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 8 May 2026.

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

6 months to
8 May 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 37 34 34
Rank change year-on-year -3 0 +22
Contract jobs requiring a Consultant 1,138 674 1,030
As % of all contract jobs in the UK excluding London 4.72% 5.29% 5.02%
As % of the Job Titles category 5.13% 5.74% 5.42%
Number of daily rates quoted 643 431 731
10th Percentile £400 £419 £380
25th Percentile £450 £475 £463
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £525 £540 £550
Median % change year-on-year -2.78% -1.82% -
75th Percentile £613 £613 £650
90th Percentile £713 £680 £725
UK median daily rate £538 £550 £550
% change year-on-year -2.27% - -
Number of hourly rates quoted 63 11 22
10th Percentile £51.00 £44.23 £26.38
25th Percentile £56.25 £67.50 £50.73
Median hourly rate £57.50 £82.50 £58.44
Median % change year-on-year -30.30% +41.16% -11.45%
75th Percentile £58.75 £86.00 £61.60
90th Percentile £60.00 - £63.29
UK median hourly rate £57.50 £78.75 £61.60
% change year-on-year -26.98% +27.84% -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 22,179 11,738 18,988
% of contract IT jobs with a recognized job title 91.95% 92.19% 92.50%
Number of daily rates quoted 12,949 7,499 11,563
10th Percentile £284 £213 £213
25th Percentile £400 £363 £363
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £492 £475 £490
Median % change year-on-year +3.58% -3.06% -2.00%
75th Percentile £588 £575 £595
90th Percentile £682 £650 £688
UK median daily rate £505 £513 £525
% change year-on-year -1.46% -2.38% -2.78%
Number of hourly rates quoted 2,470 839 2,247
10th Percentile £14.64 £14.00 £12.50
25th Percentile £20.00 £17.50 £15.75
Median hourly rate £45.59 £27.50 £40.00
Median % change year-on-year +65.76% -31.25% -5.35%
75th Percentile £67.25 £64.50 £61.30
90th Percentile £78.75 £75.00 £73.85
UK median hourly rate £44.00 £28.75 £36.50
% change year-on-year +53.04% -21.23% -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 8 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 8 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 8 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 -3 337 £525 -6.67% 252
Midlands -15 230 £525 -2.33% 100
North of England -23 221 £525 -2.33% 279
South West +24 177 £550 - 168
West Midlands 0 155 £550 - 73
North West -31 103 £525 -3.67% 177
Yorkshire -3 98 £538 +2.38% 73
East of England -12 76 £550 +10.00% 60
Scotland +21 72 £438 -12.50% 26
East Midlands -14 68 £500 -3.85% 28
Wales +6 30 £550 +37.50% 27
North East -20 20 £525 -1.69% 30
Northern Ireland +2 3 £600 +15.38% 21
Consultant
UK

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

For the 6 months to 8 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.

1 241 (21.18%) SAP
1 241 (21.18%) Security Cleared
2 180 (15.82%) SC Cleared
