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 6 October 2026.

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

6 months to
6 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 1,340 941 1,073
As % of all contract jobs in the UK excluding London 4.75% 6.02% 6.17%
As % of the Job Titles category 5.22% 6.74% 6.68%
Number of daily rates quoted 784 585 629
10th Percentile £410 £413 £420
25th Percentile £463 £495 £475
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £550 £550 £565
Median % change year-on-year - -2.65% +7.62%
75th Percentile £641 £640 £638
90th Percentile £720 £719 £731
UK median daily rate £550 £550 £550
Number of hourly rates quoted 47 21 17
10th Percentile £37.00 £29.51 £55.00
25th Percentile £56.25 £51.25 -
Median hourly rate £76.00 £77.50 £61.60
Median % change year-on-year -1.94% +25.81% -9.08%
75th Percentile £84.13 £81.25 £73.56
90th Percentile £96.25 £87.25 £79.92
UK median hourly rate £74.50 £77.50 £62.30
% change year-on-year -3.87% +24.40% -6.84%

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 25,676 13,963 16,052
% of contract IT jobs with a recognized job title 91.05% 89.40% 92.33%
Number of daily rates quoted 13,890 8,578 9,110
10th Percentile £300 £210 £220
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 3,484 1,315 1,280
10th Percentile £14.22 £13.50 £14.69
25th Percentile £19.33 £16.34 £19.50
Median hourly rate £41.74 £25.08 £43.00
Median % change year-on-year +66.44% -41.69% -2.16%
75th Percentile £67.84 £50.00 £66.61
90th Percentile £78.51 £69.65 £74.37
UK median hourly rate £41.74 £25.15 £42.50
% change year-on-year +65.94% -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 6 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 6 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 6 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 £540 -1.82% 565
North of England -21 338 £575 -4.17% 506
North West -14 223 £585 -5.84% 280
Midlands -8 222 £500 -13.04% 270
South West +12 191 £581 +1.09% 242
West Midlands -4 159 £500 -13.04% 188
Scotland +18 119 £475 -5.00% 189
East of England -17 105 £552 +0.36% 183
Yorkshire -21 88 £575 +21.05% 110
East Midlands -4 57 £525 -9.09% 82
North East -18 26 £750 +36.36% 116
Wales -29 15 £575 +29.58% 46
Channel Islands -5 2 £600 - 3
Northern Ireland -8 2 £544 +4.57% 75
Consultant
UK

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

For the 6 months to 6 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.

