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 19 April 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
19 Apr 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 26 16 18
Rank change year-on-year -10 +2 -4
Contract jobs citing SQL 463 311 376
As % of all contract jobs in the North of England 7.65% 9.57% 7.94%
As % of the Programming Languages category 27.96% 34.25% 31.62%
Number of daily rates quoted 310 225 256
10th Percentile £315 £352 £288
25th Percentile £400 £400 £392
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £450 £475 £475
Median % change year-on-year -5.26% - -3.06%
75th Percentile £550 £545 £564
90th Percentile £626 £642 £614
England median daily rate £500 £515 £550
% change year-on-year -2.82% -6.45% -
Number of hourly rates quoted 13 3 11
10th Percentile £38.20 £31.53 £37.63
25th Percentile £59.75 £31.62 £39.44
Median hourly rate £69.00 £33.11 £42.50
Median % change year-on-year +108.40% -22.09% +4.71%
75th Percentile £81.50 £53.48 £44.97
90th Percentile £89.00 £64.89 £46.18
England median hourly rate £52.49 £49.50 £42.50
% change year-on-year +6.04% +16.47% -15.00%

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 1,656 908 1,189
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the North of England 27.38% 27.93% 25.09%
Number of daily rates quoted 1,126 660 851
10th Percentile £345 £350 £320
25th Percentile £402 £400 £402
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £475 £475 £475
Median % change year-on-year - - -9.52%
75th Percentile £550 £550 £550
90th Percentile £621 £638 £625
England median daily rate £501 £525 £540
% change year-on-year -4.67% -2.78% -5.10%
Number of hourly rates quoted 82 15 47
10th Percentile £42.25 £35.66 £37.63
25th Percentile £52.81 £58.63 £43.57
Median hourly rate £66.25 £75.00 £47.50
Median % change year-on-year -11.67% +57.89% -
75th Percentile £74.26 £92.70 £66.25
90th Percentile £84.65 £100.62 £72.50
England median hourly rate £65.00 £62.50 £62.00
% change year-on-year +4.00% +0.81% +1.35%

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 19 April 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 19 April 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 19 April 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 0 259 £450 -5.26% 268
Yorkshire -16 185 £465 -4.62% 138
North East -10 30 £475 +4.40% 56
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 24 (5.18%) Apache Spark
2 21 (4.54%) Confluence
3 20 (4.32%) Apache Airflow
4 18 (3.89%) Apache
5 7 (1.51%) Apache Geronimo
5 7 (1.51%) Apache ServiceMix
5 7 (1.51%) Red Hat Fuse
5 7 (1.51%) SAS
5 7 (1.51%) Tomcat
5 7 (1.51%) WebSphere
6 6 (1.30%) SharePoint
7 3 (0.65%) Oracle Workflow
8 2 (0.43%) IIS
