Data Engineer Contract Job Trends in London

Data Engineer
England > London

The median Data Engineer daily rate in London is £525, according to job vacancies posted in the 6 months leading up to 5 July 2026.

The table below compares current contractor rates and summary statistics with the previous two years.

6 months to
5 Jul 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 51 87 85
Rank change year-on-year +36 -2 +12
Contract jobs requiring a Data Engineer 844 419 506
As % of all contract jobs in London 4.35% 3.16% 2.87%
As % of the Job Titles category 4.68% 3.38% 3.06%
Number of daily rates quoted 618 312 398
10th Percentile £388 £400 £350
25th Percentile £451 £455 £450
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £525 £525 £550
Median % change year-on-year - -4.55% -4.35%
75th Percentile £625 £620 £650
90th Percentile £711 £736 £741
England median daily rate £500 £500 £520
% change year-on-year - -3.85% -5.45%
Number of hourly rates quoted 8 7 6
10th Percentile £26.80 £47.65 £48.00
25th Percentile £30.00 £51.25 £49.25
Median hourly rate £34.84 £52.50 £50.50
Median % change year-on-year -33.64% +3.96% -22.31%
75th Percentile £46.75 £70.00 £53.25
90th Percentile £61.15 £84.00 £63.13
England median hourly rate £45.00 £52.50 £71.25
% change year-on-year -14.29% -26.32% -

All Contract IT Job Roles
London

For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all contract IT job vacancies in London. Most job vacancies include a discernible job title that can be normalized. As such, the figures in the second row provide an indication of the number of contract jobs in our overall sample.

Contract vacancies in London with a recognized job title 18,021 12,401 16,556
% of contract IT jobs with a recognized job title 92.90% 93.39% 93.96%
Number of daily rates quoted 11,847 8,365 11,850
10th Percentile £358 £332 £325
25th Percentile £440 £425 £444
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £540 £550 £550
Median % change year-on-year -1.82% - -4.35%
75th Percentile £650 £675 £688
90th Percentile £760 £788 £800
England median daily rate £525 £513 £525
% change year-on-year +2.44% -2.38% -4.55%
Number of hourly rates quoted 313 189 307
10th Percentile £17.69 £18.87 £16.00
25th Percentile £23.50 £23.45 £20.24
Median hourly rate £39.00 £32.00 £27.81
Median % change year-on-year +21.88% +15.07% -25.52%
75th Percentile £63.10 £50.50 £46.68
90th Percentile £81.00 £64.00 £68.30
England median hourly rate £45.00 £28.00 £40.00
% change year-on-year +60.71% -30.00% -8.57%

Data Engineer
Job Vacancy Trend in London

Historical trend showing the proportion of contract IT job postings featuring 'Data Engineer' in the job title relative to all contract IT jobs advertised in London.

Data Engineer job vacancy trend in London

Data Engineer
Daily Rate Trend in London

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for Data Engineer job vacancies in London.

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for Data Engineer job vacancies in London

Data Engineer
Daily Rate Histogram in London

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing Data Engineer in London over the 6 months to 5 July 2026.

Daily rate histogram for Data Engineer in London

Data Engineer
Hourly Rate Trend in London

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for Data Engineer job vacancies in London.

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for Data Engineer job vacancies in London

Data Engineer
Hourly Rate Histogram in London

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing Data Engineer in London over the 6 months to 5 July 2026.

Hourly rate histogram for Data Engineer in London

Data Engineer
Contract Job Locations in London

The table below looks at the demand and provides a guide to the median contractor rates quoted in IT jobs citing Data Engineer within the London region over the 6 months to 5 July 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
Central London +18 115 £553 +10.50% 34
West London -7 22 £603 +9.15% 2
South London +1 6 £500 +5.26% 5
East London +3 4 £450 - 4
Data Engineer
England

Data Engineer Skill Set
Top 30 Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities in London

For the 6 months to 5 July 2026, Data Engineer contract job roles required the following skills and capabilities in order of popularity. The figures indicate the absolute number of co-occurrences and as a proportion of all contract job ads across the London region featuring Data Engineer in the job title.

