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 18 August 2026.

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

6 months to
18 Aug 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 33 35 27
Rank change year-on-year +2 -8 +15
Contract jobs requiring a Consultant 1,388 787 1,109
As % of all contract jobs in the UK excluding London 5.03% 5.14% 6.11%
As % of the Job Titles category 5.48% 5.70% 6.62%
Number of daily rates quoted 793 487 710
10th Percentile £400 £412 £420
25th Percentile £456 £475 £475
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £525 £550 £552
Median % change year-on-year -4.55% -0.27% +5.05%
75th Percentile £638 £625 £638
90th Percentile £725 £688 £742
UK median daily rate £550 £550 £550
Number of hourly rates quoted 47 19 20
10th Percentile £51.00 £29.11 £47.75
25th Percentile £56.25 £47.74 £55.00
Median hourly rate £62.25 £77.50 £61.60
Median % change year-on-year -19.68% +25.81% -5.23%
75th Percentile £78.85 £81.25 -
90th Percentile £94.00 - £70.21
UK median hourly rate £62.25 £77.50 £61.60
% change year-on-year -19.68% +25.81% -5.32%

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 25,321 13,807 16,743
% of contract IT jobs with a recognized job title 91.85% 90.15% 92.21%
Number of daily rates quoted 14,279 8,448 10,226
10th Percentile £305 £213 £220
25th Percentile £410 £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 £688
UK median daily rate £525 £500 £525
% change year-on-year +5.00% -4.76% -1.87%
Number of hourly rates quoted 3,053 1,245 1,700
10th Percentile £14.57 £13.25 £14.00
25th Percentile £20.48 £16.32 £18.35
Median hourly rate £42.50 £25.15 £44.02
Median % change year-on-year +68.99% -42.87% +22.28%
75th Percentile £68.00 £55.00 £65.00
90th Percentile £80.00 £74.50 £75.00
UK median hourly rate £41.74 £25.15 £43.00
% change year-on-year +65.94% -41.51% +3.61%

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 18 August 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 18 August 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 18 August 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 -1 412 £540 -1.82% 220
North of England -11 312 £550 - 193
Midlands +3 252 £500 -9.09% 86
South West +12 205 £553 -5.06% 128
North West -10 194 £581 +5.64% 137
West Midlands +17 179 £490 -10.91% 64
Scotland +36 111 £425 -10.53% 33
Yorkshire -18 97 £525 +2.44% 42
East of England -19 83 £550 - 54
East Midlands -7 64 £525 -4.55% 21
Wales -12 27 £550 +10.00% 9
North East -34 20 £750 +39.66% 15
Northern Ireland -2 2 £544 +4.57% 39
Consultant
UK

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

For the 6 months to 18 August 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.

1 385 (27.74%) Security Cleared
2 313 (22.55%) SAP
3 256 (18.44%) SC Cleared
4 183 (13.18%) Stakeholder Management
5 179 (12.90%) Microsoft
6 154 (11.10%) Migration
7 149 (10.73%) Oracle
8 140 (10.09%) Stakeholder Engagement
9 136 (9.80%) ERP
10 127 (9.15%) SQL
11 124 (8.93%) Azure
12 121 (8.72%) Cybersecurity
13 120 (8.65%) Continuous Improvement
14 119 (8.57%) Problem-Solving
15 100 (7.20%) Validation
16 98 (7.06%) DV Cleared
17 95 (6.84%) Workshop Facilitation
18 94 (6.77%) SAP S/4HANA
19 89 (6.41%) Agile
20 88 (6.34%) User Acceptance Testing
21 85 (6.12%) Roadmaps
22 79 (5.69%) AWS
23 77 (5.55%) Data Migration
24 72 (5.19%) Analytics
25 69 (4.97%) Risk Management
26 63 (4.54%) Business Intelligence
27 61 (4.39%) Knowledge Transfer
28 60 (4.32%) CISSP
28 60 (4.32%) Power Platform
28 60 (4.32%) Requirements Gathering