8 2 (0.43%) Mule
8 2 (0.43%) Mule ESB
9 1 (0.22%) JBoss
9 1 (0.22%) Jupyter
9 1 (0.22%) WebLogic
Applications
1 33 (7.13%) Microsoft Excel
2 4 (0.86%) Microsoft Office
2 4 (0.86%) MS Visio
3 2 (0.43%) Spreadsheet
4 1 (0.22%) SPSS
Business Applications
1 8 (1.73%) Advent Geneva
1 8 (1.73%) Oracle EBS
2 3 (0.65%) Elite 3E
2 3 (0.65%) SAP S/4HANA
3 2 (0.43%) Dynamics CRM
3 2 (0.43%) NEC Housing
3 2 (0.43%) Oracle Applications
3 2 (0.43%) Remedy ITSM
3 2 (0.43%) Salesforce CRM
4 1 (0.22%) Maximo
4 1 (0.22%) NetSuite
4 1 (0.22%) Oracle Procure-to-Pay
4 1 (0.22%) Payment Gateway
4 1 (0.22%) SAP CRM
Cloud Services
1 136 (29.37%) Azure
2 120 (25.92%) AWS
3 80 (17.28%) Power Platform
4 46 (9.94%) GCP
5 35 (7.56%) Azure Data Factory
6 23 (4.97%) GitHub
6 23 (4.97%) Serverless
7 20 (4.32%) Azure Synapse Analytics
8 19 (4.10%) Azure DevOps
8 19 (4.10%) dbt
9 16 (3.46%) GitHub Actions
10 15 (3.24%) Snowflake
11 11 (2.38%) IaaS
11 11 (2.38%) SaaS
12 10 (2.16%) PaaS
13 9 (1.94%) AWS Lambda
14 8 (1.73%) Amazon EKS
14 8 (1.73%) AWS CloudFormation
15 7 (1.51%) Dynamics 365
15 7 (1.51%) Kong
Communications & Networking
1 17 (3.67%) Firewall
2 10 (2.16%) DNS
3 7 (1.51%) TCP/IP
4 6 (1.30%) SSL
5 5 (1.08%) IPsec
5 5 (1.08%) Kerberos
6 3 (0.65%) 3GPP
6 3 (0.65%) RTP
6 3 (0.65%) Wireshark
7 2 (0.43%) VPN
8 1 (0.22%) DHCP
8 1 (0.22%) Internet
8 1 (0.22%) LAN
8 1 (0.22%) WAN
8 1 (0.22%) Wi-Fi
Database & Business Intelligence
1 89 (19.22%) SQL Server
2 73 (15.77%) Power BI
3 59 (12.74%) Data Warehouse
4 47 (10.15%) NoSQL
5 37 (7.99%) PostgreSQL
6 27 (5.83%) Tableau
7 24 (5.18%) MySQL
7 24 (5.18%) SQL Server Reporting Services
8 23 (4.97%) Data Lake
9 22 (4.75%) Relational Database
9 22 (4.75%) SQL Server Integration Services
10 20 (4.32%) Metadata
10 20 (4.32%) MongoDB
11 19 (4.10%) Azure SQL Database
12 15 (3.24%) DB2
12 15 (3.24%) Hadoop
12 15 (3.24%) Oracle Database
12 15 (3.24%) Snowflake Schema
13 13 (2.81%) Power Query
14 12 (2.59%) Delta Lake
Development Applications
1 51 (11.02%) Git
2 48 (10.37%) JIRA
3 33 (7.13%) Jenkins
4 32 (6.91%) GitLab
5 16 (3.46%) Cucumber
6 15 (3.24%) REST Assured
6 15 (3.24%) Selenium
7 11 (2.38%) Postman
8 9 (1.94%) Jaeger
9 6 (1.30%) Oracle Forms
9 6 (1.30%) TestRail
10 5 (1.08%) Flyway
10 5 (1.08%) Liquibase
11 4 (0.86%) ERwin
12 3 (0.65%) CircleCI
12 3 (0.65%) JUnit
12 3 (0.65%) SoapUI
12 3 (0.65%) TeamCity
13 2 (0.43%) Gradle
13 2 (0.43%) Maven
General
1 136 (29.37%) Social Skills
2 113 (24.41%) Finance
3 96 (20.73%) Analytical Skills
4 53 (11.45%) Banking
5 44 (9.50%) Public Sector
6 13 (2.81%) Documentation Skills
7 10 (2.16%) Law
7 10 (2.16%) Legal
8 9 (1.94%) Financial Institution
9 7 (1.51%) Presentation Skills
9 7 (1.51%) Retail
