Developer Contract Job Trends in London

Developer
England > London

The median Developer daily rate in London is £530, according to job vacancies posted in the 6 months leading up to 5 September 2026.

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

6 months to
5 Sep 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 17 8 4
Rank change year-on-year -9 -4 0
Contract jobs requiring a Developer 2,223 1,965 3,036
As % of all contract jobs in London 11.02% 14.76% 18.96%
As % of the Job Titles category 11.81% 15.90% 20.15%
Number of daily rates quoted 1,490 1,407 2,218
10th Percentile £400 £375 £375
25th Percentile £434 £425 £463
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £530 £550 £575
Median % change year-on-year -3.64% -4.35% -4.17%
75th Percentile £656 £738 £725
90th Percentile £800 £850 £850
England median daily rate £520 £505 £525
% change year-on-year +2.97% -3.81% -4.55%
Number of hourly rates quoted 15 9 4
10th Percentile £44.75 £33.06 £65.50
25th Percentile £51.00 £34.63 £71.61
Median hourly rate £55.00 £70.00 £100.00
Median % change year-on-year -21.43% -30.00% +73.91%
75th Percentile £62.25 £78.75 £137.50
90th Percentile £80.50 £84.70 -
England median hourly rate £55.00 £55.00 £65.00
% change year-on-year - -15.38% +10.94%

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 18,826 12,356 15,069
% of contract IT jobs with a recognized job title 93.33% 92.83% 94.12%
Number of daily rates quoted 12,170 8,283 10,294
10th Percentile £363 £325 £350
25th Percentile £450 £425 £450
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £550 £540 £550
Median % change year-on-year +1.85% -1.82% -4.35%
75th Percentile £656 £675 £681
90th Percentile £775 £775 £800
England median daily rate £525 £506 £525
% change year-on-year +3.75% -3.62% -4.55%
Number of hourly rates quoted 369 207 187
10th Percentile £17.60 £17.05 £17.73
25th Percentile £21.93 £23.00 £22.56
Median hourly rate £39.00 £30.50 £35.00
Median % change year-on-year +27.87% -12.86% -6.47%
75th Percentile £63.10 £50.38 £55.50
90th Percentile £80.25 £66.34 £73.13
England median hourly rate £43.56 £25.15 £46.87
% change year-on-year +73.20% -46.34% +6.85%

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 5 September 2026.

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 5 September 2026.

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 5 September 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 -7 267 £538 -6.52% 80
South London +7 38 £550 - 11
East London +1 14 £670 +24.07% 16
West London -42 3 £485 +9.73% 25
North London - 2 £550 - 2
Developer
England

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

For the 6 months to 5 September 2026, 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.

1 611 (27.49%) Agile
2 576 (25.91%) CI/CD
3 538 (24.20%) SQL
4 509 (22.90%) Java
5 456 (20.51%) Python
6 433 (19.48%) Security Cleared
7 428 (19.25%) Azure
8 385 (17.32%) C#
9 384 (17.27%) DevOps
10 379 (17.05%) SC Cleared
11 361 (16.24%) REST
12 342 (15.38%) AWS
13 335 (15.07%) JavaScript
14 313 (14.08%) .NET
15 291 (13.09%) Problem-Solving
16 288 (12.96%) Microservices
17 284 (12.78%) React
18 276 (12.42%) Full-Stack Development
19 267 (12.01%) Microsoft
19 267 (12.01%) TypeScript
20 263 (11.83%) AI
21 244 (10.98%) Git
22 233 (10.48%) Docker
23 229 (10.30%) Power Platform
24 219 (9.85%) Software Engineering
25 208 (9.36%) Spring
26 207 (9.31%) RESTful
27 204 (9.18%) Test Automation
28 201 (9.04%) Kubernetes
29 199 (8.95%) Oracle

