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 27 December 2025, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
27 Dec 2025
Same period 2024 Same period 2023
Rank 133 179 139
Rank change year-on-year +46 -40 -29
Contract jobs citing User Stories 676 411 673
As % of all contract jobs in England 2.13% 1.44% 1.82%
As % of the Processes & Methodologies category 2.40% 1.62% 2.06%
Number of daily rates quoted 477 261 472
10th Percentile £351 £354 £388
25th Percentile £406 £422 £438
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £490 £525 £525
Median % change year-on-year -6.67% - -1.87%
75th Percentile £555 £625 £601
90th Percentile £650 £685 £686
UK median daily rate £485 £519 £525
% change year-on-year -6.51% -1.19% -
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 and 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 28,126 25,301 32,618
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in England 88.47% 88.70% 88.26%
Number of daily rates quoted 17,892 15,616 22,141
10th Percentile £301 £311 £310
25th Percentile £406 £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 £528
% change year-on-year -4.76% -0.47% -4.09%
Number of hourly rates quoted 1,807 836 1,442
10th Percentile £15.18 £15.62 £14.25
25th Percentile £17.98 £20.30 £19.06
Median hourly rate £25.15 £35.00 £44.50
Median % change year-on-year -28.14% -21.35% +25.64%
75th Percentile £56.69 £64.79 £65.00
90th Percentile £69.65 £75.00 £77.50
UK median hourly rate £25.15 £32.50 £42.50
% change year-on-year -22.62% -23.53% +21.43%

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 27 December 2025.

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 27 December 2025.

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 27 December 2025. 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 +48 374 £500 -9.09% 192
North of England +21 122 £500 +11.11% 202
South East -14 74 £465 -8.92% 263
Midlands +6 62 £428 +6.21% 196
Yorkshire +7 58 £513 - 87
North West +6 52 £427 +0.47% 102
West Midlands +2 37 £490 +4.81% 105
East Midlands -3 25 £360 -6.49% 81
South West -4 21 £498 -17.08% 102
North East +5 14 £500 +19.05% 14
East of England -18 13 £427 +10.19% 139
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
1 135 (19.97%) Confluence
2 21 (3.11%) SharePoint
3 10 (1.48%) CMS
4 8 (1.18%) Microsoft Exchange
5 6 (0.89%) Apache Airflow
6 5 (0.74%) nginx
7 4 (0.59%) Anypoint
7 4 (0.59%) Drupal
7 4 (0.59%) JBoss
7 4 (0.59%) Oracle Workflow
7 4 (0.59%) SAS
7 4 (0.59%) WordPress
8 2 (0.30%) Apache
8 2 (0.30%) Traefik
8 2 (0.30%) WebSphere
9 1 (0.15%) Adobe Experience Manager
9 1 (0.15%) Kentico
9 1 (0.15%) SharePoint Server
Applications
1 37 (5.47%) Microsoft Excel
2 29 (4.29%) MS Visio
3 24 (3.55%) Microsoft Office
4 20 (2.96%) 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 (0.44%) InVision
8 2 (0.30%) Spreadsheet
8 2 (0.30%) Zeplin
Business Applications
1 28 (4.14%) Dynamics CRM
2 9 (1.33%) Payment Gateway
2 9 (1.33%) Temenos T24
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 (0.44%) ProductWriter
6 3 (0.44%) Salesforce CRM
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 90 (13.31%) Azure
2 72 (10.65%) AWS
3 59 (8.73%) Power Platform
4 45 (6.66%) Azure DevOps
5 30 (4.44%) GCP
