Consultant Contract Job Trends in the UK excluding London

Consultant
UK > UK excluding London

The median Consultant daily rate in the UK excluding London is £525, according to job vacancies posted in the 6 months leading up to 16 May 2026.

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

6 months to
16 May 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 38 35 32
Rank change year-on-year -3 -3 +23
Contract jobs requiring a Consultant 1,153 667 1,021
As % of all contract jobs in the UK excluding London 4.72% 5.20% 5.04%
As % of the Job Titles category 5.13% 5.66% 5.45%
Number of daily rates quoted 647 424 723
10th Percentile £403 £404 £376
25th Percentile £454 £475 £463
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £525 £538 £550
Median % change year-on-year -2.42% -2.18% -
75th Percentile £613 £607 £650
90th Percentile £713 £664 £725
UK median daily rate £538 £550 £550
% change year-on-year -2.27% - -
Number of hourly rates quoted 65 12 21
10th Percentile £51.00 £37.27 £26.25
25th Percentile £56.25 £59.81 £50.00
Median hourly rate £57.50 £76.25 £56.89
Median % change year-on-year -24.59% +34.04% -13.15%
75th Percentile £58.75 £86.00 £61.60
90th Percentile £60.00 - -
UK median hourly rate £57.50 £75.00 £61.60
% change year-on-year -23.33% +21.75% -6.67%

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 22,479 11,791 18,742
% of contract IT jobs with a recognized job title 91.95% 91.99% 92.49%
Number of daily rates quoted 13,034 7,536 11,429
10th Percentile £300 £213 £213
25th Percentile £400 £363 £363
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £498 £475 £490
Median % change year-on-year +4.74% -3.06% -2.00%
75th Percentile £588 £575 £595
90th Percentile £686 £650 £688
UK median daily rate £510 £513 £525
% change year-on-year -0.49% -2.38% -2.78%
Number of hourly rates quoted 2,533 841 2,251
10th Percentile £14.64 £13.85 £12.50
25th Percentile £19.72 £17.30 £15.75
Median hourly rate £45.00 £27.35 £40.00
Median % change year-on-year +64.53% -31.63% -5.88%
75th Percentile £67.25 £63.75 £61.60
90th Percentile £78.75 £75.00 £74.00
UK median hourly rate £42.69 £28.18 £36.50
% change year-on-year +51.47% -22.79% -18.89%

Consultant
Job Vacancy Trend in the UK excluding London

Historical trend showing the proportion of contract IT job postings featuring 'Consultant' in the job title relative to all contract IT jobs advertised in the UK excluding London.

Consultant job vacancy trend in the UK excluding London

Consultant
Daily Rate Trend in the UK excluding London

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for Consultant job vacancies in the UK excluding London.

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for Consultant job vacancies in the UK excluding London

Consultant
Daily Rate Histogram in the UK excluding London

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing Consultant in the UK excluding London over the 6 months to 16 May 2026.

Daily rate histogram for Consultant in the UK excluding London

Consultant
Hourly Rate Trend in the UK excluding London

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for Consultant job vacancies in the UK excluding London.

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for Consultant job vacancies in the UK excluding London

Consultant
Hourly Rate Histogram in the UK excluding London

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing Consultant in the UK excluding London over the 6 months to 16 May 2026.

Hourly rate histogram for Consultant in the UK excluding London

Consultant
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 Consultant within the UK excluding London region over the 6 months to 16 May 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 -7 336 £530 -6.24% 265
Midlands -14 234 £525 -2.33% 116
North of England -22 229 £525 -1.69% 312
South West +26 187 £550 +4.76% 207
West Midlands -5 158 £550 - 83
North West -27 106 £518 -4.93% 198
Yorkshire -5 104 £538 +6.17% 80
Scotland +27 71 £425 -15.00% 28
East of England -14 71 £550 +11.39% 72
East Midlands -14 68 £500 -3.85% 34
Wales +4 30 £550 +37.50% 31
North East -25 19 £550 +3.00% 35
Northern Ireland -1 3 £600 +15.38% 19
Consultant
UK

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

For the 6 months to 16 May 2026, Consultant 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 Consultant in the job title.

