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 24 July 2026, comparing them to the same period in the previous two years.

6 months to
24 Jul 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 315 346 279
Rank change year-on-year +31 -67 -68
Contract jobs citing NHS 347 162 291
As % of all contract jobs in England 0.77% 0.59% 0.83%
As % of the Miscellaneous category 2.32% 1.70% 2.68%
Number of daily rates quoted 271 111 188
10th Percentile £281 £208 £171
25th Percentile £400 £280 £248
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £475 £450 £350
Median % change year-on-year +5.56% +28.57% +7.69%
75th Percentile £538 £528 £500
90th Percentile £600 £575 £597
UK median daily rate £464 £425 £350
% change year-on-year +9.06% +21.43% +11.11%
Number of hourly rates quoted 14 10 42
10th Percentile £18.22 £12.57 £11.37
25th Percentile £21.25 £13.98 £12.86
Median hourly rate £26.72 £19.20 £15.46
Median % change year-on-year +39.15% +24.21% -22.70%
75th Percentile £34.62 £29.64 £24.71
90th Percentile £55.50 £33.03 £26.21
UK median hourly rate £26.72 £21.25 £16.17
% change year-on-year +25.74% +31.42% -13.16%

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 14,953 9,537 10,869
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in England 33.27% 34.85% 31.09%
Number of daily rates quoted 9,270 6,034 7,052
10th Percentile £318 £306 £300
25th Percentile £420 £408 £425
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £525 £525 £550
Median % change year-on-year - -4.55% -
75th Percentile £638 £650 £675
90th Percentile £750 £775 £825
UK median daily rate £525 £525 £540
% change year-on-year - -2.78% -1.82%
Number of hourly rates quoted 807 475 662
10th Percentile £16.01 £15.49 £12.29
25th Percentile £21.08 £18.87 £16.35
Median hourly rate £43.96 £32.89 £42.50
Median % change year-on-year +33.66% -22.61% +2.98%
75th Percentile £72.25 £60.00 £65.02
90th Percentile £87.50 £80.00 £74.88
UK median hourly rate £43.96 £30.00 £40.00
% change year-on-year +46.53% -25.00% +11.11%

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 24 July 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 24 July 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 24 July 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 0 146 £490 +8.89% 113
North of England -4 115 £488 -0.26% 130
Yorkshire 0 88 £500 - 70
North West -30 26 £350 +62.79% 51
South East -69 21 £450 +28.57% 78
East of England -6 18 £211 -7.38% 48
South West -29 13 £546 +33.23% 54
Midlands -49 12 £400 +14.29% 55
West Midlands -57 11 £400 +39.37% 43
East Midlands -12 1 - - 12
North East -35 1 - - 14
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 11 (3.17%) Palantir Foundry
2 6 (1.73%) SharePoint
3 5 (1.44%) Confluence
4 2 (0.58%) CMS
4 2 (0.58%) Microsoft Exchange
5 1 (0.29%) Apache Airflow
5 1 (0.29%) nginx
5 1 (0.29%) Oracle Workflow
Applications
1 5 (1.44%) Microsoft Excel
1 5 (1.44%) Microsoft Office
2 4 (1.15%) Spreadsheet
3 2 (0.58%) Trello
4 1 (0.29%) Microsoft Project
4 1 (0.29%) MS Visio
Business Applications
1 6 (1.73%) SystmOne
2 2 (0.58%) Dynamics CRM
2 2 (0.58%) Oracle EBS
3 1 (0.29%) Cerner Millennium
3 1 (0.29%) Oracle Assets
3 1 (0.29%) Oracle Cash Management
3 1 (0.29%) Oracle ERP
3 1 (0.29%) Oracle Financials
3 1 (0.29%) Oracle General Ledger
3 1 (0.29%) Oracle Payables
