SQL Contract Job Trends in the North of England

SQL (Structured Query Language)
England > North of England

The table below provides summary statistics and contractor rates for jobs advertised in the North of England requiring SQL skills. It covers contract job vacancies from the 6 months leading up to 25 September 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
25 Sep 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 22 22 17
Rank change year-on-year 0 -5 -1
Contract jobs citing SQL 595 309 355
As % of all contract jobs in the North of England 7.82% 7.69% 8.56%
As % of the Programming Languages category 31.41% 26.16% 34.43%
Number of daily rates quoted 356 224 234
10th Percentile £314 £313 £350
25th Percentile £406 £363 £413
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £475 £450 £485
Median % change year-on-year +5.56% -7.22% -3.00%
75th Percentile £538 £525 £550
90th Percentile £604 £600 £609
England median daily rate £500 £500 £540
% change year-on-year - -7.41% -1.82%
Number of hourly rates quoted 24 2 7
10th Percentile £23.23 £24.13 £29.25
25th Percentile £28.50 £26.11 £33.63
Median hourly rate £39.50 £30.31 £40.00
Median % change year-on-year +30.32% -24.23% +33.33%
75th Percentile £58.75 £33.61 £53.75
90th Percentile £76.00 £35.04 £65.00
England median hourly rate £45.00 £50.00 £40.00
% change year-on-year -10.00% +25.00% -11.97%

All Programming Languages
North of England

SQL falls under the Programming Languages category. For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all contract job vacancies requiring coding skills in the North of England.

Contract vacancies with a requirement for coding skills 1,894 1,181 1,031
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the North of England 24.89% 29.38% 24.87%
Number of daily rates quoted 1,211 834 688
10th Percentile £350 £315 £339
25th Percentile £413 £380 £400
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £492 £457 £488
Median % change year-on-year +7.66% -6.40% -2.35%
75th Percentile £575 £538 £575
90th Percentile £650 £625 £638
England median daily rate £525 £515 £550
% change year-on-year +1.94% -6.36% -
Number of hourly rates quoted 78 12 29
10th Percentile £28.50 £30.60 £35.93
25th Percentile £46.80 £40.46 £37.55
Median hourly rate £69.75 £66.50 £46.18
Median % change year-on-year +4.89% +44.00% -
75th Percentile £72.92 £85.56 £65.00
90th Percentile £77.00 £94.38 £80.84
England median hourly rate £65.00 £57.50 £65.00
% change year-on-year +13.04% -11.54% -

SQL
Job Vacancy Trend in the North of England

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

SQL job vacancy trend in the North of England

SQL
Daily Rate Trend in the North of England

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in the North of England citing SQL.

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in the North of England citing SQL

SQL
Daily Rate Histogram in the North of England

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing SQL in the North of England over the 6 months to 25 September 2026.

Daily rate histogram for SQL in the North of England

SQL
Hourly Rate Trend in the North of England

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in the North of England citing SQL.

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in the North of England citing SQL

SQL
Hourly Rate Histogram in the North of England

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing SQL in the North of England over the 6 months to 25 September 2026.

Hourly rate histogram for SQL in the North of England

SQL
Contract Job Locations in the North of England

The table below looks at the demand and provides a guide to the median contractor rates quoted in IT jobs citing SQL within the North of England region over the 6 months to 25 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
North West +1 292 £500 +12.99% 506
Yorkshire +6 251 £454 -4.42% 275
North East -9 59 £400 -13.98% 104
SQL
England

