Junior Contract Job Trends in England

Junior
UK > England

The median Junior daily rate in England is £353, according to job vacancies posted in the 6 months leading up to 19 June 2026.

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

6 months to
19 Jun 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 376 333 345
Rank change year-on-year -43 +12 +25
Contract jobs requiring a Junior 223 147 199
As % of all contract jobs in England 0.52% 0.59% 0.53%
As % of the Job Titles category 0.56% 0.64% 0.57%
Number of daily rates quoted 146 100 149
10th Percentile £164 £152 £123
25th Percentile £263 £185 £213
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £353 £250 £325
Median % change year-on-year +41.00% -23.08% +20.37%
75th Percentile £438 £327 £400
90th Percentile £498 £414 £500
UK median daily rate £336 £250 £325
% change year-on-year +34.50% -23.08% +20.37%
Number of hourly rates quoted 18 7 11
10th Percentile £11.32 £17.85 -
25th Percentile £12.43 £19.39 -
Median hourly rate £14.00 £21.28 £10.42
Median % change year-on-year -34.21% +104.22% -23.91%
75th Percentile £20.48 £23.41 £13.16
90th Percentile £24.14 £24.25 £40.00
UK median hourly rate £15.99 £21.28 £10.42
% change year-on-year -24.86% +104.22% -28.73%

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 39,807 22,960 35,034
% of contract IT jobs with a recognized job title 92.35% 92.31% 92.85%
Number of daily rates quoted 24,488 15,102 22,819
10th Percentile £325 £294 £288
25th Percentile £415 £405 £413
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £521 £513 £525
Median % change year-on-year +1.56% -2.38% -4.55%
75th Percentile £625 £635 £638
90th Percentile £733 £750 £750
UK median daily rate £515 £500 £525
% change year-on-year +3.00% -4.76% -2.33%
Number of hourly rates quoted 2,805 1,027 2,691
10th Percentile £15.93 £14.00 £12.86
25th Percentile £21.35 £18.13 £16.58
Median hourly rate £45.50 £28.75 £39.55
Median % change year-on-year +58.26% -27.31% -12.11%
75th Percentile £67.84 £58.75 £63.19
90th Percentile £80.00 £75.00 £74.37
UK median hourly rate £43.69 £27.21 £37.50
% change year-on-year +60.57% -27.44% -16.67%

Junior
Job Vacancy Trend in England

Historical trend showing the proportion of contract IT job postings featuring 'Junior' in the job title relative to all contract IT jobs advertised in England.

Junior job vacancy trend in England

Junior
Daily Rate Trend in England

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for Junior job vacancies in England.

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for Junior job vacancies in England

Junior
Daily Rate Histogram in England

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing Junior in England over the 6 months to 19 June 2026.

Daily rate histogram for Junior in England

Junior
Hourly Rate Trend in England

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for Junior job vacancies in England.

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for Junior job vacancies in England

Junior
Hourly Rate Histogram in England

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing Junior in England over the 6 months to 19 June 2026.

Hourly rate histogram for Junior in England

Junior
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 Junior within the England region over the 6 months to 19 June 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 -26 127 £325 +25.48% 69
South West +2 31 £425 +41.67% 37
North of England -53 24 £353 +65.88% 63
South East -56 24 £325 +18.18% 83
North West -26 15 £323 +51.76% 34
North East - 8 £425 - 14
East of England -32 7 £300 +37.14% 31
West Midlands -67 6 £140 -6.67% 22
Midlands -75 6 £140 -30.86% 46
Yorkshire -62 1 £355 +67.06% 17
Junior
UK

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

For the 6 months to 19 June 2026, Junior 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 Junior in the job title.

1 59 (26.46%) Security Cleared
2 53 (23.77%) Agile
3 52 (23.32%) SC Cleared
4 34 (15.25%) SQL
5 26 (11.66%) Degree
5 26 (11.66%) Python
6 23 (10.31%) C#
6 23 (10.31%) Microsoft
6 23 (10.31%) Problem-Solving
7 21 (9.42%) Accessibility
8 19 (8.52%) Computer Science
8 19 (8.52%) Project Management
9 18 (8.07%) .NET
9 18 (8.07%) Migration
10 17 (7.62%) Azure
10 17 (7.62%) Continuous Improvement
10 17 (7.62%) User Experience
11 15 (6.73%) Figma
11 15 (6.73%) Java
11 15 (6.73%) Software Engineering
11 15 (6.73%) TCP/IP
12 14 (6.28%) Data Protection
12 14 (6.28%) DevOps
12 14 (6.28%) REST
13 13 (5.83%) CI/CD
13 13 (5.83%) Stakeholder Engagement
13 13 (5.83%) UX Design
14 12 (5.38%) Active Directory
14 12 (5.38%) Analytics
14 12 (5.38%) AWS

