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 October 2025.

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

6 months to
18 Oct 2025
Same period 2024 Same period 2023
Rank 21 12 16
Rank change year-on-year -9 +4 +6
Contract jobs requiring an Architect 1,266 1,612 1,819
As % of all contract jobs in the UK excluding London 7.89% 9.37% 8.50%
As % of the Job Titles category 8.80% 10.17% 9.04%
Number of daily rates quoted 882 945 1,260
10th Percentile £458 £455 £500
25th Percentile £519 £525 £563
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £600 £625 £634
Median % change year-on-year -4.00% -1.42% -1.71%
75th Percentile £694 £700 £700
90th Percentile £775 £775 £750
UK median daily rate £625 £625 £650
% change year-on-year - -3.85% -
Number of hourly rates quoted 13 54 40
10th Percentile £58.99 £60.00 £61.25
25th Percentile £66.25 £61.56 £70.00
Median hourly rate £72.50 £70.00 £75.67
Median % change year-on-year +3.57% -7.49% +8.10%
75th Percentile £85.00 £79.19 £80.00
90th Percentile £97.50 £90.00 £85.92
UK median hourly rate £80.00 £70.00 £72.84
% change year-on-year +14.29% -3.89% +4.05%

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 14,384 15,852 20,120
% of contract IT jobs with a recognized job title 89.62% 92.16% 94.06%
Number of daily rates quoted 8,852 9,019 13,429
10th Percentile £209 £220 £219
25th Percentile £363 £373 £385
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £475 £490 £500
Median % change year-on-year -3.06% -2.00% -
75th Percentile £575 £588 £600
90th Percentile £675 £675 £688
UK median daily rate £500 £525 £525
% change year-on-year -4.76% - -4.55%
Number of hourly rates quoted 1,371 1,184 1,270
10th Percentile £13.57 £14.73 £14.16
25th Percentile £16.50 £19.59 £18.00
Median hourly rate £24.62 £41.27 £44.50
Median % change year-on-year -40.34% -7.27% +97.78%
75th Percentile £50.00 £66.61 £65.00
90th Percentile £69.65 £73.75 £77.50
UK median hourly rate £25.15 £40.33 £45.00
% change year-on-year -37.63% -10.39% +68.48%

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 October 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 October 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 October 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 +2 367 £600 -6.25% 483
North of England -15 336 £600 +3.45% 194
Midlands -9 213 £575 -1.20% 91
North West -9 208 £575 -3.16% 114
South West -6 180 £650 - 121
West Midlands -14 140 £600 -3.23% 57
Yorkshire -25 113 £613 +5.79% 62
Scotland -10 82 £599 -7.88% 46
East of England -10 82 £555 -7.50% 64
East Midlands -6 72 £500 -1.48% 32
Wales +1 17 £625 +4.17% 40
North East -4 16 £738 +28.54% 20
Channel Islands - 6 £743 -
Northern Ireland -13 2 £788 +31.25% 13
Architect
UK

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

For the 6 months to 18 October 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.

1 403 (31.83%) Security Cleared
2 324 (25.59%) Azure
3 293 (23.14%) AWS
4 233 (18.40%) SC Cleared
5 208 (16.43%) Roadmaps
6 184 (14.53%) Microsoft
7 182 (14.38%) Stakeholder Management
8 168 (13.27%) Migration
9 162 (12.80%) Problem-Solving
10 160 (12.64%) Agile
11 149 (11.77%) TOGAF
12 142 (11.22%) CI/CD
13 137 (10.82%) Enterprise Architecture
14 136 (10.74%) DevOps
15 135 (10.66%) DV Cleared
16 126 (9.95%) Data Modelling
17 123 (9.72%) Stakeholder Engagement
18 118 (9.32%) AI
19 115 (9.08%) Technical Leadership
20 112 (8.85%) Microservices
21 111 (8.77%) GCP
22 106 (8.37%) Cybersecurity
23 98 (7.74%) Python
24 93 (7.35%) VMware
25 91 (7.19%) Mentoring
26 90 (7.11%) Architectural Design
27 88 (6.95%) ITIL
28 82 (6.48%) Architectural Patterns
29 81 (6.40%) Analytics
29 81 (6.40%) Oracle

