Solutions Architect Contract Job Trends in the South East

Solution Architect
England > South East

The median Solution Architect daily rate in the South East is £625, according to job vacancies posted in the 6 months leading up to 3 May 2026.

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

6 months to
3 May 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 85 93 65
Rank change year-on-year +8 -28 +16
Contract jobs requiring a Solutions Architect 146 63 147
As % of all contract jobs in the South East 2.49% 2.10% 2.65%
As % of the Job Titles category 2.71% 2.29% 2.87%
Number of daily rates quoted 105 39 94
10th Percentile £477 £493 £463
25th Percentile £506 £513 £563
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £625 £625 £625
Median % change year-on-year - - -3.85%
75th Percentile £700 £713 £700
90th Percentile £775 £788 £738
England median daily rate £625 £625 £650
% change year-on-year - -3.85% -2.26%
Number of hourly rates quoted 6 0 4
10th Percentile - - £90.60
25th Percentile £77.55 - £91.50
Median hourly rate £83.82 - £92.19
75th Percentile £93.77 - £95.00
90th Percentile £95.00 - £99.72
England median hourly rate £71.27 £63.00 £89.00
% change year-on-year +13.13% -29.21% +34.85%

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 5,378 2,755 5,123
% of contract IT jobs with a recognized job title 91.73% 91.77% 92.41%
Number of daily rates quoted 3,348 1,821 3,082
10th Percentile £300 £248 £213
25th Percentile £413 £400 £400
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £514 £500 £500
Median % change year-on-year +2.80% - -
75th Percentile £613 £600 £615
90th Percentile £713 £665 £688
England median daily rate £510 £525 £525
% change year-on-year -2.86% - -4.55%
Number of hourly rates quoted 508 163 483
10th Percentile £15.25 £14.20 £12.79
25th Percentile £24.25 £20.48 £18.32
Median hourly rate £54.50 £32.50 £47.50
Median % change year-on-year +67.69% -31.58% -1.86%
75th Percentile £82.06 £63.75 £62.50
90th Percentile £88.00 £75.00 £76.96
England median hourly rate £47.00 £30.45 £36.34
% change year-on-year +54.35% -16.20% -18.83%

Solutions Architect
Job Vacancy Trend in the South East

Historical trend showing the proportion of contract IT job postings featuring 'Solutions Architect' in the job title relative to all contract IT jobs advertised in the South East.

Solutions Architect job vacancy trend in the South East

Solutions Architect
Daily Rate Trend in the South East

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for Solutions Architect job vacancies in the South East.

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for Solutions Architect job vacancies in the South East

Solutions Architect
Daily Rate Histogram in the South East

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing Solutions Architect in the South East over the 6 months to 3 May 2026.

Daily rate histogram for Solutions Architect in the South East

Solutions Architect
Hourly Rate Trend in the South East

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for Solutions Architect job vacancies in the South East.

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for Solutions Architect job vacancies in the South East

Solutions Architect
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 Solutions Architect within the South East region over the 6 months to 3 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 -7 91 £613 -5.77% 23
Berkshire 0 72 £625 -0.40% 13
Buckinghamshire -14 19 £538 -23.21% 7
Surrey -4 15 £663 -5.36% 5
Hampshire -18 15 £625 +25.00% 7
Kent - 13 £645 - 6
West Sussex -13 5 £720 +51.58% 3
East Sussex - 4 £591 - 4
Solutions Architect
England

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

For the 6 months to 3 May 2026, Solutions Architect 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 Solutions Architect in the job title.

1 35 (23.97%) Azure
2 25 (17.12%) Roadmaps
3 24 (16.44%) Microsoft
4 19 (13.01%) AWS
4 19 (13.01%) ERP
4 19 (13.01%) Security Cleared
5 18 (12.33%) Architectural Design
6 17 (11.64%) Enterprise Architecture
6 17 (11.64%) TOGAF
7 16 (10.96%) Agile
7 16 (10.96%) Migration
8 15 (10.27%) Integration Patterns
8 15 (10.27%) Stakeholder Management
9 14 (9.59%) Cybersecurity
9 14 (9.59%) DevOps
9 14 (9.59%) SAP
10 13 (8.90%) SC Cleared
11 12 (8.22%) Microservices
11 12 (8.22%) Stakeholder Engagement
11 12 (8.22%) Zero Trust
12 10 (6.85%) SaaS
13 9 (6.16%) Continuous Improvement
13 9 (6.16%) Decision-Making
13 9 (6.16%) Oracle
14 8 (5.48%) Active Directory
14 8 (5.48%) Architecture Governance
14 8 (5.48%) Containerisation
14 8 (5.48%) Entra ID
14 8 (5.48%) Microsoft 365
14 8 (5.48%) Salesforce

