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 20 August 2026.

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

6 months to
20 Aug 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 14 21 13
Rank change year-on-year +7 -8 +6
Contract jobs requiring an Architect 2,497 1,238 1,822
As % of all contract jobs in the UK excluding London 9.07% 8.08% 10.02%
As % of the Job Titles category 9.88% 8.97% 10.86%
Number of daily rates quoted 1,670 845 1,156
10th Percentile £475 £463 £482
25th Percentile £525 £519 £550
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £620 £600 £649
Median % change year-on-year +3.33% -7.55% -0.15%
75th Percentile £706 £688 £725
90th Percentile £775 £752 £784
UK median daily rate £620 £625 £650
% change year-on-year -0.80% -3.85% -
Number of hourly rates quoted 153 15 71
10th Percentile £46.00 £33.64 £60.00
25th Percentile £60.00 £64.38 £60.63
Median hourly rate £65.00 £72.50 £70.00
Median % change year-on-year -10.34% +3.57% -3.34%
75th Percentile £71.91 £86.50 £85.00
90th Percentile £88.60 £99.42 £90.00
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 25,275 13,804 16,780
% of contract IT jobs with a recognized job title 91.79% 90.08% 92.25%
Number of daily rates quoted 14,256 8,477 10,186
10th Percentile £304 £213 £220
25th Percentile £410 £360 £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 £688
UK median daily rate £525 £500 £525
% change year-on-year +5.00% -4.76% -1.87%
Number of hourly rates quoted 3,037 1,240 1,692
10th Percentile £14.56 £13.27 £13.95
25th Percentile £20.44 £16.50 £18.27
Median hourly rate £42.50 £25.15 £43.90
Median % change year-on-year +68.99% -42.71% +17.07%
75th Percentile £68.00 £55.00 £65.00
90th Percentile £78.75 £73.75 £75.00
UK median hourly rate £41.74 £25.15 £43.00
% change year-on-year +65.94% -41.51% +2.38%

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 20 August 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 20 August 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 20 August 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 +1 739 £625 +4.17% 202
North of England +5 695 £600 - 189
Midlands 0 411 £625 +8.70% 79
North West +6 405 £600 - 90
South West -2 313 £638 -0.39% 91
West Midlands -1 295 £640 +6.58% 61
Yorkshire +4 226 £594 -1.04% 72
East of England +16 158 £602 +8.47% 37
Scotland +19 153 £635 +1.60% 41
East Midlands +5 109 £600 +18.23% 18
North East -3 66 £588 -16.07% 27
Wales +5 42 £633 +1.20% 12
Northern Ireland +8 5 £475 -32.14% 12
Channel Islands -4 3 £575 -22.56% 2
Architect
UK

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

For the 6 months to 20 August 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.

1 825 (33.04%) Security Cleared
2 567 (22.71%) Azure
3 523 (20.95%) SC Cleared
4 440 (17.62%) AWS
5 359 (14.38%) Stakeholder Management
6 348 (13.94%) Microsoft
6 348 (13.94%) Roadmaps
7 313 (12.54%) Agile
8 286 (11.45%) Technical Leadership
9 284 (11.37%) Migration
10 276 (11.05%) Enterprise Architecture
11 259 (10.37%) DV Cleared
12 244 (9.77%) DevOps
13 235 (9.41%) Integration Patterns
14 234 (9.37%) Stakeholder Engagement
15 229 (9.17%) CI/CD
16 225 (9.01%) AI
17 214 (8.57%) Data Architecture
18 206 (8.25%) Data Modelling
19 202 (8.09%) Architectural Patterns
20 199 (7.97%) Cybersecurity
21 186 (7.45%) Security Architecture
22 179 (7.17%) TOGAF
23 175 (7.01%) GCP
24 161 (6.45%) Microservices
25 154 (6.17%) Architecture Governance
26 147 (5.89%) Event-Driven
27 146 (5.85%) Problem-Solving
28 145 (5.81%) Continuous Improvement
29 144 (5.77%) Analytics