1 479 (56.75%) Python
2 470 (55.69%) SQL
3 391 (46.33%) Data Pipeline
4 338 (40.05%) Data Engineering
5 323 (38.27%) Analytics
6 320 (37.91%) Azure
7 316 (37.44%) ETL
8 302 (35.78%) AWS
9 293 (34.72%) Data Modelling
10 235 (27.84%) Data Quality
11 229 (27.13%) CI/CD
12 205 (24.29%) Databricks
13 184 (21.80%) Security Cleared
14 181 (21.45%) DevOps
15 173 (20.50%) SC Cleared
16 157 (18.60%) Business Intelligence
16 157 (18.60%) Data Warehouse
17 150 (17.77%) Power Platform
18 147 (17.42%) Agile
19 140 (16.59%) Power BI
20 137 (16.23%) PySpark
21 136 (16.11%) Migration
22 133 (15.76%) Data Governance
23 130 (15.40%) AI
24 127 (15.05%) Terraform
25 122 (14.45%) dbt
25 122 (14.45%) Snowflake
26 121 (14.34%) Apache Airflow
27 119 (14.10%) Azure Data Factory
28 114 (13.51%) Amazon S3

Data Engineer Skill Set
Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities in London 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
1 121 (14.34%) Apache Airflow
2 88 (10.43%) Apache Spark
3 62 (7.35%) Apache
4 15 (1.78%) Confluence
5 9 (1.07%) SharePoint
6 8 (0.95%) Palantir Foundry
7 5 (0.59%) Microsoft Exchange
8 4 (0.47%) Jupyter
8 4 (0.47%) SAS
9 2 (0.24%) Luigi
10 1 (0.12%) Appian
10 1 (0.12%) Camunda
10 1 (0.12%) R Markdown
Applications
1 11 (1.30%) Microsoft Excel
2 3 (0.36%) Spreadsheet
3 1 (0.12%) Chatbot
Business Applications
1 7 (0.83%) Aladdin
2 3 (0.36%) SAP BPC
2 3 (0.36%) SimCorp Dimension
3 2 (0.24%) BambooHR
3 2 (0.24%) Maximo
4 1 (0.12%) Dynamics CRM
4 1 (0.12%) iTrent
4 1 (0.12%) NetSuite
4 1 (0.12%) Oracle EBS
4 1 (0.12%) Raiser’s Edge
4 1 (0.12%) Sage X3
4 1 (0.12%) SAP Business ByDesign
4 1 (0.12%) SAP CAR
4 1 (0.12%) SAP EWM
Cloud Services
1 320 (37.91%) Azure
2 302 (35.78%) AWS
3 150 (17.77%) Power Platform
4 122 (14.45%) dbt
4 122 (14.45%) Snowflake
5 119 (14.10%) Azure Data Factory
6 114 (13.51%) Amazon S3
7 102 (12.09%) Azure DevOps
8 94 (11.14%) GCP
9 87 (10.31%) Azure Synapse Analytics
10 77 (9.12%) GitHub
11 64 (7.58%) Serverless
12 63 (7.46%) AWS Lambda
13 35 (4.15%) GitHub Actions
14 24 (2.84%) Amazon EMR
15 21 (2.49%) Dagster
16 19 (2.25%) AWS CloudFormation
17 18 (2.13%) Amazon Kinesis
18 16 (1.90%) Amazon SQS
19 15 (1.78%) Amazon CloudWatch
Communications & Networking
1 2 (0.24%) Structured Cabling
2 1 (0.12%) 4G
2 1 (0.12%) 5G
2 1 (0.12%) Firewall
Database & Business Intelligence
1 157 (18.60%) Data Warehouse
2 140 (16.59%) Power BI
3 108 (12.80%) Data Lake
4 69 (8.18%) BigQuery
5 64 (7.58%) Delta Lake
5 64 (7.58%) SQL Server
6 54 (6.40%) Amazon Redshift
6 54 (6.40%) Metadata
7 52 (6.16%) Tableau
