Software Engineer Contract Job Trends in England

Software Engineer
UK > England

The median Software Engineer daily rate in England is £550, according to job vacancies posted in the 6 months leading up to 14 May 2026.

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

 6 months to
14 May 2026		 Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 84 131 73
Rank change year-on-year +47 -58 +67
Contract jobs requiring a Software Engineer 1,166 520 1,015
As % of all contract jobs in England 2.87% 2.16% 2.78%
As % of the Job Titles category 3.11% 2.33% 2.99%
Number of daily rates quoted 497 352 532
10th Percentile £400 £411 £450
25th Percentile £463 £475 £513
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £550 £625 £638
Median % change year-on-year -12.00% -1.96% +8.05%
75th Percentile £688 £825 £750
90th Percentile £780 £875 £850
UK median daily rate £550 £600 £625
% change year-on-year -8.33% -4.00% +5.93%
Number of hourly rates quoted 391 46 313
10th Percentile £52.50 £52.25 £46.25
25th Percentile £61.25 £61.25 £52.50
Median hourly rate £65.00 £65.00 £65.00
75th Percentile £70.00 £68.00 £70.00
90th Percentile £72.50 £68.75 £80.00
UK median hourly rate £65.00 £65.00 £65.00
% change year-on-year - - +1.96%

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 37,507 22,311 33,904
% of contract IT jobs with a recognized job title 92.34% 92.50% 92.75%
Number of daily rates quoted 23,310 14,840 22,465
10th Percentile £315 £300 £281
25th Percentile £413 £406 £413
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £513 £525 £525
Median % change year-on-year -2.38% - -4.55%
75th Percentile £623 £638 £645
90th Percentile £725 £750 £750
UK median daily rate £510 £513 £525
% change year-on-year -0.49% -2.38% -2.78%
Number of hourly rates quoted 2,581 900 2,436
10th Percentile £15.50 £14.00 £12.87
25th Percentile £20.89 £18.50 £16.30
Median hourly rate £46.50 £30.00 £37.50
Median % change year-on-year +55.00% -20.00% -14.88%
75th Percentile £67.50 £63.75 £61.30
90th Percentile £78.75 £75.00 £73.75
UK median hourly rate £43.43 £28.18 £37.50
% change year-on-year +54.13% -24.85% -16.67%

Software Engineer
Job Vacancy Trend in England

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

Software Engineer job vacancy trend in England

Software Engineer
Daily Rate Trend in England

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

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

Software Engineer
Daily Rate Histogram in England

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing Software Engineer in England over the 6 months to 14 May 2026.

Daily rate histogram for Software Engineer in England

Software Engineer
Hourly Rate Trend in England

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

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

Software Engineer
Hourly Rate Histogram in England

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing Software Engineer in England over the 6 months to 14 May 2026.

Hourly rate histogram for Software Engineer in England

Software 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 Software Engineer within the England region over the 6 months to 14 May 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 -28 350 £618 -8.52% 286
South West +42 262 £573 -0.43% 111
North of England +27 172 £500 +11.11% 159
South East +23 154 £550 -4.35% 200
East of England +51 151 £500 -14.16% 108
North West +19 102 £500 +11.11% 80
Yorkshire -21 49 £500 +4.17% 39
Midlands -39 42 £500 +14.29% 66
West Midlands -28 36 £489 +8.58% 37
North East +5 23 £400 - 42
East Midlands -34 6 £513 +7.89% 29
Software Engineer
UK

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

For the 6 months to 14 May 2026, Software 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 Software Engineer in the job title.

1 1,154 (98.97%) Software Engineering
2 296 (25.39%) Java
3 277 (23.76%) Agile
4 272 (23.33%) Security Cleared
5 259 (22.21%) AWS
6 245 (21.01%) CI/CD
7 224 (19.21%) Python
8 207 (17.75%) SC Cleared
9 178 (15.27%) C++
10 166 (14.24%) C#
11 159 (13.64%) TypeScript
12 152 (13.04%) React
13 146 (12.52%) JavaScript
14 141 (12.09%) DevOps
15 137 (11.75%) Microservices
16 129 (11.06%) Docker
17 126 (10.81%) Kubernetes
18 125 (10.72%) Linux
19 120 (10.29%) Full-Stack Development
20 119 (10.21%) SQL
21 118 (10.12%) Azure
22 113 (9.69%) Ada
23 102 (8.75%) Node.js
24 96 (8.23%) .NET
24 96 (8.23%) AI
25 89 (7.63%) Kafka
25 89 (7.63%) Problem-Solving
26 87 (7.46%) C
27 86 (7.38%) Go
28 85 (7.29%) Test Automation

