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

6 months to
11 Sep 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 125 112 60
Rank change year-on-year -13 -52 -5
Contract jobs citing SQL Server 993 687 1,166
As % of all contract jobs in England 2.14% 2.47% 3.54%
As % of the Database & Business Intelligence category 14.16% 13.74% 19.41%
Number of daily rates quoted 699 500 836
10th Percentile £364 £313 £330
25th Percentile £413 £387 £406
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £488 £500 £500
Median % change year-on-year -2.50% - -4.76%
75th Percentile £600 £642 £625
90th Percentile £713 £750 £725
UK median daily rate £488 £500 £500
% change year-on-year -2.50% - -4.76%
Number of hourly rates quoted 40 5 6
10th Percentile £13.51 £20.86 £26.83
25th Percentile £18.93 £21.02 £32.63
Median hourly rate £47.54 £21.27 £43.00
Median % change year-on-year +123.51% -50.53% -12.85%
75th Percentile £59.06 £77.50 £51.12
90th Percentile £74.20 £84.25 £75.95
UK median hourly rate £47.54 £72.50 £38.50
% change year-on-year -34.43% +88.31% -16.47%

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 7,014 5,001 6,008
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in England 15.12% 17.97% 18.22%
Number of daily rates quoted 4,681 3,436 4,193
10th Percentile £358 £332 £350
25th Percentile £423 £412 £425
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £505 £510 £550
Median % change year-on-year -0.98% -7.27% -
75th Percentile £619 £638 £675
90th Percentile £701 £750 £825
UK median daily rate £500 £500 £525
% change year-on-year - -4.76% -2.86%
Number of hourly rates quoted 238 80 80
10th Percentile £15.61 £21.25 £17.50
25th Percentile £23.35 £31.45 £21.25
Median hourly rate £39.00 £42.00 £35.00
Median % change year-on-year -7.13% +19.99% -36.36%
75th Percentile £61.88 £65.00 £60.36
90th Percentile £75.30 £80.00 £71.85
UK median hourly rate £40.18 £40.00 £34.47
% change year-on-year +0.45% +16.06% -35.58%

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 11 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 11 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 11 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 -31 481 £520 -9.17% 303
North of England +2 197 £475 +10.47% 89
Midlands +6 113 £468 +21.49% 89
North West +10 110 £481 +11.86% 53
South East -29 100 £475 +46.15% 115
Yorkshire +9 85 £450 +5.88% 31
West Midlands -6 69 £460 -10.24% 55
South West -26 49 £525 +13.51% 37
East Midlands +12 43 £525 +60.80% 33
East of England -37 26 £425 -15.00% 27
North East -48 2 - - 7
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 72 (7.25%) SharePoint
2 45 (4.53%) IIS
3 43 (4.33%) Confluence
4 25 (2.52%) Apache Airflow
5 24 (2.42%) Microsoft Exchange
6 20 (2.01%) Apache
7 19 (1.91%) Camunda
8 17 (1.71%) Apache Spark
9 9 (0.91%) Oracle Workflow
10 6 (0.60%) Appian
10 6 (0.60%) CMS
11 5 (0.50%) Apache Solr
11 5 (0.50%) NetWeaver
11 5 (0.50%) Tuxedo
12 4 (0.40%) OpenEdge
12 4 (0.40%) Tomcat
12 4 (0.40%) Umbraco
13 3 (0.30%) Apache Superset
13 3 (0.30%) nginx
