SQL Server Contract Job Trends in London

Microsoft SQL Server (MS SQL)
England > London

The table below provides summary statistics and contractor rates for jobs advertised in London requiring SQL Server skills. It covers contract job vacancies from the 6 months leading up to 10 February 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
10 Feb 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 106 71 49
Rank change year-on-year -35 -22 -7
Contract jobs citing SQL Server 421 455 751
As % of all contract jobs in London 2.81% 3.38% 4.05%
As % of the Database & Business Intelligence category 14.09% 15.65% 20.80%
Number of daily rates quoted 293 318 554
10th Percentile £369 £363 £377
25th Percentile £408 £441 £440
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £550 £575
Median % change year-on-year -9.09% -4.35% -4.17%
75th Percentile £638 £650 £675
90th Percentile £700 £725 £750
England median daily rate £480 £508 £540
% change year-on-year -5.58% -5.86% -1.82%
Number of hourly rates quoted 1 1 0
10th Percentile - - -
25th Percentile £66.00 £60.25 -
Median hourly rate £68.00 £60.50 -
Median % change year-on-year +12.40% - -
75th Percentile £70.00 £60.75 -
90th Percentile - - -
England median hourly rate £26.72 £63.75 £40.25
% change year-on-year -58.08% +58.37% -7.47%

All Database & BI Skills
London

SQL Server falls under the Databases and Business Intelligence category. For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all contract job vacancies requiring database or business intelligence skills in London.

Contract vacancies with a requirement for database or business intelligence skills 2,987 2,908 3,610
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in London 19.91% 21.61% 19.46%
Number of daily rates quoted 2,047 1,983 2,667
10th Percentile £355 £363 £381
25th Percentile £415 £454 £463
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £525 £550 £551
Median % change year-on-year -4.55% -0.18% -8.17%
75th Percentile £638 £699 £683
90th Percentile £738 £825 £788
England median daily rate £500 £538 £538
% change year-on-year -6.98% - -2.27%
Number of hourly rates quoted 32 30 41
10th Percentile £18.25 £22.27 £20.98
25th Percentile £29.72 £28.60 £25.79
Median hourly rate £54.25 £42.00 £42.50
Median % change year-on-year +29.17% -1.18% -5.56%
75th Percentile £75.94 £60.25 £53.75
90th Percentile £89.75 £78.88 £63.75
England median hourly rate £51.36 £41.00 £42.50
% change year-on-year +25.27% -3.53% -25.26%

SQL Server
Job Vacancy Trend in London

Historical trend showing the proportion of contract IT job postings citing SQL Server relative to all contract IT jobs advertised in London.

SQL Server job vacancy trend in London

SQL Server
Daily Rate Trend in London

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in London citing SQL Server.

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in London citing SQL Server

SQL Server
Daily Rate Histogram in London

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing SQL Server in London over the 6 months to 10 February 2026.

Daily rate histogram for SQL Server in London

SQL Server
Hourly Rate Trend in London

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in London citing SQL Server.

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in London citing SQL Server

SQL Server
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 SQL Server within the London region over the 6 months to 10 February 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 -36 42 £538 -6.93% 25
South London -3 7 £530 -26.90% 5
East London -5 2 £585 +46.25% 2
SQL Server
England

