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 27 May 2026, comparing them to the same period in the previous two years.

6 months to
27 May 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 34 25 19
Rank change year-on-year -9 -6 +9
Contract jobs citing Degree 2,172 1,809 3,019
As % of all contract jobs in England 5.21% 7.61% 8.26%
As % of the Qualifications category 16.32% 24.15% 27.03%
Number of daily rates quoted 1,226 1,095 1,634
10th Percentile £218 £235 £230
25th Percentile £389 £384 £375
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £505 £500
Median % change year-on-year -1.04% +1.05% -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 206 124 374
10th Percentile £20.31 £17.59 £14.11
25th Percentile £28.40 £27.80 £23.81
Median hourly rate £55.00 £54.75 £40.00
Median % change year-on-year +0.46% +36.88% -11.11%
75th Percentile £84.00 £75.00 £61.30
90th Percentile £88.00 £85.00 £73.38
UK median hourly rate £52.50 £54.00 £40.00
% change year-on-year -2.78% +35.00% -18.37%

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 13,312 7,492 11,168
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in England 31.95% 31.51% 30.55%
Number of daily rates quoted 8,924 4,776 6,929
10th Percentile £350 £278 £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 £714 £750
UK median daily rate £525 £523 £530
% change year-on-year +0.43% -1.37% -3.64%
Number of hourly rates quoted 1,009 422 982
10th Percentile £17.04 £17.87 £14.00
25th Percentile £21.33 £22.27 £18.15
Median hourly rate £47.50 £35.00 £40.00
Median % change year-on-year +35.71% -12.50% -26.31%
75th Percentile £73.00 £67.44 £62.28
90th Percentile £85.27 £80.91 £75.24
UK median hourly rate £47.54 £32.50 £40.00
% change year-on-year +46.28% -18.75% -27.27%

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 27 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 27 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 27 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 -16 911 £515 -6.36% 1,351
South East 0 388 £500 +4.99% 631
North of England -17 323 £443 -2.85% 454
Midlands -21 215 £505 +41.06% 268
North West -5 170 £402 -14.29% 247
West Midlands -28 152 £487 +29.73% 176
East of England -1 141 £450 -10.00% 231
Yorkshire -12 138 £450 +5.88% 151
South West -15 137 £505 +6.32% 282
East Midlands -12 61 £531 +48.74% 92
North East -27 15 £450 +130.77% 64
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
1 122 (5.62%) Confluence
2 118 (5.43%) SharePoint
3 63 (2.90%) Microsoft Exchange
4 35 (1.61%) Apache Spark
5 22 (1.01%) Apache Airflow
6 18 (0.83%) Apache
7 8 (0.37%) IIS
8 7 (0.32%) Oracle Workflow
9 6 (0.28%) Camunda
9 6 (0.28%) CMS
9 6 (0.28%) Oracle SOA Suite
10 5 (0.23%) OpenStack
10 5 (0.23%) SAS
11 4 (0.18%) Appian
12 3 (0.14%) Adobe Experience Manager
12 3 (0.14%) Moodle
12 3 (0.14%) MS Project Server
13 2 (0.092%) Cloud Foundry
13 2 (0.092%) Skype for Business
13 2 (0.092%) WinCC
Applications
1 269 (12.38%) Microsoft Office
2 207 (9.53%) Microsoft Excel
3 147 (6.77%) Microsoft Project
