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 23 January 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

 6 months to
23 Jan 2026		 Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 134 79 66
Rank change year-on-year -55 -13 -20
Contract jobs citing SQL Server 661 780 1,148
As % of all contract jobs in England 2.04% 2.91% 3.10%
As % of the Database & Business Intelligence category 12.32% 15.81% 19.12%
Number of daily rates quoted 457 550 845
10th Percentile £350 £325 £351
25th Percentile £404 £400 £413
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £480 £510 £550
Median % change year-on-year -5.88% -7.27% -
75th Percentile £588 £625 £650
90th Percentile £700 £700 £725
UK median daily rate £480 £500 £536
% change year-on-year -4.00% -6.76% -0.69%
Number of hourly rates quoted 6 7 25
10th Percentile £12.95 £46.15 £19.77
25th Percentile £14.90 £61.06 £37.63
Median hourly rate £22.13 £63.75 £46.18
Median % change year-on-year -65.29% +38.04% +10.61%
75th Percentile £45.50 £65.62 £58.48
90th Percentile £61.29 £79.37 £62.80
UK median hourly rate £22.13 £62.12 £46.18
% change year-on-year -64.38% +34.52% +6.00%

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 5,365 4,935 6,005
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in England 16.53% 18.41% 16.23%
Number of daily rates quoted 3,752 3,274 4,313
10th Percentile £330 £355 £353
25th Percentile £413 £425 £429
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £550 £550
Median % change year-on-year -9.09% - -
75th Percentile £609 £663 £650
90th Percentile £708 £775 £750
UK median daily rate £500 £525 £525
% change year-on-year -4.76% - -4.55%
Number of hourly rates quoted 92 77 158
10th Percentile £18.25 £21.25 £15.80
25th Percentile £29.00 £24.50 £22.34
Median hourly rate £45.75 £35.00 £42.50
Median % change year-on-year +30.71% -17.65% -25.26%
75th Percentile £72.57 £64.73 £62.31
90th Percentile £84.00 £74.75 £77.50
UK median hourly rate £45.00 £30.40 £42.50
% change year-on-year +48.03% -28.47% -25.26%

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 23 January 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 23 January 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 23 January 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 -29 407 £500 -9.09% 111
North of England -29 82 £450 -5.26% 147
South East -42 78 £484 -2.27% 208
Yorkshire -26 42 £425 -15.00% 49
North West -27 38 £450 +2.86% 79
South West -28 26 £550 - 90
East of England -23 22 £525 +31.25% 89
Midlands -104 18 £395 -16.84% 107
West Midlands -79 13 £414 -27.03% 45
East Midlands -53 4 £313 -18.41% 61
North East -11 2 £475 +28.38% 20
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 (4.69%) SharePoint
2 24 (3.63%) IIS
3 19 (2.87%) Confluence
3 19 (2.87%) Microsoft Exchange
4 14 (2.12%) Oracle SOA Suite
4 14 (2.12%) WebSphere
5 9 (1.36%) WebLogic
6 8 (1.21%) Apache
6 8 (1.21%) Apache Spark
7 7 (1.06%) Apache Airflow
8 6 (0.91%) Appian
8 6 (0.91%) CMS
9 4 (0.61%) SharePoint Server
10 3 (0.45%) Sitecore CMS