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 35 (1.40%) SharePoint
2 31 (1.24%) SAS
3 30 (1.20%) Confluence
4 13 (0.52%) Microsoft Exchange
5 12 (0.48%) OpenStack
6 10 (0.40%) Apache
6 10 (0.40%) Apache Spark
6 10 (0.40%) Palantir Foundry
7 9 (0.36%) Apache Airflow
8 7 (0.28%) Documentum
9 5 (0.20%) Adobe Experience Manager
10 4 (0.16%) CMS
11 3 (0.12%) JBoss
11 3 (0.12%) NetWeaver
11 3 (0.12%) SAP EP
12 2 (0.080%) Alfresco
12 2 (0.080%) Apache Superset
13 1 (0.040%) CIMPLICITY
13 1 (0.040%) FactoryTalk
13 1 (0.040%) Red Hat Fuse
Applications
1 12 (0.48%) MS Visio
2 11 (0.44%) Microsoft Excel
3 9 (0.36%) Microsoft Office
4 7 (0.28%) Navisworks
4 7 (0.28%) Revit
5 6 (0.24%) Microsoft PowerPoint
5 6 (0.24%) Spreadsheet
6 1 (0.040%) Microsoft Project
Business Applications
1 64 (2.56%) SAP S/4HANA
2 13 (0.52%) Payment Gateway
3 12 (0.48%) Sparx Enterprise Architect
4 11 (0.44%) Teamcenter
5 10 (0.40%) Remedy ITSM
6 7 (0.28%) SAP ERP
7 5 (0.20%) Dynamics CRM
7 5 (0.20%) Maximo
7 5 (0.20%) Oracle ERP
7 5 (0.20%) Oracle Retail
8 4 (0.16%) NetSuite
8 4 (0.16%) Oracle Payables
8 4 (0.16%) SAP MDG
9 3 (0.12%) Dynamics NAV
9 3 (0.12%) Remedy AR System
9 3 (0.12%) SAP CRM
9 3 (0.12%) SAP GRC
9 3 (0.12%) SAP HR
9 3 (0.12%) SAP IBP
9 3 (0.12%) SAP Payroll
Cloud Services
1 567 (22.71%) Azure
2 440 (17.62%) AWS
3 175 (7.01%) GCP
4 100 (4.00%) Power Platform
5 81 (3.24%) SaaS
5 81 (3.24%) Serverless
6 76 (3.04%) Entra ID
7 51 (2.04%) Microsoft 365
8 47 (1.88%) PaaS
9 45 (1.80%) GitHub
10 44 (1.76%) Azure DevOps
11 42 (1.68%) Dynamics 365
12 39 (1.56%) IaaS
13 38 (1.52%) AWS Lambda
14 32 (1.28%) OpenShift
15 30 (1.20%) GitHub Actions
16 29 (1.16%) Snowflake
17 28 (1.12%) Amazon S3
18 23 (0.92%) Azure Data Factory
18 23 (0.92%) Azure Synapse Analytics
Communications & Networking
1 94 (3.76%) Firewall
2 64 (2.56%) WAN
3 59 (2.36%) DNS
4 52 (2.08%) LAN
5 49 (1.96%) Network Security
6 36 (1.44%) VPN
7 34 (1.36%) DHCP
8 33 (1.32%) BGP
9 32 (1.28%) SD-WAN
10 29 (1.16%) VLAN
11 27 (1.08%) TCP/IP
12 25 (1.00%) MPLS
12 25 (1.00%) SAN
13 22 (0.88%) NAS
14 20 (0.80%) Structured Cabling
15 18 (0.72%) Wireless
16 16 (0.64%) OSPF
17 15 (0.60%) BIG-IP
18 13 (0.52%) Cisco Nexus
18 13 (0.52%) NX-OS
Database & Business Intelligence
1 74 (2.96%) Data Lake
2 70 (2.80%) Power BI
3 67 (2.68%) Metadata
4 65 (2.60%) Data Warehouse
5 36 (1.44%) NoSQL
6 22 (0.88%) SQL Server
7 21 (0.84%) Azure SQL Database
8 20 (0.80%) Amazon RDS
9 19 (0.76%) Enterprise Data Warehouse
10 17 (0.68%) Oracle Database
11 16 (0.64%) Base SAS
12 15 (0.60%) PostgreSQL
13 14 (0.56%) BigQuery
14 12 (0.48%) Delta Lake
15 11 (0.44%) GIS
16 10 (0.40%) Big Data
16 10 (0.40%) MySQL
17 9 (0.36%) Amazon Redshift
17 9 (0.36%) Electronic Patient Records
17 9 (0.36%) Semantic Layer
Development Applications
1 35 (1.40%) JIRA
2 30 (1.20%) Git
3 22 (0.88%) Jenkins
4 13 (0.52%) GitLab
5 9 (0.36%) ERwin
6 6 (0.24%) Claude Code
6 6 (0.24%) Sonatype Nexus
7 5 (0.20%) Artifactory
8 4 (0.16%) Hudson
8 4 (0.16%) MSI
