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 £600, according to job vacancies posted in the 6 months leading up to 26 February 2026.

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

6 months to
26 Feb 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 13 18 14
Rank change year-on-year +5 -4 +7
Contract jobs requiring an Architect 2,056 1,189 1,901
As % of all contract jobs in the UK excluding London 9.96% 8.89% 9.22%
As % of the Job Titles category 10.91% 9.62% 9.91%
Number of daily rates quoted 1,345 765 1,175
10th Percentile £447 £450 £500
25th Percentile £506 £547 £570
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £600 £625 £650
Median % change year-on-year -4.00% -3.85% -
75th Percentile £706 £688 £715
90th Percentile £775 £750 £775
UK median daily rate £625 £625 £650
% change year-on-year - -3.85% -
Number of hourly rates quoted 74 24 39
10th Percentile £49.40 £61.50 £56.30
25th Percentile £58.82 £64.88 £61.25
Median hourly rate £70.36 £72.50 £81.27
Median % change year-on-year -2.96% -10.79% +16.09%
75th Percentile £85.00 £78.92 £87.53
90th Percentile £95.00 £84.72 £95.00
UK median hourly rate £70.00 £71.25 £77.64
% change year-on-year -1.75% -8.22% +10.91%

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 18,844 12,360 19,178
% of contract IT jobs with a recognized job title 91.30% 92.36% 93.06%
Number of daily rates quoted 11,291 7,594 11,999
10th Percentile £233 £210 £213
25th Percentile £383 £363 £363
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £481 £475 £488
Median % change year-on-year +1.32% -2.56% -2.50%
75th Percentile £580 £588 £594
90th Percentile £675 £675 £685
UK median daily rate £500 £525 £525
% change year-on-year -4.76% - -4.55%
Number of hourly rates quoted 2,020 639 1,940
10th Percentile £14.25 £15.42 £12.86
25th Percentile £18.50 £21.00 £15.97
Median hourly rate £31.00 £32.50 £35.00
Median % change year-on-year -4.62% -7.14% -2.78%
75th Percentile £63.75 £65.00 £60.00
90th Percentile £73.51 £75.00 £71.87
UK median hourly rate £33.17 £35.00 £35.00
% change year-on-year -5.23% - -10.26%

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 26 February 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 26 February 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 26 February 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 +7 631 £625 - 251
North of England -1 509 £575 -4.17% 113
Midlands -2 361 £575 -4.17% 94
North West -4 283 £596 -0.63% 61
West Midlands -4 270 £600 -1.15% 61
South West +1 261 £706 +12.96% 57
Yorkshire 0 208 £558 -2.62% 32
East of England +15 164 £550 -13.73% 28
Scotland +14 136 £650 +4.00% 31
East Midlands -6 89 £503 -10.27% 33
Wales +4 31 £600 +5.26% 8
North East -11 23 £625 -1.96% 22
Northern Ireland +2 9 £500 -26.47% 1
Architect
UK

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

For the 6 months to 26 February 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.

1 670 (32.59%) Security Cleared
2 429 (20.87%) Azure
3 393 (19.11%) SC Cleared
4 326 (15.86%) AWS
5 307 (14.93%) Microsoft
6 300 (14.59%) Roadmaps
7 297 (14.45%) Agile
8 277 (13.47%) Stakeholder Management
9 259 (12.60%) Migration
10 251 (12.21%) Enterprise Architecture
11 226 (10.99%) DV Cleared
12 225 (10.94%) TOGAF
13 194 (9.44%) DevOps
14 184 (8.95%) Data Modelling
15 177 (8.61%) Stakeholder Engagement
16 172 (8.37%) Technical Leadership
17 161 (7.83%) Problem-Solving
18 160 (7.78%) CI/CD
19 147 (7.15%) Data Architecture
20 141 (6.86%) Analytics
20 141 (6.86%) Microservices
21 139 (6.76%) ITIL
22 135 (6.57%) Cybersecurity
23 131 (6.37%) Architectural Design
24 128 (6.23%) GCP
25 127 (6.18%) Python
25 127 (6.18%) VMware
26 125 (6.08%) ServiceNow
26 125 (6.08%) Windows
27 122 (5.93%) Identity Access Management

