Degree Contract Job Trends in the South East

Academic Degree
England > South East

The table below provides summary statistics for contract job vacancies advertised in the South East with a requirement for Degree qualifications. It includes a benchmarking guide to the contractor rates offered over the 6 months leading up to 2 February 2026, comparing them to the same period in the previous two years.

6 months to
2 Feb 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 28 29 15
Rank change year-on-year +1 -14 +10
Contract jobs citing Degree 278 213 480
As % of all contract jobs in the South East 6.10% 6.69% 8.72%
As % of the Qualifications category 13.84% 17.81% 19.90%
Number of daily rates quoted 155 118 296
10th Percentile £204 £181 £166
25th Percentile £311 £307 £263
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £475 £500 £500
Median % change year-on-year -5.00% - +4.17%
75th Percentile £569 £585 £606
90th Percentile £655 £686 £670
England median daily rate £500 £525 £520
% change year-on-year -4.76% +0.96% -5.45%
Number of hourly rates quoted 28 9 48
10th Percentile £20.79 £18.44 £16.25
25th Percentile £21.32 £31.25 £29.68
Median hourly rate £29.61 £42.50 £55.00
Median % change year-on-year -30.33% -22.73% +22.22%
75th Percentile £80.25 £61.76 £67.14
90th Percentile £81.30 £78.71 £72.33
England median hourly rate £35.00 £42.50 £40.00
% change year-on-year -17.65% +6.25% -6.98%

All Academic and Professional Certifications
South East

Degree 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 the South East.

Contract vacancies requiring academic qualifications or professional certifications 2,009 1,196 2,412
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the South East 44.10% 37.59% 43.80%
Number of daily rates quoted 1,350 746 1,394
10th Percentile £275 £256 £213
25th Percentile £413 £413 £413
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £525 £536
Median % change year-on-year -4.76% -2.01% -0.33%
75th Percentile £600 £631 £639
90th Percentile £723 £688 £700
England median daily rate £520 £525 £550
% change year-on-year -0.95% -4.55% -
Number of hourly rates quoted 189 68 169
10th Percentile £15.24 £19.12 £19.25
25th Percentile £19.10 £31.25 £42.00
Median hourly rate £25.15 £57.00 £60.00
Median % change year-on-year -55.88% -5.00% +33.33%
75th Percentile £55.00 £64.73 £70.50
90th Percentile £90.09 £77.54 £83.17
England median hourly rate £25.15 £46.18 £46.18
% change year-on-year -45.54% - +2.62%

Degree
Job Vacancy Trend in the South East

Historical trend showing the proportion of contract IT job postings citing Degree relative to all contract IT jobs advertised in the South East.

Degree job vacancy trend in the South East

Degree
Daily Rate Trend in the South East

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in the South East citing Degree.

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in the South East citing Degree

Degree
Daily Rate Histogram in the South East

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing Degree in the South East over the 6 months to 2 February 2026.

Daily rate histogram for Degree in the South East

Degree
Hourly Rate Trend in the South East

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in the South East citing Degree.

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in the South East citing Degree

Degree
Hourly Rate Histogram in the South East

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing Degree in the South East over the 6 months to 2 February 2026.

Hourly rate histogram for Degree in the South East

Degree
Contract Job Locations in the South East

The table below looks at the demand and provides a guide to the median contractor rates quoted in IT jobs citing Degree within the South East region over the 6 months to 2 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
Thames Valley +5 132 £446 -0.89% 198
Berkshire -5 97 £425 -5.56% 91
Hampshire +15 67 £500 -4.76% 144
Surrey -13 32 £500 - 85
Buckinghamshire +14 30 £445 +97.78% 49
West Sussex -4 16 £385 -23.00% 27
Kent -3 12 £445 -1.11% 36
East Sussex -1 7 £565 -9.60% 14
Oxfordshire -14 5 £494 -17.71% 59
Isle of Wight - 4 - - 2
Home Counties - 4 £700 -
Degree
England

