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 3 October 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
3 Oct 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 135 110 62
Rank change year-on-year -25 -48 -5
Contract jobs citing SQL Server 966 700 1,104
As % of all contract jobs in England 2.08% 2.50% 3.40%
As % of the Database & Business Intelligence category 14.14% 13.73% 18.64%
Number of daily rates quoted 678 514 782
10th Percentile £351 £313 £331
25th Percentile £413 £400 £406
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £488 £498 £503
Median % change year-on-year -2.06% -0.95% -6.07%
75th Percentile £600 £626 £625
90th Percentile £713 £746 £725
UK median daily rate £488 £500 £500
% change year-on-year -2.50% - -4.76%
Number of hourly rates quoted 35 4 6
10th Percentile £13.51 £20.83 £26.83
25th Percentile £17.97 £20.95 £35.00
Median hourly rate £47.54 £21.27 £56.25
Median % change year-on-year +123.51% -62.19% +7.14%
75th Percentile £56.50 £35.52 £65.00
90th Percentile £74.00 £60.71 £82.50
UK median hourly rate £24.25 £21.27 £47.50
% change year-on-year +14.01% -55.22% -9.52%

All Database & BI 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 6,834 5,099 5,923
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in England 14.69% 18.20% 18.26%
Number of daily rates quoted 4,545 3,494 4,037
10th Percentile £350 £338 £350
25th Percentile £419 £413 £425
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £510 £513 £550
Median % change year-on-year -0.49% -6.82% -
75th Percentile £625 £638 £673
90th Percentile £716 £750 £825
UK median daily rate £501 £500 £525
% change year-on-year +0.10% -4.76% -2.78%
Number of hourly rates quoted 257 77 84
10th Percentile £16.42 £20.91 £17.50
25th Percentile £23.00 £29.00 £22.30
Median hourly rate £41.71 £43.50 £37.50
Median % change year-on-year -4.11% +16.00% -28.57%
75th Percentile £60.75 £65.00 £61.60
90th Percentile £74.68 £80.00 £71.50
UK median hourly rate £41.36 £39.48 £35.00
% change year-on-year +4.75% +12.80% -33.33%

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 3 October 2026.

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 3 October 2026.

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 October 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 -24 482 £500 -9.09% 576
North of England -1 185 £475 +7.95% 196
Midlands +7 108 £463 +20.13% 149
North West +1 106 £500 +12.36% 100
South East -44 93 £475 +35.71% 192
West Midlands +3 75 £460 -10.24% 82
Yorkshire -4 73 £450 +5.88% 77
South West -28 40 £675 +45.95% 66
East Midlands -1 33 £525 +60.80% 66
East of England -34 21 £425 -15.00% 68
North East - 6 £425 - 22
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 73 (7.56%) SharePoint
2 46 (4.76%) Confluence
3 39 (4.04%) IIS
4 24 (2.48%) Apache Airflow
5 22 (2.28%) Microsoft Exchange
6 19 (1.97%) Apache
7 18 (1.86%) Apache Spark
8 17 (1.76%) Camunda
9 9 (0.93%) Oracle Workflow
10 7 (0.72%) CMS
11 5 (0.52%) Apache Solr
11 5 (0.52%) Appian
11 5 (0.52%) NetWeaver
11 5 (0.52%) Tomcat
11 5 (0.52%) Tuxedo
