SQL Server Contract Job Trends in England

Microsoft SQL Server (MS SQL)
UK > England

The table below provides summary statistics and contractor rates for jobs advertised in England requiring SQL Server skills. It covers contract job vacancies from the 6 months leading up to 8 November 2025, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
8 Nov 2025
Same period 2024 Same period 2023
Rank 127 72 59
Rank change year-on-year -55 -13 -12
Contract jobs citing SQL Server 666 950 1,461
As % of all contract jobs in England 2.24% 3.05% 3.66%
As % of the Database & Business Intelligence category 12.50% 17.13% 21.91%
Number of daily rates quoted 479 682 1,065
10th Percentile £313 £312 £363
25th Percentile £400 £400 £425
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £488 £513 £550
Median % change year-on-year -4.88% -6.82% -
75th Percentile £614 £625 £651
90th Percentile £700 £725 £750
UK median daily rate £491 £500 £525
% change year-on-year -1.80% -4.76% -
Number of hourly rates quoted 4 7 20
10th Percentile £20.83 £27.71 £20.17
25th Percentile £20.95 £38.75 £42.13
Median hourly rate £21.27 £60.50 £52.50
Median % change year-on-year -64.84% +15.24% -4.55%
75th Percentile £35.52 £65.00 £62.50
90th Percentile £60.71 £79.00 £64.96
UK median hourly rate £21.27 £54.00 £52.50
% change year-on-year -60.61% +2.86% +5.00%

All Database and Business Intelligence Skills
England

SQL Server falls under the Databases and Business Intelligence category. For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all contract job vacancies requiring database or business intelligence skills in England.

Contract vacancies with a requirement for database or business intelligence skills 5,327 5,546 6,667
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in England 17.90% 17.80% 16.69%
Number of daily rates quoted 3,676 3,735 4,732
10th Percentile £325 £350 £360
25th Percentile £413 £425 £450
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £507 £550 £550
Median % change year-on-year -7.82% - -
75th Percentile £625 £663 £650
90th Percentile £732 £788 £750
UK median daily rate £500 £525 £534
% change year-on-year -4.76% -1.69% -2.91%
Number of hourly rates quoted 78 79 142
10th Percentile £19.94 £17.90 £19.27
25th Percentile £29.00 £23.45 £25.28
Median hourly rate £43.50 £35.00 £48.45
Median % change year-on-year +24.29% -27.76% -3.11%
75th Percentile £65.00 £54.75 £68.31
90th Percentile £85.30 £65.20 £78.00
UK median hourly rate £43.50 £30.40 £47.50
% change year-on-year +43.09% -36.00% -4.90%

SQL Server
Job Vacancy Trend in England

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

SQL Server job vacancy trend in England

SQL Server
Daily Rate Trend in England

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in England citing SQL Server.

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in England citing SQL Server

SQL Server
Daily Rate Histogram in England

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing SQL Server in England over the 6 months to 8 November 2025.

Daily rate histogram for SQL Server in England

SQL Server
Hourly Rate Trend in England

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in England citing SQL Server.

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in England citing SQL Server

SQL Server
Hourly Rate Histogram in England

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing SQL Server in England over the 6 months to 8 November 2025.

Hourly rate histogram for SQL Server in England

SQL Server
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 SQL Server within the England region over the 6 months to 8 November 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 -49 372 £533 -3.18% 510
North of England -5 86 £445 -7.53% 213
South East -36 77 £425 -15.00% 554
North West -8 47 £450 +1.35% 140
Yorkshire -13 39 £413 -26.54% 53
East of England -3 33 £500 +33.33% 62
South West -21 32 £450 -10.00% 54
Midlands -86 31 £345 -22.82% 148
West Midlands -60 17 £395 -30.34% 80
East Midlands -42 13 £319 -13.78% 67
SQL Server
UK

