Architect Contract Job Trends in the UK excluding London

Architect
UK > UK excluding London

The median Architect daily rate in the UK excluding London is £613, according to job vacancies posted in the 6 months leading up to 22 May 2026.

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

6 months to
22 May 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 10 19 13
Rank change year-on-year +9 -6 +5
Contract jobs requiring an Architect 2,403 1,069 2,022
As % of all contract jobs in the UK excluding London 9.75% 8.39% 9.99%
As % of the Job Titles category 10.61% 9.13% 10.79%
Number of daily rates quoted 1,589 719 1,210
10th Percentile £450 £450 £495
25th Percentile £513 £525 £563
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £613 £600 £650
Median % change year-on-year +2.08% -7.69% -
75th Percentile £713 £700 £731
90th Percentile £775 £750 £800
UK median daily rate £618 £625 £650
% change year-on-year -1.20% -3.85% -1.18%
Number of hourly rates quoted 119 25 87
10th Percentile £48.72 £45.58 £60.00
25th Percentile £60.00 £62.50 £60.63
Median hourly rate £65.00 £72.50 £70.00
Median % change year-on-year -10.34% +3.57% -
75th Percentile £78.75 £80.00 £86.32
90th Percentile £95.50 £85.50 £88.80
UK median hourly rate £65.00 £72.50 £70.00
% change year-on-year -10.34% +3.57% -

All Contract IT Job Roles
UK excluding London

For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all contract IT job vacancies in the UK excluding London. 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 UK excluding London with a recognized job title 22,657 11,703 18,731
% of contract IT jobs with a recognized job title 91.93% 91.90% 92.50%
Number of daily rates quoted 13,109 7,489 11,452
10th Percentile £300 £213 £213
25th Percentile £402 £363 £363
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £475 £488
Median % change year-on-year +5.26% -2.56% -2.50%
75th Percentile £588 £575 £594
90th Percentile £684 £650 £688
UK median daily rate £513 £510 £525
% change year-on-year +0.49% -2.86% -3.31%
Number of hourly rates quoted 2,560 825 2,272
10th Percentile £14.64 £14.00 £12.50
25th Percentile £19.91 £17.30 £15.74
Median hourly rate £45.00 £27.13 £40.00
Median % change year-on-year +65.90% -32.19% -5.88%
75th Percentile £67.25 £63.75 £61.60
90th Percentile £78.75 £75.00 £73.75
UK median hourly rate £42.69 £28.15 £36.50
% change year-on-year +51.63% -22.88% -18.89%

Architect
Job Vacancy Trend in the UK excluding London

Historical trend showing the proportion of contract IT job postings featuring 'Architect' in the job title relative to all contract IT jobs advertised in the UK excluding London.

Architect job vacancy trend in the UK excluding London

Architect
Daily Rate Trend in the UK excluding London

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for Architect job vacancies in the UK excluding London.

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for Architect job vacancies in the UK excluding London

Architect
Daily Rate Histogram in the UK excluding London

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing Architect in the UK excluding London over the 6 months to 22 May 2026.

Daily rate histogram for Architect in the UK excluding London

Architect
Hourly Rate Trend in the UK excluding London

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for Architect job vacancies in the UK excluding London.

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for Architect job vacancies in the UK excluding London

Architect
Hourly Rate Histogram in the UK excluding London

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing Architect in the UK excluding London over the 6 months to 22 May 2026.

Hourly rate histogram for Architect in the UK excluding London

Architect
Contract Job Locations in the UK excluding London

The table below looks at the demand and provides a guide to the median contractor rates quoted in IT jobs citing Architect within the UK excluding London region over the 6 months to 22 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
South East +6 697 £625 - 189
North of England +6 663 £600 - 184
Midlands +1 434 £600 - 85
North West +6 370 £610 +5.35% 98
West Midlands -1 311 £620 +3.33% 54
South West +1 269 £663 +10.54% 93
Yorkshire +4 250 £557 -7.25% 49
East of England +24 203 £569 -12.50% 64
Scotland +16 140 £650 +4.00% 51
East Midlands -1 117 £550 +2.42% 31
North East +4 51 £575 -4.17% 39
Wales -5 30 £600 +25.00% 45
Northern Ireland +5 8 £475 -28.30% 10
Architect
UK

Architect Skill Set
Top 30 Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities in the UK excluding London

For the 6 months to 22 May 2026, 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 UK excluding London region featuring Architect in the job title.

