Platform Engineer Contract Job Trends in England

Platform Engineer
UK > England

The median Platform Engineer daily rate in England is £544, according to job vacancies posted in the 6 months leading up to 17 December 2025.

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

 6 months to
17 Dec 2025		 Same period 2024 Same period 2023
Rank 251 400 362
Rank change year-on-year +149 -38 +127
Contract jobs requiring a Platform Engineer 334 111 196
As % of all contract jobs in England 1.06% 0.38% 0.53%
As % of the Job Titles category 1.17% 0.41% 0.57%
Number of daily rates quoted 238 92 147
10th Percentile £381 £406 £425
25th Percentile £465 £464 £500
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £544 £573 £550
Median % change year-on-year -5.02% +4.09% -6.38%
75th Percentile £619 £678 £650
90th Percentile £725 £749 £700
UK median daily rate £550 £550 £556
% change year-on-year - -1.12% -3.26%
Number of hourly rates quoted 1 0 4
10th Percentile - - -
25th Percentile £59.75 - £60.00
Median hourly rate £64.50 - £63.50
75th Percentile £69.25 - £69.75
90th Percentile - - £74.70
UK median hourly rate £57.25 - £63.50
% change year-on-year - - -31.17%

All Contract IT Job Vacancies
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 28,658 27,111 34,658
% of contract IT jobs with a recognized job title 91.24% 92.91% 93.35%
Number of daily rates quoted 18,308 16,895 23,809
10th Percentile £290 £300 £288
25th Percentile £405 £413 £413
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £510 £525 £533
Median % change year-on-year -2.86% -1.50% -3.09%
75th Percentile £625 £638 £650
90th Percentile £725 £750 £750
UK median daily rate £500 £525 £525
% change year-on-year -4.76% - -4.55%
Number of hourly rates quoted 1,754 870 1,350
10th Percentile £14.38 £15.62 £15.31
25th Percentile £18.20 £21.25 £19.62
Median hourly rate £26.30 £36.00 £45.00
Median % change year-on-year -26.94% -20.00% +38.46%
75th Percentile £60.00 £65.00 £65.00
90th Percentile £71.85 £73.75 £77.50
UK median hourly rate £25.15 £33.52 £45.00
% change year-on-year -24.97% -25.51% +50.00%

Platform Engineer
Job Vacancy Trend in England

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

Platform Engineer job vacancy trend in England

Platform Engineer
Daily Rate Trend in England

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for Platform Engineer job vacancies in England.

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for Platform Engineer job vacancies in England

Platform Engineer
Daily Rate Histogram in England

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing Platform Engineer in England over the 6 months to 17 December 2025.

Daily rate histogram for Platform Engineer in England

Platform Engineer
Hourly Rate Trend in England

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for Platform Engineer job vacancies in England.

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for Platform Engineer job vacancies in England

Platform Engineer
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 Platform Engineer within the England region over the 6 months to 17 December 2025. 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 +84 157 £550 -4.35% 34
North of England -10 59 £538 -6.93% 23
Midlands +7 48 £525 -10.26% 7
West Midlands +6 47 £525 -23.36% 7
North West +9 43 £550 -13.73% 9
South East +22 40 £531 -12.91% 20
South West +13 19 £563 -1.75% 24
Yorkshire -45 14 £523 +1.70% 12
East of England -9 5 £500 -9.09% 4
North East - 5 £550 - 2
East Midlands -25 1 £525 +10.53%
Platform Engineer
UK

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

For the 6 months to 17 December 2025, Platform Engineer 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 Platform Engineer in the job title.

1 300 (89.82%) Platform Engineering
2 181 (54.19%) CI/CD
3 160 (47.90%) Python
3 160 (47.90%) Terraform
4 151 (45.21%) AWS
5 136 (40.72%) DevOps
5 136 (40.72%) Infrastructure as Code
6 131 (39.22%) Security Cleared
7 119 (35.63%) Azure
8 110 (32.93%) SC Cleared
9 97 (29.04%) Kubernetes
10 95 (28.44%) Windows
11 94 (28.14%) PowerShell
12 92 (27.54%) Linux
13 77 (23.05%) Docker
14 75 (22.46%) Observability
15 74 (22.16%) Jenkins
16 70 (20.96%) Grafana
17 68 (20.36%) Microsoft
18 62 (18.56%) Firewall
19 61 (18.26%) Prometheus
20 60 (17.96%) Bash
21 59 (17.66%) Active Directory
22 57 (17.07%) Problem-Solving
23 56 (16.77%) GitHub
24 48 (14.37%) Containerisation
24 48 (14.37%) DNS
24 48 (14.37%) Java
25 44 (13.17%) GitHub Actions
26 43 (12.87%) SQL

