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 £540, according to job vacancies posted in the 6 months leading up to 9 September 2026.

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

6 months to
9 Sep 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 36 34 26
Rank change year-on-year -2 -8 +11
Contract jobs requiring a Consultant 1,393 820 1,110
As % of all contract jobs in the UK excluding London 4.96% 5.35% 6.24%
As % of the Job Titles category 5.42% 5.96% 6.76%
Number of daily rates quoted 817 525 678
10th Percentile £405 £413 £419
25th Percentile £460 £481 £481
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £540 £550 £568
Median % change year-on-year -1.82% -3.08% +8.10%
75th Percentile £638 £627 £638
90th Percentile £713 £700 £746
UK median daily rate £550 £550 £550
% change year-on-year - - +0.09%
Number of hourly rates quoted 39 20 19
10th Percentile £51.00 £29.31 £52.32
25th Percentile £61.13 £49.50 £55.47
Median hourly rate £76.50 £77.50 £61.60
Median % change year-on-year -1.29% +25.81% -5.23%
75th Percentile £84.63 £81.25 -
90th Percentile £100.80 £81.85 £70.72
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 25,680 13,763 16,432
% of contract IT jobs with a recognized job title 91.51% 89.80% 92.40%
Number of daily rates quoted 14,365 8,435 9,615
10th Percentile £303 £213 £225
25th Percentile £413 £363 £379
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% -0.94%
Number of hourly rates quoted 3,186 1,240 1,485
10th Percentile £14.38 £13.27 £14.27
25th Percentile £20.00 £16.17 £19.50
Median hourly rate £42.50 £25.15 £45.00
Median % change year-on-year +68.99% -44.11% +11.35%
75th Percentile £68.00 £53.75 £66.61
90th Percentile £78.75 £71.60 £75.00
UK median hourly rate £42.50 £25.15 £43.00
% change year-on-year +68.99% -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 9 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 9 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 9 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 -3 390 £550 - 248
North of England -9 326 £575 +4.55% 248
Midlands +3 237 £500 -9.09% 141
North West -2 212 £566 -1.57% 174
South West +10 207 £550 -8.33% 191
West Midlands +10 167 £481 -12.50% 115
Scotland +31 128 £450 -10.00% 112
East of England -12 102 £559 +1.55% 96
Yorkshire -11 93 £575 +21.05% 41
East Midlands -4 63 £525 -4.55% 25
Wales -17 22 £550 +22.22% 13
North East -38 20 £750 +37.61% 33
Channel Islands -3 2 £600 - 4
Northern Ireland -6 2 £544 +4.57% 122
Consultant
UK

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

For the 6 months to 9 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.

1 409 (29.36%) Security Cleared
2 336 (24.12%) SAP
3 273 (19.60%) SC Cleared
4 215 (15.43%) Stakeholder Management
5 190 (13.64%) Microsoft
6 163 (11.70%) Migration