10 3 (0.45%) Tomcat
11 2 (0.30%) JBoss
11 2 (0.30%) Oracle Workflow
11 2 (0.30%) WildFly
12 1 (0.15%) ArcGIS
12 1 (0.15%) BizTalk Server
Applications
1 46 (6.96%) Microsoft Excel
2 12 (1.82%) Microsoft Office
2 12 (1.82%) MS Visio
3 6 (0.91%) Microsoft Project
4 4 (0.61%) Microsoft PowerPoint
5 2 (0.30%) Trello
5 2 (0.30%) Windchill
Business Applications
1 9 (1.36%) Advent Geneva
2 8 (1.21%) Dynamics CRM
3 7 (1.06%) BusinessWorks
4 6 (0.91%) Salesforce CRM
5 4 (0.61%) Oracle Procure-to-Pay
6 3 (0.45%) Oracle General Ledger
6 3 (0.45%) Oracle Payables
6 3 (0.45%) Oracle Receivables
6 3 (0.45%) Oracle Subledger Accounting
7 2 (0.30%) Dynamics AX
7 2 (0.30%) Dynamics NAV
7 2 (0.30%) Oracle FAH
7 2 (0.30%) SAP S/4HANA
7 2 (0.30%) Teamcenter
7 2 (0.30%) Veritas eDiscovery
8 1 (0.15%) Aladdin
8 1 (0.15%) Elite 3E
8 1 (0.15%) ION Anvil
8 1 (0.15%) Maximo
8 1 (0.15%) Orchestrade
Cloud Services
1 292 (44.18%) Azure
2 134 (20.27%) AWS
3 120 (18.15%) Power Platform
4 79 (11.95%) Azure DevOps
5 54 (8.17%) Azure Data Factory
5 54 (8.17%) GCP
6 51 (7.72%) GitHub
7 32 (4.84%) Azure Synapse Analytics
8 31 (4.69%) Microsoft 365
9 30 (4.54%) SaaS
10 21 (3.18%) GitHub Actions
10 21 (3.18%) Snowflake
11 18 (2.72%) Amazon S3
11 18 (2.72%) Dynamics 365
11 18 (2.72%) Power Automate
12 17 (2.57%) IaaS
13 16 (2.42%) Azure Service Bus
13 16 (2.42%) Serverless
14 14 (2.12%) AWS CloudFormation
15 13 (1.97%) PaaS
Communications & Networking
1 29 (4.39%) Firewall
2 21 (3.18%) DNS
3 17 (2.57%) TCP/IP
4 12 (1.82%) Internet
5 11 (1.66%) DHCP
6 10 (1.51%) HTTP
7 8 (1.21%) LAN
8 7 (1.06%) NetScaler
9 6 (0.91%) VPN
10 5 (0.76%) Skype
11 4 (0.61%) NAS
11 4 (0.61%) SAN
11 4 (0.61%) SSL
11 4 (0.61%) VoIP
12 3 (0.45%) RS-232
12 3 (0.45%) WAN
12 3 (0.45%) X.400
13 2 (0.30%) SMTP
13 2 (0.30%) Software-Defined Networking
13 2 (0.30%) WebEx
Database & Business Intelligence
1 103 (15.58%) Power BI
2 84 (12.71%) PostgreSQL
3 83 (12.56%) SQL Server Integration Services
4 82 (12.41%) Relational Database
5 72 (10.89%) Data Warehouse
6 56 (8.47%) Oracle Database
7 53 (8.02%) SQL Server Reporting Services
8 47 (7.11%) Azure SQL Database
8 47 (7.11%) MySQL
9 40 (6.05%) Data Lake
10 38 (5.75%) MongoDB
11 35 (5.30%) NoSQL
12 23 (3.48%) DB2
12 23 (3.48%) RDBMS
13 21 (3.18%) Amazon RDS
14 20 (3.03%) Delta Lake
15 18 (2.72%) Big Data
15 18 (2.72%) SQL Server Analysis Services
15 18 (2.72%) Tableau
16 14 (2.12%) Metadata
Development Applications
1 63 (9.53%) Git
2 45 (6.81%) JIRA
3 31 (4.69%) Jenkins
4 21 (3.18%) Visual Studio
5 17 (2.57%) GitLab
6 14 (2.12%) Postman
7 12 (1.82%) SpecFlow
8 11 (1.66%) Selenium
9 10 (1.51%) Cucumber
9 10 (1.51%) SQL Server Management Studio (SSMS)
10 9 (1.36%) Maven
10 9 (1.36%) Octopus Deploy
10 9 (1.36%) TeamCity
11 8 (1.21%) ERwin
11 8 (1.21%) JUnit
12 7 (1.06%) Bitbucket
13 6 (0.91%) REST Assured
13 6 (0.91%) TestRail
14 5 (0.76%) MLflow
14 5 (0.76%) Mockito
General
1 217 (32.83%) Social Skills
2 174 (26.32%) Finance
3 91 (13.77%) Banking
4 90 (13.62%) Analytical Skills
5 37 (5.60%) Public Sector
