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 15 June 2026.

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

6 months to
15 Jun 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 36 37 31
Rank change year-on-year +1 -6 +17
Contract jobs requiring a Consultant 1,227 670 1,115
As % of all contract jobs in the UK excluding London 4.79% 5.01% 5.22%
As % of the Job Titles category 5.22% 5.47% 5.64%
Number of daily rates quoted 675 423 725
10th Percentile £404 £400 £400
25th Percentile £450 £463 £463
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £525 £537 £550
Median % change year-on-year -2.23% -2.36% +1.85%
75th Percentile £618 £600 £638
90th Percentile £725 £664 £725
UK median daily rate £545 £550 £550
% change year-on-year -0.91% - -
Number of hourly rates quoted 70 16 20
10th Percentile £52.35 £28.52 £24.84
25th Percentile £56.25 £42.30 £48.13
Median hourly rate £57.50 £73.75 £56.89
Median % change year-on-year -22.03% +29.65% -13.15%
75th Percentile £60.00 £86.00 £61.60
90th Percentile £63.38 £86.13 -
UK median hourly rate £57.50 £70.00 £61.60
% change year-on-year -17.86% +13.64% -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 23,528 12,242 19,761
% of contract IT jobs with a recognized job title 91.93% 91.54% 92.46%
Number of daily rates quoted 13,512 7,716 11,756
10th Percentile £303 £217 £213
25th Percentile £405 £363 £363
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £475 £488
Median % change year-on-year +5.26% -2.56% -2.50%
75th Percentile £594 £575 £592
90th Percentile £688 £650 £678
UK median daily rate £515 £500 £525
% change year-on-year +3.00% -4.76% -2.33%
Number of hourly rates quoted 2,711 928 2,529
10th Percentile £14.87 £13.50 £12.62
25th Percentile £20.27 £16.95 £15.96
Median hourly rate £45.00 £25.15 £40.00
Median % change year-on-year +78.93% -37.13% -1.45%
75th Percentile £67.50 £58.75 £63.75
90th Percentile £78.75 £75.00 £74.00
UK median hourly rate £43.61 £27.52 £37.50
% change year-on-year +58.48% -26.63% -16.67%

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 15 June 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 15 June 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 15 June 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 +2 339 £525 -4.55% 307
North of England -17 266 £550 +4.27% 355
Midlands -10 232 £525 -4.55% 134
South West +35 204 £550 - 181
West Midlands -2 156 £525 -4.55% 92
North West -10 137 £550 - 229
Yorkshire -7 107 £544 +14.47% 88
East of England -9 84 £550 +7.42% 65
Scotland +18 79 £425 -10.53% 56
East Midlands -11 67 £500 -9.09% 41
Wales -3 30 £550 +37.50% 20
North East -36 22 £650 +21.72% 39
Northern Ireland -3 3 £600 +15.38% 61
Consultant
UK

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

For the 6 months to 15 June 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.

1 258 (21.03%) SAP
1 258 (21.03%) Security Cleared
2 190 (15.48%) SC Cleared
3 152 (12.39%) Migration
4 151 (12.31%) ERP
5 145 (11.82%) Azure
6 139 (11.33%) Oracle
7 126 (10.27%) Microsoft
8 120 (9.78%) Stakeholder Engagement
9 118 (9.62%) Problem-Solving
10 111 (9.05%) SQL
11 103 (8.39%) Stakeholder Management
12 98 (7.99%) Continuous Improvement
12 98 (7.99%) SAP S/4HANA
13 90 (7.33%) Validation
14 87 (7.09%) Data Migration
15 82 (6.68%) Cybersecurity
16 76 (6.19%) Workshop Facilitation
17 73 (5.95%) User Acceptance Testing
18 67 (5.46%) Agile
19 64 (5.22%) AWS
19 64 (5.22%) Roadmaps
20 60 (4.89%) PLM
21 59 (4.81%) Analytics
22 57 (4.65%) Business Intelligence
22 57 (4.65%) Change Management
22 57 (4.65%) Data Protection
23 54 (4.40%) Siemens
24 51 (4.16%) CISSP
24 51 (4.16%) DV Cleared