Solutions Architect 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 4 (2.74%) ArcGIS
2 3 (2.05%) Microsoft Exchange
2 3 (2.05%) SharePoint
3 1 (0.68%) Confluence
3 1 (0.68%) Palantir Foundry
Applications
1 1 (0.68%) MS Visio
1 1 (0.68%) Spreadsheet
Business Applications
1 6 (4.11%) SAP S/4HANA
2 5 (3.42%) SAP ERP
3 4 (2.74%) Workday HCM
4 3 (2.05%) Maximo
4 3 (2.05%) Oracle Retail
5 2 (1.37%) Remedy ITSM
6 1 (0.68%) Avolution ABACUS
6 1 (0.68%) Salesforce CRM
Cloud Services
1 35 (23.97%) Azure
2 19 (13.01%) AWS
3 10 (6.85%) SaaS
4 8 (5.48%) Entra ID
4 8 (5.48%) Microsoft 365
5 6 (4.11%) Dynamics 365
5 6 (4.11%) GCP
6 5 (3.42%) Azure DevOps
6 5 (3.42%) OpenShift
7 4 (2.74%) Microsoft Purview
8 3 (2.05%) Amazon EventBridge
8 3 (2.05%) Amazon S3
8 3 (2.05%) Amazon SQS
8 3 (2.05%) AWS Step Functions
8 3 (2.05%) dbt
8 3 (2.05%) OneDrive
8 3 (2.05%) Power Platform
8 3 (2.05%) Snowflake
9 2 (1.37%) IaaS
9 2 (1.37%) PaaS
Communications & Networking
1 5 (3.42%) SD-WAN
2 4 (2.74%) IPsec
2 4 (2.74%) MQTT
2 4 (2.74%) RFID
3 3 (2.05%) Firewall
3 3 (2.05%) Network Security
4 2 (1.37%) MPLS
4 2 (1.37%) Radio Access Network
5 1 (0.68%) Cisco Nexus
5 1 (0.68%) DMVPN
5 1 (0.68%) F5 BIG-IP GTM
5 1 (0.68%) F5 BIG-IP LTM
5 1 (0.68%) LAN
5 1 (0.68%) NAS
5 1 (0.68%) SAN
5 1 (0.68%) TETRA
5 1 (0.68%) VLAN
5 1 (0.68%) VoIP
5 1 (0.68%) WAN
Database & Business Intelligence
1 4 (2.74%) GIS
2 1 (0.68%) Electronic Patient Records
2 1 (0.68%) Power BI
2 1 (0.68%) Snowflake Schema
2 1 (0.68%) SQL Server
Development Applications
1 5 (3.42%) Git
1 5 (3.42%) Jenkins
2 1 (0.68%) JIRA
General
1 21 (14.38%) Finance
2 17 (11.64%) Social Skills
3 15 (10.27%) Retail
4 6 (4.11%) Manufacturing
4 6 (4.11%) Telecoms
5 5 (3.42%) Banking
5 5 (3.42%) Documentation Skills
6 4 (2.74%) Billing
6 4 (2.74%) Public Sector
7 3 (2.05%) Analytical Skills
7 3 (2.05%) Financial Institution
8 2 (1.37%) Police
9 1 (0.68%) Automotive
9 1 (0.68%) Legal
9 1 (0.68%) Marketing
9 1 (0.68%) Presentation Skills
9 1 (0.68%) Retail Banking
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 5 (3.42%) .NET
2 4 (2.74%) ADO
3 3 (2.05%) JSON
3 3 (2.05%) Middleware
3 3 (2.05%) REST
3 3 (2.05%) XML
4 2 (1.37%) MACH
4 2 (1.37%) OAuth
4 2 (1.37%) Oracle Fusion
5 1 (0.68%) COM
5 1 (0.68%) COM+
5 1 (0.68%) CSS
5 1 (0.68%) CSS3
5 1 (0.68%) HTML5
5 1 (0.68%) Lambda Expressions
5 1 (0.68%) OAuth2
5 1 (0.68%) OpenID
5 1 (0.68%) RESTful
5 1 (0.68%) SAML
5 1 (0.68%) SOAP
Miscellaneous
1 12 (8.22%) Operational Technology
2 9 (6.16%) Cloud Native
3 7 (4.79%) Legacy Systems
4 4 (2.74%) Onboarding
5 3 (2.05%) Algorithms
