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 24 March 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
24 Mar 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 133 161 133
Rank change year-on-year +28 -28 -11
Contract jobs citing User Stories 767 401 641
As % of all contract jobs in England 2.05% 1.65% 1.70%
As % of the Processes & Methodologies category 2.37% 1.82% 1.96%
Number of daily rates quoted 546 262 451
10th Percentile £350 £350 £375
25th Percentile £408 £410 £438
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £492 £500 £538
Median % change year-on-year -1.60% -6.98% +2.38%
75th Percentile £575 £600 £600
90th Percentile £638 £656 £675
UK median daily rate £489 £488 £538
% change year-on-year +0.36% -9.30% +2.38%
Number of hourly rates quoted 18 2 9
10th Percentile £48.86 £54.90 £31.71
25th Percentile £60.61 £57.00 £33.00
Median hourly rate £74.26 £61.75 £52.50
Median % change year-on-year +20.26% +17.62% -17.97%
75th Percentile - £67.75 £66.00
90th Percentile £80.11 £70.60 £68.55
UK median hourly rate £74.26 £53.50 £52.50
% change year-on-year +38.80% +1.90% -17.97%

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 32,321 22,086 32,747
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in England 86.33% 90.81% 86.83%
Number of daily rates quoted 20,717 14,513 21,645
10th Percentile £313 £310 £300
25th Percentile £413 £413 £413
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £505 £525 £525
Median % change year-on-year -3.81% - -4.55%
75th Percentile £615 £638 £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 1,977 834 2,155
10th Percentile £15.31 £15.00 £13.00
25th Percentile £18.87 £20.67 £16.00
Median hourly rate £35.00 £33.00 £33.00
Median % change year-on-year +6.06% - -12.00%
75th Percentile £65.00 £65.00 £58.70
90th Percentile £75.40 £77.41 £71.89
UK median hourly rate £32.50 £32.50 £32.50
% change year-on-year - - -9.47%

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 24 March 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 24 March 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 24 March 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 +55 432 £500 -4.76% 89
North of England +2 131 £480 +6.67% 75
Midlands -17 77 £483 +4.32% 27
North West +6 70 £423 -13.18% 41
South East -48 67 £475 -5.94% 55
West Midlands -19 59 £492 +1.86% 18
Yorkshire -27 47 £515 +21.18% 18
South West -20 30 £475 -17.39% 15
East Midlands -21 18 £401 +8.23% 8
East of England -25 18 £475 +35.79% 8
North East -10 16 £475 +18.75% 16
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
1 164 (21.38%) Confluence
2 25 (3.26%) SharePoint
3 14 (1.83%) CMS
4 11 (1.43%) Microsoft Exchange
5 9 (1.17%) SAS
6 3 (0.39%) Anypoint
6 3 (0.39%) Camunda
7 2 (0.26%) Drupal
7 2 (0.26%) JBoss
