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 22 November 2025, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

 6 months to
22 Nov 2025		 Same period 2024 Same period 2023
Rank 128 73 62
Rank change year-on-year -55 -11 -16
Contract jobs citing SQL Server 680 923 1,428
As % of all contract jobs in England 2.22% 2.95% 3.61%
As % of the Database & Business Intelligence category 12.62% 16.61% 21.70%
Number of daily rates quoted 493 659 1,031
10th Percentile £325 £325 £363
25th Percentile £403 £400 £413
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £480 £500 £550
Median % change year-on-year -4.00% -9.09% -
75th Percentile £600 £625 £650
90th Percentile £700 £713 £750
UK median daily rate £486 £500 £525
% change year-on-year -2.75% -4.76% -
Number of hourly rates quoted 5 7 20
10th Percentile £20.86 £27.71 £20.17
25th Percentile £21.02 £38.75 £45.13
Median hourly rate £21.27 £60.50 £53.75
Median % change year-on-year -64.84% +12.56% +28.74%
75th Percentile £70.00 £65.00 £62.50
90th Percentile £74.50 £79.00 £64.96
UK median hourly rate £21.27 £32.50 £52.50
% change year-on-year -34.55% -38.10% +31.25%

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 5,388 5,557 6,580
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in England 17.62% 17.77% 16.64%
Number of daily rates quoted 3,747 3,717 4,680
10th Percentile £328 £345 £355
25th Percentile £412 £425 £450
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £550 £550
Median % change year-on-year -9.09% - -
75th Percentile £625 £663 £650
90th Percentile £725 £788 £750
UK median daily rate £500 £529 £534
% change year-on-year -5.48% -0.94% -2.91%
Number of hourly rates quoted 78 78 138
10th Percentile £20.72 £17.85 £19.05
25th Percentile £29.06 £22.93 £24.86
Median hourly rate £44.25 £35.00 £48.45
Median % change year-on-year +26.43% -27.76% -3.11%
75th Percentile £65.00 £53.75 £68.31
90th Percentile £85.30 £65.30 £78.00
UK median hourly rate £43.50 £30.11 £47.70
% change year-on-year +44.49% -36.88% +5.99%

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 22 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 22 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 22 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 -41 393 £525 -4.55% 286
North of England -7 93 £445 -7.53% 182
South East -41 73 £441 -11.75% 186
North West -10 54 £450 +0.56% 111
Yorkshire -20 39 £425 -24.31% 58
East of England -7 30 £525 +40.00% 34
South West -27 29 £485 -3.00% 45
Midlands -87 29 £375 -16.48% 110
West Midlands -55 16 £438 -22.84% 74
East Midlands -38 12 £325 -12.16% 35
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 32 (4.71%) IIS
2 28 (4.12%) Confluence
3 26 (3.82%) SharePoint
4 16 (2.35%) Apache
4 16 (2.35%) WebSphere
5 13 (1.91%) Microsoft Exchange
6 10 (1.47%) Apache Spark
6 10 (1.47%) Oracle SOA Suite
7 9 (1.32%) WebLogic
8 5 (0.74%) JBoss
9 4 (0.59%) SharePoint Server
10 3 (0.44%) Apache Airflow
10 3 (0.44%) CICS
10 3 (0.44%) CMS
10 3 (0.44%) Oracle Workflow