10 6 (1.30%) Inclusion and Diversity
10 6 (1.30%) Local Government
11 5 (1.08%) Manufacturing
11 5 (1.08%) Marketing
12 4 (0.86%) Influencing Skills
12 4 (0.86%) Military
12 4 (0.86%) Organisational Skills
13 3 (0.65%) Police
13 3 (0.65%) Social Housing
Job Titles
1 94 (20.30%) Analyst
2 89 (19.22%) Developer
3 69 (14.90%) Data Engineer
4 46 (9.94%) Senior
5 45 (9.72%) Lead
6 30 (6.48%) Data Analyst
7 25 (5.40%) DBA
8 21 (4.54%) Architect
9 20 (4.32%) Consultant
10 19 (4.10%) Business Analyst
11 17 (3.67%) Java Developer
12 15 (3.24%) Software Engineer
12 15 (3.24%) Technical Analyst
13 13 (2.81%) SQL DBA
13 13 (2.81%) Test Engineer
14 11 (2.38%) .NET Developer
14 11 (2.38%) Azure Engineer
14 11 (2.38%) SQL Developer
14 11 (2.38%) Test Automation Engineer
15 10 (2.16%) Senior Data Engineer
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 45 (9.72%) .NET
2 42 (9.07%) REST
3 31 (6.70%) Spring Boot
4 30 (6.48%) XML
5 28 (6.05%) Kafka
6 24 (5.18%) RESTful
6 24 (5.18%) Spring
7 21 (4.54%) Middleware
8 17 (3.67%) OpenID
8 17 (3.67%) PySpark
9 16 (3.46%) JSON
9 16 (3.46%) OAuth
10 13 (2.81%) React
11 12 (2.59%) LDAP
11 12 (2.59%) SailPoint
11 12 (2.59%) SOAP
12 11 (2.38%) HTML
13 10 (2.16%) OpenTelemetry
14 9 (1.94%) Pandas
15 8 (1.73%) OAuth2
Miscellaneous
1 33 (7.13%) Cloud Native
2 28 (6.05%) Product Ownership
3 20 (4.32%) Clustering
4 18 (3.89%) Data Protection Act
5 17 (3.67%) Distributed Systems
6 15 (3.24%) Data Structures
6 15 (3.24%) Management Information System
7 14 (3.02%) NHS
8 13 (2.81%) Replication
9 12 (2.59%) Linux Command Line
10 10 (2.16%) Legacy Systems
11 9 (1.94%) Virtual Team
12 7 (1.51%) Onboarding
12 7 (1.51%) Security Posture
12 7 (1.51%) SWIFT Messaging Network
13 5 (1.08%) Cloud Security Posture
13 5 (1.08%) Distributed Denial-of-Service
14 4 (0.86%) Data Centre
14 4 (0.86%) IoT
14 4 (0.86%) Reinsurance
Operating Systems
1 45 (9.72%) Linux
2 25 (5.40%) Windows
3 14 (3.02%) Windows Server
4 13 (2.81%) Unix
5 6 (1.30%) AIX
6 3 (0.65%) Oracle Linux
6 3 (0.65%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
7 2 (0.43%) Windows Server 2012
7 2 (0.43%) Windows Server 2016
8 1 (0.22%) Windows 10
8 1 (0.22%) Windows Server 2008
8 1 (0.22%) Windows Server 2019
Processes & Methodologies
1 141 (30.45%) CI/CD
2 121 (26.13%) Agile
3 112 (24.19%) Problem-Solving
4 104 (22.46%) Analytics
4 104 (22.46%) DevOps
5 100 (21.60%) Data Modelling
6 93 (20.09%) ETL
7 90 (19.44%) Business Intelligence
8 69 (14.90%) Data Pipeline
9 55 (11.88%) Microservices
10 54 (11.66%) Data Engineering
10 54 (11.66%) Performance Tuning
11 49 (10.58%) Data Governance
12 47 (10.15%) Test Automation
13 46 (9.94%) Data Analysis
13 46 (9.94%) Migration