7 2 (0.26%) Sitecore CMS
7 2 (0.26%) WordPress
8 1 (0.13%) Adobe Experience Manager
8 1 (0.13%) Apache
8 1 (0.13%) Apache Airflow
8 1 (0.13%) Apache Solr
8 1 (0.13%) Kentico
8 1 (0.13%) SharePoint Server
8 1 (0.13%) Tomcat
Applications
1 48 (6.26%) Microsoft Excel
2 44 (5.74%) MS Visio
3 29 (3.78%) Microsoft Office
4 21 (2.74%) Microsoft PowerPoint
5 5 (0.65%) Adobe XD
5 5 (0.65%) Sketch
6 4 (0.52%) Notion
7 3 (0.39%) InVision
7 3 (0.39%) Microsoft Project
7 3 (0.39%) Zeplin
8 2 (0.26%) Chatbot
9 1 (0.13%) Spreadsheet
9 1 (0.13%) Trello
Business Applications
1 18 (2.35%) Dynamics CRM
2 6 (0.78%) Adobe Campaign
2 6 (0.78%) NetSuite
2 6 (0.78%) Payment Gateway
2 6 (0.78%) SAP S/4HANA
3 4 (0.52%) Eloqua
4 3 (0.39%) Oracle Financials
4 3 (0.39%) Salesforce CRM
4 3 (0.39%) Temenos T24
5 2 (0.26%) Actimize
5 2 (0.26%) Aladdin
5 2 (0.26%) Dynamics AX
5 2 (0.26%) Exchequer
5 2 (0.26%) Oracle ERP
5 2 (0.26%) Oracle Payables
5 2 (0.26%) Oracle Receivables
5 2 (0.26%) Primavera
5 2 (0.26%) ProductWriter
5 2 (0.26%) SAP BPC
5 2 (0.26%) Shopify
Cloud Services
1 128 (16.69%) Azure
2 67 (8.74%) AWS
3 66 (8.60%) Power Platform
4 55 (7.17%) Azure DevOps
5 29 (3.78%) GCP
6 24 (3.13%) Microsoft 365
7 23 (3.00%) Salesforce Service Cloud
8 21 (2.74%) GitHub
9 20 (2.61%) Dynamics 365
9 20 (2.61%) PowerApps
10 19 (2.48%) Power Automate
11 18 (2.35%) SaaS
12 13 (1.69%) Entra ID
12 13 (1.69%) Figma
12 13 (1.69%) Lucidchart
12 13 (1.69%) Salesforce Sales Cloud
13 12 (1.56%) Miro
14 11 (1.43%) Snowflake
15 10 (1.30%) Azure Data Factory
15 10 (1.30%) GitHub Actions
Communications & Networking
1 11 (1.43%) WebEx
2 9 (1.17%) Firewall
3 8 (1.04%) Network Security
4 5 (0.65%) DNS
5 4 (0.52%) FTP
5 4 (0.52%) HTTP
6 3 (0.39%) BGP
6 3 (0.39%) VLAN
7 2 (0.26%) Software-Defined Networking
8 1 (0.13%) Cisco IPT
8 1 (0.13%) NGFW
8 1 (0.13%) VPN
8 1 (0.13%) Wireless
Database & Business Intelligence
1 51 (6.65%) Power BI
2 28 (3.65%) Data Warehouse
3 19 (2.48%) Tableau
4 15 (1.96%) BigQuery
4 15 (1.96%) Metadata
5 13 (1.69%) SQL Server
6 12 (1.56%) PostgreSQL
7 10 (1.30%) Relational Database
8 9 (1.17%) NoSQL
9 7 (0.91%) Amazon Athena
10 6 (0.78%) Data Lake
11 4 (0.52%) Big Data
12 3 (0.39%) Amazon RDS
12 3 (0.39%) Data Mining
12 3 (0.39%) Delta Lake
12 3 (0.39%) MongoDB
12 3 (0.39%) OLAP
12 3 (0.39%) Oracle Database
13 2 (0.26%) Data Vault
13 2 (0.26%) SQL Server Integration Services
Development Applications
1 210 (27.38%) JIRA
2 23 (3.00%) Jenkins
3 15 (1.96%) Postman
4 13 (1.69%) Git
5 11 (1.43%) Cucumber
5 11 (1.43%) Selenium
6 9 (1.17%) GitLab
6 9 (1.17%) Zephyr
7 8 (1.04%) JUnit
8 6 (0.78%) SonarQube
9 5 (0.65%) Axure RP
9 5 (0.65%) Balsamiq
9 5 (0.65%) JMeter
9 5 (0.65%) REST Assured
9 5 (0.65%) TeamCity
9 5 (0.65%) TestRail