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 24 (1.90%) Confluence
2 13 (1.03%) SharePoint
3 12 (0.95%) ArcGIS
4 10 (0.79%) Apache Spark
5 9 (0.71%) WebLogic
6 8 (0.63%) Apache Airflow
7 7 (0.55%) Microsoft Exchange
7 7 (0.55%) WebSphere
8 6 (0.47%) OpenStack
8 6 (0.47%) SAS
8 6 (0.47%) Smallworld
9 4 (0.32%) Camunda
9 4 (0.32%) CICS
9 4 (0.32%) Documentum
9 4 (0.32%) ThingWorx
10 3 (0.24%) GeoServer
10 3 (0.24%) Oracle Spatial
11 2 (0.16%) Anypoint
11 2 (0.16%) Oracle Coherence
11 2 (0.16%) Oracle SOA Suite
Applications
1 12 (0.95%) Siemens NX
2 11 (0.87%) MS Visio
3 8 (0.63%) Microsoft Excel
4 6 (0.47%) Microsoft PowerPoint
5 3 (0.24%) Fusion 360
5 3 (0.24%) Microsoft Office
6 2 (0.16%) Chatbot
6 2 (0.16%) Microsoft Project
6 2 (0.16%) Trello
7 1 (0.079%) FrameMaker
7 1 (0.079%) Revit
Business Applications
1 27 (2.13%) SAP S/4HANA
2 15 (1.18%) Dynamics CRM
3 12 (0.95%) Teamcenter
4 11 (0.87%) Payment Gateway
5 10 (0.79%) Maximo
5 10 (0.79%) SAP PM
6 7 (0.55%) SAP CO
7 6 (0.47%) Salesforce CRM
7 6 (0.47%) SAP FI
7 6 (0.47%) SAP FI/CO
7 6 (0.47%) SAP HR
7 6 (0.47%) Workday HCM
8 5 (0.39%) Dynamics AX
8 5 (0.39%) Oracle SCM
9 4 (0.32%) Avolution ABACUS
9 4 (0.32%) Sparx Enterprise Architect
10 3 (0.24%) NetSuite
11 2 (0.16%) SAP ERP
11 2 (0.16%) SAP Retail
12 1 (0.079%) Oracle ERP
Cloud Services
1 324 (25.59%) Azure
2 293 (23.14%) AWS
3 111 (8.77%) GCP
4 69 (5.45%) Serverless
5 56 (4.42%) SaaS
6 47 (3.71%) Dynamics 365
7 45 (3.55%) AWS Lambda
8 43 (3.40%) Power Platform
9 42 (3.32%) GitHub
10 39 (3.08%) Amazon S3
11 37 (2.92%) Entra ID
12 30 (2.37%) Azure DevOps
13 29 (2.29%) Microsoft 365
14 24 (1.90%) Azure Synapse Analytics
14 24 (1.90%) GitHub Actions
15 22 (1.74%) Amazon CloudWatch
16 20 (1.58%) Azure Data Factory
16 20 (1.58%) PaaS
17 19 (1.50%) Microsoft Purview
17 19 (1.50%) Snowflake
Communications & Networking
1 66 (5.21%) Firewall
2 48 (3.79%) Network Security
3 40 (3.16%) WAN
4 34 (2.69%) LAN
5 24 (1.90%) SD-WAN
5 24 (1.90%) VPN
6 19 (1.50%) BGP
6 19 (1.50%) SAN
7 17 (1.34%) Fibre Channel
7 17 (1.34%) iSCSI
8 14 (1.11%) DNS
8 14 (1.11%) MPLS
9 12 (0.95%) VSAN
10 10 (0.79%) Internet
11 7 (0.55%) 4G
11 7 (0.55%) FTP
12 6 (0.47%) IPsec
12 6 (0.47%) Wi-Fi
13 5 (0.39%) Kerberos
13 5 (0.39%) Wireless
Database & Business Intelligence
1 49 (3.87%) Data Warehouse
2 40 (3.16%) PostgreSQL
3 33 (2.61%) Power BI
4 30 (2.37%) NoSQL
5 25 (1.97%) MongoDB
6 23 (1.82%) Metadata
6 23 (1.82%) SQL Server
7 22 (1.74%) DynamoDB
8 20 (1.58%) GIS
9 19 (1.50%) Oracle Database
10 17 (1.34%) Big Data
11 16 (1.26%) Relational Database
12 14 (1.11%) BigQuery
13 13 (1.03%) Amazon Aurora
14 12 (0.95%) RDBMS
15 11 (0.87%) Amazon Redshift
15 11 (0.87%) Data Lake
15 11 (0.87%) Redis
16 9 (0.71%) Amazon RDS
16 9 (0.71%) Azure SQL Database
Development Applications
1 50 (3.95%) Jenkins
2 44 (3.48%) JIRA
3 35 (2.76%) Git
4 10 (0.79%) CircleCI
4 10 (0.79%) GitLab
5 9 (0.71%) Oracle Forms
6 8 (0.63%) Maven
7 7 (0.55%) Gradle
7 7 (0.55%) Rational DOORS