7 156 (11.20%) Oracle
8 142 (10.19%) Stakeholder Engagement
9 132 (9.48%) Cybersecurity
10 131 (9.40%) Problem-Solving
11 126 (9.05%) Azure
12 124 (8.90%) Continuous Improvement
13 122 (8.76%) ERP
14 112 (8.04%) SAP S/4HANA
15 104 (7.47%) DV Cleared
15 104 (7.47%) Validation
16 102 (7.32%) Workshop Facilitation
17 97 (6.96%) SQL
18 94 (6.75%) User Acceptance Testing
19 89 (6.39%) AWS
20 85 (6.10%) Roadmaps
21 84 (6.03%) Agile
22 78 (5.60%) Analytics
23 74 (5.31%) Data Migration
24 69 (4.95%) Knowledge Transfer
25 65 (4.67%) Requirements Gathering
25 65 (4.67%) Risk Management
26 62 (4.45%) Translating Business Requirements
27 61 (4.38%) CISSP
28 60 (4.31%) Dynamics 365

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 26 (1.87%) Confluence
2 13 (0.93%) SharePoint
3 8 (0.57%) WebLogic
3 8 (0.57%) WebSphere
4 7 (0.50%) 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%) OpenEdge
7 1 (0.072%) SAS
7 1 (0.072%) Tomcat
Applications
1 28 (2.01%) Microsoft Office
2 25 (1.79%) Microsoft Excel
3 18 (1.29%) Microsoft PowerPoint
4 9 (0.65%) 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
1 112 (8.04%) SAP S/4HANA
2 32 (2.30%) SAP PSCD
3 23 (1.65%) Oracle ERP
4 22 (1.58%) Oracle EBS
5 20 (1.44%) Oracle Payables
5 20 (1.44%) SAP EWM
6 19 (1.36%) SAP MM
6 19 (1.36%) SAP Payroll
6 19 (1.36%) Workday HCM
7 18 (1.29%) SAP FI
8 17 (1.22%) Oracle Receivables
8 17 (1.22%) SAP SD
9 16 (1.15%) SAP HCM
9 16 (1.15%) SAP QM
10 13 (0.93%) SAP HR
10 13 (0.93%) SAP PP
11 11 (0.79%) NetSuite
11 11 (0.79%) Teamcenter
12 10 (0.72%) SAP CO
12 10 (0.72%) SAP FI/CO
Cloud Services
1 126 (9.05%) Azure
2 89 (6.39%) AWS
3 60 (4.31%) Dynamics 365
3 60 (4.31%) Power Platform
3 60 (4.31%) SuccessFactors
4 54 (3.88%) GCP
5 49 (3.52%) OCI
6 33 (2.37%) Microsoft 365
7 30 (2.15%) Entra ID
8 24 (1.72%) Power Automate
9 14 (1.01%) SaaS
10 13 (0.93%) Azure DevOps
11 12 (0.86%) Microsoft Copilot
11 12 (0.86%) Oracle Service Cloud
12 11 (0.79%) PowerApps
13 10 (0.72%) GitHub
13 10 (0.72%) SAP Commerce Cloud
14 9 (0.65%) Cloud Computing
15 8 (0.57%) Azure Monitor
15 8 (0.57%) Microsoft Purview
Communications & Networking
1 32 (2.30%) Network Security
2 22 (1.58%) Firewall
3 18 (1.29%) SNMP
4 12 (0.86%) BGP
4 12 (0.86%) WAN
5 8 (0.57%) DNS
5 8 (0.57%) VPN
6 7 (0.50%) Wi-Fi
7 6 (0.43%) LAN
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%) FTP
9 4 (0.29%) Wireless
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 (2.44%) Power BI
2 28 (2.01%) Oracle Reports
3 16 (1.15%) Oracle BI Publisher
3 16 (1.15%) SAP BW
3 16 (1.15%) SAP HANA
4 14 (1.01%) SQL Server
5 13 (0.93%) Oracle ODI
6 11 (0.79%) Tableau
7 10 (0.72%) Metadata
8 9 (0.65%) BusinessObjects
8 9 (0.65%) SAP Data Services
9 7 (0.50%) Oracle Database
9 7 (0.50%) Relational Database
10 6 (0.43%) Data Warehouse