3 149 (13.09%) Oracle
4 144 (12.65%) Migration
5 140 (12.30%) ERP
6 123 (10.81%) Azure
7 110 (9.67%) SQL
8 109 (9.58%) Problem-Solving
9 101 (8.88%) Stakeholder Engagement
10 93 (8.17%) Microsoft
11 89 (7.82%) Workshop Facilitation
12 85 (7.47%) Continuous Improvement
12 85 (7.47%) Data Migration
13 84 (7.38%) Stakeholder Management
14 81 (7.12%) SAP S/4HANA
15 76 (6.68%) Cybersecurity
15 76 (6.68%) User Acceptance Testing
16 71 (6.24%) Validation
17 65 (5.71%) Agile
18 64 (5.62%) Business Intelligence
19 58 (5.10%) Data Protection
19 58 (5.10%) PLM
20 54 (4.75%) AWS
20 54 (4.75%) Change Management
20 54 (4.75%) DV Cleared
21 53 (4.66%) Analytics
22 52 (4.57%) Siemens
23 50 (4.39%) Power Platform
23 50 (4.39%) Roadmaps

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 (1.93%) SharePoint
2 19 (1.67%) Confluence
3 6 (0.53%) Jupyter
3 6 (0.53%) Oracle Workflow
4 3 (0.26%) Apache
4 3 (0.26%) Apache Spark
4 3 (0.26%) Apache Superset
5 2 (0.18%) Microsoft Exchange
5 2 (0.18%) WebSphere
6 1 (0.088%) ArcGIS
6 1 (0.088%) NetWeaver
6 1 (0.088%) Tomcat
6 1 (0.088%) WebLogic
Applications
1 38 (3.34%) Microsoft Excel
2 11 (0.97%) Microsoft PowerPoint
3 7 (0.62%) Microsoft Office
4 6 (0.53%) MS Visio
5 5 (0.44%) PTC Creo
6 3 (0.26%) Microsoft Project
7 2 (0.18%) Lectora
7 2 (0.18%) Oracle Smart View
8 1 (0.088%) CATIA
8 1 (0.088%) Chatbot
8 1 (0.088%) Siemens NX
8 1 (0.088%) Spreadsheet
Business Applications
1 81 (7.12%) SAP S/4HANA
2 38 (3.34%) Oracle EBS
3 33 (2.90%) SAP PSCD
4 25 (2.20%) Oracle Payables
5 24 (2.11%) Oracle Receivables
6 23 (2.02%) Teamcenter
7 21 (1.85%) SAP FI
7 21 (1.85%) SAP MM
8 17 (1.49%) Oracle Assets
8 17 (1.49%) Oracle ERP
9 16 (1.41%) Oracle Cash Management
10 15 (1.32%) Oracle General Ledger
10 15 (1.32%) SAP HCM
10 15 (1.32%) SAP Hybris
11 14 (1.23%) Oracle Procure-to-Pay
11 14 (1.23%) SAP BRIM
12 13 (1.14%) Oracle EBS R12
12 13 (1.14%) SAP EWM
12 13 (1.14%) SAP PP
13 12 (1.05%) SAP SD
Cloud Services
1 123 (10.81%) Azure
2 54 (4.75%) AWS
3 50 (4.39%) Power Platform
4 49 (4.31%) OCI
5 45 (3.95%) Dynamics 365
6 27 (2.37%) SuccessFactors
7 26 (2.28%) GCP
8 18 (1.58%) Microsoft 365
8 18 (1.58%) Power Automate
9 16 (1.41%) Microsoft Copilot
9 16 (1.41%) SaaS
9 16 (1.41%) SAP Commerce Cloud
10 12 (1.05%) Azure DevOps
11 11 (0.97%) PowerApps
12 10 (0.88%) Entra ID
13 8 (0.70%) Copilot Studio
14 7 (0.62%) GitHub
15 6 (0.53%) Oracle Service Cloud
16 5 (0.44%) Azure AI
16 5 (0.44%) Serverless
Communications & Networking
1 16 (1.41%) Network Security
1 16 (1.41%) SNMP
2 12 (1.05%) Firewall
3 9 (0.79%) FTP
4 5 (0.44%) HTTP
5 4 (0.35%) SAN
5 4 (0.35%) VPN
6 3 (0.26%) SMS
6 3 (0.26%) TCP/IP
7 2 (0.18%) Cisco ISE
7 2 (0.18%) Connectrix
7 2 (0.18%) DNS
7 2 (0.18%) HTTPS
7 2 (0.18%) Intranet
7 2 (0.18%) LAN
7 2 (0.18%) SD-WAN
7 2 (0.18%) VSAN
7 2 (0.18%) WAN
8 1 (0.088%) Ethernet VPN
8 1 (0.088%) VXLAN
