PhD Contracts in London

Doctor of Philosophy (PhD, DPhil, EngD, Doctorate)
England > London

The table below provides summary statistics for contract job vacancies advertised in London with a requirement for PhD qualifications. It includes a benchmarking guide to the contractor rates offered over the 6 months leading up to 2 July 2025, comparing them to the same period in the previous two years.

6 months to
2 Jul 2025
Same period 2024 Same period 2023
Rank 307 354 408
Rank change year-on-year +47 +54 +94
Contract jobs citing PhD 48 39 81
As % of all contract jobs advertised in London 0.37% 0.22% 0.32%
As % of the Qualifications category 1.43% 0.94% 1.49%
Number of daily rates quoted 20 29 59
10th Percentile £488 £340 £670
25th Percentile £520 £505 £700
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £561 £600 £900
Median % change year-on-year -6.50% -33.33% +50.00%
75th Percentile £763 £725 £1,000
90th Percentile £850 £875 £1,300
England median daily rate £561 £600 £750
% change year-on-year -6.50% -20.00% +27.12%
Number of hourly rates quoted 2 1 0
10th Percentile - - -
25th Percentile £78.75 £76.25 -
Median hourly rate £82.50 £77.50 -
Median % change year-on-year +6.45% - -
75th Percentile £86.25 £78.75 -
90th Percentile - - -
England median hourly rate £82.50 £61.25 -
% change year-on-year +34.69% - -

All Academic and Professional Certifications
London

PhD falls under the Academic Qualifications and Professional Certifications category. For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all contract job vacancies requiring academic qualifications or professional certifications in London.

Contract vacancies requiring academic qualifications or professional certifications 3,360 4,159 5,452
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in London 25.87% 23.61% 21.55%
Number of daily rates quoted 2,259 2,855 3,755
10th Percentile £350 £325 £363
25th Percentile £433 £425 £463
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £525 £525 £560
Median % change year-on-year - -6.25% +1.82%
75th Percentile £661 £650 £688
90th Percentile £750 £775 £800
England median daily rate £525 £538 £550
% change year-on-year -2.33% -2.27% +3.77%
Number of hourly rates quoted 75 108 82
10th Percentile £18.32 £15.07 £19.46
25th Percentile £25.00 £20.43 £24.94
Median hourly rate £26.32 £25.25 £54.00
Median % change year-on-year +4.24% -53.24% +26.32%
75th Percentile £51.08 £42.75 £71.88
90th Percentile £66.73 £68.23 £87.50
England median hourly rate £28.58 £42.50 £55.00
% change year-on-year -32.76% -22.73% +32.53%

PhD
Job Vacancy Trend in London

Job postings citing PhD as a proportion of all IT jobs advertised in London.

Job vacancy trend for PhD in London

PhD
Contractor Daily Rate Trend in London

3-month moving average daily rate quoted in jobs citing PhD in London.

Daily rate trend for PhD in London

PhD
Daily Rate Histogram in London

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing PhD in London over the 6 months to 2 July 2025.

Daily rate histogram for PhD in London

PhD
Contractor Hourly Rate Trend in London

3-month moving average hourly rates quoted in jobs citing PhD in London.

Hourly rate trend for PhD in London

PhD
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 PhD within the London region over the 6 months to 2 July 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 +13 11 £750 -14.29% 126
PhD
England

PhD
Co-occurring Skills and Capabilities in London by Category

The follow tables expand on the table above by listing co-occurrences grouped by category. The same employment type, locality and period is covered with up to 20 co-occurrences shown in each of the following categories:

Application Platforms
1 30 (62.50%) Apache Spark
2 2 (4.17%) Apache
3 1 (2.08%) Ethereum
3 1 (2.08%) Hyperledger
3 1 (2.08%) MetaMask
Business Applications
1 1 (2.08%) R3 Corda
Cloud Services
1 12 (25.00%) AWS
2 10 (20.83%) Azure
3 1 (2.08%) Azure Machine Learning
3 1 (2.08%) GCP
Database & Business Intelligence
1 10 (20.83%) Hadoop
2 7 (14.58%) Apache Hive
3 6 (12.50%) Big Data
4 5 (10.42%) Data Mining
5 3 (6.25%) MySQL
6 1 (2.08%) MongoDB
6 1 (2.08%) PostgreSQL
Development Applications
1 2 (4.17%) MLflow
2 1 (2.08%) Bitbucket
2 1 (2.08%) Git
2 1 (2.08%) Hardhat
2 1 (2.08%) JIRA
2 1 (2.08%) TeamCity
General
1 20 (41.67%) Finance
2 10 (20.83%) Banking
2 10 (20.83%) Marketing
3 9 (18.75%) Analytical Skills
4 5 (10.42%) Financial Institution
5 4 (8.33%) Digital Health
5 4 (8.33%) Front Office
5 4 (8.33%) Public Sector
6 3 (6.25%) Electronics
6 3 (6.25%) Manufacturing
6 3 (6.25%) Social Skills
6 3 (6.25%) Telecoms
7 1 (2.08%) Investment Banking
7 1 (2.08%) Retail
Job Titles
1 14 (29.17%) Machine Learning Engineer
2 10 (20.83%) Data Scientist
2 10 (20.83%) Senior
3 7 (14.58%) AWS Engineer
4 5 (10.42%) Gen AI Specialist
5 4 (8.33%) Developer
5 4 (8.33%) Java Engineer
5 4 (8.33%) Senior Data Scientist
5 4 (8.33%) Senior User Experience Researcher
5 4 (8.33%) User Experience Researcher
6 3 (6.25%) Big Data Engineer
6 3 (6.25%) FPGA Engineer
7 2 (4.17%) Analyst
7 2 (4.17%) Artificial Intelligence Specialist
7 2 (4.17%) Qualitative Analyst
7 2 (4.17%) Quantitative Analyst
8 1 (2.08%) Java Developer
8 1 (2.08%) Python Developer
8 1 (2.08%) Quantitative Developer
8 1 (2.08%) Senior Data Warehouse Specialist
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 12 (25.00%) TensorFlow
2 10 (20.83%) Pandas
2 10 (20.83%) PySpark
3 5 (10.42%) PyTorch
3 5 (10.42%) scikit-learn
4 3 (6.25%) REST
5 1 (2.08%) AngularJS
5 1 (2.08%) FIX Protocol
5 1 (2.08%) Protocol Buffers
5 1 (2.08%) Ray
5 1 (2.08%) React
5 1 (2.08%) Smart Contracts
5 1 (2.08%) Truffle
5 1 (2.08%) Vue
5 1 (2.08%) web3js
Miscellaneous
1 15 (31.25%) Distributed Computing
2 8 (16.67%) Algorithms
2 8 (16.67%) Derivative
3 7 (14.58%) Equity Derivative
4 6 (12.50%) Credit Risk
4 6 (12.50%) Distributed Systems
4 6 (12.50%) Multi-touch
5 4 (8.33%) Life Science
6 3 (6.25%) FPGA
6 3 (6.25%) Verilog
6 3 (6.25%) VHDL
7 2 (4.17%) Data Structures
8 1 (2.08%) Blockchain
8 1 (2.08%) Distributed Architecture
8 1 (2.08%) Exotic Derivative
8 1 (2.08%) FMCG
8 1 (2.08%) Foreign Exchange (FX)
8 1 (2.08%) Interest Rate Derivative
Processes & Methodologies
1 31 (64.58%) Computer Science
1 31 (64.58%) Machine Learning
2 25 (52.08%) Mathematics
3 19 (39.58%) Deep Learning
4 18 (37.50%) Data Science
5 14 (29.17%) Artificial Intelligence
6 12 (25.00%) Model Validation
6 12 (25.00%) Validation
7 11 (22.92%) Statistics
8 10 (20.83%) Data Extraction
9 9 (18.75%) Data Analysis
9 9 (18.75%) LLM
9 9 (18.75%) Risk Management
10 8 (16.67%) Generative AI
10 8 (16.67%) Low Latency
10 8 (16.67%) Statistical Modelling
11 7 (14.58%) Bayesian Methods
11 7 (14.58%) Marketing Mix
11 7 (14.58%) Physics
12 6 (12.50%) Data Collection
Programming Languages
1 37 (77.08%) Python
2 17 (35.42%) C++
2 17 (35.42%) SQL
3 13 (27.08%) Java
4 10 (20.83%) C
5 7 (14.58%) R
6 5 (10.42%) Shell Script
7 3 (6.25%) SystemVerilog
8 1 (2.08%) Go
8 1 (2.08%) Rust
8 1 (2.08%) Solidity
Qualifications
1 48 (100.00%) Degree
2 38 (79.17%) Master's Degree
3 8 (16.67%) Computer Science Degree
4 1 (2.08%) Numerate Degree
4 1 (2.08%) Security Cleared
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 1 (2.08%) QA
System Software
1 5 (10.42%) Docker
2 3 (6.25%) Firmware
Systems Management
1 3 (6.25%) Kubernetes
2 2 (4.17%) Kubeflow
Vendors
1 3 (6.25%) SAP
2 2 (4.17%) Microsoft
3 1 (2.08%) Databricks
3 1 (2.08%) Oracle