12 4 (0.41%) Traefik
12 4 (0.41%) Umbraco
13 3 (0.31%) nginx
13 3 (0.31%) OpenEdge
13 3 (0.31%) Oracle SOA Suite
Applications
1 50 (5.18%) Microsoft Excel
2 30 (3.11%) Microsoft Office
3 10 (1.04%) MS Visio
4 3 (0.31%) Microsoft PowerPoint
4 3 (0.31%) Windchill
5 1 (0.10%) Adobe XD
5 1 (0.10%) Chatbot
Business Applications
1 30 (3.11%) Dynamics CRM
2 19 (1.97%) Remedy ITSM
3 15 (1.55%) SAP S/4HANA
4 7 (0.72%) Aladdin
4 7 (0.72%) OpenText MBPM
4 7 (0.72%) Oracle BPM
5 6 (0.62%) Dynamics AX
5 6 (0.62%) Oracle Payables
6 4 (0.41%) Elite 3E
7 3 (0.31%) Dynamics NAV
7 3 (0.31%) Teamcenter
8 2 (0.21%) Infor LN
8 2 (0.21%) Siebel CRM
9 1 (0.10%) Endur
9 1 (0.10%) FIS Private Capital Suite
9 1 (0.10%) NetSuite
9 1 (0.10%) SAP CRM
9 1 (0.10%) SAP MDG
9 1 (0.10%) SDL Web 8
9 1 (0.10%) Sparx Enterprise Architect
Cloud Services
1 415 (42.96%) Azure
2 204 (21.12%) AWS
3 158 (16.36%) Power Platform
4 120 (12.42%) Azure DevOps
5 90 (9.32%) GitHub
6 57 (5.90%) Entra ID
7 53 (5.49%) Serverless
8 51 (5.28%) Azure Data Factory
9 45 (4.66%) Power Automate
10 43 (4.45%) Microsoft 365
11 42 (4.35%) Dynamics 365
12 39 (4.04%) GCP
12 39 (4.04%) Snowflake
13 38 (3.93%) Azure Monitor
14 35 (3.62%) Azure Synapse Analytics
15 31 (3.21%) GitHub Actions
16 24 (2.48%) Amazon S3
16 24 (2.48%) GitHub Copilot
17 23 (2.38%) Azure Functions
18 22 (2.28%) PaaS
Communications & Networking
1 45 (4.66%) DNS
2 38 (3.93%) DHCP
3 32 (3.31%) Firewall
4 16 (1.66%) SAN
4 16 (1.66%) SSL
5 15 (1.55%) VLAN
6 14 (1.45%) Internet
7 13 (1.35%) TCP/IP
7 13 (1.35%) VPN
8 12 (1.24%) Network Security
9 9 (0.93%) SSH
9 9 (0.93%) Wi-Fi
10 6 (0.62%) HTTPS
10 6 (0.62%) LAN
11 5 (0.52%) Kerberos
11 5 (0.52%) VoIP
11 5 (0.52%) WAN
12 3 (0.31%) IPv4
12 3 (0.31%) IPv6
12 3 (0.31%) Wireless
Database & Business Intelligence
1 157 (16.25%) PostgreSQL
2 129 (13.35%) Power BI
3 99 (10.25%) MySQL
4 98 (10.14%) Relational Database
5 90 (9.32%) SQL Server Integration Services
6 87 (9.01%) Data Warehouse
7 57 (5.90%) Azure SQL Database
7 57 (5.90%) Oracle Database
8 56 (5.80%) SQL Server Reporting Services
9 55 (5.69%) MongoDB
10 32 (3.31%) Data Lake
11 29 (3.00%) Amazon RDS
12 23 (2.38%) NoSQL
13 21 (2.17%) RDBMS
14 20 (2.07%) Redis
14 20 (2.07%) Tableau
15 19 (1.97%) SQL Server Analysis Services
16 18 (1.86%) Metadata
17 15 (1.55%) Amazon Aurora
18 12 (1.24%) Star Schema
Development Applications
1 113 (11.70%) Git
2 73 (7.56%) JIRA
3 53 (5.49%) Jenkins
4 32 (3.31%) GitLab
5 23 (2.38%) Visual Studio
6 20 (2.07%) SQL Server Management Studio (SSMS)
7 18 (1.86%) Maven
7 18 (1.86%) Sonatype Nexus
7 18 (1.86%) Team Foundation Server
8 17 (1.76%) REST Assured
8 17 (1.76%) Selenium
9 14 (1.45%) Claude Code
9 14 (1.45%) Gradle
9 14 (1.45%) Postman
10 13 (1.35%) SonarQube
11 12 (1.24%) Cucumber
11 12 (1.24%) Cypress.io
11 12 (1.24%) JUnit
11 12 (1.24%) Mockito
12 11 (1.14%) WebDriver
General
1 307 (31.78%) Social Skills
2 257 (26.60%) Finance
3 174 (18.01%) Analytical Skills
4 126 (13.04%) Banking
5 71 (7.35%) Public Sector
6 40 (4.14%) Documentation Skills
7 38 (3.93%) Front Office