Database & Business Intelligence
1 35 (3.08%) Power BI
2 34 (2.99%) Oracle Reports
3 17 (1.49%) Oracle ODI
4 16 (1.41%) Oracle BI Publisher
5 13 (1.14%) SAP HANA
6 9 (0.79%) Tableau
7 8 (0.70%) SQL Server
8 6 (0.53%) NoSQL
9 5 (0.44%) Oracle Database
9 5 (0.44%) SAP Data Services
10 4 (0.35%) Electronic Patient Records
10 4 (0.35%) NonStop SQL
10 4 (0.35%) Relational Database
10 4 (0.35%) SAP BW
11 3 (0.26%) Amazon Athena
11 3 (0.26%) Delta Lake
11 3 (0.26%) GIS
11 3 (0.26%) Hadoop
11 3 (0.26%) Metadata
11 3 (0.26%) Snowflake Schema
Development Applications
1 33 (2.90%) JIRA
2 15 (1.32%) Hudson
3 7 (0.62%) 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 (0.18%) Postman
7 1 (0.088%) Appium
7 1 (0.088%) Bitbucket
7 1 (0.088%) GitLab
7 1 (0.088%) JDeveloper
7 1 (0.088%) JUnit
7 1 (0.088%) MSTest
7 1 (0.088%) NUnit
7 1 (0.088%) Rational Rhapsody
General
1 241 (21.18%) Finance
2 223 (19.60%) Social Skills
3 94 (8.26%) Public Sector
4 92 (8.08%) Analytical Skills
5 39 (3.43%) Manufacturing
6 27 (2.37%) Legal
7 26 (2.28%) Billing
8 23 (2.02%) Banking
9 22 (1.93%) General Ledger
9 22 (1.93%) Telecoms
10 15 (1.32%) Organisational Skills
11 14 (1.23%) Retail
12 13 (1.14%) Presentation Skills
13 12 (1.05%) Local Government
14 11 (0.97%) Aerospace
15 10 (0.88%) Influencing Skills
16 9 (0.79%) Documentation Skills
16 9 (0.79%) Marketing
17 8 (0.70%) Law
18 7 (0.62%) Back Office
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 49 (4.31%) XML
2 45 (3.95%) REST
3 30 (2.64%) Oracle Fusion
4 15 (1.32%) SOAP
5 13 (1.14%) Web Services
6 11 (0.97%) JSON
7 7 (0.62%) .NET
8 5 (0.44%) LDAP
8 5 (0.44%) SAP Basis
8 5 (0.44%) SAP Fiori
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%) PySpark
10 3 (0.26%) XSLT
Miscellaneous
1 32 (2.81%) Data Protection Act
2 18 (1.58%) Onboarding
3 16 (1.41%) Operational Technology
4 15 (1.32%) Replication
5 14 (1.23%) Legacy Systems
5 14 (1.23%) Security Posture
6 13 (1.14%) AI Agents
7 12 (1.05%) Product Ownership
8 11 (0.97%) Public Cloud
9 9 (0.79%) Data Centre
9 9 (0.79%) Management Information System
10 8 (0.70%) Cloud Native
10 8 (0.70%) Data Structures
10 8 (0.70%) NHS
11 7 (0.62%) Analytical Mindset
11 7 (0.62%) SCADA
12 6 (0.53%) Beowulf
13 5 (0.44%) Greenfield Project
13 5 (0.44%) Market Risk
13 5 (0.44%) SCORM
Operating Systems
1 31 (2.72%) Windows
2 27 (2.37%) Linux
3 13 (1.14%) AIX
4 11 (0.97%) Solaris
5 9 (0.79%) VMS
6 4 (0.35%) Windows Server
7 2 (0.18%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
7 2 (0.18%) Unix
8 1 (0.088%) CoreOS
8 1 (0.088%) Data ONTAP
8 1 (0.088%) Mac OS
Processes & Methodologies
1 144 (12.65%) Migration
2 140 (12.30%) ERP
3 109 (9.58%) Problem-Solving
4 101 (8.88%) Stakeholder Engagement
5 89 (7.82%) Workshop Facilitation
6 85 (7.47%) Continuous Improvement
6 85 (7.47%) Data Migration
7 84 (7.38%) Stakeholder Management
8 76 (6.68%) Cybersecurity
