Software Engineering Contract Job Trends in the South West

Software Engineering
England > South West

The table below provides summary statistics and contractor rates for jobs advertised in the South West requiring Software Engineering skills. It covers contract job vacancies from the 6 months leading up to 14 May 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
14 May 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 10 26 33
Rank change year-on-year +16 +7 -7
Contract jobs citing Software Engineering 307 106 157
As % of all contract jobs in the South West 9.26% 6.37% 4.95%
As % of the Processes & Methodologies category 11.83% 7.04% 5.96%
Number of daily rates quoted 59 43 58
10th Percentile £405 £355 £400
25th Percentile £509 £434 £456
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £575 £575 £525
Median % change year-on-year - +9.52% -9.33%
75th Percentile £644 £647 £672
90th Percentile £700 £685 £728
England median daily rate £550 £600 £600
% change year-on-year -8.33% - -
Number of hourly rates quoted 192 46 73
10th Percentile £56.75 £62.25 £52.50
25th Percentile - £65.00 £61.25
Median hourly rate £65.00 £66.50 £70.00
Median % change year-on-year -2.26% -5.00% +6.87%
75th Percentile £67.25 £68.00 -
90th Percentile £68.00 £68.75 £73.00
England median hourly rate £65.00 £65.00 £62.50
% change year-on-year - +4.00% -3.85%

All Process & Methodology Skills
South West

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 West.

Contract vacancies with a requirement for process or methodology skills 2,596 1,506 2,635
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the South West 78.29% 90.56% 83.10%
Number of daily rates quoted 1,417 941 1,680
10th Percentile £320 £230 £220
25th Percentile £413 £400 £405
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £525 £515 £525
Median % change year-on-year +1.94% -1.90% -4.55%
75th Percentile £613 £623 £625
90th Percentile £714 £688 £700
England median daily rate £513 £525 £525
% change year-on-year -2.38% - -4.55%
Number of hourly rates quoted 456 153 341
10th Percentile £16.62 £18.26 £13.86
25th Percentile £26.13 £18.87 £29.75
Median hourly rate £57.50 £60.00 £55.00
Median % change year-on-year -4.17% +9.09% -8.33%
75th Percentile £65.00 £68.00 £70.00
90th Percentile £70.00 £70.00 £77.50
England median hourly rate £47.00 £29.02 £36.50
% change year-on-year +61.96% -20.49% -2.25%

Software Engineering
Job Vacancy Trend in the South West

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

Software Engineering job vacancy trend in the South West

Software Engineering
Daily Rate Trend in the South West

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

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

Software Engineering
Daily Rate Histogram in the South West

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing Software Engineering in the South West over the 6 months to 14 May 2026.

Daily rate histogram for Software Engineering in the South West

Software Engineering
Hourly Rate Trend in the South West

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

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

Software Engineering
Hourly Rate Histogram in the South West

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing Software Engineering in the South West over the 6 months to 14 May 2026.

Hourly rate histogram for Software Engineering in the South West

Software Engineering
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 Software Engineering within the South West region over the 6 months to 14 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
Bristol +7 237 £548 +47.97% 75
Gloucestershire +9 29 £606 -9.21% 50
Wiltshire -15 13 £575 -1.71% 11
Dorset -1 11 £550 -4.35% 17
Somerset -13 6 £542 +17.14% 20
Devon -18 6 £613 +22.50% 5
Cornwall - 2 £628 -
Software Engineering
England