10 3 (0.44%) Skype for Business
10 3 (0.44%) Tomcat
11 2 (0.29%) HCL Notes
11 2 (0.29%) SAS
11 2 (0.29%) WildFly
Applications
1 63 (9.26%) Microsoft Excel
2 7 (1.03%) Microsoft Project
2 7 (1.03%) MS Visio
3 6 (0.88%) Microsoft PowerPoint
4 5 (0.74%) Microsoft Office
5 2 (0.29%) Trello
5 2 (0.29%) Windchill
6 1 (0.15%) ProjectWise
Business Applications
1 9 (1.32%) Advent Geneva
1 9 (1.32%) Maximo
2 8 (1.18%) Dynamics CRM
2 8 (1.18%) Oracle BPM
3 7 (1.03%) Fidessa
4 6 (0.88%) Salesforce CRM
5 5 (0.74%) BusinessWorks
5 5 (0.74%) OpenText MBPM
6 4 (0.59%) Aladdin
6 4 (0.59%) Endur
6 4 (0.59%) thinkFolio
7 3 (0.44%) SAP S/4HANA
8 2 (0.29%) Dynamics AX
8 2 (0.29%) Dynamics NAV
8 2 (0.29%) Kondor
8 2 (0.29%) Loan IQ
8 2 (0.29%) Oracle EBS
8 2 (0.29%) Oracle Procure-to-Pay
8 2 (0.29%) Teamcenter
8 2 (0.29%) Temenos T24
Cloud Services
1 259 (38.09%) Azure
2 120 (17.65%) AWS
3 100 (14.71%) Power Platform
4 54 (7.94%) Azure DevOps
5 40 (5.88%) GCP
5 40 (5.88%) GitHub
6 28 (4.12%) Azure Data Factory
7 24 (3.53%) Microsoft 365
7 24 (3.53%) Serverless
8 22 (3.24%) SaaS
9 20 (2.94%) Azure Synapse Analytics
9 20 (2.94%) Dynamics 365
9 20 (2.94%) GitHub Actions
10 19 (2.79%) Azure Service Bus
11 18 (2.65%) Amazon S3
11 18 (2.65%) Azure Logic Apps
11 18 (2.65%) Snowflake
12 17 (2.50%) Power Automate
13 16 (2.35%) PowerApps
14 14 (2.06%) Azure Cosmos DB
Communications & Networking
1 29 (4.26%) Firewall
2 17 (2.50%) DNS
2 17 (2.50%) TCP/IP
3 13 (1.91%) Internet
4 10 (1.47%) HTTP
5 9 (1.32%) LAN
6 7 (1.03%) DHCP
6 7 (1.03%) SSL
7 5 (0.74%) NAS
7 5 (0.74%) Skype
8 4 (0.59%) NetScaler
8 4 (0.59%) SAN
9 3 (0.44%) VSAN
9 3 (0.44%) Wireshark
10 2 (0.29%) iSCSI
10 2 (0.29%) RS-232
10 2 (0.29%) VLAN
10 2 (0.29%) VPN
10 2 (0.29%) WebEx
10 2 (0.29%) X.400
Database & Business Intelligence
1 87 (12.79%) Power BI
2 84 (12.35%) PostgreSQL
2 84 (12.35%) Relational Database
3 70 (10.29%) Oracle Database
4 60 (8.82%) Data Warehouse
5 57 (8.38%) SQL Server Integration Services
6 55 (8.09%) SQL Server Reporting Services
7 43 (6.32%) MySQL
8 42 (6.18%) Azure SQL Database
8 42 (6.18%) MongoDB
9 33 (4.85%) NoSQL
10 32 (4.71%) DB2
11 28 (4.12%) Amazon RDS
12 20 (2.94%) Big Data
13 19 (2.79%) Data Lake
13 19 (2.79%) RDBMS
14 18 (2.65%) Redis
15 15 (2.21%) Power Query
16 14 (2.06%) Tableau
17 12 (1.76%) Metadata
Development Applications
1 64 (9.41%) Git
2 44 (6.47%) JIRA
3 26 (3.82%) Jenkins
4 21 (3.09%) GitLab
5 17 (2.50%) Bitbucket
5 17 (2.50%) Maven
6 15 (2.21%) SpecFlow
6 15 (2.21%) Visual Studio
7 13 (1.91%) JUnit
7 13 (1.91%) Selenium
8 12 (1.76%) Cucumber
9 10 (1.47%) Mockito
9 10 (1.47%) Octopus Deploy
9 10 (1.47%) Sonatype Nexus
10 9 (1.32%) TeamCity
11 8 (1.18%) Postman
12 7 (1.03%) SonarQube
12 7 (1.03%) webpack
13 6 (0.88%) Eclipse
13 6 (0.88%) ERwin
General
1 234 (34.41%) Social Skills
2 214 (31.47%) Finance
3 100 (14.71%) Analytical Skills
4 96 (14.12%) Banking
5 37 (5.44%) Public Sector
6 35 (5.15%) Documentation Skills
7 30 (4.41%) Investment Banking