4 126 (5.80%) Microsoft PowerPoint
5 55 (2.53%) MS Visio
6 14 (0.64%) Adobe Illustrator
6 14 (0.64%) Photoshop
7 12 (0.55%) Adobe After Effects
7 12 (0.55%) Spreadsheet
8 11 (0.51%) Simulink
9 8 (0.37%) Navisworks
9 8 (0.37%) Revit
10 7 (0.32%) Trello
11 6 (0.28%) Adobe XD
11 6 (0.28%) Sketch
12 5 (0.23%) Chatbot
13 4 (0.18%) UserZoom
14 2 (0.092%) Adobe Creative Suite
14 2 (0.092%) CPLEX
14 2 (0.092%) FrameMaker
Business Applications
1 51 (2.35%) SAP S/4HANA
2 13 (0.60%) Primavera
3 12 (0.55%) Dynamics CRM
3 12 (0.55%) Remedy ITSM
4 10 (0.46%) Payment Gateway
5 9 (0.41%) Oracle Payables
6 8 (0.37%) Aladdin
6 8 (0.37%) Oracle General Ledger
6 8 (0.37%) Veritas eDiscovery
7 6 (0.28%) Oracle Procure-to-Pay
7 6 (0.28%) SAP EWM
8 5 (0.23%) Oracle EBS
8 5 (0.23%) Oracle ERP
8 5 (0.23%) Oracle Receivables
9 4 (0.18%) Fidessa
9 4 (0.18%) HFM
9 4 (0.18%) Magento
9 4 (0.18%) NetSuite
9 4 (0.18%) Oracle Subledger Accounting
9 4 (0.18%) Shopify
Cloud Services
1 458 (21.09%) Azure
2 266 (12.25%) AWS
3 184 (8.47%) Microsoft 365
4 168 (7.73%) Power Platform
5 115 (5.29%) Entra ID
6 84 (3.87%) GCP
7 80 (3.68%) SaaS
8 68 (3.13%) Azure DevOps
9 51 (2.35%) GitHub
10 35 (1.61%) Figma
11 31 (1.43%) Google Workspace
11 31 (1.43%) PaaS
12 29 (1.34%) Dynamics 365
12 29 (1.34%) PowerApps
13 28 (1.29%) IaaS
13 28 (1.29%) Power Automate
14 27 (1.24%) Snowflake
15 26 (1.20%) OneDrive
16 25 (1.15%) Serverless
17 22 (1.01%) GitHub Actions
Communications & Networking
1 90 (4.14%) Firewall
2 54 (2.49%) TCP/IP
2 54 (2.49%) WAN
3 53 (2.44%) LAN
4 52 (2.39%) DNS
5 49 (2.26%) Network Security
6 34 (1.57%) VPN
7 24 (1.10%) BGP
7 24 (1.10%) DHCP
7 24 (1.10%) Wireless
8 21 (0.97%) OSPF
9 20 (0.92%) Ethernet
10 17 (0.78%) Skype
11 14 (0.64%) SAN
11 14 (0.64%) VXLAN
11 14 (0.64%) Wi-Fi
12 11 (0.51%) 3GPP
12 11 (0.51%) IPsec
12 11 (0.51%) Structured Cabling
13 10 (0.46%) Unified Communications
Database & Business Intelligence
1 136 (6.26%) Power BI
2 96 (4.42%) SQL Server
3 49 (2.26%) PostgreSQL
4 48 (2.21%) Relational Database
5 46 (2.12%) Data Warehouse
6 36 (1.66%) Tableau
7 32 (1.47%) NoSQL
8 31 (1.43%) Metadata
9 26 (1.20%) Big Data
10 23 (1.06%) MySQL
11 22 (1.01%) MongoDB
12 18 (0.83%) Oracle Database
13 17 (0.78%) Elasticsearch
14 16 (0.74%) Hadoop
15 14 (0.64%) SQL Server Integration Services
16 13 (0.60%) Data Lake
17 12 (0.55%) Oracle Reports
17 12 (0.55%) Snowflake Schema
18 11 (0.51%) Power Query
18 11 (0.51%) SQL Server Reporting Services
Development Applications
1 212 (9.76%) JIRA
2 97 (4.47%) Git
3 40 (1.84%) Jenkins
4 39 (1.80%) GitLab
5 31 (1.43%) Rational DOORS
6 20 (0.92%) Visual Studio
7 19 (0.87%) MLflow
8 16 (0.74%) Selenium
9 14 (0.64%) Gradle
10 13 (0.60%) JUnit
10 13 (0.60%) Postman
11 12 (0.55%) Cucumber
12 10 (0.46%) REST Assured
12 10 (0.46%) TeamCity
13 9 (0.41%) Burp Suite
13 9 (0.41%) Jaeger
13 9 (0.41%) SonarQube
14 8 (0.37%) Maven
14 8 (0.37%) Metasploit
15 7 (0.32%) Subversion
General
1 1,007 (46.36%) Social Skills
2 671 (30.89%) Finance
3 435 (20.03%) Analytical Skills
4 198 (9.12%) Banking
5 172 (7.92%) Public Sector