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 83 (4.04%) Confluence
2 61 (2.97%) SharePoint
3 50 (2.43%) Microsoft Exchange
4 25 (1.22%) SAS
5 13 (0.63%) Appian
6 12 (0.58%) CMS
7 11 (0.54%) ArcGIS
8 10 (0.49%) Anypoint
9 9 (0.44%) Apache
9 9 (0.44%) Smallworld
10 8 (0.39%) Apache Airflow
11 7 (0.34%) Apache Spark
11 7 (0.34%) Skype for Business
12 6 (0.29%) Adobe Experience Manager
12 6 (0.29%) Sitecore CMS
12 6 (0.29%) WebLogic
13 5 (0.24%) GeoServer
14 4 (0.19%) IIS
14 4 (0.19%) OpenStack
14 4 (0.19%) Oracle SOA Suite
Applications
1 45 (2.19%) Microsoft Office
2 31 (1.51%) Microsoft Project
3 21 (1.02%) Microsoft Excel
4 20 (0.97%) Microsoft PowerPoint
5 4 (0.19%) Chatbot
6 3 (0.15%) MS Visio
7 1 (0.049%) FrameMaker
7 1 (0.049%) OrCAD
7 1 (0.049%) Revit
7 1 (0.049%) Trello
Business Applications
1 46 (2.24%) SAP S/4HANA
2 25 (1.22%) Sparx Enterprise Architect
3 15 (0.73%) Payment Gateway
4 14 (0.68%) Workday HCM
5 11 (0.54%) Dynamics CRM
6 9 (0.44%) Salesforce CRM
7 7 (0.34%) SAP ERP
8 6 (0.29%) Maximo
9 5 (0.24%) Dynamics AX
9 5 (0.24%) Remedy ITSM
9 5 (0.24%) SAP CO
9 5 (0.24%) SAP FI
9 5 (0.24%) SAP FI/CO
10 4 (0.19%) Distributed Ledger
10 4 (0.19%) R3 Corda
10 4 (0.19%) SAP PP
11 3 (0.15%) NetSuite
11 3 (0.15%) Oracle SCM
11 3 (0.15%) SAP CRM
11 3 (0.15%) SAP PM
Cloud Services
1 429 (20.87%) Azure
2 326 (15.86%) AWS
3 128 (6.23%) GCP
4 92 (4.47%) Microsoft 365
5 80 (3.89%) Entra ID
6 63 (3.06%) SaaS
7 56 (2.72%) Power Platform
8 52 (2.53%) Serverless
9 48 (2.33%) Microsoft Purview
10 43 (2.09%) PaaS
11 42 (2.04%) IaaS
12 40 (1.95%) OneDrive
13 34 (1.65%) Azure DevOps
13 34 (1.65%) Dynamics 365
13 34 (1.65%) OpenShift
14 30 (1.46%) GitHub
15 25 (1.22%) AWS CloudFormation
15 25 (1.22%) AWS Lambda
15 25 (1.22%) Azure Synapse Analytics
16 24 (1.17%) Azure Data Factory
Communications & Networking
1 105 (5.11%) Firewall
2 68 (3.31%) DNS
3 66 (3.21%) WAN
4 59 (2.87%) Network Security
5 52 (2.53%) VPN
6 41 (1.99%) LAN
7 36 (1.75%) SD-WAN
8 25 (1.22%) DHCP
9 22 (1.07%) MPLS
10 18 (0.88%) BGP
11 17 (0.83%) SAN
11 17 (0.83%) VLAN
11 17 (0.83%) Wireless
12 16 (0.78%) Wi-Fi
13 14 (0.68%) IPsec
14 11 (0.54%) Kerberos
14 11 (0.54%) OSPF
14 11 (0.54%) VSAN
14 11 (0.54%) VXLAN
15 10 (0.49%) SSL
Database & Business Intelligence
1 79 (3.84%) Data Warehouse
2 67 (3.26%) Metadata
3 48 (2.33%) Power BI
4 43 (2.09%) SQL Server
5 28 (1.36%) PostgreSQL
6 25 (1.22%) Tableau
7 23 (1.12%) Data Lake
8 22 (1.07%) Oracle Database
9 20 (0.97%) GIS
10 18 (0.88%) NoSQL
11 15 (0.73%) DynamoDB
12 14 (0.68%) Metadata Repository
13 11 (0.54%) Big Data
13 11 (0.54%) Relational Database
14 10 (0.49%) Amazon Redshift
14 10 (0.49%) Azure SQL Database
15 9 (0.44%) Redis
16 8 (0.39%) Amazon Athena
17 7 (0.34%) Hadoop
17 7 (0.34%) MongoDB
Development Applications
1 94 (4.57%) JIRA
2 45 (2.19%) Jenkins
3 18 (0.88%) GitLab
4 17 (0.83%) Git
5 6 (0.29%) Artifactory
6 5 (0.24%) Postman
6 5 (0.24%) Rational DOORS
7 4 (0.19%) Selenium
