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 3 September 2026.

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

6 months to
3 Sep 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 35 33 26
Rank change year-on-year -2 -7 +11
Contract jobs requiring a Consultant 1,383 803 1,104
As % of all contract jobs in the UK excluding London 5.01% 5.27% 6.17%
As % of the Job Titles category 5.47% 5.85% 6.68%
Number of daily rates quoted 808 511 684
10th Percentile £405 £413 £413
25th Percentile £458 £489 £475
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £525 £550 £561
Median % change year-on-year -4.55% -2.00% +6.90%
75th Percentile £638 £630 £638
90th Percentile £713 £700 £746
UK median daily rate £550 £550 £550
Number of hourly rates quoted 40 19 20
10th Percentile £51.00 £29.11 £47.75
25th Percentile £59.34 £47.74 £55.00
Median hourly rate £76.25 £77.50 £61.60
Median % change year-on-year -1.61% +25.81% -5.23%
75th Percentile £83.94 £81.25 -
90th Percentile £100.40 - £70.21
UK median hourly rate £76.00 £77.50 £61.60
% change year-on-year -1.94% +25.81% -5.23%

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 25,293 13,731 16,524
% of contract IT jobs with a recognized job title 91.60% 90.05% 92.42%
Number of daily rates quoted 14,187 8,391 9,832
10th Percentile £303 £213 £220
25th Percentile £413 £363 £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 £685
UK median daily rate £525 £500 £525
% change year-on-year +5.00% -4.76% -1.69%
Number of hourly rates quoted 3,098 1,249 1,554
10th Percentile £14.50 £13.33 £14.05
25th Percentile £20.25 £16.30 £18.50
Median hourly rate £42.50 £25.15 £43.95
Median % change year-on-year +68.99% -42.78% +11.13%
75th Percentile £68.00 £54.01 £66.33
90th Percentile £78.70 £72.50 £75.00
UK median hourly rate £42.25 £25.15 £43.00
% change year-on-year +67.99% -41.51% +1.18%

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 3 September 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 3 September 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 3 September 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 -4 389 £545 -0.91% 242
North of England -4 327 £575 +4.55% 286
Midlands +4 243 £500 -9.09% 154
North West -6 215 £565 -1.74% 198
South West +15 206 £550 -8.33% 222
West Midlands +9 172 £481 -12.55% 124
Scotland +29 123 £450 -7.69% 123
East of England -14 93 £559 +1.55% 123
Yorkshire -13 91 £575 +12.20% 49
East Midlands -8 64 £525 -4.55% 28
Wales -16 22 £550 +22.22% 13
North East -35 20 £750 +38.89% 39
Northern Ireland -6 2 £544 +4.57% 146
Consultant
UK

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

For the 6 months to 3 September 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.

