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 1 July 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
1 Jul 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 79 152 202
Rank change year-on-year +73 +50 -8
Contract jobs citing Data Engineering 1,324 490 450
As % of all contract jobs in England 3.02% 1.91% 1.21%
As % of the Processes & Methodologies category 3.54% 2.10% 1.42%
Number of daily rates quoted 930 330 333
10th Percentile £385 £375 £375
25th Percentile £447 £450 £468
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £525 £533 £575
Median % change year-on-year -1.50% -7.30% -8.00%
75th Percentile £638 £675 £688
90th Percentile £750 £825 £773
UK median daily rate £525 £525 £550
% change year-on-year - -4.55% -12.00%
Number of hourly rates quoted 15 7 13
10th Percentile £53.45 £24.75 £30.55
25th Percentile £63.75 £28.13 £35.00
Median hourly rate £70.00 £38.96 £48.50
Median % change year-on-year +79.67% -19.67% -37.82%
75th Percentile £80.88 £53.75 £60.00
90th Percentile £89.00 £58.25 -
UK median hourly rate £69.44 £38.96 £35.00
% change year-on-year +78.23% +11.31% -52.05%

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 37,409 23,372 31,772
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in England 85.35% 91.17% 85.57%
Number of daily rates quoted 23,567 15,052 20,589
10th Percentile £325 £300 £304
25th Percentile £418 £406 £413
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £520 £515 £525
Median % change year-on-year +0.97% -1.90% -4.55%
75th Percentile £625 £638 £650
90th Percentile £729 £750 £750
UK median daily rate £515 £501 £525
% change year-on-year +2.79% -4.57% -4.55%
Number of hourly rates quoted 2,348 1,165 2,330
10th Percentile £15.25 £14.20 £12.79
25th Percentile £20.97 £17.88 £16.06
Median hourly rate £46.90 £25.15 £38.12
Median % change year-on-year +86.48% -34.02% +1.65%
75th Percentile £68.50 £55.00 £61.60
90th Percentile £82.25 £72.50 £72.93
UK median hourly rate £43.96 £25.15 £37.50
% change year-on-year +74.79% -32.93% +3.81%

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 1 July 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 1 July 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 1 July 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 +50 784 £550 - 404
North of England +20 170 £475 -5.00% 112
Midlands +34 140 £475 +2.70% 49
West Midlands +36 117 £469 -19.14% 32
South West +28 81 £500 -11.11% 39
South East -19 79 £525 +5.00% 124
Yorkshire +2 75 £480 +3.78% 26
North West -5 59 £500 - 63
North East 0 38 £425 -15.00% 23
East of England -10 26 £575 +71.29% 12
East Midlands -3 20 £525 +13.51% 17
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
1 176 (13.29%) Apache Spark
2 152 (11.48%) Apache Airflow
