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 £620, according to job vacancies posted in the 6 months leading up to 4 September 2026.

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

6 months to
4 Sep 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 13 21 13
Rank change year-on-year +8 -8 +4
Contract jobs requiring an Architect 2,523 1,213 1,734
As % of all contract jobs in the UK excluding London 9.14% 8.02% 9.77%
As % of the Job Titles category 9.98% 8.91% 10.57%
Number of daily rates quoted 1,707 821 1,070
10th Percentile £467 £460 £480
25th Percentile £525 £519 £550
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £620 £600 £635
Median % change year-on-year +3.33% -5.55% -1.36%
75th Percentile £700 £688 £725
90th Percentile £775 £760 £788
UK median daily rate £615 £625 £638
% change year-on-year -1.60% -1.96% -1.92%
Number of hourly rates quoted 143 15 70
10th Percentile £46.00 £33.64 £60.00
25th Percentile £60.00 £64.38 £61.25
Median hourly rate £65.00 £72.50 £70.00
Median % change year-on-year -10.34% +3.57% -6.67%
75th Percentile £71.91 £86.50 £85.00
90th Percentile £95.00 £99.42 £90.00
UK median hourly rate £66.66 £72.50 £70.00
% change year-on-year -8.06% +3.57% -0.12%

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 25,284 13,611 16,411
% of contract IT jobs with a recognized job title 91.60% 89.96% 92.46%
Number of daily rates quoted 14,174 8,330 9,753
10th Percentile £304 £213 £225
25th Percentile £413 £363 £375
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £475 £500
Median % change year-on-year +5.26% -5.00% -
75th Percentile £600 £575 £600
90th Percentile £688 £650 £685
UK median daily rate £525 £500 £525
% change year-on-year +5.00% -4.76% -1.69%
Number of hourly rates quoted 3,104 1,230 1,526
10th Percentile £14.50 £13.27 £14.16
25th Percentile £20.25 £16.17 £19.11
Median hourly rate £42.50 £25.15 £45.00
Median % change year-on-year +68.99% -44.11% +12.50%
75th Percentile £68.00 £53.75 £66.61
90th Percentile £78.74 £72.50 £75.00
UK median hourly rate £42.13 £25.15 £43.00
% change year-on-year +67.50% -41.51% +1.18%

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 4 September 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 4 September 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 4 September 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 +1 720 £625 +4.17% 404
North of England +5 705 £600 - 383
Midlands +2 421 £626 +9.11% 179
North West +7 413 £600 +4.35% 239
South West +2 324 £648 +0.78% 212
West Midlands +3 313 £650 +9.38% 118
Yorkshire +10 231 £588 -2.08% 111
Scotland +24 169 £625 - 187
East of England +14 152 £611 +10.52% 125
East Midlands +3 103 £600 +16.50% 61
North East -2 62 £588 -17.54% 33
Wales +4 42 £633 +1.20% 17
Channel Islands -2 6 £663 -10.77% 3
Northern Ireland +5 4 £488 -30.36% 84
Architect
UK

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

For the 6 months to 4 September 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.

1 857 (33.97%) Security Cleared
2 582 (23.07%) Azure
3 559 (22.16%) SC Cleared
4 453 (17.95%) AWS
5 410 (16.25%) Stakeholder Management
6 365 (14.47%) Roadmaps
7 354 (14.03%) Microsoft
8 318 (12.60%) Technical Leadership
9 302 (11.97%) Agile
10 296 (11.73%) Migration
11 294 (11.65%) Enterprise Architecture
12 257 (10.19%) DV Cleared
13 242 (9.59%) Stakeholder Engagement
14 239 (9.47%) DevOps
15 234 (9.27%) AI
16 231 (9.16%) Data Architecture
17 229 (9.08%) Integration Patterns
18 221 (8.76%) CI/CD
19 211 (8.36%) Data Modelling
20 207 (8.20%) Architectural Patterns
21 206 (8.16%) Security Architecture
22 203 (8.05%) Cybersecurity
23 189 (7.49%) TOGAF
24 182 (7.21%) GCP
25 175 (6.94%) Architecture Governance
26 162 (6.42%) Microservices
27 157 (6.22%) Continuous Improvement
28 153 (6.06%) Event-Driven
29 143 (5.67%) Problem-Solving
30 142 (5.63%) Decision-Making

