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 1 April 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
1 Apr 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 129 159 145
Rank change year-on-year +30 -14 -29
Contract jobs citing User Stories 791 416 618
As % of all contract jobs in England 2.07% 1.72% 1.64%
As % of the Processes & Methodologies category 2.41% 1.89% 1.89%
Number of daily rates quoted 563 270 432
10th Percentile £351 £350 £375
25th Percentile £410 £410 £425
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £496 £500 £538
Median % change year-on-year -0.90% -6.98% +2.38%
75th Percentile £575 £600 £600
90th Percentile £650 £658 £656
UK median daily rate £492 £498 £525
% change year-on-year -1.11% -5.24% +0.96%
Number of hourly rates quoted 23 2 7
10th Percentile £48.86 £54.90 £31.71
25th Percentile £65.31 £57.00 £32.36
Median hourly rate £72.50 £61.75 £52.50
Median % change year-on-year +17.41% +17.62% -17.97%
75th Percentile £74.26 £67.75 £59.88
90th Percentile - £70.60 £68.60
UK median hourly rate £73.38 £53.50 £52.50
% change year-on-year +37.16% +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 32,858 22,016 32,689
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in England 86.08% 90.81% 86.75%
Number of daily rates quoted 21,074 14,505 21,608
10th Percentile £313 £313 £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 £614 £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 2,007 857 2,166
10th Percentile £15.34 £15.00 £13.00
25th Percentile £19.27 £20.00 £16.00
Median hourly rate £37.00 £32.50 £32.50
Median % change year-on-year +13.85% - -13.33%
75th Percentile £65.00 £65.00 £58.36
90th Percentile £77.50 £76.63 £71.25
UK median hourly rate £35.50 £32.00 £32.50
% change year-on-year +10.94% -1.54% -11.33%

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 1 April 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 1 April 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 1 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 +42 444 £500 -4.76% 93
North of England +6 143 £480 +6.67% 73
Midlands -23 79 £475 +2.70% 22
North West +2 72 £409 -16.05% 37
South East -44 72 £475 -5.00% 55
West Midlands -19 59 £492 +2.71% 14
Yorkshire -16 52 £510 +20.00% 20
South West -19 28 £475 -17.39% 14
North East 0 21 £475 +18.75% 16
East Midlands -22 20 £401 +4.16% 7
East of England -24 18 £475 +26.73% 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
1 162 (20.48%) Confluence
2 28 (3.54%) SharePoint
3 15 (1.90%) CMS
4 11 (1.39%) Microsoft Exchange
5 9 (1.14%) SAS
6 3 (0.38%) Anypoint
6 3 (0.38%) Camunda
7 2 (0.25%) Drupal
7 2 (0.25%) JBoss
7 2 (0.25%) Sitecore CMS
7 2 (0.25%) 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%) Jupyter