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 80 (3.60%) SharePoint
2 50 (2.25%) Confluence
3 27 (1.21%) IIS
4 24 (1.08%) CMS
5 19 (0.85%) Apache Spark
6 18 (0.81%) Camunda
7 16 (0.72%) Apache
7 16 (0.72%) Oracle Workflow
8 15 (0.67%) Anypoint
9 14 (0.63%) Mule
10 12 (0.54%) SAS
11 11 (0.49%) Ethereum
12 10 (0.45%) nginx
13 7 (0.31%) WebLogic
14 6 (0.27%) Apache Airflow
14 6 (0.27%) Appian
15 4 (0.18%) CICS
15 4 (0.18%) Hyperledger
15 4 (0.18%) Tomcat
15 4 (0.18%) Umbraco
Applications
1 30 (1.35%) Microsoft Excel
2 4 (0.18%) Chatbot
2 4 (0.18%) Spreadsheet
3 3 (0.13%) Microsoft Office
4 2 (0.090%) Adobe XD
4 2 (0.090%) CPLEX
4 2 (0.090%) Sketch
5 1 (0.045%) Oracle Smart View
5 1 (0.045%) S-PLUS
5 1 (0.045%) Trello
Business Applications
1 41 (1.84%) Dynamics CRM
2 15 (0.67%) Oracle EBS
3 14 (0.63%) NetSuite
4 10 (0.45%) Oracle General Ledger
5 9 (0.40%) Oracle Financials
5 9 (0.40%) Oracle Payables
5 9 (0.40%) Oracle Receivables
5 9 (0.40%) Temenos T24
6 8 (0.36%) Endur
7 7 (0.31%) Findur
7 7 (0.31%) Oracle Assets
8 6 (0.27%) Aladdin
8 6 (0.27%) Oracle FAH
8 6 (0.27%) Oracle Internet Expenses
8 6 (0.27%) Oracle iProcurement
8 6 (0.27%) Salesforce CRM
9 5 (0.22%) Oracle BPM
9 5 (0.22%) Orchestrade
9 5 (0.22%) Payment Gateway
9 5 (0.22%) Shopify
Cloud Services
1 428 (19.25%) Azure
2 342 (15.38%) AWS
3 229 (10.30%) Power Platform
4 139 (6.25%) GitHub
5 122 (5.49%) Azure DevOps
6 121 (5.44%) Power Automate
7 118 (5.31%) PowerApps
8 110 (4.95%) Serverless
9 107 (4.81%) Dynamics 365
10 95 (4.27%) GCP
11 77 (3.46%) GitHub Actions
12 49 (2.20%) Amazon S3
12 49 (2.20%) AWS Lambda
12 49 (2.20%) Azure Service Bus
13 45 (2.02%) Microsoft Copilot
14 40 (1.80%) Azure Functions
14 40 (1.80%) Azure Logic Apps
15 39 (1.75%) Salesforce Service Cloud
16 35 (1.57%) Copilot Studio
17 33 (1.48%) Microsoft 365
Communications & Networking
1 20 (0.90%) HTTP
2 15 (0.67%) FIX Connectivity
3 13 (0.58%) Internet
4 8 (0.36%) Multicast
5 4 (0.18%) SMS
5 4 (0.18%) SSL
6 3 (0.13%) FTP
7 2 (0.090%) 5G
7 2 (0.090%) CTI
7 2 (0.090%) HTTPS
7 2 (0.090%) Intranet
7 2 (0.090%) NFC
7 2 (0.090%) RTP
8 1 (0.045%) 4G
8 1 (0.045%) Bluetooth
8 1 (0.045%) DNS
8 1 (0.045%) Ethernet
8 1 (0.045%) SSH
8 1 (0.045%) TCP/IP
8 1 (0.045%) VPN
Database & Business Intelligence
1 186 (8.37%) SQL Server
2 148 (6.66%) Power BI
3 125 (5.62%) PostgreSQL
4 111 (4.99%) Relational Database
5 62 (2.79%) Data Warehouse
6 60 (2.70%) NoSQL
7 57 (2.56%) MongoDB
8 51 (2.29%) Oracle Database
9 37 (1.66%) Redis
10 33 (1.48%) MySQL
11 32 (1.44%) Azure SQL Database
12 30 (1.35%) DynamoDB
12 30 (1.35%) KDB
12 30 (1.35%) Power Query
13 25 (1.12%) SQL Server Integration Services
14 24 (1.08%) Elasticsearch
15 20 (0.90%) Star Schema
16 19 (0.85%) Amazon RDS
17 18 (0.81%) Data Lake
17 18 (0.81%) Kdb+
Development Applications
1 244 (10.98%) Git
2 137 (6.16%) Jenkins