8 3 (0.15%) Bitbucket
8 3 (0.15%) Cucumber
8 3 (0.15%) ERwin
8 3 (0.15%) MLflow
8 3 (0.15%) MSI
8 3 (0.15%) REST Assured
8 3 (0.15%) Sonatype Nexus
9 2 (0.097%) Gatling
9 2 (0.097%) LoadRunner
9 2 (0.097%) NeoLoad
9 2 (0.097%) SonarQube
9 2 (0.097%) Visual Studio Code
General
1 432 (21.01%) Social Skills
2 254 (12.35%) Finance
3 226 (10.99%) Public Sector
4 147 (7.15%) Analytical Skills
5 112 (5.45%) Banking
6 60 (2.92%) Documentation Skills
7 56 (2.72%) Military
8 45 (2.19%) Legal
9 39 (1.90%) Influencing Skills
9 39 (1.90%) Marketing
9 39 (1.90%) Retail
9 39 (1.90%) Telecoms
10 35 (1.70%) Presentation Skills
11 21 (1.02%) Manufacturing
12 20 (0.97%) Aerospace
13 15 (0.73%) Investment Banking
14 12 (0.58%) Billing
14 12 (0.58%) Inclusion and Diversity
15 10 (0.49%) Local Government
16 8 (0.39%) Financial Institution
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 79 (3.84%) REST
2 50 (2.43%) Middleware
3 44 (2.14%) SOAP
4 39 (1.90%) .NET
5 34 (1.65%) OAuth
6 29 (1.41%) OpenID
6 29 (1.41%) SailPoint
6 29 (1.41%) SAML
7 26 (1.26%) OAuth2
8 24 (1.17%) Kafka
9 23 (1.12%) RESTful
10 17 (0.83%) Node.js
10 17 (0.83%) React
10 17 (0.83%) Web Services
11 15 (0.73%) Oracle Fusion
12 14 (0.68%) Microsoft Graph
13 12 (0.58%) CSS
13 12 (0.58%) HTML
13 12 (0.58%) LDAP
14 10 (0.49%) JSON
Miscellaneous
1 125 (6.08%) Cloud Native
2 97 (4.72%) Product Ownership
3 74 (3.60%) Data Centre
4 60 (2.92%) Onboarding
5 50 (2.43%) PKI
6 46 (2.24%) Public Cloud
7 45 (2.19%) Hybrid Cloud
8 44 (2.14%) Operational Technology
9 43 (2.09%) Legacy Systems
10 36 (1.75%) Enterprise Software
11 34 (1.65%) Management Information System
12 30 (1.46%) Data Protection Act
12 30 (1.46%) Distributed Systems
13 26 (1.26%) CMDB
14 24 (1.17%) SCADA
15 16 (0.78%) NHS
16 15 (0.73%) AI Agents
17 14 (0.68%) Data Structures
18 13 (0.63%) Blackberry
19 12 (0.58%) Blockchain
Operating Systems
1 125 (6.08%) Windows
2 70 (3.40%) Linux
3 27 (1.31%) Windows Server
4 17 (0.83%) Windows 7
5 14 (0.68%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
6 13 (0.63%) Android
6 13 (0.63%) Apple iOS
7 11 (0.54%) Windows 10
8 7 (0.34%) Unix
8 7 (0.34%) Windows Server 2016
9 6 (0.29%) Windows Server 2019
10 5 (0.24%) VMS
11 4 (0.19%) Mac OS
12 3 (0.15%) Ubuntu
13 2 (0.097%) Windows Server 2012
14 1 (0.049%) CentOS
14 1 (0.049%) Data ONTAP
14 1 (0.049%) Kali Linux
Processes & Methodologies
1 300 (14.59%) Roadmaps
2 297 (14.45%) Agile
3 277 (13.47%) Stakeholder Management
4 259 (12.60%) Migration
5 251 (12.21%) Enterprise Architecture
6 225 (10.94%) TOGAF
7 194 (9.44%) DevOps
8 184 (8.95%) Data Modelling
9 177 (8.61%) Stakeholder Engagement
10 172 (8.37%) Technical Leadership
11 161 (7.83%) Problem-Solving
12 160 (7.78%) CI/CD
13 147 (7.15%) Data Architecture
14 141 (6.86%) Analytics
14 141 (6.86%) Microservices
15 139 (6.76%) ITIL
16 135 (6.57%) Cybersecurity
17 131 (6.37%) Architectural Design
18 122 (5.93%) Identity Access Management
19 120 (5.84%) AI
Programming Languages
