Degree Contract Job Trends in England

Academic Degree
UK > England

The table below provides summary statistics for contract job vacancies advertised in England with a requirement for Degree qualifications. It includes a benchmarking guide to the contractor rates offered over the 6 months leading up to 20 May 2026, comparing them to the same period in the previous two years.

6 months to
20 May 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 35 25 19
Rank change year-on-year -10 -6 +8
Contract jobs citing Degree 2,125 1,877 3,014
As % of all contract jobs in England 5.17% 7.73% 8.28%
As % of the Qualifications category 16.21% 24.54% 26.91%
Number of daily rates quoted 1,221 1,125 1,620
10th Percentile £238 £246 £224
25th Percentile £385 £384 £380
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £513 £500
Median % change year-on-year -2.44% +2.50% -9.09%
75th Percentile £613 £650 £638
90th Percentile £738 £775 £769
UK median daily rate £500 £500 £500
% change year-on-year - - -4.76%
Number of hourly rates quoted 193 141 377
10th Percentile £20.31 £17.50 £14.06
25th Percentile £28.50 £27.39 £23.75
Median hourly rate £58.00 £54.50 £40.00
Median % change year-on-year +6.42% +36.25% -11.11%
75th Percentile £84.00 £75.00 £61.30
90th Percentile £88.00 £85.00 £73.00
UK median hourly rate £55.00 £53.50 £40.00
% change year-on-year +2.80% +33.75% -11.11%

All Academic and Professional Certifications
England

Degree falls under the Academic Qualifications and Professional Certifications category. For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all contract job vacancies requiring academic qualifications or professional certifications in England.

Contract vacancies requiring academic qualifications or professional certifications 13,107 7,650 11,201
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in England 31.88% 31.50% 30.77%
Number of daily rates quoted 8,817 4,861 6,958
10th Percentile £350 £281 £313
25th Percentile £425 £413 £425
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £525 £525 £538
Median % change year-on-year - -2.33% -2.27%
75th Percentile £625 £625 £650
90th Percentile £725 £713 £750
UK median daily rate £525 £525 £532
% change year-on-year - -1.32% -3.27%
Number of hourly rates quoted 953 439 971
10th Percentile £17.00 £18.13 £14.00
25th Percentile £21.33 £22.40 £17.94
Median hourly rate £47.54 £40.00 £40.00
Median % change year-on-year +18.85% - -23.81%
75th Percentile £72.50 £67.50 £61.60
90th Percentile £85.25 £81.48 £77.50
UK median hourly rate £47.80 £37.50 £40.00
% change year-on-year +27.45% -6.25% -27.25%

Degree
Job Vacancy Trend in England

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

Degree job vacancy trend in England

Degree
Daily Rate Trend in England

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in England citing Degree.

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in England citing Degree

Degree
Daily Rate Histogram in England

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing Degree in England over the 6 months to 20 May 2026.

Daily rate histogram for Degree in England

Degree
Hourly Rate Trend in England

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in England citing Degree.

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in England citing Degree

Degree
Hourly Rate Histogram in England

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing Degree in England over the 6 months to 20 May 2026.

Hourly rate histogram for Degree in England

Degree
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 Degree within the England region over the 6 months to 20 May 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 -16 899 £513 -6.82% 846
South East -5 374 £500 +2.04% 628
North of England -11 315 £425 -8.75% 407
Midlands -21 208 £513 +43.96% 262
North West -9 161 £402 -14.29% 204
West Midlands -23 145 £492 +35.72% 161
East of England -4 138 £450 -10.00% 213
Yorkshire -16 138 £450 +4.53% 152
South West -17 131 £540 +13.58% 258
East Midlands -13 61 £531 +49.16% 101
North East -27 16 £450 -5.26% 58
Degree
UK