14 2 (0.20%) Skype for Business
Applications
1 51 (5.14%) Microsoft Excel
2 28 (2.82%) Microsoft Office
3 9 (0.91%) MS Visio
4 3 (0.30%) Microsoft PowerPoint
5 2 (0.20%) Microsoft Project
5 2 (0.20%) Windchill
6 1 (0.10%) Adobe XD
6 1 (0.10%) Chatbot
6 1 (0.10%) Spreadsheet
Business Applications
1 29 (2.92%) Dynamics CRM
2 23 (2.32%) Remedy ITSM
3 16 (1.61%) SAP S/4HANA
4 7 (0.70%) OpenText MBPM
4 7 (0.70%) Oracle BPM
5 6 (0.60%) Oracle Payables
6 4 (0.40%) Aladdin
6 4 (0.40%) Dynamics AX
6 4 (0.40%) Elite 3E
7 2 (0.20%) Dynamics NAV
7 2 (0.20%) Endur
7 2 (0.20%) Infor LN
7 2 (0.20%) Siebel CRM
7 2 (0.20%) Teamcenter
8 1 (0.10%) Findur
8 1 (0.10%) Payment Gateway
8 1 (0.10%) Salesforce CRM
8 1 (0.10%) SAP Business One
8 1 (0.10%) SAP CRM
8 1 (0.10%) SDL Web 8
Cloud Services
1 423 (42.60%) Azure
2 212 (21.35%) AWS
3 161 (16.21%) Power Platform
4 114 (11.48%) Azure DevOps
5 89 (8.96%) GitHub
6 59 (5.94%) Azure Data Factory
7 52 (5.24%) Entra ID
8 50 (5.04%) Serverless
9 44 (4.43%) Power Automate
10 43 (4.33%) Microsoft 365
11 40 (4.03%) Azure Monitor
12 39 (3.93%) Dynamics 365
12 39 (3.93%) Snowflake
13 37 (3.73%) Azure Synapse Analytics
14 35 (3.52%) GCP
14 35 (3.52%) GitHub Actions
15 24 (2.42%) dbt
16 23 (2.32%) PowerApps
16 23 (2.32%) SaaS
17 21 (2.11%) Azure Functions
Communications & Networking
1 49 (4.93%) DNS
2 42 (4.23%) DHCP
3 34 (3.42%) Firewall
4 19 (1.91%) VLAN
5 18 (1.81%) SAN
6 15 (1.51%) VPN
7 14 (1.41%) Internet
7 14 (1.41%) SSL
7 14 (1.41%) TCP/IP
8 13 (1.31%) Network Security
9 10 (1.01%) Wi-Fi
10 9 (0.91%) SSH
11 6 (0.60%) HTTPS
11 6 (0.60%) IPv4
11 6 (0.60%) IPv6
11 6 (0.60%) Kerberos
11 6 (0.60%) LAN
12 5 (0.50%) VoIP
12 5 (0.50%) WAN
13 3 (0.30%) Wireless
Database & Business Intelligence
1 162 (16.31%) PostgreSQL
2 132 (13.29%) Power BI
3 101 (10.17%) Relational Database
4 98 (9.87%) Data Warehouse
5 95 (9.57%) SQL Server Integration Services
6 87 (8.76%) MySQL
7 59 (5.94%) Azure SQL Database
8 57 (5.74%) Oracle Database
8 57 (5.74%) SQL Server Reporting Services
9 55 (5.54%) MongoDB
10 34 (3.42%) Data Lake
11 25 (2.52%) NoSQL
12 24 (2.42%) Amazon RDS
12 24 (2.42%) SQL Server Analysis Services
13 22 (2.22%) Redis
14 21 (2.11%) RDBMS
14 21 (2.11%) Tableau
15 18 (1.81%) Metadata
16 17 (1.71%) Star Schema
17 13 (1.31%) Amazon Aurora
Development Applications
1 104 (10.47%) Git
2 64 (6.45%) JIRA
3 61 (6.14%) Jenkins
4 34 (3.42%) GitLab
5 23 (2.32%) Visual Studio
6 22 (2.22%) Maven
7 20 (2.01%) Sonatype Nexus
7 20 (2.01%) SQL Server Management Studio (SSMS)
8 15 (1.51%) REST Assured
8 15 (1.51%) Team Foundation Server
9 14 (1.41%) Selenium
10 12 (1.21%) Gradle
10 12 (1.21%) JUnit
10 12 (1.21%) TeamCity
11 11 (1.11%) Artifactory
11 11 (1.11%) Mockito
11 11 (1.11%) Postman
11 11 (1.11%) SonarQube
12 10 (1.01%) Claude Code
12 10 (1.01%) Cucumber
General
1 313 (31.52%) Social Skills
2 261 (26.28%) Finance
3 183 (18.43%) Analytical Skills
4 129 (12.99%) Banking
5 71 (7.15%) Public Sector
6 44 (4.43%) Front Office
7 40 (4.03%) Documentation Skills
8 26 (2.62%) Investment Banking
