Software Engineering Contract Job Trends in the South East

Software Engineering
England > South East

The table below provides summary statistics and contractor rates for jobs advertised in the South East requiring Software Engineering skills. It covers contract job vacancies from the 6 months leading up to 19 July 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
19 Jul 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 42 65 41
Rank change year-on-year +23 -24 +24
Contract jobs citing Software Engineering 309 108 230
As % of all contract jobs in the South East 4.70% 3.15% 4.18%
As % of the Processes & Methodologies category 5.79% 3.50% 5.05%
Number of daily rates quoted 134 65 128
10th Percentile £280 £328 £400
25th Percentile £400 £434 £425
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £525 £501 £500
Median % change year-on-year +4.90% +0.10% -4.31%
75th Percentile £638 £600 £632
90th Percentile £711 £608 £688
England median daily rate £550 £600 £615
% change year-on-year -8.33% -2.44% +2.50%
Number of hourly rates quoted 86 11 60
10th Percentile £47.00 £44.51 £46.13
25th Percentile £48.64 £45.38 £54.84
Median hourly rate £60.00 £52.50 £70.00
Median % change year-on-year +14.29% -25.00% +21.74%
75th Percentile £68.75 £63.51 £75.00
90th Percentile £70.00 £64.52 £77.75
England median hourly rate £65.00 £65.00 £65.00

All Process & Methodology Skills
South East

Software Engineering falls under the Processes and Methodologies category. For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all contract job vacancies requiring process or methodology skills in the South East.

Contract vacancies with a requirement for process or methodology skills 5,336 3,083 4,556
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the South East 81.24% 90.04% 82.78%
Number of daily rates quoted 3,368 1,920 2,684
10th Percentile £280 £250 £263
25th Percentile £413 £400 £406
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £525 £500 £513
Median % change year-on-year +5.00% -2.44% -0.49%
75th Percentile £610 £600 £638
90th Percentile £700 £666 £700
England median daily rate £525 £513 £525
% change year-on-year +2.44% -2.38% -4.55%
Number of hourly rates quoted 530 268 405
10th Percentile £15.72 £13.50 £13.00
25th Percentile £25.06 £15.13 £18.35
Median hourly rate £55.00 £22.29 £54.36
Median % change year-on-year +146.80% -59.00% +8.72%
75th Percentile £82.25 £53.56 £70.00
90th Percentile £88.00 £75.00 £78.75
England median hourly rate £47.00 £25.15 £38.50
% change year-on-year +86.88% -34.68% -9.41%

Software Engineering
Job Vacancy Trend in the South East

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

Software Engineering job vacancy trend in the South East

Software Engineering
Daily Rate Trend in the South East

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in the South East citing Software Engineering.

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in the South East citing Software Engineering

Software Engineering
Daily Rate Histogram in the South East

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing Software Engineering in the South East over the 6 months to 19 July 2026.

Daily rate histogram for Software Engineering in the South East

Software Engineering
Hourly Rate Trend in the South East

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in the South East citing Software Engineering.

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in the South East citing Software Engineering

Software Engineering
Hourly Rate Histogram in the South East

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing Software Engineering in the South East over the 6 months to 19 July 2026.

Hourly rate histogram for Software Engineering in the South East

Software Engineering
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 Software Engineering within the South East region over the 6 months to 19 July 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 +27 137 £546 +6.59% 80
Thames Valley -9 75 £525 +4.95% 76
Surrey +10 51 £525 +10.53% 22
Berkshire -18 40 £510 +1.90% 27
West Sussex -8 23 £280 -2.78% 10
Buckinghamshire -10 22 £361 -37.17% 19
Oxfordshire -13 13 £688 +59.42% 30
East Sussex - 11 £525 - 3
Kent +4 6 £550 +15.79% 3
Sussex - 3 £323 - 6
Middlesex -11 1 £470 -25.98% 3
Home Counties - 1 - -
Software Engineering
England