Degree
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
1 129 (6.07%) Confluence
2 112 (5.27%) SharePoint
3 61 (2.87%) Microsoft Exchange
4 35 (1.65%) Apache Spark
5 18 (0.85%) Apache Airflow
6 17 (0.80%) Apache
7 7 (0.33%) IIS
8 6 (0.28%) CMS
8 6 (0.28%) Oracle SOA Suite
8 6 (0.28%) Oracle Workflow
9 5 (0.24%) OpenStack
10 4 (0.19%) SAS
11 3 (0.14%) Adobe Experience Manager
11 3 (0.14%) Appian
11 3 (0.14%) Camunda
11 3 (0.14%) Moodle
11 3 (0.14%) MS Project Server
12 2 (0.094%) Ethereum
12 2 (0.094%) Skype for Business
12 2 (0.094%) WinCC
Applications
1 270 (12.71%) Microsoft Office
2 208 (9.79%) Microsoft Excel
3 155 (7.29%) Microsoft Project
4 124 (5.84%) Microsoft PowerPoint
5 57 (2.68%) MS Visio
6 12 (0.56%) Spreadsheet
7 11 (0.52%) Adobe Illustrator
7 11 (0.52%) Photoshop
7 11 (0.52%) Simulink
8 10 (0.47%) Adobe After Effects
9 8 (0.38%) Navisworks
9 8 (0.38%) Revit
10 7 (0.33%) Trello
11 5 (0.24%) Adobe XD
11 5 (0.24%) Chatbot
11 5 (0.24%) Sketch
12 3 (0.14%) UserZoom
13 2 (0.094%) Adobe Creative Suite
13 2 (0.094%) CPLEX
13 2 (0.094%) FrameMaker
Business Applications
1 51 (2.40%) SAP S/4HANA
2 16 (0.75%) Dynamics CRM
3 13 (0.61%) Primavera
4 12 (0.56%) Remedy ITSM
5 10 (0.47%) Payment Gateway
6 9 (0.42%) Oracle Payables
7 8 (0.38%) Aladdin
7 8 (0.38%) Oracle General Ledger
7 8 (0.38%) Veritas eDiscovery
8 6 (0.28%) Oracle Procure-to-Pay
8 6 (0.28%) SAP EWM
9 5 (0.24%) Oracle EBS
9 5 (0.24%) Oracle ERP
9 5 (0.24%) Oracle Receivables
9 5 (0.24%) Shopify
10 4 (0.19%) Fidessa
10 4 (0.19%) Magento
10 4 (0.19%) NEC Housing
10 4 (0.19%) NetSuite
10 4 (0.19%) Oracle Subledger Accounting
Cloud Services
1 448 (21.08%) Azure
2 256 (12.05%) AWS
3 184 (8.66%) Microsoft 365
4 169 (7.95%) Power Platform
5 103 (4.85%) Entra ID
6 86 (4.05%) SaaS
7 84 (3.95%) GCP
8 70 (3.29%) Azure DevOps
9 48 (2.26%) GitHub
10 33 (1.55%) Google Workspace
11 32 (1.51%) Dynamics 365
11 32 (1.51%) PaaS
12 30 (1.41%) Figma
13 29 (1.36%) IaaS
14 28 (1.32%) Power Automate
15 24 (1.13%) Serverless
15 24 (1.13%) Snowflake
16 23 (1.08%) OneDrive
16 23 (1.08%) PowerApps
17 22 (1.04%) Cloud Computing
Communications & Networking
1 89 (4.19%) Firewall
2 52 (2.45%) LAN
2 52 (2.45%) TCP/IP
2 52 (2.45%) WAN
3 48 (2.26%) DNS
4 44 (2.07%) Network Security
5 33 (1.55%) VPN
6 27 (1.27%) Wireless
7 24 (1.13%) BGP
8 21 (0.99%) DHCP
8 21 (0.99%) Ethernet
8 21 (0.99%) OSPF
9 17 (0.80%) Skype
10 14 (0.66%) SAN
10 14 (0.66%) Wi-Fi
11 12 (0.56%) HTTP
