Developer Contract Job Trends in the South East

Developer
England > South East

The median Developer daily rate in the South East is £500, according to job vacancies posted in the 6 months leading up to 7 May 2026.

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

6 months to
7 May 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 24 23 12
Rank change year-on-year -1 -11 -1
Contract jobs requiring a Developer 383 234 519
As % of all contract jobs in the South East 6.50% 7.78% 9.36%
As % of the Job Titles category 7.08% 8.48% 10.15%
Number of daily rates quoted 262 173 399
10th Percentile £335 £322 £325
25th Percentile £413 £406 £400
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £465 £500
Median % change year-on-year +7.53% -7.00% -4.08%
75th Percentile £567 £575 £569
90th Percentile £613 £638 £675
England median daily rate £500 £525 £525
% change year-on-year -4.76% - -4.55%
Number of hourly rates quoted 22 6 27
10th Percentile £25.90 £29.32 £41.75
25th Percentile £34.01 £40.85 £50.55
Median hourly rate £45.00 £51.25 £58.91
Median % change year-on-year -12.20% -13.00% -15.85%
75th Percentile £60.00 £54.69 £70.00
90th Percentile £67.50 £66.10 £81.78
England median hourly rate £55.00 £59.88 £65.00
% change year-on-year -8.14% -7.88% +4.00%

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 5,413 2,760 5,114
% of contract IT jobs with a recognized job title 91.84% 91.82% 92.26%
Number of daily rates quoted 3,378 1,830 3,094
10th Percentile £300 £247 £213
25th Percentile £413 £399 £400
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £514 £500 £500
Median % change year-on-year +2.80% - -
75th Percentile £613 £600 £618
90th Percentile £706 £666 £688
England median daily rate £513 £525 £525
% change year-on-year -2.38% - -4.55%
Number of hourly rates quoted 508 165 481
10th Percentile £15.20 £14.20 £12.78
25th Percentile £24.87 £20.12 £18.32
Median hourly rate £55.00 £32.50 £47.50
Median % change year-on-year +69.23% -31.58% -0.61%
75th Percentile £82.06 £63.75 £62.50
90th Percentile £88.00 £75.00 £77.50
England median hourly rate £47.00 £31.35 £36.50
% change year-on-year +49.94% -14.12% -17.64%

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 7 May 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 7 May 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 7 May 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 -9 162 £513 +2.50% 81
Hampshire -1 113 £500 +10.50% 34
Berkshire -23 86 £475 -6.63% 36
Buckinghamshire +3 75 £525 +10.53% 22
Surrey +1 43 £509 +7.11% 38
West Sussex -3 29 £475 +29.25% 19
East Sussex +2 13 £525 -4.55% 17
Sussex - 13 £475 - 7
Kent -4 8 - - 30
Middlesex - 2 £552 - 6
Oxfordshire -26 1 £301 -3.84% 23
Home Counties - 1 - - 1
Developer
England

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

For the 6 months to 7 May 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.

1 157 (40.99%) Security Cleared
2 140 (36.55%) SC Cleared
3 90 (23.50%) Java
4 85 (22.19%) CI/CD
5 76 (19.84%) Azure
6 73 (19.06%) Agile
7 72 (18.80%) SQL
8 64 (16.71%) Python
9 63 (16.45%) .NET
10 61 (15.93%) Oracle
11 53 (13.84%) DevOps
11 53 (13.84%) Software Engineering
12 51 (13.32%) Git
13 50 (13.05%) AWS
13 50 (13.05%) C#
14 48 (12.53%) JavaScript
15 46 (12.01%) Microservices
16 45 (11.75%) Full-Stack Development
17 41 (10.70%) Problem-Solving
17 41 (10.70%) React
18 40 (10.44%) REST
19 38 (9.92%) Kubernetes
20 37 (9.66%) PostgreSQL
21 36 (9.40%) Data Modelling
22 34 (8.88%) Analytics
22 34 (8.88%) RESTful
23 33 (8.62%) Business Intelligence
23 33 (8.62%) Performance Tuning
23 33 (8.62%) Spring
23 33 (8.62%) Test Automation