6 123 (5.66%) Organisational Skills
7 108 (4.97%) Presentation Skills
8 85 (3.91%) Marketing
9 77 (3.55%) Aerospace
10 76 (3.50%) Documentation Skills
10 76 (3.50%) Legal
11 73 (3.36%) Manufacturing
12 67 (3.08%) Influencing Skills
13 53 (2.44%) Telecoms
14 51 (2.35%) Law
15 49 (2.26%) Retail
16 40 (1.84%) Front Office
17 37 (1.70%) Investment Banking
18 36 (1.66%) Military
19 35 (1.61%) Inclusion and Diversity
Job Titles
1 306 (14.09%) Analyst
2 250 (11.51%) Senior
3 171 (7.87%) Architect
4 164 (7.55%) Lead
5 152 (7.00%) Project Manager
6 149 (6.86%) Developer
7 145 (6.68%) Business Analyst
8 61 (2.81%) Delivery Manager
9 59 (2.72%) Solutions Architect
10 58 (2.67%) Senior Analyst
10 58 (2.67%) Technical Support
11 57 (2.62%) Consultant
12 55 (2.53%) Senior Manager
12 55 (2.53%) Software Engineer
13 50 (2.30%) Designer
14 48 (2.21%) Product Manager
15 42 (1.93%) IT Manager
16 41 (1.89%) Data Engineer
16 41 (1.89%) Data Scientist
17 40 (1.84%) Systems Engineer
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 95 (4.37%) REST
2 75 (3.45%) .NET
3 56 (2.58%) React
4 53 (2.44%) Oracle Fusion
5 50 (2.30%) Middleware
6 47 (2.16%) Kafka
7 42 (1.93%) HTML
8 37 (1.70%) RESTful
9 32 (1.47%) CSS
9 32 (1.47%) Spring Boot
10 31 (1.43%) .NET Framework
11 28 (1.29%) Spring
11 28 (1.29%) XML
12 27 (1.24%) OAuth
13 26 (1.20%) AngularJS
13 26 (1.20%) Pandas
13 26 (1.20%) SOAP
14 25 (1.15%) PyTorch
15 24 (1.10%) Web Services
16 22 (1.01%) JSON
Miscellaneous
1 151 (6.95%) Management Information System
2 138 (6.35%) Product Ownership
3 122 (5.62%) Onboarding
4 80 (3.68%) Self-Motivation
5 75 (3.45%) Cloud Native
6 66 (3.04%) Data Centre
7 57 (2.62%) Virtual Team
8 51 (2.35%) Data Structures
9 50 (2.30%) Distributed Systems
10 45 (2.07%) PMI
11 44 (2.03%) Algorithms
12 43 (1.98%) Data Protection Act
13 38 (1.75%) Robotics
14 34 (1.57%) Operational Technology
15 33 (1.52%) Analytical Mindset
15 33 (1.52%) Derivative
16 31 (1.43%) Legacy Systems
17 29 (1.34%) Security Posture
18 28 (1.29%) Life Science
19 27 (1.24%) Enterprise Software
Operating Systems
1 276 (12.71%) Windows
2 166 (7.64%) Linux
3 72 (3.31%) Unix
4 65 (2.99%) Windows Server
5 57 (2.62%) Windows 10
6 27 (1.24%) Android
7 24 (1.10%) Mac OS
8 23 (1.06%) Apple iOS
8 23 (1.06%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
9 12 (0.55%) Windows Server 2019
10 9 (0.41%) Ubuntu
10 9 (0.41%) Windows Server 2016
11 8 (0.37%) Windows Server 2012
12 6 (0.28%) AIX
12 6 (0.28%) Windows 7
13 5 (0.23%) VMS
14 4 (0.18%) Debian
14 4 (0.18%) Rocky
14 4 (0.18%) Solaris
15 2 (0.092%) Robot Operating System
Processes & Methodologies
1 740 (34.07%) Computer Science
2 628 (28.91%) Agile
3 552 (25.41%) Problem-Solving
4 343 (15.79%) Stakeholder Management
5 336 (15.47%) Continuous Improvement
6 324 (14.92%) AI
7 288 (13.26%) Project Management
8 287 (13.21%) DevOps
9 244 (11.23%) CI/CD
10 234 (10.77%) Analytics
11 231 (10.64%) Decision-Making
12 223 (10.27%) Stakeholder Engagement
13 203 (9.35%) Cybersecurity
14 201 (9.25%) Migration
15 199 (9.16%) Change Management
