Retail Contract Job Trends in England

Retailing
UK > England

The table below looks at the prevalence of the term Retail in contract job vacancies in England. Included is a benchmarking guide to the contractor rates offered in vacancies that cited Retail over the 6 months leading up to 26 August 2026, comparing them to the same period in the previous two years.

6 months to
26 Aug 2026		 Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 79 113 81
Rank change year-on-year +34 -32 +9
Contract jobs citing Retail 1,462 675 888
As % of all contract jobs in England 3.20% 2.45% 2.67%
As % of the General category 5.79% 3.81% 4.64%
Number of daily rates quoted 846 355 494
10th Percentile £319 £287 £300
25th Percentile £456 £413 £413
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £550 £513 £525
Median % change year-on-year +7.32% -2.38% -
75th Percentile £675 £638 £638
90th Percentile £738 £725 £721
UK median daily rate £550 £513 £505
% change year-on-year +7.32% +1.49% -4.72%
Number of hourly rates quoted 111 49 52
10th Percentile £12.76 - £12.15
25th Percentile £13.51 £15.25 £12.50
Median hourly rate £17.50 £16.34 £16.30
Median % change year-on-year +7.13% +0.21% -17.72%
75th Percentile £22.50 £25.15 £21.37
90th Percentile £43.75 £26.67 £23.97
UK median hourly rate £16.92 £16.32 £16.30
% change year-on-year +3.69% +0.11% -17.72%

All General Skills
England

Retail falls under the General Skills category. For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all contract job vacancies requiring general skills in England.

Contract vacancies with a requirement for general skills 25,243 17,730 19,132
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in England 55.26% 64.36% 57.59%
Number of daily rates quoted 14,983 11,269 12,137
10th Percentile £313 £275 £300
25th Percentile £420 £400 £419
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £525 £505 £538
Median % change year-on-year +3.96% -6.05% -2.27%
75th Percentile £638 £638 £656
90th Percentile £750 £750 £775
UK median daily rate £525 £500 £525
% change year-on-year +5.00% -4.76% -4.55%
Number of hourly rates quoted 2,041 992 1,117
10th Percentile £14.00 £13.38 £14.18
25th Percentile £17.50 £16.30 £17.44
Median hourly rate £31.93 £25.15 £38.12
Median % change year-on-year +26.94% -34.02% +35.80%
75th Percentile £57.50 £50.00 £61.30
90th Percentile £80.00 £73.75 £71.35
UK median hourly rate £31.50 £25.15 £35.36
% change year-on-year +25.25% -28.87% +27.47%

Retail
Job Vacancy Trend in England

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

Retail job vacancy trend in England

Retail
Daily Rate Trend in England

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

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in England citing Retail

Retail
Daily Rate Histogram in England

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing Retail in England over the 6 months to 26 August 2026.

Daily rate histogram for Retail in England

Retail
Hourly Rate Trend in England

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

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in England citing Retail

Retail
Hourly Rate Histogram in England

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing Retail in England over the 6 months to 26 August 2026.

Hourly rate histogram for Retail in England

Retail
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 Retail within the England region over the 6 months to 26 August 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 +47 830 £569 +3.41% 985
North of England -17 191 £550 +10.00% 372
South East +6 174 £525 -4.55% 252
Midlands +24 138 £500 +16.14% 253
North West +6 118 £550 +10.00% 203
East Midlands +19 78 £500 +14.68% 141
East of England +11 70 £575 +9.52% 119
West Midlands -19 59 £550 +29.41% 112
Yorkshire -37 56 £500 - 148
South West -32 46 £375 +15.38% 106
North East -30 17 £525 +18.64% 24
Retail
UK