Junior 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 4 (1.79%) Confluence
2 3 (1.35%) IIS
3 2 (0.90%) Apache
3 2 (0.90%) Apache Airflow
3 2 (0.90%) SharePoint
4 1 (0.45%) Apache Spark
4 1 (0.45%) govService
4 1 (0.45%) WebLogic
Applications
1 8 (3.59%) Microsoft Excel
2 4 (1.79%) Adobe Illustrator
2 4 (1.79%) Photoshop
2 4 (1.79%) Spreadsheet
2 4 (1.79%) UserZoom
3 3 (1.35%) Adobe After Effects
3 3 (1.35%) InDesign
3 3 (1.35%) Microsoft Project
4 2 (0.90%) Microsoft PowerPoint
4 2 (0.90%) MS Visio
5 1 (0.45%) Adobe Creative Suite
5 1 (0.45%) Adobe XD
5 1 (0.45%) Microsoft Office
5 1 (0.45%) Sketch
Cloud Services
1 17 (7.62%) Azure
2 15 (6.73%) Figma
3 12 (5.38%) AWS
4 11 (4.93%) Power Platform
5 8 (3.59%) Microsoft 365
6 6 (2.69%) Azure DevOps
7 5 (2.24%) GitHub
7 5 (2.24%) Miro
8 4 (1.79%) Amazon S3
8 4 (1.79%) AWS Lambda
8 4 (1.79%) Serverless
9 3 (1.35%) Amazon Kinesis
9 3 (1.35%) AWS Step Functions
9 3 (1.35%) Azure AKS
9 3 (1.35%) Azure Cosmos DB
9 3 (1.35%) Canva
10 2 (0.90%) Anthropic Claude
10 2 (0.90%) ChatGPT
10 2 (0.90%) Entra ID
10 2 (0.90%) SaaS
Communications & Networking
1 15 (6.73%) TCP/IP
2 12 (5.38%) DNS
3 7 (3.14%) BIG-IP
3 7 (3.14%) HTTP
3 7 (3.14%) SSL
3 7 (3.14%) Wireshark
4 6 (2.69%) Internet
5 5 (2.24%) DHCP
5 5 (2.24%) LAN
5 5 (2.24%) VPN
6 4 (1.79%) Network Security
6 4 (1.79%) VLAN
6 4 (1.79%) Wi-Fi
7 3 (1.35%) BGP
7 3 (1.35%) Firewall
8 1 (0.45%) HTTPS
8 1 (0.45%) Intranet
8 1 (0.45%) IPsec
8 1 (0.45%) WAN
8 1 (0.45%) Wireless
Database & Business Intelligence
1 12 (5.38%) Relational Database
2 11 (4.93%) Power BI
3 3 (1.35%) Amazon Athena
3 3 (1.35%) Data Warehouse
3 3 (1.35%) NoSQL
3 3 (1.35%) SQL Server
4 2 (0.90%) Power Query
5 1 (0.45%) BigQuery
5 1 (0.45%) Data Lake
5 1 (0.45%) DTS
5 1 (0.45%) Looker
5 1 (0.45%) MS Access
5 1 (0.45%) MySQL
5 1 (0.45%) RDBMS
5 1 (0.45%) SQL Server Integration Services
5 1 (0.45%) SQL Server Reporting Services
5 1 (0.45%) Tableau
Development Applications
1 7 (3.14%) JIRA
2 6 (2.69%) Fiddler
3 4 (1.79%) Git
3 4 (1.79%) GitLab
4 2 (0.90%) Jenkins
5 1 (0.45%) Artifactory
5 1 (0.45%) Bitbucket
5 1 (0.45%) TeamCity
General
1 73 (32.74%) Social Skills
2 35 (15.70%) Finance
3 20 (8.97%) Analytical Skills
3 20 (8.97%) Public Sector
4 19 (8.52%) Organisational Skills
5 13 (5.83%) Banking
6 8 (3.59%) Publishing
7 6 (2.69%) Investment Banking
8 5 (2.24%) Inclusion and Diversity
8 5 (2.24%) Legal
8 5 (2.24%) Retail
9 4 (1.79%) Social Science
10 3 (1.35%) French Language
10 3 (1.35%) Front Office
10 3 (1.35%) Games
10 3 (1.35%) Pharmaceutical
10 3 (1.35%) Retail Banking
11 2 (0.90%) German Language
11 2 (0.90%) Local Government
11 2 (0.90%) Marketing
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 18 (8.07%) .NET
2 14 (6.28%) REST
3 7 (3.14%) Spring
4 3 (1.35%) Spring Boot
4 3 (1.35%) XML
5 2 (0.90%) AngularJS
5 2 (0.90%) ASP.NET
5 2 (0.90%) HTML
5 2 (0.90%) React
5 2 (0.90%) Vue
6 1 (0.45%) ADO.NET
6 1 (0.45%) JSF
6 1 (0.45%) LDAP
6 1 (0.45%) Middleware
6 1 (0.45%) SAML
6 1 (0.45%) SOAP
6 1 (0.45%) Struts
6 1 (0.45%) Web Services
6 1 (0.45%) XSL
6 1 (0.45%) XSLT
Miscellaneous
1 16 (7.17%) Onboarding
2 14 (6.28%) Product Ownership