3 100 (7.55%) Apache
4 41 (3.10%) SAS
5 23 (1.74%) Confluence
5 23 (1.74%) Jupyter
6 17 (1.28%) Palantir Foundry
7 12 (0.91%) SharePoint
8 7 (0.53%) Apache Superset
9 6 (0.45%) Appian
10 5 (0.38%) Microsoft Exchange
11 2 (0.15%) Apache Synapse
11 2 (0.15%) ArcGIS
12 1 (0.076%) Camunda
12 1 (0.076%) CICS
12 1 (0.076%) IBM HTTP Server
12 1 (0.076%) PowerExchange
Applications
1 22 (1.66%) Microsoft Excel
2 8 (0.60%) Microsoft Office
2 8 (0.60%) Spreadsheet
3 7 (0.53%) Microsoft PowerPoint
4 3 (0.23%) Chatbot
5 2 (0.15%) MS Visio
6 1 (0.076%) Microsoft Project
6 1 (0.076%) Notion
6 1 (0.076%) Trello
Business Applications
1 6 (0.45%) Aladdin
2 5 (0.38%) BambooHR
2 5 (0.38%) Dynamics CRM
2 5 (0.38%) SAP S/4HANA
3 4 (0.30%) NetSuite
3 4 (0.30%) Sage X3
3 4 (0.30%) Salesforce CRM
4 2 (0.15%) Endur
4 2 (0.15%) Oracle Assets
4 2 (0.15%) SAP BPC
4 2 (0.15%) Temenos T24
5 1 (0.076%) FIS Private Capital Suite
5 1 (0.076%) Markit EDM
5 1 (0.076%) SAP ECC
Cloud Services
1 570 (43.05%) Azure
2 515 (38.90%) AWS
3 291 (21.98%) Power Platform
4 185 (13.97%) Snowflake
5 182 (13.75%) GCP
6 156 (11.78%) Azure Data Factory
7 153 (11.56%) dbt
8 150 (11.33%) Amazon S3
9 127 (9.59%) Azure Synapse Analytics
10 113 (8.53%) Azure DevOps
11 112 (8.46%) GitHub
11 112 (8.46%) Serverless
12 96 (7.25%) AWS Lambda
13 68 (5.14%) GitHub Actions
14 37 (2.79%) Amazon EMR
15 32 (2.42%) AWS CloudFormation
15 32 (2.42%) Azure AI
16 28 (2.11%) Azure Cosmos DB
17 27 (2.04%) Amazon Bedrock
17 27 (2.04%) Amazon SageMaker
Communications & Networking
1 5 (0.38%) Firewall
1 5 (0.38%) RTP
2 2 (0.15%) Network Security
3 1 (0.076%) 4G
3 1 (0.076%) 5G
3 1 (0.076%) MIMO
3 1 (0.076%) MQTT
Database & Business Intelligence
1 265 (20.02%) Power BI
2 249 (18.81%) Data Warehouse
3 197 (14.88%) Data Lake
4 120 (9.06%) Metadata
5 96 (7.25%) Amazon Redshift
6 90 (6.80%) Big Data
7 86 (6.50%) Delta Lake
8 83 (6.27%) BigQuery
9 80 (6.04%) Tableau
10 77 (5.82%) SQL Server
11 66 (4.98%) NoSQL
12 63 (4.76%) Amazon Athena
13 60 (4.53%) Snowflake Schema
14 52 (3.93%) Relational Database
15 48 (3.63%) PostgreSQL
16 42 (3.17%) Azure SQL Database
17 38 (2.87%) Hadoop
18 33 (2.49%) SQL Server Integration Services
19 32 (2.42%) Star Schema
20 27 (2.04%) Spark SQL
Development Applications
1 142 (10.73%) Git
2 68 (5.14%) GitLab
3 51 (3.85%) JIRA
4 33 (2.49%) MLflow
5 19 (1.44%) Jenkins
6 6 (0.45%) SonarQube
7 4 (0.30%) Postman
7 4 (0.30%) Selenium
8 3 (0.23%) Artifactory
8 3 (0.23%) Bitbucket
8 3 (0.23%) Snyk
8 3 (0.23%) Visual Studio
9 2 (0.15%) ERwin
9 2 (0.15%) Robot Framework
9 2 (0.15%) Yeoman
10 1 (0.076%) Ant
10 1 (0.076%) Atlassian Bamboo
10 1 (0.076%) Cypress.io
10 1 (0.076%) JUnit
10 1 (0.076%) Maven
General
1 329 (24.85%) Social Skills
