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 August 2026.

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

6 months to
8 Aug 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 33 34 27
Rank change year-on-year +1 -7 +15
Contract jobs requiring a Consultant 1,378 776 1,108
As % of all contract jobs in the UK excluding London 5.03% 5.10% 6.05%
As % of the Job Titles category 5.46% 5.64% 6.57%
Number of daily rates quoted 780 478 713
10th Percentile £400 £409 £425
25th Percentile £455 £475 £481
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £525 £550 £575
Median % change year-on-year -4.55% -4.35% +9.52%
75th Percentile £630 £625 £638
90th Percentile £725 £688 £749
UK median daily rate £550 £550 £550
Number of hourly rates quoted 61 22 19
10th Percentile £51.00 £30.21 £45.50
25th Percentile £56.25 £54.69 £55.00
Median hourly rate £60.00 £77.50 £61.60
Median % change year-on-year -22.58% +25.81% -4.99%
75th Percentile £78.70 £81.25 -
90th Percentile £86.11 - £68.34
UK median hourly rate £59.00 £70.00 £61.60
% change year-on-year -15.71% +13.64% -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 25,241 13,749 16,863
% of contract IT jobs with a recognized job title 92.09% 90.38% 92.05%
Number of daily rates quoted 14,273 8,447 10,310
10th Percentile £305 £215 £219
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 £685
UK median daily rate £525 £500 £525
% change year-on-year +5.00% -4.76% -1.87%
Number of hourly rates quoted 3,008 1,207 1,754
10th Percentile £14.56 £13.36 £14.05
25th Percentile £20.47 £16.50 £18.50
Median hourly rate £42.50 £25.15 £45.00
Median % change year-on-year +68.99% -44.11% +20.00%
75th Percentile £68.00 £55.00 £65.00
90th Percentile £80.00 £75.00 £75.00
UK median hourly rate £42.00 £25.15 £43.00
% change year-on-year +67.00% -41.51% +0.58%

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 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 8 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 8 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 +1 409 £525 -4.55% 259
North of England -8 300 £550 +3.00% 256
Midlands +5 257 £500 -9.09% 92
South West +15 207 £550 -8.33% 167
West Midlands +18 184 £500 -11.11% 66
North West -9 178 £550 - 174
Scotland +37 108 £425 -10.53% 58
Yorkshire -13 101 £531 +11.84% 65
East of England -19 81 £551 +0.18% 65
East Midlands -2 64 £513 -6.82% 25
Wales -8 28 £550 +10.00% 15
North East -38 20 £750 +39.66% 18
Northern Ireland -3 1 £450 -13.46% 43
Consultant
UK

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

For the 6 months to 8 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.

1 357 (25.91%) Security Cleared
2 299 (21.70%) SAP
3 236 (17.13%) SC Cleared
4 169 (12.26%) Microsoft
5 168 (12.19%) Stakeholder Management
6 151 (10.96%) Migration
7 146 (10.60%) Oracle
8 139 (10.09%) ERP
9 134 (9.72%) Stakeholder Engagement
10 131 (9.51%) Azure
11 125 (9.07%) SQL
12 122 (8.85%) Problem-Solving
