Solutions Architect Contract Job Trends in the South West

Solution Architect
England > South West

The median Solution Architect daily rate in the South West is £700, according to job vacancies posted in the 6 months leading up to 30 January 2026.

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

6 months to
30 Jan 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 81 60 36
Rank change year-on-year -21 -24 +66
Contract jobs requiring a Solutions Architect 60 64 156
As % of all contract jobs in the South West 2.28% 3.39% 5.00%
As % of the Job Titles category 2.51% 3.60% 5.31%
Number of daily rates quoted 40 45 108
10th Percentile £519 £450 £562
25th Percentile £659 £513 £612
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £700 £575 £650
Median % change year-on-year +21.74% -11.54% -
75th Percentile £725 £688 £714
90th Percentile £753 £733 £775
England median daily rate £625 £625 £650
% change year-on-year - -3.85% -
Number of hourly rates quoted 1 2 0
Median hourly rate £89.00 £69.00 -
Median % change year-on-year +28.99% - -
England median hourly rate £83.82 £66.00 £87.50
% change year-on-year +27.00% -24.57% +25.00%

All Contract IT Job Roles
South West

For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all contract IT job vacancies in the South West. 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 West with a recognized job title 2,386 1,776 2,936
% of contract IT jobs with a recognized job title 90.86% 94.07% 94.07%
Number of daily rates quoted 1,354 1,091 1,881
10th Percentile £236 £208 £215
25th Percentile £400 £400 £406
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £514 £513 £525
Median % change year-on-year +0.24% -2.38% -
75th Percentile £625 £625 £638
90th Percentile £725 £700 £725
England median daily rate £500 £525 £525
% change year-on-year -4.76% - -4.55%
Number of hourly rates quoted 376 110 377
10th Percentile £17.87 £17.93 £14.46
25th Percentile £23.50 £46.25 £33.00
Median hourly rate £57.50 £65.00 £55.00
Median % change year-on-year -11.54% +18.18% -15.38%
75th Percentile £65.00 £68.75 £70.00
90th Percentile £67.67 £73.82 £79.02
England median hourly rate £30.00 £35.00 £36.50
% change year-on-year -14.29% -4.11% +4.29%

Solutions Architect
Job Vacancy Trend in the South West

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 West.

Solutions Architect job vacancy trend in the South West

Solutions Architect
Daily Rate Trend in the South West

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

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

Solutions Architect
Daily Rate Histogram in the South West

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing Solutions Architect in the South West over the 6 months to 30 January 2026.

Daily rate histogram for Solutions Architect in the South West

Solutions Architect
Hourly Rate Trend in the South West

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

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

Solutions Architect
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 Solutions Architect within the South West region over the 6 months to 30 January 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 -15 26 £708 +4.81% 4
Bristol -11 22 £700 +51.35% 5
Devon - 4 - - 2
Somerset -4 2 £550 -13.73% 4
Dorset +3 1 £725 +3.57% 5
Gloucestershire -24 1 - - 1
Solutions Architect
England

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

For the 6 months to 30 January 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 West region featuring Solutions Architect in the job title.

1 41 (68.33%) Security Cleared
2 21 (35.00%) SC Cleared
3 19 (31.67%) DV Cleared
4 12 (20.00%) Identity Access Management
4 12 (20.00%) Microsoft
4 12 (20.00%) Stakeholder Engagement
5 10 (16.67%) Stakeholder Management
5 10 (16.67%) Technical Leadership
5 10 (16.67%) TOGAF
6 8 (13.33%) Enterprise Architecture
6 8 (13.33%) Windows
7 7 (11.67%) Collaborative Working
7 7 (11.67%) PowerShell
7 7 (11.67%) Problem-Solving
7 7 (11.67%) Roadmaps
7 7 (11.67%) Windows Server
8 6 (10.00%) Active Directory
8 6 (10.00%) Active Directory Federation Services
8 6 (10.00%) Agile
8 6 (10.00%) AWS
8 6 (10.00%) Azure
8 6 (10.00%) DevOps
8 6 (10.00%) DNS
8 6 (10.00%) Firewall
8 6 (10.00%) Load Balancing
8 6 (10.00%) Mentoring
8 6 (10.00%) Microsoft Certification
8 6 (10.00%) OAuth
8 6 (10.00%) OAuth2
8 6 (10.00%) OpenID

