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 22 August 2026.

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

6 months to
22 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 2,507 1,242 1,829
As % of all contract jobs in the UK excluding London 9.05% 8.10% 10.06%
As % of the Job Titles category 9.87% 9.00% 10.90%
Number of daily rates quoted 1,675 846 1,158
10th Percentile £475 £462 £480
25th Percentile £525 £519 £550
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £620 £600 £640
Median % change year-on-year +3.33% -6.21% -1.58%
75th Percentile £706 £688 £725
90th Percentile £775 £751 £780
UK median daily rate £620 £625 £648
% change year-on-year -0.80% -3.51% -0.35%
Number of hourly rates quoted 155 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% -3.89%
75th Percentile £71.91 £86.50 £85.00
90th Percentile £95.00 £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 25,402 13,799 16,779
% of contract IT jobs with a recognized job title 91.72% 90.05% 92.25%
Number of daily rates quoted 14,332 8,464 10,141
10th Percentile £304 £213 £220
25th Percentile £410 £361 £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% -1.69%
Number of hourly rates quoted 3,061 1,256 1,678
10th Percentile £14.56 £13.31 £13.86
25th Percentile £20.31 £16.39 £18.20
Median hourly rate £42.50 £25.15 £43.00
Median % change year-on-year +68.99% -41.51% +14.67%
75th Percentile £68.00 £55.00 £65.00
90th Percentile £78.75 £73.75 £75.00
UK median hourly rate £42.00 £25.15 £43.00
% change year-on-year +67.00% -41.51% +1.55%

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 22 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 22 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 22 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 0 740 £625 +4.17% 239
North of England +5 698 £600 - 255
Midlands -1 415 £625 +8.70% 98
North West +6 407 £600 - 144
South West -2 315 £640 - 132
West Midlands -2 299 £640 +6.58% 74
Yorkshire +6 227 £594 -3.06% 79
Scotland +18 156 £625 +0.60% 74
East of England +12 154 £604 +8.83% 48
East Midlands +5 109 £600 +18.23% 24
North East -6 66 £588 -16.07% 33
Wales +2 43 £633 +1.20% 17
Northern Ireland +4 5 £475 -32.14% 33
Channel Islands -3 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 22 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.

1 831 (33.15%) Security Cleared
2 568 (22.66%) Azure
3 530 (21.14%) SC Cleared
4 444 (17.71%) AWS
5 361 (14.40%) Stakeholder Management
6 351 (14.00%) Roadmaps
7 350 (13.96%) Microsoft
8 315 (12.56%) Agile
9 293 (11.69%) Migration
10 289 (11.53%) Technical Leadership
11 277 (11.05%) Enterprise Architecture
12 258 (10.29%) DV Cleared
13 244 (9.73%) DevOps
14 236 (9.41%) Integration Patterns
14 236 (9.41%) Stakeholder Engagement
15 228 (9.09%) CI/CD
16 226 (9.01%) AI
17 216 (8.62%) Data Architecture
18 207 (8.26%) Data Modelling
19 204 (8.14%) Architectural Patterns
20 196 (7.82%) Cybersecurity
21 190 (7.58%) Security Architecture
22 180 (7.18%) TOGAF
23 176 (7.02%) GCP
24 162 (6.46%) Microservices
25 155 (6.18%) Architecture Governance
26 148 (5.90%) Event-Driven
27 145 (5.78%) Continuous Improvement
27 145 (5.78%) Problem-Solving
28 144 (5.74%) 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%) Confluence
2 31 (1.24%) SAS
3 15 (0.60%) Microsoft Exchange
4 12 (0.48%) OpenStack
5 10 (0.40%) Apache