3 8 (3.59%) Cloud Native
3 8 (3.59%) Data Centre
4 5 (2.24%) Foreign Exchange (FX)
5 4 (1.79%) Data Protection Act
5 4 (1.79%) Distributed Systems
5 4 (1.79%) Graphic Design
5 4 (1.79%) Hedge funds
5 4 (1.79%) Management Information System
6 3 (1.35%) Data Structures
6 3 (1.35%) Housing Association
6 3 (1.35%) Security Posture
6 3 (1.35%) Team-Oriented Environment
7 2 (0.90%) Equities
7 2 (0.90%) Fat Client
7 2 (0.90%) Life Science
7 2 (0.90%) NHS
7 2 (0.90%) Private Cloud
7 2 (0.90%) Thin Client
Operating Systems
1 7 (3.14%) Windows
2 5 (2.24%) Windows 10
3 2 (0.90%) AIX
3 2 (0.90%) Mac OS
3 2 (0.90%) Solaris
4 1 (0.45%) CatOS
4 1 (0.45%) Linux
4 1 (0.45%) Unix
4 1 (0.45%) Windows Server
Processes & Methodologies
1 53 (23.77%) Agile
2 23 (10.31%) Problem-Solving
3 19 (8.52%) Computer Science
3 19 (8.52%) Project Management
4 18 (8.07%) Migration
5 17 (7.62%) Continuous Improvement
5 17 (7.62%) User Experience
6 15 (6.73%) Software Engineering
7 14 (6.28%) Data Protection
7 14 (6.28%) DevOps
8 13 (5.83%) CI/CD
8 13 (5.83%) Stakeholder Engagement
8 13 (5.83%) UX Design
9 12 (5.38%) Analytics
9 12 (5.38%) Validation
10 11 (4.93%) AI
10 11 (4.93%) Business Intelligence
10 11 (4.93%) Project Delivery
10 11 (4.93%) Stakeholder Management
11 9 (4.04%) Decision-Making
Programming Languages
1 34 (15.25%) SQL
2 26 (11.66%) Python
3 23 (10.31%) C#
4 15 (6.73%) Java
5 4 (1.79%) JavaScript
6 3 (1.35%) C++
7 2 (0.90%) Bash
8 1 (0.45%) Data Analysis Expressions
8 1 (0.45%) PL/SQL
8 1 (0.45%) Ruby
8 1 (0.45%) VB
Qualifications
1 59 (26.46%) Security Cleared
2 52 (23.32%) SC Cleared
3 26 (11.66%) Degree
4 7 (3.14%) DV Cleared
5 4 (1.79%) Computer Science Degree
5 4 (1.79%) Master's Degree
6 3 (1.35%) BPSS Clearance
7 1 (0.45%) A+ Certification
7 1 (0.45%) ACCA
7 1 (0.45%) CIMA
7 1 (0.45%) CompTIA Security+
7 1 (0.45%) Network+ Certification
7 1 (0.45%) PMI Certification
7 1 (0.45%) PMP
7 1 (0.45%) Six Sigma Black Belt
7 1 (0.45%) Six Sigma Green Belt
7 1 (0.45%) SSCP
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 21 (9.42%) Accessibility
2 7 (3.14%) Data Quality
2 7 (3.14%) PMO
3 5 (2.24%) QA
4 3 (1.35%) SLA
5 2 (0.90%) WCAG
6 1 (0.45%) Actionable Recommendations
6 1 (0.45%) Cyber Essentials
6 1 (0.45%) GDPR
6 1 (0.45%) GRC
6 1 (0.45%) HL7
6 1 (0.45%) ISO/IEC 27001
6 1 (0.45%) P3O
System Software
1 12 (5.38%) Active Directory
2 7 (3.14%) VMware NSX
3 3 (1.35%) Docker
3 3 (1.35%) VMware Infrastructure
4 2 (0.90%) Virtual Machines
5 1 (0.45%) Hyper-V
5 1 (0.45%) VMware ESXi
5 1 (0.45%) VMware Workstation
Systems Management
1 10 (4.48%) Ansible
2 5 (2.24%) Terraform
3 4 (1.79%) Kubernetes
4 2 (0.90%) Jamf Pro
4 2 (0.90%) Microsoft Intune
5 1 (0.45%) Istio
5 1 (0.45%) Prometheus
5 1 (0.45%) Single Sign-On
Vendors
1 23 (10.31%) Microsoft
2 11 (4.93%) VMware
3 7 (3.14%) F5
4 6 (2.69%) Blue Coat
4 6 (2.69%) McAfee
5 5 (2.24%) Google
6 4 (1.79%) Adobe
6 4 (1.79%) Cisco
7 3 (1.35%) Arista
7 3 (1.35%) SAP
7 3 (1.35%) ServiceNow
8 2 (0.90%) Fortinet
9 1 (0.45%) Alteryx
9 1 (0.45%) Anaplan
9 1 (0.45%) CheckPoint
9 1 (0.45%) IFS
9 1 (0.45%) InterSystems
9 1 (0.45%) Oracle
9 1 (0.45%) Palo Alto
9 1 (0.45%) Salesforce