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 9 March 2026.

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

6 months to
9 Mar 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 10 5 4
Rank change year-on-year -5 -1 -1
Contract jobs requiring a Developer 2,185 2,182 3,000
As % of all contract jobs in London 13.62% 16.71% 16.39%
As % of the Job Titles category 14.72% 17.84% 17.60%
Number of daily rates quoted 1,538 1,535 2,284
10th Percentile £381 £385 £400
25th Percentile £425 £450 £463
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £525 £575 £575
Median % change year-on-year -8.70% - -8.00%
75th Percentile £650 £713 £750
90th Percentile £800 £850 £848
England median daily rate £500 £538 £525
% change year-on-year -6.98% +2.38% -8.70%
Number of hourly rates quoted 9 8 13
10th Percentile £33.54 £35.53 £33.03
25th Percentile £35.00 £36.50 £56.25
Median hourly rate £46.00 £40.25 £60.00
Median % change year-on-year +14.29% -32.92% +4.35%
75th Percentile £57.50 £55.25 £72.50
90th Percentile £95.00 £57.13 £73.42
England median hourly rate £63.14 £65.00 £62.50
% change year-on-year -2.87% +4.00% -

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 14,847 12,234 17,041
% of contract IT jobs with a recognized job title 92.56% 93.71% 93.10%
Number of daily rates quoted 9,976 8,184 12,295
10th Percentile £350 £338 £325
25th Percentile £425 £435 £450
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £525 £550 £550
Median % change year-on-year -4.55% - -4.35%
75th Percentile £650 £675 £675
90th Percentile £750 £800 £788
England median daily rate £505 £525 £525
% change year-on-year -3.81% - -4.55%
Number of hourly rates quoted 229 145 345
10th Percentile £18.07 £21.08 £16.00
25th Percentile £22.41 £24.66 £19.38
Median hourly rate £34.50 £35.00 £28.75
Median % change year-on-year -1.44% +21.74% -17.86%
75th Percentile £59.72 £53.75 £48.56
90th Percentile £76.58 £78.04 £65.00
England median hourly rate £36.00 £35.00 £32.50
% change year-on-year +2.86% +7.69% -22.27%

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 9 March 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 9 March 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 9 March 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 -8 276 £525 -8.70% 192
South London 0 45 £511 -44.73% 26
West London -15 19 £455 +11.12% 40
East London -7 6 £625 +56.25% 37
Developer
England

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

For the 6 months to 9 March 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.

1 544 (24.90%) Java
2 531 (24.30%) Python
3 529 (24.21%) Agile
4 516 (23.62%) SQL
5 498 (22.79%) CI/CD
6 488 (22.33%) Azure
7 447 (20.46%) AWS
8 405 (18.54%) JavaScript
9 385 (17.62%) C#
10 378 (17.30%) Security Cleared
11 354 (16.20%) React
12 348 (15.93%) DevOps
13 341 (15.61%) Problem-Solving
14 309 (14.14%) .NET
15 305 (13.96%) SC Cleared
16 288 (13.18%) Docker
17 286 (13.09%) Full-Stack Development
18 282 (12.91%) Microservices
19 272 (12.45%) TypeScript
20 269 (12.31%) Kubernetes
21 249 (11.40%) Microsoft
22 235 (10.76%) Analytics
22 235 (10.76%) Software Engineering
23 231 (10.57%) REST
24 220 (10.07%) Kafka
25 219 (10.02%) Git
26 215 (9.84%) Node.js
27 213 (9.75%) Power Platform
28 196 (8.97%) AI
29 195 (8.92%) HTML