1 245 (21.25%) Security Cleared
2 240 (20.82%) SAP
3 180 (15.61%) SC Cleared
4 148 (12.84%) Migration
5 146 (12.66%) Oracle
6 144 (12.49%) ERP
7 127 (11.01%) Azure
8 110 (9.54%) Stakeholder Engagement
9 109 (9.45%) SQL
10 106 (9.19%) Problem-Solving
11 103 (8.93%) Microsoft
12 89 (7.72%) Continuous Improvement
12 89 (7.72%) Data Migration
13 87 (7.55%) Stakeholder Management
14 84 (7.29%) Workshop Facilitation
15 83 (7.20%) SAP S/4HANA
16 77 (6.68%) Cybersecurity
17 74 (6.42%) User Acceptance Testing
18 73 (6.33%) Validation
19 64 (5.55%) Agile
20 63 (5.46%) Business Intelligence
21 60 (5.20%) PLM
22 56 (4.86%) Data Protection
23 55 (4.77%) AWS
24 54 (4.68%) DV Cleared
24 54 (4.68%) Siemens
25 53 (4.60%) Roadmaps
26 52 (4.51%) Analytics
26 52 (4.51%) Change Management
27 51 (4.42%) Power Platform

Consultant 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 22 (1.91%) SharePoint
2 19 (1.65%) Confluence
3 6 (0.52%) Jupyter
3 6 (0.52%) Oracle Workflow
4 3 (0.26%) Apache
4 3 (0.26%) Apache Spark
4 3 (0.26%) Apache Superset
5 2 (0.17%) Microsoft Exchange
5 2 (0.17%) WebSphere
6 1 (0.087%) ArcGIS
6 1 (0.087%) NetWeaver
6 1 (0.087%) Tomcat
6 1 (0.087%) WebLogic
Applications
1 39 (3.38%) Microsoft Excel
2 11 (0.95%) Microsoft PowerPoint
3 7 (0.61%) Microsoft Office
4 6 (0.52%) MS Visio
5 5 (0.43%) PTC Creo
6 3 (0.26%) Microsoft Project
7 2 (0.17%) Lectora
7 2 (0.17%) Oracle Smart View
8 1 (0.087%) CATIA
8 1 (0.087%) Chatbot
8 1 (0.087%) Siemens NX
8 1 (0.087%) Spreadsheet
Business Applications
1 83 (7.20%) SAP S/4HANA
2 38 (3.30%) Oracle EBS
3 30 (2.60%) SAP PSCD
4 26 (2.25%) Oracle Payables
5 25 (2.17%) Oracle Receivables
5 25 (2.17%) Teamcenter
6 22 (1.91%) SAP MM
7 20 (1.73%) SAP FI
8 17 (1.47%) Oracle Assets
8 17 (1.47%) Oracle ERP
9 16 (1.39%) Oracle Cash Management
10 15 (1.30%) Oracle General Ledger
11 14 (1.21%) Oracle Procure-to-Pay
12 13 (1.13%) Oracle EBS R12
12 13 (1.13%) SAP EWM
12 13 (1.13%) SAP PP
12 13 (1.13%) SAP SD
13 12 (1.04%) SAP Hybris
14 11 (0.95%) SAP BRIM
14 11 (0.95%) SAP CO
Cloud Services
1 127 (11.01%) Azure
2 55 (4.77%) AWS
3 51 (4.42%) Power Platform
4 49 (4.25%) OCI
5 47 (4.08%) Dynamics 365
6 27 (2.34%) GCP
7 22 (1.91%) SuccessFactors
8 20 (1.73%) Microsoft 365
9 19 (1.65%) Power Automate
10 16 (1.39%) Microsoft Copilot
10 16 (1.39%) SaaS
11 13 (1.13%) SAP Commerce Cloud
12 12 (1.04%) Azure DevOps
12 12 (1.04%) PowerApps
13 11 (0.95%) Entra ID
14 8 (0.69%) Copilot Studio
15 7 (0.61%) GitHub
16 6 (0.52%) Oracle Service Cloud
17 5 (0.43%) Azure AI
17 5 (0.43%) Serverless
Communications & Networking
1 17 (1.47%) Network Security
2 16 (1.39%) SNMP
3 11 (0.95%) Firewall
4 9 (0.78%) FTP
5 5 (0.43%) HTTP
6 4 (0.35%) SAN
6 4 (0.35%) VPN
7 3 (0.26%) SMS
7 3 (0.26%) TCP/IP
8 2 (0.17%) Cisco ISE
8 2 (0.17%) Connectrix
8 2 (0.17%) DNS
8 2 (0.17%) HTTPS
8 2 (0.17%) Intranet
8 2 (0.17%) LAN
8 2 (0.17%) SD-WAN
8 2 (0.17%) VSAN
8 2 (0.17%) WAN
9 1 (0.087%) Cisco Firepower
9 1 (0.087%) Ethernet VPN
Database & Business Intelligence
