Data Engineer Contract Job Trends in the UK excluding London

Data Engineer
UK > UK excluding London

The median Data Engineer daily rate in the UK excluding London is £470, according to job vacancies posted in the 6 months leading up to 13 August 2026.

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

6 months to
13 Aug 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 62 154 119
Rank change year-on-year +92 -35 +35
Contract jobs requiring a Data Engineer 926 242 318
As % of all contract jobs in the UK excluding London 3.39% 1.58% 1.74%
As % of the Job Titles category 3.68% 1.76% 1.89%
Number of daily rates quoted 570 162 230
10th Percentile £367 £350 £170
25th Percentile £413 £413 £253
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £470 £475 £450
Median % change year-on-year -1.05% +5.56% -14.29%
75th Percentile £538 £538 £550
90th Percentile £588 £630 £613
UK median daily rate £500 £500 £522
% change year-on-year - -4.21% -5.09%
Number of hourly rates quoted 77 5 25
10th Percentile £20.49 £17.96 £45.30
25th Percentile £30.96 £18.22 £72.50
Median hourly rate £45.00 £27.00 £80.00
Median % change year-on-year +66.67% -66.25% +63.27%
75th Percentile £70.00 £78.70 -
90th Percentile £74.25 £79.48 -
UK median hourly rate £50.00 £52.50 £75.00
% change year-on-year -4.76% -30.00% +15.38%

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 25,145 13,784 16,858
% of contract IT jobs with a recognized job title 91.97% 90.25% 92.05%
Number of daily rates quoted 14,180 8,460 10,277
10th Percentile £305 £215 £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 £682
UK median daily rate £525 £500 £525
% change year-on-year +5.00% -4.76% -1.87%
Number of hourly rates quoted 3,024 1,225 1,739
10th Percentile £14.57 £13.26 £14.05
25th Percentile £20.51 £16.35 £19.05
Median hourly rate £43.61 £25.11 £45.00
Median % change year-on-year +73.66% -44.20% +25.00%
75th Percentile £68.00 £53.99 £65.00
90th Percentile £80.00 £75.00 £75.00
UK median hourly rate £42.31 £25.15 £43.00
% change year-on-year +68.21% -41.51% +2.38%

Data Engineer
Job Vacancy Trend in the UK excluding London

Historical trend showing the proportion of contract IT job postings featuring 'Data Engineer' in the job title relative to all contract IT jobs advertised in the UK excluding London.

Data Engineer job vacancy trend in the UK excluding London

Data Engineer
Daily Rate Trend in the UK excluding London

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for Data Engineer job vacancies in the UK excluding London.

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for Data Engineer job vacancies in the UK excluding London

Data Engineer
Daily Rate Histogram in the UK excluding London

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing Data Engineer in the UK excluding London over the 6 months to 13 August 2026.

Daily rate histogram for Data Engineer in the UK excluding London

Data Engineer
Hourly Rate Trend in the UK excluding London

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for Data Engineer job vacancies in the UK excluding London.

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for Data Engineer job vacancies in the UK excluding London

Data Engineer
Hourly Rate Histogram in the UK excluding London

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing Data Engineer in the UK excluding London over the 6 months to 13 August 2026.

Hourly rate histogram for Data Engineer in the UK excluding London

Data Engineer
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 Data Engineer within the UK excluding London region over the 6 months to 13 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
Midlands +71 402 £465 +3.33% 71
West Midlands +68 346 £463 +0.54% 47
North of England +31 232 £500 +5.26% 135
North West +30 133 £525 +10.53% 66
South East +22 127 £463 +2.78% 142
South West +8 88 £525 +6.33% 43
Yorkshire -1 77 £465 -4.62% 32
Scotland +25 62 £425 -0.70% 28
East Midlands +23 56 £475 +13.10% 24
East of England +9 39 £520 +34.19% 23
North East -25 23 £515 +22.62% 39
Wales +2 17 £500 +12.36% 13
Northern Ireland +8 3 £410 -18.00% 8
Data Engineer
UK

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

For the 6 months to 13 August 2026, Data Engineer 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 Data Engineer in the job title.

