Junior Contract Job Trends in England

Junior
UK > England

The median Junior daily rate in England is £275, according to job vacancies posted in the 6 months leading up to 23 February 2026.

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

6 months to
23 Feb 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 380 339 371
Rank change year-on-year -41 +32 +36
Contract jobs requiring a Junior 186 148 191
As % of all contract jobs in England 0.54% 0.58% 0.50%
As % of the Job Titles category 0.58% 0.62% 0.54%
Number of daily rates quoted 91 116 141
10th Percentile £150 £143 £130
25th Percentile £158 £200 £213
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £275 £288 £325
Median % change year-on-year -4.51% -11.38% +18.18%
75th Percentile £398 £400 £419
90th Percentile £488 £454 £519
UK median daily rate £275 £280 £325
% change year-on-year -1.79% -13.85% +18.18%
Number of hourly rates quoted 13 3 10
10th Percentile - £16.63 £10.42
25th Percentile £12.43 £17.19 £11.70
Median hourly rate £13.25 £18.13 £17.41
Median % change year-on-year -26.92% +4.14% +39.06%
75th Percentile - £22.57 £28.79
90th Percentile £17.92 £25.23 £40.38
UK median hourly rate £13.25 £18.13 £15.89
% change year-on-year -26.92% +14.10% +24.24%

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 31,876 23,857 35,159
% of contract IT jobs with a recognized job title 91.89% 92.97% 92.94%
Number of daily rates quoted 20,202 15,057 23,560
10th Percentile £305 £300 £272
25th Percentile £410 £409 £413
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £501 £525 £525
Median % change year-on-year -4.67% - -4.55%
75th Percentile £623 £638 £640
90th Percentile £725 £750 £745
UK median daily rate £500 £525 £525
% change year-on-year -4.76% - -4.55%
Number of hourly rates quoted 2,049 719 2,153
10th Percentile £15.00 £16.25 £13.23
25th Percentile £18.87 £22.00 £16.54
Median hourly rate £33.17 £36.00 £35.00
Median % change year-on-year -7.86% +2.86% -12.50%
75th Percentile £65.00 £65.00 £60.00
90th Percentile £74.68 £75.30 £71.87
UK median hourly rate £31.76 £35.00 £35.00
% change year-on-year -9.27% - -12.01%

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 23 February 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
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 23 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 -39 70 £275 -15.38% 87
South East -10 37 £165 -40.00% 71
North of England -49 27 £337 +34.80% 64
Midlands -50 24 £195 -6.02% 40
North West -28 19 £283 -28.29% 31
West Midlands -54 19 £190 -8.43% 19
South West -10 14 £340 +13.33% 29
East of England -15 14 £168 -42.24% 26
North East - 8 £398 - 12
East Midlands -25 5 £290 +28.60% 21
Yorkshire -62 2 £441 +204.31% 22
Junior
UK

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

For the 6 months to 23 February 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 29 (15.59%) Problem-Solving
2 28 (15.05%) Break/Fix
3 27 (14.52%) HP
4 24 (12.90%) Python
5 23 (12.37%) Agile
6 22 (11.83%) Security Cleared
7 21 (11.29%) Microsoft
8 19 (10.22%) DNS
8 19 (10.22%) TCP/IP
8 19 (10.22%) Time Management
9 18 (9.68%) Degree
9 18 (9.68%) SQL
10 17 (9.14%) SC Cleared
11 15 (8.06%) Continuous Improvement
12 14 (7.53%) Ansible
12 14 (7.53%) BIG-IP
12 14 (7.53%) F5
12 14 (7.53%) HTTP
12 14 (7.53%) JIRA
12 14 (7.53%) SSL
12 14 (7.53%) Windows
12 14 (7.53%) Wireshark
13 13 (6.99%) Active Directory
13 13 (6.99%) Blue Coat
13 13 (6.99%) Fiddler
13 13 (6.99%) Load Balancing
13 13 (6.99%) McAfee
14 12 (6.45%) Project Delivery
14 12 (6.45%) VMware
14 12 (6.45%) VMware NSX

