SQL Contract Job Trends in England

SQL (Structured Query Language)
UK > England

The table below provides summary statistics and contractor rates for jobs advertised in England requiring SQL skills. It covers contract job vacancies from the 6 months leading up to 25 April 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
25 Apr 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 17 12 12
Rank change year-on-year -5 0 -1
Contract jobs citing SQL 3,993 3,014 3,636
As % of all contract jobs in England 10.02% 12.26% 9.77%
As % of the Programming Languages category 36.50% 36.29% 33.45%
Number of daily rates quoted 2,749 2,141 2,675
10th Percentile £350 £356 £350
25th Percentile £413 £413 £425
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £518 £550
Median % change year-on-year -3.38% -5.91% -
75th Percentile £588 £638 £650
90th Percentile £688 £775 £750
UK median daily rate £500 £500 £536
% change year-on-year - -6.72% -0.28%
Number of hourly rates quoted 63 57 61
10th Percentile £29.73 £21.30 £22.61
25th Percentile £35.75 £30.00 £25.99
Median hourly rate £50.00 £52.50 £42.50
Median % change year-on-year -4.76% +23.53% -15.00%
75th Percentile £73.84 £65.62 £53.75
90th Percentile £83.45 £79.21 £61.75
UK median hourly rate £54.75 £45.50 £42.50
% change year-on-year +20.33% +7.06% -16.26%

All Programming Languages
England

SQL falls under the Programming Languages category. For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all contract job vacancies requiring coding skills in England.

Contract vacancies with a requirement for coding skills 10,940 8,305 10,869
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in England 27.44% 33.78% 29.20%
Number of daily rates quoted 7,274 5,736 7,900
10th Percentile £352 £363 £350
25th Percentile £415 £425 £425
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £502 £525 £540
Median % change year-on-year -4.48% -2.78% -4.42%
75th Percentile £608 £650 £650
90th Percentile £725 £788 £775
UK median daily rate £500 £525 £525
% change year-on-year -4.76% - -4.55%
Number of hourly rates quoted 523 215 436
10th Percentile £41.94 £25.25 £35.50
25th Percentile £55.00 £38.68 £47.31
Median hourly rate £65.00 £62.50 £62.43
Median % change year-on-year +4.00% +0.12% -0.12%
75th Percentile £70.00 £68.00 £70.00
90th Percentile £77.50 £85.00 £80.00
UK median hourly rate £65.00 £62.50 £60.00
% change year-on-year +4.00% +4.17% -1.92%

SQL
Job Vacancy Trend in England

Historical trend showing the proportion of contract IT job postings citing SQL relative to all contract IT jobs advertised in England.

SQL job vacancy trend in England

SQL
Daily Rate Trend in England

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in England citing SQL.

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in England citing SQL

SQL
Daily Rate Histogram in England

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing SQL in England over the 6 months to 25 April 2026.

Daily rate histogram for SQL in England

SQL
Hourly Rate Trend in England

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in England citing SQL.

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in England citing SQL

SQL
Hourly Rate Histogram in England

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing SQL in England over the 6 months to 25 April 2026.

Hourly rate histogram for SQL in England

SQL
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 within the England region over the 6 months to 25 April 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 0 2,264 £513 -6.82% 636
Midlands +7 517 £465 +1.31% 217
North of England -8 476 £450 -5.26% 314
West Midlands +8 410 £460 -0.65% 126
South East -18 322 £500 - 485
North West -1 264 £450 -5.26% 187
South West -7 214 £475 -5.00% 133
Yorkshire -17 190 £463 -2.63% 84
East Midlands +3 104 £525 +25.00% 91
East of England -21 89 £503 +9.54% 119
North East -9 33 £475 +4.40% 46
SQL
UK

