User Stories Contract Job Trends in England

User Story
UK > England

The table below provides summary statistics and contractor rates for jobs advertised in England requiring User Stories skills. It covers contract job vacancies from the 6 months leading up to 2 January 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

 6 months to
2 Jan 2026		 Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 132 178 142
Rank change year-on-year +46 -36 -34
Contract jobs citing User Stories 673 406 666
As % of all contract jobs in England 2.12% 1.46% 1.82%
As % of the Processes & Methodologies category 2.40% 1.64% 2.07%
Number of daily rates quoted 481 258 469
10th Percentile £338 £362 £388
25th Percentile £406 £422 £438
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £488 £525 £525
Median % change year-on-year -7.14% - -1.87%
75th Percentile £550 £620 £600
90th Percentile £650 £685 £675
UK median daily rate £485 £518 £525
% change year-on-year -6.28% -1.43% -
Number of hourly rates quoted 17 0 4
10th Percentile £31.49 - £50.38
25th Percentile £48.86 - £50.94
Median hourly rate £60.61 - £52.50
75th Percentile £74.26 - £57.20
90th Percentile £82.06 - £63.42
UK median hourly rate £60.61 £29.00 £52.50
% change year-on-year +109.00% -44.76% -4.55%

All Process & Methodology Skills
England

User Stories falls under the Processes and Methodologies category. For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all contract job vacancies requiring process or methodology skills in England.

Contract vacancies with a requirement for process or methodology skills 28,067 24,730 32,211
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in England 88.57% 88.83% 88.19%
Number of daily rates quoted 17,937 15,201 21,830
10th Percentile £304 £310 £306
25th Percentile £408 £413 £425
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £525 £540
Median % change year-on-year -4.76% -2.78% -1.82%
75th Percentile £625 £645 £650
90th Percentile £725 £750 £750
UK median daily rate £500 £525 £525
% change year-on-year -4.76% - -4.55%
Number of hourly rates quoted 1,762 813 1,440
10th Percentile £15.18 £15.62 £14.25
25th Percentile £17.96 £20.30 £19.06
Median hourly rate £25.15 £35.00 £44.50
Median % change year-on-year -28.14% -21.35% +25.35%
75th Percentile £57.44 £64.50 £65.00
90th Percentile £70.00 £75.00 £77.50
UK median hourly rate £25.15 £32.50 £43.79
% change year-on-year -22.62% -25.79% +25.12%

User Stories
Job Vacancy Trend in England

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

User Stories job vacancy trend in England

User Stories
Daily Rate Trend in England

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in England citing User Stories.

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in England citing User Stories

User Stories
Daily Rate Histogram in England

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing User Stories in England over the 6 months to 2 January 2026.

Daily rate histogram for User Stories in England

User Stories
Hourly Rate Trend in England

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in England citing User Stories.

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in England citing User Stories

User Stories
Hourly Rate Histogram in England

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing User Stories in England over the 6 months to 2 January 2026.

Hourly rate histogram for User Stories in England

User Stories
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 User Stories within the England region over the 6 months to 2 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 +42 364 £500 -9.09% 114
North of England +33 125 £500 +11.11% 32
South East -12 73 £465 -8.92% 67
Midlands +13 66 £440 +2.03% 31
Yorkshire -2 57 £516 +3.25% 9
North West -2 56 £425 - 21
West Midlands -6 40 £491 +5.03% 23
East Midlands 0 26 £359 -8.83% 8
South West -9 22 £498 -17.08% 11
North East +4 14 £500 +19.05% 3
East of England -14 14 £439 +13.16% 9
User Stories
UK