8 21 (3.09%) Front Office
9 18 (2.65%) Financial Institution
10 16 (2.35%) Inclusion and Diversity
11 11 (1.62%) Retail
12 10 (1.47%) Back Office
12 10 (1.47%) Presentation Skills
13 8 (1.18%) Legal
14 7 (1.03%) Local Government
14 7 (1.03%) Manufacturing
15 6 (0.88%) Influencing Skills
16 5 (0.74%) Organisational Skills
17 4 (0.59%) Law
18 3 (0.44%) Marketing
Job Titles
1 261 (38.38%) Developer
2 73 (10.74%) Senior
3 65 (9.56%) C# Developer
4 59 (8.68%) Analyst
5 52 (7.65%) .NET Developer
6 51 (7.50%) Data Engineer
7 44 (6.47%) Architect
8 42 (6.18%) DBA
9 40 (5.88%) Senior Developer
10 36 (5.29%) Consultant
11 26 (3.82%) Angular Developer
12 23 (3.38%) Lead
12 23 (3.38%) SQL Developer
13 22 (3.24%) C# .NET Developer
13 22 (3.24%) Data Analyst
13 22 (3.24%) Full-Stack Developer
14 21 (3.09%) Applications Support
14 21 (3.09%) SQL DBA
15 20 (2.94%) Java Developer
16 19 (2.79%) Software Engineer
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 188 (27.65%) .NET
2 86 (12.65%) .NET Framework
3 65 (9.56%) HTML
4 60 (8.82%) CSS
5 56 (8.24%) REST
6 52 (7.65%) AngularJS
7 48 (7.06%) XML
8 46 (6.76%) React
9 42 (6.18%) Entity Framework
10 40 (5.88%) RESTful
11 37 (5.44%) .NET Core
12 35 (5.15%) Kafka
12 35 (5.15%) SOAP
13 34 (5.00%) Web Services
14 26 (3.82%) ASP.NET
14 26 (3.82%) WPF
15 24 (3.53%) JSON
16 23 (3.38%) NHibernate
17 19 (2.79%) Middleware
18 18 (2.65%) Node.js
Miscellaneous
1 27 (3.97%) Cloud Native
1 27 (3.97%) Legacy Systems
2 24 (3.53%) Derivative
3 22 (3.24%) Foreign Exchange (FX)
4 20 (2.94%) Data Protection Act
4 20 (2.94%) Product Ownership
5 19 (2.79%) Management Information System
6 17 (2.50%) Enterprise Software
7 16 (2.35%) Replication
8 15 (2.21%) PKI
9 14 (2.06%) Credit Risk
9 14 (2.06%) Onboarding
10 13 (1.91%) Reinsurance
11 12 (1.76%) Fixed Income
12 11 (1.62%) Clustering
12 11 (1.62%) Distributed Systems
12 11 (1.62%) Hedge funds
13 10 (1.47%) Linux Command Line
13 10 (1.47%) Market Risk
13 10 (1.47%) Virtual Team
Operating Systems
1 120 (17.65%) Windows
2 86 (12.65%) Linux
3 58 (8.53%) Windows Server
4 12 (1.76%) Unix
5 10 (1.47%) Windows 10
6 7 (1.03%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
6 7 (1.03%) Windows Server 2016
7 5 (0.74%) Windows Server 2019
8 4 (0.59%) VMS
9 2 (0.29%) Solaris
9 2 (0.29%) Ubuntu
9 2 (0.29%) Windows Server 2003
9 2 (0.29%) Windows Server 2012
10 1 (0.15%) AIX
10 1 (0.15%) Android
10 1 (0.15%) Mac OS
10 1 (0.15%) Mac OS X
10 1 (0.15%) SUSE
10 1 (0.15%) Windows 7
10 1 (0.15%) Windows Server 2008
Processes & Methodologies
1 174 (25.59%) Agile
2 162 (23.82%) Problem-Solving
3 140 (20.59%) DevOps
4 131 (19.26%) CI/CD
5 108 (15.88%) Migration
6 106 (15.59%) Business Intelligence
7 96 (14.12%) ETL
8 83 (12.21%) Microservices
9 71 (10.44%) Data Modelling
10 63 (9.26%) Data Analysis
11 59 (8.68%) Test Automation
12 56 (8.24%) Data Migration
12 56 (8.24%) Performance Tuning
13 55 (8.09%) Full-Stack Development
14 54 (7.94%) Analytics
15 48 (7.06%) Software Engineering