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 23 (1.87%) Confluence
2 17 (1.39%) SharePoint
3 8 (0.65%) Oracle Workflow
4 6 (0.49%) Jupyter
4 6 (0.49%) WebSphere
5 5 (0.41%) WebLogic
6 3 (0.24%) Apache
6 3 (0.24%) Apache Spark
6 3 (0.24%) Apache Superset
6 3 (0.24%) Microsoft Exchange
7 1 (0.081%) ArcGIS
7 1 (0.081%) NetWeaver
7 1 (0.081%) SAS
7 1 (0.081%) Tomcat
Applications
1 43 (3.50%) Microsoft Excel
2 16 (1.30%) Microsoft Office
3 13 (1.06%) Microsoft PowerPoint
4 6 (0.49%) MS Visio
5 5 (0.41%) PTC Creo
6 3 (0.24%) Microsoft Project
7 2 (0.16%) Lectora
7 2 (0.16%) Oracle Smart View
7 2 (0.16%) Spreadsheet
8 1 (0.081%) CATIA
8 1 (0.081%) Siemens NX
Business Applications
1 98 (7.99%) SAP S/4HANA
2 30 (2.44%) SAP PSCD
3 25 (2.04%) Oracle EBS
4 24 (1.96%) Teamcenter
5 22 (1.79%) SAP MM
6 21 (1.71%) Oracle Payables
7 19 (1.55%) Oracle ERP
7 19 (1.55%) SAP FI
8 18 (1.47%) Oracle Receivables
9 15 (1.22%) SAP EWM
9 15 (1.22%) SAP SD
10 12 (0.98%) SAP CO
11 11 (0.90%) NetSuite
11 11 (0.90%) SAP BRIM
11 11 (0.90%) SAP FI/CO
11 11 (0.90%) SAP Hybris
11 11 (0.90%) SAP Payroll
12 10 (0.81%) SAP HCM
13 9 (0.73%) Oracle Cash Management
14 8 (0.65%) Workday HCM
Cloud Services
1 145 (11.82%) Azure
2 64 (5.22%) AWS
3 50 (4.07%) Power Platform
4 45 (3.67%) OCI
5 43 (3.50%) Dynamics 365
6 33 (2.69%) GCP
7 28 (2.28%) Microsoft 365
8 26 (2.12%) SuccessFactors
9 21 (1.71%) Entra ID
10 19 (1.55%) Power Automate
11 18 (1.47%) Microsoft Copilot
12 16 (1.30%) SaaS
13 12 (0.98%) PowerApps
13 12 (0.98%) SAP Commerce Cloud
14 11 (0.90%) Azure DevOps
14 11 (0.90%) GitHub
15 9 (0.73%) Cloud Computing
15 9 (0.73%) Copilot Studio
15 9 (0.73%) Oracle Service Cloud
16 6 (0.49%) Azure AI
Communications & Networking
1 24 (1.96%) Network Security
2 17 (1.39%) Firewall
3 16 (1.30%) SNMP
4 9 (0.73%) FTP
5 6 (0.49%) BGP
5 6 (0.49%) WAN
6 5 (0.41%) HTTP
7 4 (0.33%) LAN
7 4 (0.33%) SAN
7 4 (0.33%) VPN
8 3 (0.24%) DNS
8 3 (0.24%) Ethernet VPN
8 3 (0.24%) SMS
8 3 (0.24%) VXLAN
9 2 (0.16%) Connectrix
9 2 (0.16%) HTTPS
9 2 (0.16%) Intranet
9 2 (0.16%) TCP/IP
9 2 (0.16%) VSAN
9 2 (0.16%) Wi-Fi
Database & Business Intelligence
1 36 (2.93%) Oracle Reports
2 31 (2.53%) Power BI
3 17 (1.39%) Oracle BI Publisher
3 17 (1.39%) Oracle ODI
4 15 (1.22%) SAP HANA
5 9 (0.73%) Tableau
6 8 (0.65%) SQL Server
7 6 (0.49%) Metadata
7 6 (0.49%) NoSQL
7 6 (0.49%) Oracle Database
8 5 (0.41%) NonStop SQL
8 5 (0.41%) SAP Data Services
9 4 (0.33%) Power Query
9 4 (0.33%) Relational Database
9 4 (0.33%) SAP BW
10 3 (0.24%) Amazon Athena
10 3 (0.24%) BusinessObjects
10 3 (0.24%) Delta Lake
10 3 (0.24%) Hadoop
10 3 (0.24%) Snowflake Schema
Development Applications
1 38 (3.10%) JIRA
2 12 (0.98%) Hudson
3 8 (0.65%) Oracle Forms
4 6 (0.49%) Git
