SQL Server Contracts in England

Microsoft SQL Server (MS SQL)
UK > England

The table below provides summary statistics for contract job vacancies advertised in England requiring SQL Server skills. It includes a benchmarking guide to the contractor rates offered in vacancies that cited SQL Server over the 6 months leading up to 3 July 2025, comparing them to the same period in the previous two years.

6 months to
3 Jul 2025
Same period 2024 Same period 2023
Rank 102 58 52
Rank change year-on-year -44 -6 0
Contract jobs citing SQL Server 679 1,320 1,971
As % of all contract jobs advertised in England 2.60% 3.53% 4.16%
As % of the Database & Business Intelligence category 14.13% 20.13% 24.17%
Number of daily rates quoted 508 929 1,503
10th Percentile £325 £349 £363
25th Percentile £400 £413 £419
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £510 £525
Median % change year-on-year -1.96% -2.86% -
75th Percentile £650 £638 £666
90th Percentile £750 £725 £750
UK median daily rate £500 £505 £525
% change year-on-year -0.99% -3.81% -
Number of hourly rates quoted 7 23 11
10th Percentile £20.91 £25.55 £26.48
25th Percentile £21.02 £38.81 £34.20
Median hourly rate £25.00 £40.00 £45.00
Median % change year-on-year -37.50% -11.11% -17.43%
75th Percentile £51.91 £47.47 £73.75
90th Percentile £82.00 £62.96 £85.00
UK median hourly rate £48.16 £40.00 £45.00
% change year-on-year +20.40% -11.11% -10.00%

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 4,804 6,558 8,156
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in England 18.40% 17.55% 17.22%
Number of daily rates quoted 3,326 4,727 5,816
10th Percentile £357 £350 £363
25th Percentile £413 £425 £450
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £525 £525 £550
Median % change year-on-year - -4.55% -
75th Percentile £650 £675 £675
90th Percentile £775 £813 £775
UK median daily rate £513 £525 £538
% change year-on-year -2.38% -2.33% -2.27%
Number of hourly rates quoted 90 139 151
10th Percentile £19.20 £14.00 £21.24
25th Percentile £23.88 £20.62 £32.30
Median hourly rate £33.94 £40.00 £57.50
Median % change year-on-year -15.15% -30.43% +52.12%
75th Percentile £61.25 £51.75 £75.00
90th Percentile £70.75 £71.70 £83.00
UK median hourly rate £34.99 £39.25 £56.95
% change year-on-year -10.85% -31.08% +50.66%

SQL Server
Job Vacancy Trend in England

Job postings citing SQL Server as a proportion of all IT jobs advertised in England.

Job vacancy trend for SQL Server in England

SQL Server
Contractor Daily Rate Trend in England

3-month moving average daily rate quoted in jobs citing SQL Server in England.

Daily rate trend for SQL Server in England

SQL Server
Daily Rate Histogram in England

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing SQL Server in England over the 6 months to 3 July 2025.

Daily rate histogram for SQL Server in England

SQL Server
Contractor Hourly Rate Trend in England

3-month moving average hourly rates quoted in jobs citing SQL Server in England.

Hourly rate trend for SQL Server in England

SQL Server
Hourly Rate Histogram in England

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing SQL Server in England over the 6 months to 3 July 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 3 July 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 -41 418 £575 +7.48% 1,282
North of England -15 85 £425 -8.60% 522
South East -7 65 £450 -11.11% 594
North West -12 61 £425 -5.56% 312
Midlands -28 45 £425 -4.49% 270
West Midlands -7 27 £525 +6.60% 166
South West -13 26 £475 -11.63% 189
Yorkshire -1 19 £400 -15.79% 169
East Midlands -22 17 £327 -24.94% 103
East of England +17 16 £500 +5.26% 160
North East -2 5 £456 -3.95% 42
SQL Server
UK