3 1 (0.29%) Oracle Procure-to-Pay
3 1 (0.29%) Oracle Receivables
3 1 (0.29%) Oracle Subledger Accounting
Cloud Services
1 54 (15.56%) AWS
2 42 (12.10%) Azure
3 28 (8.07%) Serverless
4 19 (5.48%) Amazon S3
4 19 (5.48%) AWS Lambda
5 16 (4.61%) Power Platform
6 13 (3.75%) GitHub
7 11 (3.17%) Amazon EC2
8 9 (2.59%) GitHub Actions
9 7 (2.02%) Azure Data Factory
9 7 (2.02%) Microsoft 365
10 6 (1.73%) Amazon SQS
10 6 (1.73%) AWS Step Functions
10 6 (1.73%) Azure Functions
11 5 (1.44%) Adobe Analytics
11 5 (1.44%) Azure DevOps
11 5 (1.44%) Azure Synapse Analytics
11 5 (1.44%) GCP
12 4 (1.15%) Apigee
12 4 (1.15%) Virtual Private Cloud
Communications & Networking
1 9 (2.59%) LAN
1 9 (2.59%) WAN
2 6 (1.73%) DNS
2 6 (1.73%) Firewall
3 5 (1.44%) NGFW
4 4 (1.15%) Structured Cabling
4 4 (1.15%) TCP/IP
4 4 (1.15%) Wireless
5 1 (0.29%) DHCP
5 1 (0.29%) Network Security
Database & Business Intelligence
1 38 (10.95%) Electronic Patient Records
2 16 (4.61%) SQL Server
3 15 (4.32%) Data Warehouse
4 14 (4.03%) Power BI
5 8 (2.31%) Amazon RDS
6 7 (2.02%) DynamoDB
7 6 (1.73%) Amazon Athena
7 6 (1.73%) SQL Server Reporting Services
8 4 (1.15%) DocumentDB
8 4 (1.15%) SQL Server Integration Services
9 3 (0.86%) BusinessObjects
9 3 (0.86%) Data Lake
9 3 (0.86%) Geospatial Data
9 3 (0.86%) OLAP
9 3 (0.86%) Relational Database
10 2 (0.58%) Amazon Redshift
10 2 (0.58%) Azure SQL Database
10 2 (0.58%) Delta Lake
10 2 (0.58%) Oracle BI Publisher
10 2 (0.58%) Tableau
Development Applications
1 9 (2.59%) Git
2 8 (2.31%) GitLab
3 5 (1.44%) JIRA
4 2 (0.58%) Cypress.io
4 2 (0.58%) Jenkins
5 1 (0.29%) JUnit
5 1 (0.29%) Postman
5 1 (0.29%) Selenium
5 1 (0.29%) SonarQube
General
1 145 (41.79%) Public Sector
2 107 (30.84%) Social Skills
3 31 (8.93%) Analytical Skills
4 19 (5.48%) Finance
5 16 (4.61%) Digital Health
6 12 (3.46%) Local Government
7 10 (2.88%) Influencing Skills
8 8 (2.31%) Organisational Skills
9 7 (2.02%) Documentation Skills
10 6 (1.73%) Pharmaceutical
11 4 (1.15%) Health Technology
11 4 (1.15%) Inclusion and Diversity
11 4 (1.15%) Law
11 4 (1.15%) Legal
12 3 (0.86%) Billing
12 3 (0.86%) Digital Healthcare
12 3 (0.86%) Marketing
13 2 (0.58%) Military
13 2 (0.58%) Publishing
13 2 (0.58%) Telecoms
Job Titles
1 40 (11.53%) Developer
2 36 (10.37%) Architect
2 36 (10.37%) Senior
3 32 (9.22%) Analyst
4 24 (6.92%) Lead
5 22 (6.34%) Data Engineer
6 21 (6.05%) Designer
7 17 (4.90%) Business Analyst
8 16 (4.61%) Project Manager
8 16 (4.61%) User Researcher
9 13 (3.75%) Consultant
9 13 (3.75%) Solutions Architect
10 12 (3.46%) Delivery Manager
11 11 (3.17%) Data Architect
12 9 (2.59%) Administrator
12 9 (2.59%) Senior User Researcher
12 9 (2.59%) Service Designer
13 8 (2.31%) AWS Engineer
13 8 (2.31%) Full-Stack Developer
13 8 (2.31%) NHS Project Manager
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 27 (7.78%) FHIR
2 11 (3.17%) PySpark
2 11 (3.17%) REST
3 9 (2.59%) React
3 9 (2.59%) RESTful
4 8 (2.31%) Node.js
5 6 (1.73%) .NET
6 5 (1.44%) OpenID
6 5 (1.44%) Playwright
6 5 (1.44%) Vue
7 4 (1.15%) CSS
7 4 (1.15%) HTML
7 4 (1.15%) Middleware
7 4 (1.15%) OAuth
7 4 (1.15%) OAuth2
8 3 (0.86%) Flask
8 3 (0.86%) GeoJSON
8 3 (0.86%) JSON
8 3 (0.86%) Spring
8 3 (0.86%) Spring Boot
Miscellaneous
1 27 (7.78%) Cloud Native
2 21 (6.05%) Product Ownership
3 19 (5.48%) Onboarding
4 7 (2.02%) Data Structures
