Developer Contract Job Trends in the South East

Developer
England > South East

The median Developer daily rate in the South East is £475, according to job vacancies posted in the 6 months leading up to 23 February 2026.

The table below compares current contractor rates and summary statistics with the previous two years.

6 months to
23 Feb 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 29 21 20
Rank change year-on-year -8 -1 -10
Contract jobs requiring a Developer 292 279 411
As % of all contract jobs in the South East 6.10% 8.90% 7.46%
As % of the Job Titles category 6.74% 9.57% 8.01%
Number of daily rates quoted 213 188 299
10th Percentile £323 £350 £350
25th Percentile £405 £400 £413
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £475 £463 £485
Median % change year-on-year +2.70% -4.64% -9.98%
75th Percentile £575 £600 £582
90th Percentile £633 £638 £688
England median daily rate £500 £538 £525
% change year-on-year -6.98% +2.38% -8.70%
Number of hourly rates quoted 18 1 23
10th Percentile £40.00 - £46.25
25th Percentile £52.50 - £50.63
Median hourly rate £55.00 £77.19 £60.00
Median % change year-on-year -28.75% +28.65% -11.11%
75th Percentile £60.00 - £73.75
90th Percentile £67.50 - £83.56
England median hourly rate £61.00 £65.00 £68.05
% change year-on-year -6.15% -4.48% +13.42%

All Contract IT Job Roles
South East

For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all contract IT job vacancies in the South East. Most job vacancies include a discernible job title that can be normalized. As such, the figures in the second row provide an indication of the number of contract jobs in our overall sample.

Contract vacancies in the South East with a recognized job title 4,330 2,915 5,133
% of contract IT jobs with a recognized job title 90.49% 92.98% 93.11%
Number of daily rates quoted 2,775 1,822 3,160
10th Percentile £264 £243 £205
25th Percentile £403 £400 £378
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £500 £500
75th Percentile £600 £603 £608
90th Percentile £688 £663 £688
England median daily rate £501 £525 £525
% change year-on-year -4.67% - -4.55%
Number of hourly rates quoted 379 106 404
10th Percentile £13.95 £18.50 £13.00
25th Percentile £18.32 £24.18 £18.15
Median hourly rate £29.61 £42.69 £44.00
Median % change year-on-year -30.64% -2.98% -2.22%
75th Percentile £69.20 £62.50 £62.50
90th Percentile £85.50 £75.00 £76.53
England median hourly rate £33.17 £36.00 £35.00
% change year-on-year -7.86% +2.86% -12.50%

Developer
Job Vacancy Trend in the South East

Historical trend showing the proportion of contract IT job postings featuring 'Developer' in the job title relative to all contract IT jobs advertised in the South East.

Developer job vacancy trend in the South East

Developer
Daily Rate Trend in the South East

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for Developer job vacancies in the South East.

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for Developer job vacancies in the South East

Developer
Daily Rate Histogram in the South East

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing Developer in the South East over the 6 months to 23 February 2026.

Daily rate histogram for Developer in the South East

Developer
Hourly Rate Trend in the South East

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for Developer job vacancies in the South East.

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for Developer job vacancies in the South East

Developer
Hourly Rate Histogram in the South East

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing Developer in the South East over the 6 months to 23 February 2026.

Hourly rate histogram for Developer in the South East

Developer
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 Developer within the South East region over the 6 months to 23 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 -26 123 £484 -9.58% 77
Hampshire +2 90 £488 +14.71% 58
Berkshire -36 75 £496 -9.77% 24
Buckinghamshire +12 45 £469 -13.99% 35
Surrey +5 29 £505 +12.22% 50
West Sussex -9 22 £475 +12.35% 26
East Sussex 0 14 £450 -18.18% 26
Kent -2 9 £338 -10.00% 24
Sussex 0 7 £475 - 8
Oxfordshire -16 3 £338 +1.89% 18
Middlesex - 2 £552 - 10
Home Counties -1 1 - -
Developer
England

Developer Skill Set
Top 30 Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities in the South East

For the 6 months to 23 February 2026, Developer contract job roles required 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 job ads across the South East region featuring Developer in the job title.

