Principal Data Engineer Contract Job Trends in the North West
Principal Data Engineer
England > North West
The median Principal Data Engineer daily rate in the North West is £750, according to job vacancies posted in the 6 months leading up to 30 October 2026.
The table below compares current contractor rates and summary statistics with the previous two years.
| 6 months to 30 Oct 2026 |
Same period 2025 | Same period 2024 | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Rank | 185 | - | - |
| Rank change year-on-year | - | - | - |
| Contract Principal Data Engineer jobs | 1 | 0 | 0 |
| As % of all contract jobs in the North West | 0.025% | - | - |
| As % of the Job Titles category | 0.028% | - | - |
| Number of daily rates quoted | 1 | 0 | 0 |
| 10th Percentile | - | - | - |
| 25th Percentile | £725 | - | - |
| Median daily rate (50th Percentile) | £750 | - | - |
| 75th Percentile | £775 | - | - |
| 90th Percentile | - | - | - |
| England median daily rate | £638 | £600 | £529 |
| % change year-on-year | +6.25% | +13.48% | - |
All Contract IT Job Roles
North West
For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all contract IT job adverts in the North West matching a recognised job title. The table also shows what proportion of all contract IT job adverts they make up.
| 6 months to 30 Oct 2026 |
Same period 2025 | Same period 2024 | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Contract job adverts in the North West matching a recognised job title | 3,613 | 2,161 | 2,181 |
| % of contract job adverts matching a recognised job title | 90.35% | 91.07% | 93.61% |
| Number of daily rates quoted | 2,048 | 1,423 | 1,155 |
| 10th Percentile | £303 | £215 | £274 |
| 25th Percentile | £405 | £363 | £388 |
| Median daily rate (50th Percentile) | £500 | £450 | £475 |
| Median % change year-on-year | +11.11% | -5.26% | -5.00% |
| 75th Percentile | £600 | £575 | £575 |
| 90th Percentile | £675 | £680 | £650 |
| England median daily rate | £525 | £510 | £525 |
| % change year-on-year | +2.94% | -2.86% | -2.33% |
| Number of hourly rates quoted | 451 | 206 | 153 |
| 10th Percentile | £14.25 | £14.13 | £15.52 |
| 25th Percentile | £24.18 | £18.87 | £18.00 |
| Median hourly rate | £45.56 | £27.30 | £33.00 |
| Median % change year-on-year | +66.88% | -17.28% | -4.46% |
| 75th Percentile | £73.12 | £50.56 | £51.91 |
| 90th Percentile | £85.00 | £70.16 | £71.38 |
| England median hourly rate | £41.00 | £25.15 | £41.50 |
| % change year-on-year | +63.02% | -39.40% | -9.55% |
Principal Data Engineer Job Vacancy Trend in the North West
Historical trend showing the proportion of contract Principal Data Engineer job postings relative to all contract IT jobs advertised in the North West.
Principal Data Engineer Daily Rate Trend in the North West
Contractor daily rate distribution trend for Principal Data Engineer job vacancies in the North West.
Principal Data Engineer Contract Job Locations in the North West
The table below looks at the demand and provides a guide to the median contractor rates quoted in Principal Data Engineer jobs within the North West region over the 6 months to 30 October 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 |
Job Ads Past 6 Months |
Median Daily Rate Past 6 Months |
Median Daily Rate % Change on Same Period Last Year |
Live Jobs |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Manchester | - | 1 | £750 | - | 3 |
| Principal Data Engineer England |
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Principal Data Engineer Skill Set Top 30 Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities in the North West
For the 6 months to 30 October 2026, Principal Data Engineer contract job ads cited 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 Principal Data Engineer job ads across the North West region.
| Rank | Skill | Share | Job Ads |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Agile | 100.0% | 1 |
| 1 | AI | 100.0% | 1 |
| 1 | Analytics | 100.0% | 1 |
| 1 | Apache | 100.0% | 1 |
| 1 | Apache Arrow | 100.0% | 1 |
| 1 | Apache Iceberg | 100.0% | 1 |
| 1 | Apache Pulsar | 100.0% | 1 |
| 1 | Artifactory | 100.0% | 1 |
| 1 | Artificial Intelligence Engineering | 100.0% | 1 |
| 1 | Azure | 100.0% | 1 |
| 1 | CI/CD | 100.0% | 1 |
| 1 | Collibra | 100.0% | 1 |
| 1 | Continuous Improvement | 100.0% | 1 |
| 1 | Dask | 100.0% | 1 |
| 1 | Data Engineering | 100.0% | 1 |
| 1 | Data Pipeline | 100.0% | 1 |
| 1 | Data Privacy | 100.0% | 1 |
| 1 | Data Strategy | 100.0% | 1 |
| 1 | dbt | 100.0% | 1 |
| 1 | Docker | 100.0% | 1 |
| 1 | GitHub | 100.0% | 1 |
| 1 | GitHub Actions | 100.0% | 1 |
| 1 | Infrastructure as Code | 100.0% | 1 |
| 1 | Investment Management | 100.0% | 1 |
| 1 | Java | 100.0% | 1 |
| 1 | Jinja | 100.0% | 1 |
| 1 | Kafka | 100.0% | 1 |
| 1 | LangChain | 100.0% | 1 |
| 1 | LlamaIndex | 100.0% | 1 |
| 1 | Machine Learning | 100.0% | 1 |
Principal Data Engineer Skill Set Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities in the North West by Category
The table below expands on the one above by listing co-occurrences one category at a time. It covers the same employment type, locality and period, with up to 20 co-occurrences in each category.
Job Titles
| Rank | Job Title | Share | Job Ads |
|---|