Degree Contract Job Trends in the South West

Academic Degree
England > South West

The table below provides summary statistics for contract job vacancies advertised in the South West with a requirement for Degree qualifications. It includes a benchmarking guide to the contractor rates offered over the 6 months leading up to 25 May 2026, comparing them to the same period in the previous two years.

6 months to
25 May 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 38 24 18
Rank change year-on-year -14 -6 +4
Contract jobs citing Degree 132 124 248
As % of all contract jobs in the South West 3.91% 7.41% 7.76%
As % of the Qualifications category 8.86% 13.48% 14.11%
Number of daily rates quoted 77 92 122
10th Percentile £150 £145 £160
25th Percentile £325 £235 £450
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £505 £475 £525
Median % change year-on-year +6.32% -9.52% -4.55%
75th Percentile £700 £575 £688
90th Percentile £738 £673 £711
England median daily rate £500 £500 £500
% change year-on-year - - -9.09%
Number of hourly rates quoted 19 18 63
10th Percentile £14.00 £55.00 £36.25
25th Percentile £16.43 £57.81 £40.00
Median hourly rate £35.00 £65.00 £57.33
Median % change year-on-year -46.15% +13.38% -11.80%
75th Percentile £57.13 £73.75 £72.50
90th Percentile £75.49 £79.08 £74.80
England median hourly rate £55.00 £55.00 £40.00
% change year-on-year - +37.50% -13.51%

All Academic and Professional Certifications
South West

Degree falls under the Academic Qualifications and Professional Certifications category. For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all contract job vacancies requiring academic qualifications or professional certifications in the South West.

Contract vacancies requiring academic qualifications or professional certifications 1,490 920 1,758
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the South West 44.17% 54.96% 55.02%
Number of daily rates quoted 920 575 1,123
10th Percentile £331 £220 £360
25th Percentile £428 £419 £465
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £533 £550 £550
Median % change year-on-year -3.09% - -5.09%
75th Percentile £613 £638 £653
90th Percentile £706 £700 £725
England median daily rate £525 £525 £538
% change year-on-year - -2.33% -2.27%
Number of hourly rates quoted 202 97 193
10th Percentile £17.87 £18.51 £21.53
25th Percentile £21.33 £18.87 £40.00
Median hourly rate £55.00 £40.00 £62.00
Median % change year-on-year +37.50% -35.48% -4.62%
75th Percentile £67.84 £67.50 £72.50
90th Percentile £81.71 £75.00 £80.00
England median hourly rate £47.50 £35.00 £40.00
% change year-on-year +35.71% -12.50% -25.93%

Degree
Job Vacancy Trend in the South West

Historical trend showing the proportion of contract IT job postings citing Degree relative to all contract IT jobs advertised in the South West.

Degree job vacancy trend in the South West

Degree
Daily Rate Trend in the South West

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in the South West citing Degree.

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in the South West citing Degree

Degree
Daily Rate Histogram in the South West

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing Degree in the South West over the 6 months to 25 May 2026.

Daily rate histogram for Degree in the South West

Degree
Hourly Rate Trend in the South West

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in the South West citing Degree.

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in the South West citing Degree

Degree
Hourly Rate Histogram in the South West

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing Degree in the South West over the 6 months to 25 May 2026.

Hourly rate histogram for Degree in the South West

Degree
Contract Job Locations in the South West

The table below looks at the demand and provides a guide to the median contractor rates quoted in IT jobs citing Degree within the South West region over the 6 months to 25 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
Wiltshire +1 40 £706 +21.51% 28
Bristol -24 32 £425 +14.86% 95
Somerset -4 20 £160 -69.16% 35
Devon -16 20 £314 +96.41% 26
Gloucestershire -1 10 £575 +35.29% 68
Dorset -10 7 £400 -27.27% 24
Cornwall - 1 - - 3
Degree
England