Retail
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 50 (3.42%) Confluence
2 19 (1.30%) CMS
3 11 (0.75%) Adobe Experience Manager
4 10 (0.68%) SharePoint
5 8 (0.55%) Apache Airflow
6 5 (0.34%) SAS
7 4 (0.27%) WebSphere
8 2 (0.14%) Anypoint
8 2 (0.14%) Apache Spark
8 2 (0.14%) CICS
9 1 (0.068%) Apache
9 1 (0.068%) Mendix
9 1 (0.068%) Microsoft Exchange
9 1 (0.068%) Mule
9 1 (0.068%) SharePoint Server
Applications
1 53 (3.63%) Microsoft Excel
2 38 (2.60%) Microsoft Office
3 21 (1.44%) Microsoft PowerPoint
4 16 (1.09%) Adobe Creative Suite
5 15 (1.03%) Microsoft Project
6 10 (0.68%) Photoshop
7 9 (0.62%) Adobe Illustrator
8 8 (0.55%) MS Visio
8 8 (0.55%) Spreadsheet
9 7 (0.48%) InDesign
10 6 (0.41%) Chatbot
11 4 (0.27%) CPLEX
11 4 (0.27%) Notion
12 1 (0.068%) 3ds Max
12 1 (0.068%) PlantUML
12 1 (0.068%) Siemens NX
12 1 (0.068%) SOLIDWORKS
12 1 (0.068%) UserZoom
Business Applications
1 43 (2.94%) SAP S/4HANA
2 27 (1.85%) Shopify
3 11 (0.75%) Dynamics CRM
4 9 (0.62%) Oracle Retail
5 8 (0.55%) Magento
6 7 (0.48%) SAP Retail
7 6 (0.41%) Salesforce CRM
7 6 (0.41%) SAP CRM
8 5 (0.34%) NetSuite
8 5 (0.34%) SAP MDG
9 4 (0.27%) Payment Gateway
9 4 (0.27%) SAP SD
10 3 (0.21%) OpenText VIM for SAP
10 3 (0.21%) Oracle Payables
10 3 (0.21%) Oracle Receivables
10 3 (0.21%) SAP IBP
10 3 (0.21%) SAP MM
10 3 (0.21%) Workday HCM
11 2 (0.14%) SAP ERP
11 2 (0.14%) SAP EWM
Cloud Services
1 185 (12.65%) Azure
2 137 (9.37%) AWS
3 77 (5.27%) Power Platform
4 67 (4.58%) GCP
5 49 (3.35%) Snowflake
6 38 (2.60%) GitHub
7 31 (2.12%) Entra ID
8 30 (2.05%) Azure DevOps
9 25 (1.71%) Dynamics 365
10 24 (1.64%) GitHub Actions
11 20 (1.37%) Figma
12 19 (1.30%) SaaS
13 15 (1.03%) Azure Data Factory
13 15 (1.03%) Microsoft 365
13 15 (1.03%) Salesforce Commerce Cloud
14 14 (0.96%) Azure Synapse Analytics
15 11 (0.75%) dbt
15 11 (0.75%) OCI
15 11 (0.75%) Salesforce Service Cloud
16 9 (0.62%) Serverless
Communications & Networking
1 22 (1.50%) Firewall
1 22 (1.50%) WAN
2 18 (1.23%) VPN
3 16 (1.09%) Wireless
4 15 (1.03%) Network Security
5 14 (0.96%) ATM
5 14 (0.96%) LAN
6 11 (0.75%) Wi-Fi
7 8 (0.55%) BGP
7 8 (0.55%) IPsec
7 8 (0.55%) OSPF
8 7 (0.48%) F5 BIG-IP LTM
8 7 (0.48%) SD-WAN
8 7 (0.48%) VLAN
9 6 (0.41%) Cisco Firepower
9 6 (0.41%) Internet
9 6 (0.41%) VSAN
10 5 (0.34%) Cisco ASA
10 5 (0.34%) Cisco Nexus
10 5 (0.34%) Structured Cabling
Database & Business Intelligence
1 77 (5.27%) Power BI
2 34 (2.33%) Data Warehouse
3 32 (2.19%) BigQuery
4 24 (1.64%) Data Lake
5 21 (1.44%) Metadata
6 19 (1.30%) NoSQL
7 18 (1.23%) MongoDB
8 17 (1.16%) SQL Server
9 16 (1.09%) Tableau
10 13 (0.89%) MySQL
11 12 (0.82%) Amazon Redshift
11 12 (0.82%) Power Query
11 12 (0.82%) Relational Database
12 11 (0.75%) PostgreSQL
13 10 (0.68%) Redis
13 10 (0.68%) SQL Server Integration Services
14 8 (0.55%) Couchbase
15 7 (0.48%) SQL Server Reporting Services
15 7 (0.48%) Star Schema
16 6 (0.41%) SAP BW
Development Applications
1 78 (5.34%) JIRA
2 24 (1.64%) Git
3 18 (1.23%) Jenkins
4 8 (0.55%) Subversion
5 7 (0.48%) Claude Code
6 5 (0.34%) Cypress.io