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 34 (1.35%) SharePoint
2 32 (1.27%) SAS
3 29 (1.15%) Confluence
4 15 (0.59%) Microsoft Exchange
5 12 (0.48%) OpenStack
6 11 (0.44%) Apache
7 10 (0.40%) Apache Spark
7 10 (0.40%) Palantir Foundry
8 9 (0.36%) Apache Airflow
9 7 (0.28%) Documentum
10 3 (0.12%) CMS
10 3 (0.12%) JBoss
10 3 (0.12%) NetWeaver
10 3 (0.12%) SAP EP
11 2 (0.079%) Adobe Experience Manager
11 2 (0.079%) Alfresco
11 2 (0.079%) Apache Superset
11 2 (0.079%) IIS
12 1 (0.040%) CIMPLICITY
12 1 (0.040%) FactoryTalk
Applications
1 10 (0.40%) Microsoft Excel
1 10 (0.40%) MS Visio
2 9 (0.36%) Microsoft Office
3 7 (0.28%) Microsoft PowerPoint
3 7 (0.28%) Navisworks
3 7 (0.28%) Revit
4 6 (0.24%) Spreadsheet
5 1 (0.040%) Microsoft Project
Business Applications
1 70 (2.77%) SAP S/4HANA
2 13 (0.52%) Teamcenter
3 12 (0.48%) Payment Gateway
4 10 (0.40%) Sparx Enterprise Architect
5 9 (0.36%) Remedy ITSM
6 7 (0.28%) SAP ERP
7 6 (0.24%) Oracle ERP
7 6 (0.24%) SAP MDG
8 5 (0.20%) Dynamics CRM
8 5 (0.20%) Maximo
9 4 (0.16%) NetSuite
9 4 (0.16%) Oracle Payables
9 4 (0.16%) Oracle Retail
9 4 (0.16%) Remedy AR System
10 3 (0.12%) Adobe Campaign
10 3 (0.12%) Dynamics NAV
10 3 (0.12%) Oracle Receivables
10 3 (0.12%) Salesforce CRM
10 3 (0.12%) SAP CRM
10 3 (0.12%) Workday HCM
Cloud Services
1 582 (23.07%) Azure
2 453 (17.95%) AWS
3 182 (7.21%) GCP
4 92 (3.65%) SaaS
5 91 (3.61%) Power Platform
6 80 (3.17%) Serverless
7 77 (3.05%) Entra ID
8 57 (2.26%) Microsoft 365
9 49 (1.94%) Azure DevOps
10 48 (1.90%) Dynamics 365
11 45 (1.78%) GitHub
12 38 (1.51%) PaaS
13 37 (1.47%) AWS Lambda
14 32 (1.27%) IaaS
15 30 (1.19%) GitHub Actions
16 28 (1.11%) Amazon S3
16 28 (1.11%) OpenShift
16 28 (1.11%) Snowflake
17 23 (0.91%) Azure Data Factory
18 22 (0.87%) Microsoft Purview
Communications & Networking
1 90 (3.57%) Firewall
2 63 (2.50%) WAN
3 56 (2.22%) DNS
4 54 (2.14%) Network Security
5 47 (1.86%) LAN
6 34 (1.35%) BGP
6 34 (1.35%) SD-WAN
6 34 (1.35%) VPN
7 33 (1.31%) DHCP
8 27 (1.07%) TCP/IP
9 26 (1.03%) MPLS
9 26 (1.03%) VLAN
10 23 (0.91%) SAN
11 20 (0.79%) NAS
12 17 (0.67%) BIG-IP
12 17 (0.67%) OSPF
13 16 (0.63%) Structured Cabling
14 15 (0.59%) Wireless
15 13 (0.52%) NX-OS
16 12 (0.48%) Cisco Nexus
Database & Business Intelligence
1 80 (3.17%) Metadata
2 72 (2.85%) Data Lake
3 62 (2.46%) Data Warehouse
3 62 (2.46%) Power BI
4 36 (1.43%) NoSQL
5 20 (0.79%) Amazon RDS
5 20 (0.79%) Azure SQL Database
5 20 (0.79%) Enterprise Data Warehouse
5 20 (0.79%) Oracle Database
6 16 (0.63%) Base SAS
6 16 (0.63%) SQL Server
7 14 (0.55%) BigQuery
8 13 (0.52%) Delta Lake
8 13 (0.52%) PostgreSQL
9 11 (0.44%) GIS
10 10 (0.40%) MySQL
11 9 (0.36%) Amazon Redshift
11 9 (0.36%) Big Data
11 9 (0.36%) Electronic Patient Records
11 9 (0.36%) Semantic Layer
Development Applications
1 35 (1.39%) JIRA
2 31 (1.23%) Git
3 23 (0.91%) Jenkins
4 15 (0.59%) GitLab
5 7 (0.28%) ERwin
6 6 (0.24%) Claude Code
6 6 (0.24%) MSI
7 5 (0.20%) Artifactory