11 5 (0.36%) NonStop SQL
11 5 (0.36%) Power Query
12 3 (0.22%) Amazon Athena
12 3 (0.22%) Delta Lake
12 3 (0.22%) RDBMS
12 3 (0.22%) Snowflake Schema
Development Applications
1 48 (3.45%) JIRA
2 14 (1.01%) Git
3 11 (0.79%) Hudson
4 8 (0.57%) Oracle Forms
5 5 (0.36%) Jenkins
6 3 (0.22%) GitLab
6 3 (0.22%) Toad
6 3 (0.22%) Visual Studio Code
7 2 (0.14%) JDeveloper
7 2 (0.14%) LoadRunner
7 2 (0.14%) Postman
7 2 (0.14%) TestRail
7 2 (0.14%) tSQLt
7 2 (0.14%) Zephyr
8 1 (0.072%) Claude Code
8 1 (0.072%) Gradle
8 1 (0.072%) JMeter
8 1 (0.072%) Oracle APEX
8 1 (0.072%) ScriptRunner
8 1 (0.072%) Yeoman
General
1 330 (23.69%) Social Skills
2 277 (19.89%) Finance
3 124 (8.90%) Analytical Skills
4 112 (8.04%) Public Sector
5 56 (4.02%) Manufacturing
6 31 (2.23%) Documentation Skills
6 31 (2.23%) Presentation Skills
7 30 (2.15%) General Ledger
7 30 (2.15%) Legal
8 26 (1.87%) Banking
8 26 (1.87%) Telecoms
9 20 (1.44%) Billing
9 20 (1.44%) Retail
10 19 (1.36%) Influencing Skills
11 15 (1.08%) Organisational Skills
12 14 (1.01%) Financial Institution
13 12 (0.86%) Marketing
14 11 (0.79%) Aerospace
14 11 (0.79%) Military
15 9 (0.65%) Advertising
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 44 (3.16%) REST
2 34 (2.44%) Oracle Fusion
3 22 (1.58%) SOAP
4 21 (1.51%) Terraform
5 18 (1.29%) Middleware
6 17 (1.22%) LDAP
6 17 (1.22%) SailPoint
6 17 (1.22%) SAP Fiori
6 17 (1.22%) XML
7 15 (1.08%) Web Services
8 9 (0.65%) SAP PI
9 7 (0.50%) SAP Basis
10 6 (0.43%) EDI
10 6 (0.43%) IDoc
10 6 (0.43%) Microsoft Graph
11 5 (0.36%) JDBC
11 5 (0.36%) JSON
11 5 (0.36%) OpenTelemetry
11 5 (0.36%) RESTful
11 5 (0.36%) XSLT
Miscellaneous
1 45 (3.23%) Onboarding
2 27 (1.94%) Data Protection Act
3 25 (1.79%) Operational Technology
4 24 (1.72%) CMDB
4 24 (1.72%) Security Posture
5 15 (1.08%) Product Ownership
6 14 (1.01%) PKI
7 13 (0.93%) Replication
8 12 (0.86%) Cloud Native
8 12 (0.86%) Management Information System
9 11 (0.79%) Data Centre
9 11 (0.79%) Data Structures
9 11 (0.79%) Enterprise Software
10 10 (0.72%) Learning Management System
11 9 (0.65%) FMCG
12 8 (0.57%) Private Cloud
12 8 (0.57%) Public Cloud
13 7 (0.50%) Greenfield Project
13 7 (0.50%) Hybrid Cloud
13 7 (0.50%) Security Operations Centre
Operating Systems
1 58 (4.16%) Windows
2 42 (3.02%) Linux
3 17 (1.22%) Solaris
4 12 (0.86%) AIX
4 12 (0.86%) Windows Server
5 10 (0.72%) Unix
6 7 (0.50%) 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%) Windows 10
9 1 (0.072%) zOS
Processes & Methodologies
1 215 (15.43%) Stakeholder Management
2 163 (11.70%) Migration
3 142 (10.19%) Stakeholder Engagement
4 132 (9.48%) Cybersecurity
5 131 (9.40%) Problem-Solving
6 124 (8.90%) Continuous Improvement
7 122 (8.76%) ERP
8 104 (7.47%) Validation
9 102 (7.32%) Workshop Facilitation
10 94 (6.75%) User Acceptance Testing