14 42 (9.07%) Actionable Insight
15 39 (8.42%) Stakeholder Management
16 37 (7.99%) Validation
17 36 (7.78%) Visualisation
Programming Languages
1 139 (30.02%) Python
2 73 (15.77%) Java
3 34 (7.34%) C#
4 27 (5.83%) PowerShell
5 26 (5.62%) PL/SQL
5 26 (5.62%) T-SQL
6 24 (5.18%) JavaScript
7 17 (3.67%) Bash
8 12 (2.59%) PHP
8 12 (2.59%) TypeScript
9 11 (2.38%) R
9 11 (2.38%) VBA
10 10 (2.16%) Shell Script
11 8 (1.73%) Rust
12 7 (1.51%) Data Analysis Expressions
12 7 (1.51%) Go
13 4 (0.86%) ProC
13 4 (0.86%) Scala
14 3 (0.65%) C++
14 3 (0.65%) Delphi
Qualifications
1 57 (12.31%) Degree
2 56 (12.10%) Security Cleared
3 41 (8.86%) SC Cleared
4 21 (4.54%) Computer Science Degree
5 14 (3.02%) BPSS Clearance
6 12 (2.59%) Master's Degree
7 4 (0.86%) Azure Certification
7 4 (0.86%) MBA
8 3 (0.65%) AWS Certification
8 3 (0.65%) CISSP
8 3 (0.65%) ITIL Certification
9 2 (0.43%) DV Cleared
9 2 (0.43%) ISTQB
9 2 (0.43%) Microsoft Certification
10 1 (0.22%) AWS Certified Developer
10 1 (0.22%) AWS Certified DevOps Engineer
10 1 (0.22%) CISM
10 1 (0.22%) DBS Check
10 1 (0.22%) Tableau Certification
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 68 (14.69%) Data Quality
2 34 (7.34%) QA
3 21 (4.54%) GDPR
4 8 (1.73%) HIPAA
4 8 (1.73%) SLA
5 7 (1.51%) California Consumer Privacy Act
5 7 (1.51%) ISO 20022
5 7 (1.51%) PMO
6 6 (1.30%) PSD2
6 6 (1.30%) Sarbanes-Oxley
6 6 (1.30%) SEPA
7 4 (0.86%) GRC
8 3 (0.65%) Accessibility
8 3 (0.65%) NIST
9 2 (0.43%) Actionable Recommendations
9 2 (0.43%) Solvency II
9 2 (0.43%) WCAG
10 1 (0.22%) HL7
10 1 (0.22%) ISO/IEC 27001
10 1 (0.22%) PERC
System Software
1 67 (14.47%) Docker
2 9 (1.94%) Hyper-V
2 9 (1.94%) KVM
2 9 (1.94%) Virtual Machines
3 6 (1.30%) Active Directory
4 5 (1.08%) RACF
5 3 (0.65%) VMware Infrastructure
6 2 (0.43%) Oracle RAC
7 1 (0.22%) vSphere
Systems Management
1 58 (12.53%) Kubernetes
2 28 (6.05%) Terraform
3 20 (4.32%) Grafana
4 18 (3.89%) Prometheus
5 13 (2.81%) Ansible
6 11 (2.38%) Oracle RMAN
7 9 (1.94%) Kiali
8 8 (1.73%) Single Sign-On
9 6 (1.30%) IBM BigFix
9 6 (1.30%) vCenter Server
10 5 (1.08%) SCCM
11 3 (0.65%) Data Guard
11 3 (0.65%) Foglight
12 1 (0.22%) AirWatch
12 1 (0.22%) Argo
12 1 (0.22%) HAProxy
12 1 (0.22%) Kubeflow
12 1 (0.22%) Microsoft Intune
12 1 (0.22%) Oracle Identity Manager
Vendors
1 75 (16.20%) Microsoft
2 64 (13.82%) Oracle
3 38 (8.21%) Databricks
4 34 (7.34%) Splunk
5 29 (6.26%) ServiceNow
6 20 (4.32%) Google
7 11 (2.38%) SAP
8 9 (1.94%) IBM
9 8 (1.73%) Advent
10 7 (1.51%) SolarWinds
10 7 (1.51%) TIBCO
11 6 (1.30%) MuleSoft
11 6 (1.30%) RedGate
11 6 (1.30%) Salesforce
11 6 (1.30%) Varonis
12 4 (0.86%) Alteryx
12 4 (0.86%) AppDynamics
12 4 (0.86%) CyberArk
12 4 (0.86%) VMware
13 3 (0.65%) Teradata