SQL Server
Co-occurring Skills and Capabilities in England by Category

The follow tables expand on the table above by listing co-occurrences grouped by category. The same employment type, locality and period is covered with up to 20 co-occurrences shown in each of the following categories:

Application Platforms
1 39 (5.74%) IIS
2 36 (5.30%) Apache
3 21 (3.09%) SharePoint
4 19 (2.80%) Confluence
4 19 (2.80%) Microsoft Exchange
5 14 (2.06%) Apache Spark
6 7 (1.03%) Tomcat
6 7 (1.03%) WebSphere
7 6 (0.88%) Oracle Workflow
7 6 (0.88%) Skype for Business
8 5 (0.74%) nginx
8 5 (0.74%) Oracle SOA Suite
9 4 (0.59%) BizTalk Server
9 4 (0.59%) CMS
9 4 (0.59%) Drupal
9 4 (0.59%) Jupyter
9 4 (0.59%) SAS
9 4 (0.59%) WordPress
10 3 (0.44%) JBoss
10 3 (0.44%) OpenEdge
Applications
1 68 (10.01%) Microsoft Excel
2 9 (1.33%) Microsoft Office
3 3 (0.44%) MS Visio
4 2 (0.29%) Microsoft PowerPoint
5 1 (0.15%) Microsoft Project
5 1 (0.15%) Spreadsheet
5 1 (0.15%) SPSS
5 1 (0.15%) Stata
5 1 (0.15%) Trello
Business Applications
1 29 (4.27%) Dynamics CRM
2 7 (1.03%) Kondor
2 7 (1.03%) Maximo
2 7 (1.03%) OpenText MBPM
2 7 (1.03%) Oracle BPM
3 5 (0.74%) Endur
3 5 (0.74%) SAP S/4HANA
4 4 (0.59%) Cognos Business Intelligence
5 3 (0.44%) Fidessa
5 3 (0.44%) Oracle EBS
5 3 (0.44%) Oracle Procure-to-Pay
6 2 (0.29%) Aladdin
6 2 (0.29%) Alphatax
6 2 (0.29%) Markit EDM
6 2 (0.29%) Oracle Subledger Accounting
6 2 (0.29%) Temenos T24
7 1 (0.15%) FastStats
7 1 (0.15%) Oracle Cash Management
7 1 (0.15%) Sparx Enterprise Architect
7 1 (0.15%) thinkFolio
Cloud Services
1 289 (42.56%) Azure
2 111 (16.35%) Power Platform
3 91 (13.40%) AWS
4 58 (8.54%) Azure DevOps
5 52 (7.66%) Azure Data Factory
6 38 (5.60%) Entra ID
7 34 (5.01%) Microsoft 365
8 33 (4.86%) PowerApps
9 31 (4.57%) Azure Service Bus
9 31 (4.57%) Dynamics 365
9 31 (4.57%) Power Automate
10 30 (4.42%) Serverless
11 27 (3.98%) Azure Logic Apps
12 26 (3.83%) GitHub
13 23 (3.39%) Azure Functions
13 23 (3.39%) GCP
14 21 (3.09%) Azure Cosmos DB
14 21 (3.09%) Azure Synapse Analytics
15 20 (2.95%) SaaS
16 15 (2.21%) IaaS
Communications & Networking
1 29 (4.27%) Firewall
2 24 (3.53%) DNS
3 17 (2.50%) Internet
4 10 (1.47%) Network Security
5 9 (1.33%) TCP/IP
6 8 (1.18%) Intrusion Detection
7 7 (1.03%) DHCP
7 7 (1.03%) LAN
7 7 (1.03%) VPN
8 6 (0.88%) HTTP
8 6 (0.88%) WAN
9 4 (0.59%) Skype
9 4 (0.59%) SSH
9 4 (0.59%) VLAN
9 4 (0.59%) VoIP
10 3 (0.44%) SSL
11 2 (0.29%) iSCSI