7 4 (0.27%) Eclipse
7 4 (0.27%) GitLab
7 4 (0.27%) JMeter
8 3 (0.21%) Hudson
8 3 (0.21%) Selenium
9 2 (0.14%) git-flow
9 2 (0.14%) Maven
9 2 (0.14%) MLflow
9 2 (0.14%) Oracle Forms
9 2 (0.14%) Postman
9 2 (0.14%) Terragrunt
9 2 (0.14%) Visual Studio
9 2 (0.14%) webpack
10 1 (0.068%) Pylint
General
1 406 (27.77%) Social Skills
2 346 (23.67%) Finance
3 158 (10.81%) Analytical Skills
4 120 (8.21%) Banking
5 103 (7.05%) Marketing
6 97 (6.63%) Manufacturing
7 59 (4.04%) Organisational Skills
8 57 (3.90%) Retail Banking
9 40 (2.74%) Investment Banking
10 38 (2.60%) Corporate Banking
11 31 (2.12%) Influencing Skills
11 31 (2.12%) Public Sector
12 30 (2.05%) Telecoms
13 29 (1.98%) Legal
14 27 (1.85%) Advertising
15 25 (1.71%) Presentation Skills
16 20 (1.37%) Documentation Skills
17 19 (1.30%) French Language
18 18 (1.23%) Spanish Language
19 14 (0.96%) Back Office
Job Titles
1 250 (17.10%) Architect
2 207 (14.16%) Analyst
3 162 (11.08%) Senior
4 141 (9.64%) Solutions Architect
5 120 (8.21%) Project Manager
6 107 (7.32%) Business Analyst
7 103 (7.05%) Lead
8 76 (5.20%) Developer
9 48 (3.28%) Product Manager
10 47 (3.21%) Designer
11 46 (3.15%) Consultant
12 44 (3.01%) Senior Manager
13 40 (2.74%) Supply Chain Architect
14 35 (2.39%) Technical Manager
15 34 (2.33%) Data Architect
15 34 (2.33%) Senior Developer
16 33 (2.26%) Programme Manager
17 32 (2.19%) Enterprise Architect
18 29 (1.98%) Data Analyst
19 26 (1.78%) 2nd Line Support
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 60 (4.10%) REST
2 49 (3.35%) Terraform
3 37 (2.53%) React
4 31 (2.12%) Kafka
5 29 (1.98%) Spring
6 27 (1.85%) Middleware
7 23 (1.57%) Node.js
7 23 (1.57%) Spring Boot
8 21 (1.44%) VML
9 20 (1.37%) Django
10 19 (1.30%) MACH
11 18 (1.23%) RESTful
12 15 (1.03%) HTML
12 15 (1.03%) SOAP
13 14 (0.96%) Next.js
13 14 (0.96%) OAuth
14 12 (0.82%) CSS
15 11 (0.75%) Jakarta EE
16 10 (0.68%) .NET
17 9 (0.62%) OAuth2
Miscellaneous
1 76 (5.20%) Product Ownership
2 68 (4.65%) FMCG
3 52 (3.56%) EPoS
3 52 (3.56%) Onboarding
4 42 (2.87%) Cloud Native
5 33 (2.26%) Legacy Systems
6 31 (2.12%) Data Centre
7 25 (1.71%) Mobile App
8 23 (1.57%) Data Structures
9 22 (1.50%) Greenfield Project
10 21 (1.44%) Driving Licence
10 21 (1.44%) Marketing Technology
10 21 (1.44%) Operational Technology
11 19 (1.30%) Self-Motivation
12 17 (1.16%) Management Information System
12 17 (1.16%) Smartphone
13 16 (1.09%) Mainframe
14 15 (1.03%) Distributed Systems
14 15 (1.03%) IoT
15 14 (0.96%) AI Agents
Operating Systems
1 53 (3.63%) Windows
2 20 (1.37%) Linux
3 11 (0.75%) Android
4 9 (0.62%) Unix
5 8 (0.55%) Apple iOS
6 7 (0.48%) Mac OS
7 6 (0.41%) Ubuntu
8 5 (0.34%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
8 5 (0.34%) Windows 10
8 5 (0.34%) Windows Server
9 3 (0.21%) zOS
10 2 (0.14%) Debian
11 1 (0.068%) SUSE
11 1 (0.068%) SUSE Linux Enterprise Server
11 1 (0.068%) VMS
Processes & Methodologies
1 386 (26.40%) Stakeholder Management
2 343 (23.46%) Agile
3 216 (14.77%) E-Commerce
4 184 (12.59%) Migration
5 183 (12.52%) Problem-Solving
6 170 (11.63%) Analytics