SQL
Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities in the North of England 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 48 (8.07%) Confluence
2 23 (3.87%) Apache Airflow
3 21 (3.53%) Apache Spark
4 20 (3.36%) Apache
5 11 (1.85%) SharePoint
6 10 (1.68%) SAS
7 9 (1.51%) Jupyter
8 7 (1.18%) Palantir Foundry
9 5 (0.84%) Camunda
10 4 (0.67%) Oracle Workflow
10 4 (0.67%) WebSphere
11 3 (0.50%) CMS
12 2 (0.34%) nginx
12 2 (0.34%) WordPress
13 1 (0.17%) Adobe Experience Manager
13 1 (0.17%) IIS
13 1 (0.17%) JBoss
13 1 (0.17%) Mule
13 1 (0.17%) Mule ESB
13 1 (0.17%) WebLogic
Applications
1 30 (5.04%) Microsoft Excel
2 4 (0.67%) Microsoft Office
2 4 (0.67%) MS Visio
3 2 (0.34%) Spreadsheet
4 1 (0.17%) Chatbot
Business Applications
1 11 (1.85%) SAP S/4HANA
2 8 (1.34%) Oracle EBS
3 7 (1.18%) Oracle Payables
4 5 (0.84%) Infor LN
5 3 (0.50%) NetSuite
5 3 (0.50%) Salesforce CRM
6 2 (0.34%) Elite 3E
6 2 (0.34%) Oracle Cash Management
6 2 (0.34%) Oracle Procure-to-Pay
6 2 (0.34%) Oracle Subledger Accounting
6 2 (0.34%) Payment Gateway
6 2 (0.34%) Remedy ITSM
7 1 (0.17%) Dynamics CRM
7 1 (0.17%) FIS Private Capital Suite
7 1 (0.17%) Oracle Applications
7 1 (0.17%) Sage 200
Cloud Services
1 159 (26.72%) Azure
2 126 (21.18%) AWS
3 121 (20.34%) Power Platform
4 59 (9.92%) GCP
5 52 (8.74%) GitHub
6 43 (7.23%) Azure DevOps
7 40 (6.72%) Serverless
8 26 (4.37%) Azure Data Factory
9 24 (4.03%) Snowflake
10 23 (3.87%) Amazon S3
10 23 (3.87%) AWS Lambda
11 22 (3.70%) Azure Synapse Analytics
12 18 (3.03%) GitHub Actions
13 17 (2.86%) Azure Monitor
13 17 (2.86%) dbt
13 17 (2.86%) Google Analytics
13 17 (2.86%) SaaS
14 15 (2.52%) Amazon EMR
14 15 (2.52%) Google Kubernetes Engine
14 15 (2.52%) Power Automate
Communications & Networking
1 15 (2.52%) SSL
2 11 (1.85%) DNS
2 11 (1.85%) Network Security
3 8 (1.34%) Firewall
4 6 (1.01%) 3GPP
4 6 (1.01%) RTP
4 6 (1.01%) Wireshark
5 4 (0.67%) BGP
5 4 (0.67%) DHCP
5 4 (0.67%) HTTP
5 4 (0.67%) Reverse Proxy
6 3 (0.50%) Internet
6 3 (0.50%) Kerberos
6 3 (0.50%) LAN
7 2 (0.34%) PABX
7 2 (0.34%) VLAN
7 2 (0.34%) VoIP
7 2 (0.34%) VPN
8 1 (0.17%) F5 BIG-IP GTM
8 1 (0.17%) Wi-Fi
Database & Business Intelligence
1 137 (23.03%) SQL Server
2 111 (18.66%) Power BI
3 87 (14.62%) Data Warehouse
4 46 (7.73%) PostgreSQL
5 42 (7.06%) Metadata
6 36 (6.05%) MySQL
7 34 (5.71%) Relational Database
8 33 (5.55%) Tableau
9 31 (5.21%) SQL Server Integration Services
10 30 (5.04%) NoSQL
11 26 (4.37%) BigQuery
11 26 (4.37%) Data Lake
12 24 (4.03%) Oracle Database
13 21 (3.53%) Amazon Redshift
14 18 (3.03%) Looker
14 18 (3.03%) SQL Server Reporting Services
15 17 (2.86%) Amazon Athena
15 17 (2.86%) MongoDB
16 15 (2.52%) DynamoDB
17 14 (2.35%) Azure SQL Database
Development Applications
1 72 (12.10%) Git
2 52 (8.74%) Jenkins
2 52 (8.74%) JIRA
3 38 (6.39%) GitLab
4 16 (2.69%) Gradle
5 12 (2.02%) Bitbucket
5 12 (2.02%) JUnit
5 12 (2.02%) Sonatype Nexus
6 11 (1.85%) Maven
7 10 (1.68%) Mockito
8 8 (1.34%) Postman
