Developer Contract Job Trends in the South East

Developer
England > South East

The median Developer daily rate in the South East is £513, according to job vacancies posted in the 6 months leading up to 17 June 2026.

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

6 months to
17 Jun 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 21 18 12
Rank change year-on-year -3 -6 0
Contract jobs requiring a Developer 424 254 545
As % of all contract jobs in the South East 6.94% 8.42% 9.51%
As % of the Job Titles category 7.58% 9.25% 10.31%
Number of daily rates quoted 291 183 405
10th Percentile £335 £350 £325
25th Percentile £413 £408 £400
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £513 £485 £490
Median % change year-on-year +5.67% -1.02% -2.00%
75th Percentile £584 £575 £569
90th Percentile £638 £625 £675
England median daily rate £515 £525 £525
% change year-on-year -1.90% - -4.55%
Number of hourly rates quoted 24 16 25
10th Percentile £25.00 - £39.50
25th Percentile £34.01 £32.94 £46.25
Median hourly rate £38.25 £37.24 £58.91
Median % change year-on-year +2.72% -36.78% -15.85%
75th Percentile £60.00 £55.00 £68.75
90th Percentile £67.50 £66.10 £82.67
England median hourly rate £50.00 £40.59 £65.00
% change year-on-year +23.18% -37.55% -

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 5,595 2,745 5,288
% of contract IT jobs with a recognized job title 91.56% 91.01% 92.27%
Number of daily rates quoted 3,384 1,807 3,107
10th Percentile £303 £220 £250
25th Percentile £417 £375 £400
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £525 £500 £500
Median % change year-on-year +5.00% - -
75th Percentile £613 £600 £625
90th Percentile £700 £656 £688
England median daily rate £520 £513 £525
% change year-on-year +1.46% -2.38% -4.55%
Number of hourly rates quoted 570 191 557
10th Percentile £15.75 £14.20 £12.88
25th Percentile £24.30 £16.64 £19.00
Median hourly rate £50.00 £31.50 £50.00
Median % change year-on-year +58.73% -37.00% -4.76%
75th Percentile £78.75 £62.37 £67.02
90th Percentile £88.00 £75.00 £79.25
England median hourly rate £45.00 £28.75 £39.55
% change year-on-year +56.52% -27.31% -12.11%

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 17 June 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 17 June 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 17 June 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 -14 168 £525 +1.55% 185
Hampshire -7 118 £500 +3.09% 103
Berkshire -25 82 £488 -11.36% 75
Buckinghamshire -3 81 £525 +10.53% 73
Surrey +12 56 £513 +7.89% 112
West Sussex +9 42 £461 +25.37% 100
Sussex - 15 £475 - 8
East Sussex -1 12 £525 +40.00% 89
Kent +11 9 £450 -5.26% 96
Oxfordshire -29 5 £625 +51.52% 37
Home Counties - 1 - - 1
Developer
England

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

For the 6 months to 17 June 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.

1 186 (43.87%) Security Cleared
2 157 (37.03%) SC Cleared
3 95 (22.41%) Azure
4 84 (19.81%) SQL
5 83 (19.58%) Agile
6 78 (18.40%) CI/CD
6 78 (18.40%) Java
7 77 (18.16%) .NET
8 74 (17.45%) Oracle
9 70 (16.51%) DevOps
10 62 (14.62%) Python
11 58 (13.68%) C#
12 54 (12.74%) Git
13 53 (12.50%) JavaScript
14 51 (12.03%) Software Engineering
15 48 (11.32%) Full-Stack Development
16 47 (11.08%) Microservices
17 46 (10.85%) REST
18 44 (10.38%) RESTful
19 42 (9.91%) Problem-Solving
20 41 (9.67%) AWS
20 41 (9.67%) React
21 39 (9.20%) Data Modelling
21 39 (9.20%) Scrum
22 38 (8.96%) Azure DevOps
23 37 (8.73%) Business Intelligence
23 37 (8.73%) Kubernetes
24 36 (8.49%) Analytics
25 35 (8.25%) Microsoft
25 35 (8.25%) Performance Tuning