Software Engineering
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 7 (2.28%) Apache
2 6 (1.95%) Confluence
3 1 (0.33%) SharePoint
Applications
1 3 (0.98%) Simulink
2 2 (0.65%) Microsoft Office
Cloud Services
1 33 (10.75%) AWS
2 21 (6.84%) Azure
3 8 (2.61%) GCP
4 4 (1.30%) GitHub
4 4 (1.30%) OpenShift
5 2 (0.65%) AWS CloudFormation
5 2 (0.65%) Power Platform
5 2 (0.65%) Serverless
6 1 (0.33%) Amazon EC2
6 1 (0.33%) Amazon S3
6 1 (0.33%) AWS Lambda
6 1 (0.33%) Azure DevOps
6 1 (0.33%) Entra ID
6 1 (0.33%) Figma
6 1 (0.33%) IaaS
6 1 (0.33%) Microsoft 365
6 1 (0.33%) Power Automate
6 1 (0.33%) PowerApps
Communications & Networking
1 6 (1.95%) TCP/IP
2 5 (1.63%) Ethernet
3 1 (0.33%) AMQP
3 1 (0.33%) Bluetooth
3 1 (0.33%) Firewall
3 1 (0.33%) Network Security
3 1 (0.33%) VPN
3 1 (0.33%) Wireless
Database & Business Intelligence
1 6 (1.95%) PostgreSQL
2 5 (1.63%) Amazon RDS
3 4 (1.30%) Amazon Aurora
3 4 (1.30%) DynamoDB
3 4 (1.30%) MongoDB
3 4 (1.30%) MySQL
4 2 (0.65%) GIS
4 2 (0.65%) Power BI
4 2 (0.65%) Relational Database
5 1 (0.33%) Geospatial Data
5 1 (0.33%) InfluxDB
Development Applications
1 22 (7.17%) GitLab
2 19 (6.19%) Rational Rhapsody
3 15 (4.89%) Git
4 12 (3.91%) Jenkins
5 7 (2.28%) JIRA
6 5 (1.63%) Eclipse
6 5 (1.63%) Visual Studio
7 4 (1.30%) Oracle APEX
8 3 (0.98%) Artifactory
8 3 (0.98%) Sonatype Nexus
9 2 (0.65%) Rational DOORS
10 1 (0.33%) Atlassian Bamboo
10 1 (0.33%) Bitbucket
10 1 (0.33%) JUnit
10 1 (0.33%) NUnit
10 1 (0.33%) Selenium
General
1 28 (9.12%) Aerospace
2 26 (8.47%) Social Skills
3 11 (3.58%) Analytical Skills
3 11 (3.58%) Law
4 10 (3.26%) Finance
5 8 (2.61%) Military
6 6 (1.95%) Public Sector
7 5 (1.63%) Electronics
8 3 (0.98%) Banking
9 2 (0.65%) Financial Institution
9 2 (0.65%) Investment Banking
9 2 (0.65%) Presentation Skills
10 1 (0.33%) Automotive
10 1 (0.33%) Documentation Skills
10 1 (0.33%) Legal
10 1 (0.33%) Manufacturing
10 1 (0.33%) Organisational Skills
10 1 (0.33%) Telecoms
Job Titles
1 261 (85.02%) Software Engineer
2 61 (19.87%) C++ Software Engineer
3 53 (17.26%) Embedded Engineer
3 53 (17.26%) Embedded Software Engineer
4 30 (9.77%) Ada Engineer
4 30 (9.77%) Ada Software Engineer
5 29 (9.45%) Algorithm Engineer
6 19 (6.19%) Java Engineer
6 19 (6.19%) Java Software Engineer
7 17 (5.54%) Senior
8 15 (4.89%) Developer
8 15 (4.89%) Senior Software Engineer
9 12 (3.91%) Applications Engineer
10 11 (3.58%) Lead
11 10 (3.26%) C# Software Engineer
12 9 (2.93%) SC Cleared Software Engineer
13 7 (2.28%) C Software Engineer
13 7 (2.28%) C/C++ Software Engineer
13 7 (2.28%) Java Developer
14 6 (1.95%) Full-Stack Engineer
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 33 (10.75%) Middleware
2 17 (5.54%) Qt
3 14 (4.56%) REST
4 10 (3.26%) Node.js
5 8 (2.61%) React
6 6 (1.95%) .NET
7 5 (1.63%) AWS CDK
7 5 (1.63%) Spring Boot
7 5 (1.63%) Web Services
8 4 (1.30%) GraphQL
8 4 (1.30%) SOAP
9 3 (0.98%) Apache NiFi
9 3 (0.98%) Elastic Stack
10 2 (0.65%) Flask
10 2 (0.65%) Jest
10 2 (0.65%) pytest
10 2 (0.65%) RESTful
11 1 (0.33%) HTML5 Canvas
11 1 (0.33%) OpenID
11 1 (0.33%) RabbitMQ
Miscellaneous
1 45 (14.66%) Algorithms
2 10 (3.26%) Embedded Systems