SQL Server
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 31 (4.65%) IIS
2 28 (4.20%) Confluence
3 24 (3.60%) SharePoint
4 16 (2.40%) Apache
5 15 (2.25%) Microsoft Exchange
6 13 (1.95%) WebSphere
7 11 (1.65%) Apache Spark
8 10 (1.50%) Oracle SOA Suite
9 7 (1.05%) WebLogic
10 4 (0.60%) JBoss
10 4 (0.60%) SharePoint Server
11 3 (0.45%) Apache Airflow
11 3 (0.45%) CICS
11 3 (0.45%) CMS
11 3 (0.45%) Oracle Workflow
11 3 (0.45%) Skype for Business
11 3 (0.45%) Tomcat
12 2 (0.30%) BizTalk Server
12 2 (0.30%) HCL Notes
12 2 (0.30%) WildFly
Applications
1 60 (9.01%) Microsoft Excel
2 7 (1.05%) Microsoft Project
3 5 (0.75%) Microsoft PowerPoint
3 5 (0.75%) MS Visio
4 4 (0.60%) Microsoft Office
5 2 (0.30%) Trello
5 2 (0.30%) Windchill
6 1 (0.15%) ProjectWise
Business Applications
1 9 (1.35%) Maximo
1 9 (1.35%) Oracle BPM
2 8 (1.20%) Dynamics CRM
3 7 (1.05%) Fidessa
4 6 (0.90%) OpenText MBPM
5 5 (0.75%) Endur
5 5 (0.75%) Salesforce CRM
6 4 (0.60%) Advent Geneva
6 4 (0.60%) Aladdin
6 4 (0.60%) Oracle EBS
6 4 (0.60%) Oracle Procure-to-Pay
6 4 (0.60%) SAP S/4HANA
6 4 (0.60%) thinkFolio
7 3 (0.45%) BusinessWorks
7 3 (0.45%) Dynamics AX
8 2 (0.30%) Kondor
8 2 (0.30%) Loan IQ
8 2 (0.30%) RMDS
8 2 (0.30%) Teamcenter
8 2 (0.30%) Temenos T24
Cloud Services
1 261 (39.19%) Azure
2 115 (17.27%) AWS
3 97 (14.56%) Power Platform
4 55 (8.26%) Azure DevOps
5 40 (6.01%) GitHub
6 38 (5.71%) GCP
7 30 (4.50%) Azure Data Factory
8 25 (3.75%) Serverless
9 24 (3.60%) Microsoft 365
9 24 (3.60%) SaaS
10 22 (3.30%) Azure Service Bus
11 21 (3.15%) Azure Synapse Analytics
11 21 (3.15%) Snowflake
12 20 (3.00%) Azure Logic Apps
12 20 (3.00%) Dynamics 365
13 19 (2.85%) GitHub Actions
14 18 (2.70%) Power Automate
15 15 (2.25%) Azure Functions
15 15 (2.25%) PaaS
15 15 (2.25%) PowerApps
Communications & Networking
1 28 (4.20%) Firewall
2 16 (2.40%) DNS
2 16 (2.40%) TCP/IP
3 12 (1.80%) Internet
4 10 (1.50%) HTTP
5 9 (1.35%) LAN
6 7 (1.05%) SSL
7 6 (0.90%) DHCP
8 5 (0.75%) NAS
8 5 (0.75%) Skype
9 4 (0.60%) SAN
10 3 (0.45%) Wireshark
11 2 (0.30%) RS-232
11 2 (0.30%) SMTP
11 2 (0.30%) VLAN
11 2 (0.30%) VoIP
11 2 (0.30%) VPN
11 2 (0.30%) WAN
11 2 (0.30%) WebEx
11 2 (0.30%) X.400
Database & Business Intelligence
1 85 (12.76%) Power BI
2 78 (11.71%) Relational Database
3 76 (11.41%) PostgreSQL
4 69 (10.36%) Oracle Database
5 62 (9.31%) Data Warehouse
6 60 (9.01%) SQL Server Integration Services
7 51 (7.66%) SQL Server Reporting Services
8 44 (6.61%) Azure SQL Database
9 41 (6.16%) MongoDB
9 41 (6.16%) MySQL
10 33 (4.95%) NoSQL
11 25 (3.75%) DB2
12 23 (3.45%) Amazon RDS
13 21 (3.15%) Big Data
14 20 (3.00%) RDBMS
14 20 (3.00%) Redis
15 15 (2.25%) Data Lake
16 14 (2.10%) Power Query
16 14 (2.10%) Tableau
17 12 (1.80%) SQL Server Analysis Services
Development Applications
1 60 (9.01%) Git
2 44 (6.61%) JIRA
3 24 (3.60%) Jenkins
4 22 (3.30%) GitLab
5 17 (2.55%) Bitbucket
5 17 (2.55%) Maven
5 17 (2.55%) SpecFlow
6 15 (2.25%) Visual Studio
7 13 (1.95%) Selenium
8 12 (1.80%) Cucumber
8 12 (1.80%) JUnit
9 10 (1.50%) Octopus Deploy
9 10 (1.50%) Sonatype Nexus
10 9 (1.35%) Mockito
10 9 (1.35%) TeamCity
11 8 (1.20%) Postman