3 106 (4.77%) JIRA
4 71 (3.19%) GitLab
5 46 (2.07%) Gradle
5 46 (2.07%) JUnit
6 43 (1.93%) Maven
7 33 (1.48%) Visual Studio
8 26 (1.17%) Mockito
9 22 (0.99%) SonarQube
10 20 (0.90%) Bitbucket
10 20 (0.90%) Cypress.io
11 15 (0.67%) Vite
12 14 (0.63%) REST Assured
13 13 (0.58%) TeamCity
14 9 (0.40%) Selenium
14 9 (0.40%) Sonatype Nexus
15 8 (0.36%) Claude Code
15 8 (0.36%) Octopus Deploy
15 8 (0.36%) Visual Studio Code
General
1 628 (28.25%) Finance
2 407 (18.31%) Social Skills
3 381 (17.14%) Banking
4 208 (9.36%) Public Sector
5 190 (8.55%) Front Office
6 172 (7.74%) Analytical Skills
7 160 (7.20%) Investment Banking
8 52 (2.34%) Financial Institution
9 51 (2.29%) Marketing
10 46 (2.07%) Retail
11 38 (1.71%) Inclusion and Diversity
12 24 (1.08%) Publishing
13 20 (0.90%) Back Office
13 20 (0.90%) Law
14 16 (0.72%) Presentation Skills
15 14 (0.63%) Documentation Skills
16 12 (0.54%) Games
17 11 (0.49%) Private Banking
17 11 (0.49%) Telecoms
18 9 (0.40%) General Ledger
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 361 (16.24%) REST
2 313 (14.08%) .NET
3 284 (12.78%) React
4 208 (9.36%) Spring
5 207 (9.31%) RESTful
6 170 (7.65%) Spring Boot
7 151 (6.79%) HTML
8 147 (6.61%) Kafka
9 146 (6.57%) CSS
10 121 (5.44%) Node.js
11 103 (4.63%) SOAP
12 99 (4.45%) AngularJS
13 92 (4.14%) Terraform
14 88 (3.96%) JSON
14 88 (3.96%) Web Services
15 70 (3.15%) .NET Framework
16 69 (3.10%) Redux
17 65 (2.92%) Django
18 63 (2.83%) XML
19 61 (2.74%) Lightning Web Components
Miscellaneous
1 131 (5.89%) Cloud Native
2 109 (4.90%) Derivative
3 105 (4.72%) Distributed Systems
4 95 (4.27%) Foreign Exchange (FX)
5 79 (3.55%) Product Ownership
6 78 (3.51%) Equities
7 65 (2.92%) Fixed Income
8 54 (2.43%) Enterprise Software
9 52 (2.34%) Data Structures
10 43 (1.93%) Algorithms
11 42 (1.89%) Greenfield Project
12 36 (1.62%) AI Agents
13 34 (1.53%) Legacy Systems
14 33 (1.48%) Mobile App
14 33 (1.48%) Self-Motivation
15 31 (1.39%) Onboarding
16 30 (1.35%) Management Information System
17 29 (1.30%) Data Protection Act
18 28 (1.26%) Low-Code
19 26 (1.17%) CMDB
Operating Systems
1 93 (4.18%) Linux
2 73 (3.28%) Unix
3 49 (2.20%) Windows
4 38 (1.71%) Apple iOS
5 21 (0.94%) Android
6 10 (0.45%) Windows Server
7 3 (0.13%) zOS
8 2 (0.090%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
9 1 (0.045%) Mac OS
9 1 (0.045%) Solaris
9 1 (0.045%) SUSE Linux Enterprise Server
9 1 (0.045%) Windows Server 2008
Processes & Methodologies
1 611 (27.49%) Agile
2 576 (25.91%) CI/CD
3 384 (17.27%) DevOps
4 291 (13.09%) Problem-Solving
5 288 (12.96%) Microservices
6 276 (12.42%) Full-Stack Development
7 263 (11.83%) AI
8 219 (9.85%) Software Engineering
9 204 (9.18%) Test Automation
10 174 (7.83%) Business Intelligence
11 172 (7.74%) Containerisation
12 169 (7.60%) Scrum
13 165 (7.42%) Continuous Improvement
14 163 (7.33%) Data Modelling
