NHS Contract Job Trends in England

National Health Service (NHS)
UK > England

The table below looks at the prevalence of the term NHS in contract job vacancies in England. Included is a benchmarking guide to the contractor rates offered in vacancies that cited NHS over the 6 months leading up to 21 April 2026, comparing them to the same period in the previous two years.

6 months to
21 Apr 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 265 298 212
Rank change year-on-year +33 -86 -36
Contract jobs citing NHS 359 177 413
As % of all contract jobs in England 0.91% 0.72% 1.12%
As % of the Miscellaneous category 2.78% 2.12% 3.60%
Number of daily rates quoted 281 127 277
10th Percentile £243 £191 £163
25th Percentile £338 £227 £205
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £450 £400 £280
Median % change year-on-year +12.50% +42.86% -6.67%
75th Percentile £525 £488 £400
90th Percentile £600 £555 £550
UK median daily rate £450 £395 £298
% change year-on-year +13.92% +32.66% -0.75%
Number of hourly rates quoted 21 17 73
10th Percentile - £13.08 £11.25
25th Percentile £15.79 £15.22 £12.27
Median hourly rate £21.30 £18.13 £15.86
Median % change year-on-year +17.48% +14.35% -27.93%
75th Percentile £23.75 £33.75 £25.83
90th Percentile £34.62 £33.91 £41.17
UK median hourly rate £21.15 £23.84 £14.49
% change year-on-year -11.26% +64.55% -32.97%

All Generic Skills
England

NHS falls under the General and Transferable Skills category. For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all contract job vacancies requiring generic IT skills in England.

Contract vacancies with a requirement for generic IT skills 12,900 8,334 11,461
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in England 32.61% 34.00% 30.96%
Number of daily rates quoted 8,165 5,465 7,487
10th Percentile £303 £300 £263
25th Percentile £413 £413 £413
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £513 £545 £550
Median % change year-on-year -5.96% -0.91% -4.35%
75th Percentile £625 £675 £675
90th Percentile £749 £788 £800
UK median daily rate £500 £525 £538
% change year-on-year -4.76% -2.33% -2.27%
Number of hourly rates quoted 666 315 815
10th Percentile £16.01 £16.67 £12.25
25th Percentile £21.25 £22.85 £15.13
Median hourly rate £45.46 £36.48 £28.25
Median % change year-on-year +24.62% +29.13% +25.56%
75th Percentile £70.00 £65.00 £58.75
90th Percentile £85.40 £85.00 £68.83
UK median hourly rate £45.00 £32.50 £28.00
% change year-on-year +38.46% +16.07% +24.44%

NHS
Job Vacancy Trend in England

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

NHS job vacancy trend in England

NHS
Daily Rate Trend in England

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

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in England citing NHS

NHS
Daily Rate Histogram in England

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing NHS in England over the 6 months to 21 April 2026.

Daily rate histogram for NHS in England

NHS
Hourly Rate Trend in England

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

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in England citing NHS

NHS
Hourly Rate Histogram in England

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing NHS in England over the 6 months to 21 April 2026.

Hourly rate histogram for NHS in England

NHS
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 NHS within the England region over the 6 months to 21 April 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 -9 121 £438 -0.57% 52
North of England -7 107 £500 +11.11% 66
Yorkshire -7 87 £500 +5.26% 39
East of England +17 51 £278 -0.89% 10
South East -63 27 £425 +70.00% 42
Midlands -58 19 £450 +100.89% 45
North West -47 18 £425 +97.67% 24
West Midlands -54 18 £450 +100.89% 28
South West -18 14 £573 +61.27% 29
North East -13 2 - - 4
East Midlands - 1 £300 - 17
NHS
UK