SQL
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
1 229 (5.74%) Apache Spark
2 161 (4.03%) Apache Airflow
3 139 (3.48%) Apache
4 123 (3.08%) Confluence
5 83 (2.08%) SharePoint
6 82 (2.05%) SAS
7 45 (1.13%) WebLogic
8 34 (0.85%) IIS
9 24 (0.60%) Tomcat
10 21 (0.53%) Microsoft Exchange
11 20 (0.50%) Oracle Workflow
12 15 (0.38%) Tuxedo
13 14 (0.35%) HCL Notes
13 14 (0.35%) nginx
14 13 (0.33%) Appian
14 13 (0.33%) CMS
14 13 (0.33%) Mendix
14 13 (0.33%) Palantir Foundry
15 12 (0.30%) Jupyter
15 12 (0.30%) Oracle SOA Suite
Applications
1 272 (6.81%) Microsoft Excel
2 56 (1.40%) Microsoft Office
3 47 (1.18%) MS Visio
4 33 (0.83%) Microsoft PowerPoint
5 23 (0.58%) Spreadsheet
6 10 (0.25%) Microsoft Project
7 7 (0.18%) Chatbot
8 5 (0.13%) Notepad++
9 3 (0.075%) Notion
9 3 (0.075%) Oracle Smart View
9 3 (0.075%) Trello
10 1 (0.025%) InDesign
10 1 (0.025%) Mingle
10 1 (0.025%) SPSS
10 1 (0.025%) Weka
Business Applications
1 42 (1.05%) Oracle EBS
2 26 (0.65%) Aladdin
3 23 (0.58%) NEC Housing
4 22 (0.55%) Dynamics CRM
5 21 (0.53%) Oracle EBS R12
5 21 (0.53%) Oracle Payables
6 19 (0.48%) Oracle Receivables
6 19 (0.48%) SAP S/4HANA
7 17 (0.43%) Oracle General Ledger
8 16 (0.40%) NetSuite
9 15 (0.38%) Oracle ERP
10 12 (0.30%) Remedy ITSM
11 11 (0.28%) Oracle Assets
11 11 (0.28%) Oracle Procure-to-Pay
11 11 (0.28%) Payment Gateway
12 10 (0.25%) Oracle 11i
13 9 (0.23%) Maximo
13 9 (0.23%) Oracle Cash Management
14 8 (0.20%) Endur
14 8 (0.20%) Oracle Subledger Accounting
Cloud Services
1 1,377 (34.49%) Azure
2 969 (24.27%) AWS
3 782 (19.58%) Power Platform
4 412 (10.32%) Azure DevOps
5 346 (8.67%) Azure Data Factory
6 324 (8.11%) GCP
7 298 (7.46%) GitHub
8 267 (6.69%) Serverless
9 234 (5.86%) Azure Synapse Analytics
10 229 (5.74%) Snowflake
11 227 (5.68%) Amazon S3
12 176 (4.41%) dbt
13 155 (3.88%) AWS Lambda
14 154 (3.86%) GitHub Actions
15 92 (2.30%) Power Automate
16 76 (1.90%) SaaS
17 75 (1.88%) Entra ID
18 74 (1.85%) Azure Functions
19 73 (1.83%) AWS CloudFormation
19 73 (1.83%) PowerApps
Communications & Networking
1 47 (1.18%) Firewall
2 36 (0.90%) DNS
3 23 (0.58%) Network Security
4 18 (0.45%) TCP/IP
5 16 (0.40%) HTTP
5 16 (0.40%) Internet
6 15 (0.38%) WAN
7 12 (0.30%) LAN
8 11 (0.28%) SNMP
8 11 (0.28%) SSL
8 11 (0.28%) VPN
9 9 (0.23%) DHCP
10 8 (0.20%) Wi-Fi
11 6 (0.15%) IPsec
11 6 (0.15%) VLAN
11 6 (0.15%) Wireshark
12 5 (0.13%) 5G
12 5 (0.13%) NetScaler
12 5 (0.13%) PuTTY
12 5 (0.13%) WinSCP
Database & Business Intelligence
1 712 (17.83%) Power BI
2 513 (12.85%) Data Warehouse
3 498 (12.47%) SQL Server
4 279 (6.99%) Tableau
5 261 (6.54%) PostgreSQL
6 259 (6.49%) Data Lake
7 255 (6.39%) NoSQL
8 245 (6.14%) Relational Database
9 207 (5.18%) Metadata
10 204 (5.11%) Azure SQL Database
11 147 (3.68%) SQL Server Integration Services
12 145 (3.63%) Oracle Database
13 120 (3.01%) Amazon Redshift
13 120 (3.01%) BigQuery
14 118 (2.96%) MySQL
15 114 (2.85%) Delta Lake
16 111 (2.78%) Big Data
17 100 (2.50%) Oracle Reports
18 96 (2.40%) MongoDB
19 95 (2.38%) Amazon RDS
Development Applications
1 425 (10.64%) Git
2 319 (7.99%) JIRA
3 211 (5.28%) Jenkins
4 162 (4.06%) GitLab
5 61 (1.53%) Selenium
6 56 (1.40%) JUnit
7 48 (1.20%) Postman
8 40 (1.00%) Maven
9 37 (0.93%) Cucumber
10 36 (0.90%) MLflow
11 35 (0.88%) Mockito