1 414 (30.90%) Security Cleared
2 311 (23.21%) SAP
3 271 (20.22%) SC Cleared
4 240 (17.91%) Stakeholder Management
5 200 (14.93%) Microsoft
6 165 (12.31%) Migration
7 135 (10.07%) Cybersecurity
8 132 (9.85%) Stakeholder Engagement
9 131 (9.78%) Oracle
10 129 (9.63%) Problem-Solving
11 127 (9.48%) Azure
12 114 (8.51%) SAP S/4HANA
13 110 (8.21%) Validation
14 108 (8.06%) Continuous Improvement
15 103 (7.69%) Workshop Facilitation
16 101 (7.54%) User Acceptance Testing
17 100 (7.46%) DV Cleared
18 99 (7.39%) ERP
19 87 (6.49%) Agile
20 84 (6.27%) Analytics
20 84 (6.27%) Roadmaps
21 76 (5.67%) Data Migration
21 76 (5.67%) Knowledge Transfer
22 75 (5.60%) AWS
23 74 (5.52%) SQL
24 68 (5.07%) Requirements Gathering
25 65 (4.85%) Dynamics 365
26 62 (4.63%) BPSS Clearance
27 59 (4.40%) SuccessFactors
28 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 26 (1.94%) SAP HCM
5 22 (1.64%) SAP HR
6 21 (1.57%) Oracle ERP
6 21 (1.57%) SAP FI
7 20 (1.49%) Workday HCM
8 18 (1.34%) Oracle Payables
8 18 (1.34%) Oracle Receivables
9 16 (1.19%) Oracle EBS
10 15 (1.12%) SAP BRIM
10 15 (1.12%) Teamcenter
11 13 (0.97%) SAP Hybris
11 13 (0.97%) SAP QM
12 12 (0.90%) Oracle General Ledger
12 12 (0.90%) SAP EWM
13 11 (0.82%) SAP CO
13 11 (0.82%) SAP FI/CO
14 10 (0.75%) SAP MM
Cloud Services
1 127 (9.48%) Azure
2 75 (5.60%) AWS
3 65 (4.85%) Dynamics 365
4 59 (4.40%) SuccessFactors
5 57 (4.25%) Power Platform
6 52 (3.88%) GCP
7 42 (3.13%) OCI
8 40 (2.99%) Microsoft 365
9 34 (2.54%) Entra ID
10 22 (1.64%) Power Automate
11 18 (1.34%) Azure DevOps
11 18 (1.34%) SaaS
12 16 (1.19%) 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
17 8 (0.60%) GitHub
Communications & Networking
1 29 (2.16%) Network Security
2 21 (1.57%) Firewall
3 12 (0.90%) BGP
3 12 (0.90%) SNMP
3 12 (0.90%) WAN
4 9 (0.67%) DNS
4 9 (0.67%) VPN
5 7 (0.52%) Wi-Fi
6 6 (0.45%) FTP
6 6 (0.45%) TCP/IP
6 6 (0.45%) VSAN
7 5 (0.37%) DHCP
7 5 (0.37%) LAN
7 5 (0.37%) SAN
8 4 (0.30%) Wireless
9 3 (0.22%) Ethernet VPN
9 3 (0.22%) MPLS
9 3 (0.22%) SD-WAN
9 3 (0.22%) TACACS
9 3 (0.22%) VXLAN
Database & Business Intelligence
1 27 (2.01%) Power BI
2 18 (1.34%) 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
8 6 (0.45%) Tableau
9 5 (0.37%) Power Query
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%) Oracle ODI
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%) Gerrit
7 1 (0.075%) ScriptRunner
7 1 (0.075%) SonarQube
7 1 (0.075%) Visual Studio Code
General
1 333 (24.85%) Social Skills
2 264 (19.70%) Finance
3 126 (9.40%) Public Sector
4 111 (8.28%) Analytical Skills
5 62 (4.63%) Manufacturing
6 37 (2.76%) Documentation Skills
7 34 (2.54%) Legal
8 33 (2.46%) Telecoms
9 30 (2.24%) 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 18 (1.34%) Retail
14 14 (1.04%) Aerospace
14 14 (1.04%) Financial Institution
14 14 (1.04%) Marketing
15 13 (0.97%) Organisational Skills
16 12 (0.90%) Military
17 9 (0.67%) Local Government
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 36 (2.69%) REST
2 35 (2.61%) Oracle Fusion
3 22 (1.64%) SOAP
4 21 (1.57%) Middleware
4 21 (1.57%) Terraform
5 20 (1.49%) Web Services
6 18 (1.34%) SailPoint
7 16 (1.19%) LDAP
7 16 (1.19%) SAP Fiori
7 16 (1.19%) XML
8 10 (0.75%) SAPUI5
9 9 (0.67%) SAP PI
10 8 (0.60%) XSLT
11 7 (0.52%) Microsoft Graph
12 5 (0.37%) EDI
12 5 (0.37%) IDoc
12 5 (0.37%) JSON
12 5 (0.37%) OAuth
12 5 (0.37%) OpenTelemetry
12 5 (0.37%) SLSA
Miscellaneous
1 47 (3.51%) Onboarding
2 28 (2.09%) Operational Technology
3 23 (1.72%) CMDB