5 6 (1.73%) IoT
6 5 (1.44%) Driving Licence
6 5 (1.44%) Legacy Systems
6 5 (1.44%) LIMS
7 4 (1.15%) Data Protection Act
7 4 (1.15%) Management Information System
7 4 (1.15%) Mobile App
7 4 (1.15%) PACS
7 4 (1.15%) Replication
7 4 (1.15%) Security Posture
8 3 (0.86%) Distributed Systems
8 3 (0.86%) Life Science
9 2 (0.58%) Distributed Architecture
9 2 (0.58%) Enterprise Software
10 1 (0.29%) Algorithms
10 1 (0.29%) Freedom of Information
Operating Systems
1 10 (2.88%) Windows
2 6 (1.73%) Windows Server
3 2 (0.58%) Android
3 2 (0.58%) Apple iOS
3 2 (0.58%) Linux
3 2 (0.58%) Mac OS
4 1 (0.29%) CentOS
4 1 (0.29%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
4 1 (0.29%) Ubuntu
Processes & Methodologies
1 116 (33.43%) Agile
2 69 (19.88%) Stakeholder Management
3 53 (15.27%) Stakeholder Engagement
4 49 (14.12%) CI/CD
5 42 (12.10%) Analytics
6 40 (11.53%) Continuous Improvement
7 37 (10.66%) Decision-Making
7 37 (10.66%) DevOps
8 35 (10.09%) User Research
9 34 (9.80%) Problem-Solving
10 33 (9.51%) Infrastructure as Code
11 29 (8.36%) Digital Transformation Programme
11 29 (8.36%) Migration
12 27 (7.78%) User-Centered Design (UCD)
13 25 (7.20%) Validation
14 24 (6.92%) Business Intelligence
14 24 (6.92%) Service Design
15 23 (6.63%) ETL
15 23 (6.63%) Roadmaps
16 22 (6.34%) Information Governance
Programming Languages
1 43 (12.39%) SQL
2 38 (10.95%) Python
3 17 (4.90%) TypeScript
4 16 (4.61%) JavaScript
5 9 (2.59%) Java
6 8 (2.31%) C#
7 7 (2.02%) T-SQL
8 4 (1.15%) Bicep
9 3 (0.86%) PowerShell
10 1 (0.29%) Bash
10 1 (0.29%) R
Qualifications
1 30 (8.65%) Security Cleared
2 25 (7.20%) SC Cleared
3 21 (6.05%) BPSS Clearance
4 14 (4.03%) Degree
5 4 (1.15%) AWS Certification
5 4 (1.15%) JNCIP
5 4 (1.15%) JNCIS
6 3 (0.86%) Microsoft Certification
7 2 (0.58%) AWS Certified Solutions Architect
7 2 (0.58%) DV Cleared
7 2 (0.58%) PRINCE2 Practitioner
8 1 (0.29%) Azure Certification
8 1 (0.29%) CCNA
8 1 (0.29%) Cisco Certification
8 1 (0.29%) DBS Check
8 1 (0.29%) IIBA
8 1 (0.29%) NVQ Level 3
8 1 (0.29%) PMI Certification
8 1 (0.29%) PMP
8 1 (0.29%) TOGAF Certification
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 31 (8.93%) HL7
2 25 (7.20%) Accessibility
3 23 (6.63%) Data Quality
4 17 (4.90%) QA
5 15 (4.32%) GDPR
6 13 (3.75%) WCAG
7 9 (2.59%) ISO/IEC 27001
8 7 (2.02%) PMO
9 6 (1.73%) SNOMED CT
10 5 (1.44%) DICOM
11 4 (1.15%) Actionable Recommendations
11 4 (1.15%) NCSC
12 3 (0.86%) IEC 62304
13 2 (0.58%) Cyber Essentials
13 2 (0.58%) Cyber Essentials PLUS
13 2 (0.58%) ISO 13485
13 2 (0.58%) NIST
14 1 (0.29%) GRC
14 1 (0.29%) PCI DSS
14 1 (0.29%) SOC 2
System Software
1 15 (4.32%) Docker
2 7 (2.02%) Active Directory
3 2 (0.58%) VMware Infrastructure
4 1 (0.29%) Hyper-V
4 1 (0.29%) Virtual Machines
Systems Management
1 32 (9.22%) Terraform
2 12 (3.46%) Kubernetes
3 5 (1.44%) Microsoft Intune
4 2 (0.58%) Jamf Pro
5 1 (0.29%) Ansible
5 1 (0.29%) Puppet
Vendors
1 35 (10.09%) Microsoft
2 18 (5.19%) Palantir
3 15 (4.32%) Foundry
4 11 (3.17%) Databricks
5 8 (2.31%) Brio
5 8 (2.31%) Oracle
6 5 (1.44%) Adobe
6 5 (1.44%) ServiceNow
7 4 (1.15%) Google
7 4 (1.15%) Juniper
7 4 (1.15%) Palo Alto
7 4 (1.15%) Splunk
8 3 (0.86%) Cisco
8 3 (0.86%) InterSystems
8 3 (0.86%) VMware
9 2 (0.58%) Cerner
9 2 (0.58%) Informatica
9 2 (0.58%) Meraki
9 2 (0.58%) OneLogin
9 2 (0.58%) Zscaler