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 £550, according to job vacancies posted in the 6 months leading up to 8 October 2026.

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

6 months to
8 Oct 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 38 27 27
Rank change year-on-year -11 0 +9
Contract jobs requiring a Consultant 1,340 963 1,075
As % of all contract jobs in the UK excluding London 4.76% 6.11% 6.16%
As % of the Job Titles category 5.23% 6.83% 6.67%
Number of daily rates quoted 780 589 630
10th Percentile £411 £413 £420
25th Percentile £463 £492 £475
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £550 £550 £564
Median % change year-on-year - -2.44% +7.38%
75th Percentile £650 £640 £638
90th Percentile £722 £719 £732
UK median daily rate £550 £550 £550
Number of hourly rates quoted 50 23 17
10th Percentile £35.00 £30.91 £55.00
25th Percentile £53.44 £58.13 -
Median hourly rate £76.00 £77.50 £61.60
Median % change year-on-year -1.94% +25.81% -9.08%
75th Percentile £84.56 £81.25 £73.56
90th Percentile £94.38 £87.00 £79.92
UK median hourly rate £74.00 £77.50 £62.30
% change year-on-year -4.52% +24.40% -8.04%

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 25,607 14,106 16,105
% of contract IT jobs with a recognized job title 90.95% 89.49% 92.31%
Number of daily rates quoted 13,838 8,655 9,162
10th Percentile £300 £209 £219
25th Percentile £413 £363 £375
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £475 £495
Median % change year-on-year +5.26% -4.04% -1.00%
75th Percentile £600 £575 £588
90th Percentile £688 £669 £675
UK median daily rate £525 £500 £525
% change year-on-year +5.00% -4.76% -0.94%
Number of hourly rates quoted 3,488 1,319 1,261
10th Percentile £14.22 £13.50 £14.73
25th Percentile £19.00 £16.35 £19.50
Median hourly rate £41.71 £25.08 £43.00
Median % change year-on-year +66.34% -41.69% -3.37%
75th Percentile £67.70 £50.00 £66.61
90th Percentile £78.51 £69.72 £74.37
UK median hourly rate £41.71 £25.15 £42.50
% change year-on-year +65.84% -40.82% -4.49%

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 8 October 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 8 October 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 8 October 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 -5 378 £525 -4.55% 430
North of England -22 340 £576 -3.96% 450
North West -15 224 £585 -5.65% 255
Midlands -6 221 £501 -12.96% 234
South West +8 189 £600 +4.35% 211
West Midlands -2 159 £500 -13.04% 165
Scotland +17 118 £500 - 156
East of England -18 107 £559 +1.55% 167
Yorkshire -25 88 £575 +19.79% 103
East Midlands -9 56 £525 -7.69% 69
North East -18 27 £750 +36.36% 92
Wales -23 16 £575 +29.58% 44
Channel Islands -5 2 £600 - 3
Northern Ireland -7 1 £638 +22.60% 75
Consultant
UK

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

For the 6 months to 8 October 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.

1 407 (30.37%) Security Cleared
2 313 (23.36%) SAP
3 266 (19.85%) SC Cleared
4 244 (18.21%) Stakeholder Management
5 201 (15.00%) Microsoft
6 166 (12.39%) Migration
7 136 (10.15%) Cybersecurity
8 132 (9.85%) Oracle
8 132 (9.85%) Problem-Solving
8 132 (9.85%) Stakeholder Engagement
9 129 (9.63%) Azure
10 114 (8.51%) SAP S/4HANA
11 113 (8.43%) Validation
12 109 (8.13%) Continuous Improvement
13 107 (7.99%) Workshop Facilitation
14 101 (7.54%) DV Cleared
15 100 (7.46%) User Acceptance Testing
16 98 (7.31%) ERP
17 86 (6.42%) Roadmaps
18 84 (6.27%) Agile
19 83 (6.19%) Analytics
20 75 (5.60%) Data Migration
21 74 (5.52%) AWS
21 74 (5.52%) Knowledge Transfer
21 74 (5.52%) SQL
22 68 (5.07%) Requirements Gathering
23 63 (4.70%) BPSS Clearance
23 63 (4.70%) Dynamics 365
24 61 (4.55%) SuccessFactors
25 58 (4.33%) AI