User Stories
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
1 138 (20.51%) Confluence
2 21 (3.12%) SharePoint
3 8 (1.19%) CMS
3 8 (1.19%) Microsoft Exchange
4 7 (1.04%) SAS
5 6 (0.89%) Apache Airflow
6 5 (0.74%) nginx
7 4 (0.59%) Anypoint
8 2 (0.30%) Apache
8 2 (0.30%) Drupal
8 2 (0.30%) Traefik
8 2 (0.30%) WebSphere
8 2 (0.30%) WordPress
9 1 (0.15%) Adobe Experience Manager
9 1 (0.15%) JBoss
9 1 (0.15%) Kentico
9 1 (0.15%) SharePoint Server
Applications
1 35 (5.20%) Microsoft Excel
2 32 (4.75%) MS Visio
3 22 (3.27%) Microsoft Office
4 20 (2.97%) Microsoft PowerPoint
5 5 (0.74%) Adobe XD
5 5 (0.74%) Chatbot
5 5 (0.74%) Microsoft Project
5 5 (0.74%) Sketch
6 4 (0.59%) Notion
6 4 (0.59%) Trello
7 3 (0.45%) InVision
8 2 (0.30%) Spreadsheet
8 2 (0.30%) Zeplin
Business Applications
1 28 (4.16%) Dynamics CRM
2 9 (1.34%) Payment Gateway
3 7 (1.04%) SAP S/4HANA
4 5 (0.74%) NetSuite
5 4 (0.59%) Endur
5 4 (0.59%) SAP HR
5 4 (0.59%) SAP PM
6 3 (0.45%) ProductWriter
6 3 (0.45%) Salesforce CRM
6 3 (0.45%) Temenos T24
7 2 (0.30%) Oracle EBS R12
7 2 (0.30%) Oracle Receivables
7 2 (0.30%) Primavera
8 1 (0.15%) Fidessa
8 1 (0.15%) HFM
8 1 (0.15%) OpenLink RightAngle
8 1 (0.15%) Oracle ERP
8 1 (0.15%) SAP CRM
8 1 (0.15%) Shopify
8 1 (0.15%) Workday HCM
Cloud Services
1 88 (13.08%) Azure
2 74 (11.00%) AWS
3 59 (8.77%) Power Platform
4 43 (6.39%) Azure DevOps
5 29 (4.31%) GCP
6 25 (3.71%) Dynamics 365
7 23 (3.42%) GitHub
8 22 (3.27%) Microsoft 365
9 19 (2.82%) PowerApps
10 18 (2.67%) Figma
10 18 (2.67%) Power Automate
10 18 (2.67%) Salesforce Service Cloud
10 18 (2.67%) Serverless
11 17 (2.53%) AWS Lambda
12 16 (2.38%) Snowflake
13 14 (2.08%) Miro
13 14 (2.08%) SaaS
14 13 (1.93%) GitHub Actions
15 11 (1.63%) Lucidchart
16 10 (1.49%) OpenShift
Communications & Networking
1 8 (1.19%) WebEx
2 5 (0.74%) DNS
3 4 (0.59%) Firewall
3 4 (0.59%) HTTP
4 3 (0.45%) FTP
5 2 (0.30%) BGP
5 2 (0.30%) Software-Defined Networking
5 2 (0.30%) VLAN
5 2 (0.30%) VPN
6 1 (0.15%) Calico
6 1 (0.15%) Cisco IPT
6 1 (0.15%) Internet
6 1 (0.15%) LAN
6 1 (0.15%) SD-WAN
6 1 (0.15%) WAN
6 1 (0.15%) Wireless
Database & Business Intelligence
1 48 (7.13%) Power BI
2 20 (2.97%) Data Warehouse
2 20 (2.97%) Tableau
3 16 (2.38%) BigQuery
4 14 (2.08%) PostgreSQL
5 12 (1.78%) SQL Server
6 9 (1.34%) Metadata
7 7 (1.04%) Amazon Athena
7 7 (1.04%) Relational Database
7 7 (1.04%) Star Schema
8 6 (0.89%) Big Data
8 6 (0.89%) Data Vault
8 6 (0.89%) SQL Server Integration Services
9 4 (0.59%) Amazon RDS
9 4 (0.59%) NoSQL
9 4 (0.59%) Oracle Database
9 4 (0.59%) Redis
9 4 (0.59%) Snowflake Schema
10 3 (0.45%) DynamoDB
10 3 (0.45%) MongoDB
Development Applications
1 194 (28.83%) JIRA
2 33 (4.90%) Jenkins
3 19 (2.82%) GitLab
4 15 (2.23%) Cucumber
5 14 (2.08%) Git
6 12 (1.78%) Postman
7 11 (1.63%) JUnit
8 10 (1.49%) Selenium
9 9 (1.34%) SonarQube