1 98 (33.56%) Java
2 92 (31.51%) Security Cleared
3 78 (26.71%) SC Cleared
4 77 (26.37%) Agile
5 75 (25.68%) CI/CD
6 72 (24.66%) SQL
7 57 (19.52%) AWS
8 54 (18.49%) Azure
9 53 (18.15%) Problem-Solving
10 47 (16.10%) REST
11 46 (15.75%) Spring
12 44 (15.07%) JavaScript
12 44 (15.07%) Python
13 43 (14.73%) Full-Stack Development
14 42 (14.38%) Kubernetes
14 42 (14.38%) Software Engineering
15 41 (14.04%) DevOps
16 40 (13.70%) PostgreSQL
17 39 (13.36%) Microservices
18 38 (13.01%) GitHub
18 38 (13.01%) Test Automation
19 37 (12.67%) Spring Boot
20 36 (12.33%) Business Intelligence
20 36 (12.33%) Git
20 36 (12.33%) React
21 33 (11.30%) Jenkins
21 33 (11.30%) Scrum
22 32 (10.96%) .NET
23 31 (10.62%) Microsoft
24 29 (9.93%) Data Modelling

Developer Skill Set
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 10 (3.42%) Confluence
2 7 (2.40%) SharePoint
3 5 (1.71%) Apache Spark
4 4 (1.37%) Apache
5 3 (1.03%) ArcGIS
6 2 (0.68%) CMS
6 2 (0.68%) IIS
7 1 (0.34%) Appian
7 1 (0.34%) BizTalk Server
7 1 (0.34%) Documentum
7 1 (0.34%) JBoss
7 1 (0.34%) Jupyter
7 1 (0.34%) Oracle SOA Suite
7 1 (0.34%) SharePoint Server
7 1 (0.34%) Smallworld
7 1 (0.34%) Tomcat
7 1 (0.34%) Umbraco
7 1 (0.34%) WebLogic
7 1 (0.34%) WordPress
Applications
1 3 (1.03%) Microsoft Office
2 2 (0.68%) Spreadsheet
3 1 (0.34%) CPLEX
Business Applications
1 3 (1.03%) Oracle Assets
1 3 (1.03%) Oracle General Ledger
1 3 (1.03%) Oracle Payables
1 3 (1.03%) Oracle Receivables
1 3 (1.03%) Oracle Subledger Accounting
1 3 (1.03%) Payment Gateway
2 2 (0.68%) Dynamics CRM
2 2 (0.68%) Maximo
2 2 (0.68%) Oracle Cash Management
2 2 (0.68%) Oracle EBS
3 1 (0.34%) Oracle 11i
3 1 (0.34%) Oracle EBS R12
3 1 (0.34%) Oracle ERP
3 1 (0.34%) SAP HR
3 1 (0.34%) SAP PSCD
3 1 (0.34%) Teamcenter
Cloud Services
1 57 (19.52%) AWS
2 54 (18.49%) Azure
3 38 (13.01%) GitHub
4 24 (8.22%) GCP
5 22 (7.53%) GitHub Actions
6 20 (6.85%) OpenShift
7 19 (6.51%) Power Platform
8 14 (4.79%) Azure DevOps
9 12 (4.11%) Amazon S3
10 10 (3.42%) Dynamics 365
11 9 (3.08%) OCI
11 9 (3.08%) Serverless
12 8 (2.74%) AWS Lambda
12 8 (2.74%) Datadog
13 7 (2.40%) Azure Service Bus
14 6 (2.05%) Boomi
14 6 (2.05%) Snowflake
15 5 (1.71%) Amazon EC2
15 5 (1.71%) AtomSphere
15 5 (1.71%) AWS CloudFormation
Communications & Networking
1 5 (1.71%) Kerberos
2 2 (0.68%) Bluetooth
2 2 (0.68%) HTTP
2 2 (0.68%) HTTPS
2 2 (0.68%) Tactical Data Link
2 2 (0.68%) VoIP
3 1 (0.34%) Asterisk PBX
3 1 (0.34%) SAN
3 1 (0.34%) TCP/IP
Database & Business Intelligence
1 40 (13.70%) PostgreSQL