1 422 (45.57%) SQL
2 346 (37.37%) Data Pipeline
3 307 (33.15%) ETL
4 305 (32.94%) Analytics
5 283 (30.56%) Security Cleared
6 277 (29.91%) Data Engineering
7 269 (29.05%) Data Modelling
8 268 (28.94%) Python
9 237 (25.59%) SC Cleared
10 219 (23.65%) Azure
11 212 (22.89%) AWS
12 196 (21.17%) Data Quality
13 181 (19.55%) Business Intelligence
14 174 (18.79%) CI/CD
15 167 (18.03%) Data Integration
16 148 (15.98%) Agile
17 144 (15.55%) Databricks
18 134 (14.47%) Migration
19 127 (13.71%) Problem-Solving
20 117 (12.63%) DevOps
21 116 (12.53%) Data Warehouse
22 114 (12.31%) Oracle
23 112 (12.10%) Power Platform
24 109 (11.77%) Power BI
25 104 (11.23%) Microsoft
26 103 (11.12%) Talend
27 98 (10.58%) Data Governance
27 98 (10.58%) Validation
28 94 (10.15%) Git
29 89 (9.61%) Pentaho

Data Engineer 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 68 (7.34%) SAS
2 48 (5.18%) Apache Spark
3 34 (3.67%) Apache
3 34 (3.67%) Apache Airflow
4 23 (2.48%) Confluence
5 6 (0.65%) Jupyter
6 3 (0.32%) Apache Superset
6 3 (0.32%) SharePoint
7 2 (0.22%) Palantir Foundry
Applications
1 12 (1.30%) Microsoft Excel
2 5 (0.54%) Notepad++
3 2 (0.22%) Spreadsheet
4 1 (0.11%) Microsoft PowerPoint
Business Applications
1 5 (0.54%) Dynamics CRM
1 5 (0.54%) Infor LN
2 4 (0.43%) NetSuite
2 4 (0.43%) Sage X3
3 3 (0.32%) SAP S/4HANA
4 1 (0.11%) Aladdin
4 1 (0.11%) FIS Private Capital Suite
4 1 (0.11%) MIS ActiveH
4 1 (0.11%) Oracle 11i
4 1 (0.11%) Oracle Assets
4 1 (0.11%) Oracle ERP
Cloud Services
1 219 (23.65%) Azure
2 212 (22.89%) AWS
3 112 (12.10%) Power Platform
4 84 (9.07%) Azure Data Factory
5 75 (8.10%) Snowflake
6 48 (5.18%) GCP
7 45 (4.86%) Azure Synapse Analytics
8 43 (4.64%) Amazon S3
9 39 (4.21%) dbt
10 35 (3.78%) Serverless
11 30 (3.24%) Azure DevOps
12 26 (2.81%) AWS Lambda
13 24 (2.59%) GitHub
14 15 (1.62%) Matillion
15 13 (1.40%) GitHub Actions
16 12 (1.30%) OpenShift
17 11 (1.19%) Amazon EMR
17 11 (1.19%) Power Automate
18 10 (1.08%) Amazon CloudWatch
18 10 (1.08%) AWS Step Functions
Communications & Networking
1 32 (3.46%) VPN
2 31 (3.35%) BGP
2 31 (3.35%) DMZ
2 31 (3.35%) DNS
2 31 (3.35%) Multicast
3 8 (0.86%) Structured Cabling
4 6 (0.65%) Firewall
5 5 (0.54%) PuTTY
5 5 (0.54%) WinSCP
6 4 (0.43%) Wi-Fi
6 4 (0.43%) Wireless
7 3 (0.32%) Intrusion Detection
Database & Business Intelligence
1 116 (12.53%) Data Warehouse
2 109 (11.77%) Power BI
3 89 (9.61%) Pentaho
4 50 (5.40%) Data Lake
5 43 (4.64%) Amazon Redshift
5 43 (4.64%) Metadata
6 39 (4.21%) SQL Server
7 29 (3.13%) Big Data
7 29 (3.13%) SQL Server Integration Services
8 27 (2.92%) Relational Database
9 25 (2.70%) Hadoop
10 23 (2.48%) MySQL
11 22 (2.38%) Amazon Athena
11 22 (2.38%) Delta Lake
12 20 (2.16%) Azure SQL Database
13 17 (1.84%) BigQuery
13 17 (1.84%) BusinessObjects
13 17 (1.84%) Data Vault
13 17 (1.84%) Tableau