1 127 (6.18%) Python
2 79 (3.84%) PowerShell
3 73 (3.55%) SQL
4 62 (3.02%) Java
5 34 (1.65%) JavaScript
6 30 (1.46%) C#
7 17 (0.83%) Bash
8 14 (0.68%) Bicep
9 11 (0.54%) Kusto Query Language
10 9 (0.44%) PL/SQL
11 8 (0.39%) R
12 7 (0.34%) TypeScript
12 7 (0.34%) VB
12 7 (0.34%) VBScript
13 5 (0.24%) Apex Code
14 4 (0.19%) C
14 4 (0.19%) C++
14 4 (0.19%) Perl
14 4 (0.19%) Scala
14 4 (0.19%) Shell Script
Qualifications
1 670 (32.59%) Security Cleared
2 393 (19.11%) SC Cleared
3 226 (10.99%) DV Cleared
4 113 (5.50%) Degree
5 77 (3.75%) TOGAF Certification
6 67 (3.26%) CISSP
7 51 (2.48%) AWS Certification
8 42 (2.04%) BPSS Clearance
9 41 (1.99%) Cisco Certification
10 39 (1.90%) Azure Certification
11 36 (1.75%) CISM
12 33 (1.61%) Microsoft Certification
13 31 (1.51%) Computer Science Degree
14 29 (1.41%) AWS Certified Solutions Architect
15 27 (1.31%) CCNP
15 27 (1.31%) Master's Degree
16 26 (1.26%) ISEB
17 25 (1.22%) ITIL Certification
18 20 (0.97%) CCIE
19 10 (0.49%) (ISC)2 CCSP
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 102 (4.96%) GDPR
2 82 (3.99%) NIST
3 68 (3.31%) Data Quality
4 62 (3.02%) ISO/IEC 27001
5 43 (2.09%) NCSC
6 31 (1.51%) PCI DSS
7 29 (1.41%) COBIT
8 21 (1.02%) QA
9 19 (0.92%) GRC
10 18 (0.88%) JSP 440
11 16 (0.78%) Cyber Essentials
12 12 (0.58%) FINRA
12 12 (0.58%) ISO 20022
12 12 (0.58%) MiFID
13 10 (0.49%) Accessibility
14 9 (0.44%) California Consumer Privacy Act
14 9 (0.44%) Def Stans
14 9 (0.44%) HMG Security Policy Framework
15 7 (0.34%) NIST 800
16 6 (0.29%) Cyber Essentials PLUS
System Software
1 95 (4.62%) Active Directory
2 55 (2.68%) VMware Infrastructure
3 39 (1.90%) Docker
4 35 (1.70%) VMware NSX
5 26 (1.26%) vSphere
6 14 (0.68%) Virtual Desktop
7 10 (0.49%) Hyper-V
7 10 (0.49%) VMware ESXi
8 8 (0.39%) Virtual Machines
9 7 (0.34%) BitLocker
10 6 (0.29%) vCloud
11 5 (0.24%) RACF
12 4 (0.19%) NFS
13 2 (0.097%) Active Directory Lightweight Directory Services
13 2 (0.097%) IAG
14 1 (0.049%) Embedded Firmware
14 1 (0.049%) Firmware
14 1 (0.049%) HDFS
Systems Management
1 93 (4.52%) Terraform
2 74 (3.60%) Kubernetes
3 58 (2.82%) Ansible
4 34 (1.65%) Single Sign-On
5 30 (1.46%) OPNET
6 29 (1.41%) Microsoft Intune
7 27 (1.31%) vCenter Server
8 19 (0.92%) SCCM
9 16 (0.78%) WMI
10 14 (0.68%) Active Directory Federation Services
11 13 (0.63%) Argo
11 13 (0.63%) FortiGate
12 6 (0.29%) Prometheus
13 5 (0.24%) Istio
14 3 (0.15%) Endace
14 3 (0.15%) Grafana
14 3 (0.15%) SCOM
15 2 (0.097%) Jamf Pro
15 2 (0.097%) Nessus
15 2 (0.097%) vRealize
Vendors
1 307 (14.93%) Microsoft
2 127 (6.18%) VMware
3 125 (6.08%) ServiceNow
4 98 (4.77%) SAP
5 97 (4.72%) Oracle
6 78 (3.79%) Salesforce
7 72 (3.50%) Cisco
8 48 (2.33%) Google
9 42 (2.04%) Remedy
10 37 (1.80%) Palo Alto
11 36 (1.75%) Atlassian
12 35 (1.70%) Red Hat
13 34 (1.65%) Databricks
13 34 (1.65%) MuleSoft
14 31 (1.51%) BiZZdesign
15 27 (1.31%) Citrix
15 27 (1.31%) CyberArk
16 26 (1.26%) Virgin Media
17 24 (1.17%) Sparx
18 23 (1.12%) F5