Public Cloud Contract Job Trends in the South East

Public Cloud
England > South East

The table below looks at the prevalence of the term Public Cloud in contract job vacancies in the South East. Included is a benchmarking guide to the contractor rates offered in vacancies that cited Public Cloud over the 6 months leading up to 4 April 2026, comparing them to the same period in the previous two years.

6 months to
4 Apr 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 156 116 182
Rank change year-on-year -40 +66 -4
Contract jobs citing Public Cloud 48 39 25
As % of all contract jobs in the South East 0.86% 1.31% 0.44%
As % of the Miscellaneous category 2.87% 3.83% 1.53%
Number of daily rates quoted 36 32 21
10th Percentile £400 £526 £325
25th Percentile £510 £538 £468
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £557 £600 £575
Median % change year-on-year -7.21% +4.35% +16.16%
75th Percentile £641 £675 £643
90th Percentile £725 £743 £688
England median daily rate £557 £613 £600
% change year-on-year -9.21% +2.21% -4.00%
Number of hourly rates quoted 0 1 1
10th Percentile - - -
25th Percentile - - £36.75
Median hourly rate - £70.00 £38.50
Median % change year-on-year - +81.82% -
75th Percentile - - £40.25
90th Percentile - - -
England median hourly rate £72.50 £70.00 £38.50
% change year-on-year +3.57% +81.82% -50.64%

All Generic Skills
South East

Public Cloud falls under the General and Transferable Skills category. For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all contract job vacancies requiring generic IT skills in the South East.

Contract vacancies with a requirement for generic IT skills 1,673 1,019 1,638
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the South East 30.08% 34.15% 29.06%
Number of daily rates quoted 1,116 636 942
10th Percentile £253 £218 £205
25th Percentile £400 £372 £360
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £516 £500
Median % change year-on-year -3.15% +3.25% -2.91%
75th Percentile £600 £613 £608
90th Percentile £700 £663 £688
England median daily rate £513 £545 £550
% change year-on-year -5.96% -0.91% -4.35%
Number of hourly rates quoted 122 60 151
10th Percentile £15.62 £16.95 £11.79
25th Percentile £20.79 £23.50 £18.65
Median hourly rate £68.75 £33.75 £41.50
Median % change year-on-year +103.70% -18.67% -13.16%
75th Percentile £88.00 £62.62 £61.30
90th Percentile - £79.07 £63.29
England median hourly rate £45.46 £34.25 £28.00
% change year-on-year +32.73% +22.32% +24.44%

Public Cloud
Job Vacancy Trend in the South East

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

Public Cloud job vacancy trend in the South East

Public Cloud
Daily Rate Trend in the South East

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

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

Public Cloud
Daily Rate Histogram in the South East

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing Public Cloud in the South East over the 6 months to 4 April 2026.

Daily rate histogram for Public Cloud in the South East

Public Cloud
Hourly Rate Trend in the South East

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

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

Public Cloud
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 Public Cloud within the South East region over the 6 months to 4 April 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
Buckinghamshire -14 21 £600 -8.05% 3
Thames Valley -36 21 £600 -4.76% 7
Surrey +5 19 £400 +14.29% 6
Hampshire -46 4 £525 -10.64% 2
Public Cloud
England

