Python Contract Job Trends in the Thames Valley

Python
South East > Thames Valley

The table below provides summary statistics and contractor rates for jobs advertised in the Thames Valley requiring Python skills. It covers contract job vacancies from the 6 months leading up to 24 April 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
24 Apr 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 20 16 33
Rank change year-on-year -4 +17 -12
Contract jobs citing Python 251 146 141
As % of all contract jobs in the Thames Valley 8.65% 9.74% 5.19%
As % of the Programming Languages category 46.57% 36.59% 26.21%
Number of daily rates quoted 179 90 104
10th Percentile £312 £350 £360
25th Percentile £393 £451 £459
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £471 £500 £525
Median % change year-on-year -5.80% -4.76% -
75th Percentile £560 £589 £600
90th Percentile £650 £638 £675
South East median daily rate £500 £525 £525
% change year-on-year -4.76% - -4.55%
Number of hourly rates quoted 16 0 9
10th Percentile £35.85 - £61.25
25th Percentile £43.81 - -
Median hourly rate £52.50 - £65.00
75th Percentile £80.65 - £67.50
90th Percentile £83.75 - £71.50
South East median hourly rate £48.02 £56.25 £65.00
% change year-on-year -14.63% -13.46% +44.44%

All Programming Languages
Thames Valley

Python falls under the Programming Languages category. For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all contract job vacancies requiring coding skills in the Thames Valley.

Contract vacancies with a requirement for coding skills 539 399 538
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the Thames Valley 18.58% 26.62% 19.80%
Number of daily rates quoted 389 252 371
10th Percentile £310 £339 £358
25th Percentile £394 £450 £425
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £475 £501 £525
Median % change year-on-year -5.09% -4.67% +0.96%
75th Percentile £575 £608 £608
90th Percentile £638 £699 £669
South East median daily rate £500 £513 £500
% change year-on-year -2.44% +2.50% -4.76%
Number of hourly rates quoted 20 7 30
10th Percentile £42.22 £26.49 £33.94
25th Percentile £49.39 £40.75 £46.25
Median hourly rate £65.00 £55.00 £58.30
Median % change year-on-year +18.18% -5.66% +6.00%
75th Percentile £82.25 £65.62 £65.00
90th Percentile £83.75 £70.25 £67.63
South East median hourly rate £52.50 £56.75 £60.00
% change year-on-year -7.49% -5.42% +9.09%

Python
Job Vacancy Trend in the Thames Valley

Historical trend showing the proportion of contract IT job postings citing Python relative to all contract IT jobs advertised in the Thames Valley.

Python job vacancy trend in the Thames Valley

Python
Daily Rate Trend in the Thames Valley

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in the Thames Valley citing Python.

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in the Thames Valley citing Python

Python
Daily Rate Histogram in the Thames Valley

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing Python in the Thames Valley over the 6 months to 24 April 2026.

Daily rate histogram for Python in the Thames Valley

Python
Hourly Rate Trend in the Thames Valley

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in the Thames Valley citing Python.

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in the Thames Valley citing Python

Python
Hourly Rate Histogram in the Thames Valley

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing Python in the Thames Valley over the 6 months to 24 April 2026.

Hourly rate histogram for Python in the Thames Valley

Python
Contract Job Locations in the Thames Valley

The table below looks at the demand and provides a guide to the median contractor rates quoted in IT jobs citing Python within the Thames Valley region over the 6 months to 24 April 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
Berkshire -5 175 £430 -14.00% 40
Buckinghamshire -6 43 £515 +19.35% 19
Oxfordshire +2 33 £575 +46.50% 52
Python
South East