Degree
Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities in the South East 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 (6.47%) Confluence
2 14 (5.04%) SharePoint
3 6 (2.16%) Microsoft Exchange
4 4 (1.44%) GeoServer
4 4 (1.44%) Smallworld
5 3 (1.08%) Apache
5 3 (1.08%) Apache Spark
5 3 (1.08%) MS Project Server
6 2 (0.72%) Adobe Experience Manager
6 2 (0.72%) CMS
6 2 (0.72%) Palantir Foundry
7 1 (0.36%) SharePoint Server
7 1 (0.36%) Skype for Business
Applications
1 51 (18.35%) Microsoft Office
2 50 (17.99%) Microsoft Excel
3 36 (12.95%) Microsoft Project
4 20 (7.19%) Microsoft PowerPoint
5 7 (2.52%) Chatbot
6 2 (0.72%) MS Visio
7 1 (0.36%) PTC Creo
Business Applications
1 10 (3.60%) Primavera
2 5 (1.80%) SAP ERP
3 3 (1.08%) SAP S/4HANA
4 1 (0.36%) Dynamics AX
4 1 (0.36%) Dynamics GP
4 1 (0.36%) Oracle EBS
4 1 (0.36%) Oracle EBS R12
4 1 (0.36%) Oracle Procure-to-Pay
4 1 (0.36%) Oracle Receivables
4 1 (0.36%) Payment Gateway
4 1 (0.36%) Salesforce CRM
4 1 (0.36%) SAP Hybris
4 1 (0.36%) SAP WM
4 1 (0.36%) Teamcenter
4 1 (0.36%) Workday HCM
Cloud Services
1 41 (14.75%) Azure
2 29 (10.43%) AWS
3 18 (6.47%) Microsoft 365
4 16 (5.76%) Power Platform
5 10 (3.60%) GitHub
5 10 (3.60%) GitHub Actions
6 8 (2.88%) GCP
7 6 (2.16%) Entra ID
7 6 (2.16%) SaaS
8 5 (1.80%) Azure DevOps
8 5 (1.80%) IaaS
9 3 (1.08%) Amazon S3
9 3 (1.08%) PowerApps
10 2 (0.72%) Amazon EC2
10 2 (0.72%) Amazon ECS
10 2 (0.72%) Amazon EKS
10 2 (0.72%) Azure Sentinel
10 2 (0.72%) OCI
10 2 (0.72%) Power Automate
10 2 (0.72%) Serverless
Communications & Networking
1 22 (7.91%) Firewall
2 14 (5.04%) WAN
2 14 (5.04%) Wireless
3 11 (3.96%) LAN
3 11 (3.96%) Network Security
4 9 (3.24%) BGP
4 9 (3.24%) OSPF
5 8 (2.88%) IPsec
5 8 (2.88%) Structured Cabling
6 7 (2.52%) Unified Communications
7 6 (2.16%) DNS
8 4 (1.44%) TCP/IP
8 4 (1.44%) WebEx
9 3 (1.08%) HTTP
9 3 (1.08%) VoIP
9 3 (1.08%) Wi-Fi
10 2 (0.72%) Internet
11 1 (0.36%) 5G
11 1 (0.36%) Telepresence
11 1 (0.36%) VXLAN
Database & Business Intelligence
1 15 (5.40%) Relational Database
2 14 (5.04%) Power BI
3 11 (3.96%) MySQL
4 8 (2.88%) PostgreSQL
5 6 (2.16%) BusinessObjects Business Intelligence
5 6 (2.16%) Data Warehouse
5 6 (2.16%) NoSQL
6 5 (1.80%) Apache Cassandra
6 5 (1.80%) Big Data
6 5 (1.80%) Couchbase
6 5 (1.80%) Metadata
7 4 (1.44%) Geospatial Data
7 4 (1.44%) GIS
7 4 (1.44%) QGIS
7 4 (1.44%) SQL Server
8 3 (1.08%) Tableau
9 2 (0.72%) Amazon RDS
9 2 (0.72%) Hadoop
9 2 (0.72%) Oracle Reports
10 1 (0.36%) RDBMS
Development Applications
1 23 (8.27%) JIRA
2 12 (4.32%) Burp Suite
3 11 (3.96%) Git
4 10 (3.60%) Metasploit
5 7 (2.52%) GitLab
6 6 (2.16%) Jenkins
7 4 (1.44%) CircleCI
7 4 (1.44%) Selenium
7 4 (1.44%) Visual Studio
8 3 (1.08%) Gradle
8 3 (1.08%) JUnit
9 2 (0.72%) Cypress.io