11 12 (0.56%) VXLAN
12 11 (0.52%) IPsec
12 11 (0.52%) Structured Cabling
13 10 (0.47%) SSH
Database & Business Intelligence
1 141 (6.64%) Power BI
2 88 (4.14%) SQL Server
3 49 (2.31%) Data Warehouse
4 47 (2.21%) PostgreSQL
4 47 (2.21%) Relational Database
5 36 (1.69%) Tableau
6 33 (1.55%) NoSQL
7 29 (1.36%) Big Data
7 29 (1.36%) Metadata
8 24 (1.13%) MySQL
9 21 (0.99%) MongoDB
10 16 (0.75%) Elasticsearch
10 16 (0.75%) Hadoop
10 16 (0.75%) SQL Server Integration Services
11 15 (0.71%) Oracle Database
12 14 (0.66%) Data Lake
13 12 (0.56%) Oracle Reports
13 12 (0.56%) Power Query
13 12 (0.56%) Snowflake Schema
14 9 (0.42%) Star Schema
Development Applications
1 219 (10.31%) JIRA
2 93 (4.38%) Git
3 40 (1.88%) Jenkins
4 36 (1.69%) GitLab
5 31 (1.46%) Rational DOORS
6 21 (0.99%) Visual Studio
7 18 (0.85%) MLflow
8 16 (0.75%) Selenium
9 13 (0.61%) Gradle
9 13 (0.61%) Postman
10 12 (0.56%) Burp Suite
11 11 (0.52%) Metasploit
12 10 (0.47%) Cucumber
12 10 (0.47%) JUnit
13 9 (0.42%) Jaeger
13 9 (0.42%) REST Assured
13 9 (0.42%) TeamCity
14 7 (0.33%) CircleCI
14 7 (0.33%) Maven
14 7 (0.33%) Subversion
General
1 999 (47.01%) Social Skills
2 658 (30.96%) Finance
3 447 (21.04%) Analytical Skills
4 195 (9.18%) Banking
5 172 (8.09%) Public Sector
6 117 (5.51%) Organisational Skills
7 111 (5.22%) Presentation Skills
8 86 (4.05%) Marketing
9 77 (3.62%) Documentation Skills
10 72 (3.39%) Legal
11 70 (3.29%) Aerospace
12 66 (3.11%) Influencing Skills
13 63 (2.96%) Manufacturing
14 51 (2.40%) Telecoms
15 50 (2.35%) Law
16 49 (2.31%) Retail
17 44 (2.07%) Military
18 40 (1.88%) Front Office
19 34 (1.60%) Inclusion and Diversity
20 33 (1.55%) Investment Banking
Job Titles
1 306 (14.40%) Analyst
2 244 (11.48%) Senior
3 169 (7.95%) Architect
4 160 (7.53%) Lead
5 154 (7.25%) Project Manager
6 149 (7.01%) Business Analyst
7 148 (6.96%) Developer
8 62 (2.92%) Senior Analyst
9 61 (2.87%) Delivery Manager
10 57 (2.68%) Technical Support
11 56 (2.64%) Consultant
11 56 (2.64%) Solutions Architect
12 52 (2.45%) Software Engineer
13 50 (2.35%) Product Manager
14 48 (2.26%) Senior Manager
15 45 (2.12%) Designer
16 41 (1.93%) Data Scientist
17 40 (1.88%) Data Engineer
18 39 (1.84%) Systems Engineer
19 38 (1.79%) Support Engineer
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 87 (4.09%) REST
2 69 (3.25%) .NET
3 53 (2.49%) React
4 52 (2.45%) Middleware
5 44 (2.07%) Kafka
6 43 (2.02%) Oracle Fusion
7 39 (1.84%) HTML
8 36 (1.69%) RESTful
