Developer Contract Job Trends in London

Developer
England > London

The median Developer daily rate in London is £525, according to job vacancies posted in the 6 months leading up to 4 December 2025.

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

6 months to
4 Dec 2025
Same period 2024 Same period 2023
Rank 10 4 5
Rank change year-on-year -6 +1 -2
Contract jobs requiring a Developer 1,999 2,738 3,169
As % of all contract jobs in London 13.92% 17.41% 16.51%
As % of the Job Titles category 15.09% 18.60% 17.66%
Number of daily rates quoted 1,392 1,879 2,410
10th Percentile £363 £376 £400
25th Percentile £425 £450 £475
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £525 £564 £600
Median % change year-on-year -6.91% -6.00% -4.00%
75th Percentile £675 £701 £750
90th Percentile £813 £850 £850
England median daily rate £500 £535 £550
% change year-on-year -6.54% -2.73% -6.78%
Number of hourly rates quoted 8 8 19
10th Percentile £40.51 £35.53 £42.94
25th Percentile £52.75 £36.50 £55.00
Median hourly rate £63.75 £40.25 £57.50
Median % change year-on-year +58.39% -30.00% -
75th Percentile £78.75 £80.50 £73.70
90th Percentile £80.33 £137.50 £79.31
England median hourly rate £55.00 £65.00 £60.00
% change year-on-year -15.38% +8.33% +0.27%

All Contract IT Job Vacancies
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 13,248 14,718 17,942
% of contract IT jobs with a recognized job title 92.22% 93.61% 93.47%
Number of daily rates quoted 8,794 9,565 12,956
10th Percentile £338 £340 £335
25th Percentile £425 £450 £450
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £530 £550 £563
Median % change year-on-year -3.64% -2.22% -2.22%
75th Percentile £650 £675 £688
90th Percentile £760 £800 £788
England median daily rate £504 £525 £534
% change year-on-year -4.00% -1.69% -2.91%
Number of hourly rates quoted 232 154 210
10th Percentile £17.50 £17.25 £18.15
25th Percentile £21.35 £23.80 £21.81
Median hourly rate £27.86 £35.75 £36.31
Median % change year-on-year -22.08% -1.53% +3.73%
75th Percentile £54.06 £53.75 £59.69
90th Percentile £74.75 £80.75 £73.66
England median hourly rate £25.47 £37.50 £45.00
% change year-on-year -32.08% -16.67% +36.36%

Developer
Job Vacancy Trend in London

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

Developer job vacancy trend in London

Developer
Daily Rate Trend in London

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for Developer job vacancies in London.

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for Developer job vacancies in London

Developer
Daily Rate Histogram in London

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing Developer in London over the 6 months to 4 December 2025.

Daily rate histogram for Developer in London

Developer
Hourly Rate Trend in London

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for Developer job vacancies in London.

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for Developer job vacancies in London

Developer
Hourly Rate Histogram in London

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing Developer in London over the 6 months to 4 December 2025.

Hourly rate histogram for Developer in London

Developer
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 Developer within the London region over the 6 months to 4 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
Central London -8 248 £550 -5.98% 140
South London -14 23 £525 -27.59% 13
West London -22 22 £442 +4.00% 24
East London +3 16 £540 +35.00% 22
Developer
England

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

For the 6 months to 4 December 2025, Developer 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 Developer in the job title.

1 599 (29.96%) Agile
2 551 (27.56%) Java
3 547 (27.36%) SQL
4 521 (26.06%) Python
5 481 (24.06%) CI/CD
6 442 (22.11%) Azure
7 437 (21.86%) AWS
8 420 (21.01%) Problem-Solving
9 390 (19.51%) C#
10 377 (18.86%) JavaScript
11 344 (17.21%) DevOps
12 323 (16.16%) Microservices
13 300 (15.01%) React
14 299 (14.96%) .NET
15 274 (13.71%) Security Cleared
16 272 (13.61%) Docker
16 272 (13.61%) Kubernetes
17 264 (13.21%) Full-Stack Development
18 251 (12.56%) REST
19 248 (12.41%) Git
20 247 (12.36%) TypeScript
21 244 (12.21%) Software Engineering
22 232 (11.61%) Microsoft
23 222 (11.11%) SC Cleared
24 215 (10.76%) Analytics
25 213 (10.66%) Kafka
26 192 (9.60%) RESTful
27 190 (9.50%) Power Platform
28 183 (9.15%) Node.js
29 177 (8.85%) Scrum

