Software Engineering Contract Job Trends in England

Software Engineering
UK > England

The table below provides summary statistics and contractor rates for jobs advertised in England requiring Software Engineering skills. It covers contract job vacancies from the 6 months leading up to 30 June 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
30 Jun 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 33 43 27
Rank change year-on-year +10 -16 +13
Contract jobs citing Software Engineering 2,382 1,230 2,304
As % of all contract jobs in England 5.44% 4.82% 6.21%
As % of the Processes & Methodologies category 6.38% 5.29% 7.25%
Number of daily rates quoted 1,286 804 1,340
10th Percentile £400 £400 £419
25th Percentile £463 £475 £493
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £550 £600 £603
Median % change year-on-year -8.33% -0.50% -0.50%
75th Percentile £688 £775 £778
90th Percentile £788 £846 £875
UK median daily rate £550 £575 £600
% change year-on-year -4.35% -4.17% -
Number of hourly rates quoted 440 74 400
10th Percentile £52.50 £37.84 £46.25
25th Percentile £61.25 £52.84 £52.50
Median hourly rate £65.00 £65.00 £65.00
75th Percentile £70.00 £68.00 £70.00
90th Percentile £74.03 £76.75 £77.50
UK median hourly rate £65.00 £65.00 £65.00

All Process & Methodology Skills
England

Software Engineering falls under the Processes and Methodologies category. For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all contract job vacancies requiring process or methodology skills in England.

Contract vacancies with a requirement for process or methodology skills 37,351 23,260 31,773
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in England 85.35% 91.20% 85.57%
Number of daily rates quoted 23,546 14,980 20,587
10th Percentile £325 £300 £305
25th Percentile £418 £406 £413
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £520 £515 £525
Median % change year-on-year +0.97% -1.90% -4.55%
75th Percentile £625 £638 £650
90th Percentile £730 £750 £750
UK median daily rate £515 £504 £525
% change year-on-year +2.18% -4.00% -4.55%
Number of hourly rates quoted 2,338 1,158 2,330
10th Percentile £15.25 £14.20 £12.79
25th Percentile £21.00 £17.87 £16.06
Median hourly rate £47.00 £25.23 £38.12
Median % change year-on-year +86.32% -33.83% +1.65%
75th Percentile £68.38 £55.00 £61.60
90th Percentile £82.25 £72.50 £72.93
UK median hourly rate £43.96 £25.15 £37.50
% change year-on-year +74.79% -32.93% +4.17%

Software Engineering
Job Vacancy Trend in England

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

Software Engineering job vacancy trend in England

Software Engineering
Daily Rate Trend in England

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in England citing Software Engineering.

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in England citing Software Engineering

Software Engineering
Daily Rate Histogram in England

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing Software Engineering in England over the 6 months to 30 June 2026.

Daily rate histogram for Software Engineering in England

Software Engineering
Hourly Rate Trend in England

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in England citing Software Engineering.

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in England citing Software Engineering

Software Engineering
Hourly Rate Histogram in England

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing Software Engineering in England over the 6 months to 30 June 2026.

Hourly rate histogram for Software Engineering in England

Software Engineering
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 Engineering within the England region over the 6 months to 30 June 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 -5 1,030 £600 -7.69% 586
North of England +30 361 £538 +8.28% 222
South West +24 333 £550 +4.76% 155
South East +19 293 £525 +4.90% 327
East of England +26 222 £495 +1.38% 140
North West +10 170 £525 +5.00% 137
Yorkshire +24 126 £538 +9.69% 46
Midlands -27 96 £462 -8.51% 108
West Midlands -21 76 £459 -17.67% 60
North East +17 70 £621 +35.05% 41
East Midlands -14 19 £513 +7.89% 48
Software Engineering
UK