6 34 (5.14%) Documentation Skills
7 24 (3.63%) Investment Banking
8 16 (2.42%) Financial Institution
8 16 (2.42%) Front Office
9 15 (2.27%) Retail
10 14 (2.12%) Inclusion and Diversity
11 8 (1.21%) Legal
11 8 (1.21%) Local Government
12 6 (0.91%) Law
12 6 (0.91%) Manufacturing
12 6 (0.91%) Organisational Skills
12 6 (0.91%) Presentation Skills
13 5 (0.76%) Influencing Skills
13 5 (0.76%) Telecoms
14 4 (0.61%) Back Office
Job Titles
1 233 (35.25%) Developer
2 90 (13.62%) Senior
3 87 (13.16%) Data Engineer
4 70 (10.59%) C# Developer
5 50 (7.56%) .NET Developer
6 47 (7.11%) Analyst
6 47 (7.11%) Architect
7 37 (5.60%) Senior Developer
8 31 (4.69%) DBA
8 31 (4.69%) Lead
9 29 (4.39%) Senior Data Engineer
10 27 (4.08%) Full-Stack Developer
11 23 (3.48%) C# .NET Developer
11 23 (3.48%) Consultant
12 21 (3.18%) Software Engineer
13 18 (2.72%) Azure Engineer
13 18 (2.72%) SQL Developer
14 17 (2.57%) Angular Developer
14 17 (2.57%) SQL DBA
15 15 (2.27%) Business Intelligence Developer
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 188 (28.44%) .NET
2 76 (11.50%) .NET Framework
3 61 (9.23%) REST
4 45 (6.81%) AngularJS
5 44 (6.66%) HTML
6 43 (6.51%) React
7 38 (5.75%) .NET Core
7 38 (5.75%) RESTful
8 35 (5.30%) CSS
8 35 (5.30%) XML
9 34 (5.14%) Kafka
10 30 (4.54%) ASP.NET
11 28 (4.24%) Entity Framework
12 27 (4.08%) SOAP
12 27 (4.08%) Web Services
13 23 (3.48%) Middleware
13 23 (3.48%) WPF
14 17 (2.57%) Node.js
14 17 (2.57%) OAuth
14 17 (2.57%) WinForms
Miscellaneous
1 34 (5.14%) Legacy Systems
2 30 (4.54%) Cloud Native
3 21 (3.18%) Enterprise Software
4 17 (2.57%) Management Information System
5 16 (2.42%) Derivative
6 15 (2.27%) Data Structures
6 15 (2.27%) Onboarding
6 15 (2.27%) Product Ownership
7 14 (2.12%) Credit Risk
7 14 (2.12%) Data Protection Act
8 13 (1.97%) Foreign Exchange (FX)
9 12 (1.82%) Distributed Systems
9 12 (1.82%) Replication
10 11 (1.66%) PKI
11 10 (1.51%) Reinsurance
12 8 (1.21%) Greenfield Project
12 8 (1.21%) Market Risk
12 8 (1.21%) NHS
12 8 (1.21%) Virtual Team
13 7 (1.06%) Linux Command Line
Operating Systems
1 113 (17.10%) Windows
2 85 (12.86%) Linux
3 58 (8.77%) Windows Server
4 14 (2.12%) Windows 10
5 13 (1.97%) Windows Server 2016
6 10 (1.51%) Unix
7 8 (1.21%) Windows Server 2019
8 6 (0.91%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
9 4 (0.61%) Windows Server 2012
10 3 (0.45%) Android
10 3 (0.45%) VMS
11 2 (0.30%) Windows Server 2003
12 1 (0.15%) AIX
12 1 (0.15%) Mac OS
12 1 (0.15%) Mac OS X
12 1 (0.15%) MVS
12 1 (0.15%) Solaris
12 1 (0.15%) Ubuntu
12 1 (0.15%) Windows 7
12 1 (0.15%) zOS
Processes & Methodologies
1 157 (23.75%) Agile
2 155 (23.45%) CI/CD
3 148 (22.39%) DevOps
4 147 (22.24%) Problem-Solving
5 124 (18.76%) ETL
6 122 (18.46%) Business Intelligence
7 101 (15.28%) Data Modelling
8 99 (14.98%) Migration
9 74 (11.20%) Analytics
10 66 (9.98%) Microservices
11 58 (8.77%) Performance Tuning
12 56 (8.47%) Full-Stack Development
12 56 (8.47%) Test Automation
13 55 (8.32%) Containerisation
14 53 (8.02%) Data Analysis
14 53 (8.02%) Data Pipeline
