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 26 September 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
26 Sep 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 135 109 62
Rank change year-on-year -26 -47 -7
Contract jobs citing SQL Server 962 705 1,133
As % of all contract jobs in England 2.07% 2.52% 3.46%
As % of the Database & Business Intelligence category 13.89% 13.82% 19.10%
Number of daily rates quoted 675 519 801
10th Percentile £356 £313 £325
25th Percentile £413 £394 £410
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £488 £500 £507
Median % change year-on-year -2.50% -1.32% -5.73%
75th Percentile £600 £638 £625
90th Percentile £713 £750 £725
UK median daily rate £481 £500 £500
% change year-on-year -3.80% - -4.76%
Number of hourly rates quoted 36 5 7
10th Percentile £13.51 £20.86 £27.71
25th Percentile £17.97 £21.02 £34.00
Median hourly rate £47.54 £21.27 £47.50
Median % change year-on-year +123.51% -55.22% -3.73%
75th Percentile £57.50 £77.50 £65.00
90th Percentile £74.00 £84.25 £79.00
UK median hourly rate £36.02 £72.50 £43.00
% change year-on-year -50.32% +68.60% -6.70%

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 6,924 5,101 5,933
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in England 14.87% 18.26% 18.12%
Number of daily rates quoted 4,623 3,514 4,071
10th Percentile £352 £339 £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 £675
90th Percentile £713 £750 £825
UK median daily rate £500 £500 £530
% change year-on-year - -5.66% -1.85%
Number of hourly rates quoted 244 74 83
10th Percentile £15.95 £21.02 £17.50
25th Percentile £22.96 £29.06 £21.63
Median hourly rate £39.00 £43.50 £35.00
Median % change year-on-year -10.34% +24.29% -36.07%
75th Percentile £57.81 £65.00 £61.60
90th Percentile £74.68 £80.00 £71.50
UK median hourly rate £40.18 £42.00 £35.00
% change year-on-year -4.32% +19.99% -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 26 September 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 26 September 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 26 September 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 -30 471 £500 -9.09% 541
North of England -4 184 £475 +9.20% 185
Midlands +10 111 £461 +19.81% 137
North West +1 105 £485 +10.23% 104
South East -49 93 £475 +40.74% 162
West Midlands +1 76 £460 -10.24% 78
Yorkshire -4 75 £450 +5.88% 69
South West -28 42 £630 +36.22% 35
East Midlands +1 34 £525 +60.80% 59
East of England -40 25 £425 -15.00% 60
North East -38 4 £425 - 15
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 (7.59%) SharePoint
2 47 (4.89%) Confluence
3 38 (3.95%) IIS
4 25 (2.60%) Apache Airflow
5 22 (2.29%) Microsoft Exchange
6 21 (2.18%) Apache
7 18 (1.87%) Apache Spark
7 18 (1.87%) Camunda
8 9 (0.94%) Oracle Workflow
9 7 (0.73%) CMS
10 6 (0.62%) Appian
11 5 (0.52%) Apache Solr
11 5 (0.52%) NetWeaver
11 5 (0.52%) Tuxedo
12 4 (0.42%) OpenEdge
12 4 (0.42%) Traefik