Solutions Architect Skill Set
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 2 (3.33%) Confluence
2 1 (1.67%) Apache
2 1 (1.67%) SharePoint
Business Applications
1 4 (6.67%) SAP PP
2 3 (5.00%) SAP EWM
2 3 (5.00%) SAP PM
2 3 (5.00%) SAP QM
2 3 (5.00%) SAP S/4HANA
3 2 (3.33%) SAP WM
3 2 (3.33%) Sparx Enterprise Architect
4 1 (1.67%) Dynamics CRM
4 1 (1.67%) NetSuite
Cloud Services
1 6 (10.00%) AWS
1 6 (10.00%) Azure
2 2 (3.33%) Azure DevOps
2 2 (3.33%) Dynamics 365
2 2 (3.33%) GCP
2 2 (3.33%) GitHub
2 2 (3.33%) SaaS
3 1 (1.67%) Amazon Bedrock
3 1 (1.67%) Azure AI
3 1 (1.67%) Azure API Management
3 1 (1.67%) Azure Event Grid
3 1 (1.67%) Azure Key Vault
3 1 (1.67%) Intacct
Communications & Networking
1 6 (10.00%) DNS
1 6 (10.00%) Firewall
2 2 (3.33%) DWDM
2 2 (3.33%) SDH
Database & Business Intelligence
1 3 (5.00%) Data Warehouse
Development Applications
1 3 (5.00%) Artifactory
2 2 (3.33%) JIRA
2 2 (3.33%) MSI
2 2 (3.33%) Rational DOORS
3 1 (1.67%) GitLab
General
1 18 (30.00%) Social Skills
2 9 (15.00%) Public Sector
3 8 (13.33%) Documentation Skills
4 4 (6.67%) Manufacturing
4 4 (6.67%) Military
5 2 (3.33%) Analytical Skills
5 2 (3.33%) Finance
5 2 (3.33%) Pharmaceutical
5 2 (3.33%) Telecoms
6 1 (1.67%) Legal
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 6 (10.00%) OAuth
1 6 (10.00%) OAuth2
1 6 (10.00%) OpenID
1 6 (10.00%) SAML
2 3 (5.00%) Middleware
3 2 (3.33%) REST
3 2 (3.33%) RESTful
4 1 (1.67%) .NET
4 1 (1.67%) ADO
4 1 (1.67%) Apache NiFi
4 1 (1.67%) SOAP
Miscellaneous
1 2 (3.33%) Data Centre
1 2 (3.33%) Legacy Systems
1 2 (3.33%) Wiki
2 1 (1.67%) Blackberry
2 1 (1.67%) Client/Server
2 1 (1.67%) FMCG
2 1 (1.67%) Legacy Applications
2 1 (1.67%) Operational Technology
2 1 (1.67%) Product Ownership
Operating Systems
1 8 (13.33%) Windows
2 7 (11.67%) Windows Server
3 2 (3.33%) Linux
3 2 (3.33%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
3 2 (3.33%) Ubuntu
4 1 (1.67%) Android
4 1 (1.67%) Apple iOS
Processes & Methodologies
1 12 (20.00%) Identity Access Management
1 12 (20.00%) Stakeholder Engagement
2 10 (16.67%) Stakeholder Management
2 10 (16.67%) Technical Leadership
2 10 (16.67%) TOGAF
3 8 (13.33%) Enterprise Architecture
4 7 (11.67%) Collaborative Working
4 7 (11.67%) Problem-Solving
4 7 (11.67%) Roadmaps
5 6 (10.00%) Agile
5 6 (10.00%) DevOps
5 6 (10.00%) Load Balancing
5 6 (10.00%) Mentoring
5 6 (10.00%) RBAC
5 6 (10.00%) Translating Business Requirements
6 5 (8.33%) CI/CD
6 5 (8.33%) Decision-Making
6 5 (8.33%) Identity Management
6 5 (8.33%) Service Management
7 4 (6.67%) Containerisation
Programming Languages
1 7 (11.67%) PowerShell
2 1 (1.67%) Java
2 1 (1.67%) Python
Qualifications
1 41 (68.33%) Security Cleared
2 21 (35.00%) SC Cleared
3 19 (31.67%) DV Cleared
4 6 (10.00%) Microsoft Certification
5 2 (3.33%) AWS Certification
5 2 (3.33%) AWS Certified Solutions Architect
5 2 (3.33%) Azure Certification
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 2 (3.33%) NCSC
1 2 (3.33%) QA
2 1 (1.67%) Accessibility
2 1 (1.67%) GDPR
2 1 (1.67%) Government Security Classifications
2 1 (1.67%) ISO/IEC 27001
2 1 (1.67%) NIST
System Software
1 6 (10.00%) Active Directory
2 2 (3.33%) Docker
Systems Management
1 6 (10.00%) Active Directory Federation Services
1 6 (10.00%) Single Sign-On
2 5 (8.33%) Kubernetes
3 2 (3.33%) SCOM
3 2 (3.33%) Terraform
4 1 (1.67%) Ansible
4 1 (1.67%) Microsoft Intune
Vendors
1 12 (20.00%) Microsoft
2 5 (8.33%) SAP
3 4 (6.67%) IBM
4 3 (5.00%) Salesforce
4 3 (5.00%) ServiceNow
5 2 (3.33%) Atlassian
5 2 (3.33%) Cisco
5 2 (3.33%) F5
5 2 (3.33%) Juniper
5 2 (3.33%) Nokia
5 2 (3.33%) Oracle
5 2 (3.33%) Palo Alto
5 2 (3.33%) Sparx
6 1 (1.67%) Citrix
6 1 (1.67%) Foundry
6 1 (1.67%) MobileIron
6 1 (1.67%) Red Hat
6 1 (1.67%) Sage
6 1 (1.67%) Talend
6 1 (1.67%) VMware