1 724 (30.13%) Security Cleared
2 473 (19.68%) Azure
3 422 (17.56%) SC Cleared
4 363 (15.11%) AWS
5 339 (14.11%) Agile
6 329 (13.69%) Roadmaps
7 321 (13.36%) Microsoft
8 261 (10.86%) Stakeholder Management
9 254 (10.57%) Migration
10 250 (10.40%) DV Cleared
10 250 (10.40%) Enterprise Architecture
11 245 (10.20%) DevOps
12 219 (9.11%) CI/CD
13 206 (8.57%) Technical Leadership
14 186 (7.74%) Integration Patterns
15 184 (7.66%) Architectural Patterns
15 184 (7.66%) Data Modelling
15 184 (7.66%) Stakeholder Engagement
16 182 (7.57%) Microservices
17 175 (7.28%) TOGAF
18 165 (6.87%) Data Architecture
19 158 (6.58%) Architectural Design
20 148 (6.16%) Problem-Solving
21 146 (6.08%) SAP
22 143 (5.95%) Cybersecurity
23 134 (5.58%) Analytics
24 132 (5.49%) GCP
25 131 (5.45%) AI
26 129 (5.37%) VMware
27 125 (5.20%) ServiceNow

Architect Skill Set
Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities in the UK excluding London 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 64 (2.66%) SharePoint
2 61 (2.54%) Confluence
3 37 (1.54%) Microsoft Exchange
4 19 (0.79%) SAS
5 13 (0.54%) Appian
6 11 (0.46%) Apache Airflow
7 10 (0.42%) Anypoint
7 10 (0.42%) Apache
7 10 (0.42%) CMS
8 8 (0.33%) Apache Spark
9 7 (0.29%) ArcGIS
10 6 (0.25%) Adobe Experience Manager
10 6 (0.25%) NetWeaver
10 6 (0.25%) Sitecore CMS
10 6 (0.25%) WebLogic
11 5 (0.21%) SAP EP
12 4 (0.17%) OpenStack
12 4 (0.17%) Oracle SOA Suite
12 4 (0.17%) Skype for Business
12 4 (0.17%) Smallworld
Applications
1 27 (1.12%) Microsoft Office
2 17 (0.71%) Microsoft Project
3 13 (0.54%) Microsoft Excel
3 13 (0.54%) Microsoft PowerPoint
4 7 (0.29%) Navisworks
4 7 (0.29%) Revit
5 5 (0.21%) MS Visio
6 4 (0.17%) Chatbot
7 2 (0.083%) Spreadsheet
8 1 (0.042%) OrCAD
Business Applications
1 57 (2.37%) SAP S/4HANA
2 23 (0.96%) Sparx Enterprise Architect
3 20 (0.83%) Payment Gateway
4 12 (0.50%) SAP ERP
5 10 (0.42%) Teamcenter
6 9 (0.37%) Remedy ITSM
6 9 (0.37%) Workday HCM
7 6 (0.25%) SAP MDG
8 5 (0.21%) SAP CRM
9 4 (0.17%) Oracle Retail
9 4 (0.17%) Salesforce CRM
9 4 (0.17%) SAP GRC
10 3 (0.12%) Dynamics CRM
10 3 (0.12%) Oracle Payables
10 3 (0.12%) SAP SD
11 2 (0.083%) Dynamics AX
11 2 (0.083%) Infor M3
11 2 (0.083%) Maximo
11 2 (0.083%) NetSuite
11 2 (0.083%) Oracle ERP
Cloud Services
1 473 (19.68%) Azure
2 363 (15.11%) AWS
3 132 (5.49%) GCP
4 93 (3.87%) Entra ID
4 93 (3.87%) Power Platform
5 81 (3.37%) Microsoft 365
6 72 (3.00%) Serverless
7 69 (2.87%) SaaS
8 54 (2.25%) PaaS
9 44 (1.83%) GitHub