9 25 (2.52%) Inclusion and Diversity
10 20 (2.01%) Retail
11 15 (1.51%) Legal
12 12 (1.21%) Financial Institution
13 10 (1.01%) Organisational Skills
14 9 (0.91%) Back Office
15 8 (0.81%) Billing
15 8 (0.81%) Manufacturing
16 6 (0.60%) Presentation Skills
17 5 (0.50%) Law
17 5 (0.50%) Military
17 5 (0.50%) Publishing
Job Titles
1 317 (31.92%) Developer
2 160 (16.11%) Senior
3 131 (13.19%) DBA
4 82 (8.26%) SQL DBA
5 78 (7.85%) .NET Developer
6 75 (7.55%) Data Engineer
7 73 (7.35%) C# Developer
8 70 (7.05%) Administrator
8 70 (7.05%) Lead
9 56 (5.64%) Full-Stack Developer
10 53 (5.34%) Senior Developer
11 50 (5.04%) Architect
12 49 (4.93%) Analyst
13 48 (4.83%) Infrastructure Engineer
14 46 (4.63%) SQL Developer
15 35 (3.52%) Software Engineer
16 30 (3.02%) Azure Engineer
17 29 (2.92%) Oracle DBA
17 29 (2.92%) Software Developer
18 28 (2.82%) C# .NET Developer
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 282 (28.40%) .NET
2 126 (12.69%) REST
3 93 (9.37%) .NET Framework
4 85 (8.56%) React
5 75 (7.55%) Terraform
6 67 (6.75%) CSS
7 60 (6.04%) ASP.NET
7 60 (6.04%) HTML
8 59 (5.94%) Kafka
9 56 (5.64%) AngularJS
10 54 (5.44%) .NET Core
11 51 (5.14%) RESTful
12 44 (4.43%) JSON
13 38 (3.83%) Web Services
14 36 (3.63%) XML
15 33 (3.32%) Spring Boot
16 30 (3.02%) OAuth
17 28 (2.82%) SOAP
17 28 (2.82%) Spring
18 25 (2.52%) WinForms
Miscellaneous
1 61 (6.14%) Cloud Native
1 61 (6.14%) Onboarding
2 54 (5.44%) Data Structures
3 46 (4.63%) Enterprise Software
4 45 (4.53%) Replication
5 43 (4.33%) Clustering
6 40 (4.03%) Self-Motivation
7 37 (3.73%) Product Ownership
8 36 (3.63%) Legacy Systems
9 30 (3.02%) Management Information System
10 29 (2.92%) Data Centre
11 20 (2.01%) PKI
12 18 (1.81%) Distributed Systems
13 14 (1.41%) Derivative
13 14 (1.41%) Low-Code
13 14 (1.41%) Virtual Team
14 12 (1.21%) Algorithms
14 12 (1.21%) Fixed Income
15 11 (1.11%) Data Protection Act
15 11 (1.11%) NHS
Operating Systems
1 259 (26.08%) Windows
2 151 (15.21%) Windows Server
3 92 (9.26%) Linux
4 37 (3.73%) Unix
5 14 (1.41%) Solaris
6 13 (1.31%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
7 12 (1.21%) Ubuntu
8 8 (0.81%) VMS
9 7 (0.70%) CentOS
9 7 (0.70%) Windows 10
9 7 (0.70%) Windows Server 2012
9 7 (0.70%) Windows Server 2019
10 6 (0.60%) Android
11 4 (0.40%) Windows Server 2008
11 4 (0.40%) Windows Server 2016
12 2 (0.20%) AIX
12 2 (0.20%) Windows Server 2003
13 1 (0.10%) Data ONTAP
13 1 (0.10%) Windows XP
Processes & Methodologies
1 260 (26.18%) DevOps
2 243 (24.47%) CI/CD
3 237 (23.87%) Agile
4 198 (19.94%) Problem-Solving
5 182 (18.33%) Migration
6 154 (15.51%) ETL
7 145 (14.60%) Business Intelligence
8 142 (14.30%) Data Modelling
9 127 (12.79%) Performance Tuning
10 124 (12.49%) AI
11 112 (11.28%) Stakeholder Management
12 106 (10.67%) Disaster Recovery
13 96 (9.67%) Continuous Improvement
14 93 (9.37%) Microservices
15 92 (9.26%) Analytics
16 87 (8.76%) Software Engineering
17 84 (8.46%) Test Automation
18 81 (8.16%) Validation
19 76 (7.65%) Data Integration
19 76 (7.65%) Data Pipeline
Programming Languages