3 8 (2.61%) Product Ownership
4 7 (2.28%) Legacy Systems
5 6 (1.95%) Onboarding
6 4 (1.30%) Self-Motivation
7 3 (0.98%) Cloud Native
8 2 (0.65%) AI Agents
8 2 (0.65%) CUDA
8 2 (0.65%) Data Protection Act
9 1 (0.33%) Device Driver
9 1 (0.33%) Distributed Systems
9 1 (0.33%) Legacy Applications
9 1 (0.33%) Linux Command Line
9 1 (0.33%) Low-Code
9 1 (0.33%) Management Information System
9 1 (0.33%) Video\Live Streaming
9 1 (0.33%) Virtual Team
Operating Systems
1 42 (13.68%) Linux
2 11 (3.58%) Windows
3 10 (3.26%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
4 4 (1.30%) Debian
4 4 (1.30%) Rocky
4 4 (1.30%) Ubuntu
5 2 (0.65%) Embedded Linux
6 1 (0.33%) FreeRTOS
6 1 (0.33%) Windows Server
Processes & Methodologies
1 52 (16.94%) CI/CD
2 31 (10.10%) Agile
3 21 (6.84%) UML
4 18 (5.86%) Problem-Solving
5 17 (5.54%) Containerisation
5 17 (5.54%) DevOps
5 17 (5.54%) Full-Stack Development
5 17 (5.54%) Technical Leadership
6 15 (4.89%) AI
6 15 (4.89%) Configuration Management
6 15 (4.89%) Workflow
7 14 (4.56%) SysML
8 13 (4.23%) Test Automation
8 13 (4.23%) Validation
9 12 (3.91%) Continuous Improvement
9 12 (3.91%) SDLC
10 11 (3.58%) Integration Testing
10 11 (3.58%) Microservices
10 11 (3.58%) Workflow Management
11 10 (3.26%) Computer Science
Programming Languages
1 87 (28.34%) Ada
2 83 (27.04%) C++
3 48 (15.64%) Java
4 45 (14.66%) Python
5 30 (9.77%) C
6 29 (9.45%) C#
7 24 (7.82%) MATLAB
8 14 (4.56%) JavaScript
9 11 (3.58%) PowerShell
10 9 (2.93%) TypeScript
11 7 (2.28%) Bash
11 7 (2.28%) SQL
12 5 (1.63%) Go
13 4 (1.30%) PL/SQL
14 3 (0.98%) PHP
15 1 (0.33%) Fortran
15 1 (0.33%) Scala
15 1 (0.33%) Shell Script
Qualifications
1 107 (34.85%) Security Cleared
2 76 (24.76%) SC Cleared
3 21 (6.84%) DV Cleared
4 12 (3.91%) Degree
5 9 (2.93%) Computer Science Degree
6 5 (1.63%) BPSS Clearance
7 2 (0.65%) Master's Degree
8 1 (0.33%) AWS Certification
8 1 (0.33%) AWS Certified Solutions Architect
8 1 (0.33%) CCNP
8 1 (0.33%) Cisco Certification
8 1 (0.33%) DBS Check
8 1 (0.33%) ISTQB
8 1 (0.33%) ISTQB Foundation Certification
8 1 (0.33%) OCA
8 1 (0.33%) Oracle Certification
8 1 (0.33%) Postgraduate
8 1 (0.33%) RHCA
8 1 (0.33%) RHCE
8 1 (0.33%) VMware Certified Professional (VCP)
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 40 (13.03%) Def Stans
2 34 (11.07%) IEC 61508
3 20 (6.51%) MISRA
4 15 (4.89%) MISRA C
5 13 (4.23%) QA
6 5 (1.63%) DO-178B
7 4 (1.30%) NCSC
8 3 (0.98%) Accessibility
9 2 (0.65%) JSP 440
9 2 (0.65%) WCAG
10 1 (0.33%) Data Quality
10 1 (0.33%) DICOM
10 1 (0.33%) GDPR
10 1 (0.33%) HL7
System Software
1 25 (8.14%) Docker
2 5 (1.63%) Firmware
3 4 (1.30%) Oracle RAC
4 2 (0.65%) VMware Infrastructure
5 1 (0.33%) Active Directory
Systems Management
1 20 (6.51%) Kubernetes
2 16 (5.21%) Ansible
3 8 (2.61%) Terraform
4 4 (1.30%) Data Guard
4 4 (1.30%) Grafana
4 4 (1.30%) Prometheus
5 3 (0.98%) Progress Chef
6 2 (0.65%) Puppet
7 1 (0.33%) Computer Emergency Response Teams
7 1 (0.33%) Docker Swarm
Vendors
1 11 (3.58%) IBM
2 10 (3.26%) MathWorks
3 9 (2.93%) Red Hat
4 6 (1.95%) Microsoft
5 5 (1.63%) Oracle
6 2 (0.65%) VMware
7 1 (0.33%) Databricks
7 1 (0.33%) F5
7 1 (0.33%) Google