6 27 (3.99%) Dynamics 365
7 23 (3.40%) GitHub
8 22 (3.25%) Microsoft 365
9 20 (2.96%) Figma
10 19 (2.81%) PowerApps
11 18 (2.66%) Power Automate
11 18 (2.66%) Serverless
12 17 (2.51%) AWS Lambda
12 17 (2.51%) Salesforce Service Cloud
13 16 (2.37%) Miro
13 16 (2.37%) SaaS
13 16 (2.37%) Snowflake
14 13 (1.92%) GitHub Actions
15 11 (1.63%) Lucidchart
16 10 (1.48%) OpenShift
Communications & Networking
1 8 (1.18%) WebEx
2 5 (0.74%) DNS
3 4 (0.59%) Firewall
3 4 (0.59%) HTTP
4 3 (0.44%) 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 49 (7.25%) Power BI
2 23 (3.40%) Data Warehouse
3 21 (3.11%) Tableau
4 15 (2.22%) BigQuery
5 14 (2.07%) PostgreSQL
6 11 (1.63%) SQL Server
7 9 (1.33%) Metadata
8 7 (1.04%) Amazon Athena
8 7 (1.04%) Oracle Database
8 7 (1.04%) Relational Database
8 7 (1.04%) Star Schema
9 6 (0.89%) Big Data
9 6 (0.89%) Data Vault
9 6 (0.89%) SQL Server Integration Services
10 4 (0.59%) Amazon RDS
10 4 (0.59%) Data Lake
10 4 (0.59%) NoSQL
10 4 (0.59%) Redis
10 4 (0.59%) Snowflake Schema
11 3 (0.44%) DynamoDB
Development Applications
1 195 (28.85%) JIRA
2 33 (4.88%) Jenkins
3 19 (2.81%) GitLab
4 17 (2.51%) Cucumber
5 14 (2.07%) Git
6 12 (1.78%) Postman
6 12 (1.78%) Selenium
7 11 (1.63%) JUnit
8 10 (1.48%) Zephyr
9 7 (1.04%) JMeter
9 7 (1.04%) SonarQube
10 6 (0.89%) Sonatype Nexus
11 4 (0.59%) Axure RP
11 4 (0.59%) Cypress.io
11 4 (0.59%) ER Studio
11 4 (0.59%) ERwin
11 4 (0.59%) PowerDesigner
11 4 (0.59%) TeamCity
11 4 (0.59%) TestRail
12 3 (0.44%) SpecFlow
General
1 288 (42.60%) Social Skills
2 176 (26.04%) Finance
3 146 (21.60%) Analytical Skills
4 76 (11.24%) Public Sector
5 64 (9.47%) Banking
6 46 (6.80%) Documentation Skills
7 33 (4.88%) Marketing
8 32 (4.73%) Presentation Skills
9 31 (4.59%) Retail
10 25 (3.70%) Influencing Skills
11 22 (3.25%) Legal
12 17 (2.51%) Back Office
13 16 (2.37%) Front Office
14 14 (2.07%) Investment Banking
15 12 (1.78%) Telecoms
16 11 (1.63%) Organisational Skills
17 8 (1.18%) General Ledger
18 7 (1.04%) Billing
18 7 (1.04%) Financial Institution
18 7 (1.04%) Manufacturing
Job Titles
1 326 (48.22%) Analyst
2 303 (44.82%) Business Analyst
3 97 (14.35%) Product Owner
4 83 (12.28%) Senior
5 50 (7.40%) Senior Analyst
5 50 (7.40%) Technical Analyst
6 47 (6.95%) Technical Business Analyst
7 46 (6.80%) Senior Business Analyst
8 33 (4.88%) Developer
9 26 (3.85%) Lead
9 26 (3.85%) Product Manager
9 26 (3.85%) Salesforce Business Analyst
10 23 (3.40%) Salesforce Analyst
11 21 (3.11%) Consultant
11 21 (3.11%) Designer
12 20 (2.96%) Test Analyst
13 16 (2.37%) Architect
14 15 (2.22%) Product Analyst
15 14 (2.07%) Digital Business Analyst
15 14 (2.07%) SC Cleared Business Analyst
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 19 (2.81%) XML
2 18 (2.66%) JSON
2 18 (2.66%) RESTful
3 17 (2.51%) REST
4 15 (2.22%) Kafka
5 14 (2.07%) SOAP
6 13 (1.92%) React
6 13 (1.92%) Spring
7 12 (1.78%) ADO
7 12 (1.78%) Spring Boot
8 11 (1.63%) HTML
9 9 (1.33%) Lightning Web Components
9 9 (1.33%) Playwright
10 8 (1.18%) Apache NiFi
10 8 (1.18%) Gherkin
10 8 (1.18%) OAuth
10 8 (1.18%) XMPP
11 7 (1.04%) OAuth2
12 6 (0.89%) Node.js
12 6 (0.89%) Web Services
Miscellaneous
1 229 (33.88%) Product Ownership
2 27 (3.99%) Onboarding
3 20 (2.96%) Data Structures
4 18 (2.66%) Cloud Native