8 4 (0.16%) Rational DOORS
9 3 (0.12%) SonarQube
10 2 (0.080%) Bitbucket
10 2 (0.080%) Cypress.io
10 2 (0.080%) IntelliJ
10 2 (0.080%) JUnit
10 2 (0.080%) Oracle APEX
10 2 (0.080%) Oracle Forms
10 2 (0.080%) Rational Rhapsody
10 2 (0.080%) Selenium
General
1 472 (18.90%) Social Skills
2 308 (12.33%) Finance
3 240 (9.61%) Public Sector
4 129 (5.17%) Banking
5 128 (5.13%) Analytical Skills
6 102 (4.08%) Retail
7 91 (3.64%) Manufacturing
8 59 (2.36%) Documentation Skills
9 56 (2.24%) Influencing Skills
10 40 (1.60%) Aerospace
11 36 (1.44%) Legal
12 31 (1.24%) Military
13 28 (1.12%) Telecoms
14 22 (0.88%) Inclusion and Diversity
15 21 (0.84%) Aviation
15 21 (0.84%) Financial Institution
16 20 (0.80%) Back Office
16 20 (0.80%) Marketing
16 20 (0.80%) Presentation Skills
17 17 (0.68%) Local Government
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 100 (4.00%) REST
2 93 (3.72%) Terraform
3 73 (2.92%) Middleware
4 56 (2.24%) OAuth
5 46 (1.84%) SOAP
6 38 (1.52%) Oracle Fusion
7 36 (1.44%) .NET
8 35 (1.40%) OpenID
9 34 (1.36%) SAML
10 33 (1.32%) Kafka
11 25 (1.00%) OAuth2
12 23 (0.92%) JSON
13 22 (0.88%) SailPoint
14 20 (0.80%) LDAP
15 17 (0.68%) Node.js
15 17 (0.68%) RESTful
16 15 (0.60%) JWT
17 14 (0.56%) GraphQL
18 13 (0.52%) Swagger
18 13 (0.52%) Web Services
Miscellaneous
1 193 (7.73%) Cloud Native
2 82 (3.28%) Data Centre
3 80 (3.20%) Hybrid Cloud
4 67 (2.68%) Operational Technology
5 61 (2.44%) Data Protection Act
6 59 (2.36%) Product Ownership
7 57 (2.28%) Distributed Systems
7 57 (2.28%) Legacy Systems
8 54 (2.16%) Management Information System
9 53 (2.12%) Enterprise Software
9 53 (2.12%) Onboarding
10 38 (1.52%) Public Cloud
11 36 (1.44%) AI Agents
12 31 (1.24%) Private Cloud
13 28 (1.12%) Security Posture
14 26 (1.04%) IVR
15 25 (1.00%) Enterprise Cloud
16 24 (0.96%) CMDB
17 23 (0.92%) SCADA
18 22 (0.88%) PKI
Operating Systems
1 85 (3.40%) Windows
2 51 (2.04%) Linux
3 35 (1.40%) Windows Server
4 13 (0.52%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
5 9 (0.36%) Android
5 9 (0.36%) Apple iOS
6 8 (0.32%) Unix
7 6 (0.24%) AIX
8 5 (0.20%) Data ONTAP
9 2 (0.080%) HPUX
9 2 (0.080%) Solaris
9 2 (0.080%) Windows 10
9 2 (0.080%) Windows Server 2019
10 1 (0.040%) CatOS
10 1 (0.040%) CentOS
10 1 (0.040%) Ubuntu
10 1 (0.040%) VMS
10 1 (0.040%) Windows Server 2008
10 1 (0.040%) Windows Server 2016
10 1 (0.040%) zOS
Processes & Methodologies
1 359 (14.38%) Stakeholder Management
2 348 (13.94%) Roadmaps
3 313 (12.54%) Agile
4 286 (11.45%) Technical Leadership
5 284 (11.37%) Migration
6 276 (11.05%) Enterprise Architecture
7 244 (9.77%) DevOps
8 235 (9.41%) Integration Patterns
9 234 (9.37%) Stakeholder Engagement
10 229 (9.17%) CI/CD
11 225 (9.01%) AI
12 214 (8.57%) Data Architecture
13 206 (8.25%) Data Modelling
14 202 (8.09%) Architectural Patterns
15 199 (7.97%) Cybersecurity
16 186 (7.45%) Security Architecture
17 179 (7.17%) TOGAF
18 161 (6.45%) Microservices
19 154 (6.17%) Architecture Governance
20 147 (5.89%) Event-Driven
Programming Languages
