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 31 August 2026.

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

6 months to
31 Aug 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 26 20 12
Rank change year-on-year -6 -8 +2
Contract jobs requiring a Developer 448 270 438
As % of all contract jobs in the South East 6.76% 7.61% 9.25%
As % of the Job Titles category 7.37% 8.43% 10.02%
Number of daily rates quoted 285 181 316
10th Percentile £310 £315 £351
25th Percentile £413 £387 £400
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £513 £490 £500
Median % change year-on-year +4.59% -2.00% -
75th Percentile £600 £569 £600
90th Percentile £675 £625 £650
England median daily rate £520 £507 £525
% change year-on-year +2.51% -3.38% -4.55%
Number of hourly rates quoted 56 33 8
10th Percentile £32.06 £32.94 £30.88
25th Percentile £38.25 £37.80 £49.89
Median hourly rate £55.00 £55.00 £65.00
Median % change year-on-year - -15.38% +10.94%
75th Percentile £61.88 £57.50 -
90th Percentile £70.00 - £71.75
England median hourly rate £55.00 £55.00 £65.00
% change year-on-year - -15.38% +8.62%

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 6,081 3,204 4,373
% of contract IT jobs with a recognized job title 91.72% 90.33% 92.39%
Number of daily rates quoted 3,543 2,059 2,632
10th Percentile £303 £205 £252
25th Percentile £425 £375 £400
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £525 £500 £513
Median % change year-on-year +5.00% -2.44% +2.50%
75th Percentile £625 £600 £630
90th Percentile £720 £663 £688
England median daily rate £525 £508 £525
% change year-on-year +3.45% -3.33% -4.55%
Number of hourly rates quoted 758 286 351
10th Percentile £15.50 £13.75 £16.25
25th Percentile £23.88 £15.50 £30.00
Median hourly rate £52.43 £25.15 £57.35
Median % change year-on-year +108.45% -56.15% +14.70%
75th Percentile £70.00 £57.50 £75.00
90th Percentile £85.65 £71.50 £80.00
England median hourly rate £42.50 £25.15 £45.00
% change year-on-year +68.99% -44.11% +4.65%

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 31 August 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 31 August 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 31 August 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
Hampshire +9 163 £525 +7.14% 32
Thames Valley -29 135 £475 -5.09% 61
Surrey -2 82 £513 -6.82% 26
Berkshire -29 73 £460 -14.81% 43
Buckinghamshire -12 55 £525 +16.67% 6
West Sussex +3 36 £425 +47.57% 11
East Sussex +1 10 £525 +44.83% 15
Kent +3 8 £450 +28.57% 20
Oxfordshire -20 7 £425 - 12
Sussex - 7 £600 - 2
Middlesex -19 1 - - 4
Developer
England

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

For the 6 months to 31 August 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.

1 189 (42.19%) Security Cleared
2 149 (33.26%) SC Cleared
3 91 (20.31%) Agile
4 87 (19.42%) SQL
5 85 (18.97%) Oracle
6 80 (17.86%) Azure
7 68 (15.18%) CI/CD
8 66 (14.73%) .NET
8 66 (14.73%) DevOps
9 59 (13.17%) Java
10 58 (12.95%) DV Cleared
11 54 (12.05%) Software Engineering
12 53 (11.83%) C#
13 51 (11.38%) Analytics
13 51 (11.38%) Data Warehouse
13 51 (11.38%) JavaScript
13 51 (11.38%) REST
14 48 (10.71%) Python
15 47 (10.49%) ETL
16 46 (10.27%) Full-Stack Development
16 46 (10.27%) Microsoft
17 44 (9.82%) RESTful
17 44 (9.82%) ServiceNow
18 43 (9.60%) Data Modelling
18 43 (9.60%) Git
19 42 (9.38%) Scrum
20 40 (8.93%) Azure DevOps
20 40 (8.93%) Kubernetes
20 40 (8.93%) Problem-Solving
21 36 (8.04%) Microservices