11 85 (6.10%) Roadmaps
12 84 (6.03%) Agile
13 78 (5.60%) Analytics
14 74 (5.31%) Data Migration
15 69 (4.95%) Knowledge Transfer
16 65 (4.67%) Requirements Gathering
16 65 (4.67%) Risk Management
17 62 (4.45%) Translating Business Requirements
18 58 (4.16%) CI/CD
19 55 (3.95%) Project Delivery
Programming Languages
1 97 (6.96%) SQL
2 57 (4.09%) Python
3 29 (2.08%) ABAP
4 28 (2.01%) PowerShell
5 22 (1.58%) PL/SQL
6 19 (1.36%) JavaScript
7 14 (1.01%) Java
8 13 (0.93%) Search Processing Language
9 12 (0.86%) Bash
10 10 (0.72%) Kusto Query Language
11 7 (0.50%) T-SQL
12 6 (0.43%) C#
12 6 (0.43%) R
13 3 (0.22%) TypeScript
14 2 (0.14%) Data Analysis Expressions
14 2 (0.14%) Groovy
14 2 (0.14%) Magik
14 2 (0.14%) Perl
14 2 (0.14%) Shell Script
14 2 (0.14%) VBScript
Qualifications
1 409 (29.36%) Security Cleared
2 273 (19.60%) SC Cleared
3 104 (7.47%) DV Cleared
4 61 (4.38%) CISSP
5 59 (4.24%) BPSS Clearance
6 49 (3.52%) CISM
7 36 (2.58%) Cisco Certification
8 31 (2.23%) (ISC)2 CCSP
9 27 (1.94%) CCSP
10 26 (1.87%) Degree
11 13 (0.93%) ACCA
11 13 (0.93%) CIMA
12 12 (0.86%) CompTIA Security+
13 11 (0.79%) PMP
14 10 (0.72%) CRISC
15 8 (0.57%) Azure Certification
15 8 (0.57%) CCSK
15 8 (0.57%) CEH
15 8 (0.57%) OSCP
15 8 (0.57%) SAP Certification
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 48 (3.45%) NIST
2 43 (3.09%) GRC
3 38 (2.73%) ISO/IEC 27001
4 35 (2.51%) Data Quality
5 22 (1.58%) QA
6 16 (1.15%) GDPR
6 16 (1.15%) SLA
7 15 (1.08%) NCSC
8 13 (0.93%) Actionable Recommendations
9 10 (0.72%) PCI DSS
9 10 (0.72%) PMO
10 9 (0.65%) Accessibility
11 7 (0.50%) NIST 800
12 6 (0.43%) COBIT
12 6 (0.43%) Def Stans
13 5 (0.36%) Cyber Essentials
13 5 (0.36%) Sarbanes-Oxley
14 4 (0.29%) JSP 440
14 4 (0.29%) RMADS
14 4 (0.29%) WCAG
System Software
1 49 (3.52%) Active Directory
2 23 (1.65%) VMware Infrastructure
3 15 (1.08%) VMware NSX
4 14 (1.01%) VMware ESXi
5 11 (0.79%) vSphere
6 9 (0.65%) Hyper-V
7 6 (0.43%) Docker
8 5 (0.36%) Virtual Desktop
9 4 (0.29%) Virtual Machines
10 3 (0.22%) Firmware
10 3 (0.22%) IAG
11 1 (0.072%) NFS
11 1 (0.072%) PowerHA
11 1 (0.072%) Time Sharing Option
Systems Management
1 28 (2.01%) Kubernetes
2 18 (1.29%) Ansible
3 11 (0.79%) Nagios
3 11 (0.79%) vRealize
3 11 (0.79%) 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 (0.50%) 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%) Oracle Identity Management
Vendors
1 336 (24.12%) SAP
2 190 (13.64%) Microsoft
3 156 (11.20%) Oracle
4 59 (4.24%) ServiceNow
5 32 (2.30%) VMware
6 26 (1.87%) Splunk
7 23 (1.65%) Workday
8 20 (1.44%) Salesforce
9 18 (1.29%) Ariba
10 16 (1.15%) BMC
11 15 (1.08%) Databricks
12 14 (1.01%) JD Edwards
13 12 (0.86%) CyberArk
13 12 (0.86%) IBM
14 11 (0.79%) SolarWinds
15 10 (0.72%) Google
15 10 (0.72%) HP
16 9 (0.65%) Informatica
17 8 (0.57%) Cisco
17 8 (0.57%) Veeam