
8 5 (0.52%) SOC 2
9 3 (0.31%) GRC
9 3 (0.31%) WCAG
10 2 (0.21%) HL7
10 2 (0.21%) MiFID
10 2 (0.21%) NIST
10 2 (0.21%) PCI DSS
11 1 (0.10%) Actionable Recommendations
11 1 (0.10%) ISO 13485
11 1 (0.10%) NCSC
11 1 (0.10%) PMO
System Software
1 135 (14.12%) Docker
2 10 (1.05%) HDFS
3 2 (0.21%) Active Directory
3 2 (0.21%) Virtual Machines
4 1 (0.10%) Apache ZooKeeper
Systems Management
1 157 (16.42%) Terraform
2 133 (13.91%) Kubernetes
3 23 (2.41%) Prometheus
4 13 (1.36%) Grafana
5 6 (0.63%) Ansible
5 6 (0.63%) Hadoop YARN
6 5 (0.52%) Argo
7 3 (0.31%) Control-M
7 3 (0.31%) Kubeflow
8 2 (0.21%) Kibana
8 2 (0.21%) logstash
8 2 (0.21%) Nagios
8 2 (0.21%) Oozie
8 2 (0.21%) Puppet
8 2 (0.21%) Single Sign-On
9 1 (0.10%) Apache Ranger
9 1 (0.10%) HP Fortify
9 1 (0.10%) Rancher
Vendors
1 280 (29.29%) Databricks
2 128 (13.39%) Microsoft
3 45 (4.71%) Google
4 30 (3.14%) Informatica
5 29 (3.03%) Oracle
6 22 (2.30%) Foundry
6 22 (2.30%) Palantir
6 22 (2.30%) Talend
7 21 (2.20%) OpenAI
8 13 (1.36%) SAP
9 11 (1.15%) Salesforce
10 10 (1.05%) Cloudera
11 9 (0.94%) Splunk
12 8 (0.84%) Automation Anywhere
12 8 (0.84%) UiPath
12 8 (0.84%) Virgin Media
13 7 (0.73%) Denodo
14 6 (0.63%) MicroStrategy
14 6 (0.63%) ServiceNow
15 5 (0.52%) Guidewire