9 32 (1.51%) Spring Boot
10 30 (1.41%) XML
11 29 (1.36%) Spring
12 28 (1.32%) CSS
13 27 (1.27%) .NET Framework
13 27 (1.27%) Pandas
13 27 (1.27%) SOAP
14 25 (1.18%) PyTorch
15 24 (1.13%) AngularJS
15 24 (1.13%) Web Services
16 23 (1.08%) JSON
17 22 (1.04%) OAuth
Miscellaneous
1 158 (7.44%) Management Information System
2 144 (6.78%) Product Ownership
3 122 (5.74%) Onboarding
4 73 (3.44%) Self-Motivation
5 71 (3.34%) Cloud Native
6 62 (2.92%) Data Centre
7 59 (2.78%) Virtual Team
8 52 (2.45%) Data Structures
9 50 (2.35%) Distributed Systems
10 46 (2.16%) Algorithms
11 45 (2.12%) Data Protection Act
11 45 (2.12%) PMI
12 38 (1.79%) Robotics
13 33 (1.55%) Derivative
14 32 (1.51%) Analytical Mindset
15 31 (1.46%) Operational Technology
16 30 (1.41%) Legacy Systems
16 30 (1.41%) Security Posture
17 28 (1.32%) Enterprise Software
18 25 (1.18%) Life Science
Operating Systems
1 261 (12.28%) Windows
2 159 (7.48%) Linux
3 71 (3.34%) Unix
4 62 (2.92%) Windows Server
5 55 (2.59%) Windows 10
6 26 (1.22%) Android
7 22 (1.04%) Mac OS
8 21 (0.99%) Apple iOS
8 21 (0.99%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
9 12 (0.56%) Windows Server 2019
10 10 (0.47%) Ubuntu
10 10 (0.47%) Windows Server 2016
11 7 (0.33%) Windows Server 2012
12 6 (0.28%) Windows 7
13 5 (0.24%) AIX
13 5 (0.24%) VMS
14 4 (0.19%) Debian
14 4 (0.19%) Rocky
15 3 (0.14%) Solaris
16 2 (0.094%) OpenVMS
Processes & Methodologies
1 722 (33.98%) Computer Science
2 628 (29.55%) Agile
3 545 (25.65%) Problem-Solving
4 340 (16.00%) Stakeholder Management
5 320 (15.06%) Continuous Improvement
6 309 (14.54%) AI
7 294 (13.84%) Project Management
8 285 (13.41%) DevOps
9 236 (11.11%) CI/CD
10 229 (10.78%) Decision-Making
11 224 (10.54%) Analytics
12 219 (10.31%) Stakeholder Engagement
13 201 (9.46%) Change Management
14 200 (9.41%) Migration
15 195 (9.18%) ITIL
16 193 (9.08%) Cybersecurity
17 191 (8.99%) Risk Management
18 183 (8.61%) PRINCE2
18 183 (8.61%) Roadmaps
19 172 (8.09%) Project Delivery
Programming Languages
1 340 (16.00%) Python
2 322 (15.15%) SQL
3 152 (7.15%) Java
4 103 (4.85%) PowerShell
5 85 (4.00%) C#
6 77 (3.62%) JavaScript
7 56 (2.64%) C++
8 35 (1.65%) Bash
9 30 (1.41%) TypeScript
10 25 (1.18%) R
11 23 (1.08%) PL/SQL
12 18 (0.85%) C
13 16 (0.75%) T-SQL
14 14 (0.66%) Perl
14 14 (0.66%) Rust
14 14 (0.66%) Shell Script
15 13 (0.61%) Go
16 12 (0.56%) Data Analysis Expressions
16 12 (0.56%) Kotlin
17 11 (0.52%) SystemVerilog
Qualifications