1 35 (3.04%) Power BI
2 33 (2.86%) Oracle Reports
3 17 (1.47%) Oracle ODI
4 15 (1.30%) Oracle BI Publisher
5 13 (1.13%) SAP HANA
6 9 (0.78%) SQL Server
6 9 (0.78%) Tableau
7 6 (0.52%) NoSQL
8 5 (0.43%) SAP Data Services
9 4 (0.35%) Electronic Patient Records
9 4 (0.35%) NonStop SQL
9 4 (0.35%) Oracle Database
9 4 (0.35%) SAP BW
10 3 (0.26%) Amazon Athena
10 3 (0.26%) Delta Lake
10 3 (0.26%) GIS
10 3 (0.26%) Hadoop
10 3 (0.26%) Metadata
10 3 (0.26%) Relational Database
10 3 (0.26%) Snowflake Schema
Development Applications
1 33 (2.86%) JIRA
2 14 (1.21%) Hudson
3 7 (0.61%) Oracle Forms
4 4 (0.35%) Git
4 4 (0.35%) Visual Studio Code
5 3 (0.26%) Jenkins
5 3 (0.26%) Toad
6 2 (0.17%) Postman
7 1 (0.087%) Appium
7 1 (0.087%) Bitbucket
7 1 (0.087%) GitLab
7 1 (0.087%) JDeveloper
7 1 (0.087%) JUnit
7 1 (0.087%) MSTest
7 1 (0.087%) NUnit
7 1 (0.087%) Rational Rhapsody
General
1 239 (20.73%) Finance
2 223 (19.34%) Social Skills
3 90 (7.81%) Public Sector
4 88 (7.63%) Analytical Skills
5 41 (3.56%) Manufacturing
6 27 (2.34%) Legal
7 24 (2.08%) Banking
8 23 (1.99%) Billing
9 22 (1.91%) General Ledger
10 20 (1.73%) Telecoms
11 14 (1.21%) Organisational Skills
11 14 (1.21%) Retail
12 12 (1.04%) Aerospace
12 12 (1.04%) Influencing Skills
12 12 (1.04%) Local Government
12 12 (1.04%) Presentation Skills
13 11 (0.95%) Marketing
14 10 (0.87%) Documentation Skills
15 9 (0.78%) Law
16 6 (0.52%) Advertising
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 47 (4.08%) XML
2 45 (3.90%) REST
3 30 (2.60%) Oracle Fusion
4 13 (1.13%) SOAP
5 11 (0.95%) JSON
5 11 (0.95%) Web Services
6 7 (0.61%) .NET
7 6 (0.52%) SAP Fiori
8 5 (0.43%) LDAP
8 5 (0.43%) SAP Basis
9 4 (0.35%) AngularJS
9 4 (0.35%) BAPI
9 4 (0.35%) CSS
9 4 (0.35%) HTML
9 4 (0.35%) Microsoft Graph
9 4 (0.35%) Middleware
9 4 (0.35%) RESTful
9 4 (0.35%) SailPoint
10 3 (0.26%) scikit-learn
10 3 (0.26%) TensorFlow
Miscellaneous
1 31 (2.69%) Data Protection Act
2 19 (1.65%) Onboarding
3 16 (1.39%) Operational Technology
4 14 (1.21%) AI Agents
4 14 (1.21%) Legacy Systems
4 14 (1.21%) Security Posture
5 12 (1.04%) Product Ownership
6 11 (0.95%) Replication
7 10 (0.87%) Data Centre
7 10 (0.87%) Public Cloud
8 9 (0.78%) Management Information System
9 8 (0.69%) Cloud Native
9 8 (0.69%) NHS
10 7 (0.61%) SCADA
11 6 (0.52%) Analytical Mindset
11 6 (0.52%) Beowulf
11 6 (0.52%) Data Structures
12 5 (0.43%) BYOD
12 5 (0.43%) Greenfield Project
12 5 (0.43%) SCORM
Operating Systems
1 33 (2.86%) Windows
2 26 (2.25%) Linux
3 13 (1.13%) AIX
3 13 (1.13%) Solaris
4 9 (0.78%) VMS
5 4 (0.35%) Windows Server
6 2 (0.17%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
6 2 (0.17%) Unix
7 1 (0.087%) CoreOS
7 1 (0.087%) Data ONTAP
7 1 (0.087%) Mac OS
Processes & Methodologies
1 148 (12.84%) Migration
2 144 (12.49%) ERP
3 110 (9.54%) Stakeholder Engagement
4 106 (9.19%) Problem-Solving
5 89 (7.72%) Continuous Improvement
5 89 (7.72%) Data Migration
6 87 (7.55%) Stakeholder Management
7 84 (7.29%) Workshop Facilitation
8 77 (6.68%) Cybersecurity