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 17 (1.22%) SharePoint
3 9 (0.65%) WebSphere
4 8 (0.58%) WebLogic
5 7 (0.50%) Oracle Workflow
6 3 (0.22%) Apache
6 3 (0.22%) Apache Spark
6 3 (0.22%) Apache Superset
6 3 (0.22%) OpenStack
6 3 (0.22%) TIBCO ActiveMatrix
7 2 (0.14%) Microsoft Exchange
8 1 (0.072%) NetWeaver
8 1 (0.072%) SAS
8 1 (0.072%) Smallworld
8 1 (0.072%) Tomcat
Applications
1 50 (3.60%) Microsoft Excel
2 28 (2.02%) Microsoft Office
3 16 (1.15%) Microsoft PowerPoint
4 7 (0.50%) MS Visio
5 3 (0.22%) Microsoft Project
5 3 (0.22%) Spreadsheet
6 1 (0.072%) Adobe Captivate
6 1 (0.072%) Adobe Creative Suite
6 1 (0.072%) Oracle Smart View
Business Applications
1 94 (6.77%) SAP S/4HANA
2 32 (2.31%) SAP PSCD
3 28 (2.02%) Oracle ERP
4 22 (1.59%) Oracle EBS
5 21 (1.51%) SAP MM
6 20 (1.44%) Oracle Payables
7 19 (1.37%) SAP EWM
8 17 (1.22%) Oracle Receivables
8 17 (1.22%) SAP FI
9 16 (1.15%) SAP Payroll
10 15 (1.08%) SAP QM
10 15 (1.08%) SAP SD
11 13 (0.94%) Teamcenter
12 11 (0.79%) NetSuite
12 11 (0.79%) SAP CO
12 11 (0.79%) SAP PP
12 11 (0.79%) Workday HCM
13 10 (0.72%) SAP FI/CO
13 10 (0.72%) SAP HCM
14 8 (0.58%) SAP HR
Cloud Services
1 124 (8.93%) Azure
2 79 (5.69%) AWS
3 60 (4.32%) Power Platform
4 59 (4.25%) SuccessFactors
5 57 (4.11%) Dynamics 365
6 51 (3.67%) OCI
7 47 (3.39%) GCP
8 32 (2.31%) Microsoft 365
9 27 (1.95%) Entra ID
10 23 (1.66%) Power Automate
11 15 (1.08%) SaaS
12 12 (0.86%) Microsoft Copilot
12 12 (0.86%) Oracle Service Cloud
13 11 (0.79%) Azure DevOps
13 11 (0.79%) GitHub
14 10 (0.72%) PowerApps
14 10 (0.72%) SAP Commerce Cloud
15 9 (0.65%) Cloud Computing
16 8 (0.58%) Azure Monitor
16 8 (0.58%) Microsoft Purview
Communications & Networking
1 31 (2.23%) Network Security
2 22 (1.59%) Firewall
3 20 (1.44%) SNMP
4 12 (0.86%) BGP
5 11 (0.79%) WAN
6 7 (0.50%) DNS
6 7 (0.50%) LAN
6 7 (0.50%) VPN
6 7 (0.50%) VSAN
7 6 (0.43%) TCP/IP
7 6 (0.43%) Wi-Fi
8 5 (0.36%) HTTP
8 5 (0.36%) SAN
9 4 (0.29%) FTP
9 4 (0.29%) Wireless
10 3 (0.22%) DHCP
10 3 (0.22%) MPLS
10 3 (0.22%) SMS
10 3 (0.22%) TACACS
10 3 (0.22%) VXLAN
Database & Business Intelligence
1 37 (2.67%) Power BI
2 30 (2.16%) Oracle Reports
3 18 (1.30%) Oracle BI Publisher
3 18 (1.30%) SAP HANA
4 17 (1.22%) Oracle ODI
5 16 (1.15%) SAP BW
6 14 (1.01%) SQL Server
7 11 (0.79%) Metadata
7 11 (0.79%) Tableau
8 9 (0.65%) SAP Data Services
9 8 (0.58%) BusinessObjects
10 6 (0.43%) Oracle Database
10 6 (0.43%) Relational Database
11 5 (0.36%) Data Warehouse
11 5 (0.36%) NonStop SQL
12 4 (0.29%) 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 (3.46%) JIRA
2 12 (0.86%) Hudson
3 11 (0.79%) Git
4 8 (0.58%) Oracle Forms
5 6 (0.43%) Jenkins
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%) GitLab