2 23 (7.88%) NoSQL
3 18 (6.16%) Oracle BI Publisher
3 18 (6.16%) Oracle Reports
4 16 (5.48%) Relational Database
5 13 (4.45%) SQL Server
6 12 (4.11%) MongoDB
7 11 (3.77%) MySQL
8 10 (3.42%) Power BI
9 9 (3.08%) DynamoDB
10 8 (2.74%) HBase
11 7 (2.40%) Data Warehouse
12 6 (2.05%) Azure SQL Database
13 5 (1.71%) Apache Cassandra
13 5 (1.71%) Big Data
13 5 (1.71%) Couchbase
13 5 (1.71%) Oracle Database
14 4 (1.37%) SAP HANA
14 4 (1.37%) SQL Server Integration Services
15 3 (1.03%) Oracle BI EE
Development Applications
1 36 (12.33%) Git
2 33 (11.30%) Jenkins
3 26 (8.90%) JUnit
4 22 (7.53%) Cucumber
4 22 (7.53%) Gradle
5 15 (5.14%) Sonatype Nexus
6 12 (4.11%) GitLab
7 11 (3.77%) Maven
8 9 (3.08%) JMeter
9 8 (2.74%) Artifactory
9 8 (2.74%) JIRA
10 7 (2.40%) Android Studio
10 7 (2.40%) Bitbucket
11 5 (1.71%) Selenium
11 5 (1.71%) SonarQube
11 5 (1.71%) Subversion
11 5 (1.71%) Visual Studio
12 4 (1.37%) Storybook
13 3 (1.03%) CircleCI
14 2 (0.68%) Oracle Forms
General
1 62 (21.23%) Social Skills
2 45 (15.41%) Finance
3 26 (8.90%) Analytical Skills
4 22 (7.53%) Public Sector
5 6 (2.05%) Telecoms
6 5 (1.71%) Manufacturing
7 4 (1.37%) Banking
7 4 (1.37%) Electronics
7 4 (1.37%) Marketing
8 3 (1.03%) Aerospace
8 3 (1.03%) Aviation
8 3 (1.03%) Billing
9 2 (0.68%) Documentation Skills
9 2 (0.68%) General Ledger
9 2 (0.68%) Inclusion and Diversity
9 2 (0.68%) Legal
10 1 (0.34%) Health Technology
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 47 (16.10%) REST
2 46 (15.75%) Spring
3 37 (12.67%) Spring Boot
4 36 (12.33%) React
5 32 (10.96%) .NET
6 27 (9.25%) Kafka
7 24 (8.22%) SOAP
8 23 (7.88%) RESTful
9 21 (7.19%) CSS
10 20 (6.85%) AngularJS
11 19 (6.51%) HTML
11 19 (6.51%) Oracle Fusion
12 14 (4.79%) Web Services
13 13 (4.45%) Hibernate
13 13 (4.45%) Node.js
13 13 (4.45%) RabbitMQ
14 12 (4.11%) JSON
15 9 (3.08%) OAuth
16 7 (2.40%) .NET Framework
17 6 (2.05%) JPA
Miscellaneous
1 14 (4.79%) Data Structures
2 10 (3.42%) Distributed Systems
3 9 (3.08%) Mobile App
4 6 (2.05%) Product Ownership
5 5 (1.71%) Client/Server
5 5 (1.71%) Cloud Native
6 4 (1.37%) Algorithms
6 4 (1.37%) Analytical Mindset
6 4 (1.37%) Data Centre
7 3 (1.03%) Legacy Code
7 3 (1.03%) Onboarding
7 3 (1.03%) Virtual Team
8 2 (0.68%) CMDB
8 2 (0.68%) Enterprise Software
8 2 (0.68%) Greenfield Project
8 2 (0.68%) Management Information System
9 1 (0.34%) AI Agents
9 1 (0.34%) Distributed Architecture
9 1 (0.34%) Renewable Energy
9 1 (0.34%) Self-Motivation
Operating Systems
1 24 (8.22%) Android