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 22 (4.91%) Oracle Application Server
2 9 (2.01%) Confluence
3 6 (1.34%) Oracle Workflow
4 5 (1.12%) Apache Spark
4 5 (1.12%) CMS
4 5 (1.12%) Documentum
5 4 (0.89%) SharePoint
5 4 (0.89%) Umbraco
6 2 (0.45%) IIS
6 2 (0.45%) SAS
7 1 (0.22%) Apache
7 1 (0.22%) Kentico
7 1 (0.22%) OpenStack
7 1 (0.22%) WordPress
Applications
1 8 (1.79%) CPLEX
2 2 (0.45%) Microsoft Excel
3 1 (0.22%) Chatbot
3 1 (0.22%) Oracle Smart View
3 1 (0.22%) Spreadsheet
Business Applications
1 15 (3.35%) Siebel CRM
2 8 (1.79%) Oracle ERP
3 3 (0.67%) Oracle 11i
3 3 (0.67%) Oracle EBS R12
4 2 (0.45%) ProductWriter
5 1 (0.22%) Oracle EBS
5 1 (0.22%) SAP HR
5 1 (0.22%) SAP PSCD
Cloud Services
1 80 (17.86%) Azure
2 40 (8.93%) Azure DevOps
3 35 (7.81%) AWS
4 32 (7.14%) Power Platform
5 21 (4.69%) Power Automate
6 19 (4.24%) Dynamics 365
7 18 (4.02%) Serverless
8 17 (3.79%) GCP
8 17 (3.79%) GitHub
8 17 (3.79%) OpenShift
9 16 (3.57%) PowerApps
10 14 (3.13%) OCI
11 12 (2.68%) Azure Functions
12 11 (2.46%) Azure Logic Apps
12 11 (2.46%) GitHub Actions
13 8 (1.79%) Azure Monitor
13 8 (1.79%) SaaS
14 7 (1.56%) Amazon S3
15 6 (1.34%) Entra ID
15 6 (1.34%) Microsoft 365
Communications & Networking
1 12 (2.68%) BGP
1 12 (2.68%) IPsec
1 12 (2.68%) LAN
1 12 (2.68%) MPLS
1 12 (2.68%) WAN
2 5 (1.12%) HTTPS
3 2 (0.45%) Firewall
3 2 (0.45%) Software-Defined Radio
3 2 (0.45%) Wireless
4 1 (0.22%) Broadband
4 1 (0.22%) Network Security
Database & Business Intelligence
1 51 (11.38%) Data Warehouse
2 30 (6.70%) Oracle ODI
3 28 (6.25%) Oracle Reports
4 25 (5.58%) PostgreSQL
5 23 (5.13%) SQL Server
6 22 (4.91%) NoSQL
7 21 (4.69%) Power BI
8 15 (3.35%) Relational Database
9 11 (2.46%) Siebel EIM
10 10 (2.23%) MongoDB
11 6 (1.34%) DataStage
11 6 (1.34%) Oracle Database
12 5 (1.12%) Azure SQL Database
12 5 (1.12%) Big Data
12 5 (1.12%) DynamoDB
12 5 (1.12%) MySQL
13 4 (0.89%) DocumentDB
13 4 (0.89%) GIS
13 4 (0.89%) Oracle BI Publisher
14 3 (0.67%) SQL Server Integration Services
Development Applications
1 43 (9.60%) Git
2 18 (4.02%) JIRA
3 13 (2.90%) Jenkins
4 12 (2.68%) SonarQube
5 7 (1.56%) GitLab
6 5 (1.12%) JUnit
6 5 (1.12%) Visual Studio
7 4 (0.89%) Bitbucket
7 4 (0.89%) Gradle
7 4 (0.89%) Maven
7 4 (0.89%) NUnit
8 3 (0.67%) Postman
9 2 (0.45%) fastlane
9 2 (0.45%) Mockito
9 2 (0.45%) Subversion
9 2 (0.45%) Team Foundation Server
10 1 (0.22%) Atlassian Bamboo
10 1 (0.22%) Eclipse
10 1 (0.22%) Oracle APEX
10 1 (0.22%) Oracle Forms
General
1 34 (7.59%) Finance
2 33 (7.37%) Social Skills
3 26 (5.80%) Aerospace
4 25 (5.58%) Public Sector
5 18 (4.02%) Manufacturing
6 16 (3.57%) Analytical Skills
7 9 (2.01%) Law
7 9 (2.01%) Local Government
7 9 (2.01%) Telecoms
8 7 (1.56%) Automotive
8 7 (1.56%) Billing
9 5 (1.12%) Inclusion and Diversity
9 5 (1.12%) Legal
10 4 (0.89%) Banking
10 4 (0.89%) Police
11 3 (0.67%) Aviation
11 3 (0.67%) Publishing
12 2 (0.45%) Presentation Skills
12 2 (0.45%) Retail
13 1 (0.22%) Marketing
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 66 (14.73%) .NET
2 51 (11.38%) REST
3 44 (9.82%) RESTful
4 32 (7.14%) React
5 29 (6.47%) AngularJS
6 24 (5.36%) Kafka
7 22 (4.91%) .NET Framework
7 22 (4.91%) JSON