7 5 (0.20%) Sonatype Nexus
8 4 (0.16%) Hudson
9 3 (0.12%) Rational DOORS
9 3 (0.12%) SonarQube
10 2 (0.079%) Bitbucket
10 2 (0.079%) Cypress.io
10 2 (0.079%) IntelliJ
10 2 (0.079%) JUnit
10 2 (0.079%) Oracle APEX
10 2 (0.079%) Oracle Forms
10 2 (0.079%) Rational Rhapsody
10 2 (0.079%) Selenium
General
1 505 (20.02%) Social Skills
2 307 (12.17%) Finance
3 260 (10.31%) Public Sector
4 130 (5.15%) Banking
5 121 (4.80%) Analytical Skills
6 106 (4.20%) Retail
7 92 (3.65%) Manufacturing
8 63 (2.50%) Influencing Skills
9 62 (2.46%) Documentation Skills
10 38 (1.51%) Aerospace
10 38 (1.51%) Legal
11 32 (1.27%) Military
12 29 (1.15%) Telecoms
13 22 (0.87%) Aviation
14 21 (0.83%) Marketing
15 20 (0.79%) Back Office
15 20 (0.79%) Inclusion and Diversity
16 18 (0.71%) Presentation Skills
17 17 (0.67%) Billing
17 17 (0.67%) Local Government
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 105 (4.16%) REST
2 89 (3.53%) Terraform
3 72 (2.85%) Middleware
4 53 (2.10%) OAuth
5 51 (2.02%) SOAP
6 38 (1.51%) Oracle Fusion
7 35 (1.39%) Kafka
8 34 (1.35%) SAML
9 33 (1.31%) .NET
10 32 (1.27%) OpenID
11 29 (1.15%) LDAP
12 25 (0.99%) JSON
13 22 (0.87%) OAuth2
14 20 (0.79%) SailPoint
15 18 (0.71%) Node.js
16 16 (0.63%) GraphQL
17 14 (0.55%) JWT
17 14 (0.55%) RESTful
17 14 (0.55%) Swagger
18 13 (0.52%) FHIR
Miscellaneous
1 202 (8.01%) Cloud Native
2 83 (3.29%) Data Centre
3 79 (3.13%) Hybrid Cloud
4 64 (2.54%) Operational Technology
5 60 (2.38%) Enterprise Software
6 58 (2.30%) Data Protection Act
6 58 (2.30%) Distributed Systems
6 58 (2.30%) Onboarding
7 55 (2.18%) Legacy Systems
8 54 (2.14%) Product Ownership
9 51 (2.02%) Management Information System
10 40 (1.59%) AI Agents
11 39 (1.55%) Public Cloud
12 33 (1.31%) Private Cloud
13 31 (1.23%) CMDB
14 27 (1.07%) Enterprise Cloud
14 27 (1.07%) Security Posture
15 26 (1.03%) IVR
16 23 (0.91%) SCADA
17 21 (0.83%) PKI
Operating Systems
1 83 (3.29%) Windows
2 57 (2.26%) Linux
3 36 (1.43%) Windows Server
4 17 (0.67%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
5 9 (0.36%) Unix
6 6 (0.24%) AIX
7 4 (0.16%) Data ONTAP
8 2 (0.079%) Android
8 2 (0.079%) Apple iOS
8 2 (0.079%) HPUX
8 2 (0.079%) Solaris
8 2 (0.079%) Windows 10
9 1 (0.040%) CatOS
9 1 (0.040%) CentOS
9 1 (0.040%) Ubuntu
9 1 (0.040%) VMS
9 1 (0.040%) Windows Server 2008
9 1 (0.040%) zOS
Processes & Methodologies
1 410 (16.25%) Stakeholder Management
2 365 (14.47%) Roadmaps
3 318 (12.60%) Technical Leadership
4 302 (11.97%) Agile
5 296 (11.73%) Migration
6 294 (11.65%) Enterprise Architecture
7 242 (9.59%) Stakeholder Engagement
8 239 (9.47%) DevOps
9 234 (9.27%) AI
10 231 (9.16%) Data Architecture
11 229 (9.08%) Integration Patterns
12 221 (8.76%) CI/CD
13 211 (8.36%) Data Modelling
14 207 (8.20%) Architectural Patterns
15 206 (8.16%) Security Architecture
16 203 (8.05%) Cybersecurity
17 189 (7.49%) TOGAF
18 175 (6.94%) Architecture Governance
19 162 (6.42%) Microservices
20 157 (6.22%) Continuous Improvement