8 1 (0.072%) JMeter
8 1 (0.072%) Oracle APEX
8 1 (0.072%) ScriptRunner
8 1 (0.072%) Yeoman
General
1 318 (22.91%) Social Skills
2 268 (19.31%) Finance
3 116 (8.36%) Analytical Skills
4 112 (8.07%) Public Sector
5 50 (3.60%) Manufacturing
6 33 (2.38%) Legal
7 30 (2.16%) Presentation Skills
8 29 (2.09%) General Ledger
9 27 (1.95%) Documentation Skills
10 26 (1.87%) Banking
11 25 (1.80%) Telecoms
12 20 (1.44%) Billing
13 17 (1.22%) Influencing Skills
13 17 (1.22%) Retail
14 16 (1.15%) Organisational Skills
15 13 (0.94%) Aerospace
16 12 (0.86%) Marketing
17 10 (0.72%) Financial Institution
18 9 (0.65%) Advertising
19 8 (0.58%) Military
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 47 (3.39%) REST
2 41 (2.95%) XML
3 28 (2.02%) Oracle Fusion
4 25 (1.80%) SOAP
5 17 (1.22%) Middleware
6 12 (0.86%) SAP Fiori
6 12 (0.86%) Web Services
7 11 (0.79%) LDAP
8 10 (0.72%) SailPoint
9 9 (0.65%) SAP PI
10 7 (0.50%) IDoc
10 7 (0.50%) JSON
11 6 (0.43%) EDI
11 6 (0.43%) JDBC
11 6 (0.43%) Microsoft Graph
11 6 (0.43%) SAP Basis
12 5 (0.36%) OpenTelemetry
12 5 (0.36%) RESTful
13 4 (0.29%) AngularJS
13 4 (0.29%) PySpark
Miscellaneous
1 41 (2.95%) Onboarding
2 30 (2.16%) Data Protection Act
3 23 (1.66%) Security Posture
4 22 (1.59%) CMDB
5 16 (1.15%) Product Ownership
6 15 (1.08%) Operational Technology
7 14 (1.01%) Replication
8 12 (0.86%) Management Information System
9 11 (0.79%) Cloud Native
9 11 (0.79%) Data Centre
9 11 (0.79%) Data Structures
10 9 (0.65%) Analytical Mindset
10 9 (0.65%) FMCG
10 9 (0.65%) Private Cloud
10 9 (0.65%) Public Cloud
11 8 (0.58%) Enterprise Software
11 8 (0.58%) Hybrid Cloud
11 8 (0.58%) Legacy Systems
11 8 (0.58%) PKI
11 8 (0.58%) Security Operations Centre
Operating Systems
1 56 (4.03%) Windows
2 44 (3.17%) Linux
3 17 (1.22%) Solaris
4 14 (1.01%) AIX
5 10 (0.72%) Unix
6 8 (0.58%) VMS
6 8 (0.58%) Windows Server
7 3 (0.22%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
8 2 (0.14%) Windows Server 2016
9 1 (0.072%) Android
9 1 (0.072%) CoreOS
9 1 (0.072%) Data ONTAP
9 1 (0.072%) Mac OS
9 1 (0.072%) zOS
Processes & Methodologies
1 183 (13.18%) Stakeholder Management
2 154 (11.10%) Migration
3 140 (10.09%) Stakeholder Engagement
4 136 (9.80%) ERP
5 121 (8.72%) Cybersecurity
6 120 (8.65%) Continuous Improvement
7 119 (8.57%) Problem-Solving
8 100 (7.20%) Validation
9 95 (6.84%) Workshop Facilitation
10 89 (6.41%) Agile
11 88 (6.34%) User Acceptance Testing
12 85 (6.12%) Roadmaps
13 77 (5.55%) Data Migration
14 72 (5.19%) Analytics
15 69 (4.97%) Risk Management
16 63 (4.54%) Business Intelligence
17 61 (4.39%) Knowledge Transfer
18 60 (4.32%) Requirements Gathering
19 56 (4.03%) Project Delivery
19 56 (4.03%) Workflow
Programming Languages
1 127 (9.15%) SQL