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 14 (3.30%) Oracle Application Server
2 8 (1.89%) Confluence
3 6 (1.42%) Apache Spark
3 6 (1.42%) CMS
4 5 (1.18%) Umbraco
5 4 (0.94%) IIS
5 4 (0.94%) Oracle Workflow
5 4 (0.94%) SharePoint
6 2 (0.47%) ArcGIS
6 2 (0.47%) Documentum
6 2 (0.47%) SAS
6 2 (0.47%) WordPress
7 1 (0.24%) Apache
7 1 (0.24%) BizTalk Server
7 1 (0.24%) JBoss
7 1 (0.24%) Kentico
7 1 (0.24%) OpenStack
7 1 (0.24%) Oracle SOA Suite
7 1 (0.24%) Tomcat
7 1 (0.24%) WebLogic
Applications
1 8 (1.89%) CPLEX
2 2 (0.47%) Microsoft Excel
2 2 (0.47%) Microsoft Office
2 2 (0.47%) Oracle Smart View
2 2 (0.47%) Spreadsheet
3 1 (0.24%) Chatbot
Business Applications
1 11 (2.59%) Siebel CRM
2 10 (2.36%) Oracle ERP
3 5 (1.18%) Oracle 11i
3 5 (1.18%) Oracle EBS R12
4 2 (0.47%) Payment Gateway
4 2 (0.47%) ProductWriter
4 2 (0.47%) SAP HR
4 2 (0.47%) SAP PSCD
5 1 (0.24%) Oracle EBS
Cloud Services
1 95 (22.41%) Azure
2 41 (9.67%) AWS
3 38 (8.96%) Azure DevOps
4 26 (6.13%) Power Platform
5 20 (4.72%) GCP
6 19 (4.48%) Serverless
7 17 (4.01%) Dynamics 365
8 16 (3.77%) GitHub
9 15 (3.54%) OpenShift
10 12 (2.83%) OCI
11 11 (2.59%) Azure Functions
11 11 (2.59%) GitHub Actions
12 10 (2.36%) Amazon S3
12 10 (2.36%) Power Automate
13 8 (1.89%) Azure Logic Apps
14 7 (1.65%) AWS Lambda
14 7 (1.65%) Azure Service Bus
15 6 (1.42%) Google App Engine
15 6 (1.42%) Oracle CX
15 6 (1.42%) PowerApps
Communications & Networking
1 7 (1.65%) BGP
1 7 (1.65%) IPsec
1 7 (1.65%) LAN
1 7 (1.65%) MPLS
1 7 (1.65%) WAN
2 4 (0.94%) HTTPS
3 2 (0.47%) Firewall
3 2 (0.47%) Software-Defined Radio
3 2 (0.47%) Wireless
4 1 (0.24%) HTTP
4 1 (0.24%) Tactical Data Link
Database & Business Intelligence
1 31 (7.31%) PostgreSQL
2 30 (7.08%) Data Warehouse
3 29 (6.84%) Oracle Reports
4 26 (6.13%) SQL Server
5 21 (4.95%) NoSQL
6 20 (4.72%) Power BI
7 19 (4.48%) Oracle ODI
8 16 (3.77%) Relational Database
9 15 (3.54%) Oracle BI Publisher
10 12 (2.83%) MongoDB
11 10 (2.36%) Siebel EIM
12 8 (1.89%) DynamoDB
13 7 (1.65%) Big Data
13 7 (1.65%) MySQL
13 7 (1.65%) Oracle Database
14 6 (1.42%) SQL Server Integration Services
15 5 (1.18%) Azure SQL Database
15 5 (1.18%) GIS
16 3 (0.71%) DocumentDB
16 3 (0.71%) Power Query
Development Applications
1 54 (12.74%) Git
2 13 (3.07%) Jenkins
3 12 (2.83%) JIRA
4 10 (2.36%) GitLab
4 10 (2.36%) Visual Studio
5 9 (2.12%) Maven
6 8 (1.89%) JUnit
6 8 (1.89%) SonarQube
7 7 (1.65%) Bitbucket
7 7 (1.65%) Gradle
8 6 (1.42%) Subversion
9 4 (0.94%) Eclipse
9 4 (0.94%) NUnit
9 4 (0.94%) Postman
9 4 (0.94%) Selenium
10 3 (0.71%) Android Studio
10 3 (0.71%) CircleCI
11 2 (0.47%) Mockito
11 2 (0.47%) SpecFlow
11 2 (0.47%) Team Foundation Server
General
1 41 (9.67%) Social Skills
2 38 (8.96%) Finance
3 30 (7.08%) Public Sector
4 18 (4.25%) Analytical Skills
5 13 (3.07%) Aerospace
6 10 (2.36%) Manufacturing
7 9 (2.12%) Law
8 8 (1.89%) Telecoms
9 7 (1.65%) Automotive
10 6 (1.42%) Billing
11 5 (1.18%) Inclusion and Diversity
11 5 (1.18%) Legal
12 2 (0.47%) Aviation
12 2 (0.47%) Presentation Skills
12 2 (0.47%) Retail
13 1 (0.24%) Advertising
13 1 (0.24%) Banking
13 1 (0.24%) Marketing
13 1 (0.24%) Organisational Skills
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 77 (18.16%) .NET
2 46 (10.85%) REST
3 44 (10.38%) RESTful
4 41 (9.67%) React
5 29 (6.84%) Kafka
6 25 (5.90%) AngularJS
7 24 (5.66%) JSON
7 24 (5.66%) Spring
8 22 (5.19%) CSS