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 (1.94%) Confluence
2 21 (1.57%) SharePoint
3 8 (0.60%) WebSphere
4 7 (0.52%) WebLogic
5 3 (0.22%) ArcGIS
5 3 (0.22%) Microsoft Exchange
5 3 (0.22%) OpenStack
5 3 (0.22%) Oracle Workflow
5 3 (0.22%) TIBCO ActiveMatrix
6 2 (0.15%) Apache
6 2 (0.15%) SAP Portal
6 2 (0.15%) Smallworld
7 1 (0.075%) Apache Spark
7 1 (0.075%) IIS
7 1 (0.075%) JBoss
7 1 (0.075%) OpenEdge
7 1 (0.075%) Oracle SOA Suite
7 1 (0.075%) SAS
7 1 (0.075%) Tomcat
Applications
1 26 (1.94%) Microsoft Office
2 19 (1.42%) Microsoft PowerPoint
3 18 (1.34%) Microsoft Excel
4 10 (0.75%) MS Visio
5 2 (0.15%) Microsoft Project
5 2 (0.15%) Spreadsheet
6 1 (0.075%) Adobe Captivate
6 1 (0.075%) Adobe Creative Suite
Business Applications
1 114 (8.51%) SAP S/4HANA
2 38 (2.84%) SAP PSCD
3 33 (2.46%) SAP Payroll
4 28 (2.09%) SAP HCM
5 22 (1.64%) SAP FI
5 22 (1.64%) SAP HR
6 21 (1.57%) Oracle ERP
6 21 (1.57%) Workday HCM
7 18 (1.34%) Oracle Payables
7 18 (1.34%) Oracle Receivables
8 16 (1.19%) Oracle EBS
8 16 (1.19%) SAP BRIM
8 16 (1.19%) Teamcenter
9 13 (0.97%) SAP Hybris
9 13 (0.97%) SAP QM
10 12 (0.90%) Oracle General Ledger
10 12 (0.90%) SAP EWM
11 11 (0.82%) SAP CO
11 11 (0.82%) SAP FI/CO
12 10 (0.75%) SAP PP
Cloud Services
1 129 (9.63%) Azure
2 74 (5.52%) AWS
3 63 (4.70%) Dynamics 365
4 61 (4.55%) SuccessFactors
5 55 (4.10%) Power Platform
6 52 (3.88%) GCP
7 42 (3.13%) OCI
8 39 (2.91%) Microsoft 365
9 35 (2.61%) Entra ID
10 22 (1.64%) Power Automate
11 19 (1.42%) Azure DevOps
11 19 (1.42%) SaaS
12 17 (1.27%) SAP Commerce Cloud
13 12 (0.90%) Microsoft Copilot
14 11 (0.82%) Microsoft Purview
14 11 (0.82%) PowerApps
15 10 (0.75%) Oracle Service Cloud
16 9 (0.67%) Cloud Computing
17 8 (0.60%) Azure Monitor
18 7 (0.52%) GitHub
Communications & Networking
1 30 (2.24%) Network Security
2 21 (1.57%) Firewall
3 12 (0.90%) BGP
3 12 (0.90%) SNMP
4 11 (0.82%) WAN
5 9 (0.67%) VPN
6 8 (0.60%) DNS
7 7 (0.52%) FTP
7 7 (0.52%) Wi-Fi
8 6 (0.45%) VSAN
9 5 (0.37%) DHCP
9 5 (0.37%) LAN
9 5 (0.37%) SAN
9 5 (0.37%) TCP/IP
10 4 (0.30%) Wireless
11 3 (0.22%) Ethernet VPN
11 3 (0.22%) MPLS
11 3 (0.22%) TACACS
11 3 (0.22%) VXLAN
12 2 (0.15%) SMS
Database & Business Intelligence
1 26 (1.94%) Power BI
2 17 (1.27%) Oracle Reports
3 15 (1.12%) Oracle BI Publisher
3 15 (1.12%) SAP BW
4 14 (1.04%) SAP HANA
5 12 (0.90%) Metadata
6 11 (0.82%) SQL Server
7 10 (0.75%) BusinessObjects
8 6 (0.45%) Data Warehouse
8 6 (0.45%) Oracle Database
8 6 (0.45%) Relational Database
9 5 (0.37%) Power Query
9 5 (0.37%) Tableau
10 4 (0.30%) Elasticsearch
10 4 (0.30%) SAP Data Services
10 4 (0.30%) Snowflake Schema
11 3 (0.22%) GIS
11 3 (0.22%) NonStop SQL
11 3 (0.22%) NoSQL
11 3 (0.22%) RDBMS
Development Applications
1 46 (3.43%) JIRA
2 17 (1.27%) Git
3 7 (0.52%) Jenkins
4 4 (0.30%) GitLab
4 4 (0.30%) Hudson