4 22 (1.64%) Security Posture
5 21 (1.57%) Data Protection Act
6 15 (1.12%) Data Structures
6 15 (1.12%) Enterprise Software
7 14 (1.04%) PKI
7 14 (1.04%) Product Ownership
8 12 (0.90%) Data Centre
8 12 (0.90%) Learning Management System
8 12 (0.90%) Management Information System
9 11 (0.82%) Cloud Native
10 9 (0.67%) AI Agents
11 7 (0.52%) Hybrid Cloud
11 7 (0.52%) Replication
11 7 (0.52%) Security Operations Centre
12 6 (0.45%) FMCG
12 6 (0.45%) Legacy Systems
12 6 (0.45%) Private Cloud
Operating Systems
1 54 (4.03%) Windows
2 32 (2.39%) Linux
3 17 (1.27%) Solaris
4 14 (1.04%) 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
1 240 (17.91%) Stakeholder Management
2 165 (12.31%) Migration
3 135 (10.07%) Cybersecurity
4 132 (9.85%) Stakeholder Engagement
5 129 (9.63%) Problem-Solving
6 110 (8.21%) Validation
7 108 (8.06%) Continuous Improvement
8 103 (7.69%) Workshop Facilitation
9 101 (7.54%) User Acceptance Testing
10 99 (7.39%) ERP
11 87 (6.49%) Agile
12 84 (6.27%) Analytics
12 84 (6.27%) Roadmaps
13 76 (5.67%) Data Migration
13 76 (5.67%) Knowledge Transfer
14 68 (5.07%) Requirements Gathering
15 58 (4.33%) AI
15 58 (4.33%) Vulnerability Management
16 55 (4.10%) CI/CD
17 54 (4.03%) Project Delivery
Programming Languages
1 74 (5.52%) SQL
2 45 (3.36%) Python
3 39 (2.91%) ABAP
4 25 (1.87%) PowerShell
5 18 (1.34%) JavaScript
6 14 (1.04%) Java
7 12 (0.90%) Bash
7 12 (0.90%) PL/SQL
8 10 (0.75%) Kusto Query Language
9 7 (0.52%) Search Processing Language
10 5 (0.37%) C#
11 4 (0.30%) TypeScript
12 3 (0.22%) T-SQL
13 2 (0.15%) C++
13 2 (0.15%) Groovy
13 2 (0.15%) Korn
13 2 (0.15%) Magik
13 2 (0.15%) R
13 2 (0.15%) Shell Script
13 2 (0.15%) XPath
Qualifications
1 414 (30.90%) Security Cleared
2 271 (20.22%) SC Cleared
3 100 (7.46%) DV Cleared
4 62 (4.63%) BPSS Clearance
5 47 (3.51%) CISSP
6 39 (2.91%) 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%) CCSK
15 6 (0.45%) ISO 27001 Lead Auditor
15 6 (0.45%) Network+ Certification
15 6 (0.45%) OSCP
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 41 (3.06%) NIST
2 38 (2.84%) Data Quality
3 37 (2.76%) GRC
4 35 (2.61%) ISO/IEC 27001
5 21 (1.57%) QA
6 20 (1.49%) SLA
7 19 (1.42%) NCSC
8 16 (1.19%) GDPR
9 13 (0.97%) Actionable Recommendations
10 12 (0.90%) PMO
11 9 (0.67%) Accessibility
12 7 (0.52%) Cyber Essentials
12 7 (0.52%) NIST 800
13 6 (0.45%) Def Stans
14 4 (0.30%) COBIT
14 4 (0.30%) ISO 14001
14 4 (0.30%) ISO 9001
14 4 (0.30%) ISO/IEC 20000
14 4 (0.30%) PCI DSS
14 4 (0.30%) WCAG
System Software
1 52 (3.88%) Active Directory
2 23 (1.72%) 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 5 (0.37%) Virtual Desktop
10 4 (0.30%) Virtual Machines
11 2 (0.15%) Embedded Firmware
11 2 (0.15%) IAG
12 1 (0.075%) NFS
12 1 (0.075%) PowerHA
12 1 (0.075%) Time Sharing Option
Systems Management
1 30 (2.24%) Kubernetes
2 18 (1.34%) 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%) Tivoli
10 3 (0.22%) Failover Clustering
10 3 (0.22%) Oracle Identity Manager
10 3 (0.22%) Single Sign-On
10 3 (0.22%) Tivoli Monitoring
10 3 (0.22%) vRealize Orchestrator
Vendors
1 311 (23.21%) SAP
2 200 (14.93%) Microsoft
3 131 (9.78%) Oracle
4 57 (4.25%) ServiceNow
5 31 (2.31%) Workday
6 30 (2.24%) VMware
7 22 (1.64%) Salesforce
8 19 (1.42%) Splunk
9 14 (1.04%) JD Edwards
10 12 (0.90%) CyberArk
10 12 (0.90%) Databricks
10 12 (0.90%) Google
11 10 (0.75%) BMC
12 9 (0.67%) Concur
13 8 (0.60%) Veeam
14 7 (0.52%) Cisco
14 7 (0.52%) Epicor
14 7 (0.52%) IBM
14 7 (0.52%) Qualtrics
15 6 (0.45%) OpenAI