12 4 (0.42%) Umbraco
13 3 (0.31%) nginx
13 3 (0.31%) Tomcat
14 2 (0.21%) Oracle SOA Suite
Applications
1 50 (5.20%) Microsoft Excel
2 30 (3.12%) 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
5 1 (0.10%) Spreadsheet
Business Applications
1 34 (3.53%) Dynamics CRM
2 20 (2.08%) Remedy ITSM
3 14 (1.46%) SAP S/4HANA
4 7 (0.73%) OpenText MBPM
4 7 (0.73%) Oracle BPM
5 6 (0.62%) Aladdin
5 6 (0.62%) Dynamics AX
5 6 (0.62%) Oracle Payables
6 4 (0.42%) Elite 3E
7 3 (0.31%) Dynamics NAV
8 2 (0.21%) Endur
8 2 (0.21%) Infor LN
8 2 (0.21%) Siebel CRM
8 2 (0.21%) Teamcenter
9 1 (0.10%) Findur
9 1 (0.10%) FIS Private Capital Suite
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
1 414 (43.04%) Azure
2 199 (20.69%) AWS
3 154 (16.01%) Power Platform
4 117 (12.16%) Azure DevOps
5 88 (9.15%) GitHub
6 53 (5.51%) Azure Data Factory
7 52 (5.41%) Entra ID
8 51 (5.30%) Serverless
9 46 (4.78%) Dynamics 365
9 46 (4.78%) Power Automate
10 40 (4.16%) Microsoft 365
11 39 (4.05%) Snowflake
12 37 (3.85%) GCP
13 35 (3.64%) Azure Monitor
14 32 (3.33%) Azure Synapse Analytics
14 32 (3.33%) GitHub Actions
15 22 (2.29%) Amazon S3
15 22 (2.29%) Azure Functions
15 22 (2.29%) GitHub Copilot
15 22 (2.29%) PowerApps
Communications & Networking
1 44 (4.57%) DNS
2 39 (4.05%) DHCP
3 32 (3.33%) Firewall
4 16 (1.66%) VLAN
5 15 (1.56%) SAN
6 14 (1.46%) Internet
6 14 (1.46%) SSL
7 13 (1.35%) TCP/IP
7 13 (1.35%) VPN
8 12 (1.25%) Network Security
9 9 (0.94%) SSH
9 9 (0.94%) 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 4 (0.42%) IPv4
12 4 (0.42%) IPv6
13 3 (0.31%) Wireless
Database & Business Intelligence
1 152 (15.80%) PostgreSQL
2 125 (12.99%) Power BI
3 93 (9.67%) MySQL
3 93 (9.67%) Relational Database
4 91 (9.46%) SQL Server Integration Services
5 88 (9.15%) Data Warehouse
6 56 (5.82%) Oracle Database
7 55 (5.72%) SQL Server Reporting Services
8 52 (5.41%) Azure SQL Database
8 52 (5.41%) MongoDB
9 34 (3.53%) Data Lake
10 24 (2.49%) Amazon RDS
11 23 (2.39%) NoSQL
12 21 (2.18%) RDBMS
13 20 (2.08%) Redis
13 20 (2.08%) SQL Server Analysis Services
14 19 (1.98%) Tableau
15 16 (1.66%) Metadata
16 13 (1.35%) Amazon Aurora
17 12 (1.25%) Star Schema
Development Applications
1 109 (11.33%) Git
2 72 (7.48%) JIRA
3 52 (5.41%) Jenkins
4 32 (3.33%) GitLab
5 23 (2.39%) Visual Studio
6 21 (2.18%) SQL Server Management Studio (SSMS)
7 18 (1.87%) Sonatype Nexus
8 17 (1.77%) Maven
8 17 (1.77%) REST Assured
8 17 (1.77%) Selenium
8 17 (1.77%) Team Foundation Server
9 14 (1.46%) Postman
10 13 (1.35%) Gradle
10 13 (1.35%) SonarQube
11 12 (1.25%) Claude Code
11 12 (1.25%) Cucumber
11 12 (1.25%) Cypress.io
11 12 (1.25%) JUnit
11 12 (1.25%) Mockito
12 11 (1.14%) WebDriver
General
1 301 (31.29%) Social Skills
2 249 (25.88%) Finance
3 175 (18.19%) Analytical Skills
4 122 (12.68%) Banking
5 74 (7.69%) Public Sector
6 40 (4.16%) Front Office
7 39 (4.05%) Documentation Skills
8 30 (3.12%) Inclusion and Diversity
9 22 (2.29%) Investment Banking