5 3 (0.22%) Oracle Forms
5 3 (0.22%) Toad
6 2 (0.15%) Gradle
6 2 (0.15%) JDeveloper
6 2 (0.15%) LoadRunner
6 2 (0.15%) Maven
6 2 (0.15%) Postman
6 2 (0.15%) TestRail
6 2 (0.15%) tSQLt
6 2 (0.15%) Zephyr
7 1 (0.075%) Claude Code
7 1 (0.075%) Metasploit
7 1 (0.075%) Oracle APEX
7 1 (0.075%) ScriptRunner
7 1 (0.075%) SonarQube
General
1 338 (25.22%) Social Skills
2 264 (19.70%) Finance
3 126 (9.40%) Public Sector
4 112 (8.36%) Analytical Skills
5 64 (4.78%) Manufacturing
6 39 (2.91%) Documentation Skills
7 34 (2.54%) Legal
7 34 (2.54%) Telecoms
8 31 (2.31%) Billing
9 30 (2.24%) General Ledger
10 29 (2.16%) Presentation Skills
11 23 (1.72%) Banking
12 19 (1.42%) Influencing Skills
13 17 (1.27%) Retail
14 15 (1.12%) Aerospace
15 14 (1.04%) Financial Institution
15 14 (1.04%) Marketing
16 13 (0.97%) Organisational Skills
17 12 (0.90%) Military
18 9 (0.67%) Local Government
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 35 (2.61%) Oracle Fusion
1 35 (2.61%) REST
2 21 (1.57%) Middleware
2 21 (1.57%) SOAP
3 20 (1.49%) Terraform
3 20 (1.49%) Web Services
4 19 (1.42%) SailPoint
5 16 (1.19%) LDAP
5 16 (1.19%) SAP Fiori
6 14 (1.04%) XML
7 10 (0.75%) SAPUI5
8 9 (0.67%) SAP PI
9 8 (0.60%) XSLT
10 7 (0.52%) Microsoft Graph
11 5 (0.37%) EDI
11 5 (0.37%) IDoc
11 5 (0.37%) JDBC
11 5 (0.37%) OAuth
11 5 (0.37%) OpenTelemetry
11 5 (0.37%) SLSA
Miscellaneous
1 48 (3.58%) Onboarding
2 28 (2.09%) Operational Technology
3 23 (1.72%) CMDB
4 22 (1.64%) Security Posture
5 19 (1.42%) Data Protection Act
6 17 (1.27%) Enterprise Software
7 16 (1.19%) Data Structures
8 14 (1.04%) PKI
8 14 (1.04%) Product Ownership
9 13 (0.97%) Management Information System
10 12 (0.90%) Data Centre
10 12 (0.90%) Learning Management System
11 11 (0.82%) Cloud Native
12 9 (0.67%) AI Agents
13 7 (0.52%) Hybrid Cloud
13 7 (0.52%) Replication
13 7 (0.52%) Security Operations Centre
14 6 (0.45%) FMCG
14 6 (0.45%) Legacy Systems
14 6 (0.45%) Private Cloud
Operating Systems
1 56 (4.18%) Windows
2 32 (2.39%) Linux
3 17 (1.27%) Solaris
4 15 (1.12%) Windows Server
5 9 (0.67%) Unix
6 6 (0.45%) AIX
7 5 (0.37%) VMS
8 4 (0.30%) Windows Server 2016
9 2 (0.15%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
9 2 (0.15%) Windows 10
10 1 (0.075%) Android
10 1 (0.075%) Apple iOS
10 1 (0.075%) Kali Linux
10 1 (0.075%) zOS
Processes & Methodologies
1 244 (18.21%) Stakeholder Management
2 166 (12.39%) Migration
3 136 (10.15%) Cybersecurity
4 132 (9.85%) Problem-Solving
4 132 (9.85%) Stakeholder Engagement
5 113 (8.43%) Validation
6 109 (8.13%) Continuous Improvement
7 107 (7.99%) Workshop Facilitation
8 100 (7.46%) User Acceptance Testing
9 98 (7.31%) ERP
10 86 (6.42%) Roadmaps
11 84 (6.27%) Agile
12 83 (6.19%) Analytics
13 75 (5.60%) Data Migration
14 74 (5.52%) Knowledge Transfer
15 68 (5.07%) Requirements Gathering
16 58 (4.33%) AI