5 3 (2.05%) Mainframe
5 3 (2.05%) Product Ownership
5 3 (2.05%) Security Posture
6 2 (1.37%) Data Protection Act
6 2 (1.37%) EPoS
6 2 (1.37%) Hybrid Cloud
6 2 (1.37%) SCADA
6 2 (1.37%) Security Operations Centre
6 2 (1.37%) SWIFT Messaging Network
6 2 (1.37%) TM Forum
7 1 (0.68%) CMDB
7 1 (0.68%) Data Centre
7 1 (0.68%) Data Structures
7 1 (0.68%) Enterprise Software
7 1 (0.68%) PKI
Operating Systems
1 5 (3.42%) Linux
2 4 (2.74%) Windows
Processes & Methodologies
1 25 (17.12%) Roadmaps
2 19 (13.01%) ERP
3 18 (12.33%) Architectural Design
4 17 (11.64%) Enterprise Architecture
4 17 (11.64%) TOGAF
5 16 (10.96%) Agile
5 16 (10.96%) Migration
6 15 (10.27%) Integration Patterns
6 15 (10.27%) Stakeholder Management
7 14 (9.59%) Cybersecurity
7 14 (9.59%) DevOps
8 12 (8.22%) Microservices
8 12 (8.22%) Stakeholder Engagement
8 12 (8.22%) Zero Trust
9 9 (6.16%) Continuous Improvement
9 9 (6.16%) Decision-Making
10 8 (5.48%) Architecture Governance
10 8 (5.48%) Containerisation
11 7 (4.79%) Architectural Patterns
11 7 (4.79%) CI/CD
Programming Languages
1 3 (2.05%) SQL
2 2 (1.37%) Bicep
2 2 (1.37%) JavaScript
2 2 (1.37%) Python
3 1 (0.68%) PHP
3 1 (0.68%) PL/SQL
Qualifications
1 19 (13.01%) Security Cleared
2 13 (8.90%) SC Cleared
3 6 (4.11%) Azure Certification
4 5 (3.42%) RHCE
4 5 (3.42%) TOGAF Certification
5 3 (2.05%) CISSP
5 3 (2.05%) Degree
5 3 (2.05%) Microsoft Certification
6 2 (1.37%) DV Cleared
7 1 (0.68%) AWS Certification
7 1 (0.68%) DBS Check
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 7 (4.79%) NCSC
1 7 (4.79%) NIST
2 4 (2.74%) NIST 800
3 3 (2.05%) GDPR
4 2 (1.37%) ISO 20022
4 2 (1.37%) SEPA
5 1 (0.68%) Cyber Essentials
5 1 (0.68%) GRC
5 1 (0.68%) HL7
5 1 (0.68%) IFRS
System Software
1 8 (5.48%) Active Directory
2 4 (2.74%) Virtual Machines
3 3 (2.05%) VMware Infrastructure
4 2 (1.37%) Virtual Desktop
5 1 (0.68%) Hyper-V
5 1 (0.68%) VMware ESXi
5 1 (0.68%) vSphere
Systems Management
1 7 (4.79%) Terraform
2 6 (4.11%) Kubernetes
3 5 (3.42%) Ansible
4 4 (2.74%) Microsoft Intune
5 2 (1.37%) MOM
6 1 (0.68%) Active Directory Federation Services
6 1 (0.68%) Netcool
6 1 (0.68%) Netcool/OMNIbus
6 1 (0.68%) SCCM
Vendors
1 24 (16.44%) Microsoft
2 14 (9.59%) SAP
3 9 (6.16%) Oracle
4 8 (5.48%) Salesforce
5 5 (3.42%) Red Hat
5 5 (3.42%) VMware
6 4 (2.74%) BiZZdesign
6 4 (2.74%) IBM
6 4 (2.74%) Sage
6 4 (2.74%) Workday
7 3 (2.05%) Citrix
7 3 (2.05%) Databricks
7 3 (2.05%) Palantir
7 3 (2.05%) ServiceNow
8 2 (1.37%) Cisco
8 2 (1.37%) ESRI
8 2 (1.37%) Fortinet
8 2 (1.37%) Remedy
8 2 (1.37%) Tenable
8 2 (1.37%) Virgin Media