8 47 (5.57%) PostgreSQL
8 47 (5.57%) Snowflake Schema
9 43 (5.09%) Amazon Athena
10 38 (4.50%) Big Data
11 34 (4.03%) Azure SQL Database
11 34 (4.03%) NoSQL
12 28 (3.32%) Relational Database
13 25 (2.96%) SQL Server Integration Services
14 24 (2.84%) MongoDB
14 24 (2.84%) Star Schema
15 23 (2.73%) Spark SQL
Development Applications
1 72 (8.53%) Git
2 31 (3.67%) JIRA
3 26 (3.08%) GitLab
4 9 (1.07%) Jenkins
5 4 (0.47%) MLflow
6 3 (0.36%) SonarQube
7 2 (0.24%) Atlassian Bamboo
7 2 (0.24%) Bitbucket
7 2 (0.24%) Sonatype Nexus
7 2 (0.24%) SQL Server Management Studio (SSMS)
7 2 (0.24%) Terragrunt
8 1 (0.12%) Claude Code
8 1 (0.12%) Octopus Deploy
8 1 (0.12%) Selenium
General
1 228 (27.01%) Finance
2 134 (15.88%) Social Skills
3 102 (12.09%) Analytical Skills
4 59 (6.99%) Public Sector
5 58 (6.87%) Banking
6 24 (2.84%) Inclusion and Diversity
7 15 (1.78%) Pharmaceutical
7 15 (1.78%) Retail
8 11 (1.30%) Marketing
9 10 (1.18%) Publishing
10 9 (1.07%) Front Office
10 9 (1.07%) Telecoms
11 6 (0.71%) Documentation Skills
12 5 (0.59%) Manufacturing
13 4 (0.47%) Billing
13 4 (0.47%) Financial Institution
13 4 (0.47%) Games
13 4 (0.47%) Legal
14 3 (0.36%) Investment Banking
14 3 (0.36%) Local Government
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 137 (16.23%) PySpark
2 80 (9.48%) Kafka
3 27 (3.20%) Pandas
4 22 (2.61%) Spring
4 22 (2.61%) Spring Boot
5 18 (2.13%) Great Expectations
6 17 (2.01%) REST
7 14 (1.66%) YAML
8 11 (1.30%) scikit-learn
9 10 (1.18%) JSON
9 10 (1.18%) Matplotlib
9 10 (1.18%) Microsoft Graph
10 9 (1.07%) Apache Beam
10 9 (1.07%) GeoJSON
10 9 (1.07%) Polars
10 9 (1.07%) XML
11 7 (0.83%) PyTorch
12 6 (0.71%) React
13 5 (0.59%) OpenID
13 5 (0.59%) Spark Streaming
Miscellaneous
1 99 (11.73%) Cloud Native
2 37 (4.38%) Legacy Systems
3 27 (3.20%) Data Structures
4 24 (2.84%) Reinsurance
5 20 (2.37%) Onboarding
6 17 (2.01%) Distributed Systems
6 17 (2.01%) Greenfield Project
7 14 (1.66%) NHS
8 11 (1.30%) Product Ownership
9 9 (1.07%) Virtual Team
10 8 (0.95%) Clustering
10 8 (0.95%) Reference Data
11 7 (0.83%) Life Science
12 6 (0.71%) Algorithms
12 6 (0.71%) Data Protection Act
12 6 (0.71%) Derivative
12 6 (0.71%) Distributed Computing
12 6 (0.71%) Replication
12 6 (0.71%) Self-Motivation
13 5 (0.59%) Public Cloud
Operating Systems
1 23 (2.73%) Linux
2 13 (1.54%) Unix
3 3 (0.36%) Windows
4 2 (0.24%) Windows Server
Processes & Methodologies
1 391 (46.33%) Data Pipeline
2 338 (40.05%) Data Engineering
3 323 (38.27%) Analytics
4 316 (37.44%) ETL
5 293 (34.72%) Data Modelling
6 229 (27.13%) CI/CD
7 181 (21.45%) DevOps