11 2 (0.29%) NAS
11 2 (0.29%) SAN
11 2 (0.29%) Wireless
Database & Business Intelligence
1 86 (12.67%) Power BI
2 69 (10.16%) SQL Server Reporting Services
3 64 (9.43%) SQL Server Integration Services
4 55 (8.10%) Data Warehouse
5 54 (7.95%) Relational Database
6 51 (7.51%) Oracle Database
7 48 (7.07%) Azure SQL Database
8 46 (6.77%) PostgreSQL
9 38 (5.60%) MySQL
10 36 (5.30%) NoSQL
11 33 (4.86%) MongoDB
12 22 (3.24%) DB2
13 18 (2.65%) Big Data
13 18 (2.65%) Tableau
14 16 (2.36%) Amazon RDS
15 15 (2.21%) Metadata
16 14 (2.06%) Data Lake
16 14 (2.06%) Redis
17 11 (1.62%) Hadoop
17 11 (1.62%) Oracle Reports
Development Applications
1 51 (7.51%) JIRA
2 46 (6.77%) Git
3 23 (3.39%) GitLab
4 20 (2.95%) Jenkins
5 17 (2.50%) Bitbucket
6 15 (2.21%) Selenium
7 14 (2.06%) Visual Studio
8 11 (1.62%) Cucumber
8 11 (1.62%) SonarQube
8 11 (1.62%) Sonatype Nexus
9 10 (1.47%) JUnit
9 10 (1.47%) Maven
9 10 (1.47%) SQL Server Management Studio (SSMS)
10 9 (1.33%) Mockito
11 8 (1.18%) ERwin
11 8 (1.18%) Octopus Deploy
12 7 (1.03%) TeamCity
13 6 (0.88%) SpecFlow
13 6 (0.88%) Team Foundation Server
13 6 (0.88%) WinRunner
General
1 214 (31.52%) Finance
2 190 (27.98%) Social Skills
3 97 (14.29%) Banking
4 77 (11.34%) Analytical Skills
5 36 (5.30%) Public Sector
6 26 (3.83%) Front Office
7 24 (3.53%) Investment Banking
8 16 (2.36%) Documentation Skills
9 12 (1.77%) Organisational Skills
9 12 (1.77%) Telecoms
10 11 (1.62%) Back Office
10 11 (1.62%) Inclusion and Diversity
10 11 (1.62%) Legal
11 8 (1.18%) Law
12 7 (1.03%) Financial Institution
13 5 (0.74%) Local Government
13 5 (0.74%) Retail
14 4 (0.59%) Marketing
14 4 (0.59%) Retail Banking
15 3 (0.44%) Corporate Banking
Job Titles
1 258 (38.00%) Developer
2 81 (11.93%) Analyst
3 74 (10.90%) C# Developer
4 63 (9.28%) Architect
5 61 (8.98%) Senior
6 49 (7.22%) Data Engineer
7 42 (6.19%) .NET Developer
8 37 (5.45%) DBA
9 31 (4.57%) Senior Developer
10 30 (4.42%) Data Analyst
11 27 (3.98%) SQL Developer
12 26 (3.83%) Consultant
13 25 (3.68%) Azure Engineer
13 25 (3.68%) SQL DBA
14 24 (3.53%) Solutions Architect
15 23 (3.39%) C# .NET Developer
16 21 (3.09%) Full-Stack Developer
16 21 (3.09%) Software Engineer
17 19 (2.80%) Data Architect
18 18 (2.65%) Java Developer
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 197 (29.01%) .NET
2 87 (12.81%) .NET Framework
3 70 (10.31%) HTML
4 64 (9.43%) CSS
5 49 (7.22%) REST
6 48 (7.07%) AngularJS
6 48 (7.07%) React