10 41 (1.71%) Azure DevOps
10 41 (1.71%) IaaS
11 39 (1.62%) Microsoft Purview
12 35 (1.46%) OpenShift
13 30 (1.25%) OneDrive
14 28 (1.17%) Dynamics 365
15 26 (1.08%) AWS Lambda
15 26 (1.08%) Azure Data Factory
16 24 (1.00%) Azure Synapse Analytics
17 23 (0.96%) Power Automate
Communications & Networking
1 95 (3.95%) Firewall
2 68 (2.83%) WAN
3 67 (2.79%) DNS
4 63 (2.62%) Network Security
5 51 (2.12%) LAN
6 49 (2.04%) VPN
7 39 (1.62%) SD-WAN
8 34 (1.41%) DHCP
9 26 (1.08%) VLAN
10 23 (0.96%) Wireless
11 21 (0.87%) BGP
12 20 (0.83%) SAN
13 19 (0.79%) NAS
14 18 (0.75%) Structured Cabling
15 17 (0.71%) IPsec
16 16 (0.67%) BIG-IP
17 15 (0.62%) MPLS
17 15 (0.62%) OSPF
18 13 (0.54%) NX-OS
19 12 (0.50%) Cisco IOS
Database & Business Intelligence
1 70 (2.91%) Power BI
2 68 (2.83%) Metadata
3 50 (2.08%) Data Warehouse
4 38 (1.58%) SQL Server
5 37 (1.54%) Data Lake
6 34 (1.41%) NoSQL
7 24 (1.00%) PostgreSQL
8 21 (0.87%) Tableau
9 19 (0.79%) Oracle Database
10 14 (0.58%) GIS
11 12 (0.50%) Azure SQL Database
12 11 (0.46%) MongoDB
13 10 (0.42%) Big Data
14 9 (0.37%) DynamoDB
14 9 (0.37%) Relational Database
15 8 (0.33%) Electronic Patient Records
16 7 (0.29%) Metadata Repository
16 7 (0.29%) MySQL
16 7 (0.29%) Spatial Data
17 6 (0.25%) SAP BW
Development Applications
1 74 (3.08%) JIRA
2 40 (1.66%) Jenkins
3 22 (0.92%) Git
4 21 (0.87%) GitLab
5 7 (0.29%) Artifactory
5 7 (0.29%) ERwin
6 5 (0.21%) Selenium
6 5 (0.21%) SonarQube
6 5 (0.21%) Sonatype Nexus
7 4 (0.17%) Bitbucket
7 4 (0.17%) Hudson
7 4 (0.17%) JUnit
7 4 (0.17%) Postman
7 4 (0.17%) REST Assured
8 3 (0.12%) Cucumber
8 3 (0.12%) MLflow
8 3 (0.12%) Rational DOORS
9 2 (0.083%) Cypress.io
9 2 (0.083%) Gatling
9 2 (0.083%) NeoLoad
General
1 417 (17.35%) Social Skills
2 317 (13.19%) Finance
3 221 (9.20%) Public Sector
4 141 (5.87%) Banking
5 128 (5.33%) Analytical Skills
6 71 (2.95%) Retail
7 57 (2.37%) Documentation Skills
8 52 (2.16%) Legal
9 51 (2.12%) Manufacturing
10 47 (1.96%) Military
11 33 (1.37%) Influencing Skills
12 30 (1.25%) Aerospace
13 26 (1.08%) Investment Banking
14 24 (1.00%) Presentation Skills
15 21 (0.87%) Telecoms
16 20 (0.83%) Marketing
17 19 (0.79%) Financial Institution
18 18 (0.75%) Back Office
19 13 (0.54%) Billing
20 10 (0.42%) Retail Banking
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 94 (3.91%) REST
2 79 (3.29%) Middleware
3 50 (2.08%) .NET
4 46 (1.91%) OAuth
5 42 (1.75%) OpenID
6 39 (1.62%) SOAP
7 31 (1.29%) OAuth2
8 30 (1.25%) SAML
9 27 (1.12%) SailPoint
10 26 (1.08%) Kafka