Software Engineering
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 2 (0.65%) Apache Spark
1 2 (0.65%) Confluence
2 1 (0.32%) Apache Airflow
2 1 (0.32%) CMS
2 1 (0.32%) IIS
2 1 (0.32%) Microsoft Exchange
2 1 (0.32%) SAS
Applications
1 8 (2.59%) Microsoft Office
2 5 (1.62%) CPLEX
3 3 (0.97%) Microsoft Excel
3 3 (0.97%) Microsoft Project
4 2 (0.65%) Spreadsheet
5 1 (0.32%) Adobe XD
5 1 (0.32%) Simulink
Business Applications
1 3 (0.97%) Primavera
1 3 (0.97%) Salesforce CRM
Cloud Services
1 37 (11.97%) Azure
2 29 (9.39%) AWS
3 22 (7.12%) OpenShift
4 16 (5.18%) GitHub
5 13 (4.21%) Azure DevOps
6 12 (3.88%) GCP
7 11 (3.56%) GitHub Actions
8 8 (2.59%) SaaS
9 6 (1.94%) Serverless
10 5 (1.62%) Amazon S3
11 4 (1.29%) Amazon EKS
11 4 (1.29%) Power Platform
12 3 (0.97%) Amazon CloudWatch
12 3 (0.97%) Amazon ECS
12 3 (0.97%) Azure AI
12 3 (0.97%) Salesforce Sales Cloud
12 3 (0.97%) Snowflake
13 2 (0.65%) Azure AKS
13 2 (0.65%) Azure Cognitive Search
13 2 (0.65%) n8n
Communications & Networking
1 16 (5.18%) Wireless
2 5 (1.62%) Software-Defined Radio
3 3 (0.97%) Network Security
4 2 (0.65%) HTTPS
5 1 (0.32%) HTTP
Database & Business Intelligence
1 22 (7.12%) PostgreSQL
2 17 (5.50%) NoSQL
3 11 (3.56%) Relational Database
4 6 (1.94%) Data Warehouse
5 5 (1.62%) Big Data
5 5 (1.62%) DynamoDB
5 5 (1.62%) MongoDB
5 5 (1.62%) SQL Server
6 4 (1.29%) Amazon Redshift
6 4 (1.29%) Data Lake
7 3 (0.97%) Geospatial Data
7 3 (0.97%) Metadata
8 2 (0.65%) Apache Iceberg
8 2 (0.65%) BigQuery
8 2 (0.65%) Power BI
8 2 (0.65%) Redis
9 1 (0.32%) Amazon Athena
9 1 (0.32%) Amazon RDS
9 1 (0.32%) Azure SQL Database
9 1 (0.32%) Parquet
Development Applications
1 34 (11.00%) Git
2 20 (6.47%) GitLab
3 19 (6.15%) SonarQube
4 16 (5.18%) Jenkins
5 8 (2.59%) JIRA
6 4 (1.29%) LabVIEW
7 2 (0.65%) Bitbucket
7 2 (0.65%) JUnit
7 2 (0.65%) Postman
7 2 (0.65%) Rational DOORS
7 2 (0.65%) Sonatype Nexus
8 1 (0.32%) CMake
8 1 (0.32%) GoogleTest
8 1 (0.32%) Liquibase
8 1 (0.32%) MLflow
8 1 (0.32%) Mockito
8 1 (0.32%) NUnit
8 1 (0.32%) Selenium
8 1 (0.32%) Subversion
8 1 (0.32%) Visual Studio Code
General
1 53 (17.15%) Social Skills
2 46 (14.89%) Aerospace
3 29 (9.39%) Finance
4 21 (6.80%) Analytical Skills
5 18 (5.83%) Manufacturing
6 8 (2.59%) Law
6 8 (2.59%) Public Sector
7 7 (2.27%) Avionics
8 5 (1.62%) Aviation
9 3 (0.97%) Automotive
9 3 (0.97%) Banking
9 3 (0.97%) Electronics
9 3 (0.97%) Inclusion and Diversity
9 3 (0.97%) Marketing
10 2 (0.65%) Military
10 2 (0.65%) Telecoms
11 1 (0.32%) Advertising
11 1 (0.32%) Legal
11 1 (0.32%) Retail Banking
Job Titles
1 157 (50.81%) Software Engineer
2 56 (18.12%) Developer
3 45 (14.56%) Senior
4 36 (11.65%) Embedded Engineer
4 36 (11.65%) Embedded Software Engineer
5 21 (6.80%) Lead
6 19 (6.15%) Senior Software Engineer
7 17 (5.50%) Java Engineer
8 15 (4.85%) Engineering Manager
8 15 (4.85%) Software Manager
9 14 (4.53%) Software Developer
9 14 (4.53%) Software Engineering Manager
10 12 (3.88%) Senior Developer
11 11 (3.56%) C++ Software Engineer
11 11 (3.56%) Java Developer
12 10 (3.24%) SC Cleared Software Engineer
13 9 (2.91%) DevOps Engineer
14 8 (2.59%) Python Developer
14 8 (2.59%) Senior Manager
14 8 (2.59%) Technical Leader
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 25 (8.09%) React
2 24 (7.77%) AngularJS
3 20 (6.47%) .NET
4 19 (6.15%) REST
5 17 (5.50%) Quarkus
6 15 (4.85%) Kafka
7 14 (4.53%) RESTful
8 13 (4.21%) JSON
9 8 (2.59%) GraphQL
9 8 (2.59%) WinForms
9 8 (2.59%) WPF
10 7 (2.27%) FastAPI
10 7 (2.27%) Flask
10 7 (2.27%) Node.js
10 7 (2.27%) RabbitMQ