6 48 (7.07%) XML
7 42 (6.19%) ASP.NET
8 40 (5.89%) .NET Core
9 36 (5.30%) Web Services
10 35 (5.15%) RESTful
11 33 (4.86%) JSON
11 33 (4.86%) SOAP
12 32 (4.71%) WCF
13 31 (4.57%) Entity Framework
14 29 (4.27%) ASP.NET Web API
15 26 (3.83%) Kafka
16 24 (3.53%) WPF
17 21 (3.09%) OAuth
Miscellaneous
1 30 (4.42%) Derivative
2 22 (3.24%) Replication
3 21 (3.09%) Foreign Exchange (FX)
4 20 (2.95%) Distributed Systems
4 20 (2.95%) Legacy Systems
5 17 (2.50%) Data Centre
5 17 (2.50%) Data Structures
6 14 (2.06%) Clustering
7 13 (1.91%) Public Cloud
8 12 (1.77%) Data Protection Act
9 11 (1.62%) Enterprise Software
9 11 (1.62%) Product Ownership
10 10 (1.47%) Onboarding
11 9 (1.33%) Linux Command Line
11 9 (1.33%) N-Tier
11 9 (1.33%) PKI
12 8 (1.18%) Greenfield Project
12 8 (1.18%) Reference Data
13 7 (1.03%) Cloud Native
13 7 (1.03%) Mobile App
Operating Systems
1 136 (20.03%) Windows
2 87 (12.81%) Linux
3 61 (8.98%) Windows Server
4 24 (3.53%) Unix
5 17 (2.50%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
6 7 (1.03%) Android
6 7 (1.03%) Windows 10
7 6 (0.88%) VMS
8 5 (0.74%) Apple iOS
8 5 (0.74%) Windows Server 2016
9 4 (0.59%) CentOS
9 4 (0.59%) Windows Server 2019
10 3 (0.44%) Windows 7
11 2 (0.29%) Oracle Linux
11 2 (0.29%) Ubuntu
11 2 (0.29%) Windows Server 2012
12 1 (0.15%) AIX
12 1 (0.15%) Solaris
12 1 (0.15%) SUSE
12 1 (0.15%) Windows Server 2003
Processes & Methodologies
1 170 (25.04%) Agile
2 162 (23.86%) Problem-Solving
3 156 (22.97%) DevOps
4 104 (15.32%) CI/CD
5 101 (14.87%) Business Intelligence
6 100 (14.73%) Migration
7 95 (13.99%) ETL
8 74 (10.90%) Test Automation
9 65 (9.57%) Data Analysis
10 63 (9.28%) Data Modelling
11 60 (8.84%) Performance Tuning
12 57 (8.39%) Microservices
13 55 (8.10%) Data Migration
14 54 (7.95%) Disaster Recovery
14 54 (7.95%) Software Engineering
15 51 (7.51%) Analytics
16 50 (7.36%) Scrum
17 48 (7.07%) High Availability
18 43 (6.33%) Unit Testing
19 42 (6.19%) SDLC
Programming Languages
1 375 (55.23%) SQL
2 231 (34.02%) C#
3 142 (20.91%) Python
4 103 (15.17%) JavaScript
5 75 (11.05%) PowerShell
6 70 (10.31%) Java
7 59 (8.69%) T-SQL
8 38 (5.60%) PL/SQL
8 38 (5.60%) TypeScript
9 34 (5.01%) VBA
10 31 (4.57%) VB
11 24 (3.53%) Bash
12 15 (2.21%) Scala
13 8 (1.18%) Data Analysis Expressions
13 8 (1.18%) Perl
13 8 (1.18%) PHP
14 7 (1.03%) Bicep
14 7 (1.03%) R
14 7 (1.03%) Shell Script
14 7 (1.03%) VB.NET
Qualifications
1 79 (11.63%) Security Cleared