1 406 (29.36%) Security Cleared
2 332 (24.01%) SAP
3 270 (19.52%) SC Cleared
4 210 (15.18%) Stakeholder Management
5 190 (13.74%) Microsoft
6 157 (11.35%) Migration
7 154 (11.14%) Oracle
8 143 (10.34%) Stakeholder Engagement
9 131 (9.47%) Cybersecurity
10 129 (9.33%) Problem-Solving
11 124 (8.97%) Continuous Improvement
12 123 (8.89%) Azure
13 122 (8.82%) ERP
14 107 (7.74%) SAP S/4HANA
15 105 (7.59%) SQL
16 104 (7.52%) DV Cleared
17 103 (7.45%) Validation
18 100 (7.23%) Workshop Facilitation
19 93 (6.72%) User Acceptance Testing
20 86 (6.22%) AWS
21 85 (6.15%) Roadmaps
22 81 (5.86%) Agile
23 76 (5.50%) Analytics
24 71 (5.13%) Data Migration
25 67 (4.84%) Knowledge Transfer
26 64 (4.63%) Requirements Gathering
26 64 (4.63%) Risk Management
27 62 (4.48%) Translating Business Requirements
28 60 (4.34%) CISSP
29 59 (4.27%) 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 27 (1.95%) Confluence
2 13 (0.94%) SharePoint
3 8 (0.58%) WebLogic
3 8 (0.58%) WebSphere
4 7 (0.51%) Oracle Workflow
5 3 (0.22%) Apache
5 3 (0.22%) Apache Superset
5 3 (0.22%) OpenStack
5 3 (0.22%) TIBCO ActiveMatrix
6 2 (0.14%) Microsoft Exchange
6 2 (0.14%) Smallworld
7 1 (0.072%) SAS
7 1 (0.072%) Tomcat
Applications
1 34 (2.46%) Microsoft Excel
2 29 (2.10%) Microsoft Office
3 17 (1.23%) Microsoft PowerPoint
4 8 (0.58%) MS Visio
5 2 (0.14%) Spreadsheet
6 1 (0.072%) Adobe Captivate
6 1 (0.072%) Adobe Creative Suite
6 1 (0.072%) Microsoft Project
Business Applications
1 107 (7.74%) SAP S/4HANA
2 32 (2.31%) SAP PSCD
3 25 (1.81%) Oracle ERP
4 22 (1.59%) Oracle EBS
4 22 (1.59%) SAP MM
5 20 (1.45%) Oracle Payables
5 20 (1.45%) SAP EWM
6 18 (1.30%) SAP Payroll
7 17 (1.23%) Oracle Receivables
7 17 (1.23%) SAP FI
7 17 (1.23%) SAP SD
8 16 (1.16%) SAP QM
8 16 (1.16%) Workday HCM
9 13 (0.94%) SAP PP
10 12 (0.87%) SAP HCM
11 11 (0.80%) NetSuite
11 11 (0.80%) SAP HR
11 11 (0.80%) Teamcenter
12 10 (0.72%) SAP CO
12 10 (0.72%) SAP FI/CO
Cloud Services
1 123 (8.89%) Azure
2 86 (6.22%) AWS
3 59 (4.27%) Power Platform
3 59 (4.27%) SuccessFactors
4 57 (4.12%) Dynamics 365
5 50 (3.62%) GCP
6 48 (3.47%) OCI
7 33 (2.39%) Microsoft 365
8 30 (2.17%) Entra ID
9 24 (1.74%) Power Automate
10 14 (1.01%) SaaS
11 12 (0.87%) Azure DevOps
11 12 (0.87%) Microsoft Copilot
11 12 (0.87%) Oracle Service Cloud
12 11 (0.80%) PowerApps
13 10 (0.72%) GitHub
13 10 (0.72%) SAP Commerce Cloud
14 9 (0.65%) Cloud Computing
15 8 (0.58%) Azure Monitor
15 8 (0.58%) Microsoft Purview
Communications & Networking
1 31 (2.24%) Network Security
2 22 (1.59%) Firewall
3 18 (1.30%) SNMP
4 12 (0.87%) BGP
4 12 (0.87%) WAN
5 8 (0.58%) DNS
5 8 (0.58%) VPN
6 7 (0.51%) LAN
6 7 (0.51%) Wi-Fi
7 6 (0.43%) TCP/IP
7 6 (0.43%) VSAN
8 5 (0.36%) SAN
9 4 (0.29%) DHCP
9 4 (0.29%) Wireless
10 3 (0.22%) FTP
10 3 (0.22%) HTTP
10 3 (0.22%) MPLS
10 3 (0.22%) SMS
10 3 (0.22%) TACACS
10 3 (0.22%) VXLAN
Database & Business Intelligence
1 34 (2.46%) Power BI
2 28 (2.02%) Oracle Reports
3 16 (1.16%) Oracle BI Publisher
3 16 (1.16%) SAP BW
3 16 (1.16%) SAP HANA
4 15 (1.08%) Oracle ODI
5 14 (1.01%) SQL Server