12 34 (0.85%) Oracle APEX
13 30 (0.75%) Bitbucket
14 28 (0.70%) REST Assured
15 27 (0.68%) SonarQube
16 25 (0.63%) ERwin
17 24 (0.60%) JMeter
18 22 (0.55%) Oracle Forms
18 22 (0.55%) SpecFlow
18 22 (0.55%) Visual Studio
General
1 1,097 (27.47%) Social Skills
2 1,089 (27.27%) Finance
3 748 (18.73%) Analytical Skills
4 382 (9.57%) Banking
5 339 (8.49%) Public Sector
6 100 (2.50%) Front Office
7 98 (2.45%) Investment Banking
8 93 (2.33%) Marketing
9 87 (2.18%) Documentation Skills
10 63 (1.58%) Inclusion and Diversity
11 58 (1.45%) Retail
12 54 (1.35%) Legal
13 53 (1.33%) Financial Institution
14 39 (0.98%) Telecoms
15 34 (0.85%) Organisational Skills
15 34 (0.85%) Presentation Skills
15 34 (0.85%) Publishing
16 32 (0.80%) Local Government
17 31 (0.78%) Law
18 29 (0.73%) Manufacturing
Job Titles
1 874 (21.89%) Developer
2 797 (19.96%) Data Engineer
3 587 (14.70%) Analyst
4 497 (12.45%) Senior
5 276 (6.91%) Lead
6 249 (6.24%) Data Analyst
7 225 (5.63%) Architect
8 188 (4.71%) Business Analyst
9 179 (4.48%) Consultant
10 150 (3.76%) Java Developer
11 130 (3.26%) Senior Data Engineer
12 129 (3.23%) Senior Developer
13 121 (3.03%) DBA
14 116 (2.91%) Azure Engineer
15 113 (2.83%) Software Engineer
16 106 (2.65%) C# Developer
17 86 (2.15%) Data Architect
17 86 (2.15%) Data Scientist
17 86 (2.15%) Python Developer
18 84 (2.10%) Full-Stack Developer
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 351 (8.79%) .NET
2 314 (7.86%) REST
3 247 (6.19%) Kafka
4 242 (6.06%) PySpark
5 194 (4.86%) React
6 186 (4.66%) Spring
7 177 (4.43%) RESTful
8 175 (4.38%) Spring Boot
9 146 (3.66%) HTML
10 143 (3.58%) XML
11 127 (3.18%) CSS
12 122 (3.06%) JSON
13 119 (2.98%) Pandas
14 112 (2.80%) AngularJS
15 88 (2.20%) Middleware
16 87 (2.18%) SOAP
17 84 (2.10%) .NET Framework
18 82 (2.05%) Node.js
19 73 (1.83%) Web Services
20 69 (1.73%) YAML
Miscellaneous
1 255 (6.39%) Cloud Native
2 140 (3.51%) Data Structures
3 136 (3.41%) Legacy Systems
4 125 (3.13%) Product Ownership
5 99 (2.48%) Distributed Systems
6 87 (2.18%) Management Information System
7 73 (1.83%) Derivative
8 68 (1.70%) Data Protection Act
9 63 (1.58%) Onboarding
10 62 (1.55%) Analytical Mindset
11 55 (1.38%) Equities
11 55 (1.38%) Fixed Income
12 49 (1.23%) Clustering
13 47 (1.18%) Enterprise Software
13 47 (1.18%) Self-Motivation
14 45 (1.13%) Algorithms
15 42 (1.05%) Foreign Exchange (FX)
16 38 (0.95%) NHS
17 37 (0.93%) Low-Code
17 37 (0.93%) Replication
Operating Systems
1 285 (7.14%) Linux
2 247 (6.19%) Windows
3 198 (4.96%) Unix
4 77 (1.93%) Windows Server
5 23 (0.58%) AIX
6 19 (0.48%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
7 13 (0.33%) Windows Server 2019
8 10 (0.25%) Windows 10
8 10 (0.25%) Windows Server 2016
9 7 (0.18%) Windows Server 2008
9 7 (0.18%) zOS
10 6 (0.15%) Solaris
10 6 (0.15%) Windows Server 2012
11 4 (0.10%) Android
11 4 (0.10%) Apple iOS
12 3 (0.075%) Oracle Linux
13 2 (0.050%) CentOS
13 2 (0.050%) Data ONTAP
13 2 (0.050%) VMS
14 1 (0.025%) Ubuntu
Processes & Methodologies
1 1,081 (27.07%) CI/CD
2 1,033 (25.87%) Agile
3 1,028 (25.75%) Analytics
4 983 (24.62%) Data Modelling
5 944 (23.64%) ETL
6 932 (23.34%) Business Intelligence
7 913 (22.87%) DevOps
8 824 (20.64%) Problem-Solving
9 719 (18.01%) Data Pipeline
10 636 (15.93%) Data Engineering