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 8 (4.30%) Confluence
2 5 (2.69%) SharePoint
3 2 (1.08%) Apache
3 2 (1.08%) Apache Airflow
3 2 (1.08%) Microsoft Exchange
4 1 (0.54%) FileNet
4 1 (0.54%) IIS
Applications
1 9 (4.84%) Microsoft Office
2 6 (3.23%) Microsoft Excel
2 6 (3.23%) Microsoft PowerPoint
3 4 (2.15%) Microsoft Project
4 3 (1.61%) MS Visio
4 3 (1.61%) Spreadsheet
5 1 (0.54%) Adobe After Effects
5 1 (0.54%) Adobe Illustrator
5 1 (0.54%) Adobe Premiere
5 1 (0.54%) Adobe XD
5 1 (0.54%) InDesign
5 1 (0.54%) Photoshop
5 1 (0.54%) Sketch
Business Applications
1 5 (2.69%) Remedy ITSM
2 1 (0.54%) Dynamics CRM
Cloud Services
1 11 (5.91%) Azure
2 10 (5.38%) Microsoft 365
3 7 (3.76%) AWS
4 6 (3.23%) Power Platform
5 5 (2.69%) Entra ID
6 4 (2.15%) Serverless
7 3 (1.61%) Amazon Kinesis
7 3 (1.61%) Amazon S3
7 3 (1.61%) AWS Lambda
7 3 (1.61%) AWS Step Functions
7 3 (1.61%) Azure DevOps
7 3 (1.61%) SaaS
8 2 (1.08%) dbt
8 2 (1.08%) Figma
8 2 (1.08%) GitHub
8 2 (1.08%) Snowflake
9 1 (0.54%) Azure AKS
9 1 (0.54%) Collibra
9 1 (0.54%) GitHub Actions
9 1 (0.54%) OCI
Communications & Networking
1 19 (10.22%) DNS
1 19 (10.22%) TCP/IP
2 14 (7.53%) BIG-IP
2 14 (7.53%) HTTP
2 14 (7.53%) SSL
2 14 (7.53%) Wireshark
3 10 (5.38%) VPN
4 6 (3.23%) Wireless
5 5 (2.69%) DHCP
5 5 (2.69%) Internet
5 5 (2.69%) LAN
5 5 (2.69%) Wi-Fi
6 4 (2.15%) VLAN
7 2 (1.08%) DMZ
7 2 (1.08%) F5 BIG-IP GTM
7 2 (1.08%) F5 BIG-IP LTM
8 1 (0.54%) Cisco ASA
8 1 (0.54%) Ethereal
8 1 (0.54%) Firewall
8 1 (0.54%) HTTPS
Database & Business Intelligence
1 6 (3.23%) Power BI
2 3 (1.61%) Amazon Athena
2 3 (1.61%) SQL Server
3 2 (1.08%) Big Data
3 2 (1.08%) Data Warehouse
3 2 (1.08%) NoSQL
4 1 (0.54%) Amazon Redshift
4 1 (0.54%) Apache Hive
4 1 (0.54%) Data Lake
4 1 (0.54%) DataStage
4 1 (0.54%) Dremio
4 1 (0.54%) Hadoop
4 1 (0.54%) Metadata
4 1 (0.54%) MongoDB
4 1 (0.54%) Snowflake Schema
4 1 (0.54%) SQL Server Analysis Services
4 1 (0.54%) SQL Server Integration Services
4 1 (0.54%) SQL Server Reporting Services
Development Applications
1 14 (7.53%) JIRA
2 13 (6.99%) Fiddler
3 5 (2.69%) Git
4 4 (2.15%) GitLab
5 2 (1.08%) Jenkins
6 1 (0.54%) JUnit
6 1 (0.54%) TeamCity
6 1 (0.54%) Visual Studio
General
1 55 (29.57%) Social Skills
2 32 (17.20%) Organisational Skills
3 23 (12.37%) Finance
4 15 (8.06%) Analytical Skills
5 11 (5.91%) Banking
6 9 (4.84%) Inclusion and Diversity
7 5 (2.69%) Military
8 4 (2.15%) Front Office
8 4 (2.15%) Public Sector
9 3 (1.61%) Documentation Skills
9 3 (1.61%) Marketing
9 3 (1.61%) Presentation Skills
9 3 (1.61%) Retail
10 2 (1.08%) Back Office
10 2 (1.08%) Investment Banking
10 2 (1.08%) Legal
10 2 (1.08%) Manufacturing
10 2 (1.08%) Retail Banking
11 1 (0.54%) Aerospace
11 1 (0.54%) Publishing
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 2 (1.08%) .NET
1 2 (1.08%) ADO
1 2 (1.08%) REST
1 2 (1.08%) Spring
2 1 (0.54%) .NET Core
2 1 (0.54%) Apache Commons
2 1 (0.54%) CSS
2 1 (0.54%) Gherkin
2 1 (0.54%) Guava
2 1 (0.54%) HTML
2 1 (0.54%) JSF
2 1 (0.54%) JSON
2 1 (0.54%) Kafka
2 1 (0.54%) LDAP
2 1 (0.54%) Oracle Fusion
2 1 (0.54%) React
2 1 (0.54%) Struts
2 1 (0.54%) Swagger
2 1 (0.54%) XML