10 8 (1.19%) Zephyr
11 7 (1.04%) JMeter
12 6 (0.89%) Sonatype Nexus
13 4 (0.59%) Axure RP
13 4 (0.59%) Cypress.io
13 4 (0.59%) ER Studio
13 4 (0.59%) ERwin
13 4 (0.59%) PowerDesigner
13 4 (0.59%) TeamCity
13 4 (0.59%) TestRail
14 3 (0.45%) REST Assured
General
1 289 (42.94%) Social Skills
2 173 (25.71%) Finance
3 151 (22.44%) Analytical Skills
4 75 (11.14%) Public Sector
5 69 (10.25%) Banking
6 45 (6.69%) Documentation Skills
7 33 (4.90%) Presentation Skills
8 31 (4.61%) Marketing
8 31 (4.61%) Retail
9 25 (3.71%) Influencing Skills
10 23 (3.42%) Legal
11 15 (2.23%) Back Office
12 14 (2.08%) Front Office
13 13 (1.93%) Investment Banking
14 12 (1.78%) Telecoms
15 11 (1.63%) Organisational Skills
16 8 (1.19%) General Ledger
17 7 (1.04%) Billing
17 7 (1.04%) Financial Institution
17 7 (1.04%) Manufacturing
Job Titles
1 329 (48.89%) Analyst
2 307 (45.62%) Business Analyst
3 91 (13.52%) Product Owner
4 86 (12.78%) Senior
5 51 (7.58%) Senior Analyst
6 46 (6.84%) Senior Business Analyst
6 46 (6.84%) Technical Analyst
7 43 (6.39%) Technical Business Analyst
8 36 (5.35%) Developer
9 27 (4.01%) Lead
9 27 (4.01%) Salesforce Business Analyst
10 26 (3.86%) Product Manager
11 24 (3.57%) Salesforce Analyst
12 21 (3.12%) Consultant
12 21 (3.12%) Designer
13 19 (2.82%) Test Analyst
14 17 (2.53%) Architect
15 15 (2.23%) Digital Analyst
15 15 (2.23%) Digital Business Analyst
15 15 (2.23%) Product Analyst
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 20 (2.97%) REST
2 18 (2.67%) JSON
3 17 (2.53%) XML
4 16 (2.38%) RESTful
5 15 (2.23%) Kafka
6 14 (2.08%) React
7 13 (1.93%) Spring
8 12 (1.78%) ADO
8 12 (1.78%) SOAP
8 12 (1.78%) Spring Boot
9 11 (1.63%) HTML
10 9 (1.34%) Lightning Web Components
10 9 (1.34%) Playwright
11 8 (1.19%) Apache NiFi
11 8 (1.19%) OAuth
11 8 (1.19%) Web Services
11 8 (1.19%) XMPP
12 7 (1.04%) OAuth2
13 6 (0.89%) Gherkin
13 6 (0.89%) Node.js
Miscellaneous
1 219 (32.54%) Product Ownership
2 26 (3.86%) Onboarding
3 18 (2.67%) Data Structures
4 17 (2.53%) Cloud Native
5 16 (2.38%) Analytical Mindset
5 16 (2.38%) PMI
6 13 (1.93%) Data Protection Act
6 13 (1.93%) Greenfield Project
7 12 (1.78%) Legacy Systems
8 9 (1.34%) Algorithms
8 9 (1.34%) Management Information System
8 9 (1.34%) SWIFT Messaging Network
9 8 (1.19%) Mobile App
10 7 (1.04%) Enterprise Software
10 7 (1.04%) Low-Code
10 7 (1.04%) Self-Motivation
11 6 (0.89%) e-Learning
11 6 (0.89%) Hybrid Cloud
11 6 (0.89%) Marketing Technology
11 6 (0.89%) NHS
Operating Systems
1 21 (3.12%) Windows
2 16 (2.38%) Linux
3 7 (1.04%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
3 7 (1.04%) Windows Server
4 5 (0.74%) VMS
5 1 (0.15%) Android
5 1 (0.15%) Apple iOS
Processes & Methodologies
1 494 (73.40%) Agile
2 208 (30.91%) Acceptance Criteria
2 208 (30.91%) Scrum
3 198 (29.42%) Stakeholder Management