8 1 (0.13%) SharePoint Server
8 1 (0.13%) Tomcat
Applications
1 48 (6.07%) Microsoft Excel
2 44 (5.56%) MS Visio
3 28 (3.54%) Microsoft Office
4 20 (2.53%) Microsoft PowerPoint
5 5 (0.63%) Adobe XD
5 5 (0.63%) Sketch
6 4 (0.51%) Notion
7 3 (0.38%) Chatbot
7 3 (0.38%) InVision
7 3 (0.38%) Microsoft Project
7 3 (0.38%) Zeplin
8 2 (0.25%) Spreadsheet
9 1 (0.13%) Trello
Business Applications
1 17 (2.15%) Dynamics CRM
2 6 (0.76%) Adobe Campaign
2 6 (0.76%) NetSuite
2 6 (0.76%) Payment Gateway
2 6 (0.76%) SAP S/4HANA
3 4 (0.51%) Eloqua
4 3 (0.38%) Oracle Financials
4 3 (0.38%) Salesforce CRM
4 3 (0.38%) Temenos T24
5 2 (0.25%) Actimize
5 2 (0.25%) Aladdin
5 2 (0.25%) Dynamics AX
5 2 (0.25%) Exchequer
5 2 (0.25%) Oracle ERP
5 2 (0.25%) Oracle Payables
5 2 (0.25%) Oracle Receivables
5 2 (0.25%) Primavera
5 2 (0.25%) ProductWriter
5 2 (0.25%) SAP BPC
5 2 (0.25%) Shopify
Cloud Services
1 129 (16.31%) Azure
2 72 (9.10%) AWS
3 70 (8.85%) Power Platform
4 54 (6.83%) Azure DevOps
5 27 (3.41%) GCP
6 25 (3.16%) Microsoft 365
7 24 (3.03%) Salesforce Service Cloud
8 22 (2.78%) GitHub
9 21 (2.65%) Dynamics 365
9 21 (2.65%) PowerApps
10 20 (2.53%) Power Automate
11 19 (2.40%) SaaS
12 14 (1.77%) Figma
13 13 (1.64%) Entra ID
13 13 (1.64%) Lucidchart
13 13 (1.64%) Salesforce Sales Cloud
14 12 (1.52%) Miro
15 10 (1.26%) Azure Data Factory
15 10 (1.26%) GitHub Actions
16 9 (1.14%) Snowflake
Communications & Networking
1 11 (1.39%) WebEx
2 9 (1.14%) Firewall
3 8 (1.01%) Network Security
4 5 (0.63%) DNS
5 4 (0.51%) FTP
5 4 (0.51%) HTTP
6 3 (0.38%) BGP
6 3 (0.38%) VLAN
7 2 (0.25%) 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 53 (6.70%) Power BI
2 28 (3.54%) Data Warehouse
3 19 (2.40%) Tableau
4 16 (2.02%) Metadata
5 15 (1.90%) BigQuery
6 13 (1.64%) SQL Server
7 11 (1.39%) PostgreSQL
8 10 (1.26%) Relational Database
9 9 (1.14%) NoSQL
10 7 (0.88%) Amazon Athena
11 6 (0.76%) Data Lake
12 5 (0.63%) Delta Lake
13 4 (0.51%) Big Data
14 3 (0.38%) Amazon RDS
14 3 (0.38%) Data Mining
14 3 (0.38%) MongoDB
14 3 (0.38%) OLAP
14 3 (0.38%) Oracle Database
15 2 (0.25%) Oracle OLAP
15 2 (0.25%) SQL Server Integration Services
Development Applications
1 206 (26.04%) JIRA
2 22 (2.78%) Jenkins
3 21 (2.65%) Postman
4 13 (1.64%) Git
5 11 (1.39%) Selenium
6 10 (1.26%) Cucumber
7 9 (1.14%) GitLab
7 9 (1.14%) Zephyr
8 8 (1.01%) JUnit
9 6 (0.76%) SonarQube
10 5 (0.63%) Axure RP
10 5 (0.63%) Balsamiq
10 5 (0.63%) JMeter
10 5 (0.63%) REST Assured
10 5 (0.63%) TeamCity
10 5 (0.63%) TestRail
11 4 (0.51%) Sonatype Nexus
11 4 (0.51%) SQL Server Management Studio (SSMS)
12 3 (0.38%) Artifactory
12 3 (0.38%) Cypress.io
General
1 321 (40.58%) Social Skills
2 206 (26.04%) Finance
3 205 (25.92%) Analytical Skills