2 322 (24.32%) Finance
3 206 (15.56%) Analytical Skills
4 147 (11.10%) Public Sector
5 93 (7.02%) Banking
6 35 (2.64%) Inclusion and Diversity
6 35 (2.64%) Marketing
7 31 (2.34%) Retail
8 28 (2.11%) Documentation Skills
9 20 (1.51%) Telecoms
10 17 (1.28%) Front Office
11 15 (1.13%) Investment Banking
12 14 (1.06%) Financial Institution
13 12 (0.91%) Manufacturing
14 11 (0.83%) Influencing Skills
15 10 (0.76%) Legal
16 9 (0.68%) Law
17 8 (0.60%) Pharmaceutical
18 7 (0.53%) Billing
19 4 (0.30%) Military
Job Titles
1 608 (45.92%) Data Engineer
2 194 (14.65%) Senior
3 157 (11.86%) Architect
4 149 (11.25%) Lead
5 114 (8.61%) Senior Data Engineer
6 85 (6.42%) Data Architect
7 72 (5.44%) Developer
8 62 (4.68%) AWS Engineer
8 62 (4.68%) Lead Data Engineer
9 61 (4.61%) Analyst
10 51 (3.85%) AWS Data Engineer
11 46 (3.47%) Solutions Architect
12 45 (3.40%) Data Scientist
12 45 (3.40%) Snowflake Engineer
13 42 (3.17%) Azure Engineer
14 40 (3.02%) Snowflake Data Engineer
15 38 (2.87%) Consultant
16 37 (2.79%) Azure Data Engineer
17 36 (2.72%) Artificial Intelligence Engineer
18 34 (2.57%) Data Analyst
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 189 (14.27%) PySpark
2 124 (9.37%) Kafka
3 42 (3.17%) REST
4 39 (2.95%) Pandas
5 31 (2.34%) scikit-learn
6 30 (2.27%) JSON
7 27 (2.04%) PyTorch
8 25 (1.89%) NumPy
8 25 (1.89%) Spring
9 24 (1.81%) React
10 20 (1.51%) TensorFlow
11 18 (1.36%) Spring Boot
12 17 (1.28%) .NET
13 15 (1.13%) OpenTelemetry
13 15 (1.13%) RESTful
13 15 (1.13%) YAML
14 13 (0.98%) FastAPI
14 13 (0.98%) pytest
14 13 (0.98%) XML
15 12 (0.91%) Apache Avro
Miscellaneous
1 180 (13.60%) Cloud Native
2 55 (4.15%) Legacy Systems
3 54 (4.08%) Distributed Systems
4 51 (3.85%) Data Structures
5 41 (3.10%) Product Ownership
6 33 (2.49%) AI Agents
7 31 (2.34%) Onboarding
8 27 (2.04%) Distributed Computing
9 22 (1.66%) Data Protection Act
10 21 (1.59%) Greenfield Project
11 20 (1.51%) NHS
12 19 (1.44%) Analytical Mindset
13 16 (1.21%) Algorithms
14 15 (1.13%) Clustering
15 14 (1.06%) Fixed Income
15 14 (1.06%) Virtual Team
16 12 (0.91%) Management Information System
16 12 (0.91%) Self-Motivation
17 11 (0.83%) Hybrid Cloud
18 9 (0.68%) Equities
Operating Systems
1 28 (2.11%) Linux
2 25 (1.89%) Unix
3 5 (0.38%) VMS
4 3 (0.23%) Windows
5 2 (0.15%) Windows Server
6 1 (0.076%) Ubuntu
Processes & Methodologies
1 685 (51.74%) Analytics
2 622 (46.98%) Data Pipeline
3 500 (37.76%) Data Modelling
4 477 (36.03%) CI/CD
5 465 (35.12%) ETL
6 396 (29.91%) AI
7 336 (25.38%) Agile
8 335 (25.30%) Business Intelligence
9 324 (24.47%) DevOps
10 269 (20.32%) Data Governance
11 255 (19.26%) Machine Learning
12 233 (17.60%) Problem-Solving
13 221 (16.69%) Data Science
14 187 (14.12%) Decision-Making
14 187 (14.12%) Migration