SQL Server
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 18 (4.28%) IIS
2 15 (3.56%) SharePoint
3 14 (3.33%) Confluence
3 14 (3.33%) Oracle SOA Suite
4 11 (2.61%) WebSphere
5 8 (1.90%) Appian
5 8 (1.90%) Microsoft Exchange
6 7 (1.66%) Apache
6 7 (1.66%) Apache Spark
6 7 (1.66%) WebLogic
7 6 (1.43%) Apache Airflow
8 2 (0.48%) CMS
9 1 (0.24%) GeoServer
9 1 (0.24%) JBoss
9 1 (0.24%) Mule
9 1 (0.24%) OpenEdge
9 1 (0.24%) Oracle Application Server
9 1 (0.24%) Oracle Workflow
9 1 (0.24%) SAS
9 1 (0.24%) Tomcat
Applications
1 32 (7.60%) Microsoft Excel
2 14 (3.33%) MS Visio
3 7 (1.66%) Microsoft Office
4 4 (0.95%) Microsoft PowerPoint
5 2 (0.48%) Trello
6 1 (0.24%) Microsoft Project
Business Applications
1 7 (1.66%) BusinessWorks
1 7 (1.66%) Dynamics CRM
2 3 (0.71%) Oracle Procure-to-Pay
2 3 (0.71%) Oracle Subledger Accounting
2 3 (0.71%) SAP S/4HANA
3 2 (0.48%) Oracle General Ledger
3 2 (0.48%) Oracle Payables
3 2 (0.48%) Oracle Receivables
3 2 (0.48%) Veritas eDiscovery
4 1 (0.24%) Endur
4 1 (0.24%) Fidessa
4 1 (0.24%) Loan IQ
4 1 (0.24%) Oracle BPM
4 1 (0.24%) Oracle FAH
4 1 (0.24%) Orchestrade
4 1 (0.24%) RMDS
4 1 (0.24%) SAP ERP
4 1 (0.24%) SAP R/3
4 1 (0.24%) thinkFolio
4 1 (0.24%) TIBCO BusinessEvents
Cloud Services
1 192 (45.61%) Azure
2 91 (21.62%) AWS
3 82 (19.48%) Power Platform
4 66 (15.68%) Azure DevOps
5 45 (10.69%) GitHub
6 44 (10.45%) Azure Data Factory
7 30 (7.13%) GCP
8 25 (5.94%) Azure Synapse Analytics
9 21 (4.99%) SaaS
10 17 (4.04%) Amazon S3
11 16 (3.80%) GitHub Actions
11 16 (3.80%) Microsoft 365
12 15 (3.56%) Power Automate
13 14 (3.33%) Snowflake
14 11 (2.61%) AWS CloudFormation
14 11 (2.61%) Dynamics 365
14 11 (2.61%) IaaS
15 10 (2.38%) Amazon EC2
16 9 (2.14%) Azure Key Vault
17 8 (1.90%) Anthropic Claude
Communications & Networking
1 11 (2.61%) Internet
2 7 (1.66%) Firewall
3 6 (1.43%) DNS
3 6 (1.43%) NetScaler
4 4 (0.95%) DHCP
5 3 (0.71%) HTTP
5 3 (0.71%) TCP/IP
5 3 (0.71%) VPN
6 2 (0.48%) FTP
6 2 (0.48%) SAN
6 2 (0.48%) Software-Defined Networking
6 2 (0.48%) VLAN
6 2 (0.48%) VSAN
6 2 (0.48%) Wi-Fi
7 1 (0.24%) DMZ
7 1 (0.24%) Ethernet VPN
7 1 (0.24%) Network Security
7 1 (0.24%) VXLAN
7 1 (0.24%) WebEx
7 1 (0.24%) Wireshark
Database & Business Intelligence
1 70 (16.63%) SQL Server Integration Services
2 68 (16.15%) Power BI
3 65 (15.44%) PostgreSQL
4 51 (12.11%) Relational Database
5 47 (11.16%) Data Warehouse
6 33 (7.84%) Data Lake
6 33 (7.84%) Oracle Database
7 29 (6.89%) SQL Server Reporting Services
8 25 (5.94%) MongoDB
9 23 (5.46%) Azure SQL Database
9 23 (5.46%) NoSQL
10 20 (4.75%) Delta Lake
11 16 (3.80%) Big Data
12 13 (3.09%) Amazon RDS
12 13 (3.09%) DB2
12 13 (3.09%) RDBMS
12 13 (3.09%) SQL Server Analysis Services
13 11 (2.61%) Metadata
13 11 (2.61%) MySQL
13 11 (2.61%) Redis
Development Applications
1 39 (9.26%) Git
2 32 (7.60%) JIRA
3 23 (5.46%) Jenkins
4 18 (4.28%) Visual Studio
5 10 (2.38%) SpecFlow
6 9 (2.14%) GitLab
7 8 (1.90%) ERwin
7 8 (1.90%) Maven
7 8 (1.90%) MLflow