Developer 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 54 (2.70%) SharePoint
2 36 (1.80%) Confluence
3 24 (1.20%) CMS
4 21 (1.05%) Apache Airflow
5 16 (0.80%) IIS
6 15 (0.75%) HCL Notes
6 15 (0.75%) Oracle Workflow
7 12 (0.60%) Oracle SOA Suite
8 10 (0.50%) Apache Spark
8 10 (0.50%) MQSeries
9 8 (0.40%) Microsoft Exchange
10 7 (0.35%) Apache
10 7 (0.35%) Headless CMS
11 6 (0.30%) Tomcat
12 5 (0.25%) Adobe Experience Manager
12 5 (0.25%) WebLogic
12 5 (0.25%) WebSphere
13 4 (0.20%) Camunda
13 4 (0.20%) Mendix
13 4 (0.20%) WordPress
Applications
1 69 (3.45%) Microsoft Excel
2 10 (0.50%) Chatbot
3 7 (0.35%) Microsoft PowerPoint
4 6 (0.30%) Microsoft Office
5 4 (0.20%) MS Visio
6 1 (0.050%) Microsoft Project
6 1 (0.050%) Oracle Smart View
6 1 (0.050%) Spreadsheet
6 1 (0.050%) Trello
Business Applications
1 24 (1.20%) Dynamics CRM
2 13 (0.65%) Oracle EBS
3 12 (0.60%) Endur
4 11 (0.55%) Fidessa
5 10 (0.50%) Oracle EBS R12
5 10 (0.50%) Oracle Payables
6 9 (0.45%) Oracle Assets
6 9 (0.45%) Oracle ERP
7 8 (0.40%) Aladdin
7 8 (0.40%) Magento
7 8 (0.40%) Oracle General Ledger
8 7 (0.35%) Oracle Financials
9 5 (0.25%) BusinessWorks
9 5 (0.25%) OpenText MBPM
9 5 (0.25%) Oracle BPM
10 4 (0.20%) Oracle 11i
10 4 (0.20%) Oracle E-Business Tax
10 4 (0.20%) ProductWriter
10 4 (0.20%) Shopify
11 3 (0.15%) Workday HCM
Cloud Services
1 442 (22.11%) Azure
2 437 (21.86%) AWS
3 190 (9.50%) Power Platform
4 134 (6.70%) Azure DevOps
5 131 (6.55%) GitHub
6 122 (6.10%) GCP
7 114 (5.70%) Serverless
8 89 (4.45%) Power Automate
9 88 (4.40%) PowerApps
10 64 (3.20%) GitHub Actions
11 57 (2.85%) Azure Functions
12 53 (2.65%) Dynamics 365
13 51 (2.55%) Azure Logic Apps
14 49 (2.45%) Amazon S3
15 48 (2.40%) AWS Lambda
16 45 (2.25%) Microsoft 365
17 42 (2.10%) Azure Service Bus
18 41 (2.05%) Entra ID
19 37 (1.85%) Azure Monitor
20 35 (1.75%) Azure AKS
Communications & Networking
1 19 (0.95%) HTTP
2 12 (0.60%) SSL
3 11 (0.55%) HTTPS
4 10 (0.50%) Internet
5 9 (0.45%) Multicast
5 9 (0.45%) TCP/IP
6 6 (0.30%) Firewall
7 5 (0.25%) CTI
7 5 (0.25%) Network Security
7 5 (0.25%) VoIP
8 4 (0.20%) DNS
8 4 (0.20%) VPN
9 3 (0.15%) FIX Connectivity
9 3 (0.15%) tcpdump
10 2 (0.10%) DHCP
10 2 (0.10%) SSH
11 1 (0.050%) BGP
11 1 (0.050%) Intranet
11 1 (0.050%) MPLS
11 1 (0.050%) MQTT
Database & Business Intelligence
1 172 (8.60%) SQL Server
2 154 (7.70%) PostgreSQL
3 127 (6.35%) Power BI
4 121 (6.05%) Relational Database
5 92 (4.60%) NoSQL
6 77 (3.85%) MongoDB
7 64 (3.20%) Oracle Database
8 39 (1.95%) Apache Cassandra
9 34 (1.70%) DB2
10 33 (1.65%) Data Warehouse
10 33 (1.65%) MySQL
11 29 (1.45%) Azure SQL Database
11 29 (1.45%) KDB
12 26 (1.30%) Power Query
12 26 (1.30%) RDBMS
13 25 (1.25%) Data Lake
13 25 (1.25%) SQL Server Integration Services
14 24 (1.20%) Amazon RDS
15 23 (1.15%) Oracle Reports
15 23 (1.15%) Redis
Development Applications
1 248 (12.41%) Git
2 100 (5.00%) JIRA