Software Engineering
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 54 (2.27%) Confluence
2 41 (1.72%) Apache Spark
3 28 (1.18%) Apache
3 28 (1.18%) Apache Airflow
4 9 (0.38%) SAS
5 7 (0.29%) CMS
6 6 (0.25%) SharePoint
7 5 (0.21%) nginx
8 4 (0.17%) Ethereum
8 4 (0.17%) Hyperledger
8 4 (0.17%) WebLogic
9 3 (0.13%) Palantir Foundry
9 3 (0.13%) Tomcat
10 2 (0.084%) Camunda
10 2 (0.084%) Cloud Foundry
10 2 (0.084%) IIS
10 2 (0.084%) MQSeries
10 2 (0.084%) Oracle SOA Suite
10 2 (0.084%) WinCC
11 1 (0.042%) Headless CMS
Applications
1 15 (0.63%) Microsoft Office
2 8 (0.34%) Chatbot
3 7 (0.29%) Adobe Creative Suite
4 5 (0.21%) CPLEX
5 4 (0.17%) Microsoft Excel
5 4 (0.17%) Simulink
6 3 (0.13%) Spreadsheet
7 2 (0.084%) CATIA
7 2 (0.084%) Microsoft PowerPoint
8 1 (0.042%) Adobe After Effects
8 1 (0.042%) Blender
8 1 (0.042%) Maya
8 1 (0.042%) MS Visio
8 1 (0.042%) Notion
8 1 (0.042%) OrCAD
8 1 (0.042%) S-PLUS
Business Applications
1 6 (0.25%) Dynamics CRM
1 6 (0.25%) Oracle EBS
1 6 (0.25%) Payment Gateway
2 4 (0.17%) Quorum
2 4 (0.17%) R3 Corda
2 4 (0.17%) Ripple
3 3 (0.13%) Orchestrade
4 2 (0.084%) Aladdin
4 2 (0.084%) Remedy ITSM
5 1 (0.042%) Endur
5 1 (0.042%) LabWindows
5 1 (0.042%) Oracle Procure-to-Pay
5 1 (0.042%) Salesforce CRM
5 1 (0.042%) Sprinklr
Cloud Services
1 589 (24.73%) AWS
2 459 (19.27%) Azure
3 214 (8.98%) GCP
4 167 (7.01%) GitHub
5 121 (5.08%) Serverless
6 98 (4.11%) Azure DevOps
7 77 (3.23%) AWS Lambda
7 77 (3.23%) GitHub Actions
8 62 (2.60%) Amazon S3
9 58 (2.43%) OpenShift
10 46 (1.93%) Power Platform
11 40 (1.68%) Amazon SQS
12 39 (1.64%) Azure AKS
13 38 (1.60%) Anthropic Claude
14 36 (1.51%) Amazon ECS
14 36 (1.51%) Amazon EKS
15 31 (1.30%) Amazon EC2
15 31 (1.30%) SaaS
16 28 (1.18%) Entra ID
17 26 (1.09%) AWS CloudFormation
Communications & Networking
1 30 (1.26%) Software-Defined Radio
2 24 (1.01%) Ethernet
3 22 (0.92%) Wireless
4 17 (0.71%) TCP/IP
5 15 (0.63%) HTTP
6 13 (0.55%) Firewall
6 13 (0.55%) Internet
7 12 (0.50%) Wi-Fi
8 10 (0.42%) 3GPP
9 9 (0.38%) VPN
10 8 (0.34%) Network Security
11 7 (0.29%) RTP
12 6 (0.25%) Wireshark
13 4 (0.17%) DNS
13 4 (0.17%) RS-232
13 4 (0.17%) RS-422
14 3 (0.13%) IPv4
14 3 (0.13%) IPv6
14 3 (0.13%) Modbus
14 3 (0.13%) RS-485
Database & Business Intelligence
1 145 (6.09%) PostgreSQL
2 86 (3.61%) Relational Database
3 72 (3.02%) SQL Server
4 67 (2.81%) NoSQL
5 55 (2.31%) MongoDB
6 35 (1.47%) DynamoDB
7 31 (1.30%) Apache Cassandra
7 31 (1.30%) Data Warehouse
8 30 (1.26%) MySQL
8 30 (1.26%) Power BI
9 28 (1.18%) Amazon RDS
10 25 (1.05%) Big Data
11 24 (1.01%) Data Lake
12 23 (0.97%) BigQuery
13 22 (0.92%) Metadata
14 20 (0.84%) Redis
15 18 (0.76%) Pinecone
16 17 (0.71%) Elasticsearch
17 16 (0.67%) Amazon Redshift
17 16 (0.67%) Weaviate
Development Applications
1 237 (9.95%) Git
2 147 (6.17%) Jenkins
3 123 (5.16%) GitLab
4 107 (4.49%) JIRA
5 54 (2.27%) SonarQube
6 38 (1.60%) Gradle
7 33 (1.39%) JUnit
8 28 (1.18%) Rational DOORS
8 28 (1.18%) Rational Rhapsody
9 25 (1.05%) Visual Studio
10 21 (0.88%) Cucumber
11 20 (0.84%) Maven
11 20 (0.84%) Selenium
12 19 (0.80%) Bitbucket