7 164 (11.22%) Roadmaps
8 159 (10.88%) Logistics
9 155 (10.60%) AI
10 132 (9.03%) Customer Experience
11 127 (8.69%) Stakeholder Engagement
12 125 (8.55%) Decision-Making
13 124 (8.48%) Continuous Improvement
14 115 (7.87%) Project Management
15 111 (7.59%) CI/CD
16 109 (7.46%) CRM
17 108 (7.39%) Business Intelligence
18 102 (6.98%) ERP
19 100 (6.84%) DevOps
19 100 (6.84%) User Acceptance Testing
Programming Languages
1 122 (8.34%) SQL
2 97 (6.63%) Python
3 51 (3.49%) Java
4 34 (2.33%) TypeScript
5 25 (1.71%) JavaScript
6 12 (0.82%) Data Analysis Expressions
7 10 (0.68%) C#
7 10 (0.68%) R
8 9 (0.62%) PowerShell
9 8 (0.55%) ABAP
10 7 (0.48%) Bash
11 6 (0.41%) Apex Code
11 6 (0.41%) PL/SQL
11 6 (0.41%) Scala
11 6 (0.41%) SOQL
12 5 (0.34%) Bicep
12 5 (0.34%) Groovy
13 4 (0.27%) Shell Script
13 4 (0.27%) SOSL
14 3 (0.21%) VBScript
Qualifications
1 63 (4.31%) Degree
2 44 (3.01%) Security Cleared
3 21 (1.44%) PMP
4 20 (1.37%) SC Cleared
5 11 (0.75%) DBS Check
5 11 (0.75%) PMI Certification
6 7 (0.48%) ITIL Certification
7 6 (0.41%) BPSS Clearance
7 6 (0.41%) Cisco Certification
7 6 (0.41%) CISSP
7 6 (0.41%) Computer Science Degree
8 5 (0.34%) CCNP
8 5 (0.34%) CCSE
8 5 (0.34%) CCSM
8 5 (0.34%) CISM
8 5 (0.34%) CSPO
8 5 (0.34%) Six Sigma Green Belt
9 4 (0.27%) City & Guilds
10 3 (0.21%) Azure Certification
10 3 (0.21%) Master's Degree
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 69 (4.72%) QA
2 61 (4.17%) Data Quality
3 36 (2.46%) GDPR
4 25 (1.71%) PMO
5 23 (1.57%) Accessibility
6 13 (0.89%) PCI DSS
7 11 (0.75%) SLA
8 9 (0.62%) ISO/IEC 27001
9 7 (0.48%) NIST
10 5 (0.34%) WCAG
11 3 (0.21%) Actionable Recommendations
11 3 (0.21%) GRC
11 3 (0.21%) PSD2
12 2 (0.14%) GAAP
12 2 (0.14%) IFRS
12 2 (0.14%) ISO 8583
12 2 (0.14%) Sarbanes-Oxley
13 1 (0.068%) Basel III
13 1 (0.068%) GxP
13 1 (0.068%) HL7
System Software
1 36 (2.46%) Docker
2 30 (2.05%) Active Directory
3 13 (0.89%) Virtual Desktop
4 8 (0.55%) VMware Infrastructure
5 6 (0.41%) Virtual Machines
6 5 (0.34%) Firmware
6 5 (0.34%) VMware ESXi
7 3 (0.21%) VMware NSX
8 1 (0.068%) vSphere
Systems Management
1 38 (2.60%) Kubernetes
2 10 (0.68%) Ansible
3 9 (0.62%) Single Sign-On
4 8 (0.55%) Microsoft Intune
5 7 (0.48%) Systems Management Server (SMS)
6 6 (0.41%) FortiGate
7 4 (0.27%) SCCM
8 3 (0.21%) Bosun
9 2 (0.14%) Active Directory Federation Services
9 2 (0.14%) AirWatch
9 2 (0.14%) CA Single Sign-On
9 2 (0.14%) Jamf Pro
9 2 (0.14%) logstash
9 2 (0.14%) MOM
9 2 (0.14%) PingFederate
9 2 (0.14%) vCenter Server
10 1 (0.068%) CloudHub
10 1 (0.068%) CSIRT
10 1 (0.068%) Kubeflow
10 1 (0.068%) vMotion
Vendors
1 133 (9.10%) Microsoft
2 108 (7.39%) SAP
3 73 (4.99%) Databricks
4 70 (4.79%) Oracle
5 69 (4.72%) Salesforce
6 44 (3.01%) Google
7 39 (2.67%) Adobe
8 25 (1.71%) Zscaler
9 17 (1.16%) ServiceNow
10 16 (1.09%) Cisco
10 16 (1.09%) MuleSoft
10 16 (1.09%) Workday
11 13 (0.89%) Fortinet
11 13 (0.89%) IBM
11 13 (0.89%) IFS
11 13 (0.89%) Palo Alto
11 13 (0.89%) VMware
12 12 (0.82%) Apple
13 11 (0.75%) Braze
13 11 (0.75%) New Relic
2,034 Retail jobs in England