10 4 (0.52%) Sonatype Nexus
10 4 (0.52%) SQL Server Management Studio (SSMS)
11 3 (0.39%) Artifactory
11 3 (0.39%) SpecFlow
General
1 318 (41.46%) Social Skills
2 200 (26.08%) Finance
3 191 (24.90%) Analytical Skills
4 109 (14.21%) Public Sector
5 76 (9.91%) Banking
6 64 (8.34%) Documentation Skills
7 40 (5.22%) Presentation Skills
8 39 (5.08%) Retail
9 31 (4.04%) Marketing
10 30 (3.91%) Legal
11 22 (2.87%) Influencing Skills
12 14 (1.83%) Front Office
12 14 (1.83%) Organisational Skills
13 13 (1.69%) Financial Institution
13 13 (1.69%) Military
14 10 (1.30%) Investment Banking
14 10 (1.30%) Retail Banking
15 8 (1.04%) Back Office
15 8 (1.04%) Pharmaceutical
15 8 (1.04%) Telecoms
Job Titles
1 426 (55.54%) Analyst
2 393 (51.24%) Business Analyst
3 113 (14.73%) Senior
4 81 (10.56%) Product Owner
5 75 (9.78%) Senior Analyst
6 65 (8.47%) Senior Business Analyst
7 52 (6.78%) Developer
8 43 (5.61%) Technical Analyst
9 42 (5.48%) Product Manager
10 41 (5.35%) Technical Business Analyst
11 35 (4.56%) Salesforce Analyst
11 35 (4.56%) Salesforce Business Analyst
12 27 (3.52%) Lead
13 26 (3.39%) Data Analyst
14 25 (3.26%) SC Cleared Business Analyst
15 23 (3.00%) Data Business Analyst
16 22 (2.87%) Financial Analyst
17 21 (2.74%) Designer
18 20 (2.61%) Implementation Analyst
19 19 (2.48%) Test Analyst
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 25 (3.26%) REST
2 17 (2.22%) ADO
3 16 (2.09%) XML
4 15 (1.96%) React
5 12 (1.56%) JSON
6 11 (1.43%) XMPP
7 10 (1.30%) HTML
8 9 (1.17%) Kafka
8 9 (1.17%) RESTful
9 8 (1.04%) AngularJS
9 8 (1.04%) Apache NiFi
9 8 (1.04%) CSS
9 8 (1.04%) Lightning Web Components
9 8 (1.04%) Node.js
9 8 (1.04%) Spring
9 8 (1.04%) VML
10 7 (0.91%) Spring Boot
10 7 (0.91%) Web Services
11 6 (0.78%) FHIR
12 5 (0.65%) Playwright
Miscellaneous
1 242 (31.55%) Product Ownership
2 23 (3.00%) Analytical Mindset
3 21 (2.74%) Onboarding
4 15 (1.96%) Legacy Systems
4 15 (1.96%) PMI
5 14 (1.83%) Self-Motivation
6 13 (1.69%) Cloud Native
6 13 (1.69%) CMDB
6 13 (1.69%) Data Protection Act
6 13 (1.69%) Management Information System
7 12 (1.56%) Data Structures
8 11 (1.43%) Foreign Exchange (FX)
9 8 (1.04%) NHS
9 8 (1.04%) SWIFT Messaging Network
10 7 (0.91%) Low-Code
10 7 (0.91%) Marketing Technology
10 7 (0.91%) Reinsurance
11 6 (0.78%) Hybrid Cloud
11 6 (0.78%) Virtual Team
12 5 (0.65%) Mobile App
Operating Systems
1 20 (2.61%) Windows
2 13 (1.69%) Linux
3 8 (1.04%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
3 8 (1.04%) Windows Server
Processes & Methodologies
1 504 (65.71%) Agile
2 300 (39.11%) Acceptance Criteria
3 241 (31.42%) Stakeholder Management
4 198 (25.81%) Requirements Gathering
4 198 (25.81%) Workshop Facilitation
5 193 (25.16%) Scrum
6 179 (23.34%) Business Analysis
7 151 (19.69%) User Acceptance Testing