Platform Engineer 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 26 (7.78%) Confluence
2 20 (5.99%) Microsoft Exchange
3 13 (3.89%) nginx
3 13 (3.89%) SharePoint
4 12 (3.59%) Apache
5 9 (2.69%) Apache Airflow
6 7 (2.10%) WebLogic
7 6 (1.80%) Apache Spark
7 6 (1.80%) CICS
8 5 (1.50%) JBoss
8 5 (1.50%) OpenStack
9 4 (1.20%) SAS
10 3 (0.90%) IIS
10 3 (0.90%) SharePoint Server
11 2 (0.60%) Cloud Foundry
11 2 (0.60%) iPlanet
11 2 (0.60%) Tomcat
11 2 (0.60%) WebSphere
11 2 (0.60%) WebSphere Application Server
12 1 (0.30%) Mule ESB
Applications
1 11 (3.29%) Mozilla Thunderbird
2 1 (0.30%) Microsoft Excel
2 1 (0.30%) Microsoft Office
Business Applications
1 1 (0.30%) Finacle
Cloud Services
1 151 (45.21%) AWS
2 119 (35.63%) Azure
3 56 (16.77%) GitHub
4 44 (13.17%) GitHub Actions
5 37 (11.08%) GCP
6 36 (10.78%) Amazon S3
7 34 (10.18%) Amazon EC2
8 30 (8.98%) Virtual Private Cloud
9 29 (8.68%) AWS CloudFormation
9 29 (8.68%) Microsoft 365
10 28 (8.38%) Azure DevOps
11 27 (8.08%) Amazon ECS
11 27 (8.08%) Amazon EKS
12 26 (7.78%) Amazon CloudWatch
13 24 (7.19%) AWS KMS
14 22 (6.59%) OpenShift
15 19 (5.69%) Entra ID
16 18 (5.39%) Amazon ELB
17 16 (4.79%) Power Platform
18 15 (4.49%) Serverless
Communications & Networking
1 62 (18.56%) Firewall
2 48 (14.37%) DNS
3 18 (5.39%) SMTP
3 18 (5.39%) SSH
4 17 (5.09%) FTP
4 17 (5.09%) HTTP
5 11 (3.29%) IMAP
5 11 (3.29%) OpenLDAP
6 9 (2.69%) Cisco IOS
7 8 (2.40%) VLAN
8 7 (2.10%) BGP
8 7 (2.10%) DHCP
8 7 (2.10%) Network Security
9 6 (1.80%) Software-Defined Networking
9 6 (1.80%) TCP/IP
10 5 (1.50%) WebEx
11 4 (1.20%) IPv4
12 3 (0.90%) Skype
13 2 (0.60%) SSL
13 2 (0.60%) VPN
Database & Business Intelligence
1 30 (8.98%) Amazon RDS
2 19 (5.69%) PostgreSQL
3 13 (3.89%) Amazon Aurora
4 10 (2.99%) NoSQL
5 9 (2.69%) Data Lake
6 8 (2.40%) SQL Server
7 7 (2.10%) Amazon Redshift
8 6 (1.80%) Hadoop
9 5 (1.50%) Big Data
9 5 (1.50%) Couchbase
9 5 (1.50%) Power BI
10 4 (1.20%) Data Warehouse
10 4 (1.20%) DynamoDB
10 4 (1.20%) Elasticsearch
10 4 (1.20%) Relational Database
11 3 (0.90%) Redis
12 2 (0.60%) Apache Hive
12 2 (0.60%) MongoDB
12 2 (0.60%) Oracle Database
12 2 (0.60%) Tableau
Development Applications
1 74 (22.16%) Jenkins
2 38 (11.38%) Git
3 30 (8.98%) JIRA
4 23 (6.89%) GitLab
5 18 (5.39%) Vagrant
6 8 (2.40%) SonarQube
7 7 (2.10%) Sonatype Nexus
8 4 (1.20%) Bitbucket
9 3 (0.90%) Bitbucket Server
9 3 (0.90%) CA Release Automation
9 3 (0.90%) CircleCI
9 3 (0.90%) TeamCity
10 2 (0.60%) Artifactory
10 2 (0.60%) MSI
10 2 (0.60%) Spinnaker
11 1 (0.30%) Cucumber
11 1 (0.30%) git-flow
11 1 (0.30%) GoCD
11 1 (0.30%) JUnit
11 1 (0.30%) Pylint
General
1 69 (20.66%) Social Skills