16 58 (4.33%) Vulnerability Management
17 55 (4.10%) CI/CD
18 54 (4.03%) Risk Management
Programming Languages
1 74 (5.52%) SQL
2 45 (3.36%) Python
3 40 (2.99%) ABAP
4 26 (1.94%) PowerShell
5 17 (1.27%) Java
6 16 (1.19%) JavaScript
7 13 (0.97%) Bash
8 12 (0.90%) PL/SQL
9 10 (0.75%) Kusto Query Language
10 7 (0.52%) Search Processing Language
11 5 (0.37%) C#
12 4 (0.30%) TypeScript
13 3 (0.22%) T-SQL
14 2 (0.15%) C++
14 2 (0.15%) Groovy
14 2 (0.15%) Korn
14 2 (0.15%) Magik
14 2 (0.15%) Perl
14 2 (0.15%) Shell Script
14 2 (0.15%) XPath
Qualifications
1 407 (30.37%) Security Cleared
2 266 (19.85%) SC Cleared
3 101 (7.54%) DV Cleared
4 63 (4.70%) BPSS Clearance
5 48 (3.58%) CISSP
6 40 (2.99%) CISM
7 33 (2.46%) Cisco Certification
8 28 (2.09%) (ISC)2 CCSP
9 24 (1.79%) CCSP
10 22 (1.64%) Degree
11 12 (0.90%) CompTIA Security+
12 11 (0.82%) ACCA
12 11 (0.82%) CIMA
13 10 (0.75%) CRISC
14 8 (0.60%) DBS Check
14 8 (0.60%) PMP
15 6 (0.45%) CCA
15 6 (0.45%) CCSK
15 6 (0.45%) CISA
15 6 (0.45%) ISO 27001 Lead Auditor
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 41 (3.06%) NIST
2 39 (2.91%) Data Quality
3 36 (2.69%) GRC
4 35 (2.61%) ISO/IEC 27001
5 21 (1.57%) QA
6 19 (1.42%) NCSC
6 19 (1.42%) SLA
7 16 (1.19%) GDPR
8 13 (0.97%) Actionable Recommendations
9 12 (0.90%) PMO
10 9 (0.67%) Accessibility
11 7 (0.52%) Cyber Essentials
11 7 (0.52%) NIST 800
12 6 (0.45%) Def Stans
13 4 (0.30%) COBIT
13 4 (0.30%) Cyber Essentials PLUS
13 4 (0.30%) ISO 14001
13 4 (0.30%) ISO/IEC 20000
13 4 (0.30%) PCI DSS
13 4 (0.30%) WCAG
System Software
1 55 (4.10%) Active Directory
2 22 (1.64%) VMware Infrastructure
3 13 (0.97%) VMware NSX
4 12 (0.90%) VMware ESXi
5 10 (0.75%) Hyper-V
6 9 (0.67%) vSphere
7 8 (0.60%) Docker
8 6 (0.45%) Firmware
9 4 (0.30%) Virtual Desktop
9 4 (0.30%) Virtual Machines
10 2 (0.15%) Embedded Firmware
10 2 (0.15%) IAG
11 1 (0.075%) NFS
11 1 (0.075%) PowerHA
11 1 (0.075%) Time Sharing Option
Systems Management
1 30 (2.24%) Kubernetes
2 17 (1.27%) Ansible
3 10 (0.75%) vCenter Server
4 9 (0.67%) vRealize
5 8 (0.60%) Microsoft Intune
6 7 (0.52%) Grafana
7 6 (0.45%) FortiGate
7 6 (0.45%) VxRail
8 5 (0.37%) Nagios
8 5 (0.37%) SCCM
8 5 (0.37%) ZABBIX
9 4 (0.30%) CEMLI
9 4 (0.30%) Netcool
9 4 (0.30%) Prometheus
9 4 (0.30%) Single Sign-On
9 4 (0.30%) Tivoli
10 3 (0.22%) Failover Clustering
10 3 (0.22%) OpenView
10 3 (0.22%) Tivoli Monitoring
11 2 (0.15%) Tivoli Storage Manager
Vendors
1 313 (23.36%) SAP
2 201 (15.00%) Microsoft
3 132 (9.85%) Oracle
4 56 (4.18%) ServiceNow
5 32 (2.39%) Workday
6 29 (2.16%) VMware
7 22 (1.64%) Salesforce
8 19 (1.42%) Splunk
9 14 (1.04%) JD Edwards
10 13 (0.97%) CyberArk
11 12 (0.90%) Google
12 11 (0.82%) Databricks
13 10 (0.75%) BMC
14 9 (0.67%) Concur
15 8 (0.60%) IBM
15 8 (0.60%) Veeam
16 7 (0.52%) Epicor
16 7 (0.52%) Qualtrics
17 6 (0.45%) Okta
17 6 (0.45%) OpenAI