Software 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 19 (1.63%) Apache
2 16 (1.37%) Confluence
3 13 (1.11%) Apache Spark
4 4 (0.34%) IIS
5 3 (0.26%) nginx
5 3 (0.26%) Tomcat
6 2 (0.17%) Camunda
6 2 (0.17%) MQSeries
6 2 (0.17%) Palantir Foundry
6 2 (0.17%) SAS
6 2 (0.17%) WebLogic
6 2 (0.17%) WinCC
7 1 (0.086%) Apache Synapse
7 1 (0.086%) CMS
7 1 (0.086%) Microsoft Exchange
7 1 (0.086%) SharePoint
7 1 (0.086%) Smallworld
Applications
1 2 (0.17%) Microsoft Excel
1 2 (0.17%) Microsoft Office
1 2 (0.17%) Spreadsheet
Business Applications
1 2 (0.17%) LabWindows
2 1 (0.086%) Oracle Procure-to-Pay
Cloud Services
1 259 (22.21%) AWS
2 118 (10.12%) Azure
3 65 (5.57%) GCP
4 49 (4.20%) GitHub
4 49 (4.20%) Serverless
5 26 (2.23%) AWS Lambda
6 21 (1.80%) Azure DevOps
7 20 (1.72%) OpenShift
8 19 (1.63%) Amazon S3
9 18 (1.54%) GitHub Actions
10 15 (1.29%) Amazon EC2
10 15 (1.29%) Amazon SQS
10 15 (1.29%) Power Platform
11 14 (1.20%) Amazon ECS
11 14 (1.20%) AWS CloudFormation
12 11 (0.94%) Azure Functions
13 9 (0.77%) Amazon EKS
13 9 (0.77%) Collibra
13 9 (0.77%) SaaS
14 7 (0.60%) AWS Step Functions
Communications & Networking
1 31 (2.66%) Software-Defined Radio
2 20 (1.72%) Ethernet
3 16 (1.37%) Wireless
4 11 (0.94%) TCP/IP
5 10 (0.86%) HTTP
6 7 (0.60%) 3GPP
7 5 (0.43%) Firewall
7 5 (0.43%) RTP
8 4 (0.34%) Wireshark
9 3 (0.26%) VPN
10 2 (0.17%) DNS
10 2 (0.17%) Modbus
11 1 (0.086%) HTTPS
11 1 (0.086%) Internet
11 1 (0.086%) Network Security
11 1 (0.086%) Profibus
11 1 (0.086%) RS-232
11 1 (0.086%) RS-422
11 1 (0.086%) RS-485
11 1 (0.086%) XCAP
Database & Business Intelligence
1 70 (6.00%) PostgreSQL
2 34 (2.92%) Relational Database
2 34 (2.92%) SQL Server
3 22 (1.89%) Apache Cassandra
4 20 (1.72%) MongoDB
5 19 (1.63%) NoSQL
6 15 (1.29%) Data Lake
6 15 (1.29%) DynamoDB
7 14 (1.20%) Amazon RDS
7 14 (1.20%) MySQL
8 12 (1.03%) Power BI
9 10 (0.86%) Amazon Athena
9 10 (0.86%) Elasticsearch
9 10 (0.86%) Metadata
9 10 (0.86%) Mixpanel
10 7 (0.60%) BigQuery
10 7 (0.60%) Redis
11 6 (0.51%) Hadoop
12 5 (0.43%) Azure SQL Database
12 5 (0.43%) GIS
Development Applications
1 82 (7.03%) Git
2 58 (4.97%) GitLab
3 51 (4.37%) Jenkins
4 40 (3.43%) JIRA
5 26 (2.23%) Gradle
6 23 (1.97%) Rational DOORS
7 22 (1.89%) JUnit
7 22 (1.89%) Rational Rhapsody
8 19 (1.63%) IntelliJ
9 18 (1.54%) Visual Studio
10 17 (1.46%) SonarQube
11 12 (1.03%) Cucumber
11 12 (1.03%) Mockito
12 11 (0.94%) Eclipse
13 10 (0.86%) Bitbucket
13 10 (0.86%) Liquibase
13 10 (0.86%) Maven
14 8 (0.69%) Selenium
15 7 (0.60%) Cypress.io