8 18 (4.02%) .NET Core
8 18 (4.02%) Spring
9 17 (3.79%) Terraform
10 16 (3.57%) Entity Framework
10 16 (3.57%) SOAP
11 15 (3.35%) CSS
11 15 (3.35%) OAuth
12 14 (3.13%) ASP.NET
12 14 (3.13%) Spring Boot
13 13 (2.90%) HTML
14 12 (2.68%) Swagger
14 12 (2.68%) Web Services
Miscellaneous
1 18 (4.02%) Data Structures
2 17 (3.79%) Product Ownership
3 16 (3.57%) Algorithms
4 15 (3.35%) Cloud Native
4 15 (3.35%) Distributed Systems
4 15 (3.35%) Enterprise Software
5 8 (1.79%) Mobile App
6 7 (1.56%) Legacy Systems
7 5 (1.12%) Onboarding
8 4 (0.89%) AI Agents
9 3 (0.67%) Data Protection Act
9 3 (0.67%) FMCG
10 2 (0.45%) CMDB
10 2 (0.45%) Data Centre
10 2 (0.45%) Device Driver
10 2 (0.45%) Distributed Architecture
10 2 (0.45%) Embedded Systems
10 2 (0.45%) MicroBlaze
10 2 (0.45%) RISC-V
10 2 (0.45%) Virtual Team
Operating Systems
1 16 (3.57%) Linux
2 13 (2.90%) Unix
3 9 (2.01%) Windows
4 6 (1.34%) Android
5 4 (0.89%) Apple iOS
6 2 (0.45%) Embedded Linux
Processes & Methodologies
1 91 (20.31%) Agile
2 68 (15.18%) CI/CD
3 66 (14.73%) DevOps
4 54 (12.05%) Software Engineering
5 51 (11.38%) Analytics
6 47 (10.49%) ETL
7 46 (10.27%) Full-Stack Development
8 43 (9.60%) Data Modelling
9 42 (9.38%) Scrum
10 40 (8.93%) Problem-Solving
11 36 (8.04%) Microservices
12 35 (7.81%) Performance Tuning
13 34 (7.59%) Business Intelligence
13 34 (7.59%) Test Automation
14 32 (7.14%) Unit Testing
15 27 (6.03%) CRM
16 26 (5.80%) Workflow
17 23 (5.13%) Containerisation
18 22 (4.91%) Front End Development
18 22 (4.91%) TDD
Programming Languages
1 87 (19.42%) SQL
2 59 (13.17%) Java
3 53 (11.83%) C#
4 51 (11.38%) JavaScript
5 48 (10.71%) Python
6 24 (5.36%) TypeScript
7 16 (3.57%) PL/SQL
8 10 (2.23%) Go
9 9 (2.01%) Data Analysis Expressions
9 9 (2.01%) X++
10 8 (1.79%) C
11 6 (1.34%) PowerShell
12 5 (1.12%) Apex Code
12 5 (1.12%) C++
13 4 (0.89%) Bash
13 4 (0.89%) Kotlin
13 4 (0.89%) Shell Script
14 3 (0.67%) Bicep
14 3 (0.67%) VB
15 2 (0.45%) PHP
Qualifications
1 189 (42.19%) Security Cleared
2 149 (33.26%) SC Cleared
3 58 (12.95%) DV Cleared
4 11 (2.46%) Degree
5 6 (1.34%) Computer Science Degree
5 6 (1.34%) Microsoft Certification
6 4 (0.89%) Azure Certification
7 2 (0.45%) BPSS Clearance
8 1 (0.22%) DBS Check
8 1 (0.22%) ITIL Foundation Certificate
8 1 (0.22%) Master's Degree
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 32 (7.14%) QA
2 11 (2.46%) Data Quality
3 4 (0.89%) GDPR
3 4 (0.89%) WCAG
4 3 (0.67%) Accessibility
5 1 (0.22%) GRC
System Software
1 27 (6.03%) Docker
2 10 (2.23%) Active Directory
3 2 (0.45%) Embedded Firmware
3 2 (0.45%) Firmware
3 2 (0.45%) Virtual Machines
Systems Management
1 40 (8.93%) Kubernetes
2 12 (2.68%) Argo
3 1 (0.22%) Ansible
3 1 (0.22%) Grafana
3 1 (0.22%) Podman
3 1 (0.22%) Prometheus
3 1 (0.22%) Single Sign-On
Vendors
1 85 (18.97%) Oracle
2 46 (10.27%) Microsoft
3 44 (9.82%) ServiceNow
4 28 (6.25%) Siebel
5 16 (3.57%) Salesforce
6 11 (2.46%) Red Hat
7 8 (1.79%) Google
7 8 (1.79%) SAP
8 6 (1.34%) IBM
9 5 (1.12%) MuleSoft
10 4 (0.89%) ESRI
11 3 (0.67%) Splunk
12 2 (0.45%) Ab Initio
12 2 (0.45%) Atlassian
12 2 (0.45%) Blue Prism
12 2 (0.45%) Dynatrace
12 2 (0.45%) HP
12 2 (0.45%) Talend
12 2 (0.45%) Teradata
12 2 (0.45%) Virgin Media