7 8 (1.90%) TeamCity
8 7 (1.66%) JUnit
8 7 (1.66%) Octopus Deploy
9 6 (1.43%) Team Foundation Server
10 5 (1.19%) Cucumber
10 5 (1.19%) Mockito
10 5 (1.19%) SQL Server Management Studio (SSMS)
11 4 (0.95%) Bitbucket
11 4 (0.95%) Selenium
12 3 (0.71%) Eclipse
12 3 (0.71%) Gradle
General
1 151 (35.87%) Finance
2 125 (29.69%) Social Skills
3 82 (19.48%) Banking
4 50 (11.88%) Analytical Skills
5 24 (5.70%) Investment Banking
6 19 (4.51%) Public Sector
7 17 (4.04%) Documentation Skills
8 13 (3.09%) Front Office
8 13 (3.09%) Inclusion and Diversity
9 12 (2.85%) Financial Institution
10 9 (2.14%) Retail
11 5 (1.19%) Local Government
12 4 (0.95%) Organisational Skills
12 4 (0.95%) Presentation Skills
13 3 (0.71%) General Ledger
13 3 (0.71%) Influencing Skills
13 3 (0.71%) Law
13 3 (0.71%) Legal
13 3 (0.71%) Telecoms
14 2 (0.48%) Manufacturing
Job Titles
1 172 (40.86%) Developer
2 78 (18.53%) Data Engineer
3 76 (18.05%) Senior
4 64 (15.20%) C# Developer
5 40 (9.50%) .NET Developer
6 31 (7.36%) Senior Developer
7 28 (6.65%) Senior Data Engineer
8 26 (6.18%) Analyst
9 25 (5.94%) Architect
10 20 (4.75%) C# .NET Developer
11 18 (4.28%) Lead
12 16 (3.80%) Full-Stack Developer
12 16 (3.80%) SQL Developer
13 14 (3.33%) Angular Developer
13 14 (3.33%) Azure Engineer
13 14 (3.33%) DBA
13 14 (3.33%) Java Developer
14 13 (3.09%) SQL DBA
15 11 (2.61%) Automation Engineer
15 11 (2.61%) Solutions Architect
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 124 (29.45%) .NET
2 66 (15.68%) .NET Framework
3 45 (10.69%) REST
4 33 (7.84%) RESTful
5 31 (7.36%) HTML
6 30 (7.13%) AngularJS
7 29 (6.89%) .NET Core
7 29 (6.89%) Kafka
7 29 (6.89%) React
8 28 (6.65%) Web Services
9 26 (6.18%) XML
10 20 (4.75%) CSS
10 20 (4.75%) SOAP
10 20 (4.75%) WPF
11 18 (4.28%) WinForms
12 17 (4.04%) OAuth
13 16 (3.80%) ASP.NET
13 16 (3.80%) Entity Framework
13 16 (3.80%) Spring
14 15 (3.56%) Middleware
Miscellaneous
1 33 (7.84%) Legacy Systems
2 24 (5.70%) Cloud Native
3 16 (3.80%) Enterprise Software
4 15 (3.56%) Foreign Exchange (FX)
4 15 (3.56%) Onboarding
5 14 (3.33%) Derivative
6 12 (2.85%) Credit Risk
6 12 (2.85%) Distributed Systems
7 11 (2.61%) Management Information System
7 11 (2.61%) Reinsurance
8 10 (2.38%) Greenfield Project
9 9 (2.14%) Data Structures
9 9 (2.14%) Low-Code
10 7 (1.66%) Data Protection Act
10 7 (1.66%) Fixed Income
10 7 (1.66%) Replication
11 6 (1.43%) Linux Command Line
11 6 (1.43%) Market Risk
11 6 (1.43%) Self-Motivation
12 5 (1.19%) Product Ownership
Operating Systems
1 68 (16.15%) Windows
2 41 (9.74%) Linux
3 26 (6.18%) Windows Server
4 8 (1.90%) Unix
5 7 (1.66%) Windows 10
5 7 (1.66%) Windows Server 2016
6 5 (1.19%) Windows Server 2019
7 2 (0.48%) Windows Server 2012
8 1 (0.24%) Ubuntu
Processes & Methodologies
1 119 (28.27%) CI/CD
2 99 (23.52%) DevOps
3 97 (23.04%) Agile
4 92 (21.85%) ETL
5 88 (20.90%) Business Intelligence
6 83 (19.71%) Data Modelling
7 82 (19.48%) Problem-Solving
8 70 (16.63%) Migration
9 59 (14.01%) Analytics