3 87 (4.35%) Jenkins
4 66 (3.30%) JUnit
5 58 (2.90%) GitLab
6 35 (1.75%) Maven
7 25 (1.25%) Bitbucket
8 21 (1.05%) Gradle
8 21 (1.05%) Mockito
8 21 (1.05%) Visual Studio
9 18 (0.90%) Cucumber
10 16 (0.80%) SpecFlow
11 15 (0.75%) webpack
12 14 (0.70%) TeamCity
13 13 (0.65%) Cypress.io
13 13 (0.65%) Sonatype Nexus
14 12 (0.60%) Selenium
14 12 (0.60%) Xcode
15 11 (0.55%) SonarQube
16 10 (0.50%) Octopus Deploy
General
1 628 (31.42%) Finance
2 485 (24.26%) Social Skills
3 343 (17.16%) Banking
4 207 (10.36%) Front Office
5 179 (8.95%) Analytical Skills
6 143 (7.15%) Public Sector
7 137 (6.85%) Investment Banking
8 48 (2.40%) Financial Institution
9 30 (1.50%) Inclusion and Diversity
10 24 (1.20%) Marketing
11 17 (0.85%) Back Office
12 15 (0.75%) Documentation Skills
12 15 (0.75%) Law
13 11 (0.55%) General Ledger
13 11 (0.55%) Retail
14 9 (0.45%) Military
15 8 (0.40%) Private Banking
16 7 (0.35%) International Banking
16 7 (0.35%) Telecoms
17 6 (0.30%) Legal
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 300 (15.01%) React
2 299 (14.96%) .NET
3 251 (12.56%) REST
4 213 (10.66%) Kafka
5 192 (9.60%) RESTful
6 183 (9.15%) Node.js
7 176 (8.80%) Spring
8 173 (8.65%) AngularJS
9 155 (7.75%) CSS
10 152 (7.60%) HTML
11 132 (6.60%) Spring Boot
12 92 (4.60%) SOAP
13 83 (4.15%) .NET Framework
14 81 (4.05%) Vue
15 80 (4.00%) JSON
16 71 (3.55%) Web Services
16 71 (3.55%) XML
17 65 (3.25%) GraphQL
18 61 (3.05%) NumPy
19 59 (2.95%) Pandas
Miscellaneous
1 138 (6.90%) Foreign Exchange (FX)
2 104 (5.20%) Equities
3 96 (4.80%) Cloud Native
4 93 (4.65%) Derivative
5 92 (4.60%) Fixed Income
6 84 (4.20%) Distributed Systems
7 79 (3.95%) Algorithms
8 78 (3.90%) Data Structures
9 61 (3.05%) Product Ownership
10 54 (2.70%) Greenfield Project
11 48 (2.40%) Mobile App
12 47 (2.35%) Hedge funds
13 41 (2.05%) Management Information System
14 40 (2.00%) Data Protection Act
15 34 (1.70%) Legacy Systems
16 29 (1.45%) Market Risk
16 29 (1.45%) Onboarding
17 28 (1.40%) Enterprise Software
18 24 (1.20%) Low-Code
19 23 (1.15%) AI Agents
Operating Systems
1 169 (8.45%) Linux
2 71 (3.55%) Windows
3 64 (3.20%) Unix
4 42 (2.10%) Android
5 35 (1.75%) Apple iOS
6 12 (0.60%) Windows Server
7 7 (0.35%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
8 6 (0.30%) Mac OS
9 5 (0.25%) AIX
9 5 (0.25%) CentOS
10 3 (0.15%) Windows Server 2016
11 1 (0.050%) tvOS
11 1 (0.050%) VMS
11 1 (0.050%) watchOS
11 1 (0.050%) zOS
Processes & Methodologies
1 599 (29.96%) Agile
2 481 (24.06%) CI/CD
3 420 (21.01%) Problem-Solving
4 344 (17.21%) DevOps
5 323 (16.16%) Microservices
6 264 (13.21%) Full-Stack Development
7 244 (12.21%) Software Engineering
8 215 (10.76%) Analytics
9 177 (8.85%) Scrum
10 165 (8.25%) Business Intelligence
11 153 (7.65%) Test Automation
12 151 (7.55%) Containerisation
13 133 (6.65%) Clean Code
13 133 (6.65%) Computer Science
14 131 (6.55%) TDD