15 186 (14.05%) Validation
16 185 (13.97%) Data Architecture
17 163 (12.31%) Infrastructure as Code
18 158 (11.93%) Stakeholder Management
19 148 (11.18%) Data Transformation
Programming Languages
1 716 (54.08%) SQL
2 700 (52.87%) Python
3 114 (8.61%) Java
4 42 (3.17%) Data Analysis Expressions
5 39 (2.95%) Scala
6 35 (2.64%) C#
7 31 (2.34%) Bash
8 24 (1.81%) T-SQL
9 23 (1.74%) PowerShell
10 20 (1.51%) JavaScript
10 20 (1.51%) R
11 17 (1.28%) Bicep
12 16 (1.21%) PL/SQL
13 13 (0.98%) Shell Script
13 13 (0.98%) TypeScript
14 12 (0.91%) SAS Macro
15 6 (0.45%) SPARQL
16 5 (0.38%) Cypher
16 5 (0.38%) Korn
16 5 (0.38%) Kusto Query Language
Qualifications
1 251 (18.96%) Security Cleared
2 222 (16.77%) SC Cleared
3 89 (6.72%) Degree
4 43 (3.25%) Computer Science Degree
5 29 (2.19%) BPSS Clearance
6 28 (2.11%) Azure Certification
6 28 (2.11%) Master's Degree
7 17 (1.28%) AWS Certification
8 14 (1.06%) DV Cleared
9 13 (0.98%) DBS Check
10 8 (0.60%) Microsoft Certification
11 7 (0.53%) AWS Certified Cloud Practitioner
12 6 (0.45%) SnowPro
13 5 (0.38%) AWS Certified Solutions Architect
14 3 (0.23%) PhD
14 3 (0.23%) Tableau Certification
15 2 (0.15%) CSPO
15 2 (0.15%) PMI Certification
16 1 (0.076%) CISSP
16 1 (0.076%) PMP
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 377 (28.47%) Data Quality
2 82 (6.19%) GDPR
3 65 (4.91%) QA
4 12 (0.91%) Accessibility
5 10 (0.76%) SLA
6 7 (0.53%) Sarbanes-Oxley
7 5 (0.38%) California Consumer Privacy Act
8 4 (0.30%) ISO/IEC 27001
8 4 (0.30%) MiFID
8 4 (0.30%) Solvency II
9 3 (0.23%) Actionable Recommendations
9 3 (0.23%) GRC
9 3 (0.23%) GxP
9 3 (0.23%) HIPAA
9 3 (0.23%) ISO/IEC 42001
9 3 (0.23%) NIST
10 2 (0.15%) 21 CFR Part 11
10 2 (0.15%) EMIR
10 2 (0.15%) PMO
11 1 (0.076%) Basel II
System Software
1 125 (9.44%) Docker
2 3 (0.23%) Active Directory
2 3 (0.23%) Virtual Machines
3 2 (0.15%) HDFS
Systems Management
1 185 (13.97%) Terraform
2 108 (8.16%) Kubernetes
3 23 (1.74%) Prometheus
4 14 (1.06%) Grafana
5 9 (0.68%) Ansible
6 4 (0.30%) Kibana
7 3 (0.23%) Argo
7 3 (0.23%) Nagios
7 3 (0.23%) Rancher
8 2 (0.15%) Kubeflow
8 2 (0.15%) logstash
8 2 (0.15%) Thomson Reuters DACS
9 1 (0.076%) Control-M
9 1 (0.076%) Hadoop YARN
9 1 (0.076%) HP Fortify
9 1 (0.076%) IBM Guardium
9 1 (0.076%) Oozie
Vendors
1 325 (24.55%) Databricks
2 227 (17.15%) Microsoft
3 73 (5.51%) Informatica
4 53 (4.00%) Oracle
5 49 (3.70%) Google
6 28 (2.11%) Foundry
7 27 (2.04%) SAP
8 26 (1.96%) OpenAI
8 26 (1.96%) Talend
9 25 (1.89%) Palantir
10 22 (1.66%) Salesforce
10 22 (1.66%) Splunk
11 15 (1.13%) Cloudera
12 14 (1.06%) ServiceNow
13 12 (0.91%) Trend Micro
14 8 (0.60%) Denodo
15 7 (0.53%) InterSystems
15 7 (0.53%) UiPath
16 6 (0.45%) Automation Anywhere
16 6 (0.45%) Workday