4 108 (13.65%) Public Sector
5 81 (10.24%) Banking
6 63 (7.96%) Documentation Skills
7 41 (5.18%) Presentation Skills
7 41 (5.18%) Retail
8 33 (4.17%) Marketing
9 30 (3.79%) Legal
10 22 (2.78%) Influencing Skills
11 15 (1.90%) Front Office
11 15 (1.90%) Organisational Skills
12 13 (1.64%) Financial Institution
12 13 (1.64%) Military
13 10 (1.26%) Investment Banking
13 10 (1.26%) Retail Banking
14 9 (1.14%) Back Office
15 8 (1.01%) Pharmaceutical
15 8 (1.01%) Telecoms
Job Titles
1 433 (54.74%) Analyst
2 401 (50.70%) Business Analyst
3 117 (14.79%) Senior
4 84 (10.62%) Product Owner
5 78 (9.86%) Senior Analyst
6 67 (8.47%) Senior Business Analyst
7 52 (6.57%) Developer
8 43 (5.44%) Technical Analyst
9 42 (5.31%) Product Manager
10 41 (5.18%) Technical Business Analyst
11 38 (4.80%) Salesforce Business Analyst
12 37 (4.68%) Salesforce Analyst
13 28 (3.54%) Lead
14 27 (3.41%) Data Analyst
15 25 (3.16%) SC Cleared Business Analyst
16 23 (2.91%) Data Business Analyst
16 23 (2.91%) Financial Analyst
17 22 (2.78%) Designer
18 21 (2.65%) Implementation Analyst
19 20 (2.53%) Finance Business Analyst
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 30 (3.79%) REST
2 17 (2.15%) ADO
3 16 (2.02%) XML
4 14 (1.77%) React
4 14 (1.77%) RESTful
5 12 (1.52%) JSON
6 11 (1.39%) XMPP
7 10 (1.26%) HTML
8 9 (1.14%) Kafka
8 9 (1.14%) VML
9 8 (1.01%) Apache NiFi
9 8 (1.01%) CSS
9 8 (1.01%) Node.js
10 7 (0.88%) AngularJS
10 7 (0.88%) Lightning Web Components
10 7 (0.88%) Spring
10 7 (0.88%) Web Services
11 6 (0.76%) FHIR
11 6 (0.76%) Spring Boot
12 5 (0.63%) Playwright
Miscellaneous
1 259 (32.74%) Product Ownership
2 23 (2.91%) Analytical Mindset
3 22 (2.78%) Onboarding
4 20 (2.53%) Self-Motivation
5 16 (2.02%) Legacy Systems
6 15 (1.90%) CMDB
6 15 (1.90%) PMI
7 14 (1.77%) Data Protection Act
8 13 (1.64%) Cloud Native
8 13 (1.64%) Management Information System
9 12 (1.52%) Data Structures
9 12 (1.52%) Foreign Exchange (FX)
10 9 (1.14%) NHS
11 8 (1.01%) SWIFT Messaging Network
12 7 (0.88%) Low-Code
12 7 (0.88%) Marketing Technology
12 7 (0.88%) Reinsurance
12 7 (0.88%) Virtual Team
13 6 (0.76%) Hybrid Cloud
13 6 (0.76%) Mobile App
Operating Systems
1 20 (2.53%) Windows
2 13 (1.64%) Linux
3 8 (1.01%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
3 8 (1.01%) Windows Server
Processes & Methodologies
1 516 (65.23%) Agile
2 314 (39.70%) Acceptance Criteria
3 248 (31.35%) Stakeholder Management
4 199 (25.16%) Requirements Gathering
4 199 (25.16%) Scrum
5 197 (24.91%) Workshop Facilitation
6 182 (23.01%) Business Analysis
7 155 (19.60%) Problem-Solving
8 152 (19.22%) User Acceptance Testing
9 149 (18.84%) DevOps
10 139 (17.57%) Stakeholder Engagement
11 131 (16.56%) Roadmaps