9 21 (4.95%) .NET Framework
10 20 (4.72%) Spring Boot
11 18 (4.25%) SOAP
12 16 (3.77%) HTML
13 15 (3.54%) Entity Framework
14 14 (3.30%) .NET Core
15 13 (3.07%) OAuth
16 12 (2.83%) ASP.NET
17 10 (2.36%) Swagger
17 10 (2.36%) Web Services
18 9 (2.12%) pytest
Miscellaneous
1 21 (4.95%) Data Structures
2 18 (4.25%) Distributed Systems
3 17 (4.01%) Algorithms
4 16 (3.77%) Cloud Native
4 16 (3.77%) Product Ownership
5 13 (3.07%) Enterprise Software
6 10 (2.36%) Mobile App
7 8 (1.89%) Data Centre
8 6 (1.42%) Legacy Systems
9 5 (1.18%) Distributed Architecture
10 4 (0.94%) Onboarding
10 4 (0.94%) Virtual Team
11 3 (0.71%) CMDB
11 3 (0.71%) FMCG
11 3 (0.71%) Legacy Code
12 2 (0.47%) Data Protection Act
12 2 (0.47%) Device Driver
12 2 (0.47%) Embedded Systems
12 2 (0.47%) Management Information System
12 2 (0.47%) MicroBlaze
Operating Systems
1 14 (3.30%) Linux
2 12 (2.83%) Android
3 11 (2.59%) Windows
4 9 (2.12%) Unix
5 5 (1.18%) Apple iOS
6 2 (0.47%) Embedded Linux
Processes & Methodologies
1 83 (19.58%) Agile
2 78 (18.40%) CI/CD
3 70 (16.51%) DevOps
4 51 (12.03%) Software Engineering
5 48 (11.32%) Full-Stack Development
6 47 (11.08%) Microservices
7 42 (9.91%) Problem-Solving
8 39 (9.20%) Data Modelling
8 39 (9.20%) Scrum
9 37 (8.73%) Business Intelligence
10 36 (8.49%) Analytics
11 35 (8.25%) Performance Tuning
11 35 (8.25%) Unit Testing
12 32 (7.55%) ETL
13 30 (7.08%) Test Automation
14 29 (6.84%) Containerisation
15 26 (6.13%) Workflow
16 25 (5.90%) Front End Development
17 23 (5.42%) TDD
18 21 (4.95%) Migration
Programming Languages
1 84 (19.81%) SQL
2 78 (18.40%) Java
3 62 (14.62%) Python
4 58 (13.68%) C#
5 53 (12.50%) JavaScript
6 21 (4.95%) Go
6 21 (4.95%) TypeScript
7 11 (2.59%) Kotlin
8 10 (2.36%) PL/SQL
9 9 (2.12%) C++
10 8 (1.89%) C
10 8 (1.89%) Data Analysis Expressions
11 7 (1.65%) X++
12 5 (1.18%) PHP
13 4 (0.94%) PowerShell
14 3 (0.71%) Apex Code
14 3 (0.71%) Bash
14 3 (0.71%) Shell Script
14 3 (0.71%) Swift
15 2 (0.47%) T-SQL
Qualifications
1 186 (43.87%) Security Cleared
2 157 (37.03%) SC Cleared
3 31 (7.31%) DV Cleared
4 12 (2.83%) Degree
5 9 (2.12%) Computer Science Degree
6 3 (0.71%) Microsoft Certification
7 2 (0.47%) Azure Certification
7 2 (0.47%) BPSS Clearance
8 1 (0.24%) AWS Certification
8 1 (0.24%) AWS Certified Developer
8 1 (0.24%) DBS Check
8 1 (0.24%) Master's Degree
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 25 (5.90%) QA
2 6 (1.42%) Accessibility
3 5 (1.18%) WCAG
4 4 (0.94%) GDPR
5 3 (0.71%) Data Quality
6 2 (0.47%) COBIT
6 2 (0.47%) ISO/IEC 27001
6 2 (0.47%) NIST
7 1 (0.24%) GRC
System Software
1 30 (7.08%) Docker
2 6 (1.42%) Active Directory
3 2 (0.47%) Embedded Firmware
3 2 (0.47%) Firmware
3 2 (0.47%) Virtual Machines
Systems Management
1 37 (8.73%) Kubernetes
2 11 (2.59%) Terraform
3 8 (1.89%) Argo
4 3 (0.71%) Single Sign-On
5 2 (0.47%) Grafana
5 2 (0.47%) Prometheus
5 2 (0.47%) Systems Management Server (SMS)
6 1 (0.24%) Ansible
6 1 (0.24%) Podman
Vendors
1 74 (17.45%) Oracle
2 35 (8.25%) Microsoft
3 23 (5.42%) ServiceNow
4 22 (5.19%) Siebel
5 9 (2.12%) Salesforce
6 7 (1.65%) Red Hat
7 6 (1.42%) Atlassian
7 6 (1.42%) SAP
8 5 (1.18%) Blue Prism
8 5 (1.18%) ESRI
8 5 (1.18%) Splunk
9 4 (0.94%) Ab Initio
9 4 (0.94%) Databricks
9 4 (0.94%) Google
9 4 (0.94%) Teradata
10 3 (0.71%) Informatica
11 2 (0.47%) Adobe
11 2 (0.47%) Cognos
11 2 (0.47%) HP
11 2 (0.47%) Talend