2 17 (5.82%) Linux
3 9 (3.08%) Apple iOS
3 9 (3.08%) Windows
4 6 (2.05%) Unix
5 1 (0.34%) CentOS
5 1 (0.34%) Debian
5 1 (0.34%) Ubuntu
Processes & Methodologies
1 77 (26.37%) Agile
2 75 (25.68%) CI/CD
3 53 (18.15%) Problem-Solving
4 43 (14.73%) Full-Stack Development
5 42 (14.38%) Software Engineering
6 41 (14.04%) DevOps
7 39 (13.36%) Microservices
8 38 (13.01%) Test Automation
9 36 (12.33%) Business Intelligence
10 33 (11.30%) Scrum
11 29 (9.93%) Data Modelling
12 24 (8.22%) Front End Development
13 22 (7.53%) Containerisation
14 20 (6.85%) AI
14 20 (6.85%) TDD
15 19 (6.51%) Android Development
15 19 (6.51%) Computer Science
16 18 (6.16%) Performance Tuning
16 18 (6.16%) Unit Testing
17 17 (5.82%) Software Testing
Programming Languages
1 98 (33.56%) Java
2 72 (24.66%) SQL
3 44 (15.07%) JavaScript
3 44 (15.07%) Python
4 28 (9.59%) C#
5 12 (4.11%) Go
5 12 (4.11%) TypeScript
6 7 (2.40%) C++
6 7 (2.40%) Kotlin
6 7 (2.40%) PL/SQL
7 6 (2.05%) VB
8 5 (1.71%) ABAP
8 5 (1.71%) Apex Code
8 5 (1.71%) PowerShell
8 5 (1.71%) Shell Script
9 4 (1.37%) C
9 4 (1.37%) PHP
10 3 (1.03%) Swift
10 3 (1.03%) T-SQL
10 3 (1.03%) X++
Qualifications
1 92 (31.51%) Security Cleared
2 78 (26.71%) SC Cleared
3 19 (6.51%) Degree
4 16 (5.48%) Computer Science Degree
5 11 (3.77%) DV Cleared
6 10 (3.42%) OCP
6 10 (3.42%) Oracle Certification
7 3 (1.03%) BPSS Clearance
8 2 (0.68%) Azure Certification
9 1 (0.34%) AWS Certification
9 1 (0.34%) AWS Certified Developer
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 11 (3.77%) QA
2 5 (1.71%) Data Quality
2 5 (1.71%) GDPR
3 3 (1.03%) Accessibility
3 3 (1.03%) SLA
4 2 (0.68%) ISO/IEC 27001
4 2 (0.68%) NIST
5 1 (0.34%) COBIT
5 1 (0.34%) Def Stans
5 1 (0.34%) WCAG
System Software
1 22 (7.53%) Docker
2 4 (1.37%) Active Directory
2 4 (1.37%) VMware Infrastructure
Systems Management
1 42 (14.38%) Kubernetes
2 10 (3.42%) Ansible
3 9 (3.08%) Grafana
3 9 (3.08%) Terraform
4 7 (2.40%) Progress Chef
5 6 (2.05%) Argo
6 3 (1.03%) Prometheus
6 3 (1.03%) Systems Management Server (SMS)
7 2 (0.68%) Single Sign-On
8 1 (0.34%) Oracle Enterprise Manager
Vendors
1 31 (10.62%) Microsoft
2 29 (9.93%) Oracle
3 11 (3.77%) Salesforce
4 10 (3.42%) Atlassian
4 10 (3.42%) ServiceNow
5 9 (3.08%) SAP
5 9 (3.08%) VMware
6 6 (2.05%) Informatica
6 6 (2.05%) Red Hat
7 5 (1.71%) Blue Prism
7 5 (1.71%) Databricks
8 4 (1.37%) Google
9 3 (1.03%) Coverity
9 3 (1.03%) Teradata
9 3 (1.03%) Thales
10 2 (0.68%) Ab Initio
10 2 (0.68%) Cognos
10 2 (0.68%) IFS
10 2 (0.68%) OpenAI
10 2 (0.68%) Splunk