13 16 (0.67%) Liquibase
14 15 (0.63%) Claude Code
14 15 (0.63%) Cypress.io
14 15 (0.63%) IntelliJ
14 15 (0.63%) Mockito
15 12 (0.50%) Eclipse
General
1 421 (17.67%) Finance
2 394 (16.54%) Social Skills
3 159 (6.68%) Banking
4 152 (6.38%) Analytical Skills
5 147 (6.17%) Public Sector
6 99 (4.16%) Aerospace
7 84 (3.53%) Front Office
8 48 (2.02%) Retail
9 46 (1.93%) Law
10 42 (1.76%) Manufacturing
11 41 (1.72%) Investment Banking
12 27 (1.13%) Military
13 25 (1.05%) Automotive
13 25 (1.05%) Aviation
14 24 (1.01%) Influencing Skills
14 24 (1.01%) Telecoms
15 20 (0.84%) Electronics
16 16 (0.67%) Documentation Skills
17 15 (0.63%) Financial Institution
18 14 (0.59%) Legal
Job Titles
1 1,207 (50.67%) Software Engineer
2 436 (18.30%) Developer
3 402 (16.88%) Senior
4 240 (10.08%) Lead
5 178 (7.47%) Senior Software Engineer
6 169 (7.09%) Java Engineer
7 145 (6.09%) Embedded Engineer
8 139 (5.84%) Java Software Engineer
9 134 (5.63%) Embedded Software Engineer
10 130 (5.46%) C++ Software Engineer
11 126 (5.29%) Java Developer
12 104 (4.37%) Architect
13 88 (3.69%) Lead Software Engineer
14 83 (3.48%) Senior Developer
15 82 (3.44%) Python Engineer
16 78 (3.27%) Software Developer
17 74 (3.11%) Artificial Intelligence Engineer
18 73 (3.06%) Python Developer
19 70 (2.94%) Developer/Software Engineer
20 66 (2.77%) DevOps Engineer
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 268 (11.25%) React
2 188 (7.89%) .NET
3 184 (7.72%) Kafka
4 175 (7.35%) Spring
5 171 (7.18%) Node.js
6 165 (6.93%) REST
7 160 (6.72%) Spring Boot
8 108 (4.53%) RESTful
9 105 (4.41%) AngularJS
10 77 (3.23%) GraphQL
11 59 (2.48%) Redux
12 48 (2.02%) CSS
13 47 (1.97%) HTML
14 41 (1.72%) Next.js
15 40 (1.68%) JSON
16 36 (1.51%) Middleware
17 35 (1.47%) Web Services
18 34 (1.43%) LangChain
19 33 (1.39%) Playwright
19 33 (1.39%) Quarkus
Miscellaneous
1 272 (11.42%) Cloud Native
2 182 (7.64%) Distributed Systems
3 118 (4.95%) Product Ownership
4 88 (3.69%) Algorithms
5 71 (2.98%) Fixed Income
6 65 (2.73%) AI Agents
7 42 (1.76%) Embedded Systems
8 40 (1.68%) Onboarding
9 36 (1.51%) Data Structures
10 35 (1.47%) Data Protection Act
11 34 (1.43%) Legacy Systems
12 33 (1.39%) Derivative
13 29 (1.22%) Self-Motivation
14 27 (1.13%) Equities
14 27 (1.13%) Foreign Exchange (FX)
15 25 (1.05%) Enterprise Software
16 21 (0.88%) Robotics
17 19 (0.80%) Greenfield Project
18 18 (0.76%) Mobile App
19 15 (0.63%) FPGA
Operating Systems
1 183 (7.68%) Linux
2 59 (2.48%) Windows
3 38 (1.60%) Unix
4 30 (1.26%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
5 15 (0.63%) Apple iOS
5 15 (0.63%) Embedded Linux
6 14 (0.59%) Android
7 11 (0.46%) FreeRTOS
8 9 (0.38%) Ubuntu
8 9 (0.38%) Windows Server
9 5 (0.21%) Debian
10 4 (0.17%) Rocky
10 4 (0.17%) VMS
10 4 (0.17%) Windows Server 2019
11 3 (0.13%) Solaris
11 3 (0.13%) Windows Server 2008
12 2 (0.084%) VxWorks
13 1 (0.042%) Tizen
13 1 (0.042%) webOS
13 1 (0.042%) Windows 10
Processes & Methodologies
1 718 (30.14%) CI/CD
2 711 (29.85%) Agile
3 502 (21.07%) DevOps
4 383 (16.08%) AI
5 348 (14.61%) Microservices
6 290 (12.17%) Test Automation
7 260 (10.92%) Problem-Solving