8 157 (18.60%) Business Intelligence
9 147 (17.42%) Agile
10 136 (16.11%) Migration
11 133 (15.76%) Data Governance
12 130 (15.40%) AI
13 109 (12.91%) Data Science
14 101 (11.97%) Infrastructure as Code
15 95 (11.26%) Validation
16 93 (11.02%) Decision-Making
17 86 (10.19%) Problem-Solving
18 82 (9.72%) Data Architecture
19 78 (9.24%) Data Transformation
20 74 (8.77%) Machine Learning
Programming Languages
1 479 (56.75%) Python
2 470 (55.69%) SQL
3 80 (9.48%) Java
4 52 (6.16%) Scala
5 24 (2.84%) C#
6 22 (2.61%) T-SQL
7 20 (2.37%) Data Analysis Expressions
8 12 (1.42%) PowerShell
8 12 (1.42%) R
9 11 (1.30%) Shell Script
10 10 (1.18%) PL/SQL
11 8 (0.95%) Bicep
12 7 (0.83%) Bash
12 7 (0.83%) JavaScript
13 6 (0.71%) TypeScript
14 5 (0.59%) Go
15 2 (0.24%) C
15 2 (0.24%) Korn
15 2 (0.24%) Ruby
15 2 (0.24%) SPARQL
Qualifications
1 184 (21.80%) Security Cleared
2 173 (20.50%) SC Cleared
3 24 (2.84%) BPSS Clearance
3 24 (2.84%) Degree
4 22 (2.61%) Azure Certification
5 12 (1.42%) Computer Science Degree
6 10 (1.18%) AWS Certification
7 8 (0.95%) DBS Check
8 6 (0.71%) AWS Certified Cloud Practitioner
9 4 (0.47%) Microsoft Certification
9 4 (0.47%) SnowPro
10 2 (0.24%) DV Cleared
10 2 (0.24%) Master's Degree
11 1 (0.12%) BICSI Certification
11 1 (0.12%) CISA
11 1 (0.12%) CISM
11 1 (0.12%) CISSP
11 1 (0.12%) City & Guilds
11 1 (0.12%) Postgraduate
11 1 (0.12%) Tableau Certification
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 235 (27.84%) Data Quality
2 32 (3.79%) GDPR
2 32 (3.79%) QA
3 9 (1.07%) Accessibility
4 4 (0.47%) MiFID
4 4 (0.47%) Sarbanes-Oxley
5 2 (0.24%) EMIR
5 2 (0.24%) GMP
5 2 (0.24%) SLA
6 1 (0.12%) GRC
6 1 (0.12%) GxP
6 1 (0.12%) IFRS
6 1 (0.12%) IFRS 17
6 1 (0.12%) IFRS 9
6 1 (0.12%) ISO/IEC 27001
6 1 (0.12%) PCI DSS
6 1 (0.12%) PMO
6 1 (0.12%) SNOMED CT
6 1 (0.12%) WCAG
System Software
1 52 (6.16%) Docker
2 3 (0.36%) Virtual Machines
3 2 (0.24%) Active Directory
4 1 (0.12%) RACF
Systems Management
1 127 (15.05%) Terraform
2 33 (3.91%) Kubernetes
3 9 (1.07%) Grafana
4 4 (0.47%) Kibana
5 2 (0.24%) Ansible
5 2 (0.24%) Thomson Reuters DACS
6 1 (0.12%) Kubeflow
6 1 (0.12%) Prometheus
Vendors
1 205 (24.29%) Databricks
2 111 (13.15%) Microsoft
3 50 (5.92%) Informatica
4 42 (4.98%) Google
5 36 (4.27%) Oracle
6 14 (1.66%) Palantir
7 12 (1.42%) SAP
8 11 (1.30%) Foundry
9 10 (1.18%) Denodo
9 10 (1.18%) Salesforce
9 10 (1.18%) Talend
10 9 (1.07%) Bloomberg
11 8 (0.95%) IBM
12 7 (0.83%) Amplitude
13 6 (0.71%) MuleSoft
14 5 (0.59%) Alteryx
15 4 (0.47%) Cloudera
15 4 (0.47%) Hortonworks
15 4 (0.47%) Splunk
16 3 (0.36%) MicroStrategy