8 76 (6.68%) User Acceptance Testing
9 71 (6.24%) Validation
10 65 (5.71%) Agile
11 64 (5.62%) Business Intelligence
12 58 (5.10%) Data Protection
12 58 (5.10%) PLM
13 54 (4.75%) Change Management
14 53 (4.66%) Analytics
15 50 (4.39%) Roadmaps
16 45 (3.95%) Knowledge Transfer
17 43 (3.78%) Risk Management
Programming Languages
1 110 (9.67%) SQL
2 42 (3.69%) Python
3 28 (2.46%) T-SQL
4 25 (2.20%) PL/SQL
5 19 (1.67%) PowerShell
6 16 (1.41%) JavaScript
7 13 (1.14%) Search Processing Language
8 9 (0.79%) ABAP
9 8 (0.70%) Java
10 7 (0.62%) Bash
10 7 (0.62%) C#
10 7 (0.62%) R
11 5 (0.44%) Kusto Query Language
12 4 (0.35%) TypeScript
13 2 (0.18%) Apex Code
13 2 (0.18%) VBScript
14 1 (0.088%) ActionScript
14 1 (0.088%) C++
14 1 (0.088%) Shell Script
14 1 (0.088%) VBA
Qualifications
1 241 (21.18%) Security Cleared
2 180 (15.82%) SC Cleared
3 54 (4.75%) DV Cleared
4 39 (3.43%) CISSP
5 32 (2.81%) BPSS Clearance
6 28 (2.46%) CISM
7 26 (2.28%) Degree
8 15 (1.32%) Cisco Certification
9 12 (1.05%) CCSP
10 11 (0.97%) (ISC)2 CCSP
11 8 (0.70%) Computer Science Degree
11 8 (0.70%) ITIL Foundation Certificate
11 8 (0.70%) SAP Certification
12 6 (0.53%) CEH
12 6 (0.53%) DBS Check
13 5 (0.44%) ACCA
13 5 (0.44%) CIMA
13 5 (0.44%) Microsoft Certification
13 5 (0.44%) Oracle Certification
13 5 (0.44%) PMP
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 45 (3.95%) ISO/IEC 27001
1 45 (3.95%) NIST
2 34 (2.99%) GRC
3 27 (2.37%) Data Quality
4 17 (1.49%) GDPR
5 12 (1.05%) QA
6 11 (0.97%) JSP 440
6 11 (0.97%) PCI DSS
7 9 (0.79%) NCSC
8 8 (0.70%) COBIT
9 7 (0.62%) PMO
9 7 (0.62%) RMADS
9 7 (0.62%) SLA
10 6 (0.53%) Actionable Recommendations
11 5 (0.44%) Sarbanes-Oxley
12 3 (0.26%) Accessibility
12 3 (0.26%) ISO/IEC 27005
13 2 (0.18%) HL7
13 2 (0.18%) ISA99
13 2 (0.18%) WCAG
System Software
1 16 (1.41%) Active Directory
2 14 (1.23%) VMware Infrastructure
3 11 (0.97%) VMware NSX
4 9 (0.79%) Docker
5 8 (0.70%) vSphere
6 6 (0.53%) Slurm Workload Manager
7 5 (0.44%) VMware ESXi
8 4 (0.35%) Virtual Desktop
9 3 (0.26%) Virtual Machines
10 1 (0.088%) Hyper-V
10 1 (0.088%) IAG
10 1 (0.088%) NFS
Systems Management
1 18 (1.58%) Kubernetes
2 13 (1.14%) Nagios
2 13 (1.14%) ZABBIX
3 12 (1.05%) Netcool
3 12 (1.05%) Tivoli
4 11 (0.97%) OpenView
4 11 (0.97%) Tivoli Monitoring
5 9 (0.79%) Ansible
6 7 (0.62%) Terraform
6 7 (0.62%) vRealize
7 6 (0.53%) NetBackup
7 6 (0.53%) 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 (0.18%) Microsoft Intune
Vendors
1 241 (21.18%) SAP
2 149 (13.09%) Oracle
3 93 (8.17%) Microsoft
4 52 (4.57%) Siemens
5 22 (1.93%) ServiceNow
5 22 (1.93%) Splunk
5 22 (1.93%) VMware
6 20 (1.76%) BMC
7 18 (1.58%) Workday
8 17 (1.49%) Ariba
8 17 (1.49%) IBM
9 14 (1.23%) Sage
10 13 (1.14%) Google
10 13 (1.14%) IFS
10 13 (1.14%) SolarWinds
11 12 (1.05%) Databricks
12 11 (0.97%) HP
13 7 (0.62%) Informatica
13 7 (0.62%) OpenText
13 7 (0.62%) Veritas