8 30 (3.11%) Inclusion and Diversity
9 22 (2.28%) Retail
10 21 (2.17%) Investment Banking
11 13 (1.35%) Legal
12 12 (1.24%) Financial Institution
13 11 (1.14%) Back Office
14 9 (0.93%) Manufacturing
15 8 (0.83%) Billing
16 7 (0.72%) Law
16 7 (0.72%) Local Government
17 6 (0.62%) Organisational Skills
17 6 (0.62%) Presentation Skills
17 6 (0.62%) Publishing
Job Titles
1 308 (31.88%) Developer
2 161 (16.67%) Senior
3 132 (13.66%) DBA
4 79 (8.18%) SQL DBA
5 73 (7.56%) Administrator
6 70 (7.25%) C# Developer
7 68 (7.04%) .NET Developer
8 67 (6.94%) Data Engineer
9 65 (6.73%) Lead
10 54 (5.59%) Full-Stack Developer
10 54 (5.59%) Senior Developer
11 53 (5.49%) Analyst
12 49 (5.07%) Infrastructure Engineer
13 46 (4.76%) Architect
14 42 (4.35%) SQL Developer
15 34 (3.52%) Software Engineer
16 29 (3.00%) Azure Engineer
17 27 (2.80%) C# .NET Developer
17 27 (2.80%) Consultant
17 27 (2.80%) SC Cleared DBA
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 278 (28.78%) .NET
2 131 (13.56%) REST
3 87 (9.01%) .NET Framework
4 82 (8.49%) React
5 74 (7.66%) Terraform
6 67 (6.94%) CSS
7 61 (6.31%) HTML
8 60 (6.21%) ASP.NET
9 58 (6.00%) .NET Core
10 57 (5.90%) AngularJS
11 56 (5.80%) Kafka
12 52 (5.38%) RESTful
13 50 (5.18%) JSON
14 44 (4.55%) Web Services
15 43 (4.45%) XML
16 38 (3.93%) SOAP
17 34 (3.52%) Spring Boot
18 32 (3.31%) OAuth
19 28 (2.90%) Spring
20 26 (2.69%) WPF
Miscellaneous
1 60 (6.21%) Onboarding
2 59 (6.11%) Cloud Native
3 55 (5.69%) Enterprise Software
4 48 (4.97%) Data Structures
5 43 (4.45%) Replication
6 42 (4.35%) Clustering
7 41 (4.24%) Product Ownership
8 40 (4.14%) Self-Motivation
9 38 (3.93%) Data Centre
10 35 (3.62%) Management Information System
11 31 (3.21%) Legacy Systems
12 19 (1.97%) PKI
13 18 (1.86%) Distributed Systems
14 14 (1.45%) Derivative
14 14 (1.45%) Low-Code
14 14 (1.45%) Virtual Team
15 13 (1.35%) Algorithms
16 11 (1.14%) Legacy Applications
16 11 (1.14%) Taxonomies
17 10 (1.04%) Fixed Income
Operating Systems
1 254 (26.29%) Windows
2 151 (15.63%) Windows Server
3 94 (9.73%) Linux
4 36 (3.73%) Unix
5 17 (1.76%) Solaris
6 13 (1.35%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
7 11 (1.14%) Ubuntu
8 8 (0.83%) VMS
9 7 (0.72%) CentOS
9 7 (0.72%) Windows Server 2019
10 6 (0.62%) Android
10 6 (0.62%) Windows Server 2012
11 4 (0.41%) Windows 10
12 3 (0.31%) Windows Server 2008
12 3 (0.31%) Windows Server 2016
13 2 (0.21%) AIX
13 2 (0.21%) Windows Server 2003
14 1 (0.10%) Data ONTAP
14 1 (0.10%) SUSE
14 1 (0.10%) Windows XP
Processes & Methodologies
1 255 (26.40%) DevOps
2 242 (25.05%) Agile
3 237 (24.53%) CI/CD
4 191 (19.77%) Problem-Solving
5 180 (18.63%) Migration
6 140 (14.49%) Business Intelligence
7 136 (14.08%) ETL
8 132 (13.66%) Performance Tuning
9 128 (13.25%) Data Modelling
10 127 (13.15%) AI
11 119 (12.32%) Stakeholder Management
12 113 (11.70%) Continuous Improvement
13 108 (11.18%) Disaster Recovery
14 90 (9.32%) Microservices
15 86 (8.90%) Analytics
15 86 (8.90%) Test Automation
16 85 (8.80%) Software Engineering
17 83 (8.59%) Validation