15 51 (7.72%) Data Governance
15 51 (7.72%) Data Migration
16 50 (7.56%) Data Engineering
16 50 (7.56%) Software Engineering
Programming Languages
1 378 (57.19%) SQL
2 168 (25.42%) C#
3 151 (22.84%) Python
4 74 (11.20%) T-SQL
5 66 (9.98%) Java
6 65 (9.83%) JavaScript
7 56 (8.47%) PL/SQL
8 48 (7.26%) PowerShell
9 33 (4.99%) Bash
10 23 (3.48%) TypeScript
11 17 (2.57%) Data Analysis Expressions
11 17 (2.57%) VB
12 14 (2.12%) PHP
12 14 (2.12%) Shell Script
12 14 (2.12%) VBA
13 12 (1.82%) Bicep
14 7 (1.06%) XPath
15 5 (0.76%) R
15 5 (0.76%) X++
16 4 (0.61%) Scala
Qualifications
1 83 (12.56%) Security Cleared
2 76 (11.50%) Degree
3 58 (8.77%) SC Cleared
4 28 (4.24%) Computer Science Degree
5 22 (3.33%) Microsoft Certification
6 18 (2.72%) Azure Certification
7 14 (2.12%) DV Cleared
8 11 (1.66%) BPSS Clearance
9 7 (1.06%) Master's Degree
10 5 (0.76%) AWS Certification
10 5 (0.76%) ITIL Certification
11 4 (0.61%) CCA
11 4 (0.61%) Cisco Certification
11 4 (0.61%) Citrix Certification
11 4 (0.61%) HNC
11 4 (0.61%) HND
11 4 (0.61%) MCP
11 4 (0.61%) MCSE
12 3 (0.45%) PMI Certification
12 3 (0.45%) PMP
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 72 (10.89%) Data Quality
2 62 (9.38%) QA
3 15 (2.27%) GDPR
4 9 (1.36%) SLA
5 8 (1.21%) Accessibility
6 6 (0.91%) Sarbanes-Oxley
7 5 (0.76%) ISO/IEC 27001
7 5 (0.76%) WCAG
8 3 (0.45%) IFRS
8 3 (0.45%) IFRS 17
8 3 (0.45%) MiFID
9 2 (0.30%) Basel III
9 2 (0.30%) EMIR
9 2 (0.30%) GAAP
9 2 (0.30%) IFRS 9
9 2 (0.30%) Solvency II
10 1 (0.15%) Actionable Recommendations
10 1 (0.15%) HIPAA
10 1 (0.15%) JSP 440
10 1 (0.15%) PCI DSS
System Software
1 82 (12.41%) Docker
2 47 (7.11%) Active Directory
3 27 (4.08%) VMware Infrastructure
4 14 (2.12%) Hyper-V
5 12 (1.82%) Oracle RAC
6 8 (1.21%) Virtual Machines
7 7 (1.06%) VMware NSX
7 7 (1.06%) zsh
8 6 (0.91%) Virtual Desktop
9 4 (0.61%) XenApp
9 4 (0.61%) XenDesktop
10 3 (0.45%) VMware ESXi
10 3 (0.45%) vSphere
11 2 (0.30%) GridGain
11 2 (0.30%) NDS
11 2 (0.30%) NetIQ eDirectory
12 1 (0.15%) KVM
12 1 (0.15%) NFS
12 1 (0.15%) Veritas Cluster Server
12 1 (0.15%) Xen
Systems Management
1 60 (9.08%) Kubernetes
2 40 (6.05%) Terraform
3 27 (4.08%) Ansible
4 13 (1.97%) Grafana
5 12 (1.82%) Puppet
5 12 (1.82%) SCCM
6 11 (1.66%) Data Guard
7 10 (1.51%) yum
8 9 (1.36%) Microsoft Intune
9 8 (1.21%) NetBackup
10 7 (1.06%) Active Directory Federation Services
10 7 (1.06%) Oracle RMAN
10 7 (1.06%) TIBCO Hawk
10 7 (1.06%) vCenter Server
11 6 (0.91%) Single Sign-On
12 5 (0.76%) Progress Chef
12 5 (0.76%) SCOM
13 4 (0.61%) SCVMM
13 4 (0.61%) WSUS
14 3 (0.45%) Control-M
Vendors
1 208 (31.47%) Oracle
2 203 (30.71%) Microsoft
3 55 (8.32%) Databricks
4 43 (6.51%) Citrix
5 38 (5.75%) VMware
6 26 (3.93%) Informatica
7 25 (3.78%) Google
8 22 (3.33%) ServiceNow
9 18 (2.72%) IBM
9 18 (2.72%) SAP
10 13 (1.97%) Salesforce
11 11 (1.66%) Cisco
11 11 (1.66%) CyberArk
12 10 (1.51%) UiPath
12 10 (1.51%) Veritas
13 9 (1.36%) Advent
14 8 (1.21%) PagerDuty
15 7 (1.06%) BEA
15 7 (1.06%) Splunk
15 7 (1.06%) TIBCO
715 SQL Server jobs in England