NHS
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 12 (3.34%) SharePoint
2 6 (1.67%) Confluence
3 5 (1.39%) CMS
3 5 (1.39%) Palantir Foundry
4 2 (0.56%) Apache Spark
4 2 (0.56%) Microsoft Exchange
5 1 (0.28%) Apache Airflow
5 1 (0.28%) Umbraco
Applications
1 11 (3.06%) Microsoft Excel
2 9 (2.51%) Microsoft Office
3 5 (1.39%) Microsoft PowerPoint
4 3 (0.84%) MS Visio
4 3 (0.84%) Spreadsheet
5 2 (0.56%) Trello
6 1 (0.28%) Microsoft Project
Business Applications
1 14 (3.90%) SystmOne
2 3 (0.84%) Lorenzo
3 2 (0.56%) Cerner Millennium
3 2 (0.56%) Oracle EBS
4 1 (0.28%) Dynamics CRM
4 1 (0.28%) Oracle ERP
Cloud Services
1 50 (13.93%) AWS
2 44 (12.26%) Azure
3 21 (5.85%) Serverless
4 15 (4.18%) AWS Lambda
4 15 (4.18%) GitHub
5 13 (3.62%) Azure DevOps
5 13 (3.62%) Microsoft 365
6 12 (3.34%) Power Platform
7 11 (3.06%) Amazon S3
8 10 (2.79%) GCP
9 8 (2.23%) Amazon ECS
9 8 (2.23%) GitHub Actions
10 5 (1.39%) AWS Step Functions
11 4 (1.11%) Amazon EC2
11 4 (1.11%) Amazon EKS
11 4 (1.11%) Amazon SQS
11 4 (1.11%) AWS CloudFormation
11 4 (1.11%) Azure AKS
11 4 (1.11%) Azure Functions
11 4 (1.11%) Entra ID
Communications & Networking
1 10 (2.79%) DNS
2 7 (1.95%) Firewall
2 7 (1.95%) TCP/IP
2 7 (1.95%) WAN
3 6 (1.67%) LAN
4 5 (1.39%) Network Security
5 4 (1.11%) VPN
6 3 (0.84%) Wireless
7 2 (0.56%) BGP
7 2 (0.56%) DHCP
7 2 (0.56%) Junos
7 2 (0.56%) OSPF
7 2 (0.56%) VLAN
8 1 (0.28%) Ethernet VPN
8 1 (0.28%) Internet
8 1 (0.28%) NGFW
8 1 (0.28%) NGN
8 1 (0.28%) SD-WAN
Database & Business Intelligence
1 59 (16.43%) Electronic Patient Records
2 17 (4.74%) SQL Server
3 15 (4.18%) Data Warehouse
4 10 (2.79%) Power BI
5 8 (2.23%) SQL Server Reporting Services
6 7 (1.95%) DynamoDB
7 5 (1.39%) BusinessObjects
7 5 (1.39%) PostgreSQL
8 4 (1.11%) Amazon Athena
8 4 (1.11%) NoSQL
8 4 (1.11%) SQL Server Integration Services
9 3 (0.84%) Amazon RDS
9 3 (0.84%) Geospatial Data
9 3 (0.84%) OLAP
10 2 (0.56%) ImageNet
10 2 (0.56%) Metadata
10 2 (0.56%) MongoDB
10 2 (0.56%) QlikView
10 2 (0.56%) SQL Server Analysis Services
10 2 (0.56%) Tableau
Development Applications
1 9 (2.51%) GitLab
2 6 (1.67%) Jenkins
2 6 (1.67%) JIRA
3 5 (1.39%) Git
4 2 (0.56%) MSI
5 1 (0.28%) Android Studio
5 1 (0.28%) Appium
5 1 (0.28%) Cypress.io
5 1 (0.28%) JUnit
5 1 (0.28%) Rational Rhapsody
5 1 (0.28%) SonarQube
5 1 (0.28%) Team Foundation Server
General
1 138 (38.44%) Public Sector
2 113 (31.48%) Social Skills
3 41 (11.42%) Analytical Skills
4 24 (6.69%) Finance
5 22 (6.13%) Organisational Skills