5 17 (2.51%) Analytical Mindset
6 15 (2.22%) PMI
7 14 (2.07%) Greenfield Project
8 13 (1.92%) Data Protection Act
9 12 (1.78%) Legacy Systems
9 12 (1.78%) SWIFT Messaging Network
10 10 (1.48%) Mobile App
11 9 (1.33%) Algorithms
11 9 (1.33%) Management Information System
12 8 (1.18%) Self-Motivation
13 7 (1.04%) Enterprise Software
13 7 (1.04%) Low-Code
13 7 (1.04%) Reinsurance
14 6 (0.89%) e-Learning
14 6 (0.89%) Hybrid Cloud
14 6 (0.89%) Marketing Technology
Operating Systems
1 20 (2.96%) Windows
2 19 (2.81%) 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
1 502 (74.26%) Agile
2 210 (31.07%) Scrum
3 206 (30.47%) Acceptance Criteria
4 190 (28.11%) Stakeholder Management
5 149 (22.04%) Requirements Gathering
5 149 (22.04%) Workshop Facilitation
6 141 (20.86%) Problem-Solving
7 138 (20.41%) Business Analysis
8 117 (17.31%) DevOps
9 116 (17.16%) Roadmaps
10 113 (16.72%) User Acceptance Testing
11 108 (15.98%) Stakeholder Engagement
12 106 (15.68%) Product Backlog
13 99 (14.64%) Backlog Management
14 93 (13.76%) Sprint Planning
15 91 (13.46%) Data Modelling
16 83 (12.28%) Continuous Improvement
16 83 (12.28%) Migration
17 81 (11.98%) Use Case
18 80 (11.83%) Analytics
Programming Languages
1 81 (11.98%) SQL
2 57 (8.43%) Python
3 37 (5.47%) Java
4 20 (2.96%) Bash
5 13 (1.92%) PowerShell
6 10 (1.48%) C#
7 9 (1.33%) JavaScript
7 9 (1.33%) Scala
8 8 (1.18%) Apex Code
8 8 (1.18%) Perl
9 6 (0.89%) TypeScript
10 4 (0.59%) Korn
11 3 (0.44%) Go
11 3 (0.44%) VBA
11 3 (0.44%) XPath
12 2 (0.30%) PL/SQL
12 2 (0.30%) Ruby
12 2 (0.30%) T-SQL
13 1 (0.15%) Groovy
13 1 (0.15%) Tcl
Qualifications
1 96 (14.20%) Security Cleared
2 89 (13.17%) Degree
3 73 (10.80%) SC Cleared
4 29 (4.29%) CBAP
5 25 (3.70%) CSPO
6 19 (2.81%) BPSS Clearance
6 19 (2.81%) PMI Certification
7 14 (2.07%) IIBA
8 8 (1.18%) Computer Science Degree
9 7 (1.04%) DV Cleared
10 6 (0.89%) CCNA
10 6 (0.89%) CFA
10 6 (0.89%) Cisco Certification
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
12 4 (0.59%) AWS Certification
12 4 (0.59%) Master's Degree
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 89 (13.17%) QA
2 29 (4.29%) Accessibility
3 27 (3.99%) GDPR
4 19 (2.81%) Data Quality
4 19 (2.81%) WCAG
5 15 (2.22%) PSD2
6 12 (1.78%) PCI DSS
7 10 (1.48%) SLA
8 6 (0.89%) ISO 8583
9 5 (0.74%) SEPA
10 4 (0.59%) FIPS 140-2
10 4 (0.59%) ISO 20022
11 3 (0.44%) GxP
11 3 (0.44%) HL7
12 2 (0.30%) Basel III
12 2 (0.30%) EMIR
12 2 (0.30%) GMP
12 2 (0.30%) NCSC
12 2 (0.30%) PMO
13 1 (0.15%) GAMP
System Software
1 25 (3.70%) Docker
2 9 (1.33%) Active Directory
3 8 (1.18%) VMware Infrastructure
4 1 (0.15%) etcd
4 1 (0.15%) Hyper-V
Systems Management
1 24 (3.55%) Kubernetes
2 19 (2.81%) Ansible
3 14 (2.07%) 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 (0.44%) 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 (15.68%) Microsoft
2 77 (11.39%) Salesforce
3 35 (5.18%) Oracle
4 29 (4.29%) SAP
5 23 (3.40%) ServiceNow
6 21 (3.11%) Red Hat
7 14 (2.07%) Commvault
7 14 (2.07%) MuleSoft
8 13 (1.92%) VMware
9 12 (1.78%) Databricks
10 11 (1.63%) Cisco
11 10 (1.48%) Citrix
11 10 (1.48%) Veritas
12 9 (1.33%) Adobe
12 9 (1.33%) Temenos
13 8 (1.18%) Pega
14 7 (1.04%) Google
15 6 (0.89%) Guidewire
16 5 (0.74%) Charles River
16 5 (0.74%) Zuora