8 149 (19.43%) Problem-Solving
9 145 (18.90%) DevOps
10 139 (18.12%) Stakeholder Engagement
11 126 (16.43%) Roadmaps
12 110 (14.34%) Sprint Planning
13 105 (13.69%) Migration
14 103 (13.43%) Data Modelling
15 98 (12.78%) Backlog Management
16 92 (11.99%) Product Backlog
17 84 (10.95%) Continuous Improvement
17 84 (10.95%) Use Case
18 82 (10.69%) Analytics
Programming Languages
1 98 (12.78%) SQL
2 56 (7.30%) Python
3 32 (4.17%) Java
4 21 (2.74%) JavaScript
5 17 (2.22%) PowerShell
6 14 (1.83%) C#
7 13 (1.69%) Bash
8 9 (1.17%) Perl
9 8 (1.04%) Scala
9 8 (1.04%) TypeScript
10 7 (0.91%) Korn
11 6 (0.78%) Apex Code
12 4 (0.52%) T-SQL
12 4 (0.52%) VBA
13 3 (0.39%) XPath
14 2 (0.26%) Google Apps Script
14 2 (0.26%) Kotlin
14 2 (0.26%) PHP
14 2 (0.26%) PL/SQL
15 1 (0.13%) Go
Qualifications
1 154 (20.08%) Security Cleared
2 126 (16.43%) SC Cleared
3 89 (11.60%) Degree
4 41 (5.35%) CBAP
5 31 (4.04%) IIBA
6 30 (3.91%) BPSS Clearance
7 21 (2.74%) PMI Certification
8 19 (2.48%) CSPO
9 11 (1.43%) Master's Degree
10 7 (0.91%) DV Cleared
10 7 (0.91%) PMP
11 6 (0.78%) CCDP
11 6 (0.78%) CCNA
11 6 (0.78%) CCNP
11 6 (0.78%) Cisco Certification
11 6 (0.78%) ISEB
11 6 (0.78%) ISTQB
11 6 (0.78%) MBA
12 5 (0.65%) AWS Certification
12 5 (0.65%) Computer Science Degree
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 110 (14.34%) QA
2 41 (5.35%) Accessibility
3 36 (4.69%) Data Quality
4 25 (3.26%) GDPR
5 14 (1.83%) SLA
6 13 (1.69%) WCAG
7 9 (1.17%) PSD2
8 7 (0.91%) NIST
8 7 (0.91%) PCI DSS
9 6 (0.78%) GxP
9 6 (0.78%) HL7
9 6 (0.78%) ISO 8583
10 3 (0.39%) California Consumer Privacy Act
10 3 (0.39%) GMP
10 3 (0.39%) ISO 20022
10 3 (0.39%) ISO/IEC 27001
10 3 (0.39%) SNOMED CT
11 2 (0.26%) EU AI Act
11 2 (0.26%) NCSC
11 2 (0.26%) Software Quality Assurance
System Software
1 18 (2.35%) Docker
2 13 (1.69%) Active Directory
3 5 (0.65%) VMware Infrastructure
4 1 (0.13%) Virtual Desktop
Systems Management
1 24 (3.13%) Kubernetes
2 12 (1.56%) Terraform
3 9 (1.17%) Ansible
4 7 (0.91%) SCCM
5 6 (0.78%) NetBackup
6 5 (0.65%) Active Directory Federation Services
6 5 (0.65%) HP Quality Center
7 4 (0.52%) Grafana
7 4 (0.52%) Puppet
8 3 (0.39%) Progress Chef
9 2 (0.26%) CASB
9 2 (0.26%) FortiGate
9 2 (0.26%) HP ALM
9 2 (0.26%) Jamf Pro
10 1 (0.13%) CloudHub
10 1 (0.13%) Kibana
10 1 (0.13%) Single Sign-On
Vendors
1 122 (15.91%) Microsoft
2 85 (11.08%) Salesforce
3 46 (6.00%) ServiceNow
4 37 (4.82%) SAP
5 31 (4.04%) Oracle
6 21 (2.74%) Cisco
7 17 (2.22%) Databricks
8 15 (1.96%) Adobe
9 14 (1.83%) Red Hat
10 13 (1.69%) Citrix
10 13 (1.69%) Google
11 11 (1.43%) MuleSoft
11 11 (1.43%) VMware
12 9 (1.17%) Pega
12 9 (1.17%) Splunk
13 8 (1.04%) Workday
13 8 (1.04%) Zscaler
14 6 (0.78%) Guidewire
14 6 (0.78%) Salesforce Marketing Cloud
14 6 (0.78%) Zuora