8 8 (1.34%) REST Assured
8 8 (1.34%) Team Foundation Server
9 7 (1.18%) Selenium
10 6 (1.01%) Claude Code
10 6 (1.01%) Cucumber
10 6 (1.01%) TeamCity
11 5 (0.84%) SonarQube
11 5 (0.84%) Toad
12 4 (0.67%) Visual Studio
General
1 192 (32.27%) Social Skills
2 117 (19.66%) Finance
3 105 (17.65%) Analytical Skills
4 70 (11.76%) Public Sector
5 56 (9.41%) Banking
6 20 (3.36%) Manufacturing
7 15 (2.52%) Inclusion and Diversity
7 15 (2.52%) Retail
8 11 (1.85%) Law
9 10 (1.68%) Marketing
10 7 (1.18%) Organisational Skills
11 6 (1.01%) Documentation Skills
11 6 (1.01%) Games
11 6 (1.01%) Influencing Skills
11 6 (1.01%) Publishing
12 5 (0.84%) Aviation
12 5 (0.84%) Fire and Rescue
12 5 (0.84%) Military
12 5 (0.84%) Police
13 4 (0.67%) Legal
Job Titles
1 134 (22.52%) Developer
2 85 (14.29%) Analyst
2 85 (14.29%) Data Engineer
3 77 (12.94%) Senior
4 71 (11.93%) DBA
5 51 (8.57%) Lead
6 45 (7.56%) SQL DBA
7 34 (5.71%) Data Analyst
8 31 (5.21%) Administrator
9 27 (4.54%) Senior Data Engineer
10 26 (4.37%) Software Engineer
11 25 (4.20%) Senior Developer
11 25 (4.20%) SQL Developer
12 24 (4.03%) Java Developer
13 21 (3.53%) Oracle DBA
14 20 (3.36%) Consultant
15 18 (3.03%) Architect
15 18 (3.03%) Performance Analyst
16 14 (2.35%) Business Analyst
16 14 (2.35%) Software Developer
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 61 (10.25%) Terraform
2 53 (8.91%) REST
3 51 (8.57%) Kafka
4 43 (7.23%) PySpark
5 39 (6.55%) Spring Boot
6 37 (6.22%) .NET
7 34 (5.71%) Spring
8 29 (4.87%) HTML
9 25 (4.20%) React
10 20 (3.36%) CSS
10 20 (3.36%) JSON
11 19 (3.19%) Web Services
12 17 (2.86%) RESTful
13 14 (2.35%) .NET Core
13 14 (2.35%) AngularJS
13 14 (2.35%) Hibernate
13 14 (2.35%) XML
14 13 (2.18%) JPA
14 13 (2.18%) Redux
15 10 (1.68%) OAuth
Miscellaneous
1 54 (9.08%) Data Structures
2 40 (6.72%) Cloud Native
3 28 (4.71%) Data Protection Act
4 26 (4.37%) Product Ownership
5 21 (3.53%) Replication
6 19 (3.19%) Enterprise Software
7 18 (3.03%) Distributed Systems
7 18 (3.03%) NHS
8 16 (2.69%) AI Agents
8 16 (2.69%) Legacy Systems
9 15 (2.52%) Clustering
9 15 (2.52%) Self-Motivation
10 13 (2.18%) Onboarding
11 7 (1.18%) Algorithms
11 7 (1.18%) Robotics
11 7 (1.18%) Virtual Team
12 5 (0.84%) Analytical Mindset
12 5 (0.84%) Low-Code
13 4 (0.67%) Data Fabric
13 4 (0.67%) Distributed Computing
Operating Systems
1 42 (7.06%) Linux
2 29 (4.87%) Windows
3 24 (4.03%) Unix
4 21 (3.53%) Windows Server
5 17 (2.86%) Solaris
6 5 (0.84%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
7 2 (0.34%) AIX
7 2 (0.34%) Ubuntu
7 2 (0.34%) Windows Server 2012
8 1 (0.17%) CentOS
8 1 (0.17%) Oracle Linux
8 1 (0.17%) VMS
8 1 (0.17%) Windows 10
8 1 (0.17%) Windows Server 2008
8 1 (0.17%) Windows Server 2016
Processes & Methodologies
1 162 (27.23%) Analytics
2 159 (26.72%) CI/CD
3 156 (26.22%) Agile
4 150 (25.21%) Data Modelling
5 135 (22.69%) Business Intelligence
6 123 (20.67%) ETL
7 117 (19.66%) Data Pipeline
8 111 (18.66%) DevOps
9 107 (17.98%) Problem-Solving