Degree
Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities in the South West 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 18 (13.64%) Confluence
2 17 (12.88%) SharePoint
3 10 (7.58%) Apache
4 4 (3.03%) Apache Airflow
5 3 (2.27%) Apache Spark
Applications
1 40 (30.30%) Microsoft Office
2 21 (15.91%) Microsoft Excel
3 19 (14.39%) Microsoft Project
4 17 (12.88%) Microsoft PowerPoint
5 3 (2.27%) MS Visio
6 2 (1.52%) Trello
Business Applications
1 4 (3.03%) Payment Gateway
2 2 (1.52%) NetSuite
3 1 (0.76%) NEC Housing
Cloud Services
1 23 (17.42%) Power Platform
2 20 (15.15%) Azure
3 16 (12.12%) Microsoft 365
4 13 (9.85%) AWS
5 5 (3.79%) Azure DevOps
5 5 (3.79%) GitHub
6 3 (2.27%) GCP
7 2 (1.52%) Asana
7 2 (1.52%) Dynamics 365
7 2 (1.52%) Entra ID
7 2 (1.52%) Power Automate
8 1 (0.76%) Azure Data Factory
8 1 (0.76%) Azure Synapse Analytics
8 1 (0.76%) Cloud Composer
8 1 (0.76%) GitHub Actions
8 1 (0.76%) Google Compute Engine
8 1 (0.76%) Google Kubernetes Engine
8 1 (0.76%) Stackdriver
Communications & Networking
1 5 (3.79%) Network Security
2 4 (3.03%) DHCP
2 4 (3.03%) DNS
3 2 (1.52%) 2G
3 2 (1.52%) 3G
3 2 (1.52%) 4G
3 2 (1.52%) 5G
3 2 (1.52%) BGP
3 2 (1.52%) Cisco IOS
3 2 (1.52%) Firewall
3 2 (1.52%) LTE
3 2 (1.52%) OSPF
3 2 (1.52%) Radio Access Network
3 2 (1.52%) VPN
4 1 (0.76%) Cisco Nexus
4 1 (0.76%) DMVPN
4 1 (0.76%) Telepresence
4 1 (0.76%) Unified Communications
4 1 (0.76%) VSAN
4 1 (0.76%) VXLAN
Database & Business Intelligence
1 23 (17.42%) Power BI
2 5 (3.79%) Relational Database
3 4 (3.03%) Data Warehouse
3 4 (3.03%) Oracle Database
4 3 (2.27%) SQL Server
5 2 (1.52%) Big Data
5 2 (1.52%) BigQuery
5 2 (1.52%) Electronic Patient Records
5 2 (1.52%) GIS
5 2 (1.52%) Star Schema
6 1 (0.76%) Apache Cassandra
6 1 (0.76%) Elasticsearch
6 1 (0.76%) Geospatial Data
6 1 (0.76%) HBase
6 1 (0.76%) MongoDB
6 1 (0.76%) NoSQL
6 1 (0.76%) PostgreSQL
6 1 (0.76%) RDBMS
6 1 (0.76%) Snowflake Schema
6 1 (0.76%) Spatial Data
Development Applications
1 30 (22.73%) JIRA
2 9 (6.82%) GitLab
3 6 (4.55%) Git
4 4 (3.03%) Cucumber
4 4 (3.03%) Jenkins
4 4 (3.03%) Postman
4 4 (3.03%) REST Assured
5 3 (2.27%) Artifactory
6 1 (0.76%) Atlassian Bamboo
6 1 (0.76%) JUnit
6 1 (0.76%) Selenium
6 1 (0.76%) Visual Studio
General
1 67 (50.76%) Social Skills
2 32 (24.24%) Analytical Skills
3 26 (19.70%) Finance
3 26 (19.70%) Military
4 21 (15.91%) Organisational Skills
5 18 (13.64%) Public Sector
6 4 (3.03%) Influencing Skills
6 4 (3.03%) Legal
6 4 (3.03%) Presentation Skills
7 3 (2.27%) Aerospace
7 3 (2.27%) Back Office