13 119 (8.64%) Continuous Improvement
14 114 (8.27%) Cybersecurity
15 98 (7.11%) Validation
16 96 (6.97%) DV Cleared
17 92 (6.68%) Workshop Facilitation
18 91 (6.60%) SAP S/4HANA
19 88 (6.39%) User Acceptance Testing
20 86 (6.24%) Agile
21 84 (6.10%) Roadmaps
22 78 (5.66%) Data Migration
23 75 (5.44%) AWS
24 71 (5.15%) Analytics
25 66 (4.79%) Risk Management
26 62 (4.50%) Business Intelligence
27 60 (4.35%) CISSP
27 60 (4.35%) Power Platform
28 58 (4.21%) Python
29 56 (4.06%) 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 28 (2.03%) Confluence
2 18 (1.31%) SharePoint
3 9 (0.65%) WebSphere
4 8 (0.58%) WebLogic
5 7 (0.51%) Oracle Workflow
6 3 (0.22%) Apache
6 3 (0.22%) Apache Spark
6 3 (0.22%) Apache Superset
6 3 (0.22%) Microsoft Exchange
6 3 (0.22%) OpenStack
6 3 (0.22%) TIBCO ActiveMatrix
7 1 (0.073%) NetWeaver
7 1 (0.073%) SAS
7 1 (0.073%) Smallworld
7 1 (0.073%) Tomcat
Applications
1 48 (3.48%) Microsoft Excel
2 26 (1.89%) Microsoft Office
3 15 (1.09%) Microsoft PowerPoint
4 8 (0.58%) MS Visio
5 3 (0.22%) Microsoft Project
5 3 (0.22%) Spreadsheet
6 2 (0.15%) Lectora
6 2 (0.15%) Oracle Smart View
7 1 (0.073%) Adobe Captivate
7 1 (0.073%) Adobe Creative Suite
Business Applications
1 91 (6.60%) SAP S/4HANA
2 32 (2.32%) SAP PSCD
3 26 (1.89%) Oracle ERP
4 22 (1.60%) Oracle EBS
5 20 (1.45%) SAP EWM
5 20 (1.45%) SAP MM
6 19 (1.38%) Oracle Payables
7 18 (1.31%) SAP FI
7 18 (1.31%) SAP Payroll
8 16 (1.16%) Oracle Receivables
9 15 (1.09%) SAP QM
9 15 (1.09%) Teamcenter
10 14 (1.02%) SAP SD
11 13 (0.94%) SAP HCM
12 12 (0.87%) SAP CO
12 12 (0.87%) Workday HCM
13 11 (0.80%) NetSuite
13 11 (0.80%) SAP FI/CO
13 11 (0.80%) SAP PP
14 8 (0.58%) Dynamics CRM
Cloud Services
1 131 (9.51%) Azure
2 75 (5.44%) AWS
3 60 (4.35%) Power Platform
4 55 (3.99%) Dynamics 365
5 50 (3.63%) OCI
5 50 (3.63%) SuccessFactors
6 45 (3.27%) GCP
7 34 (2.47%) Microsoft 365
8 25 (1.81%) Entra ID
9 24 (1.74%) Power Automate
10 16 (1.16%) SaaS
11 12 (0.87%) Microsoft Copilot
11 12 (0.87%) Oracle Service Cloud
11 12 (0.87%) PowerApps
12 11 (0.80%) Azure DevOps
12 11 (0.80%) GitHub
13 10 (0.73%) SAP Commerce Cloud
14 9 (0.65%) Cloud Computing
15 8 (0.58%) Azure Monitor
15 8 (0.58%) Microsoft Purview
Communications & Networking
1 30 (2.18%) Network Security
2 23 (1.67%) Firewall
3 20 (1.45%) SNMP
4 12 (0.87%) BGP
5 10 (0.73%) WAN
6 9 (0.65%) VPN
7 7 (0.51%) LAN
7 7 (0.51%) VSAN
8 6 (0.44%) TCP/IP
9 5 (0.36%) DNS
9 5 (0.36%) FTP
9 5 (0.36%) HTTP
9 5 (0.36%) Wi-Fi
10 4 (0.29%) SAN
10 4 (0.29%) Wireless
11 3 (0.22%) Ethernet VPN
11 3 (0.22%) MPLS
11 3 (0.22%) SMS
11 3 (0.22%) TACACS
11 3 (0.22%) VXLAN
Database & Business Intelligence
1 38 (2.76%) Power BI
2 30 (2.18%) Oracle Reports
3 21 (1.52%) SAP HANA
4 18 (1.31%) Oracle BI Publisher
5 17 (1.23%) Oracle ODI
6 16 (1.16%) SAP BW
7 14 (1.02%) SQL Server
8 11 (0.80%) Metadata
8 11 (0.80%) Tableau
9 9 (0.65%) SAP Data Services
10 8 (0.58%) BusinessObjects
11 6 (0.44%) Relational Database
12 5 (0.36%) Data Warehouse