4 156 (23.18%) Requirements Gathering
5 150 (22.29%) Workshop Facilitation
6 140 (20.80%) Business Analysis
6 140 (20.80%) Problem-Solving
7 118 (17.53%) DevOps
8 115 (17.09%) User Acceptance Testing
9 114 (16.94%) Roadmaps
10 108 (16.05%) Stakeholder Engagement
11 99 (14.71%) Product Backlog
12 95 (14.12%) Backlog Management
13 92 (13.67%) Sprint Planning
14 88 (13.08%) Migration
15 86 (12.78%) Data Modelling
16 84 (12.48%) Use Case
17 83 (12.33%) Continuous Improvement
18 80 (11.89%) Analytics
Programming Languages
1 79 (11.74%) SQL
2 57 (8.47%) Python
3 34 (5.05%) Java
4 20 (2.97%) Bash
5 13 (1.93%) PowerShell
6 10 (1.49%) C#
7 9 (1.34%) JavaScript
7 9 (1.34%) Scala
8 8 (1.19%) Apex Code
8 8 (1.19%) Perl
9 7 (1.04%) TypeScript
10 4 (0.59%) Korn
11 3 (0.45%) Go
11 3 (0.45%) VBA
11 3 (0.45%) XPath
12 2 (0.30%) PL/SQL
12 2 (0.30%) T-SQL
13 1 (0.15%) PHP
13 1 (0.15%) R
13 1 (0.15%) Tcl
Qualifications
1 97 (14.41%) Security Cleared
2 91 (13.52%) Degree
3 75 (11.14%) SC Cleared
4 31 (4.61%) CBAP
5 25 (3.71%) CSPO
6 20 (2.97%) BPSS Clearance
6 20 (2.97%) PMI Certification
7 17 (2.53%) IIBA
8 8 (1.19%) Computer Science Degree
9 7 (1.04%) DV Cleared
9 7 (1.04%) Master's Degree
10 6 (0.89%) CCNA
10 6 (0.89%) CFA
10 6 (0.89%) Cisco Certification
10 6 (0.89%) MBA
11 5 (0.74%) Azure Certification
11 5 (0.74%) CCDP
11 5 (0.74%) CCNP
11 5 (0.74%) ISEB
11 5 (0.74%) PMP
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 80 (11.89%) QA
2 29 (4.31%) Accessibility
2 29 (4.31%) GDPR
3 19 (2.82%) Data Quality
3 19 (2.82%) WCAG
4 16 (2.38%) PSD2
5 12 (1.78%) PCI DSS
6 8 (1.19%) SLA
7 6 (0.89%) ISO 8583
8 5 (0.74%) ISO 20022
8 5 (0.74%) SEPA
9 4 (0.59%) FIPS 140-2
10 3 (0.45%) GxP
10 3 (0.45%) HL7
11 2 (0.30%) Basel III
11 2 (0.30%) EMIR
11 2 (0.30%) GMP
11 2 (0.30%) NCSC
11 2 (0.30%) PMO
12 1 (0.15%) NIST
System Software
1 25 (3.71%) Docker
2 9 (1.34%) Active Directory
3 8 (1.19%) VMware Infrastructure
4 1 (0.15%) etcd
4 1 (0.15%) Hyper-V
Systems Management
1 24 (3.57%) Kubernetes
2 19 (2.82%) Ansible
3 14 (2.08%) NetBackup
4 12 (1.78%) Terraform
5 5 (0.74%) Active Directory Federation Services
5 5 (0.74%) Progress Chef
6 4 (0.59%) Grafana
6 4 (0.59%) Puppet
6 4 (0.59%) Single Sign-On
7 3 (0.45%) Kubeflow
8 2 (0.30%) FortiGate
8 2 (0.30%) Istio
9 1 (0.15%) Argo
9 1 (0.15%) CASB
9 1 (0.15%) CloudHub
9 1 (0.15%) HP ALM
9 1 (0.15%) Microsoft Intune
Vendors
1 106 (15.75%) Microsoft
2 79 (11.74%) Salesforce
3 28 (4.16%) Oracle
4 27 (4.01%) SAP
5 24 (3.57%) ServiceNow
6 21 (3.12%) Red Hat
7 14 (2.08%) Commvault
8 13 (1.93%) VMware
9 12 (1.78%) Databricks
9 12 (1.78%) MuleSoft
10 11 (1.63%) Cisco
11 10 (1.49%) Citrix
11 10 (1.49%) Veritas
12 9 (1.34%) Adobe
13 8 (1.19%) Pega
14 7 (1.04%) Google
14 7 (1.04%) Guidewire
15 5 (0.74%) Atlassian
15 5 (0.74%) HubSpot
15 5 (0.74%) Zuora
246 User Stories jobs in England