18 75 (7.76%) Mentoring
19 71 (7.35%) Full-Stack Development
Programming Languages
1 581 (60.14%) SQL
2 280 (28.99%) C#
3 179 (18.53%) Python
4 173 (17.91%) PowerShell
5 161 (16.67%) T-SQL
6 148 (15.32%) JavaScript
7 79 (8.18%) Java
8 61 (6.31%) TypeScript
9 58 (6.00%) PL/SQL
10 34 (3.52%) Bash
11 18 (1.86%) VB
12 16 (1.66%) VBA
13 15 (1.55%) Data Analysis Expressions
14 11 (1.14%) Shell Script
15 8 (0.83%) Bicep
15 8 (0.83%) PHP
15 8 (0.83%) Scala
16 7 (0.72%) Go
16 7 (0.72%) VB.NET
17 6 (0.62%) XPath
Qualifications
1 241 (24.95%) Security Cleared
2 178 (18.43%) SC Cleared
3 107 (11.08%) Degree
4 57 (5.90%) Microsoft Certification
5 51 (5.28%) DV Cleared
6 33 (3.42%) Computer Science Degree
7 28 (2.90%) Azure Certification
8 25 (2.59%) BPSS Clearance
9 15 (1.55%) AWS Certification
10 13 (1.35%) ISTQB
11 12 (1.24%) Oracle Certification
12 11 (1.14%) OCP
13 9 (0.93%) AWS Certified Solutions Architect
13 9 (0.93%) ITIL Foundation Certificate
13 9 (0.93%) Master's Degree
14 5 (0.52%) DBS Check
15 4 (0.41%) CISSP
15 4 (0.41%) PhD
16 3 (0.31%) ISTQB Foundation Certification
16 3 (0.31%) TOGAF Certification
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 95 (9.83%) QA
2 84 (8.70%) Data Quality
3 36 (3.73%) GDPR
4 34 (3.52%) Accessibility
5 25 (2.59%) WCAG
6 22 (2.28%) ISO/IEC 27001
7 20 (2.07%) NIST
8 16 (1.66%) SLA
9 5 (0.52%) ISO 9000
10 3 (0.31%) Actionable Recommendations
10 3 (0.31%) Basel III
10 3 (0.31%) Software Quality Assurance
11 2 (0.21%) California Consumer Privacy Act
11 2 (0.21%) COREP
11 2 (0.21%) FINREP
11 2 (0.21%) Government Security Classifications
11 2 (0.21%) Sarbanes-Oxley
11 2 (0.21%) SOC 2
12 1 (0.10%) GMP
12 1 (0.10%) ISO 20022
System Software
1 127 (13.15%) Active Directory
2 67 (6.94%) Docker
3 38 (3.93%) VMware Infrastructure
4 32 (3.31%) Virtual Machines
5 18 (1.86%) Oracle RAC
6 10 (1.04%) Hyper-V
7 7 (0.72%) Virtual Desktop
8 6 (0.62%) vSphere
9 5 (0.52%) VMware ESXi
10 4 (0.41%) Virtual Servers
11 3 (0.31%) Dovecot
11 3 (0.31%) Postfix
12 1 (0.10%) BitLocker
12 1 (0.10%) HDFS
12 1 (0.10%) SRDF
12 1 (0.10%) Terminal Services
Systems Management
1 80 (8.28%) Kubernetes
2 45 (4.66%) Ansible
3 20 (2.07%) SCOM
4 14 (1.45%) Data Guard
4 14 (1.45%) Microsoft Intune
5 11 (1.14%) Microsoft Clustering
5 11 (1.14%) SCCM
6 10 (1.04%) Oracle Enterprise Manager
7 8 (0.83%) HAProxy
7 8 (0.83%) Single Sign-On
8 7 (0.72%) Grafana
8 7 (0.72%) Istio
8 7 (0.72%) WSUS
9 6 (0.62%) Failover Clustering
9 6 (0.62%) Oracle RMAN
9 6 (0.62%) Prometheus
10 5 (0.52%) ITRS Geneos
11 3 (0.31%) Enterprise Manager Cloud Control
11 3 (0.31%) PowerCLI
11 3 (0.31%) Puppet
Vendors
1 350 (36.23%) Microsoft
2 259 (26.81%) Oracle
3 73 (7.56%) Databricks
4 63 (6.52%) VMware
5 44 (4.55%) CyberArk
5 44 (4.55%) ServiceNow
6 36 (3.73%) Citrix
7 31 (3.21%) SAP
8 29 (3.00%) BeyondTrust
9 26 (2.69%) IBM
10 21 (2.17%) Cisco
11 20 (2.07%) Informatica
12 19 (1.97%) BMC
12 19 (1.97%) Remedy
13 16 (1.66%) Google
14 15 (1.55%) Dynatrace
14 15 (1.55%) Red Hat
15 14 (1.45%) Splunk
16 12 (1.24%) Alteryx
17 11 (1.14%) SolarWinds