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 18 November 2025.

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

6 months to
18 Nov 2025
Same period 2024 Same period 2023
Rank 21 14 18
Rank change year-on-year -7 +4 +4
Contract jobs requiring an Architect 1,430 1,501 1,743
As % of all contract jobs in the UK excluding London 8.24% 9.16% 8.38%
As % of the Job Titles category 9.18% 9.93% 8.93%
Number of daily rates quoted 996 905 1,216
10th Percentile £463 £469 £500
25th Percentile £519 £535 £563
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £600 £625 £633
Median % change year-on-year -4.00% -1.22% -2.65%
75th Percentile £700 £706 £700
90th Percentile £775 £767 £750
UK median daily rate £625 £625 £650
% change year-on-year - -3.85% -
Number of hourly rates quoted 17 21 33
10th Percentile £63.00 £60.00 £61.25
25th Percentile £70.00 £63.75 £72.50
Median hourly rate £83.82 £70.00 £76.53
Median % change year-on-year +19.74% -8.53% +9.33%
75th Percentile £90.09 £85.78 £80.00
90th Percentile £96.86 £90.00 £88.12
UK median hourly rate £83.82 £70.00 £75.00
% change year-on-year +19.74% -6.67% +7.14%

All Contract IT Job Vacancies
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 15,583 15,113 19,511
% of contract IT jobs with a recognized job title 89.79% 92.28% 93.79%
Number of daily rates quoted 9,651 8,651 12,895
10th Percentile £206 £219 £213
25th Percentile £363 £375 £380
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £475 £490 £500
Median % change year-on-year -3.06% -2.00% -
75th Percentile £575 £590 £600
90th Percentile £675 £676 £688
UK median daily rate £500 £525 £525
% change year-on-year -4.76% - -4.55%
Number of hourly rates quoted 1,540 1,034 1,273
10th Percentile £13.75 £15.05 £14.37
25th Percentile £17.25 £20.00 £18.50
Median hourly rate £25.15 £35.00 £45.00
Median % change year-on-year -28.14% -22.22% +87.50%
75th Percentile £53.81 £65.00 £65.00
90th Percentile £70.00 £73.75 £77.00
UK median hourly rate £25.15 £36.08 £45.00
% change year-on-year -30.30% -19.82% +60.06%

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 18 November 2025.

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 18 November 2025.

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 18 November 2025. 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 +2 436 £600 -4.00% 487
North of England -9 363 £600 - 176
Midlands -9 226 £575 -4.37% 144
North West -8 217 £588 -1.96% 110
South West -4 214 £675 +3.85% 143
West Midlands -16 158 £582 -6.92% 94
Yorkshire -18 129 £613 +5.60% 58
Scotland -8 92 £575 -8.37% 53
East of England -5 88 £553 -7.92% 100
East Midlands 0 67 £500 -9.09% 48
Wales -1 23 £625 +0.81% 23
North East -6 18 £713 +18.82% 8
Channel Islands - 6 £743 -
Northern Ireland -14 5 £550 -8.33% 14
Architect
UK

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

For the 6 months to 18 November 2025, 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.

1 501 (35.03%) Security Cleared
2 356 (24.90%) Azure
3 315 (22.03%) AWS
4 293 (20.49%) SC Cleared
5 231 (16.15%) Roadmaps
6 220 (15.38%) Stakeholder Management
7 206 (14.41%) Microsoft
8 180 (12.59%) Agile
9 168 (11.75%) Migration
9 168 (11.75%) TOGAF
10 164 (11.47%) Problem-Solving
11 160 (11.19%) DV Cleared
12 154 (10.77%) Enterprise Architecture
13 151 (10.56%) Stakeholder Engagement
14 141 (9.86%) Data Modelling
15 137 (9.58%) CI/CD
16 130 (9.09%) Technical Leadership
17 129 (9.02%) GCP
18 127 (8.88%) DevOps
19 118 (8.25%) AI
20 116 (8.11%) ITIL
21 112 (7.83%) Python
22 109 (7.62%) Microservices
23 107 (7.48%) Cybersecurity
24 106 (7.41%) Mentoring
25 104 (7.27%) VMware
26 96 (6.71%) Architectural Design
27 95 (6.64%) Analytics
28 94 (6.57%) Terraform
29 89 (6.22%) Firewall