6 21 (5.85%) Digital Health
7 17 (4.74%) Documentation Skills
8 12 (3.34%) Health Technology
8 12 (3.34%) Legal
8 12 (3.34%) Telecoms
9 11 (3.06%) Marketing
10 10 (2.79%) Electronics
10 10 (2.79%) Local Government
10 10 (2.79%) Manufacturing
11 9 (2.51%) Influencing Skills
12 5 (1.39%) Digital Healthcare
13 4 (1.11%) Pharmaceutical
13 4 (1.11%) Publishing
14 3 (0.84%) Inclusion and Diversity
14 3 (0.84%) Law
Job Titles
1 50 (13.93%) Analyst
2 35 (9.75%) Developer
3 30 (8.36%) Architect
3 30 (8.36%) Senior
4 28 (7.80%) Lead
5 26 (7.24%) Business Analyst
6 24 (6.69%) Project Manager
7 17 (4.74%) Consultant
8 14 (3.90%) Data Engineer
8 14 (3.90%) Designer
9 12 (3.34%) Administrator
9 12 (3.34%) NHS Business Analyst
10 11 (3.06%) User Researcher
11 10 (2.79%) AWS Engineer
11 10 (2.79%) Data Architect
11 10 (2.79%) NHS Project Manager
12 9 (2.51%) IT Manager
12 9 (2.51%) IT Support
12 9 (2.51%) Solutions Architect
13 8 (2.23%) Senior Business Analyst
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 40 (11.14%) FHIR
2 14 (3.90%) .NET
2 14 (3.90%) React
3 12 (3.34%) RESTful
4 7 (1.95%) Spring
4 7 (1.95%) Spring Boot
5 6 (1.67%) Node.js
5 6 (1.67%) Vue
6 5 (1.39%) Kafka
7 4 (1.11%) .NET Core
7 4 (1.11%) Middleware
8 3 (0.84%) AngularJS
8 3 (0.84%) FastAPI
8 3 (0.84%) Flask
8 3 (0.84%) GeoJSON
8 3 (0.84%) OpenAPI
8 3 (0.84%) RabbitMQ
8 3 (0.84%) REST
8 3 (0.84%) Spring Cloud
8 3 (0.84%) Swagger
Miscellaneous
1 16 (4.46%) Onboarding
2 14 (3.90%) Cloud Native
3 12 (3.34%) LIMS
3 12 (3.34%) Product Ownership
4 10 (2.79%) Management Information System
4 10 (2.79%) PACS
5 9 (2.51%) Legacy Systems
6 7 (1.95%) Data Structures
7 6 (1.67%) Analytical Mindset
8 5 (1.39%) Security Posture
9 4 (1.11%) Data Protection Act
9 4 (1.11%) Distributed Systems
9 4 (1.11%) Replication
10 3 (0.84%) Freedom of Information
10 3 (0.84%) Life Science
11 2 (0.56%) Cybercrime
11 2 (0.56%) Distributed Architecture
11 2 (0.56%) IoT
11 2 (0.56%) Linux Command Line
11 2 (0.56%) SystemC
Operating Systems
1 21 (5.85%) Windows
2 9 (2.51%) Windows Server
3 8 (2.23%) Linux
4 3 (0.84%) Windows 10
5 2 (0.56%) Windows Server 2003
5 2 (0.56%) Windows Server 2012
6 1 (0.28%) Amazon Linux
6 1 (0.28%) Android
6 1 (0.28%) VMS
Processes & Methodologies
1 96 (26.74%) Agile
2 53 (14.76%) Stakeholder Management
3 45 (12.53%) Stakeholder Engagement
4 41 (11.42%) CI/CD
5 39 (10.86%) Problem-Solving
6 38 (10.58%) Information Governance
7 37 (10.31%) Analytics
8 36 (10.03%) DevOps
9 32 (8.91%) Continuous Improvement