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 71 (3.25%) SharePoint
2 38 (1.74%) Confluence
3 19 (0.87%) CMS
4 18 (0.82%) IIS
5 16 (0.73%) Microsoft Exchange
6 15 (0.69%) HCL Notes
7 13 (0.59%) Mendix
8 11 (0.50%) Ethereum
9 10 (0.46%) Adobe Experience Manager
9 10 (0.46%) Apache
9 10 (0.46%) Oracle SOA Suite
10 9 (0.41%) Headless CMS
11 8 (0.37%) Apache Spark
11 8 (0.37%) Hyperledger
11 8 (0.37%) MQSeries
12 7 (0.32%) JBoss
12 7 (0.32%) WebLogic
13 6 (0.27%) Camunda
13 6 (0.27%) WebSphere
14 5 (0.23%) Appian
Applications
1 48 (2.20%) Microsoft Excel
2 9 (0.41%) Chatbot
3 5 (0.23%) Microsoft Office
3 5 (0.23%) Microsoft PowerPoint
4 3 (0.14%) Adobe XD
4 3 (0.14%) MS Visio
4 3 (0.14%) Spreadsheet
5 1 (0.046%) Microsoft Project
Business Applications
1 45 (2.06%) Dynamics CRM
2 18 (0.82%) Endur
3 13 (0.59%) Fidessa
4 7 (0.32%) SAP S/4HANA
5 6 (0.27%) BusinessWorks
5 6 (0.27%) Oracle ERP
5 6 (0.27%) Oracle Financials
5 6 (0.27%) Temenos T24
6 5 (0.23%) BASE24
6 5 (0.23%) Payment Gateway
7 4 (0.18%) Oracle 11i
7 4 (0.18%) ProductWriter
8 3 (0.14%) Oracle EBS
8 3 (0.14%) Oracle Payables
9 2 (0.092%) Adobe Campaign
9 2 (0.092%) Magento
9 2 (0.092%) Oracle Assets
9 2 (0.092%) Oracle Cash Management
9 2 (0.092%) Oracle General Ledger
9 2 (0.092%) Oracle Receivables
Cloud Services
1 488 (22.33%) Azure
2 447 (20.46%) AWS
3 213 (9.75%) Power Platform
4 165 (7.55%) GitHub
5 143 (6.54%) Azure DevOps
6 115 (5.26%) GCP
6 115 (5.26%) Serverless
7 112 (5.13%) Power Automate
8 100 (4.58%) PowerApps
9 83 (3.80%) Dynamics 365
10 75 (3.43%) GitHub Actions
11 55 (2.52%) Azure Functions
11 55 (2.52%) Azure Logic Apps
11 55 (2.52%) Microsoft 365
12 54 (2.47%) AWS Lambda
13 53 (2.43%) Entra ID
14 51 (2.33%) Amazon S3
15 48 (2.20%) Azure Service Bus
16 38 (1.74%) Azure AKS
17 37 (1.69%) Microsoft Copilot
Communications & Networking
1 23 (1.05%) HTTP
2 13 (0.59%) FIX Connectivity
3 12 (0.55%) Internet
4 8 (0.37%) Network Security
5 7 (0.32%) SSL
5 7 (0.32%) TCP/IP
6 6 (0.27%) HTTPS
7 5 (0.23%) CTI
7 5 (0.23%) Firewall
7 5 (0.23%) SMS
7 5 (0.23%) VoIP
8 3 (0.14%) 3GPP
8 3 (0.14%) DNS
8 3 (0.14%) Multicast
8 3 (0.14%) MVNO
8 3 (0.14%) SMPP
9 2 (0.092%) DHCP
9 2 (0.092%) RTMP
9 2 (0.092%) SSH
10 1 (0.046%) Ethernet
Database & Business Intelligence
1 171 (7.83%) SQL Server
2 151 (6.91%) PostgreSQL
3 136 (6.22%) Power BI
4 118 (5.40%) Relational Database
5 85 (3.89%) NoSQL
6 71 (3.25%) Oracle Database
7 62 (2.84%) MongoDB
8 40 (1.83%) Apache Cassandra
9 38 (1.74%) Data Warehouse
10 36 (1.65%) MySQL
11 25 (1.14%) KDB
11 25 (1.14%) RDBMS
12 24 (1.10%) Data Lake
12 24 (1.10%) Kdb+
13 23 (1.05%) Amazon RDS
14 22 (1.01%) DB2
14 22 (1.01%) DynamoDB
15 21 (0.96%) SQL Server Integration Services
16 19 (0.87%) Azure SQL Database
16 19 (0.87%) Power Query
Development Applications
1 219 (10.02%) Git
2 100 (4.58%) Jenkins