1 99 (3.96%) SQL
2 98 (3.92%) Java
3 85 (3.40%) Python
4 51 (2.04%) JavaScript
5 46 (1.84%) PowerShell
6 23 (0.92%) Bash
7 16 (0.64%) Bicep
8 12 (0.48%) C#
8 12 (0.48%) TypeScript
9 10 (0.40%) Shell Script
10 8 (0.32%) ABAP
11 7 (0.28%) Apex Code
12 6 (0.24%) PL/SQL
12 6 (0.24%) VBA
13 5 (0.20%) Groovy
14 4 (0.16%) Kotlin
15 3 (0.12%) Data Analysis Expressions
16 2 (0.080%) BeanShell
16 2 (0.080%) R
16 2 (0.080%) Scala
Qualifications
1 825 (33.04%) Security Cleared
2 523 (20.95%) SC Cleared
3 259 (10.37%) DV Cleared
4 70 (2.80%) Degree
5 56 (2.24%) CISSP
6 54 (2.16%) Cisco Certification
7 44 (1.76%) Azure Certification
8 42 (1.68%) AWS Certification
8 42 (1.68%) BPSS Clearance
8 42 (1.68%) TOGAF Certification
9 30 (1.20%) Computer Science Degree
10 27 (1.08%) CCNP
11 21 (0.84%) CISM
12 19 (0.76%) Microsoft Certification
13 16 (0.64%) CCNA
14 15 (0.60%) (ISC)2 CCSP
15 14 (0.56%) CCIE
16 11 (0.44%) AWS Certified Solutions Architect
16 11 (0.44%) Network+ Certification
16 11 (0.44%) Server+ Certification
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 94 (3.76%) NIST
2 77 (3.08%) Data Quality
3 61 (2.44%) NCSC
4 60 (2.40%) ISO/IEC 27001
5 55 (2.20%) GDPR
6 23 (0.92%) QA
7 18 (0.72%) Accessibility
8 17 (0.68%) NIST 800
9 16 (0.64%) ISO/IEC 20000
9 16 (0.64%) PCI DSS
10 14 (0.56%) JSP 440
11 13 (0.52%) ISO 19650
12 12 (0.48%) GRC
13 11 (0.44%) IFRS
14 10 (0.40%) Disclosure Scotland
14 10 (0.40%) SLA
15 9 (0.36%) HL7
15 9 (0.36%) Sarbanes-Oxley
16 8 (0.32%) Cyber Essentials
17 6 (0.24%) ISO/IEC 27002 (supersedes ISO/IEC 17799)
System Software
1 93 (3.72%) Active Directory
2 49 (1.96%) Docker
3 45 (1.80%) VMware Infrastructure
4 26 (1.04%) Virtual Desktop
5 24 (0.96%) VMware NSX
6 18 (0.72%) Hyper-V
7 11 (0.44%) VMware ESXi
7 11 (0.44%) vSphere
8 9 (0.36%) Virtual Machines
9 6 (0.24%) vCloud
10 4 (0.16%) KVM
11 3 (0.12%) Ceph
11 3 (0.12%) EMC RecoverPoint
11 3 (0.12%) NFS
11 3 (0.12%) SRDF
12 2 (0.080%) zsh
13 1 (0.040%) Firmware
13 1 (0.040%) IAG
13 1 (0.040%) Microsoft Virtual Server
13 1 (0.040%) Slurm Workload Manager
Systems Management
1 128 (5.13%) Kubernetes
2 50 (2.00%) Ansible
3 25 (1.00%) Microsoft Intune
4 18 (0.72%) Single Sign-On
5 16 (0.64%) Grafana
6 15 (0.60%) Active Directory Federation Services
7 13 (0.52%) Prometheus
7 13 (0.52%) vCenter Server
8 12 (0.48%) Jamf Pro
9 7 (0.28%) Argo
9 7 (0.28%) FortiGate
9 7 (0.28%) WMI
10 6 (0.24%) Istio
11 5 (0.20%) CASB
11 5 (0.20%) MOM
11 5 (0.20%) NetBackup
12 4 (0.16%) EMC VPLEX
12 4 (0.16%) SnapMirror
13 3 (0.12%) Cisco CUCM
13 3 (0.12%) SnapVault
Vendors
1 348 (13.94%) Microsoft
2 139 (5.57%) SAP
3 108 (4.33%) Oracle
4 98 (3.92%) ServiceNow
5 91 (3.64%) VMware
6 87 (3.48%) Google
7 78 (3.12%) Cisco
8 76 (3.04%) Databricks
9 48 (1.92%) Salesforce
10 28 (1.12%) F5
11 27 (1.08%) MuleSoft
12 25 (1.00%) CyberArk
13 22 (0.88%) Informatica
13 22 (0.88%) Palo Alto
13 22 (0.88%) Red Hat
14 21 (0.84%) IBM
15 20 (0.80%) Citrix
16 17 (0.68%) Infoblox
16 17 (0.68%) Workday
17 15 (0.60%) Juniper