16 6 (0.51%) Mocha
General
1 130 (11.15%) Finance
2 93 (7.98%) Social Skills
3 59 (5.06%) Aerospace
4 52 (4.46%) Front Office
5 38 (3.26%) Public Sector
6 37 (3.17%) Analytical Skills
7 36 (3.09%) Banking
8 28 (2.40%) Law
9 26 (2.23%) Manufacturing
10 22 (1.89%) Electronics
11 17 (1.46%) Military
12 14 (1.20%) Retail
13 10 (0.86%) Automotive
13 10 (0.86%) Aviation
13 10 (0.86%) Investment Banking
14 8 (0.69%) Influencing Skills
15 6 (0.51%) Presentation Skills
15 6 (0.51%) Telecoms
16 4 (0.34%) Fire and Rescue
16 4 (0.34%) Inclusion and Diversity
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 152 (13.04%) React
2 102 (8.75%) Node.js
3 96 (8.23%) .NET
4 89 (7.63%) Kafka
5 81 (6.95%) Spring
6 76 (6.52%) Spring Boot
7 72 (6.17%) REST
8 57 (4.89%) AngularJS
9 47 (4.03%) GraphQL
10 46 (3.95%) Redux
11 37 (3.17%) RESTful
12 30 (2.57%) Middleware
13 21 (1.80%) CSS
13 21 (1.80%) Next.js
14 20 (1.72%) HTML
15 19 (1.63%) gRPC
16 18 (1.54%) Vue
16 18 (1.54%) Web Services
17 16 (1.37%) JSON
17 16 (1.37%) Qt
Miscellaneous
1 82 (7.03%) Cloud Native
2 61 (5.23%) Algorithms
3 53 (4.55%) Distributed Systems
3 53 (4.55%) Fixed Income
4 39 (3.34%) Product Ownership
5 24 (2.06%) Embedded Systems
6 20 (1.72%) AI Agents
7 18 (1.54%) Derivative
8 16 (1.37%) Legacy Systems
9 14 (1.20%) Equities
9 14 (1.20%) Robotics
10 13 (1.11%) Data Protection Act
10 13 (1.11%) Mobile App
11 12 (1.03%) FPGA
11 12 (1.03%) Greenfield Project
12 11 (0.94%) Onboarding
13 10 (0.86%) Life Science
13 10 (0.86%) Self-Motivation
14 9 (0.77%) PCIe
15 8 (0.69%) Device Driver
Operating Systems
1 125 (10.72%) Linux
2 51 (4.37%) Windows
3 19 (1.63%) Unix
4 16 (1.37%) Apple iOS
4 16 (1.37%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
5 13 (1.11%) Embedded Linux
6 11 (0.94%) Android
6 11 (0.94%) Windows Server
7 10 (0.86%) FreeRTOS
8 6 (0.51%) Ubuntu
9 5 (0.43%) Debian
10 4 (0.34%) Rocky
11 3 (0.26%) Solaris
11 3 (0.26%) Windows Server 2008
11 3 (0.26%) Windows Server 2019
12 2 (0.17%) Robot Operating System
13 1 (0.086%) Mac OS
13 1 (0.086%) VMS
Processes & Methodologies
1 1,154 (98.97%) Software Engineering
2 277 (23.76%) Agile
3 245 (21.01%) CI/CD
4 141 (12.09%) DevOps
5 137 (11.75%) Microservices
6 120 (10.29%) Full-Stack Development
7 96 (8.23%) AI
8 89 (7.63%) Problem-Solving
9 85 (7.29%) Test Automation
10 75 (6.43%) Containerisation
11 74 (6.35%) TDD
12 65 (5.57%) SDLC
13 62 (5.32%) Infrastructure as Code
13 62 (5.32%) Scrum
14 60 (5.15%) Mentoring
15 56 (4.80%) Machine Learning
16 53 (4.55%) Continuous Improvement