16 191 (8.79%) Risk Management
17 189 (8.70%) ITIL
18 185 (8.52%) PRINCE2
19 184 (8.47%) Roadmaps
20 181 (8.33%) Software Engineering
Programming Languages
1 347 (15.98%) Python
2 328 (15.10%) SQL
3 154 (7.09%) Java
4 111 (5.11%) PowerShell
5 88 (4.05%) C#
6 85 (3.91%) JavaScript
7 54 (2.49%) C++
8 36 (1.66%) Bash
9 30 (1.38%) TypeScript
10 25 (1.15%) R
11 21 (0.97%) PL/SQL
12 19 (0.87%) C
13 16 (0.74%) Shell Script
13 16 (0.74%) T-SQL
14 15 (0.69%) Rust
15 14 (0.64%) Perl
16 13 (0.60%) Go
17 12 (0.55%) Data Analysis Expressions
17 12 (0.55%) Kotlin
18 11 (0.51%) SystemVerilog
Qualifications
1 460 (21.18%) Computer Science Degree
2 405 (18.65%) Security Cleared
3 280 (12.89%) SC Cleared
4 224 (10.31%) Master's Degree
5 132 (6.08%) PMI Certification
6 115 (5.29%) PMP
7 102 (4.70%) CISSP
8 78 (3.59%) Cisco Certification
9 77 (3.55%) Microsoft Certification
10 58 (2.67%) CISM
11 55 (2.53%) DV Cleared
12 53 (2.44%) BPSS Clearance
13 47 (2.16%) PhD
14 46 (2.12%) Azure Certification
15 43 (1.98%) CCNP
16 36 (1.66%) CCNA
16 36 (1.66%) TOGAF Certification
17 33 (1.52%) MBA
18 32 (1.47%) CBAP
19 28 (1.29%) CISA
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 134 (6.17%) QA
2 107 (4.93%) ISO/IEC 27001
3 103 (4.74%) NIST
4 102 (4.70%) PMO
5 93 (4.28%) GDPR
6 91 (4.19%) Data Quality
7 48 (2.21%) SLA
8 43 (1.98%) Accessibility
9 39 (1.80%) PCI DSS
10 28 (1.29%) Sarbanes-Oxley
11 22 (1.01%) GRC
12 20 (0.92%) NCSC
13 16 (0.74%) IFRS
14 15 (0.69%) Cyber Essentials
15 12 (0.55%) NIST 800
16 11 (0.51%) SOC 2
17 10 (0.46%) COBIT
18 9 (0.41%) Basel III
18 9 (0.41%) HIPAA
18 9 (0.41%) ISO 19650
System Software
1 150 (6.91%) Active Directory
2 114 (5.25%) Docker
3 36 (1.66%) VMware Infrastructure
4 26 (1.20%) Hyper-V
5 21 (0.97%) Firmware
6 7 (0.32%) Virtual Machines
6 7 (0.32%) VMware ESXi
7 6 (0.28%) BitLocker
7 6 (0.28%) vSphere
8 5 (0.23%) Virtual Desktop
9 4 (0.18%) Embedded Firmware
9 4 (0.18%) VMware NSX
9 4 (0.18%) XenApp
9 4 (0.18%) XenDesktop
10 3 (0.14%) KVM
10 3 (0.14%) VMware Workstation
11 2 (0.092%) HDFS
11 2 (0.092%) NFS
11 2 (0.092%) Oracle RAC
11 2 (0.092%) Veritas Volume Manager
Systems Management
1 132 (6.08%) Kubernetes
2 75 (3.45%) Terraform
3 65 (2.99%) Microsoft Intune
4 59 (2.72%) Ansible
5 37 (1.70%) Grafana
6 35 (1.61%) SCCM
7 31 (1.43%) Prometheus
8 20 (0.92%) Single Sign-On
9 16 (0.74%) Active Directory Federation Services
10 15 (0.69%) Puppet
11 11 (0.51%) Kibana
12 10 (0.46%) Jamf Pro
13 9 (0.41%) Kiali
13 9 (0.41%) OPNET
13 9 (0.41%) WSUS
14 8 (0.37%) Nessus
14 8 (0.37%) Nmap
14 8 (0.37%) vCenter Server
15 7 (0.32%) HP ALM
16 5 (0.23%) Control-M
Vendors
1 501 (23.07%) Microsoft
2 165 (7.60%) Oracle
3 123 (5.66%) SAP
4 108 (4.97%) ServiceNow
5 71 (3.27%) Cisco
6 70 (3.22%) Google
7 51 (2.35%) Databricks
8 48 (2.21%) Splunk
9 43 (1.98%) Citrix
10 42 (1.93%) VMware
11 39 (1.80%) Salesforce
12 37 (1.70%) Adobe
13 34 (1.57%) Palo Alto
14 33 (1.52%) IBM
15 31 (1.43%) CheckPoint
16 27 (1.24%) Remedy
17 25 (1.15%) Aruba
18 22 (1.01%) CyberArk
19 20 (0.92%) Siemens
20 18 (0.83%) Ariba