11 8 (1.20%) SQL Server Management Studio (SSMS)
12 7 (1.05%) SonarQube
12 7 (1.05%) webpack
13 6 (0.90%) Eclipse
General
1 226 (33.93%) Social Skills
2 212 (31.83%) Finance
3 96 (14.41%) Analytical Skills
4 94 (14.11%) Banking
5 40 (6.01%) Public Sector
6 30 (4.50%) Documentation Skills
7 29 (4.35%) Investment Banking
8 21 (3.15%) Front Office
9 16 (2.40%) Inclusion and Diversity
10 14 (2.10%) Financial Institution
11 11 (1.65%) Presentation Skills
11 11 (1.65%) Retail
12 10 (1.50%) Back Office
13 8 (1.20%) Legal
14 7 (1.05%) Local Government
15 6 (0.90%) Influencing Skills
15 6 (0.90%) Manufacturing
15 6 (0.90%) Organisational Skills
16 5 (0.75%) General Ledger
17 4 (0.60%) Military
Job Titles
1 247 (37.09%) Developer
2 74 (11.11%) Senior
3 62 (9.31%) C# Developer
4 57 (8.56%) Analyst
5 56 (8.41%) Data Engineer
6 49 (7.36%) .NET Developer
7 46 (6.91%) Architect
8 42 (6.31%) Senior Developer
9 41 (6.16%) DBA
10 36 (5.41%) Consultant
11 27 (4.05%) Angular Developer
12 26 (3.90%) Lead
13 25 (3.75%) C# .NET Developer
13 25 (3.75%) SQL Developer
14 23 (3.45%) Full-Stack Developer
15 22 (3.30%) Applications Support
15 22 (3.30%) Data Analyst
16 21 (3.15%) SQL DBA
17 20 (3.00%) Java Developer
18 17 (2.55%) Support Engineer
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 173 (25.98%) .NET
2 80 (12.01%) .NET Framework
3 69 (10.36%) HTML
4 64 (9.61%) CSS
5 51 (7.66%) AngularJS
5 51 (7.66%) XML
6 50 (7.51%) REST
7 46 (6.91%) React
8 45 (6.76%) Entity Framework
9 38 (5.71%) .NET Core
10 37 (5.56%) RESTful
11 33 (4.95%) ASP.NET
11 33 (4.95%) Kafka
12 32 (4.80%) SOAP
13 30 (4.50%) Web Services
14 26 (3.90%) JSON
15 25 (3.75%) NHibernate
16 20 (3.00%) Playwright
17 19 (2.85%) Middleware
17 19 (2.85%) WPF
Miscellaneous
1 26 (3.90%) Legacy Systems
2 24 (3.60%) Derivative
3 23 (3.45%) Foreign Exchange (FX)
4 22 (3.30%) Cloud Native
5 19 (2.85%) Data Protection Act
5 19 (2.85%) Product Ownership
6 18 (2.70%) Management Information System
6 18 (2.70%) Replication
7 16 (2.40%) PKI
8 15 (2.25%) Enterprise Software
9 14 (2.10%) Clustering
9 14 (2.10%) Onboarding
9 14 (2.10%) Reinsurance
10 12 (1.80%) Fixed Income
11 11 (1.65%) Distributed Systems
11 11 (1.65%) Hedge funds
11 11 (1.65%) Linux Command Line
11 11 (1.65%) NHS
12 9 (1.35%) Credit Risk
12 9 (1.35%) Data Centre
Operating Systems
1 111 (16.67%) Windows
2 83 (12.46%) Linux
3 55 (8.26%) Windows Server
4 13 (1.95%) Unix
5 12 (1.80%) Windows 10
6 8 (1.20%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
7 6 (0.90%) Windows Server 2016
8 4 (0.60%) Android
8 4 (0.60%) VMS
8 4 (0.60%) Windows Server 2019
9 3 (0.45%) Apple iOS
9 3 (0.45%) Windows 7
10 2 (0.30%) Solaris
10 2 (0.30%) Ubuntu
10 2 (0.30%) Windows Server 2003
10 2 (0.30%) Windows Server 2012
11 1 (0.15%) Mac OS X
11 1 (0.15%) MVS
11 1 (0.15%) SUSE
11 1 (0.15%) zOS
Processes & Methodologies
1 175 (26.28%) Agile
2 157 (23.57%) Problem-Solving
3 141 (21.17%) DevOps
4 122 (18.32%) CI/CD
5 107 (16.07%) Migration
6 104 (15.62%) ETL
7 100 (15.02%) Business Intelligence
8 87 (13.06%) Microservices
9 71 (10.66%) Data Modelling
10 60 (9.01%) Data Analysis
11 59 (8.86%) Test Automation