Python
Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities in the Thames Valley 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 5 (1.99%) OpenStack
2 4 (1.59%) Apache Spark
2 4 (1.59%) WebSphere
2 4 (1.59%) WebSphere Application Server
3 2 (0.80%) Apache
3 2 (0.80%) ArcGIS
3 2 (0.80%) IBM HTTP Server
3 2 (0.80%) JBoss
3 2 (0.80%) Oracle HTTP Server
3 2 (0.80%) WebSphere Portal
4 1 (0.40%) Confluence
Applications
1 5 (1.99%) MS Visio
2 4 (1.59%) CPLEX
2 4 (1.59%) Microsoft Excel
2 4 (1.59%) Microsoft Office
2 4 (1.59%) Microsoft PowerPoint
Cloud Services
1 111 (44.22%) Azure
2 86 (34.26%) AWS
3 50 (19.92%) GCP
4 22 (8.76%) Azure DevOps
5 21 (8.37%) GitHub
6 17 (6.77%) Entra ID
7 16 (6.37%) GitHub Actions
8 11 (4.38%) Azure Monitor
8 11 (4.38%) Serverless
9 9 (3.59%) OpenShift
9 9 (3.59%) Power Platform
10 7 (2.79%) Azure Functions
10 7 (2.79%) Azure Key Vault
10 7 (2.79%) Azure Sentinel
11 6 (2.39%) AWS CloudFormation
11 6 (2.39%) AWS Lambda
12 5 (1.99%) Amazon S3
12 5 (1.99%) Azure AKS
12 5 (1.99%) Azure Data Factory
12 5 (1.99%) dbt
Communications & Networking
1 13 (5.18%) Network Security
2 11 (4.38%) Firewall
2 11 (4.38%) TCP/IP
3 8 (3.19%) BGP
3 8 (3.19%) MPLS
3 8 (3.19%) WAN
4 7 (2.79%) DNS
5 5 (1.99%) SNMP
5 5 (1.99%) SSL
5 5 (1.99%) Wireshark
6 4 (1.59%) 5G
6 4 (1.59%) DHCP
6 4 (1.59%) LTE
6 4 (1.59%) SSH
6 4 (1.59%) TACACS
7 3 (1.20%) Diameter Protocol
7 3 (1.20%) LAN
7 3 (1.20%) VoLTE
7 3 (1.20%) VoWiFi
7 3 (1.20%) VPN
Database & Business Intelligence
1 23 (9.16%) SQL Server
2 19 (7.57%) MySQL
2 19 (7.57%) PostgreSQL
2 19 (7.57%) Relational Database
3 12 (4.78%) NoSQL
4 9 (3.59%) Power BI
5 8 (3.19%) Big Data
6 7 (2.79%) Azure SQL Database
6 7 (2.79%) MongoDB
7 6 (2.39%) Data Warehouse
7 6 (2.39%) Tableau
8 5 (1.99%) Hadoop
9 4 (1.59%) Amazon Redshift
9 4 (1.59%) Data Lake
10 3 (1.20%) Parquet
11 2 (0.80%) Amazon Athena
11 2 (0.80%) Amazon RDS
11 2 (0.80%) DynamoDB
11 2 (0.80%) Metadata
11 2 (0.80%) Redis
Development Applications
1 25 (9.96%) Git
2 14 (5.58%) Jenkins
3 6 (2.39%) GitLab
4 4 (1.59%) Jaeger
5 3 (1.20%) JIRA
6 2 (0.80%) Introscope
7 1 (0.40%) Artifactory
7 1 (0.40%) Burp Suite
7 1 (0.40%) JUnit
7 1 (0.40%) Metasploit
7 1 (0.40%) Sonatype Nexus
7 1 (0.40%) Storybook
7 1 (0.40%) Visual Studio
General
1 89 (35.46%) Social Skills
2 47 (18.73%) Analytical Skills
3 36 (14.34%) Public Sector
4 34 (13.55%) Documentation Skills
5 6 (2.39%) Telecoms
6 5 (1.99%) Aerospace
7 3 (1.20%) Billing
8 2 (0.80%) Advertising
8 2 (0.80%) Finance
8 2 (0.80%) Inclusion and Diversity
8 2 (0.80%) Military