10 95 (15.97%) AI
11 90 (15.13%) Validation
12 89 (14.96%) Data Engineering
13 88 (14.79%) Migration
14 79 (13.28%) Stakeholder Management
15 75 (12.61%) Performance Tuning
16 67 (11.26%) Test Automation
17 66 (11.09%) Data Analysis
17 66 (11.09%) Data Governance
17 66 (11.09%) Infrastructure as Code
18 61 (10.25%) Microservices
Programming Languages
1 184 (30.92%) Python
2 86 (14.45%) Java
3 56 (9.41%) PowerShell
4 43 (7.23%) T-SQL
5 42 (7.06%) C#
6 41 (6.89%) JavaScript
7 27 (4.54%) PL/SQL
8 21 (3.53%) Bash
9 17 (2.86%) TypeScript
10 16 (2.69%) Data Analysis Expressions
11 13 (2.18%) Kotlin
11 13 (2.18%) Shell Script
12 9 (1.51%) Kusto Query Language
13 8 (1.34%) R
14 7 (1.18%) Scala
15 5 (0.84%) Search Processing Language
15 5 (0.84%) VB
16 4 (0.67%) Bicep
16 4 (0.67%) PHP
16 4 (0.67%) VB6
Qualifications
1 111 (18.66%) Security Cleared
2 100 (16.81%) SC Cleared
3 49 (8.24%) Degree
4 26 (4.37%) Microsoft Certification
5 25 (4.20%) BPSS Clearance
6 18 (3.03%) Computer Science Degree
7 12 (2.02%) Azure Certification
8 9 (1.51%) ITIL Foundation Certificate
9 7 (1.18%) DV Cleared
10 6 (1.01%) CISSP
10 6 (1.01%) Oracle Certification
11 5 (0.84%) GCFA
11 5 (0.84%) GCIH
11 5 (0.84%) OCP
12 2 (0.34%) AWS Certification
13 1 (0.17%) AWS Certified Cloud Practitioner
13 1 (0.17%) ITIL Certification
13 1 (0.17%) Numerate Degree
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 136 (22.86%) Data Quality
2 32 (5.38%) QA
3 18 (3.03%) GDPR
4 6 (1.01%) Sarbanes-Oxley
5 5 (0.84%) PCI DSS
6 4 (0.67%) Accessibility
6 4 (0.67%) GRC
7 3 (0.50%) SLA
8 2 (0.34%) Actionable Recommendations
8 2 (0.34%) ISO 20022
8 2 (0.34%) MiFID
8 2 (0.34%) NIST
8 2 (0.34%) PMO
9 1 (0.17%) California Consumer Privacy Act
9 1 (0.17%) HIPAA
9 1 (0.17%) ISO/IEC 27001
9 1 (0.17%) SEPA
9 1 (0.17%) Solvency II
9 1 (0.17%) WCAG
System Software
1 68 (11.43%) Docker
2 22 (3.70%) Active Directory
3 14 (2.35%) Oracle RAC
4 11 (1.85%) Virtual Machines
5 4 (0.67%) Hyper-V
5 4 (0.67%) KVM
5 4 (0.67%) VMware Infrastructure
6 1 (0.17%) HDFS
Systems Management
1 49 (8.24%) Kubernetes
2 34 (5.71%) Ansible
3 16 (2.69%) Grafana
4 15 (2.52%) Prometheus
5 13 (2.18%) Data Guard
6 11 (1.85%) Control-M
6 11 (1.85%) SCOM
7 8 (1.34%) Oracle RMAN
8 6 (1.01%) Progress Chef
9 5 (0.84%) Argo
9 5 (0.84%) CASB
10 2 (0.34%) Consul
10 2 (0.34%) Enterprise Manager Cloud Control
10 2 (0.34%) Failover Clustering
10 2 (0.34%) Kibana
10 2 (0.34%) Nagios
10 2 (0.34%) Oracle Enterprise Manager
10 2 (0.34%) Zipkin
11 1 (0.17%) Forefront Identity Manager
11 1 (0.17%) SCCM
Vendors
1 130 (21.85%) Microsoft
2 86 (14.45%) Oracle
3 60 (10.08%) Databricks
4 38 (6.39%) Google
5 26 (4.37%) Splunk
6 25 (4.20%) SAP
7 21 (3.53%) ServiceNow
8 12 (2.02%) IBM
9 11 (1.85%) Alteryx
9 11 (1.85%) Teradata
10 8 (1.34%) Adobe
10 8 (1.34%) Foundry
10 8 (1.34%) Informatica
10 8 (1.34%) OpenAI
10 8 (1.34%) Palantir
10 8 (1.34%) Salesforce
10 8 (1.34%) UiPath
11 7 (1.18%) CyberArk
12 6 (1.01%) Centrify
13 5 (0.84%) Cribl.io