2 59 (4.25%) Python
3 31 (2.23%) T-SQL
4 29 (2.09%) PowerShell
5 28 (2.02%) ABAP
6 25 (1.80%) PL/SQL
7 19 (1.37%) JavaScript
8 13 (0.94%) Java
8 13 (0.94%) Search Processing Language
9 12 (0.86%) Bash
10 10 (0.72%) Kusto Query Language
11 6 (0.43%) C#
11 6 (0.43%) R
12 2 (0.14%) Data Analysis Expressions
12 2 (0.14%) Groovy
12 2 (0.14%) Korn
12 2 (0.14%) Perl
12 2 (0.14%) Shell Script
12 2 (0.14%) TypeScript
12 2 (0.14%) VBScript
Qualifications
1 385 (27.74%) Security Cleared
2 256 (18.44%) SC Cleared
3 98 (7.06%) DV Cleared
4 60 (4.32%) CISSP
5 48 (3.46%) BPSS Clearance
6 46 (3.31%) CISM
7 34 (2.45%) Cisco Certification
8 29 (2.09%) Degree
9 28 (2.02%) (ISC)2 CCSP
10 24 (1.73%) CCSP
11 13 (0.94%) ACCA
11 13 (0.94%) CIMA
12 11 (0.79%) CompTIA Security+
12 11 (0.79%) PMP
13 10 (0.72%) CEH
13 10 (0.72%) CRISC
14 9 (0.65%) OSCP
15 8 (0.58%) Azure Certification
16 7 (0.50%) ITIL Foundation Certificate
16 7 (0.50%) SAP Certification
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 46 (3.31%) NIST
2 44 (3.17%) GRC
3 40 (2.88%) ISO/IEC 27001
4 33 (2.38%) Data Quality
5 23 (1.66%) QA
6 18 (1.30%) GDPR
7 13 (0.94%) Actionable Recommendations
7 13 (0.94%) PCI DSS
7 13 (0.94%) SLA
8 11 (0.79%) NCSC
9 10 (0.72%) PMO
10 9 (0.65%) Accessibility
11 7 (0.50%) Sarbanes-Oxley
12 6 (0.43%) Def Stans
12 6 (0.43%) JSP 440
12 6 (0.43%) NIST 800
12 6 (0.43%) RMADS
13 5 (0.36%) COBIT
14 4 (0.29%) WCAG
15 3 (0.22%) Cyber Essentials
System Software
1 41 (2.95%) Active Directory
2 24 (1.73%) VMware Infrastructure
3 16 (1.15%) VMware NSX
4 14 (1.01%) VMware ESXi
5 13 (0.94%) vSphere
6 8 (0.58%) Hyper-V
7 5 (0.36%) Virtual Desktop
8 4 (0.29%) Docker
8 4 (0.29%) Virtual Machines
9 2 (0.14%) IAG
9 2 (0.14%) NFS
10 1 (0.072%) Firmware
10 1 (0.072%) PowerHA
10 1 (0.072%) Time Sharing Option
Systems Management
1 24 (1.73%) Kubernetes
2 21 (1.51%) Terraform
3 19 (1.37%) Ansible
4 13 (0.94%) Nagios
4 13 (0.94%) ZABBIX
5 12 (0.86%) Netcool
5 12 (0.86%) Tivoli
6 11 (0.79%) OpenView
6 11 (0.79%) Tivoli Monitoring
6 11 (0.79%) vRealize
7 10 (0.72%) vCenter Server
8 7 (0.50%) Grafana
9 6 (0.43%) FortiGate
9 6 (0.43%) VxRail
10 5 (0.36%) NetBackup
11 4 (0.29%) CEMLI
11 4 (0.29%) Prometheus
11 4 (0.29%) Single Sign-On
12 3 (0.22%) Oracle Identity Management
12 3 (0.22%) vRealize Orchestrator
Vendors
1 313 (22.55%) SAP
2 179 (12.90%) Microsoft
3 149 (10.73%) Oracle
4 55 (3.96%) ServiceNow
5 33 (2.38%) VMware
6 29 (2.09%) Splunk
7 19 (1.37%) Salesforce
8 18 (1.30%) BMC
9 17 (1.22%) Ariba
10 16 (1.15%) Databricks
10 16 (1.15%) IBM
11 14 (1.01%) JD Edwards
11 14 (1.01%) Workday
12 13 (0.94%) SolarWinds
13 12 (0.86%) HP
13 12 (0.86%) Siemens
14 11 (0.79%) Google
15 9 (0.65%) IFS
15 9 (0.65%) Informatica
15 9 (0.65%) Veeam