Public Cloud
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 4 (8.33%) Apache Airflow
Applications
1 2 (4.17%) Microsoft Project
Business Applications
1 1 (2.08%) SAP ERP
1 1 (2.08%) SAP S/4HANA
Cloud Services
1 45 (93.75%) Azure
2 28 (58.33%) AWS
3 15 (31.25%) GCP
4 5 (10.42%) SaaS
5 4 (8.33%) dbt
6 3 (6.25%) Microsoft 365
7 2 (4.17%) AWS CloudFormation
7 2 (4.17%) Azure DevOps
7 2 (4.17%) IaaS
7 2 (4.17%) OpenShift
7 2 (4.17%) PaaS
8 1 (2.08%) AWS Direct Connect
8 1 (2.08%) Azure ExpressRoute
Communications & Networking
1 13 (27.08%) VPN
2 12 (25.00%) DNS
3 10 (20.83%) LAN
3 10 (20.83%) WAN
4 6 (12.50%) Firewall
5 3 (6.25%) VSAN
5 3 (6.25%) Wireless
6 1 (2.08%) MPLS
6 1 (2.08%) Network Security
6 1 (2.08%) SD-WAN
Database & Business Intelligence
1 4 (8.33%) BigQuery
General
1 8 (16.67%) Finance
2 6 (12.50%) Financial Institution
3 3 (6.25%) Public Sector
4 1 (2.08%) Analytical Skills
4 1 (2.08%) Manufacturing
4 1 (2.08%) Social Skills
Job Titles
1 29 (60.42%) Architect
2 18 (37.50%) Technical Architect
3 10 (20.83%) Infrastructure Architect
4 7 (14.58%) Cloud Engineer
5 6 (12.50%) Senior
6 4 (8.33%) Azure Engineer
6 4 (8.33%) Machine Learning Engineer
6 4 (8.33%) Python Engineer
6 4 (8.33%) Senior Architect
6 4 (8.33%) Senior Technical Architect
7 3 (6.25%) Infrastructure Engineer
7 3 (6.25%) Linux Engineer
7 3 (6.25%) Network Architect
8 2 (4.17%) Azure DevOps Engineer
8 2 (4.17%) Cloud Infrastructure Engineer
8 2 (4.17%) Network Technical Architect
8 2 (4.17%) Project Manager
8 2 (4.17%) SC Cleared Project Manager
8 2 (4.17%) Senior Manager
8 2 (4.17%) Senior Project Manager
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 8 (16.67%) Middleware
2 4 (8.33%) NumPy
2 4 (8.33%) Pandas
Miscellaneous
1 11 (22.92%) Cloud Native
2 4 (8.33%) Hybrid Cloud
2 4 (8.33%) PKI
3 2 (4.17%) Legacy Systems
3 2 (4.17%) Private Cloud
3 2 (4.17%) Virtual Team
4 1 (2.08%) Data Centre
4 1 (2.08%) Distributed Denial-of-Service
Operating Systems
1 14 (29.17%) Linux
2 9 (18.75%) Windows
3 2 (4.17%) Ubuntu
4 1 (2.08%) CentOS
4 1 (2.08%) Debian
Processes & Methodologies
1 12 (25.00%) Agile
1 12 (25.00%) Infrastructure as Code
1 12 (25.00%) IT Strategy
2 11 (22.92%) CI/CD
2 11 (22.92%) Migration
3 10 (20.83%) DevOps
3 10 (20.83%) DevSecOps
4 8 (16.67%) API Management
4 8 (16.67%) Matrix Organization
4 8 (16.67%) Technology Strategy
5 7 (14.58%) Microservices
5 7 (14.58%) TOGAF
6 6 (12.50%) Architectural Patterns
6 6 (12.50%) Containerisation
6 6 (12.50%) Stakeholder Management
7 5 (10.42%) Identity Access Management
7 5 (10.42%) Requirements Management
8 4 (8.33%) Continuous Delivery
8 4 (8.33%) Digital Transformation Programme
8 4 (8.33%) Virtual Environments
Programming Languages
1 5 (10.42%) Python
2 3 (6.25%) Bicep
2 3 (6.25%) PowerShell
Qualifications
1 23 (47.92%) Security Cleared
2 22 (45.83%) SC Cleared
3 10 (20.83%) DV Cleared
4 5 (10.42%) CCNP
4 5 (10.42%) Cisco Certification
5 4 (8.33%) MCSE
5 4 (8.33%) Microsoft Certification
6 3 (6.25%) Degree
7 1 (2.08%) TOGAF Certification
7 1 (2.08%) VMware Certified Professional (VCP)
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 12 (25.00%) NCSC
2 9 (18.75%) NIST
3 5 (10.42%) Cyber Essentials
System Software
1 13 (27.08%) VMware Infrastructure
2 10 (20.83%) Hyper-V
3 6 (12.50%) VMware NSX
4 2 (4.17%) Docker
4 2 (4.17%) VMware ESXi
Systems Management
1 6 (12.50%) Terraform
2 5 (10.42%) Ansible
3 4 (8.33%) Kubeflow
4 2 (4.17%) Kubernetes
Vendors
1 21 (43.75%) VMware
2 9 (18.75%) Microsoft
3 8 (16.67%) MuleSoft
4 4 (8.33%) Google
5 3 (6.25%) Cisco
5 3 (6.25%) Palo Alto
6 2 (4.17%) Red Hat
7 1 (2.08%) Citrix
7 1 (2.08%) SAP