6 11 (0.80%) Tableau
7 10 (0.72%) Metadata
8 9 (0.65%) SAP Data Services
9 8 (0.58%) BusinessObjects
10 7 (0.51%) Oracle Database
10 7 (0.51%) Relational Database
11 6 (0.43%) Data Warehouse
12 5 (0.36%) NonStop SQL
12 5 (0.36%) Power Query
13 3 (0.22%) Amazon Athena
13 3 (0.22%) Delta Lake
13 3 (0.22%) RDBMS
13 3 (0.22%) Snowflake Schema
Development Applications
1 48 (3.47%) JIRA
2 11 (0.80%) Git
2 11 (0.80%) Hudson
3 8 (0.58%) Oracle Forms
4 5 (0.36%) Jenkins
5 3 (0.22%) Toad
5 3 (0.22%) Visual Studio Code
6 2 (0.14%) GitLab
6 2 (0.14%) JDeveloper
6 2 (0.14%) LoadRunner
6 2 (0.14%) Postman
6 2 (0.14%) TestRail
6 2 (0.14%) tSQLt
6 2 (0.14%) Zephyr
7 1 (0.072%) Claude Code
7 1 (0.072%) JMeter
7 1 (0.072%) Oracle APEX
7 1 (0.072%) ScriptRunner
7 1 (0.072%) Yeoman
General
1 328 (23.72%) Social Skills
2 271 (19.60%) Finance
3 123 (8.89%) Analytical Skills
4 110 (7.95%) Public Sector
5 55 (3.98%) Manufacturing
6 31 (2.24%) Documentation Skills
6 31 (2.24%) Presentation Skills
7 30 (2.17%) General Ledger
7 30 (2.17%) Legal
8 26 (1.88%) Telecoms
9 25 (1.81%) Banking
10 20 (1.45%) Billing
10 20 (1.45%) Retail
11 19 (1.37%) Influencing Skills
12 15 (1.08%) Organisational Skills
13 13 (0.94%) Financial Institution
14 12 (0.87%) Marketing
15 11 (0.80%) Aerospace
16 10 (0.72%) Military
17 9 (0.65%) Advertising
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 40 (2.89%) REST
2 33 (2.39%) Oracle Fusion
3 24 (1.74%) XML
4 21 (1.52%) Terraform
5 20 (1.45%) SOAP
6 17 (1.23%) SailPoint
6 17 (1.23%) SAP Fiori
7 16 (1.16%) LDAP
7 16 (1.16%) Middleware
8 11 (0.80%) Web Services
9 9 (0.65%) SAP PI
10 7 (0.51%) SAP Basis
11 6 (0.43%) EDI
11 6 (0.43%) IDoc
11 6 (0.43%) Microsoft Graph
12 5 (0.36%) JDBC
12 5 (0.36%) OpenTelemetry
12 5 (0.36%) RESTful
12 5 (0.36%) SLSA
13 4 (0.29%) eBPF
Miscellaneous
1 44 (3.18%) Onboarding
2 27 (1.95%) Data Protection Act
3 24 (1.74%) CMDB
4 23 (1.66%) Operational Technology
5 22 (1.59%) Security Posture
6 15 (1.08%) Product Ownership
7 13 (0.94%) PKI
7 13 (0.94%) Replication
8 12 (0.87%) Management Information System
9 11 (0.80%) Cloud Native
9 11 (0.80%) Data Centre
9 11 (0.80%) Data Structures
9 11 (0.80%) Enterprise Software
10 10 (0.72%) Learning Management System
11 9 (0.65%) FMCG
11 9 (0.65%) Private Cloud
12 8 (0.58%) Analytical Mindset
12 8 (0.58%) Public Cloud
13 7 (0.51%) Greenfield Project
13 7 (0.51%) Security Operations Centre
Operating Systems
1 59 (4.27%) Windows
2 43 (3.11%) Linux
3 17 (1.23%) Solaris
4 12 (0.87%) AIX
4 12 (0.87%) Windows Server
5 10 (0.72%) Unix
6 7 (0.51%) VMS
7 4 (0.29%) Windows Server 2016
8 2 (0.14%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
9 1 (0.072%) Android
9 1 (0.072%) Mac OS
9 1 (0.072%) Windows 10
9 1 (0.072%) zOS
Processes & Methodologies
1 210 (15.18%) Stakeholder Management
2 157 (11.35%) Migration
3 143 (10.34%) Stakeholder Engagement
4 131 (9.47%) Cybersecurity
5 129 (9.33%) Problem-Solving
6 124 (8.97%) Continuous Improvement
7 122 (8.82%) ERP
8 103 (7.45%) Validation
9 100 (7.23%) Workshop Facilitation