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 39 (2.73%) Confluence
2 21 (1.47%) SharePoint
3 16 (1.12%) Microsoft Exchange
3 16 (1.12%) SAS
4 13 (0.91%) ArcGIS
5 9 (0.63%) Apache Spark
5 9 (0.63%) WebLogic
6 6 (0.42%) OpenStack
6 6 (0.42%) Smallworld
7 5 (0.35%) Apache Airflow
7 5 (0.35%) WebSphere
8 4 (0.28%) Documentum
9 3 (0.21%) GeoServer
9 3 (0.21%) Skype for Business
9 3 (0.21%) ThingWorx
10 2 (0.14%) Anypoint
10 2 (0.14%) Ethereum
10 2 (0.14%) Hyperledger
10 2 (0.14%) IIS
10 2 (0.14%) Tomcat
Applications
1 14 (0.98%) Microsoft Office
2 11 (0.77%) Microsoft Excel
2 11 (0.77%) Siemens NX
3 10 (0.70%) Microsoft PowerPoint
3 10 (0.70%) Microsoft Project
3 10 (0.70%) MS Visio
4 2 (0.14%) Fusion 360
5 1 (0.070%) Chatbot
5 1 (0.070%) FrameMaker
5 1 (0.070%) Revit
5 1 (0.070%) Trello
Business Applications
1 35 (2.45%) SAP S/4HANA
2 19 (1.33%) Dynamics CRM
3 14 (0.98%) Payment Gateway
4 13 (0.91%) Sparx Enterprise Architect
5 12 (0.84%) Maximo
5 12 (0.84%) Workday HCM
6 11 (0.77%) Teamcenter
7 10 (0.70%) SAP CO
8 9 (0.63%) SAP FI
8 9 (0.63%) SAP FI/CO
9 8 (0.56%) SAP PM
10 7 (0.49%) Salesforce CRM
11 6 (0.42%) SAP HR
12 5 (0.35%) Dynamics AX
12 5 (0.35%) Oracle SCM
13 3 (0.21%) NetSuite
14 2 (0.14%) SAP CRM
14 2 (0.14%) SAP ERP
14 2 (0.14%) SAP PP
14 2 (0.14%) SAP Retail
Cloud Services
1 356 (24.90%) Azure
2 315 (22.03%) AWS
3 129 (9.02%) GCP
4 66 (4.62%) SaaS
5 63 (4.41%) Serverless
6 48 (3.36%) Dynamics 365
7 42 (2.94%) AWS Lambda
8 40 (2.80%) Power Platform
9 38 (2.66%) Entra ID
9 38 (2.66%) Microsoft 365
10 36 (2.52%) Amazon S3
11 33 (2.31%) GitHub
12 27 (1.89%) IaaS
12 27 (1.89%) PaaS
13 25 (1.75%) Amazon CloudWatch
13 25 (1.75%) Azure DevOps
14 24 (1.68%) Microsoft Purview
15 19 (1.33%) Azure Synapse Analytics
15 19 (1.33%) Salesforce Service Cloud
16 18 (1.26%) Azure Data Factory
Communications & Networking
1 89 (6.22%) Firewall
2 50 (3.50%) Network Security
3 44 (3.08%) WAN
4 38 (2.66%) LAN
5 33 (2.31%) VPN
6 30 (2.10%) DNS
7 28 (1.96%) SD-WAN
8 22 (1.54%) SAN
9 21 (1.47%) BGP
10 18 (1.26%) MPLS
11 15 (1.05%) Fibre Channel
11 15 (1.05%) iSCSI
12 14 (0.98%) VSAN
13 12 (0.84%) DHCP
13 12 (0.84%) Internet
14 11 (0.77%) Wi-Fi
15 9 (0.63%) Cisco ASA
15 9 (0.63%) VLAN
16 8 (0.56%) Wireless
17 7 (0.49%) FTP
Database & Business Intelligence
1 57 (3.99%) Data Warehouse
2 38 (2.66%) PostgreSQL
3 33 (2.31%) Metadata
4 31 (2.17%) Power BI
5 27 (1.89%) NoSQL
6 26 (1.82%) SQL Server
7 25 (1.75%) DynamoDB
7 25 (1.75%) MongoDB
8 18 (1.26%) GIS
9 17 (1.19%) Oracle Database
10 15 (1.05%) Relational Database
11 14 (0.98%) BigQuery
12 13 (0.91%) Big Data
12 13 (0.91%) Redis
13 12 (0.84%) Amazon Redshift
13 12 (0.84%) Data Lake
13 12 (0.84%) RDBMS
13 12 (0.84%) Tableau
14 9 (0.63%) Amazon Aurora
14 9 (0.63%) Amazon RDS
Development Applications
1 56 (3.92%) JIRA
2 44 (3.08%) Jenkins
3 34 (2.38%) Git
4 11 (0.77%) GitLab
5 10 (0.70%) CircleCI
6 9 (0.63%) Oracle Forms
7 7 (0.49%) Gradle
7 7 (0.49%) Maven
7 7 (0.49%) Rational DOORS