3 98 (4.49%) JIRA
4 65 (2.97%) GitLab
5 57 (2.61%) JUnit
6 30 (1.37%) Maven
6 30 (1.37%) Visual Studio
7 22 (1.01%) Mockito
8 21 (0.96%) Gradle
9 19 (0.87%) Bitbucket
10 16 (0.73%) TeamCity
11 15 (0.69%) webpack
12 14 (0.64%) Cucumber
12 14 (0.64%) SonarQube
12 14 (0.64%) Sonatype Nexus
13 13 (0.59%) Android Studio
13 13 (0.59%) Cypress.io
13 13 (0.59%) Selenium
14 11 (0.50%) Octopus Deploy
14 11 (0.50%) Team Foundation Server
General
1 612 (28.01%) Finance
2 418 (19.13%) Social Skills
3 316 (14.46%) Banking
4 229 (10.48%) Front Office
5 213 (9.75%) Public Sector
6 155 (7.09%) Analytical Skills
7 122 (5.58%) Investment Banking
8 53 (2.43%) Financial Institution
9 20 (0.92%) Documentation Skills
10 19 (0.87%) Marketing
11 18 (0.82%) Inclusion and Diversity
12 16 (0.73%) Law
13 12 (0.55%) Back Office
13 12 (0.55%) Local Government
14 11 (0.50%) Telecoms
15 9 (0.41%) Presentation Skills
16 8 (0.37%) Retail
17 7 (0.32%) Agriculture
17 7 (0.32%) Pharmaceutical
17 7 (0.32%) Retail Banking
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 354 (16.20%) React
2 309 (14.14%) .NET
3 231 (10.57%) REST
4 220 (10.07%) Kafka
5 215 (9.84%) Node.js
6 195 (8.92%) HTML
7 190 (8.70%) RESTful
8 177 (8.10%) AngularJS
9 176 (8.05%) Spring
10 171 (7.83%) CSS
11 129 (5.90%) Spring Boot
12 84 (3.84%) Web Services
13 83 (3.80%) .NET Framework
14 79 (3.62%) Redux
15 75 (3.43%) GraphQL
15 75 (3.43%) SOAP
16 69 (3.16%) JSON
17 68 (3.11%) Vue
18 61 (2.79%) XML
19 49 (2.24%) Next.js
Miscellaneous
1 127 (5.81%) Equities
2 112 (5.13%) Derivative
3 103 (4.71%) Fixed Income
4 99 (4.53%) Foreign Exchange (FX)
5 82 (3.75%) Algorithms
6 80 (3.66%) Cloud Native
7 75 (3.43%) Distributed Systems
8 72 (3.30%) Data Structures
9 62 (2.84%) Product Ownership
10 44 (2.01%) Greenfield Project
11 41 (1.88%) Mobile App
12 39 (1.78%) Legacy Systems
13 38 (1.74%) Data Protection Act
13 38 (1.74%) Management Information System
14 37 (1.69%) AI Agents
15 31 (1.42%) Low-Code
16 29 (1.33%) Hedge funds
17 28 (1.28%) Equity Derivative
18 27 (1.24%) Market Risk
19 25 (1.14%) Onboarding
Operating Systems
1 124 (5.68%) Linux
2 69 (3.16%) Windows
3 48 (2.20%) Unix
4 35 (1.60%) Android
5 31 (1.42%) Apple iOS
6 22 (1.01%) Windows Server
7 5 (0.23%) AIX
8 4 (0.18%) Mac OS
8 4 (0.18%) zOS
9 3 (0.14%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
9 3 (0.14%) Windows Server 2016
10 1 (0.046%) CentOS
10 1 (0.046%) Windows 10
Processes & Methodologies
1 529 (24.21%) Agile
2 498 (22.79%) CI/CD
3 348 (15.93%) DevOps
4 341 (15.61%) Problem-Solving
5 286 (13.09%) Full-Stack Development
6 282 (12.91%) Microservices
7 235 (10.76%) Analytics
7 235 (10.76%) Software Engineering
8 196 (8.97%) AI
9 188 (8.60%) Business Intelligence
10 177 (8.10%) Containerisation
11 169 (7.73%) Test Automation
12 147 (6.73%) Data Modelling
13 139 (6.36%) TDD
14 130 (5.95%) Front End Development