10 93 (6.72%) User Acceptance Testing
11 85 (6.15%) Roadmaps
12 81 (5.86%) Agile
13 76 (5.50%) Analytics
14 71 (5.13%) Data Migration
15 67 (4.84%) Knowledge Transfer
16 64 (4.63%) Requirements Gathering
16 64 (4.63%) Risk Management
17 62 (4.48%) Translating Business Requirements
18 55 (3.98%) Project Delivery
19 54 (3.90%) Business Intelligence
Programming Languages
1 105 (7.59%) SQL
2 55 (3.98%) Python
3 29 (2.10%) ABAP
4 28 (2.02%) PowerShell
5 22 (1.59%) PL/SQL
6 16 (1.16%) JavaScript
6 16 (1.16%) T-SQL
7 13 (0.94%) Search Processing Language
8 12 (0.87%) Bash
8 12 (0.87%) Java
9 10 (0.72%) Kusto Query Language
10 6 (0.43%) C#
10 6 (0.43%) R
11 2 (0.14%) Data Analysis Expressions
11 2 (0.14%) Groovy
11 2 (0.14%) Korn
11 2 (0.14%) Magik
11 2 (0.14%) Perl
11 2 (0.14%) Shell Script
11 2 (0.14%) VBScript
Qualifications
1 406 (29.36%) Security Cleared
2 270 (19.52%) SC Cleared
3 104 (7.52%) DV Cleared
4 60 (4.34%) CISSP
5 53 (3.83%) BPSS Clearance
6 47 (3.40%) CISM
7 36 (2.60%) Cisco Certification
8 31 (2.24%) (ISC)2 CCSP
9 27 (1.95%) CCSP
9 27 (1.95%) Degree
10 13 (0.94%) ACCA
10 13 (0.94%) CIMA
11 11 (0.80%) PMP
12 10 (0.72%) CompTIA Security+
12 10 (0.72%) CRISC
13 9 (0.65%) CEH
13 9 (0.65%) OSCP
14 8 (0.58%) Azure Certification
14 8 (0.58%) CCSK
15 7 (0.51%) CCA
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 47 (3.40%) NIST
2 43 (3.11%) GRC
3 37 (2.68%) ISO/IEC 27001
4 35 (2.53%) Data Quality
5 22 (1.59%) QA
6 16 (1.16%) SLA
7 14 (1.01%) GDPR
7 14 (1.01%) NCSC
8 13 (0.94%) Actionable Recommendations
9 11 (0.80%) PCI DSS
10 10 (0.72%) PMO
11 9 (0.65%) Accessibility
12 7 (0.51%) NIST 800
13 6 (0.43%) COBIT
13 6 (0.43%) Def Stans
14 5 (0.36%) JSP 440
14 5 (0.36%) RMADS
14 5 (0.36%) Sarbanes-Oxley
15 4 (0.29%) WCAG
16 3 (0.22%) Cyber Essentials
System Software
1 48 (3.47%) Active Directory
2 23 (1.66%) VMware Infrastructure
3 15 (1.08%) VMware NSX
4 14 (1.01%) VMware ESXi
5 11 (0.80%) vSphere
6 9 (0.65%) Hyper-V
7 5 (0.36%) Virtual Desktop
8 4 (0.29%) Docker
8 4 (0.29%) Virtual Machines
9 3 (0.22%) Firmware
10 2 (0.14%) IAG
11 1 (0.072%) NFS
11 1 (0.072%) PowerHA
11 1 (0.072%) Time Sharing Option
Systems Management
1 24 (1.74%) Kubernetes
2 18 (1.30%) Ansible
3 11 (0.80%) Nagios
3 11 (0.80%) vRealize
3 11 (0.80%) ZABBIX
4 10 (0.72%) Netcool
4 10 (0.72%) Tivoli
4 10 (0.72%) vCenter Server
5 9 (0.65%) OpenView
5 9 (0.65%) Tivoli Monitoring
6 7 (0.51%) Grafana
7 6 (0.43%) FortiGate
7 6 (0.43%) VxRail
8 4 (0.29%) CEMLI
8 4 (0.29%) Microsoft Intune
8 4 (0.29%) NetBackup
8 4 (0.29%) Prometheus
8 4 (0.29%) SCCM
9 3 (0.22%) Failover Clustering
9 3 (0.22%) Single Sign-On
Vendors
1 332 (24.01%) SAP
2 190 (13.74%) Microsoft
3 154 (11.14%) Oracle
4 57 (4.12%) ServiceNow
5 32 (2.31%) VMware
6 26 (1.88%) Splunk
7 20 (1.45%) Salesforce
8 19 (1.37%) Workday
9 17 (1.23%) Ariba
10 16 (1.16%) BMC
11 15 (1.08%) Databricks
12 14 (1.01%) JD Edwards
13 12 (0.87%) IBM
14 11 (0.80%) CyberArk
14 11 (0.80%) SolarWinds
15 10 (0.72%) HP
16 9 (0.65%) Informatica
17 8 (0.58%) Cisco
17 8 (0.58%) Google
17 8 (0.58%) Veeam