8 6 (0.42%) SonarQube
9 5 (0.35%) SonarLint
10 3 (0.21%) Artifactory
10 3 (0.21%) MSI
10 3 (0.21%) Visual Studio Code
11 2 (0.14%) Bitbucket
11 2 (0.14%) Hudson
11 2 (0.14%) MLflow
11 2 (0.14%) Postman
11 2 (0.14%) Sonatype Nexus
12 1 (0.070%) ERwin
General
1 398 (27.83%) Social Skills
2 185 (12.94%) Finance
3 180 (12.59%) Public Sector
4 110 (7.69%) Analytical Skills
5 81 (5.66%) Banking
6 46 (3.22%) Telecoms
7 45 (3.15%) Retail
8 39 (2.73%) Marketing
9 36 (2.52%) Documentation Skills
10 31 (2.17%) Presentation Skills
11 30 (2.10%) Influencing Skills
12 28 (1.96%) Manufacturing
13 24 (1.68%) Military
14 22 (1.54%) Legal
15 20 (1.40%) Aerospace
16 13 (0.91%) Local Government
17 10 (0.70%) Back Office
17 10 (0.70%) Inclusion and Diversity
18 9 (0.63%) Aviation
18 9 (0.63%) Financial Institution
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 45 (3.15%) REST
2 39 (2.73%) Middleware
3 34 (2.38%) SOAP
4 29 (2.03%) RESTful
5 28 (1.96%) Kafka
6 25 (1.75%) .NET
7 20 (1.40%) OAuth
8 19 (1.33%) Lightning Web Components
8 19 (1.33%) Spring Boot
9 18 (1.26%) Visualforce
9 18 (1.26%) Web Services
10 15 (1.05%) Node.js
10 15 (1.05%) SailPoint
11 13 (0.91%) GraphQL
11 13 (0.91%) SAML
11 13 (0.91%) SAP PI
12 11 (0.77%) OAuth2
12 11 (0.77%) Spring
13 9 (0.63%) Celery
13 9 (0.63%) React
Miscellaneous
1 94 (6.57%) Cloud Native
2 67 (4.69%) Legacy Systems
2 67 (4.69%) Product Ownership
3 63 (4.41%) Data Centre
4 50 (3.50%) Onboarding
5 48 (3.36%) Hybrid Cloud
6 30 (2.10%) PKI
7 25 (1.75%) Operational Technology
8 24 (1.68%) Enterprise Software
9 23 (1.61%) CMDB
10 22 (1.54%) Distributed Systems
11 21 (1.47%) Security Posture
12 20 (1.40%) Data Protection Act
12 20 (1.40%) Public Cloud
12 20 (1.40%) SCADA
13 19 (1.33%) Management Information System
14 18 (1.26%) NHS
15 15 (1.05%) Security Operations Centre
16 13 (0.91%) Analytical Mindset
16 13 (0.91%) Cyber Threat
Operating Systems
1 85 (5.94%) Windows
2 52 (3.64%) Linux
3 32 (2.24%) Windows Server
4 19 (1.33%) Windows Server 2019
5 11 (0.77%) Unix
5 11 (0.77%) Windows 7
6 10 (0.70%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
6 10 (0.70%) Windows 10
7 4 (0.28%) Android
7 4 (0.28%) Apple iOS
8 3 (0.21%) Mac OS
8 3 (0.21%) Windows Server 2008
9 2 (0.14%) Solaris
9 2 (0.14%) Ubuntu
9 2 (0.14%) Windows Server 2016
9 2 (0.14%) zOS
10 1 (0.070%) MVS
10 1 (0.070%) VMS
10 1 (0.070%) Windows XP
Processes & Methodologies
1 231 (16.15%) Roadmaps
2 220 (15.38%) Stakeholder Management
3 180 (12.59%) Agile
4 168 (11.75%) Migration
4 168 (11.75%) TOGAF
5 164 (11.47%) Problem-Solving
6 154 (10.77%) Enterprise Architecture
7 151 (10.56%) Stakeholder Engagement
8 141 (9.86%) Data Modelling
9 137 (9.58%) CI/CD
10 130 (9.09%) Technical Leadership
11 127 (8.88%) DevOps
12 118 (8.25%) AI
13 116 (8.11%) ITIL
14 109 (7.62%) Microservices
15 107 (7.48%) Cybersecurity
16 106 (7.41%) Mentoring
17 96 (6.71%) Architectural Design
18 95 (6.64%) Analytics
19 86 (6.01%) Security Architecture
Programming Languages