8 257 (10.79%) Full-Stack Development
9 223 (9.36%) Containerisation
10 219 (9.19%) Infrastructure as Code
11 214 (8.98%) Continuous Improvement
12 189 (7.93%) TDD
13 184 (7.72%) SDLC
14 183 (7.68%) Machine Learning
14 183 (7.68%) Observability
15 176 (7.39%) Mentoring
16 174 (7.30%) Scrum
17 162 (6.80%) Platform Engineering
18 154 (6.47%) Event-Driven
18 154 (6.47%) Technical Leadership
Programming Languages
1 639 (26.83%) Python
2 609 (25.57%) Java
3 314 (13.18%) SQL
4 297 (12.47%) C#
5 291 (12.22%) TypeScript
6 243 (10.20%) JavaScript
7 227 (9.53%) C++
8 131 (5.50%) Ada
9 129 (5.42%) Go
10 113 (4.74%) C
11 44 (1.85%) Kotlin
12 36 (1.51%) Rust
13 32 (1.34%) PowerShell
14 31 (1.30%) Bash
15 27 (1.13%) Scala
16 24 (1.01%) MATLAB
16 24 (1.01%) PL/SQL
17 22 (0.92%) Embedded C
18 18 (0.76%) Ruby
19 17 (0.71%) Shell Script
Qualifications
1 579 (24.31%) Security Cleared
2 471 (19.77%) SC Cleared
3 176 (7.39%) Degree
4 80 (3.36%) Computer Science Degree
5 71 (2.98%) DV Cleared
6 50 (2.10%) BPSS Clearance
7 29 (1.22%) Master's Degree
8 28 (1.18%) AWS Certification
9 18 (0.76%) AWS Certified Solutions Architect
10 13 (0.55%) Azure Certification
11 12 (0.50%) PhD
12 10 (0.42%) CISSP
13 7 (0.29%) ISTQB
13 7 (0.29%) ISTQB Foundation Certification
14 6 (0.25%) Chartered Engineer
14 6 (0.25%) TOGAF Certification
15 4 (0.17%) AWS Certified DevOps Engineer
15 4 (0.17%) GIAC
15 4 (0.17%) Microsoft Certified Professional
15 4 (0.17%) PMP
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 129 (5.42%) QA
2 44 (1.85%) Data Quality
2 44 (1.85%) Def Stans
3 39 (1.64%) Accessibility
4 30 (1.26%) IEC 61508
5 21 (0.88%) GDPR
6 20 (0.84%) MISRA
7 14 (0.59%) NIST
8 11 (0.46%) MISRA C
9 10 (0.42%) DO-178B
9 10 (0.42%) ISO/IEC 27001
9 10 (0.42%) NCSC
9 10 (0.42%) WCAG
10 6 (0.25%) GRC
10 6 (0.25%) PCI DSS
11 5 (0.21%) JSP 440
11 5 (0.21%) Sarbanes-Oxley
12 4 (0.17%) DO-254
13 3 (0.13%) FATCA
14 2 (0.084%) EMIR
System Software
1 326 (13.69%) Docker
2 25 (1.05%) Firmware
3 10 (0.42%) Embedded Firmware
4 9 (0.38%) Active Directory
5 8 (0.34%) VMware Infrastructure
6 5 (0.21%) Virtual Machines
7 4 (0.17%) Oracle RAC
8 3 (0.13%) HDFS
9 2 (0.084%) SRDF
Systems Management
1 383 (16.08%) Kubernetes
2 221 (9.28%) Terraform
3 66 (2.77%) Ansible
4 64 (2.69%) Grafana
5 40 (1.68%) Prometheus
6 36 (1.51%) Argo
7 11 (0.46%) Kibana
8 9 (0.38%) Single Sign-On
9 7 (0.29%) Puppet
10 6 (0.25%) Progress Chef
11 5 (0.21%) HAProxy
12 4 (0.17%) Data Guard
12 4 (0.17%) HP Quality Center
13 3 (0.13%) Consul
13 3 (0.13%) Docker Swarm
13 3 (0.13%) Functional Safety
13 3 (0.13%) Kubeflow
14 2 (0.084%) Cilium
14 2 (0.084%) HP ALM
14 2 (0.084%) HP Fortify
Vendors
1 124 (5.21%) Microsoft
2 78 (3.27%) Google
3 73 (3.06%) Oracle
4 52 (2.18%) Red Hat
5 43 (1.81%) Databricks
6 37 (1.55%) OpenAI
7 21 (0.88%) IBM
8 18 (0.76%) Informatica
8 18 (0.76%) Splunk
9 17 (0.71%) ServiceNow
10 14 (0.59%) Salesforce
11 13 (0.55%) Foundry
12 12 (0.50%) Siemens
13 11 (0.46%) SAP
14 10 (0.42%) Checkmarx
14 10 (0.42%) ForgeRock
14 10 (0.42%) Okta
15 9 (0.38%) MathWorks
16 8 (0.34%) Adobe
16 8 (0.34%) VMware