2 36 (10.78%) Public Sector
3 35 (10.48%) Finance
4 22 (6.59%) Analytical Skills
4 22 (6.59%) Banking
5 13 (3.89%) Games
6 11 (3.29%) Presentation Skills
7 8 (2.40%) Documentation Skills
8 6 (1.80%) Legal
9 4 (1.20%) Inclusion and Diversity
9 4 (1.20%) Investment Banking
9 4 (1.20%) Publishing
10 3 (0.90%) Retail
11 2 (0.60%) Corporate Banking
11 2 (0.60%) Front Office
11 2 (0.60%) Manufacturing
11 2 (0.60%) Marketing
11 2 (0.60%) Pharmaceutical
12 1 (0.30%) Advertising
12 1 (0.30%) Aerospace
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 35 (10.48%) Kafka
2 21 (6.29%) gRPC
3 14 (4.19%) Elastic Stack
3 14 (4.19%) LDAP
4 11 (3.29%) Middleware
5 9 (2.69%) OAuth
6 8 (2.40%) React
7 7 (2.10%) AWS CDK
8 6 (1.80%) ARM Templates
8 6 (1.80%) ISPF
9 5 (1.50%) XMPP
9 5 (1.50%) YAML
10 4 (1.20%) LangChain
10 4 (1.20%) Node.js
10 4 (1.20%) OpenID
10 4 (1.20%) REST
10 4 (1.20%) SAML
11 3 (0.90%) Microsoft Graph
11 3 (0.90%) OAuth2
11 3 (0.90%) Semantic Kernel
Miscellaneous
1 34 (10.18%) Replication
2 24 (7.19%) Cloud Native
2 24 (7.19%) Distributed Systems
3 15 (4.49%) Data Centre
3 15 (4.49%) Private Cloud
4 11 (3.29%) Hybrid Cloud
4 11 (3.29%) Product Ownership
5 9 (2.69%) NHS
5 9 (2.69%) Onboarding
5 9 (2.69%) PKI
6 6 (1.80%) Enterprise Storage
6 6 (1.80%) Mainframe
6 6 (1.80%) VSAM
7 5 (1.50%) AI Agents
7 5 (1.50%) IBM Mainframe
8 4 (1.20%) Analytical Mindset
8 4 (1.20%) Security Posture
9 3 (0.90%) Data Protection Act
9 3 (0.90%) Low-Code
9 3 (0.90%) Mobile App
Operating Systems
1 95 (28.44%) Windows
2 92 (27.54%) Linux
3 36 (10.78%) Windows Server
4 25 (7.49%) VMS
5 21 (6.29%) Amazon Linux
6 19 (5.69%) Unix
7 17 (5.09%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
8 10 (2.99%) Ubuntu
9 9 (2.69%) Android
9 9 (2.69%) Mac OS
9 9 (2.69%) Windows 10
10 6 (1.80%) zOS
11 4 (1.20%) Windows Server 2016
12 2 (0.60%) Windows Server 2012
12 2 (0.60%) Windows Server 2019
13 1 (0.30%) Solaris
13 1 (0.30%) Windows Server 2003
13 1 (0.30%) Windows Server 2008
Processes & Methodologies
1 300 (89.82%) Platform Engineering
2 181 (54.19%) CI/CD
3 136 (40.72%) DevOps
3 136 (40.72%) Infrastructure as Code
4 75 (22.46%) Observability
5 57 (17.07%) Problem-Solving
6 48 (14.37%) Containerisation
7 41 (12.28%) Configuration Management
8 33 (9.88%) Continuous Improvement
9 32 (9.58%) Analytics
10 31 (9.28%) Cloud Security
11 30 (8.98%) Software Engineering
12 29 (8.68%) Incident Response
12 29 (8.68%) Open Source
12 29 (8.68%) Service Management
13 28 (8.38%) Migration
14 26 (7.78%) Performance Tuning
15 25 (7.49%) Infrastructure Automation
16 24 (7.19%) Agile
16 24 (7.19%) AI
Programming Languages