5 5 (0.41%) Jenkins
6 4 (0.33%) Toad
7 3 (0.24%) Visual Studio Code
8 2 (0.16%) JDeveloper
9 1 (0.081%) Appium
9 1 (0.081%) GitLab
9 1 (0.081%) JUnit
9 1 (0.081%) LoadRunner
9 1 (0.081%) MSTest
9 1 (0.081%) NUnit
9 1 (0.081%) Postman
General
1 250 (20.37%) Social Skills
2 242 (19.72%) Finance
3 96 (7.82%) Public Sector
4 95 (7.74%) Analytical Skills
5 43 (3.50%) Manufacturing
6 35 (2.85%) Legal
7 31 (2.53%) Banking
8 23 (1.87%) Billing
9 22 (1.79%) General Ledger
10 21 (1.71%) Telecoms
11 19 (1.55%) Presentation Skills
12 17 (1.39%) Documentation Skills
13 15 (1.22%) Aerospace
14 14 (1.14%) Organisational Skills
15 13 (1.06%) Retail
16 12 (0.98%) Local Government
16 12 (0.98%) Marketing
17 11 (0.90%) Influencing Skills
18 8 (0.65%) Advertising
18 8 (0.65%) Aviation
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 41 (3.34%) XML
2 39 (3.18%) REST
3 28 (2.28%) Oracle Fusion
4 12 (0.98%) Web Services
5 10 (0.81%) SAP Fiori
5 10 (0.81%) SOAP
6 8 (0.65%) Middleware
7 6 (0.49%) JSON
7 6 (0.49%) RESTful
7 6 (0.49%) SailPoint
8 5 (0.41%) BAPI
8 5 (0.41%) Microsoft Graph
8 5 (0.41%) SAP Basis
9 4 (0.33%) .NET
9 4 (0.33%) AngularJS
9 4 (0.33%) LDAP
10 3 (0.24%) OpenTelemetry
10 3 (0.24%) PyTorch
10 3 (0.24%) scikit-learn
10 3 (0.24%) XSLT
Miscellaneous
1 31 (2.53%) Data Protection Act
2 26 (2.12%) Onboarding
3 21 (1.71%) Security Posture
4 16 (1.30%) Operational Technology
5 14 (1.14%) AI Agents
6 13 (1.06%) Legacy Systems
6 13 (1.06%) Product Ownership
7 12 (0.98%) Public Cloud
7 12 (0.98%) Replication
8 9 (0.73%) Cloud Native
8 9 (0.73%) Management Information System
9 7 (0.57%) Enterprise Software
9 7 (0.57%) NHS
10 6 (0.49%) Beowulf
10 6 (0.49%) Data Centre
10 6 (0.49%) Data Structures
10 6 (0.49%) FMCG
10 6 (0.49%) Greenfield Project
10 6 (0.49%) Private Cloud
10 6 (0.49%) SCADA
Operating Systems
1 45 (3.67%) Windows
2 36 (2.93%) Linux
3 17 (1.39%) Solaris
4 13 (1.06%) AIX
5 11 (0.90%) VMS
6 4 (0.33%) Unix
7 3 (0.24%) Windows Server
8 2 (0.16%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
9 1 (0.081%) Android
9 1 (0.081%) CoreOS
9 1 (0.081%) Data ONTAP
9 1 (0.081%) Mac OS
9 1 (0.081%) zOS
Processes & Methodologies
1 152 (12.39%) Migration
2 151 (12.31%) ERP
3 120 (9.78%) Stakeholder Engagement
4 118 (9.62%) Problem-Solving
5 103 (8.39%) Stakeholder Management
6 98 (7.99%) Continuous Improvement
7 90 (7.33%) Validation
8 87 (7.09%) Data Migration
9 82 (6.68%) Cybersecurity
10 76 (6.19%) Workshop Facilitation
11 73 (5.95%) User Acceptance Testing
12 67 (5.46%) Agile
13 64 (5.22%) Roadmaps
14 60 (4.89%) PLM
15 59 (4.81%) Analytics
16 57 (4.65%) Business Intelligence
16 57 (4.65%) Change Management
16 57 (4.65%) Data Protection
17 50 (4.07%) AI
18 47 (3.83%) Knowledge Transfer