5 10 (0.40%) Apache Spark
5 10 (0.40%) Palantir Foundry
6 9 (0.36%) Apache Airflow
7 7 (0.28%) Documentum
8 5 (0.20%) Adobe Experience Manager
9 4 (0.16%) CMS
10 3 (0.12%) JBoss
10 3 (0.12%) NetWeaver
10 3 (0.12%) SAP EP
11 2 (0.080%) Alfresco
11 2 (0.080%) Apache Superset
12 1 (0.040%) FactoryTalk
12 1 (0.040%) Predix
12 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 65 (2.59%) SAP S/4HANA
2 12 (0.48%) Payment Gateway
2 12 (0.48%) Sparx Enterprise Architect
3 11 (0.44%) Teamcenter
4 10 (0.40%) Remedy ITSM
5 7 (0.28%) SAP ERP
6 5 (0.20%) Dynamics CRM
6 5 (0.20%) Maximo
6 5 (0.20%) Oracle ERP
6 5 (0.20%) Oracle Retail
7 4 (0.16%) NetSuite
7 4 (0.16%) Oracle Payables
7 4 (0.16%) SAP MDG
8 3 (0.12%) Dynamics NAV
8 3 (0.12%) Remedy AR System
8 3 (0.12%) SAP CRM
8 3 (0.12%) SAP GRC
8 3 (0.12%) SAP HR
8 3 (0.12%) SAP IBP
8 3 (0.12%) SAP Payroll
Cloud Services
1 568 (22.66%) Azure
2 444 (17.71%) AWS
3 176 (7.02%) GCP
4 101 (4.03%) Power Platform
5 83 (3.31%) SaaS
6 82 (3.27%) Serverless
7 76 (3.03%) Entra ID
8 52 (2.07%) Microsoft 365
9 47 (1.87%) PaaS
10 44 (1.76%) GitHub
11 43 (1.72%) Azure DevOps
11 43 (1.72%) Dynamics 365
12 39 (1.56%) IaaS
13 38 (1.52%) AWS Lambda
14 31 (1.24%) OpenShift
15 29 (1.16%) GitHub Actions
15 29 (1.16%) Snowflake
16 28 (1.12%) Amazon S3
17 23 (0.92%) Azure Synapse Analytics
17 23 (0.92%) OCI
Communications & Networking
1 92 (3.67%) Firewall
2 63 (2.51%) WAN
3 58 (2.31%) DNS
4 51 (2.03%) LAN
5 48 (1.91%) Network Security
6 35 (1.40%) VPN
7 34 (1.36%) DHCP
8 33 (1.32%) BGP
9 32 (1.28%) SD-WAN
10 27 (1.08%) TCP/IP
10 27 (1.08%) VLAN
11 25 (1.00%) SAN
12 23 (0.92%) MPLS
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 73 (2.91%) Data Lake
2 71 (2.83%) Power BI
3 69 (2.75%) Metadata
4 65 (2.59%) Data Warehouse
5 37 (1.48%) 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 18 (0.72%) Oracle Database
11 16 (0.64%) Base SAS
11 16 (0.64%) PostgreSQL
12 14 (0.56%) BigQuery
13 13 (0.52%) Delta Lake
14 11 (0.44%) GIS
15 10 (0.40%) Big Data
15 10 (0.40%) MySQL
16 9 (0.36%) Amazon Redshift
16 9 (0.36%) Electronic Patient Records
16 9 (0.36%) Relational Database
Development Applications
1 36 (1.44%) JIRA
2 30 (1.20%) Git
3 21 (0.84%) 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
1 474 (18.91%) Social Skills
2 311 (12.41%) Finance
3 244 (9.73%) Public Sector
4 130 (5.19%) Banking
5 128 (5.11%) Analytical Skills
6 104 (4.15%) Retail
7 91 (3.63%) Manufacturing
8 60 (2.39%) Documentation Skills
9 56 (2.23%) Influencing Skills
10 40 (1.60%) Aerospace
11 36 (1.44%) Legal
12 30 (1.20%) Military
13 28 (1.12%) Telecoms
14 23 (0.92%) Inclusion and Diversity
15 22 (0.88%) Aviation
16 21 (0.84%) Financial Institution
17 20 (0.80%) Back Office
17 20 (0.80%) Marketing
17 20 (0.80%) Presentation Skills
18 17 (0.68%) Local Government
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 100 (3.99%) REST
2 91 (3.63%) Terraform
3 72 (2.87%) Middleware
4 56 (2.23%) OAuth
5 45 (1.79%) 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
19 12 (0.48%) React
Miscellaneous
1 195 (7.78%) Cloud Native
2 83 (3.31%) Data Centre
3 79 (3.15%) Hybrid Cloud
4 64 (2.55%) Operational Technology
5 60 (2.39%) Data Protection Act
6 59 (2.35%) Product Ownership
7 57 (2.27%) Distributed Systems
7 57 (2.27%) Legacy Systems
8 54 (2.15%) Management Information System
9 53 (2.11%) Onboarding