11 496 (12.42%) AI
12 489 (12.25%) Validation
13 487 (12.20%) Migration
14 484 (12.12%) Data Governance
15 385 (9.64%) Decision-Making
16 384 (9.62%) Test Automation
17 371 (9.29%) Data Analysis
18 363 (9.09%) Performance Tuning
19 349 (8.74%) Microservices
20 333 (8.34%) Data Science
Programming Languages
1 1,509 (37.79%) Python
2 539 (13.50%) Java
3 436 (10.92%) C#
4 326 (8.16%) JavaScript
5 308 (7.71%) PL/SQL
6 191 (4.78%) T-SQL
7 174 (4.36%) PowerShell
8 131 (3.28%) TypeScript
9 121 (3.03%) Shell Script
10 118 (2.96%) Data Analysis Expressions
11 117 (2.93%) R
12 91 (2.28%) Scala
13 73 (1.83%) Bash
14 60 (1.50%) C++
15 57 (1.43%) VBA
16 45 (1.13%) Bicep
17 43 (1.08%) Perl
18 29 (0.73%) VB
19 28 (0.70%) Go
20 22 (0.55%) PHP
Qualifications
1 845 (21.16%) Security Cleared
2 693 (17.36%) SC Cleared
3 323 (8.09%) Degree
4 114 (2.85%) Computer Science Degree
5 87 (2.18%) BPSS Clearance
6 69 (1.73%) Azure Certification
7 53 (1.33%) Master's Degree
8 50 (1.25%) DV Cleared
8 50 (1.25%) ISTQB
9 40 (1.00%) Microsoft Certification
10 30 (0.75%) AWS Certification
11 17 (0.43%) Oracle Certification
11 17 (0.43%) PhD
12 14 (0.35%) ISTQB Foundation Certification
13 13 (0.33%) CBAP
14 11 (0.28%) CISSP
14 11 (0.28%) DBS Check
15 10 (0.25%) PMP
16 9 (0.23%) CISM
16 9 (0.23%) PMI Certification
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 712 (17.83%) Data Quality
2 307 (7.69%) QA
3 185 (4.63%) GDPR
4 41 (1.03%) Accessibility
5 35 (0.88%) SLA
6 32 (0.80%) Sarbanes-Oxley
7 28 (0.70%) PMO
8 23 (0.58%) ISO/IEC 27001
9 17 (0.43%) NIST
9 17 (0.43%) PCI DSS
10 16 (0.40%) HIPAA
11 15 (0.38%) California Consumer Privacy Act
11 15 (0.38%) MiFID
12 14 (0.35%) Actionable Recommendations
12 14 (0.35%) IFRS
13 12 (0.30%) HL7
13 12 (0.30%) ISO 20022
14 10 (0.25%) GRC
14 10 (0.25%) SEPA
14 10 (0.25%) Solvency II
System Software
1 457 (11.45%) Docker
2 96 (2.40%) Active Directory
3 35 (0.88%) Virtual Machines
4 23 (0.58%) Oracle RAC
5 20 (0.50%) VMware Infrastructure
6 17 (0.43%) Hyper-V
7 10 (0.25%) KVM
8 8 (0.20%) Postfix
8 8 (0.20%) Virtual Desktop
9 6 (0.15%) HDFS
9 6 (0.15%) RACF
10 5 (0.13%) VMware ESXi
10 5 (0.13%) XenApp
10 5 (0.13%) XenDesktop
11 3 (0.075%) Oracle Clusterware
12 2 (0.050%) GridGain
12 2 (0.050%) vSphere
13 1 (0.025%) GPFS
13 1 (0.025%) Microsoft App-V
13 1 (0.025%) Varnish
Systems Management
1 398 (9.97%) Kubernetes
2 334 (8.36%) Terraform
3 101 (2.53%) Grafana
4 64 (1.60%) Ansible
5 62 (1.55%) Prometheus
6 36 (0.90%) Oracle RMAN
7 25 (0.63%) Data Guard
8 19 (0.48%) Single Sign-On
9 16 (0.40%) Kibana
9 16 (0.40%) SCCM
10 15 (0.38%) Progress Chef
11 14 (0.35%) Control-M
12 11 (0.28%) ZABBIX
13 10 (0.25%) Nagios
13 10 (0.25%) Netcool
13 10 (0.25%) OpenView
13 10 (0.25%) Tivoli
13 10 (0.25%) Tivoli Monitoring
14 9 (0.23%) Kiali
15 8 (0.20%) Active Directory Federation Services
Vendors
1 666 (16.68%) Oracle
2 651 (16.30%) Microsoft
3 483 (12.10%) Databricks
4 157 (3.93%) Google
5 128 (3.21%) Informatica
6 123 (3.08%) ServiceNow
7 111 (2.78%) SAP
8 101 (2.53%) Talend
9 82 (2.05%) Splunk
10 64 (1.60%) IBM
11 61 (1.53%) Salesforce
12 53 (1.33%) Citrix
13 47 (1.18%) Denodo
14 43 (1.08%) OpenAI
15 34 (0.85%) Dynatrace
16 33 (0.83%) MuleSoft
16 33 (0.83%) VMware
17 32 (0.80%) Bloomberg
18 29 (0.73%) HP
19 28 (0.70%) Sage