8 2 (0.80%) Retail
9 1 (0.40%) Banking
9 1 (0.40%) Legal
9 1 (0.40%) Marketing
9 1 (0.40%) Organisational Skills
9 1 (0.40%) Pharmaceutical
Job Titles
1 49 (19.52%) Senior
2 38 (15.14%) Developer
3 28 (11.16%) SIEM Engineer
4 25 (9.96%) Python Developer
5 19 (7.57%) Data Engineer
6 13 (5.18%) DevOps Engineer
7 10 (3.98%) Analyst
7 10 (3.98%) Azure Engineer
7 10 (3.98%) Senior Data Engineer
7 10 (3.98%) Site Reliability Engineer
8 9 (3.59%) Senior Developer
8 9 (3.59%) Site Engineer
8 9 (3.59%) Technical Support
9 7 (2.79%) Architect
9 7 (2.79%) Azure DevOps Engineer
9 7 (2.79%) Platform Engineer
9 7 (2.79%) Security Engineer
9 7 (2.79%) Senior DevOps
9 7 (2.79%) Senior DevOps Engineer
10 6 (2.39%) IAM Specialist
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 26 (10.36%) LDAP
2 25 (9.96%) .NET
3 16 (6.37%) OAuth
3 16 (6.37%) REST
3 16 (6.37%) RESTful
4 11 (4.38%) OAuth2
5 10 (3.98%) OpenID
5 10 (3.98%) React
5 10 (3.98%) SAML
6 9 (3.59%) FastAPI
6 9 (3.59%) GraphQL
7 8 (3.19%) Kafka
7 8 (3.19%) Loki
7 8 (3.19%) Middleware
7 8 (3.19%) Node.js
7 8 (3.19%) PySpark
7 8 (3.19%) Web Services
8 7 (2.79%) .NET Core
9 6 (2.39%) NETCONF
9 6 (2.39%) SailPoint
Miscellaneous
1 35 (13.94%) Onboarding
2 27 (10.76%) Distributed Systems
3 15 (5.98%) Cloud Native
4 13 (5.18%) Algorithms
4 13 (5.18%) Hybrid Cloud
5 11 (4.38%) Cyber Security Posture
6 9 (3.59%) Management Information System
7 8 (3.19%) Enterprise Software
7 8 (3.19%) Operational Technology
8 7 (2.79%) Analytical Mindset
9 6 (2.39%) Security Posture
10 5 (1.99%) Clustering
10 5 (1.99%) Data Centre
10 5 (1.99%) Greenfield Project
10 5 (1.99%) PKI
11 4 (1.59%) Data Structures
11 4 (1.59%) Linux Command Line
11 4 (1.59%) Security Operations Centre
11 4 (1.59%) Self-Motivation
12 3 (1.20%) Distributed Architecture
Operating Systems
1 59 (23.51%) Linux
2 40 (15.94%) Windows
3 29 (11.55%) Unix
4 10 (3.98%) Windows Server
5 6 (2.39%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
6 2 (0.80%) Oracle Linux
6 2 (0.80%) SUSE Linux Enterprise Server
6 2 (0.80%) VMS
7 1 (0.40%) Debian
7 1 (0.40%) Kali Linux
7 1 (0.40%) Mac OS
7 1 (0.40%) Ubuntu
Processes & Methodologies
1 87 (34.66%) CI/CD
2 80 (31.87%) Problem-Solving
3 76 (30.28%) SIEM
4 74 (29.48%) DevOps
5 51 (20.32%) Cybersecurity
6 42 (16.73%) Analytics
7 31 (12.35%) DevSecOps
8 30 (11.95%) Infrastructure as Code
9 29 (11.55%) Agile
9 29 (11.55%) Computer Science
10 24 (9.56%) Data Analysis
10 24 (9.56%) Runbook
11 23 (9.16%) AI
11 23 (9.16%) Observability
11 23 (9.16%) Site Reliability Engineering