Programming Languages
1 95 (3.77%) Java
2 93 (3.69%) SQL
3 85 (3.37%) Python
4 49 (1.94%) JavaScript
5 46 (1.82%) PowerShell
6 24 (0.95%) Bash
7 15 (0.59%) Bicep
8 13 (0.52%) TypeScript
9 10 (0.40%) ABAP
9 10 (0.40%) Apex Code
9 10 (0.40%) Shell Script
10 7 (0.28%) C#
11 6 (0.24%) PL/SQL
11 6 (0.24%) VBA
12 5 (0.20%) Groovy
13 3 (0.12%) R
14 2 (0.079%) BeanShell
14 2 (0.079%) COBOL
14 2 (0.079%) Data Analysis Expressions
14 2 (0.079%) Scala
Qualifications
1 857 (33.97%) Security Cleared
2 559 (22.16%) SC Cleared
3 257 (10.19%) DV Cleared
4 68 (2.70%) Degree
5 61 (2.42%) CISSP
6 58 (2.30%) Cisco Certification
7 49 (1.94%) BPSS Clearance
8 44 (1.74%) AWS Certification
9 42 (1.66%) Azure Certification
9 42 (1.66%) TOGAF Certification
10 31 (1.23%) Computer Science Degree
11 28 (1.11%) CCNP
12 23 (0.91%) CISM
13 19 (0.75%) Microsoft Certification
14 18 (0.71%) CCIE
15 16 (0.63%) (ISC)2 CCSP
16 12 (0.48%) CCNA
16 12 (0.48%) JNCIE
17 11 (0.44%) CCSP
17 11 (0.44%) VMware Certified Professional (VCP)
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 103 (4.08%) NIST
2 84 (3.33%) Data Quality
3 71 (2.81%) ISO/IEC 27001
4 64 (2.54%) NCSC
5 54 (2.14%) GDPR
6 25 (0.99%) QA
7 18 (0.71%) PCI DSS
8 17 (0.67%) NIST 800
9 16 (0.63%) JSP 440
10 15 (0.59%) Accessibility
11 14 (0.55%) ISO/IEC 20000
12 13 (0.52%) GRC
12 13 (0.52%) ISO 19650
13 11 (0.44%) Disclosure Scotland
13 11 (0.44%) IFRS
13 11 (0.44%) SLA
14 9 (0.36%) HL7
14 9 (0.36%) Sarbanes-Oxley
15 7 (0.28%) Cyber Essentials
16 6 (0.24%) SNOMED CT
System Software
1 98 (3.88%) Active Directory
2 46 (1.82%) Docker
2 46 (1.82%) VMware Infrastructure
3 27 (1.07%) VMware NSX
4 26 (1.03%) Virtual Desktop
5 17 (0.67%) Hyper-V
6 13 (0.52%) vSphere
7 11 (0.44%) VMware ESXi
8 9 (0.36%) Virtual Machines
9 4 (0.16%) KVM
9 4 (0.16%) vCloud
10 3 (0.12%) Ceph
10 3 (0.12%) EMC RecoverPoint
10 3 (0.12%) NFS
10 3 (0.12%) SRDF
11 2 (0.079%) zsh
12 1 (0.040%) ISA Server
12 1 (0.040%) Microsoft Virtual Server
12 1 (0.040%) Slurm Workload Manager
12 1 (0.040%) Snort
Systems Management
1 128 (5.07%) Kubernetes
2 51 (2.02%) Ansible
3 19 (0.75%) Microsoft Intune
3 19 (0.75%) Single Sign-On
4 15 (0.59%) Active Directory Federation Services
4 15 (0.59%) Grafana
5 13 (0.52%) Prometheus
6 12 (0.48%) Jamf Pro
7 11 (0.44%) vCenter Server
8 9 (0.36%) WMI
9 7 (0.28%) Argo
9 7 (0.28%) FortiGate
10 6 (0.24%) CASB
10 6 (0.24%) Istio
11 5 (0.20%) NetBackup
12 4 (0.16%) Cisco CUCM
12 4 (0.16%) EMC VPLEX
12 4 (0.16%) SnapMirror
13 3 (0.12%) MOM
13 3 (0.12%) SnapVault
Vendors
1 354 (14.03%) Microsoft
2 140 (5.55%) SAP
3 110 (4.36%) Oracle
4 96 (3.80%) Google
5 94 (3.73%) ServiceNow
6 84 (3.33%) VMware
7 81 (3.21%) Cisco
7 81 (3.21%) Databricks
8 52 (2.06%) Salesforce
9 33 (1.31%) CyberArk
10 28 (1.11%) F5
10 28 (1.11%) MuleSoft
11 24 (0.95%) Informatica
12 23 (0.91%) Palo Alto
13 22 (0.87%) Red Hat
14 21 (0.83%) IBM
15 18 (0.71%) Workday
16 17 (0.67%) Infoblox
17 16 (0.63%) Juniper
18 15 (0.59%) Fortinet