12 119 (15.04%) Sprint Planning
13 107 (13.53%) Data Modelling
13 107 (13.53%) Migration
14 101 (12.77%) Backlog Management
15 95 (12.01%) Product Backlog
16 88 (11.13%) Continuous Improvement
17 85 (10.75%) Analytics
18 84 (10.62%) Use Case
Programming Languages
1 99 (12.52%) SQL
2 60 (7.59%) Python
3 32 (4.05%) Java
4 21 (2.65%) JavaScript
5 17 (2.15%) PowerShell
6 14 (1.77%) C#
7 13 (1.64%) Bash
8 9 (1.14%) Perl
9 8 (1.01%) Scala
9 8 (1.01%) TypeScript
10 6 (0.76%) Korn
11 5 (0.63%) Apex Code
12 4 (0.51%) T-SQL
12 4 (0.51%) VBA
13 3 (0.38%) XPath
14 2 (0.25%) Google Apps Script
14 2 (0.25%) Kotlin
14 2 (0.25%) PHP
14 2 (0.25%) PL/SQL
15 1 (0.13%) X++
Qualifications
1 159 (20.10%) Security Cleared
2 131 (16.56%) SC Cleared
3 89 (11.25%) Degree
4 40 (5.06%) CBAP
5 31 (3.92%) BPSS Clearance
5 31 (3.92%) IIBA
6 21 (2.65%) PMI Certification
7 19 (2.40%) CSPO
8 11 (1.39%) Master's Degree
9 7 (0.88%) DV Cleared
9 7 (0.88%) PMP
10 6 (0.76%) CCDP
10 6 (0.76%) CCNA
10 6 (0.76%) CCNP
10 6 (0.76%) Cisco Certification
10 6 (0.76%) ISEB
10 6 (0.76%) ISTQB
10 6 (0.76%) MBA
11 5 (0.63%) AWS Certification
11 5 (0.63%) Computer Science Degree
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 114 (14.41%) QA
2 41 (5.18%) Accessibility
3 40 (5.06%) Data Quality
4 23 (2.91%) GDPR
5 14 (1.77%) SLA
6 13 (1.64%) WCAG
7 9 (1.14%) PSD2
8 7 (0.88%) NIST
8 7 (0.88%) PCI DSS
9 6 (0.76%) GxP
9 6 (0.76%) HL7
9 6 (0.76%) ISO 8583
10 4 (0.51%) ISO/IEC 27001
11 3 (0.38%) California Consumer Privacy Act
11 3 (0.38%) GMP
11 3 (0.38%) ISO 20022
11 3 (0.38%) SNOMED CT
12 2 (0.25%) 21 CFR Part 11
12 2 (0.25%) EU AI Act
12 2 (0.25%) Software Quality Assurance
System Software
1 19 (2.40%) Docker
2 13 (1.64%) Active Directory
3 6 (0.76%) VMware Infrastructure
4 1 (0.13%) Ceph
4 1 (0.13%) IAG
4 1 (0.13%) Virtual Desktop
4 1 (0.13%) Virtual Machines
Systems Management
1 25 (3.16%) Kubernetes
2 12 (1.52%) Terraform
3 11 (1.39%) Ansible
4 7 (0.88%) SCCM
5 6 (0.76%) NetBackup
6 5 (0.63%) Active Directory Federation Services
6 5 (0.63%) HP Quality Center
7 4 (0.51%) Puppet
8 3 (0.38%) Grafana
8 3 (0.38%) Progress Chef
9 2 (0.25%) CASB
9 2 (0.25%) FortiGate
9 2 (0.25%) HP ALM
9 2 (0.25%) Jamf Pro
9 2 (0.25%) Single Sign-On
10 1 (0.13%) Argo
10 1 (0.13%) CloudHub
10 1 (0.13%) Kibana
Vendors
1 124 (15.68%) Microsoft
2 86 (10.87%) Salesforce
3 47 (5.94%) ServiceNow
4 39 (4.93%) SAP
5 30 (3.79%) Oracle
6 21 (2.65%) Cisco
7 17 (2.15%) Databricks
8 16 (2.02%) Adobe
9 14 (1.77%) Google
9 14 (1.77%) Red Hat
10 13 (1.64%) Citrix
11 12 (1.52%) VMware
12 10 (1.26%) MuleSoft
13 9 (1.14%) Pega
14 8 (1.01%) Splunk
14 8 (1.01%) Workday
14 8 (1.01%) Zscaler
15 7 (0.88%) Salesforce Marketing Cloud
16 6 (0.76%) Guidewire
16 6 (0.76%) Zuora