12 5 (0.36%) NonStop SQL
12 5 (0.36%) Oracle Database
13 4 (0.29%) Power Query
14 3 (0.22%) Amazon Athena
14 3 (0.22%) Delta Lake
14 3 (0.22%) NoSQL
14 3 (0.22%) RDBMS
Development Applications
1 48 (3.48%) JIRA
2 12 (0.87%) Hudson
3 11 (0.80%) Git
4 8 (0.58%) Oracle Forms
5 7 (0.51%) Jenkins
6 3 (0.22%) Postman
6 3 (0.22%) Toad
6 3 (0.22%) Visual Studio Code
7 2 (0.15%) JDeveloper
7 2 (0.15%) LoadRunner
7 2 (0.15%) TestRail
7 2 (0.15%) tSQLt
7 2 (0.15%) Zephyr
8 1 (0.073%) Claude Code
8 1 (0.073%) GitLab
8 1 (0.073%) JMeter
8 1 (0.073%) ScriptRunner
8 1 (0.073%) Yeoman
General
1 310 (22.50%) Social Skills
2 263 (19.09%) Finance
3 119 (8.64%) Analytical Skills
4 108 (7.84%) Public Sector
5 48 (3.48%) Manufacturing
6 36 (2.61%) Legal
7 32 (2.32%) Banking
8 29 (2.10%) Presentation Skills
9 27 (1.96%) General Ledger
10 25 (1.81%) Telecoms
11 24 (1.74%) Documentation Skills
12 20 (1.45%) Billing
13 19 (1.38%) Aerospace
14 17 (1.23%) Retail
15 15 (1.09%) Influencing Skills
15 15 (1.09%) Marketing
16 14 (1.02%) Organisational Skills
17 9 (0.65%) Advertising
17 9 (0.65%) Financial Institution
18 8 (0.58%) Local Government
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 47 (3.41%) REST
2 41 (2.98%) XML
3 27 (1.96%) Oracle Fusion
4 25 (1.81%) SOAP
5 15 (1.09%) Middleware
6 12 (0.87%) SAP Fiori
6 12 (0.87%) Web Services
7 9 (0.65%) LDAP
7 9 (0.65%) SAP PI
8 7 (0.51%) IDoc
8 7 (0.51%) JSON
8 7 (0.51%) SailPoint
9 6 (0.44%) JDBC
9 6 (0.44%) Microsoft Graph
10 5 (0.36%) OpenTelemetry
10 5 (0.36%) RESTful
10 5 (0.36%) SAP Basis
11 4 (0.29%) AngularJS
11 4 (0.29%) eBPF
11 4 (0.29%) PySpark
Miscellaneous
1 41 (2.98%) Onboarding
2 33 (2.39%) Data Protection Act
3 23 (1.67%) Security Posture
4 19 (1.38%) CMDB
5 16 (1.16%) Operational Technology
6 14 (1.02%) Product Ownership
6 14 (1.02%) Replication
7 11 (0.80%) AI Agents
7 11 (0.80%) Data Centre
7 11 (0.80%) Data Structures
8 10 (0.73%) Analytical Mindset
8 10 (0.73%) Cloud Native
8 10 (0.73%) Management Information System
9 9 (0.65%) Enterprise Software
9 9 (0.65%) FMCG
9 9 (0.65%) Private Cloud
9 9 (0.65%) Public Cloud
10 8 (0.58%) Legacy Systems
10 8 (0.58%) Security Operations Centre
11 7 (0.51%) Greenfield Project
Operating Systems
1 53 (3.85%) Windows
2 43 (3.12%) Linux
3 17 (1.23%) Solaris
4 14 (1.02%) AIX
5 10 (0.73%) Unix
6 8 (0.58%) VMS
7 5 (0.36%) Windows Server
8 3 (0.22%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
9 1 (0.073%) Android
9 1 (0.073%) CoreOS
9 1 (0.073%) Data ONTAP
9 1 (0.073%) Mac OS
9 1 (0.073%) Windows Server 2016
9 1 (0.073%) zOS
Processes & Methodologies
1 168 (12.19%) Stakeholder Management
2 151 (10.96%) Migration
3 139 (10.09%) ERP
4 134 (9.72%) Stakeholder Engagement
5 122 (8.85%) Problem-Solving
6 119 (8.64%) Continuous Improvement
7 114 (8.27%) Cybersecurity
8 98 (7.11%) Validation
9 92 (6.68%) Workshop Facilitation
10 88 (6.39%) User Acceptance Testing
11 86 (6.24%) Agile
12 84 (6.10%) Roadmaps