Programming Languages
1 111 (9.05%) SQL
2 49 (3.99%) Python
3 28 (2.28%) T-SQL
4 25 (2.04%) PL/SQL
5 23 (1.87%) PowerShell
6 13 (1.06%) JavaScript
6 13 (1.06%) Search Processing Language
7 11 (0.90%) ABAP
8 10 (0.81%) Kusto Query Language
9 9 (0.73%) Bash
9 9 (0.73%) Java
10 6 (0.49%) R
11 5 (0.41%) C#
12 3 (0.24%) Shell Script
13 2 (0.16%) C++
13 2 (0.16%) VBScript
14 1 (0.081%) C
14 1 (0.081%) COBOL
14 1 (0.081%) Perl
14 1 (0.081%) VB
Qualifications
1 258 (21.03%) Security Cleared
2 190 (15.48%) SC Cleared
3 51 (4.16%) CISSP
3 51 (4.16%) DV Cleared
4 38 (3.10%) CISM
5 37 (3.02%) BPSS Clearance
6 30 (2.44%) Degree
7 24 (1.96%) Cisco Certification
8 21 (1.71%) CCSP
9 20 (1.63%) (ISC)2 CCSP
10 10 (0.81%) ACCA
10 10 (0.81%) CEH
10 10 (0.81%) CIMA
10 10 (0.81%) PMP
11 9 (0.73%) OSCP
12 8 (0.65%) ITIL Foundation Certificate
13 7 (0.57%) Azure Certification
13 7 (0.57%) Computer Science Degree
13 7 (0.57%) SAP Certification
14 6 (0.49%) DBS Check
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 47 (3.83%) NIST
2 40 (3.26%) ISO/IEC 27001
3 31 (2.53%) GRC
4 29 (2.36%) Data Quality
5 19 (1.55%) GDPR
6 14 (1.14%) QA
7 13 (1.06%) PCI DSS
8 11 (0.90%) NCSC
9 10 (0.81%) Actionable Recommendations
10 8 (0.65%) SLA
11 7 (0.57%) Accessibility
11 7 (0.57%) COBIT
11 7 (0.57%) JSP 440
12 6 (0.49%) RMADS
12 6 (0.49%) Sarbanes-Oxley
13 4 (0.33%) PMO
13 4 (0.33%) WCAG
14 2 (0.16%) ISA99
14 2 (0.16%) ISO 22301
14 2 (0.16%) ISO/IEC 27005
System Software
1 25 (2.04%) Active Directory
2 16 (1.30%) VMware Infrastructure
3 10 (0.81%) Docker
3 10 (0.81%) VMware NSX
3 10 (0.81%) vSphere
4 9 (0.73%) VMware ESXi
5 6 (0.49%) Slurm Workload Manager
6 3 (0.24%) Virtual Desktop
6 3 (0.24%) Virtual Machines
7 2 (0.16%) NFS
8 1 (0.081%) Hyper-V
8 1 (0.081%) IAG
8 1 (0.081%) Time Sharing Option
Systems Management
1 28 (2.28%) Kubernetes
2 16 (1.30%) Terraform
3 13 (1.06%) Nagios
3 13 (1.06%) ZABBIX
4 12 (0.98%) Ansible
4 12 (0.98%) Netcool
4 12 (0.98%) Tivoli
5 11 (0.90%) OpenView
5 11 (0.90%) Tivoli Monitoring
6 8 (0.65%) vRealize
7 6 (0.49%) NetBackup
7 6 (0.49%) Podman
8 5 (0.41%) FortiGate
8 5 (0.41%) vCenter Server
9 4 (0.33%) Grafana
10 3 (0.24%) Oracle Identity Management
10 3 (0.24%) Oracle Identity Manager
10 3 (0.24%) Prometheus
10 3 (0.24%) Single Sign-On
10 3 (0.24%) vRealize Orchestrator
Vendors
1 258 (21.03%) SAP
2 139 (11.33%) Oracle
3 126 (10.27%) Microsoft
4 54 (4.40%) Siemens
5 30 (2.44%) ServiceNow
6 24 (1.96%) VMware
7 22 (1.79%) Splunk
8 20 (1.63%) BMC
9 18 (1.47%) Ariba
9 18 (1.47%) IBM
9 18 (1.47%) Workday
10 14 (1.14%) Sage
11 13 (1.06%) Databricks
11 13 (1.06%) Google
11 13 (1.06%) SolarWinds
12 12 (0.98%) HP
13 9 (0.73%) IFS
14 8 (0.65%) JD Edwards
15 7 (0.57%) Informatica
15 7 (0.57%) OpenText