2 1 (0.54%) XSLT
Miscellaneous
1 17 (9.14%) Mobile App
2 12 (6.45%) Data Centre
3 9 (4.84%) Management Information System
4 7 (3.76%) Onboarding
5 4 (2.15%) Cloud Native
5 4 (2.15%) Self-Motivation
6 3 (1.61%) Product Ownership
7 2 (1.08%) Data Protection Act
7 2 (1.08%) Data Structures
7 2 (1.08%) Hedge funds
8 1 (0.54%) CMDB
8 1 (0.54%) Cybercrime
8 1 (0.54%) Distributed Denial-of-Service
8 1 (0.54%) Driving Licence
8 1 (0.54%) Fat Client
8 1 (0.54%) FMCG
8 1 (0.54%) Hybrid Cloud
8 1 (0.54%) Legacy Systems
8 1 (0.54%) Reference Data
8 1 (0.54%) Social Media
Operating Systems
1 14 (7.53%) Windows
2 5 (2.69%) Windows 10
3 4 (2.15%) Mac OS
4 3 (1.61%) Linux
5 1 (0.54%) CatOS
5 1 (0.54%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
5 1 (0.54%) Windows Server
Processes & Methodologies
1 29 (15.59%) Problem-Solving
2 28 (15.05%) Break/Fix
3 23 (12.37%) Agile
4 19 (10.22%) Time Management
5 15 (8.06%) Continuous Improvement
6 13 (6.99%) Load Balancing
7 12 (6.45%) Project Delivery
8 11 (5.91%) CI/CD
8 11 (5.91%) Data Loss Prevention
8 11 (5.91%) Malware Detection/Protection
8 11 (5.91%) Scrum
9 10 (5.38%) DevOps
9 10 (5.38%) Project Management
10 9 (4.84%) Analytics
10 9 (4.84%) Customer Service
10 9 (4.84%) ITIL
10 9 (4.84%) Migration
10 9 (4.84%) Stakeholder Management
11 8 (4.30%) Computer Science
11 8 (4.30%) ITSM
Programming Languages
1 24 (12.90%) Python
2 18 (9.68%) SQL
3 7 (3.76%) Java
4 3 (1.61%) Bash
4 3 (1.61%) PowerShell
5 2 (1.08%) JavaScript
5 2 (1.08%) PHP
5 2 (1.08%) T-SQL
6 1 (0.54%) C#
6 1 (0.54%) Data Analysis Expressions
6 1 (0.54%) Korn
6 1 (0.54%) Rust
6 1 (0.54%) TypeScript
6 1 (0.54%) VBA
Qualifications
1 22 (11.83%) Security Cleared
2 18 (9.68%) Degree
3 17 (9.14%) SC Cleared
4 9 (4.84%) DV Cleared
5 5 (2.69%) Computer Science Degree
6 3 (1.61%) PMI Certification
6 3 (1.61%) PMP
7 2 (1.08%) BPSS Clearance
8 1 (0.54%) A+ Certification
8 1 (0.54%) CompTIA Security+
8 1 (0.54%) DBS Check
8 1 (0.54%) Master's Degree
8 1 (0.54%) MBA
8 1 (0.54%) Microsoft Certification
8 1 (0.54%) Network+ Certification
8 1 (0.54%) SAFe Agilist
8 1 (0.54%) SSCP
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 10 (5.38%) PMO
2 5 (2.69%) Data Quality
3 3 (1.61%) QA
4 2 (1.08%) Accessibility
4 2 (1.08%) SLA
5 1 (0.54%) Actionable Recommendations
5 1 (0.54%) Basel III
5 1 (0.54%) Cyber Essentials
5 1 (0.54%) GRC
5 1 (0.54%) ISO/IEC 27001
System Software
1 13 (6.99%) Active Directory
2 12 (6.45%) VMware NSX
3 3 (1.61%) Docker
4 1 (0.54%) VMware Infrastructure
Systems Management
1 14 (7.53%) Ansible
2 5 (2.69%) Terraform
3 4 (2.15%) Jamf Pro
3 4 (2.15%) Microsoft Intune
4 2 (1.08%) Kubernetes
5 1 (0.54%) Istio
5 1 (0.54%) Prometheus
5 1 (0.54%) Single Sign-On
Vendors
1 27 (14.52%) HP
2 21 (11.29%) Microsoft
3 14 (7.53%) F5
4 13 (6.99%) Blue Coat
4 13 (6.99%) McAfee
5 12 (6.45%) VMware
6 6 (3.23%) Cisco
7 5 (2.69%) Remedy
8 4 (2.15%) Netskope
9 2 (1.08%) Adobe
9 2 (1.08%) Databricks
9 2 (1.08%) Google
9 2 (1.08%) NetApp
9 2 (1.08%) Oracle
9 2 (1.08%) Salesforce
9 2 (1.08%) ServiceNow
10 1 (0.54%) Alteryx
10 1 (0.54%) CheckPoint
10 1 (0.54%) Palo Alto
10 1 (0.54%) Talend