9 2 (0.72%) WebDriver
10 1 (0.36%) Appium
10 1 (0.36%) Artifactory
10 1 (0.36%) Bitbucket
10 1 (0.36%) HP UFT
10 1 (0.36%) SoapUI
10 1 (0.36%) Subversion
10 1 (0.36%) Team Foundation Server
General
1 136 (48.92%) Social Skills
2 71 (25.54%) Analytical Skills
3 40 (14.39%) Finance
4 21 (7.55%) Manufacturing
5 15 (5.40%) Public Sector
6 14 (5.04%) Influencing Skills
7 12 (4.32%) Organisational Skills
8 11 (3.96%) Legal
9 10 (3.60%) Documentation Skills
10 9 (3.24%) Marketing
11 8 (2.88%) Law
12 6 (2.16%) Retail
13 5 (1.80%) Aerospace
13 5 (1.80%) Military
14 4 (1.44%) Advertising
14 4 (1.44%) Presentation Skills
14 4 (1.44%) Telecoms
15 3 (1.08%) Billing
15 3 (1.08%) Electronics
16 2 (0.72%) Banking
Job Titles
1 37 (13.31%) Analyst
2 27 (9.71%) Senior
3 20 (7.19%) Project Manager
4 19 (6.83%) Developer
5 14 (5.04%) Lead
5 14 (5.04%) Technical Support
6 13 (4.68%) Project Planner
7 12 (4.32%) Penetration Tester
7 12 (4.32%) Tester
8 11 (3.96%) Architect
9 9 (3.24%) SC Cleared Project Manager
10 8 (2.88%) IT Analyst
10 8 (2.88%) Network Engineer
11 7 (2.52%) IT Manager
11 7 (2.52%) Trainer
12 6 (2.16%) Administrator
12 6 (2.16%) Business Analyst
12 6 (2.16%) Cisco Engineer
12 6 (2.16%) Finance Manager
12 6 (2.16%) Principal Engineer
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 11 (3.96%) REST
2 6 (2.16%) HTML
2 6 (2.16%) Kafka
3 5 (1.80%) RabbitMQ
4 4 (1.44%) CSS
4 4 (1.44%) RAML
5 3 (1.08%) Android Jetpack
5 3 (1.08%) Dagger
5 3 (1.08%) Jetpack Compose
5 3 (1.08%) OkHttp
5 3 (1.08%) Pandas
5 3 (1.08%) RxJava
5 3 (1.08%) scikit-learn
5 3 (1.08%) Web Services
5 3 (1.08%) WireMock
6 2 (0.72%) .NET
6 2 (0.72%) Node.js
6 2 (0.72%) NumPy
6 2 (0.72%) Playwright
6 2 (0.72%) Spring
Miscellaneous
1 26 (9.35%) Management Information System
2 16 (5.76%) Data Centre
3 14 (5.04%) Analytical Mindset
4 11 (3.96%) Security Posture
4 11 (3.96%) Self-Motivation
4 11 (3.96%) Virtual Team
5 10 (3.60%) Security Operations Centre
6 9 (3.24%) Driving Licence
7 8 (2.88%) Data Protection Act
8 7 (2.52%) PMI
9 6 (2.16%) Product Ownership
10 5 (1.80%) Handset
10 5 (1.80%) Legacy Systems
11 4 (1.44%) Algorithms
11 4 (1.44%) Cloud Native
11 4 (1.44%) Cyberattack
11 4 (1.44%) Digital Media
11 4 (1.44%) Legacy Code
11 4 (1.44%) Video Conferencing
12 3 (1.08%) Mobile App
Operating Systems
1 47 (16.91%) Windows
2 27 (9.71%) Linux
3 12 (4.32%) Unix
4 7 (2.52%) Windows 10
5 4 (1.44%) Android
6 3 (1.08%) Apple iOS
7 2 (0.72%) Kali Linux
7 2 (0.72%) Mac OS
7 2 (0.72%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
8 1 (0.36%) Ubuntu
Processes & Methodologies
1 94 (33.81%) Computer Science
2 74 (26.62%) Problem-Solving
3 62 (22.30%) Agile
4 44 (15.83%) Project Management
5 42 (15.11%) Cybersecurity
6 40 (14.39%) Stakeholder Management