1 160 (47.90%) Python
2 94 (28.14%) PowerShell
3 60 (17.96%) Bash
4 48 (14.37%) Java
5 43 (12.87%) SQL
6 24 (7.19%) Go
7 20 (5.99%) Groovy
8 18 (5.39%) C#
9 17 (5.09%) Perl
10 16 (4.79%) JavaScript
11 15 (4.49%) Bicep
12 10 (2.99%) Shell Script
13 7 (2.10%) TypeScript
14 6 (1.80%) CLIST
14 6 (1.80%) JCL
14 6 (1.80%) REXX
15 5 (1.50%) Ruby
16 3 (0.90%) PHP
17 2 (0.60%) PL/SQL
17 2 (0.60%) Scala
Qualifications
1 131 (39.22%) Security Cleared
2 110 (32.93%) SC Cleared
3 26 (7.78%) Degree
4 19 (5.69%) AWS Certification
5 18 (5.39%) DV Cleared
6 17 (5.09%) Azure Certification
7 10 (2.99%) CCNA
7 10 (2.99%) Cisco Certification
8 9 (2.69%) CCDP
8 9 (2.69%) CCNP
9 4 (1.20%) Computer Science Degree
10 3 (0.90%) BPSS Clearance
10 3 (0.90%) Microsoft Certification
11 1 (0.30%) MCP
11 1 (0.30%) MCSA
11 1 (0.30%) MCSE
11 1 (0.30%) OCA
11 1 (0.30%) Oracle Certification
11 1 (0.30%) Server+ Certification
11 1 (0.30%) VMware Certified Professional (VCP)
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 7 (2.10%) GDPR
2 4 (1.20%) NIST
3 3 (0.90%) SOC 2
4 2 (0.60%) Data Quality
4 2 (0.60%) NCSC
4 2 (0.60%) PCI DSS
5 1 (0.30%) Cyber Essentials
5 1 (0.30%) EMIR
5 1 (0.30%) EU AI Act
5 1 (0.30%) ISO/IEC 27001
5 1 (0.30%) ISO/IEC 42001
5 1 (0.30%) MiFID
System Software
1 77 (23.05%) Docker
2 59 (17.66%) Active Directory
3 25 (7.49%) VMware Infrastructure
4 17 (5.09%) DFS Replication
5 13 (3.89%) Virtual Machines
6 11 (3.29%) Dovecot
6 11 (3.29%) Postfix
6 11 (3.29%) Squid
7 7 (2.10%) vSphere
8 6 (1.80%) Time Sharing Option
9 4 (1.20%) VMware NSX
10 2 (0.60%) Xen
11 1 (0.30%) HDFS
11 1 (0.30%) Tivoli Directory Server
11 1 (0.30%) Virtual Desktop
11 1 (0.30%) VMware ESXi
Systems Management
1 160 (47.90%) Terraform
2 97 (29.04%) Kubernetes
3 70 (20.96%) Grafana
4 61 (18.26%) Prometheus
5 39 (11.68%) Ansible
6 18 (5.39%) SCCM
7 13 (3.89%) Proxmox
8 11 (3.29%) Active Directory Federation Services
8 11 (3.29%) Argo
8 11 (3.29%) Microsoft Intune
8 11 (3.29%) Nessus
9 9 (2.69%) Packer
9 9 (2.69%) SCOM
9 9 (2.69%) vCenter Server
10 8 (2.40%) Puppet
11 6 (1.80%) Kibana
11 6 (1.80%) OMEGAMON
12 5 (1.50%) CA Endevor
12 5 (1.50%) Istio
12 5 (1.50%) NetBackup
Vendors
1 68 (20.36%) Microsoft
2 40 (11.98%) Splunk
3 38 (11.38%) VMware
4 33 (9.88%) Cisco
5 26 (7.78%) Red Hat
6 23 (6.89%) Dynatrace
7 20 (5.99%) ServiceNow
8 16 (4.79%) AppDynamics
9 15 (4.49%) IBM
10 14 (4.19%) Databricks
11 12 (3.59%) Oracle
12 11 (3.29%) Citrix
12 11 (3.29%) Jaspersoft
13 9 (2.69%) Google
13 9 (2.69%) Meraki
13 9 (2.69%) OpenAI
14 8 (2.40%) Veeam
15 7 (2.10%) Confluent
16 6 (1.80%) Commvault
17 5 (1.50%) SolarWinds
99 Platform Engineer jobs in England