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 13 (3.39%) Oracle Application Server
2 8 (2.09%) Apache Spark
3 7 (1.83%) SharePoint
4 5 (1.31%) CMS
4 5 (1.31%) Confluence
5 4 (1.04%) IIS
6 3 (0.78%) Apache
6 3 (0.78%) ArcGIS
6 3 (0.78%) Umbraco
7 2 (0.52%) WordPress
8 1 (0.26%) Appian
8 1 (0.26%) BizTalk Server
8 1 (0.26%) JBoss
8 1 (0.26%) Kentico
8 1 (0.26%) OpenStack
8 1 (0.26%) Oracle SOA Suite
8 1 (0.26%) Tomcat
8 1 (0.26%) WebLogic
Applications
1 5 (1.31%) CPLEX
2 3 (0.78%) Microsoft Office
3 2 (0.52%) Oracle Smart View
4 1 (0.26%) Spreadsheet
Business Applications
1 10 (2.61%) Oracle ERP
2 5 (1.31%) Oracle 11i
2 5 (1.31%) Oracle EBS R12
3 3 (0.78%) Payment Gateway
4 2 (0.52%) Dynamics CRM
4 2 (0.52%) SAP HR
4 2 (0.52%) SAP PSCD
5 1 (0.26%) Maximo
5 1 (0.26%) Oracle EBS
5 1 (0.26%) Siebel CRM
Cloud Services
1 76 (19.84%) Azure
2 50 (13.05%) AWS
3 29 (7.57%) Azure DevOps
4 22 (5.74%) GitHub
5 21 (5.48%) Power Platform
6 19 (4.96%) GCP
6 19 (4.96%) OpenShift
7 16 (4.18%) Serverless
8 13 (3.39%) Dynamics 365
9 12 (3.13%) GitHub Actions
10 10 (2.61%) Amazon S3
10 10 (2.61%) AWS Lambda
11 7 (1.83%) Azure Functions
11 7 (1.83%) Azure Service Bus
11 7 (1.83%) OCI
11 7 (1.83%) Power Automate
12 6 (1.57%) Azure Key Vault
12 6 (1.57%) Oracle CX
12 6 (1.57%) PowerApps
12 6 (1.57%) Snowflake
Communications & Networking
1 2 (0.52%) Firewall
1 2 (0.52%) HTTPS
1 2 (0.52%) Software-Defined Radio
1 2 (0.52%) Tactical Data Link
1 2 (0.52%) Wireless
2 1 (0.26%) BGP
2 1 (0.26%) Bluetooth
2 1 (0.26%) HTTP
2 1 (0.26%) IPsec
2 1 (0.26%) Kerberos
2 1 (0.26%) LAN
2 1 (0.26%) MPLS
2 1 (0.26%) SAN
2 1 (0.26%) TCP/IP
2 1 (0.26%) WAN
Database & Business Intelligence
1 37 (9.66%) PostgreSQL
2 30 (7.83%) Oracle Reports
3 27 (7.05%) Data Warehouse
4 22 (5.74%) SQL Server
5 20 (5.22%) NoSQL
6 19 (4.96%) Relational Database
7 18 (4.70%) Oracle ODI
8 16 (4.18%) Oracle BI Publisher
9 14 (3.66%) MongoDB
10 13 (3.39%) Power BI
11 7 (1.83%) Azure SQL Database
11 7 (1.83%) Big Data
11 7 (1.83%) DynamoDB
11 7 (1.83%) MySQL
12 4 (1.04%) Oracle Database
12 4 (1.04%) SQL Server Integration Services
13 3 (0.78%) GIS
13 3 (0.78%) HBase
13 3 (0.78%) RDBMS
14 2 (0.52%) Star Schema
Development Applications
1 51 (13.32%) Git
2 20 (5.22%) Jenkins
3 17 (4.44%) Gradle
4 14 (3.66%) JUnit
5 12 (3.13%) Maven
6 10 (2.61%) Bitbucket
6 10 (2.61%) Visual Studio
7 8 (2.09%) Cucumber
8 7 (1.83%) Android Studio
8 7 (1.83%) JIRA
8 7 (1.83%) SonarQube
8 7 (1.83%) Sonatype Nexus
8 7 (1.83%) Subversion
9 6 (1.57%) GitLab
9 6 (1.57%) JMeter
10 4 (1.04%) Eclipse
10 4 (1.04%) Selenium
11 3 (0.78%) Artifactory
11 3 (0.78%) CircleCI
11 3 (0.78%) Postman
General
1 48 (12.53%) Social Skills
2 41 (10.70%) Finance
3 28 (7.31%) Public Sector
4 18 (4.70%) Analytical Skills
5 9 (2.35%) Aerospace
6 7 (1.83%) Telecoms
7 6 (1.57%) Automotive
8 4 (1.04%) Billing
8 4 (1.04%) Inclusion and Diversity
8 4 (1.04%) Law
8 4 (1.04%) Manufacturing
9 3 (0.78%) Aviation
10 2 (0.52%) Banking
10 2 (0.52%) Presentation Skills
11 1 (0.26%) Advertising
11 1 (0.26%) Documentation Skills
11 1 (0.26%) Electronics
11 1 (0.26%) Legal
11 1 (0.26%) Marketing
11 1 (0.26%) Organisational Skills
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 63 (16.45%) .NET
2 41 (10.70%) React
3 40 (10.44%) REST
4 34 (8.88%) RESTful
5 33 (8.62%) Spring
6 31 (8.09%) Kafka
7 24 (6.27%) Spring Boot
8 19 (4.96%) CSS
9 18 (4.70%) AngularJS
10 17 (4.44%) JSON
11 16 (4.18%) SOAP