11 23 (9.16%) Stakeholder Management
12 22 (8.76%) Containerisation
12 22 (8.76%) High Availability
12 22 (8.76%) Machine Learning
13 21 (8.37%) Data Pipeline
Programming Languages
1 117 (46.61%) PowerShell
2 47 (18.73%) SQL
3 44 (17.53%) Bash
4 30 (11.95%) Go
5 29 (11.55%) Java
6 25 (9.96%) JavaScript
7 24 (9.56%) Kusto Query Language
8 21 (8.37%) C#
9 14 (5.58%) Perl
10 7 (2.79%) PHP
11 5 (1.99%) T-SQL
11 5 (1.99%) TypeScript
12 4 (1.59%) R
13 3 (1.20%) Shell Script
14 2 (0.80%) Bicep
14 2 (0.80%) Jython
14 2 (0.80%) Rust
14 2 (0.80%) Scala
15 1 (0.40%) C++
15 1 (0.40%) PL/SQL
Qualifications
1 127 (50.60%) Security Cleared
2 107 (42.63%) SC Cleared
3 35 (13.94%) CISSP
4 29 (11.55%) Degree
5 19 (7.57%) CISM
6 15 (5.98%) GIAC
7 14 (5.58%) CEH
8 12 (4.78%) DV Cleared
9 11 (4.38%) Computer Science Degree
10 7 (2.79%) AWS Certification
10 7 (2.79%) Azure Certification
10 7 (2.79%) BPSS Clearance
10 7 (2.79%) CCIE
10 7 (2.79%) Cisco Certification
11 6 (2.39%) JNCIE
12 5 (1.99%) Microsoft Certification
13 4 (1.59%) AWS Certified Solutions Architect
14 3 (1.20%) GCIA
14 3 (1.20%) GCIH
14 3 (1.20%) RHCE
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 46 (18.33%) ISO/IEC 27001
2 45 (17.93%) NIST
3 27 (10.76%) GDPR
4 14 (5.58%) Data Quality
5 5 (1.99%) PCI DSS
5 5 (1.99%) QA
6 4 (1.59%) GRC
7 3 (1.20%) SLA
8 1 (0.40%) Actionable Recommendations
8 1 (0.40%) HIPAA
8 1 (0.40%) NCSC
System Software
1 49 (19.52%) Active Directory
2 26 (10.36%) Docker
3 6 (2.39%) VMware Infrastructure
4 5 (1.99%) Hyper-V
5 1 (0.40%) Oracle RAC
5 1 (0.40%) Virtual Desktop
5 1 (0.40%) Virtual Machines
5 1 (0.40%) vSphere
Systems Management
1 47 (18.73%) Kubernetes
2 29 (11.55%) Terraform
3 21 (8.37%) Ansible
4 17 (6.77%) Grafana
4 17 (6.77%) Prometheus
5 13 (5.18%) Kibana
6 6 (2.39%) Rancher
7 5 (1.99%) Argo
8 4 (1.59%) Istio
8 4 (1.59%) Kustomize
9 3 (1.20%) Nessus
9 3 (1.20%) OpenVAS
9 3 (1.20%) Single Sign-On
10 2 (0.80%) CA Wily
10 2 (0.80%) Computer Emergency Response Teams
10 2 (0.80%) Tivoli
11 1 (0.40%) Active Directory Federation Services
11 1 (0.40%) Cisco CUCM
11 1 (0.40%) Microsoft Intune
11 1 (0.40%) Puppet
Vendors
1 42 (16.73%) Microsoft
2 35 (13.94%) BeyondTrust
2 35 (13.94%) CyberArk
3 21 (8.37%) Oracle
4 15 (5.98%) Tanium
5 14 (5.58%) Databricks
6 12 (4.78%) FireEye
7 10 (3.98%) Red Hat
7 10 (3.98%) Splunk
8 7 (2.79%) VMware
9 6 (2.39%) AppDynamics
9 6 (2.39%) Juniper
9 6 (2.39%) LogRhythm
10 5 (1.99%) Cisco
10 5 (1.99%) F5
10 5 (1.99%) Fortinet
11 4 (1.59%) ArcSight
11 4 (1.59%) Dynatrace
11 4 (1.59%) IBM
12 3 (1.20%) Ericsson