16 46 (6.76%) Data Governance
17 45 (6.62%) Disaster Recovery
17 45 (6.62%) Scrum
18 44 (6.47%) Clean Code
Programming Languages
1 382 (56.18%) SQL
2 191 (28.09%) C#
3 127 (18.68%) Python
4 92 (13.53%) JavaScript
5 82 (12.06%) T-SQL
6 61 (8.97%) Java
7 50 (7.35%) PowerShell
8 43 (6.32%) PL/SQL
9 33 (4.85%) Bash
10 29 (4.26%) VBA
11 21 (3.09%) VB
12 19 (2.79%) Data Analysis Expressions
12 19 (2.79%) TypeScript
13 15 (2.21%) Shell Script
14 8 (1.18%) PHP
15 6 (0.88%) COBOL
15 6 (0.88%) Scala
15 6 (0.88%) X++
16 5 (0.74%) VB.NET
16 5 (0.74%) XPath
Qualifications
1 80 (11.76%) Security Cleared
2 68 (10.00%) Degree
3 61 (8.97%) SC Cleared
4 27 (3.97%) Computer Science Degree
5 20 (2.94%) Microsoft Certification
6 13 (1.91%) DV Cleared
7 11 (1.62%) Azure Certification
8 9 (1.32%) MCSE
9 6 (0.88%) BPSS Clearance
9 6 (0.88%) HNC
9 6 (0.88%) HND
9 6 (0.88%) Master's Degree
9 6 (0.88%) MCP
10 5 (0.74%) AWS Certification
10 5 (0.74%) ITIL Certification
11 3 (0.44%) CCNP
11 3 (0.44%) Cisco Certification
11 3 (0.44%) PMP
12 2 (0.29%) ISEB
12 2 (0.29%) OCP
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 62 (9.12%) QA
2 52 (7.65%) Data Quality
3 14 (2.06%) Accessibility
3 14 (2.06%) GDPR
4 11 (1.62%) MiFID
5 10 (1.47%) SLA
6 5 (0.74%) EMIR
7 4 (0.59%) ISO/IEC 27001
7 4 (0.59%) Sarbanes-Oxley
8 3 (0.44%) WCAG
9 2 (0.29%) Basel III
9 2 (0.29%) HIPAA
9 2 (0.29%) PCI DSS
9 2 (0.29%) PMO
9 2 (0.29%) Solvency II
10 1 (0.15%) IFRS 17
10 1 (0.15%) ISO 19650
10 1 (0.15%) NCSC
10 1 (0.15%) NIST
10 1 (0.15%) NIST 800
System Software
1 58 (8.53%) Docker
2 43 (6.32%) Active Directory
3 27 (3.97%) VMware Infrastructure
4 12 (1.76%) Oracle RAC
5 11 (1.62%) Virtual Machines
6 9 (1.32%) zsh
7 8 (1.18%) Hyper-V
7 8 (1.18%) VMware NSX
8 4 (0.59%) vSphere
9 3 (0.44%) NFS
9 3 (0.44%) VMware ESXi
10 2 (0.29%) GPFS
10 2 (0.29%) GridGain
10 2 (0.29%) NDS
10 2 (0.29%) NetIQ eDirectory
10 2 (0.29%) Virtual Desktop
11 1 (0.15%) KVM
11 1 (0.15%) Xen
11 1 (0.15%) XenApp
11 1 (0.15%) XenDesktop
Systems Management
1 41 (6.03%) Kubernetes
2 27 (3.97%) Ansible
3 23 (3.38%) Terraform
4 14 (2.06%) Data Guard
5 13 (1.91%) Grafana
5 13 (1.91%) Oracle RMAN
5 13 (1.91%) vCenter Server
6 12 (1.76%) Puppet
7 11 (1.62%) NetBackup
8 10 (1.47%) yum
9 9 (1.32%) Active Directory Federation Services
10 8 (1.18%) Microsoft Intune
11 7 (1.03%) SCCM
12 6 (0.88%) Oracle Enterprise Manager
12 6 (0.88%) SCOM
12 6 (0.88%) Single Sign-On
13 5 (0.74%) Control-M
13 5 (0.74%) Prometheus
13 5 (0.74%) TIBCO Hawk
14 4 (0.59%) Progress Chef
Vendors
1 219 (32.21%) Microsoft
2 217 (31.91%) Oracle
3 41 (6.03%) VMware
4 34 (5.00%) Citrix
5 28 (4.12%) Databricks
6 26 (3.82%) IBM
7 22 (3.24%) Google
8 19 (2.79%) SAP
9 15 (2.21%) Salesforce
10 13 (1.91%) CyberArk
11 11 (1.62%) Cisco
11 11 (1.62%) Informatica
11 11 (1.62%) Veritas
12 10 (1.47%) Sybase
13 9 (1.32%) Advent
13 9 (1.32%) ServiceNow
14 8 (1.18%) Atlassian
15 7 (1.03%) Cognos
15 7 (1.03%) UiPath
15 7 (1.03%) Veeam
797 SQL Server jobs in England