16 53 (4.55%) Unit Testing
17 49 (4.20%) Clean Code
17 49 (4.20%) Observability
Programming Languages
1 296 (25.39%) Java
2 224 (19.21%) Python
3 178 (15.27%) C++
4 166 (14.24%) C#
5 159 (13.64%) TypeScript
6 146 (12.52%) JavaScript
7 119 (10.21%) SQL
8 113 (9.69%) Ada
9 87 (7.46%) C
10 86 (7.38%) Go
11 32 (2.74%) Embedded C
12 26 (2.23%) Kotlin
13 24 (2.06%) PowerShell
13 24 (2.06%) Rust
14 22 (1.89%) MATLAB
15 15 (1.29%) Bash
16 13 (1.11%) Embedded C++
17 10 (0.86%) PL/SQL
18 8 (0.69%) Swift
19 7 (0.60%) Shell Script
Qualifications
1 272 (23.33%) Security Cleared
2 207 (17.75%) SC Cleared
3 49 (4.20%) Degree
4 42 (3.60%) DV Cleared
5 20 (1.72%) Computer Science Degree
6 9 (0.77%) BPSS Clearance
7 7 (0.60%) AWS Certification
7 7 (0.60%) AWS Certified Solutions Architect
8 5 (0.43%) ISTQB
8 5 (0.43%) ISTQB Foundation Certification
9 3 (0.26%) Cisco Certification
10 2 (0.17%) CCNA
10 2 (0.17%) CCNP
10 2 (0.17%) HNC
10 2 (0.17%) HND
11 1 (0.086%) CCDP
11 1 (0.086%) OCA
11 1 (0.086%) Oracle Certification
11 1 (0.086%) PhD
11 1 (0.086%) RHCE
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 37 (3.17%) QA
2 34 (2.92%) Def Stans
3 29 (2.49%) IEC 61508
4 19 (1.63%) MISRA
5 17 (1.46%) Data Quality
6 13 (1.11%) GDPR
6 13 (1.11%) MISRA C
7 11 (0.94%) Accessibility
8 5 (0.43%) DO-178B
9 4 (0.34%) HL7
9 4 (0.34%) NCSC
9 4 (0.34%) Sarbanes-Oxley
10 3 (0.26%) WCAG
11 1 (0.086%) DICOM
11 1 (0.086%) FATCA
11 1 (0.086%) ISO 26262
11 1 (0.086%) ISO/IEC 27001
11 1 (0.086%) NIST
System Software
1 129 (11.06%) Docker
2 15 (1.29%) Firmware
3 8 (0.69%) VMware Infrastructure
4 6 (0.51%) Virtual Machines
5 5 (0.43%) Embedded Firmware
6 4 (0.34%) Oracle RAC
7 2 (0.17%) HDFS
8 1 (0.086%) Active Directory
Systems Management
1 126 (10.81%) Kubernetes
2 72 (6.17%) Terraform
3 26 (2.23%) Grafana
4 21 (1.80%) Ansible
5 12 (1.03%) Argo
6 7 (0.60%) Prometheus
7 4 (0.34%) Data Guard
8 2 (0.17%) HAProxy
8 2 (0.17%) Progress Chef
8 2 (0.17%) Puppet
8 2 (0.17%) Single Sign-On
9 1 (0.086%) CA Endevor
9 1 (0.086%) Cilium
9 1 (0.086%) Functional Safety
9 1 (0.086%) Podman
Vendors
1 36 (3.09%) Microsoft
2 34 (2.92%) Red Hat
3 23 (1.97%) Google
4 20 (1.72%) IBM
4 20 (1.72%) Oracle
5 18 (1.54%) Databricks
6 10 (0.86%) MathWorks
7 8 (0.69%) Spotify
7 8 (0.69%) VMware
8 7 (0.60%) Siemens
8 7 (0.60%) Splunk
9 6 (0.51%) ANSYS
9 6 (0.51%) SAP
10 4 (0.34%) Atlassian
10 4 (0.34%) Checkmarx
11 3 (0.26%) Informatica
11 3 (0.26%) OpenAI
11 3 (0.26%) Palantir
11 3 (0.26%) Sybase
11 3 (0.26%) Talend
894 Software Engineer jobs in England