12 58 (8.71%) Performance Tuning
13 54 (8.11%) Data Migration
13 54 (8.11%) Full-Stack Development
14 53 (7.96%) Analytics
15 52 (7.81%) Scrum
16 48 (7.21%) Clean Code
16 48 (7.21%) Data Governance
17 44 (6.61%) Disaster Recovery
18 42 (6.31%) Software Engineering
Programming Languages
1 371 (55.71%) SQL
2 181 (27.18%) C#
3 127 (19.07%) Python
4 95 (14.26%) JavaScript
5 75 (11.26%) T-SQL
6 64 (9.61%) Java
7 56 (8.41%) PowerShell
8 37 (5.56%) PL/SQL
9 30 (4.50%) Bash
10 29 (4.35%) VBA
11 21 (3.15%) VB
12 20 (3.00%) TypeScript
13 19 (2.85%) Data Analysis Expressions
14 15 (2.25%) Shell Script
15 8 (1.20%) COBOL
16 6 (0.90%) Bicep
16 6 (0.90%) Scala
16 6 (0.90%) VB.NET
16 6 (0.90%) X++
17 5 (0.75%) PHP
Qualifications
1 84 (12.61%) Security Cleared
2 65 (9.76%) Degree
3 63 (9.46%) SC Cleared
4 25 (3.75%) Computer Science Degree
5 20 (3.00%) Microsoft Certification
6 12 (1.80%) DV Cleared
7 11 (1.65%) Azure Certification
8 9 (1.35%) MCSE
9 7 (1.05%) BPSS Clearance
10 6 (0.90%) AWS Certification
10 6 (0.90%) HNC
10 6 (0.90%) HND
10 6 (0.90%) ITIL Certification
10 6 (0.90%) Master's Degree
10 6 (0.90%) MCP
11 4 (0.60%) PMP
12 3 (0.45%) CTC Cleared
12 3 (0.45%) ITIL Foundation Certificate
13 2 (0.30%) Cisco Certification
13 2 (0.30%) OCP
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 57 (8.56%) QA
2 56 (8.41%) Data Quality
3 14 (2.10%) Accessibility
3 14 (2.10%) GDPR
4 11 (1.65%) MiFID
4 11 (1.65%) SLA
5 5 (0.75%) EMIR
6 4 (0.60%) ISO/IEC 27001
6 4 (0.60%) Sarbanes-Oxley
7 3 (0.45%) GAAP
7 3 (0.45%) WCAG
8 2 (0.30%) Basel III
8 2 (0.30%) HIPAA
8 2 (0.30%) HL7
8 2 (0.30%) IFRS
8 2 (0.30%) ISO 15022
8 2 (0.30%) ISO 20022
8 2 (0.30%) PCI DSS
8 2 (0.30%) PMO
8 2 (0.30%) Solvency II
System Software
1 49 (7.36%) Docker
2 48 (7.21%) Active Directory
3 28 (4.20%) VMware Infrastructure
4 12 (1.80%) Oracle RAC
4 12 (1.80%) Virtual Machines
5 10 (1.50%) zsh
6 9 (1.35%) Hyper-V
7 7 (1.05%) VMware NSX
8 4 (0.60%) vSphere
9 3 (0.45%) NFS
10 2 (0.30%) GPFS
10 2 (0.30%) GridGain
10 2 (0.30%) NDS
10 2 (0.30%) NetIQ eDirectory
10 2 (0.30%) Virtual Desktop
10 2 (0.30%) VMware ESXi
11 1 (0.15%) KVM
11 1 (0.15%) SRDF
11 1 (0.15%) Veritas Cluster Server
11 1 (0.15%) Xen
Systems Management
1 40 (6.01%) Kubernetes
2 22 (3.30%) Ansible
3 20 (3.00%) Terraform
4 14 (2.10%) Data Guard
5 13 (1.95%) Oracle RMAN
5 13 (1.95%) vCenter Server
6 11 (1.65%) NetBackup
7 10 (1.50%) yum
8 9 (1.35%) Active Directory Federation Services
8 9 (1.35%) Microsoft Intune
9 8 (1.20%) Grafana
10 7 (1.05%) Puppet
10 7 (1.05%) SCCM
10 7 (1.05%) SCOM
11 6 (0.90%) Control-M
11 6 (0.90%) Oracle Enterprise Manager
11 6 (0.90%) Single Sign-On
12 5 (0.75%) Prometheus
13 4 (0.60%) ZABBIX
14 3 (0.45%) Ambari
Vendors
1 216 (32.43%) Microsoft
2 215 (32.28%) Oracle
3 41 (6.16%) VMware
4 27 (4.05%) Databricks
4 27 (4.05%) IBM
5 26 (3.90%) Citrix
6 22 (3.30%) Google
7 17 (2.55%) SAP
8 15 (2.25%) Salesforce
9 13 (1.95%) CyberArk
10 12 (1.80%) Cisco
10 12 (1.80%) Informatica
11 11 (1.65%) Veritas
12 10 (1.50%) Sybase
13 9 (1.35%) Talend
14 8 (1.20%) ServiceNow
15 7 (1.05%) Atlassian
15 7 (1.05%) Cognos
15 7 (1.05%) HP
15 7 (1.05%) Veeam