10 52 (12.35%) Data Engineering
11 50 (11.88%) Data Analysis
11 50 (11.88%) Microservices
12 44 (10.45%) Test Automation
13 43 (10.21%) Data Pipeline
14 42 (9.98%) Data Migration
15 40 (9.50%) Containerisation
16 36 (8.55%) Change Management
17 34 (8.08%) AI
17 34 (8.08%) Scrum
18 33 (7.84%) Clean Code
Programming Languages
1 259 (61.52%) SQL
2 128 (30.40%) C#
3 111 (26.37%) Python
4 62 (14.73%) T-SQL
5 50 (11.88%) PL/SQL
6 49 (11.64%) Java
7 43 (10.21%) JavaScript
8 26 (6.18%) PowerShell
9 20 (4.75%) TypeScript
10 16 (3.80%) Bash
11 15 (3.56%) VB
12 14 (3.33%) VBA
13 11 (2.61%) Data Analysis Expressions
14 7 (1.66%) XPath
15 6 (1.43%) Bicep
16 3 (0.71%) COBOL
16 3 (0.71%) R
16 3 (0.71%) Scala
16 3 (0.71%) Shell Script
17 2 (0.48%) C++
Qualifications
1 49 (11.64%) Degree
2 44 (10.45%) Security Cleared
3 31 (7.36%) SC Cleared
4 20 (4.75%) Computer Science Degree
5 10 (2.38%) Microsoft Certification
6 8 (1.90%) Azure Certification
6 8 (1.90%) BPSS Clearance
6 8 (1.90%) DV Cleared
7 6 (1.43%) Master's Degree
8 5 (1.19%) CCA
8 5 (1.19%) Citrix Certification
9 3 (0.71%) AWS Certification
9 3 (0.71%) Cisco Certification
9 3 (0.71%) PMI Certification
9 3 (0.71%) PMP
10 2 (0.48%) CCNP
10 2 (0.48%) CISSP
10 2 (0.48%) ITIL Foundation Certificate
11 1 (0.24%) CCIE
11 1 (0.24%) CCNA
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 66 (15.68%) Data Quality
2 49 (11.64%) QA
3 8 (1.90%) GDPR
4 6 (1.43%) SLA
5 4 (0.95%) Sarbanes-Oxley
6 3 (0.71%) Accessibility
6 3 (0.71%) IFRS
6 3 (0.71%) IFRS 17
6 3 (0.71%) MiFID
7 2 (0.48%) Basel III
7 2 (0.48%) EMIR
7 2 (0.48%) GAAP
7 2 (0.48%) IFRS 9
7 2 (0.48%) Solvency II
8 1 (0.24%) NCSC
8 1 (0.24%) NIST
8 1 (0.24%) NIST 800
8 1 (0.24%) WCAG
System Software
1 60 (14.25%) Docker
2 14 (3.33%) Active Directory
3 6 (1.43%) zsh
4 5 (1.19%) Hyper-V
4 5 (1.19%) XenApp
4 5 (1.19%) XenDesktop
5 2 (0.48%) GridGain
5 2 (0.48%) Virtual Desktop
5 2 (0.48%) VMware ESXi
5 2 (0.48%) VMware Infrastructure
5 2 (0.48%) VMware NSX
6 1 (0.24%) Oracle RAC
6 1 (0.24%) Virtual Machines
Systems Management
1 53 (12.59%) Kubernetes
2 28 (6.65%) Terraform
3 12 (2.85%) Ansible
4 10 (2.38%) Grafana
5 9 (2.14%) SCCM
6 8 (1.90%) Puppet
7 7 (1.66%) TIBCO Hawk
8 5 (1.19%) SCVMM
9 4 (0.95%) Microsoft Intune
9 4 (0.95%) Progress Chef
10 3 (0.71%) Control-M
10 3 (0.71%) Microsoft Clustering
10 3 (0.71%) Prometheus
11 1 (0.24%) Active Directory Federation Services
11 1 (0.24%) Ambari
11 1 (0.24%) BladeLogic
11 1 (0.24%) FortiGate
11 1 (0.24%) Oracle Identity Management
11 1 (0.24%) VxRail
11 1 (0.24%) ZABBIX
Vendors
1 145 (34.44%) Oracle
2 103 (24.47%) Microsoft
3 49 (11.64%) Databricks
4 35 (8.31%) Citrix
5 21 (4.99%) Informatica
6 16 (3.80%) SAP
7 13 (3.09%) IBM
7 13 (3.09%) UiPath
7 13 (3.09%) VMware
8 9 (2.14%) Google
8 9 (2.14%) ServiceNow
9 8 (1.90%) Automation Anywhere
9 8 (1.90%) OpenAI
10 7 (1.66%) BEA
10 7 (1.66%) Sybase
10 7 (1.66%) TIBCO
11 6 (1.43%) Atlassian
11 6 (1.43%) PagerDuty
12 5 (1.19%) Dynatrace
12 5 (1.19%) Splunk