7 3 (2.27%) Electronics
7 3 (2.27%) Telecoms
8 2 (1.52%) Aviation
8 2 (1.52%) Banking
8 2 (1.52%) General Ledger
8 2 (1.52%) Police
9 1 (0.76%) Digital Healthcare
9 1 (0.76%) Documentation Skills
9 1 (0.76%) Pharmaceutical
Job Titles
1 14 (10.61%) Architect
2 13 (9.85%) Analyst
3 11 (8.33%) Service Architect
4 10 (7.58%) Administrator
4 10 (7.58%) Project Officer
4 10 (7.58%) Project Support Officer
4 10 (7.58%) Support Officer
5 9 (6.82%) Delivery Manager
5 9 (6.82%) Lead
6 8 (6.06%) Project Manager
6 8 (6.06%) Support Engineer
7 7 (5.30%) Technical Engineer
7 7 (5.30%) Technical Support
7 7 (5.30%) Technical Support Engineer
8 6 (4.55%) Business Analyst
8 6 (4.55%) Data Engineer
8 6 (4.55%) Digital Product Manager
8 6 (4.55%) Product Manager
8 6 (4.55%) Software Engineer
8 6 (4.55%) Technical Manager
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 10 (7.58%) REST
2 7 (5.30%) JDO
3 5 (3.79%) React
4 4 (3.03%) Playwright
5 3 (2.27%) Apache NiFi
5 3 (2.27%) Kafka
5 3 (2.27%) Web Services
6 2 (1.52%) .NET
6 2 (1.52%) ASP.NET
6 2 (1.52%) FHIR
6 2 (1.52%) Oracle Fusion
6 2 (1.52%) SOAP
6 2 (1.52%) Spring
6 2 (1.52%) Spring Boot
7 1 (0.76%) ASP.NET Core
7 1 (0.76%) Dapper ORM
7 1 (0.76%) Entity Framework
7 1 (0.76%) IDoc
7 1 (0.76%) PySpark
7 1 (0.76%) Swagger
Miscellaneous
1 17 (12.88%) Product Ownership
2 10 (7.58%) Management Information System
3 6 (4.55%) Legacy Systems
3 6 (4.55%) Self-Motivation
4 4 (3.03%) Enterprise Software
4 4 (3.03%) Freedom of Information
4 4 (3.03%) Onboarding
5 3 (2.27%) Cyber Defence
5 3 (2.27%) PMI
6 2 (1.52%) Cloud Native
6 2 (1.52%) Clustering
6 2 (1.52%) CSOC
6 2 (1.52%) Cyber Security Posture
6 2 (1.52%) Cyber Threat
6 2 (1.52%) PKI
6 2 (1.52%) Security Operations Centre
6 2 (1.52%) Security Posture
7 1 (0.76%) Data Protection Act
7 1 (0.76%) Fixed Income
7 1 (0.76%) Replication
Operating Systems
1 13 (9.85%) Windows
2 10 (7.58%) Linux
3 7 (5.30%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
4 5 (3.79%) Ubuntu
4 5 (3.79%) Windows Server
5 4 (3.03%) Debian
5 4 (3.03%) Rocky
6 3 (2.27%) Windows 10
7 2 (1.52%) Solaris
7 2 (1.52%) Windows Server 2012
8 1 (0.76%) Mac OS
Processes & Methodologies
1 64 (48.48%) Agile
2 40 (30.30%) Computer Science
3 35 (26.52%) Problem-Solving
4 28 (21.21%) Continuous Improvement
5 25 (18.94%) Project Management
6 22 (16.67%) PRINCE2
7 21 (15.91%) Analytics
8 20 (15.15%) Critical Thinking
9 19 (14.39%) Knowledge Transfer
9 19 (14.39%) Waterfall
10 18 (13.64%) CI/CD
10 18 (13.64%) ITIL
10 18 (13.64%) Service Management
11 17 (12.88%) Stakeholder Management