8 6 (0.47%) SonarQube
9 5 (0.39%) SonarLint
9 5 (0.39%) Storybook
10 3 (0.24%) Artifactory
10 3 (0.24%) Hudson
10 3 (0.24%) Sonatype Nexus
10 3 (0.24%) Visual Studio Code
11 2 (0.16%) Bitbucket
11 2 (0.16%) Cypress.io
11 2 (0.16%) MSI
11 2 (0.16%) Selenium
General
1 352 (27.80%) Social Skills
2 169 (13.35%) Finance
3 157 (12.40%) Public Sector
4 92 (7.27%) Analytical Skills
5 82 (6.48%) Banking
6 45 (3.55%) Retail
7 39 (3.08%) Telecoms
8 37 (2.92%) Marketing
9 27 (2.13%) Manufacturing
10 25 (1.97%) Documentation Skills
11 24 (1.90%) Influencing Skills
11 24 (1.90%) Legal
12 23 (1.82%) Presentation Skills
13 20 (1.58%) Aerospace
14 12 (0.95%) Local Government
15 11 (0.87%) Automotive
15 11 (0.87%) Military
16 10 (0.79%) Back Office
16 10 (0.79%) Financial Institution
17 9 (0.71%) Pharmaceutical
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 39 (3.08%) Middleware
2 37 (2.92%) REST
3 36 (2.84%) Kafka
4 32 (2.53%) RESTful
5 27 (2.13%) .NET
6 25 (1.97%) SOAP
7 22 (1.74%) Web Services
8 17 (1.34%) Lightning Web Components
8 17 (1.34%) Spring Boot
9 16 (1.26%) Visualforce
10 15 (1.18%) SailPoint
11 14 (1.11%) GraphQL
12 13 (1.03%) OAuth
12 13 (1.03%) React
13 12 (0.95%) SAP PI
14 10 (0.79%) J2EE
14 10 (0.79%) Node.js
15 9 (0.71%) Celery
16 8 (0.63%) RabbitMQ
16 8 (0.63%) Spring
Miscellaneous
1 93 (7.35%) Cloud Native
2 66 (5.21%) Legacy Systems
3 61 (4.82%) Data Centre
4 56 (4.42%) Product Ownership
5 43 (3.40%) Onboarding
6 41 (3.24%) Hybrid Cloud
7 25 (1.97%) Operational Technology
8 23 (1.82%) SCADA
9 22 (1.74%) Management Information System
10 21 (1.66%) Enterprise Software
10 21 (1.66%) Public Cloud
11 20 (1.58%) Security Posture
12 19 (1.50%) PKI
13 18 (1.42%) Data Protection Act
14 16 (1.26%) Distributed Systems
15 15 (1.18%) CMDB
15 15 (1.18%) Cyber Threat
15 15 (1.18%) Security Operations Centre
16 13 (1.03%) Analytical Mindset
17 12 (0.95%) IoT
Operating Systems
1 74 (5.85%) Windows
2 51 (4.03%) Linux
3 29 (2.29%) Windows Server
4 21 (1.66%) Windows Server 2019
5 14 (1.11%) Unix
6 9 (0.71%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
7 7 (0.55%) Windows 10
8 5 (0.39%) Android
8 5 (0.39%) Apple iOS
8 5 (0.39%) Windows 7
9 3 (0.24%) Mac OS
9 3 (0.24%) Windows Server 2008
10 2 (0.16%) Solaris
10 2 (0.16%) Ubuntu
10 2 (0.16%) VMS
10 2 (0.16%) Windows Server 2016
10 2 (0.16%) zOS
11 1 (0.079%) MVS
11 1 (0.079%) Windows XP
Processes & Methodologies
1 208 (16.43%) Roadmaps
2 182 (14.38%) Stakeholder Management
3 168 (13.27%) Migration
4 162 (12.80%) Problem-Solving
5 160 (12.64%) Agile
6 149 (11.77%) TOGAF
7 142 (11.22%) CI/CD
8 137 (10.82%) Enterprise Architecture
9 136 (10.74%) DevOps
10 126 (9.95%) Data Modelling
11 123 (9.72%) Stakeholder Engagement
12 118 (9.32%) AI
13 115 (9.08%) Technical Leadership
14 112 (8.85%) Microservices
15 106 (8.37%) Cybersecurity
16 91 (7.19%) Mentoring
17 90 (7.11%) Architectural Design
18 88 (6.95%) ITIL
19 82 (6.48%) Architectural Patterns
20 81 (6.40%) Analytics
Programming Languages