2 71 (10.46%) Degree
3 60 (8.84%) SC Cleared
4 25 (3.68%) Azure Certification
5 24 (3.53%) Microsoft Certification
6 17 (2.50%) Computer Science Degree
7 13 (1.91%) DV Cleared
8 5 (0.74%) ITIL Certification
9 4 (0.59%) AWS Certification
9 4 (0.59%) MCPD
9 4 (0.59%) MCSD
10 3 (0.44%) BPSS Clearance
10 3 (0.44%) MCSE
10 3 (0.44%) PMP
10 3 (0.44%) SAP Certification
10 3 (0.44%) VMware Certified Professional (VCP)
11 2 (0.29%) ISEB
11 2 (0.29%) OCP
11 2 (0.29%) Oracle Certification
11 2 (0.29%) PRINCE2 Certification
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 66 (9.72%) QA
2 42 (6.19%) Data Quality
3 25 (3.68%) GDPR
4 13 (1.91%) MiFID
4 13 (1.91%) Sarbanes-Oxley
5 7 (1.03%) Basel III
6 6 (0.88%) Accessibility
7 5 (0.74%) EMIR
7 5 (0.74%) HIPAA
7 5 (0.74%) ISO/IEC 27001
7 5 (0.74%) SLA
8 3 (0.44%) GAAP
9 2 (0.29%) Actionable Recommendations
9 2 (0.29%) Government Security Classifications
9 2 (0.29%) HMG Security Policy Framework
9 2 (0.29%) ISO 15022
9 2 (0.29%) ISO 20022
9 2 (0.29%) PCI DSS
9 2 (0.29%) PMO
9 2 (0.29%) WCAG
System Software
1 52 (7.66%) Active Directory
2 32 (4.71%) Docker
3 30 (4.42%) VMware Infrastructure
4 13 (1.91%) Virtual Machines
5 12 (1.77%) vSphere
6 6 (0.88%) Hyper-V
7 5 (0.74%) Virtual Desktop
8 4 (0.59%) VMware ESXi
9 3 (0.44%) KVM
9 3 (0.44%) vCloud
9 3 (0.44%) VMware Workstation
10 2 (0.29%) GPFS
10 2 (0.29%) NFS
10 2 (0.29%) zsh
11 1 (0.15%) Microsoft Virtual Server
11 1 (0.15%) Oracle RAC
11 1 (0.15%) Virtual Servers
11 1 (0.15%) VMware NSX
Systems Management
1 44 (6.48%) Kubernetes
2 36 (5.30%) Terraform
3 18 (2.65%) Ansible
4 11 (1.62%) Microsoft Intune
5 7 (1.03%) Kibana
5 7 (1.03%) Oracle Enterprise Manager
6 6 (0.88%) Grafana
6 6 (0.88%) Oracle RMAN
6 6 (0.88%) Progress Chef
6 6 (0.88%) SCOM
7 5 (0.74%) WMI
8 4 (0.59%) SCCM
8 4 (0.59%) Single Sign-On
9 3 (0.44%) Active Directory Federation Services
9 3 (0.44%) Control-M
9 3 (0.44%) Data Guard
9 3 (0.44%) NetBackup
9 3 (0.44%) vCenter Server
10 2 (0.29%) SCVMM
10 2 (0.29%) WSUS
Vendors
1 225 (33.14%) Microsoft
2 192 (28.28%) Oracle
3 40 (5.89%) VMware
4 37 (5.45%) Databricks
5 32 (4.71%) IBM
6 21 (3.09%) ServiceNow
7 18 (2.65%) Cisco
7 18 (2.65%) Citrix
7 18 (2.65%) Sybase
8 16 (2.36%) SAP
9 13 (1.91%) Google
10 11 (1.62%) Informatica
11 9 (1.33%) Cognos
11 9 (1.33%) CyberArk
11 9 (1.33%) Talend
11 9 (1.33%) UiPath
12 8 (1.18%) Red Hat
12 8 (1.18%) TIBCO
12 8 (1.18%) Veracode
13 7 (1.03%) Salesforce