1 112 (7.83%) Python
2 82 (5.73%) Java
3 57 (3.99%) SQL
4 30 (2.10%) PowerShell
5 24 (1.68%) JavaScript
6 19 (1.33%) Apex Code
7 18 (1.26%) TypeScript
8 13 (0.91%) C#
9 12 (0.84%) R
10 9 (0.63%) Bash
10 9 (0.63%) C++
11 6 (0.42%) Bicep
11 6 (0.42%) C
12 5 (0.35%) ABAP
12 5 (0.35%) VB
13 4 (0.28%) Scala
14 3 (0.21%) VBScript
14 3 (0.21%) X++
15 2 (0.14%) PL/SQL
15 2 (0.14%) Ruby
Qualifications
1 501 (35.03%) Security Cleared
2 293 (20.49%) SC Cleared
3 160 (11.19%) DV Cleared
4 83 (5.80%) Degree
5 77 (5.38%) CISSP
6 49 (3.43%) AWS Certification
7 44 (3.08%) Azure Certification
8 39 (2.73%) Microsoft Certification
9 37 (2.59%) TOGAF Certification
10 36 (2.52%) Cisco Certification
10 36 (2.52%) CISM
11 26 (1.82%) Computer Science Degree
12 24 (1.68%) AWS Certified Solutions Architect
12 24 (1.68%) Master's Degree
13 20 (1.40%) CCIE
14 17 (1.19%) BPSS Clearance
14 17 (1.19%) CCNP
15 15 (1.05%) (ISC)2 CCSP
15 15 (1.05%) VMware Certified Professional (VCP)
16 14 (0.98%) MCSE
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 87 (6.08%) GDPR
2 75 (5.24%) NIST
3 72 (5.03%) ISO/IEC 27001
4 46 (3.22%) Data Quality
5 40 (2.80%) NCSC
6 32 (2.24%) PCI DSS
7 29 (2.03%) ISO/IEC 20000
8 20 (1.40%) California Consumer Privacy Act
8 20 (1.40%) JSP 440
9 19 (1.33%) QA
10 14 (0.98%) COBIT
11 13 (0.91%) GRC
12 11 (0.77%) SLA
13 9 (0.63%) Accessibility
13 9 (0.63%) Sarbanes-Oxley
14 8 (0.56%) HMG Security Policy Framework
14 8 (0.56%) NIST 800
14 8 (0.56%) PSD2
15 7 (0.49%) Cyber Essentials
15 7 (0.49%) ISO 20022
System Software
1 70 (4.90%) VMware Infrastructure
2 57 (3.99%) Active Directory
3 50 (3.50%) Docker
4 29 (2.03%) vSphere
5 22 (1.54%) VMware ESXi
6 18 (1.26%) VMware NSX
7 15 (1.05%) NFS
8 7 (0.49%) Virtual Desktop
9 5 (0.35%) Hyper-V
10 3 (0.21%) BitLocker
10 3 (0.21%) Dovecot
10 3 (0.21%) Postfix
11 2 (0.14%) KVM
11 2 (0.14%) Virtual Machines
12 1 (0.070%) HDFS
12 1 (0.070%) Microsoft App-V
12 1 (0.070%) Slurm Workload Manager
12 1 (0.070%) SRDF
12 1 (0.070%) Veritas Cluster Server
12 1 (0.070%) Xen
Systems Management
1 94 (6.57%) Terraform
2 81 (5.66%) Kubernetes
3 40 (2.80%) Ansible
4 20 (1.40%) Single Sign-On
5 15 (1.05%) Prometheus
6 14 (0.98%) vCenter Server
7 12 (0.84%) OPNET
8 11 (0.77%) Microsoft Intune
9 10 (0.70%) Active Directory Federation Services
9 10 (0.70%) Grafana
10 9 (0.63%) SCCM
10 9 (0.63%) WMI
11 7 (0.49%) Argo
12 4 (0.28%) FortiGate
13 2 (0.14%) Kubeflow
13 2 (0.14%) Microsoft Clustering
13 2 (0.14%) SCOM
14 1 (0.070%) BMC PATROL
14 1 (0.070%) Control-M
14 1 (0.070%) Podman
Vendors
1 206 (14.41%) Microsoft
2 104 (7.27%) VMware
3 79 (5.52%) Oracle
4 76 (5.31%) Salesforce
5 74 (5.17%) SAP
6 67 (4.69%) Cisco
7 56 (3.92%) ServiceNow
8 32 (2.24%) Google
9 26 (1.82%) Splunk
10 25 (1.75%) Juniper
11 24 (1.68%) F5
11 24 (1.68%) Palo Alto
11 24 (1.68%) Workday
12 21 (1.47%) IBM
12 21 (1.47%) NetApp
13 20 (1.40%) CyberArk
13 20 (1.40%) Databricks
13 20 (1.40%) Pega
13 20 (1.40%) Virgin Media
14 19 (1.33%) Fortinet