12 14 (3.66%) .NET Framework
13 13 (3.39%) HTML
14 12 (3.13%) Node.js
14 12 (3.13%) OAuth
15 11 (2.87%) Entity Framework
16 10 (2.61%) Web Services
17 9 (2.35%) .NET Core
17 9 (2.35%) Oracle Fusion
18 8 (2.09%) Flask
Miscellaneous
1 18 (4.70%) Distributed Systems
2 16 (4.18%) Data Structures
3 13 (3.39%) Algorithms
3 13 (3.39%) Mobile App
4 10 (2.61%) Cloud Native
5 9 (2.35%) Product Ownership
6 8 (2.09%) Data Centre
7 6 (1.57%) Legacy Systems
8 5 (1.31%) Distributed Architecture
9 4 (1.04%) CMDB
9 4 (1.04%) Enterprise Software
9 4 (1.04%) Virtual Team
10 3 (0.78%) AI Agents
10 3 (0.78%) Client/Server
10 3 (0.78%) Legacy Code
11 2 (0.52%) Device Driver
11 2 (0.52%) Management Information System
11 2 (0.52%) MicroBlaze
11 2 (0.52%) Onboarding
11 2 (0.52%) RISC-V
Operating Systems
1 22 (5.74%) Android
2 17 (4.44%) Linux
3 10 (2.61%) Windows
4 7 (1.83%) Apple iOS
5 5 (1.31%) Unix
6 2 (0.52%) Embedded Linux
7 1 (0.26%) Debian
7 1 (0.26%) Ubuntu
Processes & Methodologies
1 85 (22.19%) CI/CD
2 73 (19.06%) Agile
3 53 (13.84%) DevOps
3 53 (13.84%) Software Engineering
4 46 (12.01%) Microservices
5 45 (11.75%) Full-Stack Development
6 41 (10.70%) Problem-Solving
7 36 (9.40%) Data Modelling
8 34 (8.88%) Analytics
9 33 (8.62%) Business Intelligence
9 33 (8.62%) Performance Tuning
9 33 (8.62%) Test Automation
9 33 (8.62%) Unit Testing
10 30 (7.83%) Containerisation
10 30 (7.83%) ETL
10 30 (7.83%) Scrum
11 25 (6.53%) Front End Development
12 20 (5.22%) Android Development
12 20 (5.22%) Workflow
13 19 (4.96%) AI
Programming Languages
1 90 (23.50%) Java
2 72 (18.80%) SQL
3 64 (16.71%) Python
4 50 (13.05%) C#
5 48 (12.53%) JavaScript
6 21 (5.48%) Go
7 18 (4.70%) TypeScript
8 12 (3.13%) Kotlin
9 11 (2.87%) C++
10 8 (2.09%) PL/SQL
11 7 (1.83%) C
12 5 (1.31%) Data Analysis Expressions
12 5 (1.31%) PHP
12 5 (1.31%) PowerShell
13 4 (1.04%) Swift
14 3 (0.78%) ABAP
14 3 (0.78%) Bash
14 3 (0.78%) X++
15 2 (0.52%) Objective-C
15 2 (0.52%) T-SQL
Qualifications
1 157 (40.99%) Security Cleared
2 140 (36.55%) SC Cleared
3 14 (3.66%) DV Cleared
4 9 (2.35%) Degree
5 8 (2.09%) Computer Science Degree
6 4 (1.04%) BPSS Clearance
6 4 (1.04%) OCP
6 4 (1.04%) Oracle Certification
7 2 (0.52%) Azure Certification
8 1 (0.26%) AWS Certification
8 1 (0.26%) AWS Certified Developer
8 1 (0.26%) DBS Check
8 1 (0.26%) Microsoft Certification
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 15 (3.92%) QA
2 7 (1.83%) Accessibility
3 3 (0.78%) GDPR
3 3 (0.78%) WCAG
4 2 (0.52%) COBIT
4 2 (0.52%) Data Quality
4 2 (0.52%) ISO/IEC 27001
4 2 (0.52%) NIST
5 1 (0.26%) GRC
System Software
1 30 (7.83%) Docker
2 5 (1.31%) Active Directory
3 3 (0.78%) VMware Infrastructure
4 2 (0.52%) Embedded Firmware
4 2 (0.52%) Firmware
4 2 (0.52%) Virtual Machines
Systems Management
1 38 (9.92%) Kubernetes
2 11 (2.87%) Terraform
3 7 (1.83%) Ansible
3 7 (1.83%) Argo
4 4 (1.04%) Progress Chef
5 3 (0.78%) Single Sign-On
5 3 (0.78%) Systems Management Server (SMS)
6 2 (0.52%) Grafana
7 1 (0.26%) Podman
7 1 (0.26%) Prometheus
Vendors
1 61 (15.93%) Oracle
2 32 (8.36%) Microsoft
3 19 (4.96%) ServiceNow
4 8 (2.09%) Salesforce
5 7 (1.83%) Atlassian
5 7 (1.83%) Red Hat
6 6 (1.57%) Google
6 6 (1.57%) Siebel
7 5 (1.31%) Blue Prism
7 5 (1.31%) SAP
7 5 (1.31%) Splunk
7 5 (1.31%) VMware
8 4 (1.04%) Ab Initio
8 4 (1.04%) Databricks
8 4 (1.04%) Teradata
9 3 (0.78%) Coverity
9 3 (0.78%) ESRI
9 3 (0.78%) Thales
10 2 (0.52%) Adobe
10 2 (0.52%) Dynatrace