13 78 (5.66%) Data Migration
14 71 (5.15%) Analytics
15 66 (4.79%) Risk Management
16 62 (4.50%) Business Intelligence
17 56 (4.06%) AI
18 55 (3.99%) Workflow
19 54 (3.92%) Knowledge Transfer
20 53 (3.85%) Requirements Gathering
Programming Languages
1 125 (9.07%) SQL
2 58 (4.21%) Python
3 31 (2.25%) T-SQL
4 30 (2.18%) PowerShell
5 29 (2.10%) ABAP
6 25 (1.81%) PL/SQL
7 19 (1.38%) JavaScript
8 13 (0.94%) Bash
8 13 (0.94%) Java
8 13 (0.94%) Search Processing Language
9 10 (0.73%) Kusto Query Language
10 6 (0.44%) C#
10 6 (0.44%) R
11 2 (0.15%) Data Analysis Expressions
11 2 (0.15%) Groovy
11 2 (0.15%) Korn
11 2 (0.15%) Perl
11 2 (0.15%) Shell Script
11 2 (0.15%) TypeScript
11 2 (0.15%) VBScript
Qualifications
1 357 (25.91%) Security Cleared
2 236 (17.13%) SC Cleared
3 96 (6.97%) DV Cleared
4 60 (4.35%) CISSP
5 46 (3.34%) BPSS Clearance
6 45 (3.27%) CISM
7 33 (2.39%) Cisco Certification
8 31 (2.25%) Degree
9 27 (1.96%) (ISC)2 CCSP
10 23 (1.67%) CCSP
11 13 (0.94%) ACCA
11 13 (0.94%) CIMA
12 11 (0.80%) PMP
13 10 (0.73%) CEH
13 10 (0.73%) CompTIA Security+
14 9 (0.65%) CRISC
14 9 (0.65%) OSCP
15 8 (0.58%) Azure Certification
16 7 (0.51%) CCA
16 7 (0.51%) ITIL Foundation Certificate
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 49 (3.56%) NIST
2 43 (3.12%) ISO/IEC 27001
3 40 (2.90%) GRC
4 30 (2.18%) Data Quality
5 24 (1.74%) QA
6 18 (1.31%) GDPR
7 13 (0.94%) Actionable Recommendations
7 13 (0.94%) PCI DSS
8 12 (0.87%) SLA
9 11 (0.80%) NCSC
10 8 (0.58%) Accessibility
11 7 (0.51%) PMO
11 7 (0.51%) Sarbanes-Oxley
12 6 (0.44%) Def Stans
12 6 (0.44%) JSP 440
12 6 (0.44%) NIST 800
12 6 (0.44%) RMADS
13 5 (0.36%) COBIT
14 4 (0.29%) WCAG
15 2 (0.15%) GxP
System Software
1 35 (2.54%) Active Directory
2 24 (1.74%) VMware Infrastructure
3 16 (1.16%) VMware NSX
4 14 (1.02%) VMware ESXi
5 13 (0.94%) vSphere
6 5 (0.36%) Hyper-V
6 5 (0.36%) Virtual Desktop
7 4 (0.29%) Docker
8 3 (0.22%) Virtual Machines
9 2 (0.15%) NFS
10 1 (0.073%) Firmware
10 1 (0.073%) IAG
10 1 (0.073%) PowerHA
10 1 (0.073%) Time Sharing Option
Systems Management
1 23 (1.67%) Kubernetes
2 21 (1.52%) Terraform
3 20 (1.45%) Ansible
4 13 (0.94%) Nagios
4 13 (0.94%) ZABBIX
5 12 (0.87%) Netcool
5 12 (0.87%) Tivoli
6 11 (0.80%) OpenView
6 11 (0.80%) Tivoli Monitoring
6 11 (0.80%) vRealize
7 10 (0.73%) vCenter Server
8 7 (0.51%) Grafana
9 6 (0.44%) FortiGate
9 6 (0.44%) NetBackup
9 6 (0.44%) VxRail
10 4 (0.29%) CEMLI
10 4 (0.29%) Prometheus
10 4 (0.29%) Single Sign-On
11 3 (0.22%) Oracle Identity Management
11 3 (0.22%) Oracle Identity Manager
Vendors
1 299 (21.70%) SAP
2 169 (12.26%) Microsoft
3 146 (10.60%) Oracle
4 55 (3.99%) ServiceNow
5 33 (2.39%) VMware
6 29 (2.10%) Splunk
7 24 (1.74%) Siemens
8 18 (1.31%) BMC
8 18 (1.31%) Salesforce
9 16 (1.16%) Databricks
9 16 (1.16%) IBM
10 15 (1.09%) Ariba
10 15 (1.09%) Workday
11 14 (1.02%) JD Edwards
12 13 (0.94%) SolarWinds
13 12 (0.87%) HP
14 11 (0.80%) Google
15 9 (0.65%) IFS
15 9 (0.65%) Informatica
15 9 (0.65%) Veeam