15 123 (6.15%) Front End Development
16 120 (6.00%) AI
17 112 (5.60%) SDLC
18 110 (5.50%) Risk Management
19 108 (5.40%) Data Modelling
Programming Languages
1 551 (27.56%) Java
2 547 (27.36%) SQL
3 521 (26.06%) Python
4 390 (19.51%) C#
5 377 (18.86%) JavaScript
6 247 (12.36%) TypeScript
7 120 (6.00%) C++
8 82 (4.10%) PL/SQL
9 68 (3.40%) Go
10 58 (2.90%) Kotlin
11 51 (2.55%) T-SQL
12 50 (2.50%) VBA
13 43 (2.15%) VB
14 35 (1.75%) Ruby
15 33 (1.65%) Shell Script
16 32 (1.60%) Data Analysis Expressions
17 30 (1.50%) Apex Code
17 30 (1.50%) PowerShell
18 29 (1.45%) PHP
19 22 (1.10%) Swift
Qualifications
1 274 (13.71%) Security Cleared
2 222 (11.11%) SC Cleared
3 130 (6.50%) Degree
4 72 (3.60%) Computer Science Degree
5 29 (1.45%) Master's Degree
6 21 (1.05%) DV Cleared
7 15 (0.75%) BPSS Clearance
8 13 (0.65%) Numerate Degree
9 11 (0.55%) AWS Certification
10 5 (0.25%) MCP
10 5 (0.25%) PhD
11 4 (0.20%) AWS Certified Developer
11 4 (0.20%) AWS Certified Solutions Architect
11 4 (0.20%) Oracle Certification
12 3 (0.15%) Azure Certification
12 3 (0.15%) Microsoft Certification
12 3 (0.15%) OCP
13 2 (0.10%) CISSP
13 2 (0.10%) Tableau Certification
14 1 (0.050%) AWS Certified DevOps Engineer
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 83 (4.15%) QA
2 62 (3.10%) Accessibility
3 36 (1.80%) Data Quality
4 24 (1.20%) WCAG
5 8 (0.40%) GDPR
6 5 (0.25%) EMIR
6 5 (0.25%) MiFID
6 5 (0.25%) SLA
7 4 (0.20%) HL7
8 3 (0.15%) Sarbanes-Oxley
8 3 (0.15%) SEPA
9 2 (0.10%) Actionable Recommendations
9 2 (0.10%) PMO
10 1 (0.050%) Cyber Essentials
10 1 (0.050%) Cyber Essentials PLUS
10 1 (0.050%) GRC
10 1 (0.050%) HMG Security Policy Framework
10 1 (0.050%) ISO 20022
10 1 (0.050%) PSD2
System Software
1 272 (13.61%) Docker
2 29 (1.45%) Active Directory
3 8 (0.40%) zsh
4 5 (0.25%) HDFS
5 4 (0.20%) OpenAM
5 4 (0.20%) OpenDJ
5 4 (0.20%) OpenIDM
5 4 (0.20%) VMware Infrastructure
6 3 (0.15%) Virtual Machines
7 2 (0.10%) GridGain
7 2 (0.10%) VMware ESXi
8 1 (0.050%) Oracle RAC
Systems Management
1 272 (13.61%) Kubernetes
2 87 (4.35%) Terraform
3 28 (1.40%) Ansible
4 17 (0.85%) Prometheus
5 14 (0.70%) Grafana
6 12 (0.60%) Control-M
6 12 (0.60%) Single Sign-On
7 11 (0.55%) Argo
8 5 (0.25%) TIBCO Hawk
8 5 (0.25%) vCenter Server
9 4 (0.20%) Kibana
10 2 (0.10%) Docker Swarm
10 2 (0.10%) Istio
10 2 (0.10%) ITRS Geneos
10 2 (0.10%) Podman
10 2 (0.10%) Progress Chef
10 2 (0.10%) Puppet
10 2 (0.10%) rkt
11 1 (0.050%) Opsgenie
11 1 (0.050%) QRadar
Vendors
1 232 (11.61%) Microsoft
2 169 (8.45%) Oracle
3 57 (2.85%) Salesforce
4 54 (2.70%) ServiceNow
5 47 (2.35%) Databricks
6 45 (2.25%) Google
7 36 (1.80%) IBM
8 26 (1.30%) SAP
9 24 (1.20%) Sybase
10 23 (1.15%) OpenAI
11 22 (1.10%) Citrix
12 20 (1.00%) Red Hat
13 18 (0.90%) Solace
14 17 (0.85%) MuleSoft
15 15 (0.75%) Bloomberg
15 15 (0.75%) Lotus
15 15 (0.75%) Splunk
16 12 (0.60%) Axway
16 12 (0.60%) OpenLink
16 12 (0.60%) webMethods