9 74 (6.42%) User Acceptance Testing
10 73 (6.33%) Validation
11 64 (5.55%) Agile
12 63 (5.46%) Business Intelligence
13 60 (5.20%) PLM
14 56 (4.86%) Data Protection
15 53 (4.60%) Roadmaps
16 52 (4.51%) Analytics
16 52 (4.51%) Change Management
17 44 (3.82%) Knowledge Transfer
18 43 (3.73%) Risk Management
Programming Languages
1 109 (9.45%) SQL
2 42 (3.64%) Python
3 28 (2.43%) T-SQL
4 25 (2.17%) PL/SQL
5 19 (1.65%) PowerShell
6 17 (1.47%) JavaScript
7 13 (1.13%) Search Processing Language
8 8 (0.69%) C#
8 8 (0.69%) Java
9 7 (0.61%) ABAP
9 7 (0.61%) Bash
9 7 (0.61%) R
10 6 (0.52%) Kusto Query Language
11 4 (0.35%) TypeScript
12 2 (0.17%) Apex Code
12 2 (0.17%) VBScript
13 1 (0.087%) ActionScript
13 1 (0.087%) ActionScript 2.0
13 1 (0.087%) C++
13 1 (0.087%) VBA
Qualifications
1 245 (21.25%) Security Cleared
2 180 (15.61%) SC Cleared
3 54 (4.68%) DV Cleared
4 40 (3.47%) CISSP
5 32 (2.78%) BPSS Clearance
6 29 (2.52%) CISM
7 23 (1.99%) Degree
8 17 (1.47%) Cisco Certification
9 14 (1.21%) CCSP
10 13 (1.13%) (ISC)2 CCSP
11 8 (0.69%) ITIL Foundation Certificate
12 7 (0.61%) Computer Science Degree
12 7 (0.61%) SAP Certification
13 6 (0.52%) ACCA
13 6 (0.52%) CEH
13 6 (0.52%) CIMA
13 6 (0.52%) DBS Check
13 6 (0.52%) PMP
14 5 (0.43%) Azure Certification
14 5 (0.43%) CCSK
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 44 (3.82%) NIST
2 43 (3.73%) ISO/IEC 27001
3 32 (2.78%) GRC
4 27 (2.34%) Data Quality
5 16 (1.39%) GDPR
6 12 (1.04%) QA
7 10 (0.87%) JSP 440
7 10 (0.87%) PCI DSS
8 8 (0.69%) NCSC
9 7 (0.61%) Actionable Recommendations
9 7 (0.61%) COBIT
9 7 (0.61%) RMADS
9 7 (0.61%) SLA
10 6 (0.52%) PMO
11 5 (0.43%) Sarbanes-Oxley
12 3 (0.26%) Accessibility
13 2 (0.17%) ISA99
13 2 (0.17%) ISO 22301
13 2 (0.17%) NIST 800
13 2 (0.17%) SOC 2
System Software
1 17 (1.47%) Active Directory
2 13 (1.13%) VMware Infrastructure
3 11 (0.95%) VMware NSX
4 9 (0.78%) Docker
4 9 (0.78%) vSphere
5 6 (0.52%) Slurm Workload Manager
5 6 (0.52%) VMware ESXi
6 3 (0.26%) Virtual Desktop
6 3 (0.26%) Virtual Machines
7 1 (0.087%) Hyper-V
7 1 (0.087%) IAG
7 1 (0.087%) NFS
Systems Management
1 21 (1.82%) Kubernetes
2 13 (1.13%) Nagios
2 13 (1.13%) ZABBIX
3 12 (1.04%) Netcool
3 12 (1.04%) Tivoli
4 11 (0.95%) OpenView
4 11 (0.95%) Tivoli Monitoring
5 9 (0.78%) Ansible
6 7 (0.61%) Terraform
6 7 (0.61%) vRealize
7 6 (0.52%) NetBackup
7 6 (0.52%) Podman
8 3 (0.26%) Grafana
8 3 (0.26%) Oracle Identity Management
8 3 (0.26%) Oracle Identity Manager
8 3 (0.26%) Prometheus
8 3 (0.26%) Puppet
8 3 (0.26%) Single Sign-On
8 3 (0.26%) vRealize Orchestrator
9 2 (0.17%) PingFederate
Vendors
1 240 (20.82%) SAP
2 146 (12.66%) Oracle
3 103 (8.93%) Microsoft
4 54 (4.68%) Siemens
5 24 (2.08%) ServiceNow
6 22 (1.91%) Splunk
7 21 (1.82%) BMC
7 21 (1.82%) VMware
8 19 (1.65%) Workday
9 17 (1.47%) Ariba
9 17 (1.47%) IBM
10 14 (1.21%) Sage
11 13 (1.13%) SolarWinds
12 12 (1.04%) Databricks
12 12 (1.04%) IFS
13 11 (0.95%) Google
13 11 (0.95%) HP
14 7 (0.61%) Informatica
14 7 (0.61%) OpenText
14 7 (0.61%) Veritas