12 15 (11.36%) Change Control
12 15 (11.36%) Decision-Making
12 15 (11.36%) DevOps
13 13 (9.85%) Acceptance Criteria
13 13 (9.85%) Analytical Thinking
13 13 (9.85%) Stakeholder Engagement
Programming Languages
1 18 (13.64%) Python
2 15 (11.36%) SQL
3 10 (7.58%) JavaScript
4 6 (4.55%) Java
5 5 (3.79%) PowerShell
6 4 (3.03%) Apex Code
6 4 (3.03%) Go
7 3 (2.27%) PHP
8 2 (1.52%) Bash
8 2 (1.52%) C#
9 1 (0.76%) Data Analysis Expressions
9 1 (0.76%) PL/SQL
9 1 (0.76%) Scala
9 1 (0.76%) TypeScript
Qualifications
1 68 (51.52%) Security Cleared
2 53 (40.15%) SC Cleared
3 26 (19.70%) Computer Science Degree
4 15 (11.36%) DV Cleared
5 13 (9.85%) TOGAF Certification
6 10 (7.58%) APMP
6 10 (7.58%) PRINCE2 Practitioner
7 8 (6.06%) PMI Certification
7 8 (6.06%) PMP
8 5 (3.79%) Cisco Certification
8 5 (3.79%) Master's Degree
8 5 (3.79%) SANS
9 4 (3.03%) CCNP
9 4 (3.03%) ISTQB
9 4 (3.03%) ISTQB Foundation Certification
9 4 (3.03%) PRINCE2 Certification
10 3 (2.27%) VMware Certified Professional (VCP)
11 2 (1.52%) BPSS Clearance
11 2 (1.52%) CBAP
12 1 (0.76%) DBS Check
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 12 (9.09%) QA
2 8 (6.06%) GDPR
3 7 (5.30%) Data Quality
4 4 (3.03%) Accessibility
5 3 (2.27%) PMO
6 2 (1.52%) Def Stans
6 2 (1.52%) HL7
6 2 (1.52%) ISO/IEC 27001
6 2 (1.52%) SNOMED CT
7 1 (0.76%) Cyber Essentials
7 1 (0.76%) Cyber Essentials PLUS
7 1 (0.76%) GMP
7 1 (0.76%) HMG Security Policy Framework
7 1 (0.76%) ISO 20022
7 1 (0.76%) NIST
System Software
1 8 (6.06%) VMware Infrastructure
2 6 (4.55%) Docker
3 5 (3.79%) Active Directory
3 5 (3.79%) Hyper-V
4 4 (3.03%) Virtual Machines
5 3 (2.27%) VMware Workstation
6 2 (1.52%) VMware ESXi
7 1 (0.76%) KVM
7 1 (0.76%) VMware NSX
Systems Management
1 11 (8.33%) OPNET
2 10 (7.58%) Kubernetes
3 6 (4.55%) Ansible
4 5 (3.79%) Terraform
5 2 (1.52%) Computer Incident Response Team
5 2 (1.52%) vCenter Server
6 1 (0.76%) Data Guard
6 1 (0.76%) Enterprise Manager Cloud Control
6 1 (0.76%) Grafana
6 1 (0.76%) Oracle Enterprise Manager
6 1 (0.76%) Oracle RMAN
6 1 (0.76%) Progress Chef
6 1 (0.76%) Prometheus
6 1 (0.76%) Puppet
Vendors
1 36 (27.27%) Microsoft
2 23 (17.42%) ServiceNow
3 12 (9.09%) Atlassian
4 11 (8.33%) Remedy
5 8 (6.06%) Oracle
5 8 (6.06%) VMware
6 5 (3.79%) Cisco
7 4 (3.03%) ArcSight
7 4 (3.03%) Conga
7 4 (3.03%) Databricks
7 4 (3.03%) GoCardless
7 4 (3.03%) Salesforce
8 3 (2.27%) Google
8 3 (2.27%) Red Hat
9 2 (1.52%) Alteryx
9 2 (1.52%) Automation Anywhere
9 2 (1.52%) Blue Prism
9 2 (1.52%) Huawei
9 2 (1.52%) Intel
9 2 (1.52%) UiPath