1 98 (7.74%) Python
2 78 (6.16%) Java
3 68 (5.37%) SQL
4 22 (1.74%) TypeScript
5 20 (1.58%) JavaScript
6 17 (1.34%) Apex Code
6 17 (1.34%) PowerShell
7 14 (1.11%) C#
8 12 (0.95%) C++
9 10 (0.79%) Bicep
10 8 (0.63%) Bash
11 7 (0.55%) R
12 6 (0.47%) C
13 5 (0.39%) ABAP
13 5 (0.39%) Scala
14 4 (0.32%) Ada
14 4 (0.32%) Kusto Query Language
15 3 (0.24%) Magik
15 3 (0.24%) Shell Script
15 3 (0.24%) X++
Qualifications
1 403 (31.83%) Security Cleared
2 233 (18.40%) SC Cleared
3 135 (10.66%) DV Cleared
4 68 (5.37%) Degree
5 59 (4.66%) CISSP
6 39 (3.08%) Azure Certification
7 38 (3.00%) AWS Certification
8 31 (2.45%) Microsoft Certification
9 28 (2.21%) TOGAF Certification
10 26 (2.05%) Cisco Certification
10 26 (2.05%) CISM
11 23 (1.82%) Computer Science Degree
12 22 (1.74%) Master's Degree
13 20 (1.58%) AWS Certified Solutions Architect
14 17 (1.34%) VMware Certified Professional (VCP)
15 16 (1.26%) MCSE
16 14 (1.11%) CCIE
17 13 (1.03%) BPSS Clearance
18 10 (0.79%) VCP5
18 10 (0.79%) VCP6
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 63 (4.98%) GDPR
2 62 (4.90%) NIST
3 53 (4.19%) ISO/IEC 27001
4 40 (3.16%) Data Quality
4 40 (3.16%) NCSC
5 28 (2.21%) ISO/IEC 20000
6 20 (1.58%) California Consumer Privacy Act
7 18 (1.42%) QA
8 15 (1.18%) PCI DSS
9 11 (0.87%) JSP 440
10 10 (0.79%) GRC
11 9 (0.71%) NIST 800
11 9 (0.71%) Sarbanes-Oxley
12 8 (0.63%) Accessibility
12 8 (0.63%) SLA
13 7 (0.55%) Def Stans
13 7 (0.55%) IEC 61508
14 5 (0.39%) Cyber Essentials
14 5 (0.39%) EU AI Act
14 5 (0.39%) PSD2
System Software
1 61 (4.82%) VMware Infrastructure
2 48 (3.79%) Active Directory
3 47 (3.71%) Docker
4 28 (2.21%) vSphere
5 23 (1.82%) VMware ESXi
6 17 (1.34%) NFS
7 11 (0.87%) VMware NSX
8 10 (0.79%) Virtual Desktop
9 5 (0.39%) Hyper-V
10 3 (0.24%) Dovecot
10 3 (0.24%) Postfix
11 2 (0.16%) KVM
11 2 (0.16%) Virtual Machines
12 1 (0.079%) HDFS
12 1 (0.079%) Microsoft App-V
12 1 (0.079%) Slurm Workload Manager
12 1 (0.079%) SRDF
12 1 (0.079%) Veritas Cluster Server
12 1 (0.079%) Virtual Servers
12 1 (0.079%) Xen
Systems Management
1 79 (6.24%) Terraform
2 75 (5.92%) Kubernetes
3 34 (2.69%) Ansible
4 15 (1.18%) Prometheus
5 14 (1.11%) Single Sign-On
6 12 (0.95%) vCenter Server
7 11 (0.87%) Grafana
8 10 (0.79%) Microsoft Intune
9 5 (0.39%) Argo
9 5 (0.39%) WMI
10 4 (0.32%) Active Directory Federation Services
10 4 (0.32%) FortiGate
10 4 (0.32%) SCCM
11 3 (0.24%) OPNET
12 2 (0.16%) Amdocs OSS
12 2 (0.16%) Cisco CUCM
12 2 (0.16%) Control-M
12 2 (0.16%) Kubeflow
12 2 (0.16%) Microsoft Clustering
12 2 (0.16%) SCOM
Vendors
1 184 (14.53%) Microsoft
2 93 (7.35%) VMware
3 81 (6.40%) Oracle
4 65 (5.13%) SAP
5 60 (4.74%) Salesforce
6 56 (4.42%) Cisco
7 31 (2.45%) Google
8 30 (2.37%) ServiceNow
9 29 (2.29%) Splunk
10 21 (1.66%) Databricks
11 20 (1.58%) Juniper
12 19 (1.50%) Citrix
12 19 (1.50%) NetApp
13 17 (1.34%) CyberArk
13 17 (1.34%) ESRI
13 17 (1.34%) F5
13 17 (1.34%) Palo Alto
13 17 (1.34%) Workday
14 16 (1.26%) Veeam
14 16 (1.26%) Virgin Media