10 21 (2.18%) Retail
11 12 (1.25%) Legal
12 11 (1.14%) Financial Institution
13 10 (1.04%) Back Office
14 8 (0.83%) Billing
14 8 (0.83%) Manufacturing
15 7 (0.73%) Law
15 7 (0.73%) Local Government
15 7 (0.73%) Organisational Skills
16 6 (0.62%) Presentation Skills
16 6 (0.62%) Publishing
Job Titles
1 313 (32.54%) Developer
2 163 (16.94%) Senior
3 127 (13.20%) DBA
4 78 (8.11%) SQL DBA
5 71 (7.38%) Administrator
5 71 (7.38%) Data Engineer
6 70 (7.28%) C# Developer
6 70 (7.28%) Lead
7 69 (7.17%) .NET Developer
8 56 (5.82%) Senior Developer
9 54 (5.61%) Full-Stack Developer
10 52 (5.41%) Analyst
11 48 (4.99%) Architect
12 46 (4.78%) Infrastructure Engineer
13 45 (4.68%) SQL Developer
14 33 (3.43%) Software Engineer
15 27 (2.81%) C# .NET Developer
15 27 (2.81%) Oracle DBA
16 26 (2.70%) SC Cleared DBA
17 25 (2.60%) Azure Engineer
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 275 (28.59%) .NET
2 127 (13.20%) REST
3 89 (9.25%) .NET Framework
4 83 (8.63%) React
5 69 (7.17%) Terraform
6 66 (6.86%) CSS
7 60 (6.24%) ASP.NET
7 60 (6.24%) HTML
8 59 (6.13%) .NET Core
9 56 (5.82%) AngularJS
10 55 (5.72%) Kafka
11 48 (4.99%) JSON
11 48 (4.99%) RESTful
12 42 (4.37%) Web Services
12 42 (4.37%) XML
13 38 (3.95%) SOAP
14 33 (3.43%) Spring Boot
15 29 (3.01%) OAuth
16 27 (2.81%) Spring
17 25 (2.60%) WinForms
Miscellaneous
1 60 (6.24%) Onboarding
2 59 (6.13%) Cloud Native
3 52 (5.41%) Enterprise Software
4 49 (5.09%) Data Structures
5 42 (4.37%) Clustering
6 40 (4.16%) Product Ownership
6 40 (4.16%) Self-Motivation
7 38 (3.95%) Replication
8 35 (3.64%) Management Information System
9 33 (3.43%) Data Centre
10 31 (3.22%) Legacy Systems
11 18 (1.87%) Distributed Systems
11 18 (1.87%) PKI
12 15 (1.56%) Virtual Team
13 14 (1.46%) Low-Code
14 13 (1.35%) Derivative
15 12 (1.25%) Algorithms
16 11 (1.14%) NHS
16 11 (1.14%) Taxonomies
17 10 (1.04%) Fixed Income
Operating Systems
1 247 (25.68%) Windows
2 144 (14.97%) Windows Server
3 90 (9.36%) Linux
4 36 (3.74%) Unix
5 16 (1.66%) Solaris
6 12 (1.25%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
7 11 (1.14%) Ubuntu
8 8 (0.83%) VMS
9 7 (0.73%) CentOS
9 7 (0.73%) Windows Server 2012
9 7 (0.73%) Windows Server 2019
10 6 (0.62%) Android
11 5 (0.52%) Windows 10
12 4 (0.42%) Windows Server 2008
12 4 (0.42%) Windows Server 2016
13 2 (0.21%) AIX
13 2 (0.21%) Windows Server 2003
14 1 (0.10%) Windows XP
Processes & Methodologies
1 254 (26.40%) DevOps
2 240 (24.95%) Agile
3 234 (24.32%) CI/CD
4 189 (19.65%) Problem-Solving
5 176 (18.30%) Migration
6 140 (14.55%) ETL
7 136 (14.14%) Business Intelligence
7 136 (14.14%) Data Modelling
8 127 (13.20%) Performance Tuning
9 124 (12.89%) AI
10 116 (12.06%) Stakeholder Management
11 105 (10.91%) Continuous Improvement
12 98 (10.19%) Disaster Recovery
13 89 (9.25%) Microservices
14 88 (9.15%) Test Automation
15 86 (8.94%) Analytics
16 84 (8.73%) Software Engineering
17 76 (7.90%) Mentoring
18 75 (7.80%) Validation