7 33 (11.87%) PRINCE2
8 26 (9.35%) Information Security
8 26 (9.35%) ITIL
8 26 (9.35%) Line Management
9 25 (8.99%) Continuous Improvement
10 24 (8.63%) AI
11 23 (8.27%) DevOps
12 22 (7.91%) Decision-Making
12 22 (7.91%) Migration
12 22 (7.91%) Project Delivery
13 21 (7.55%) Business Intelligence
13 21 (7.55%) Change Management
14 20 (7.19%) Analytics
15 18 (6.47%) Penetration Testing
Programming Languages
1 37 (13.31%) Python
2 24 (8.63%) SQL
3 20 (7.19%) Java
4 17 (6.12%) JavaScript
5 11 (3.96%) Perl
6 5 (1.80%) C#
6 5 (1.80%) Go
6 5 (1.80%) PowerShell
7 4 (1.44%) Shell Script
8 3 (1.08%) C
8 3 (1.08%) Kotlin
9 2 (0.72%) Ada
9 2 (0.72%) Assembly Language
9 2 (0.72%) Bash
9 2 (0.72%) C++
9 2 (0.72%) MATLAB
9 2 (0.72%) R
10 1 (0.36%) Objective-C
10 1 (0.36%) Tcl
10 1 (0.36%) X++
Qualifications
1 87 (31.29%) Security Cleared
2 75 (26.98%) SC Cleared
3 73 (26.26%) Computer Science Degree
4 26 (9.35%) Master's Degree
5 19 (6.83%) CISSP
6 18 (6.47%) PMI Certification
6 18 (6.47%) PMP
7 15 (5.40%) DV Cleared
8 14 (5.04%) Cisco Certification
8 14 (5.04%) CREST Certified
9 12 (4.32%) CCNP
10 11 (3.96%) Postgraduate
11 10 (3.60%) CHECK Team Member
11 10 (3.60%) CISM
11 10 (3.60%) Cyber Scheme
12 9 (3.24%) CCNA
12 9 (3.24%) PhD
13 6 (2.16%) CompTIA Security+
13 6 (2.16%) Microsoft Certification
14 5 (1.80%) CompTIA CySA+
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 42 (15.11%) PMO
2 23 (8.27%) QA
3 22 (7.91%) GDPR
4 20 (7.19%) ISO/IEC 27001
5 13 (4.68%) PCI DSS
6 12 (4.32%) NIST
7 9 (3.24%) SLA
8 8 (2.88%) Data Quality
9 4 (1.44%) Sarbanes-Oxley
10 3 (1.08%) Accessibility
10 3 (1.08%) Actionable Recommendations
10 3 (1.08%) HIPAA
10 3 (1.08%) NCSC
10 3 (1.08%) P3O
11 2 (0.72%) ISO 9001
11 2 (0.72%) ISO/IEC 19770
11 2 (0.72%) RMADS
12 1 (0.36%) Def Stans
12 1 (0.36%) GxP
12 1 (0.36%) JSP 440
System Software
1 10 (3.60%) Active Directory
1 10 (3.60%) Docker
2 6 (2.16%) Firmware
3 1 (0.36%) VMware Infrastructure
3 1 (0.36%) VMware NSX
3 1 (0.36%) vSphere
Systems Management
1 12 (4.32%) Nmap
2 11 (3.96%) Kubernetes
3 6 (2.16%) Terraform
4 5 (1.80%) Ansible
5 3 (1.08%) Puppet
6 2 (0.72%) Grafana
6 2 (0.72%) Microsoft Intune
6 2 (0.72%) SCCM
7 1 (0.36%) FortiGate
7 1 (0.36%) Kubeflow
7 1 (0.36%) Nagios
7 1 (0.36%) Nessus
7 1 (0.36%) Podman
7 1 (0.36%) SCOM
7 1 (0.36%) vRealize
7 1 (0.36%) vRealize Orchestrator
Vendors
1 59 (21.22%) Microsoft
2 24 (8.63%) SAP
3 18 (6.47%) Oracle
4 15 (5.40%) Cisco
5 10 (3.60%) Palo Alto
5 10 (3.60%) ServiceNow
6 9 (3.24%) Aruba
6 9 (3.24%) CheckPoint
7 8 (2.88%) Splunk
8 7 (2.52%) PayPal
9 6 (2.16%) Atlassian
10 5 (1.80%) EMC
11 4 (1.44%) Cellebrite
11 4 (1.44%) ESRI
11 4 (1.44%) Google
11 4 (1.44%) Informatica
11 4 (1.44%) Intergraph
12 3 (1.08%) Salesforce
12 3 (1.08%) Snow
13 2 (0.72%) Fortinet