1 579 (58.31%) SQL
2 274 (27.59%) C#
3 192 (19.34%) Python
4 176 (17.72%) PowerShell
5 157 (15.81%) T-SQL
6 141 (14.20%) JavaScript
7 90 (9.06%) Java
8 61 (6.14%) PL/SQL
9 56 (5.64%) TypeScript
10 32 (3.22%) Bash
11 19 (1.91%) Data Analysis Expressions
12 17 (1.71%) VB
13 15 (1.51%) VBA
14 13 (1.31%) Scala
15 12 (1.21%) Shell Script
16 7 (0.70%) VB.NET
17 6 (0.60%) Bicep
17 6 (0.60%) XPath
18 5 (0.50%) PHP
18 5 (0.50%) VB6
Qualifications
1 251 (25.28%) Security Cleared
2 190 (19.13%) SC Cleared
3 108 (10.88%) Degree
4 52 (5.24%) DV Cleared
5 51 (5.14%) Microsoft Certification
6 33 (3.32%) Computer Science Degree
7 27 (2.72%) BPSS Clearance
8 25 (2.52%) Azure Certification
9 12 (1.21%) AWS Certification
9 12 (1.21%) ISTQB
9 12 (1.21%) Oracle Certification
10 11 (1.11%) OCP
11 9 (0.91%) ITIL Foundation Certificate
12 8 (0.81%) AWS Certified Solutions Architect
12 8 (0.81%) Master's Degree
13 7 (0.70%) DBS Check
14 5 (0.50%) CISSP
15 4 (0.40%) PhD
16 3 (0.30%) ISTQB Foundation Certification
16 3 (0.30%) TOGAF Certification
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 96 (9.67%) Data Quality
2 93 (9.37%) QA
3 33 (3.32%) GDPR
4 29 (2.92%) Accessibility
5 22 (2.22%) ISO/IEC 27001
5 22 (2.22%) WCAG
6 20 (2.01%) NIST
7 18 (1.81%) SLA
8 5 (0.50%) ISO 9000
9 4 (0.40%) Sarbanes-Oxley
10 3 (0.30%) Actionable Recommendations
10 3 (0.30%) Basel III
10 3 (0.30%) GRC
11 2 (0.20%) California Consumer Privacy Act
11 2 (0.20%) COREP
11 2 (0.20%) FINREP
11 2 (0.20%) Government Security Classifications
11 2 (0.20%) SOC 2
12 1 (0.10%) Disclosure Scotland
12 1 (0.10%) ISO 20022
System Software
1 128 (12.89%) Active Directory
2 76 (7.65%) Docker
3 42 (4.23%) VMware Infrastructure
4 33 (3.32%) Virtual Machines
5 17 (1.71%) Oracle RAC
6 10 (1.01%) Hyper-V
7 8 (0.81%) Virtual Desktop
8 6 (0.60%) vSphere
9 4 (0.40%) Virtual Servers
9 4 (0.40%) VMware ESXi
10 3 (0.30%) Dovecot
10 3 (0.30%) GridGain
10 3 (0.30%) Postfix
11 1 (0.10%) BitLocker
11 1 (0.10%) NFS
11 1 (0.10%) RACF
11 1 (0.10%) SRDF
11 1 (0.10%) Terminal Services
Systems Management
1 93 (9.37%) Kubernetes
2 44 (4.43%) Ansible
3 20 (2.01%) SCOM
4 14 (1.41%) Data Guard
4 14 (1.41%) Microsoft Intune
5 13 (1.31%) HAProxy
6 12 (1.21%) SCCM
7 11 (1.11%) Microsoft Clustering
8 10 (1.01%) Oracle Enterprise Manager
8 10 (1.01%) WSUS
9 8 (0.81%) Grafana
10 6 (0.60%) Failover Clustering
10 6 (0.60%) Oracle RMAN
10 6 (0.60%) Single Sign-On
11 5 (0.50%) ITRS Geneos
11 5 (0.50%) Prometheus
12 3 (0.30%) Active Directory Federation Services
12 3 (0.30%) Enterprise Manager Cloud Control
12 3 (0.30%) Istio
12 3 (0.30%) PowerCLI
Vendors
1 356 (35.85%) Microsoft
2 252 (25.38%) Oracle
3 74 (7.45%) Databricks
4 65 (6.55%) VMware
5 54 (5.44%) ServiceNow
6 45 (4.53%) CyberArk
7 39 (3.93%) Citrix
8 34 (3.42%) SAP
9 30 (3.02%) BeyondTrust
10 23 (2.32%) BMC
10 23 (2.32%) Remedy
11 22 (2.22%) IBM
11 22 (2.22%) Informatica
12 21 (2.11%) Cisco
13 17 (1.71%) Google
14 16 (1.61%) Dynatrace
14 16 (1.61%) Sybase
15 15 (1.51%) Red Hat
16 13 (1.31%) Alteryx
16 13 (1.31%) Splunk