10 30 (8.36%) Migration
11 29 (8.08%) Data Governance
12 28 (7.80%) Business Intelligence
12 28 (7.80%) Decision-Making
13 27 (7.52%) Digital Transformation Programme
13 27 (7.52%) Infrastructure as Code
14 25 (6.96%) User Research
15 24 (6.69%) Data Protection
16 22 (6.13%) Project Management
16 22 (6.13%) Roadmaps
17 20 (5.57%) Project Delivery
Programming Languages
1 37 (10.31%) SQL
2 36 (10.03%) Python
3 15 (4.18%) Java
4 14 (3.90%) TypeScript
5 13 (3.62%) JavaScript
6 10 (2.79%) C#
7 6 (1.67%) T-SQL
8 3 (0.84%) PHP
8 3 (0.84%) PL/SQL
9 2 (0.56%) Bash
9 2 (0.56%) PowerShell
10 1 (0.28%) Bicep
10 1 (0.28%) Ruby
Qualifications
1 27 (7.52%) Security Cleared
2 24 (6.69%) Degree
3 23 (6.41%) SC Cleared
4 15 (4.18%) BPSS Clearance
5 3 (0.84%) Cisco Certification
5 3 (0.84%) HND
5 3 (0.84%) ITIL Foundation Certificate
5 3 (0.84%) JNCIA
5 3 (0.84%) JNCIP
5 3 (0.84%) JNCIS
5 3 (0.84%) Microsoft Certification
5 3 (0.84%) TOGAF Certification
6 2 (0.56%) CCNP
6 2 (0.56%) CISSP
6 2 (0.56%) HNC
6 2 (0.56%) ISEB
6 2 (0.56%) ITIL Certification
6 2 (0.56%) MCSE
6 2 (0.56%) Microsoft Certified Professional
6 2 (0.56%) PRINCE2 Certification
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 40 (11.14%) HL7
2 21 (5.85%) Data Quality
3 15 (4.18%) Accessibility
4 14 (3.90%) GDPR
5 11 (3.06%) QA
6 10 (2.79%) ISO/IEC 27001
7 7 (1.95%) NCSC
7 7 (1.95%) PMO
8 5 (1.39%) Cyber Essentials
8 5 (1.39%) DICOM
8 5 (1.39%) WCAG
9 4 (1.11%) SNOMED CT
10 3 (0.84%) NIST
11 2 (0.56%) Actionable Recommendations
11 2 (0.56%) GRC
12 1 (0.28%) Cyber Essentials PLUS
12 1 (0.28%) IEC 62304
12 1 (0.28%) ISO 9001
12 1 (0.28%) SLA
12 1 (0.28%) SOC 2
System Software
1 22 (6.13%) Docker
2 14 (3.90%) Active Directory
3 2 (0.56%) Hyper-V
3 2 (0.56%) Virtual Machines
3 2 (0.56%) VMware Infrastructure
3 2 (0.56%) Xen
4 1 (0.28%) Firmware
Systems Management
1 30 (8.36%) Terraform
2 19 (5.29%) Kubernetes
3 10 (2.79%) Microsoft Intune
4 3 (0.84%) Grafana
5 2 (0.56%) Ansible
5 2 (0.56%) Nessus
5 2 (0.56%) SCCM
5 2 (0.56%) Single Sign-On
6 1 (0.28%) Argo
6 1 (0.28%) Packer
Vendors
1 42 (11.70%) Microsoft
2 14 (3.90%) Oracle
3 11 (3.06%) Cerner
4 10 (2.79%) Brio
4 10 (2.79%) SAP
5 9 (2.51%) Foundry
6 8 (2.23%) Palantir
7 7 (1.95%) Splunk
8 6 (1.67%) Databricks
9 5 (1.39%) Cisco
10 4 (1.11%) Juniper
11 3 (0.84%) InterSystems
12 2 (0.56%) Adobe
12 2 (0.56%) CheckPoint
12 2 (0.56%) Cribl.io
12 2 (0.56%) Fortinet
12 2 (0.56%) Google
12 2 (0.56%) OneLogin
12 2 (0.56%) Rapid7
12 2 (0.56%) VMware