19 72 (7.48%) Full-Stack Development
Programming Languages
1 571 (59.36%) SQL
2 276 (28.69%) C#
3 178 (18.50%) Python
4 170 (17.67%) PowerShell
5 157 (16.32%) T-SQL
6 150 (15.59%) JavaScript
7 80 (8.32%) Java
8 61 (6.34%) TypeScript
9 57 (5.93%) PL/SQL
10 33 (3.43%) Bash
11 17 (1.77%) Data Analysis Expressions
11 17 (1.77%) VB
12 15 (1.56%) VBA
13 10 (1.04%) Shell Script
14 8 (0.83%) PHP
14 8 (0.83%) Scala
15 7 (0.73%) VB.NET
16 6 (0.62%) Bicep
16 6 (0.62%) Go
16 6 (0.62%) XPath
Qualifications
1 242 (25.16%) Security Cleared
2 182 (18.92%) SC Cleared
3 106 (11.02%) Degree
4 56 (5.82%) Microsoft Certification
5 50 (5.20%) DV Cleared
6 32 (3.33%) Computer Science Degree
7 27 (2.81%) Azure Certification
8 26 (2.70%) BPSS Clearance
9 14 (1.46%) AWS Certification
10 13 (1.35%) ISTQB
11 12 (1.25%) Oracle Certification
12 11 (1.14%) OCP
13 9 (0.94%) ITIL Foundation Certificate
13 9 (0.94%) Master's Degree
14 8 (0.83%) AWS Certified Solutions Architect
15 5 (0.52%) CISSP
15 5 (0.52%) DBS Check
16 4 (0.42%) PhD
17 3 (0.31%) ISTQB Foundation Certification
17 3 (0.31%) TOGAF Certification
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 94 (9.77%) QA
2 89 (9.25%) Data Quality
3 36 (3.74%) GDPR
4 34 (3.53%) Accessibility
5 26 (2.70%) WCAG
6 22 (2.29%) ISO/IEC 27001
7 20 (2.08%) NIST
8 16 (1.66%) SLA
9 5 (0.52%) ISO 9000
10 3 (0.31%) Actionable Recommendations
10 3 (0.31%) Basel III
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%) GRC
11 2 (0.21%) Sarbanes-Oxley
11 2 (0.21%) SOC 2
11 2 (0.21%) Software Quality Assurance
12 1 (0.10%) GMP
System Software
1 123 (12.79%) Active Directory
2 67 (6.96%) Docker
3 39 (4.05%) VMware Infrastructure
4 33 (3.43%) Virtual Machines
5 18 (1.87%) Oracle RAC
6 10 (1.04%) Hyper-V
7 7 (0.73%) Virtual Desktop
8 6 (0.62%) vSphere
9 4 (0.42%) Virtual Servers
9 4 (0.42%) VMware ESXi
10 3 (0.31%) Dovecot
10 3 (0.31%) Postfix
11 1 (0.10%) BitLocker
11 1 (0.10%) HDFS
11 1 (0.10%) RACF
11 1 (0.10%) SRDF
11 1 (0.10%) Terminal Services
Systems Management
1 82 (8.52%) Kubernetes
2 42 (4.37%) Ansible
3 20 (2.08%) SCOM
4 14 (1.46%) Data Guard
5 13 (1.35%) Microsoft Intune
6 11 (1.14%) Microsoft Clustering
6 11 (1.14%) SCCM
7 10 (1.04%) Oracle Enterprise Manager
8 8 (0.83%) HAProxy
8 8 (0.83%) WSUS
9 7 (0.73%) Grafana
9 7 (0.73%) Istio
10 6 (0.62%) Failover Clustering
10 6 (0.62%) Oracle RMAN
10 6 (0.62%) Prometheus
10 6 (0.62%) Single Sign-On
11 5 (0.52%) ITRS Geneos
12 3 (0.31%) Enterprise Manager Cloud Control
12 3 (0.31%) PowerCLI
12 3 (0.31%) Puppet
Vendors
1 346 (35.97%) Microsoft
2 252 (26.20%) Oracle
3 75 (7.80%) Databricks
4 63 (6.55%) VMware
5 48 (4.99%) ServiceNow
6 45 (4.68%) CyberArk
7 37 (3.85%) Citrix
8 30 (3.12%) BeyondTrust
9 28 (2.91%) SAP
10 24 (2.49%) IBM
11 21 (2.18%) Cisco
12 20 (2.08%) BMC
12 20 (2.08%) Remedy
13 19 (1.98%) Informatica
14 17 (1.77%) Google
15 16 (1.66%) Dynatrace
16 15 (1.56%) Red Hat
17 14 (1.46%) Splunk
18 13 (1.35%) Alteryx
19 11 (1.14%) Sybase