11 25 (1.04%) Oracle Fusion
11 25 (1.04%) RESTful
12 22 (0.92%) JSON
13 20 (0.83%) Node.js
13 20 (0.83%) React
14 18 (0.75%) Web Services
15 17 (0.71%) LDAP
16 16 (0.67%) Microsoft Graph
17 13 (0.54%) AngularJS
18 12 (0.50%) YAML
Miscellaneous
1 162 (6.74%) Cloud Native
2 82 (3.41%) Data Centre
3 77 (3.20%) Product Ownership
4 62 (2.58%) Operational Technology
5 53 (2.21%) Public Cloud
6 52 (2.16%) Onboarding
7 49 (2.04%) Management Information System
8 48 (2.00%) Hybrid Cloud
9 44 (1.83%) Data Protection Act
10 39 (1.62%) Enterprise Software
11 38 (1.58%) Distributed Systems
12 37 (1.54%) Legacy Systems
13 34 (1.41%) PKI
14 28 (1.17%) SCADA
15 25 (1.04%) CMDB
16 19 (0.79%) Data Structures
16 19 (0.79%) Private Cloud
17 17 (0.71%) AI Agents
17 17 (0.71%) Security Posture
18 15 (0.62%) Mainframe
Operating Systems
1 113 (4.70%) Windows
2 64 (2.66%) Linux
3 30 (1.25%) Windows Server
4 16 (0.67%) Android
4 16 (0.67%) Apple iOS
5 12 (0.50%) Unix
6 9 (0.37%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
7 8 (0.33%) Windows 10
7 8 (0.33%) Windows Server 2016
8 7 (0.29%) Windows 7
9 5 (0.21%) Windows Server 2019
10 4 (0.17%) Mac OS
11 3 (0.12%) Data ONTAP
11 3 (0.12%) Windows Server 2012
12 2 (0.083%) VMS
13 1 (0.042%) CentOS
13 1 (0.042%) Kali Linux
13 1 (0.042%) Ubuntu
13 1 (0.042%) Windows Server 2008
13 1 (0.042%) zOS
Processes & Methodologies
1 339 (14.11%) Agile
2 329 (13.69%) Roadmaps
3 261 (10.86%) Stakeholder Management
4 254 (10.57%) Migration
5 250 (10.40%) Enterprise Architecture
6 245 (10.20%) DevOps
7 219 (9.11%) CI/CD
8 206 (8.57%) Technical Leadership
9 186 (7.74%) Integration Patterns
10 184 (7.66%) Architectural Patterns
10 184 (7.66%) Data Modelling
10 184 (7.66%) Stakeholder Engagement
11 182 (7.57%) Microservices
12 175 (7.28%) TOGAF
13 165 (6.87%) Data Architecture
14 158 (6.58%) Architectural Design
15 148 (6.16%) Problem-Solving
16 143 (5.95%) Cybersecurity
17 134 (5.58%) Analytics
18 131 (5.45%) AI
Programming Languages
1 103 (4.29%) Python
2 95 (3.95%) SQL
3 71 (2.95%) PowerShell
4 66 (2.75%) Java
5 47 (1.96%) JavaScript
6 30 (1.25%) C#
7 21 (0.87%) Bicep
8 15 (0.62%) Bash
8 15 (0.62%) TypeScript
9 12 (0.50%) PL/SQL
10 10 (0.42%) Kusto Query Language
11 7 (0.29%) VBA
12 6 (0.25%) Scala
13 5 (0.21%) ABAP
13 5 (0.21%) Apex Code
14 4 (0.17%) Data Analysis Expressions
14 4 (0.17%) Kotlin
14 4 (0.17%) T-SQL
14 4 (0.17%) VB
14 4 (0.17%) VBScript
Qualifications
1 724 (30.13%) Security Cleared
2 422 (17.56%) SC Cleared