15 127 (5.81%) Unit Testing
16 125 (5.72%) Scrum
17 120 (5.49%) Design Patterns
18 111 (5.08%) Low Latency
19 106 (4.85%) Mentoring
Programming Languages
1 544 (24.90%) Java
2 531 (24.30%) Python
3 516 (23.62%) SQL
4 405 (18.54%) JavaScript
5 385 (17.62%) C#
6 272 (12.45%) TypeScript
7 103 (4.71%) C++
8 89 (4.07%) Go
9 74 (3.39%) PL/SQL
10 52 (2.38%) T-SQL
11 51 (2.33%) Kotlin
12 40 (1.83%) Apex Code
13 35 (1.60%) PowerShell
13 35 (1.60%) Ruby
14 34 (1.56%) Shell Script
15 32 (1.46%) Data Analysis Expressions
16 29 (1.33%) VB
17 28 (1.28%) VBA
18 22 (1.01%) C
19 20 (0.92%) PHP
Qualifications
1 378 (17.30%) Security Cleared
2 305 (13.96%) SC Cleared
3 115 (5.26%) Degree
4 50 (2.29%) Computer Science Degree
5 28 (1.28%) DV Cleared
6 25 (1.14%) BPSS Clearance
7 24 (1.10%) Master's Degree
8 12 (0.55%) Numerate Degree
9 6 (0.27%) AWS Certification
9 6 (0.27%) Microsoft Certification
10 5 (0.23%) Azure Certification
10 5 (0.23%) PhD
11 4 (0.18%) Oracle Certification
12 3 (0.14%) AWS Certified Solutions Architect
12 3 (0.14%) CTC Cleared
13 2 (0.092%) AWS Certified Developer
13 2 (0.092%) AWS Certified DevOps Engineer
13 2 (0.092%) OCP
13 2 (0.092%) Postgraduate
14 1 (0.046%) CISSP
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 96 (4.39%) QA
2 74 (3.39%) Accessibility
3 35 (1.60%) WCAG
4 33 (1.51%) Data Quality
5 14 (0.64%) GDPR
6 7 (0.32%) ISO 8583
6 7 (0.32%) SLA
7 6 (0.27%) Sarbanes-Oxley
8 5 (0.23%) SEPA
9 4 (0.18%) GRC
9 4 (0.18%) PCI DSS
10 3 (0.14%) ISO 20022
10 3 (0.14%) PSD2
11 2 (0.092%) HL7
11 2 (0.092%) PMO
12 1 (0.046%) HIPAA
12 1 (0.046%) MiFID
System Software
1 288 (13.18%) Docker
2 29 (1.33%) Active Directory
3 4 (0.18%) HDFS
4 2 (0.092%) OpenAM
4 2 (0.092%) OpenDJ
4 2 (0.092%) OpenIDM
4 2 (0.092%) Virtual Machines
4 2 (0.092%) VMware ESXi
4 2 (0.092%) VMware Infrastructure
4 2 (0.092%) zsh
5 1 (0.046%) FreeRADIUS
5 1 (0.046%) Oracle RAC
5 1 (0.046%) Postfix
Systems Management
1 269 (12.31%) Kubernetes
2 77 (3.52%) Terraform
3 31 (1.42%) Ansible
4 25 (1.14%) Grafana
5 18 (0.82%) Prometheus
6 12 (0.55%) Single Sign-On
7 11 (0.50%) Argo
8 6 (0.27%) TIBCO Hawk
9 5 (0.23%) Control-M
9 5 (0.23%) SCCM
10 2 (0.092%) CloudHub
10 2 (0.092%) Docker Swarm
10 2 (0.092%) Kibana
10 2 (0.092%) Podman
10 2 (0.092%) Progress Chef
10 2 (0.092%) rkt
11 1 (0.046%) CA Endevor
11 1 (0.046%) IBM Guardium
11 1 (0.046%) Nessus
11 1 (0.046%) Oracle Identity Management
Vendors
1 249 (11.40%) Microsoft
2 173 (7.92%) Oracle
3 70 (3.20%) Salesforce
4 64 (2.93%) ServiceNow
5 35 (1.60%) Citrix
5 35 (1.60%) Databricks
6 32 (1.46%) IBM
6 32 (1.46%) OpenAI
6 32 (1.46%) SAP
7 30 (1.37%) Google
8 26 (1.19%) Adobe
9 21 (0.96%) Guidewire
9 21 (0.96%) MuleSoft
10 16 (0.73%) Sybase
11 15 (0.69%) Lotus
12 14 (0.64%) Foundry
12 14 (0.64%) Red Hat
13 11 (0.50%) OpenLink
13 11 (0.50%) Pega
13 11 (0.50%) Solace