11 6 (1.94%) pytest
11 6 (1.94%) Yocto
12 5 (1.62%) .NET Core
12 5 (1.62%) OpenAPI
12 5 (1.62%) Pandas
Miscellaneous
1 26 (8.41%) Cloud Native
2 17 (5.50%) Product Ownership
3 15 (4.85%) Algorithms
4 12 (3.88%) Data Protection Act
4 12 (3.88%) Distributed Systems
5 10 (3.24%) Data Structures
6 7 (2.27%) Embedded Systems
6 7 (2.27%) Enterprise Software
7 6 (1.94%) Device Driver
8 5 (1.62%) MicroBlaze
8 5 (1.62%) RISC-V
8 5 (1.62%) Robotics
8 5 (1.62%) Social Media
9 4 (1.29%) Onboarding
9 4 (1.29%) Virtual Team
10 3 (0.97%) AI Agents
10 3 (0.97%) Analytical Mindset
10 3 (0.97%) ARM Cortex
10 3 (0.97%) Distributed Architecture
11 2 (0.65%) Mobile App
Operating Systems
1 25 (8.09%) Linux
2 8 (2.59%) Embedded Linux
3 5 (1.62%) Android
4 4 (1.29%) Windows
5 1 (0.32%) Apple iOS
5 1 (0.32%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
5 1 (0.32%) Unix
5 1 (0.32%) Windows Server
Processes & Methodologies
1 88 (28.48%) Agile
2 61 (19.74%) CI/CD
3 47 (15.21%) DevOps
4 41 (13.27%) Test Automation
5 40 (12.94%) Problem-Solving
6 38 (12.30%) Scrum
7 34 (11.00%) DevSecOps
8 30 (9.71%) SDLC
9 28 (9.06%) Unit Testing
10 27 (8.74%) Containerisation
10 27 (8.74%) Microservices
11 26 (8.41%) Computer Science
11 26 (8.41%) Continuous Improvement
11 26 (8.41%) Front End Development
12 25 (8.09%) AI
12 25 (8.09%) Sprint Planning
13 23 (7.44%) Mentoring
14 18 (5.83%) Software Delivery
14 18 (5.83%) Software Testing
15 17 (5.50%) Stakeholder Management
Programming Languages
1 65 (21.04%) Java
2 49 (15.86%) Python
3 38 (12.30%) C
4 30 (9.71%) C#
5 26 (8.41%) C++
6 23 (7.44%) JavaScript
6 23 (7.44%) SQL
6 23 (7.44%) TypeScript
7 18 (5.83%) Go
8 10 (3.24%) Embedded C
9 6 (1.94%) Bash
10 5 (1.62%) Ada
10 5 (1.62%) PowerShell
11 4 (1.29%) PL/SQL
11 4 (1.29%) Scala
12 3 (0.97%) Apex Code
13 2 (0.65%) Kotlin
13 2 (0.65%) Rust
14 1 (0.32%) Embedded C++
14 1 (0.32%) Swift
Qualifications
1 107 (34.63%) Security Cleared
2 87 (28.16%) SC Cleared
3 30 (9.71%) Degree
4 10 (3.24%) Computer Science Degree
5 9 (2.91%) BPSS Clearance
6 5 (1.62%) DV Cleared
7 3 (0.97%) Azure Certification
7 3 (0.97%) PRINCE2 Practitioner
8 2 (0.65%) Master's Degree
9 1 (0.32%) (ISC)2 CCSP
9 1 (0.32%) AWS Certification
9 1 (0.32%) CCSP
9 1 (0.32%) CISA
9 1 (0.32%) Cisco Certification
9 1 (0.32%) CISSP
9 1 (0.32%) ISTQB
9 1 (0.32%) ISTQB Foundation Certification
9 1 (0.32%) Microsoft Certification
9 1 (0.32%) PMP
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 22 (7.12%) QA
2 3 (0.97%) Accessibility
2 3 (0.97%) Data Quality
3 1 (0.32%) Actionable Recommendations
3 1 (0.32%) GRC
3 1 (0.32%) ITGC
3 1 (0.32%) NIST
3 1 (0.32%) PMO
3 1 (0.32%) Sarbanes-Oxley
3 1 (0.32%) Software Quality Assurance
3 1 (0.32%) WCAG
System Software
1 33 (10.68%) Docker
2 5 (1.62%) Embedded Firmware
2 5 (1.62%) Firmware
3 4 (1.29%) Active Directory
3 4 (1.29%) Virtual Machines
4 1 (0.32%) VMware Infrastructure
Systems Management
1 44 (14.24%) Kubernetes
2 18 (5.83%) Argo
3 17 (5.50%) Terraform
4 8 (2.59%) Ansible
5 5 (1.62%) Grafana
6 4 (1.29%) Prometheus
7 2 (0.65%) Kibana
7 2 (0.65%) Kubeflow
7 2 (0.65%) Puppet
8 1 (0.32%) CASB
Vendors
1 18 (5.83%) Red Hat
2 6 (1.94%) Microsoft
2 6 (1.94%) Oracle
2 6 (1.94%) SAP
3 5 (1.62%) Workday
4 4 (1.29%) Salesforce
4 4 (1.29%) Siemens
5 3 (0.97%) Google
6 2 (0.65%) CA Agile Central
6 2 (0.65%) Databricks
6 2 (0.65%) Foundry
6 2 (0.65%) OpenAI
7 1 (0.32%) Ab Initio
7 1 (0.32%) Adobe
7 1 (0.32%) Apple
7 1 (0.32%) Denodo
7 1 (0.32%) Dynatrace
7 1 (0.32%) Teradata
7 1 (0.32%) UiPath
7 1 (0.32%) VMware