10 52 (2.07%) Enterprise Software
11 39 (1.56%) Public Cloud
12 37 (1.48%) AI Agents
13 31 (1.24%) Private Cloud
14 28 (1.12%) Security Posture
15 26 (1.04%) Enterprise Cloud
15 26 (1.04%) IVR
16 24 (0.96%) CMDB
17 22 (0.88%) PKI
18 21 (0.84%) SCADA
Operating Systems
1 84 (3.35%) Windows
2 52 (2.07%) Linux
3 35 (1.40%) Windows Server
4 14 (0.56%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
5 8 (0.32%) Unix
6 7 (0.28%) Android
6 7 (0.28%) Apple iOS
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
1 361 (14.40%) Stakeholder Management
2 351 (14.00%) Roadmaps
3 315 (12.56%) Agile
4 293 (11.69%) Migration
5 289 (11.53%) Technical Leadership
6 277 (11.05%) Enterprise Architecture
7 244 (9.73%) DevOps
8 236 (9.41%) Integration Patterns
8 236 (9.41%) Stakeholder Engagement
9 228 (9.09%) CI/CD
10 226 (9.01%) AI
11 216 (8.62%) Data Architecture
12 207 (8.26%) Data Modelling
13 204 (8.14%) Architectural Patterns
14 196 (7.82%) Cybersecurity
15 190 (7.58%) Security Architecture
16 180 (7.18%) TOGAF
17 162 (6.46%) Microservices
18 155 (6.18%) Architecture Governance
19 148 (5.90%) Event-Driven
Programming Languages
1 100 (3.99%) SQL
2 98 (3.91%) Java
3 85 (3.39%) Python
4 51 (2.03%) JavaScript
5 45 (1.79%) PowerShell
6 22 (0.88%) Bash
7 15 (0.60%) 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
15 3 (0.12%) R
16 2 (0.080%) BeanShell
16 2 (0.080%) Scala
Qualifications
1 831 (33.15%) Security Cleared
2 530 (21.14%) SC Cleared
3 258 (10.29%) DV Cleared
4 70 (2.79%) Degree
5 56 (2.23%) CISSP
6 54 (2.15%) Cisco Certification
7 44 (1.76%) Azure Certification
8 43 (1.72%) BPSS Clearance
9 42 (1.68%) AWS Certification
9 42 (1.68%) TOGAF Certification
10 30 (1.20%) Computer Science Degree
11 27 (1.08%) CCNP
12 21 (0.84%) CISM
13 19 (0.76%) Microsoft Certification
14 15 (0.60%) (ISC)2 CCSP
15 14 (0.56%) CCIE
15 14 (0.56%) CCNA
16 11 (0.44%) AWS Certified Solutions Architect
16 11 (0.44%) Network+ Certification
16 11 (0.44%) Server+ Certification
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 93 (3.71%) NIST
2 80 (3.19%) Data Quality
3 61 (2.43%) NCSC
4 60 (2.39%) ISO/IEC 27001
5 55 (2.19%) GDPR
6 23 (0.92%) QA
7 18 (0.72%) Accessibility
7 18 (0.72%) NIST 800
8 16 (0.64%) ISO/IEC 20000
8 16 (0.64%) PCI DSS
9 15 (0.60%) JSP 440
10 13 (0.52%) ISO 19650
11 12 (0.48%) GRC
12 11 (0.44%) IFRS
12 11 (0.44%) SLA
13 10 (0.40%) Disclosure Scotland
14 9 (0.36%) HL7
14 9 (0.36%) Sarbanes-Oxley
15 7 (0.28%) Cyber Essentials
16 6 (0.24%) ISO/IEC 27002 (supersedes ISO/IEC 17799)
System Software
1 92 (3.67%) Active Directory
2 48 (1.91%) Docker
3 45 (1.79%) VMware Infrastructure
4 26 (1.04%) Virtual Desktop
5 23 (0.92%) 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 (5.11%) Kubernetes
2 50 (1.99%) Ansible
3 23 (0.92%) 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%) WMI
10 6 (0.24%) FortiGate
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
1 350 (13.96%) Microsoft
2 140 (5.58%) SAP
3 111 (4.43%) Oracle
4 97 (3.87%) ServiceNow
5 89 (3.55%) VMware
6 88 (3.51%) Google
7 78 (3.11%) Databricks
8 76 (3.03%) Cisco
9 48 (1.91%) Salesforce
10 27 (1.08%) F5
10 27 (1.08%) MuleSoft
11 25 (1.00%) CyberArk
12 22 (0.88%) Informatica
12 22 (0.88%) Palo Alto
12 22 (0.88%) Red Hat
13 21 (0.84%) IBM
14 18 (0.72%) Citrix
15 17 (0.68%) Infoblox
15 17 (0.68%) Workday
16 15 (0.60%) Juniper