1 450 (21.18%) Computer Science Degree
2 397 (18.68%) Security Cleared
3 281 (13.22%) SC Cleared
4 229 (10.78%) Master's Degree
5 132 (6.21%) PMI Certification
6 114 (5.36%) PMP
7 93 (4.38%) CISSP
8 73 (3.44%) Cisco Certification
8 73 (3.44%) Microsoft Certification
9 52 (2.45%) BPSS Clearance
9 52 (2.45%) CISM
10 48 (2.26%) DV Cleared
11 46 (2.16%) PhD
12 44 (2.07%) Azure Certification
12 44 (2.07%) TOGAF Certification
13 41 (1.93%) CCNP
14 34 (1.60%) MBA
15 33 (1.55%) CBAP
15 33 (1.55%) CCNA
16 27 (1.27%) CISA
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 141 (6.64%) QA
2 110 (5.18%) ISO/IEC 27001
3 102 (4.80%) NIST
4 101 (4.75%) PMO
5 95 (4.47%) GDPR
6 89 (4.19%) Data Quality
7 49 (2.31%) SLA
8 40 (1.88%) Accessibility
8 40 (1.88%) PCI DSS
9 27 (1.27%) Sarbanes-Oxley
10 23 (1.08%) GRC
11 20 (0.94%) NCSC
12 16 (0.75%) IFRS
13 15 (0.71%) Cyber Essentials
14 12 (0.56%) NIST 800
14 12 (0.56%) SOC 2
15 10 (0.47%) COBIT
15 10 (0.47%) HIPAA
16 9 (0.42%) Basel III
16 9 (0.42%) IFRS 17
System Software
1 140 (6.59%) Active Directory
2 117 (5.51%) Docker
3 37 (1.74%) VMware Infrastructure
4 25 (1.18%) Hyper-V
5 21 (0.99%) Firmware
6 7 (0.33%) VMware ESXi
6 7 (0.33%) vSphere
7 6 (0.28%) Virtual Desktop
8 5 (0.24%) BitLocker
8 5 (0.24%) Virtual Machines
9 4 (0.19%) Embedded Firmware
9 4 (0.19%) VMware NSX
9 4 (0.19%) XenApp
9 4 (0.19%) XenDesktop
10 3 (0.14%) KVM
11 2 (0.094%) HDFS
11 2 (0.094%) Oracle RAC
11 2 (0.094%) VMware Workstation
12 1 (0.047%) Microsoft App-V
12 1 (0.047%) Squid
Systems Management
1 132 (6.21%) Kubernetes
2 69 (3.25%) Terraform
3 60 (2.82%) Microsoft Intune
4 55 (2.59%) Ansible
5 34 (1.60%) SCCM
6 33 (1.55%) Grafana
7 27 (1.27%) Prometheus
8 19 (0.89%) Single Sign-On
9 18 (0.85%) OPNET
10 15 (0.71%) Active Directory Federation Services
11 14 (0.66%) Puppet
12 12 (0.56%) Kibana
13 11 (0.52%) Nmap
14 9 (0.42%) Jamf Pro
14 9 (0.42%) Kiali
14 9 (0.42%) WSUS
15 8 (0.38%) Nessus
15 8 (0.38%) vCenter Server
16 7 (0.33%) HP ALM
17 6 (0.28%) Control-M
Vendors
1 486 (22.87%) Microsoft
2 151 (7.11%) Oracle
3 117 (5.51%) SAP
4 109 (5.13%) ServiceNow
5 70 (3.29%) Cisco
5 70 (3.29%) Google
6 50 (2.35%) Splunk
7 48 (2.26%) Databricks
8 43 (2.02%) VMware
9 41 (1.93%) Citrix
10 40 (1.88%) Salesforce
11 36 (1.69%) Remedy
12 35 (1.65%) IBM
13 34 (1.60%) Adobe
14 32 (1.51%) Palo Alto
15 29 (1.36%) CheckPoint
16 26 (1.22%) Atlassian
17 23 (1.08%) Aruba
18 21 (0.99%) CyberArk
18 21 (0.99%) Siemens