15 160 (7.20%) Event-Driven
16 153 (6.88%) Analytics
17 146 (6.57%) Code Quality
18 140 (6.30%) SDLC
19 132 (5.94%) TDD
20 131 (5.89%) Front End Development
Programming Languages
1 538 (24.20%) SQL
2 509 (22.90%) Java
3 456 (20.51%) Python
4 385 (17.32%) C#
5 335 (15.07%) JavaScript
6 267 (12.01%) TypeScript
7 96 (4.32%) PL/SQL
8 65 (2.92%) T-SQL
9 64 (2.88%) Apex Code
10 47 (2.11%) Shell Script
11 45 (2.02%) Data Analysis Expressions
12 39 (1.75%) C++
13 37 (1.66%) Kotlin
14 26 (1.17%) Swift
15 23 (1.03%) PowerShell
16 21 (0.94%) Ruby
17 19 (0.85%) Bash
18 17 (0.76%) PHP
19 15 (0.67%) Objective-C
19 15 (0.67%) VBA
Qualifications
1 433 (19.48%) Security Cleared
2 379 (17.05%) SC Cleared
3 110 (4.95%) Degree
4 57 (2.56%) Computer Science Degree
5 39 (1.75%) DV Cleared
6 33 (1.48%) BPSS Clearance
7 16 (0.72%) Microsoft Certification
8 15 (0.67%) Master's Degree
9 10 (0.45%) PhD
10 9 (0.40%) Azure Certification
11 6 (0.27%) Numerate Degree
12 5 (0.22%) AWS Certification
12 5 (0.22%) Microsoft Certified Professional
13 2 (0.090%) AWS Certified Developer
13 2 (0.090%) AWS Certified Solutions Architect
13 2 (0.090%) DBS Check
14 1 (0.045%) AWS Certified DevOps Engineer
14 1 (0.045%) CTC Cleared
14 1 (0.045%) ITIL Certification
14 1 (0.045%) ITIL Foundation Certificate
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 140 (6.30%) QA
2 75 (3.37%) Accessibility
3 46 (2.07%) Data Quality
4 29 (1.30%) WCAG
5 10 (0.45%) GDPR
6 6 (0.27%) HL7
7 5 (0.22%) GRC
7 5 (0.22%) ISO 20022
8 4 (0.18%) SEPA
8 4 (0.18%) SLA
9 3 (0.13%) Basel III
9 3 (0.13%) PMO
9 3 (0.13%) Solvency II
10 2 (0.090%) 21 CFR Part 11
10 2 (0.090%) EMIR
10 2 (0.090%) GMP
10 2 (0.090%) IEC 62304
10 2 (0.090%) ISO 13485
10 2 (0.090%) ISO 15022
10 2 (0.090%) ISO/IEC 17025
System Software
1 233 (10.48%) Docker
2 7 (0.31%) Active Directory
3 4 (0.18%) Apache ZooKeeper
4 3 (0.13%) GridGain
5 2 (0.090%) Postfix
5 2 (0.090%) Varnish
6 1 (0.045%) Oracle RAC
6 1 (0.045%) VMware ESXi
6 1 (0.045%) VMware Infrastructure
Systems Management
1 201 (9.04%) Kubernetes
2 28 (1.26%) Ansible
3 25 (1.12%) Grafana
4 16 (0.72%) Prometheus
5 12 (0.54%) Control-M
6 8 (0.36%) Kibana
7 4 (0.18%) Argo
8 3 (0.13%) Bosun
8 3 (0.13%) Single Sign-On
9 2 (0.090%) CloudHub
9 2 (0.090%) Istio
10 1 (0.045%) CA Endevor
10 1 (0.045%) HP ALM
10 1 (0.045%) HP Fortify
10 1 (0.045%) Oracle RMAN
10 1 (0.045%) Progress Chef
Vendors
1 267 (12.01%) Microsoft
2 199 (8.95%) Oracle
3 140 (6.30%) Salesforce
4 102 (4.59%) ServiceNow
5 45 (2.02%) IBM
6 41 (1.84%) MuleSoft
7 40 (1.80%) Databricks
8 39 (1.75%) Google
9 34 (1.53%) Citrix
10 32 (1.44%) SAP
11 24 (1.08%) Salesforce Marketing Cloud
12 23 (1.03%) UiPath
13 19 (0.85%) OpenAI
14 15 (0.67%) Adobe
15 14 (0.63%) Splunk
16 13 (0.58%) Sybase
17 10 (0.45%) Avaloq
18 9 (0.40%) OutSystems
18 9 (0.40%) Solace
18 9 (0.40%) Temenos