3 250 (10.40%) DV Cleared
4 97 (4.04%) Degree
5 58 (2.41%) TOGAF Certification
6 52 (2.16%) BPSS Clearance
7 45 (1.87%) Cisco Certification
8 35 (1.46%) CISSP
9 33 (1.37%) Computer Science Degree
10 32 (1.33%) Azure Certification
11 31 (1.29%) AWS Certification
11 31 (1.29%) CCNP
12 20 (0.83%) Microsoft Certification
13 18 (0.75%) CISM
14 16 (0.67%) Master's Degree
15 15 (0.62%) CCNA
16 14 (0.58%) AWS Certified Solutions Architect
17 12 (0.50%) ITIL Certification
18 11 (0.46%) Network+ Certification
18 11 (0.46%) Server+ Certification
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 90 (3.75%) NIST
2 74 (3.08%) GDPR
3 61 (2.54%) Data Quality
4 56 (2.33%) ISO/IEC 27001
5 46 (1.91%) NCSC
6 22 (0.92%) QA
7 20 (0.83%) Accessibility
8 16 (0.67%) Cyber Essentials
8 16 (0.67%) PCI DSS
9 14 (0.58%) GRC
10 12 (0.50%) FINRA
10 12 (0.50%) MiFID
11 11 (0.46%) COBIT
11 11 (0.46%) NIST 800
12 10 (0.42%) ISO 20022
13 7 (0.29%) Disclosure Scotland
13 7 (0.29%) HL7
13 7 (0.29%) ISO 19650
14 6 (0.25%) IFRS
14 6 (0.25%) SEPA
System Software
1 100 (4.16%) Active Directory
2 58 (2.41%) VMware Infrastructure
3 34 (1.41%) Docker
4 32 (1.33%) VMware NSX
5 20 (0.83%) Hyper-V
5 20 (0.83%) vSphere
6 19 (0.79%) Virtual Desktop
7 11 (0.46%) VMware ESXi
8 10 (0.42%) vCloud
9 7 (0.29%) Virtual Machines
10 5 (0.21%) RACF
11 4 (0.17%) BitLocker
11 4 (0.17%) NFS
12 3 (0.12%) IAG
13 2 (0.083%) Active Directory Lightweight Directory Services
13 2 (0.083%) Firmware
14 1 (0.042%) Embedded Firmware
14 1 (0.042%) KVM
14 1 (0.042%) ProxySG
14 1 (0.042%) Slurm Workload Manager
Systems Management
1 82 (3.41%) Terraform
2 79 (3.29%) Kubernetes
3 55 (2.29%) Ansible
4 35 (1.46%) Microsoft Intune
5 26 (1.08%) Single Sign-On
5 26 (1.08%) vCenter Server
6 17 (0.71%) OPNET
7 15 (0.62%) SCCM
8 14 (0.58%) Active Directory Federation Services
9 12 (0.50%) FortiGate
10 10 (0.42%) Argo
10 10 (0.42%) Grafana
11 8 (0.33%) WMI
12 7 (0.29%) Istio
13 6 (0.25%) Jamf Pro
13 6 (0.25%) Prometheus
14 5 (0.21%) Endace
15 3 (0.12%) CASB
15 3 (0.12%) EMC VPLEX
15 3 (0.12%) Puppet
Vendors
1 321 (13.36%) Microsoft
2 146 (6.08%) SAP
3 129 (5.37%) VMware
4 125 (5.20%) ServiceNow
5 99 (4.12%) Oracle
6 70 (2.91%) Cisco
7 59 (2.46%) Salesforce
8 54 (2.25%) Databricks
9 52 (2.16%) Google
10 46 (1.91%) MuleSoft
11 29 (1.21%) Citrix
11 29 (1.21%) Red Hat
12 28 (1.17%) F5
12 28 (1.17%) Remedy
13 25 (1.04%) BiZZdesign
13 25 (1.04%) Palo Alto
14 24 (1.00%) Sparx
15 22 (0.92%) Juniper
16 20 (0.83%) Atlassian
16 20 (0.83%) Talend