14 16 (1.73%) NoSQL
Development Applications
1 94 (10.15%) Git
2 62 (6.70%) GitLab
3 46 (4.97%) JIRA
4 38 (4.10%) Jenkins
5 7 (0.76%) Postman
6 5 (0.54%) Artifactory
7 4 (0.43%) Bitbucket
8 3 (0.32%) Newman
9 2 (0.22%) Yeoman
10 1 (0.11%) ER Studio
10 1 (0.11%) ERwin
10 1 (0.11%) MLflow
10 1 (0.11%) SonarQube
10 1 (0.11%) Sonatype Nexus
10 1 (0.11%) Toad
General
1 145 (15.66%) Social Skills
2 103 (11.12%) Analytical Skills
3 95 (10.26%) Public Sector
4 63 (6.80%) Finance
5 42 (4.54%) Banking
6 21 (2.27%) Investment Banking
7 20 (2.16%) Marketing
8 19 (2.05%) Automotive
9 15 (1.62%) Telecoms
10 14 (1.51%) Aerospace
10 14 (1.51%) Documentation Skills
11 13 (1.40%) Manufacturing
12 12 (1.30%) Retail
13 10 (1.08%) Inclusion and Diversity
14 6 (0.65%) Law
15 5 (0.54%) Billing
15 5 (0.54%) Front Office
15 5 (0.54%) Military
15 5 (0.54%) Police
16 4 (0.43%) Local Government
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 86 (9.29%) PySpark
2 54 (5.83%) Kafka
3 16 (1.73%) JSON
4 13 (1.40%) Pandas
5 10 (1.08%) XML
6 8 (0.86%) REST
7 7 (0.76%) RESTful
8 6 (0.65%) Apache NiFi
8 6 (0.65%) Streamlit
9 5 (0.54%) Great Expectations
10 4 (0.43%) Apache Avro
10 4 (0.43%) AWS CDK
10 4 (0.43%) Node.js
10 4 (0.43%) pytest
10 4 (0.43%) Spring
10 4 (0.43%) Spring Boot
11 3 (0.32%) .NET
11 3 (0.32%) AngularJS
11 3 (0.32%) Apache Beam
11 3 (0.32%) XML Schema
Miscellaneous
1 33 (3.56%) Cloud Native
1 33 (3.56%) Legacy Systems
2 28 (3.02%) Data Structures
3 11 (1.19%) Management Information System
3 11 (1.19%) Reference Data
4 9 (0.97%) Distributed Systems
4 9 (0.97%) NHS
5 8 (0.86%) Data Protection Act
5 8 (0.86%) Driving Licence
5 8 (0.86%) Onboarding
6 7 (0.76%) Greenfield Project
7 6 (0.65%) Linux Command Line
7 6 (0.65%) Product Ownership
8 4 (0.43%) Data Centre
8 4 (0.43%) Data Fabric
8 4 (0.43%) Fibre Optics
8 4 (0.43%) iPad
9 3 (0.32%) Enterprise Software
9 3 (0.32%) Life Science
9 3 (0.32%) SCADA
Operating Systems
1 41 (4.43%) Unix
2 14 (1.51%) Linux
3 2 (0.22%) Ubuntu
4 1 (0.11%) VMS
4 1 (0.11%) Windows
Processes & Methodologies
1 346 (37.37%) Data Pipeline
2 307 (33.15%) ETL
3 305 (32.94%) Analytics
4 277 (29.91%) Data Engineering
5 269 (29.05%) Data Modelling
6 181 (19.55%) Business Intelligence
7 174 (18.79%) CI/CD
8 167 (18.03%) Data Integration
9 148 (15.98%) Agile
10 134 (14.47%) Migration
11 127 (13.71%) Problem-Solving
12 117 (12.63%) DevOps
13 98 (10.58%) Data Governance
13 98 (10.58%) Validation
14 88 (9.50%) AI
15 82 (8.86%) Decision-Making
15 82 (8.86%) Test Automation
16 74 (7.99%) Data Transformation
17 70 (7.56%) Data Migration
18 69 (7.45%) Scrum
Programming Languages
1 422 (45.57%) SQL
2 268 (28.94%) Python
3 35 (3.78%) PL/SQL
4 30 (3.24%) Java
5 21 (2.27%) Bash
6 16 (1.73%) Shell Script
7 13 (1.40%) T-SQL
8 11 (1.19%) Data Analysis Expressions
9 9 (0.97%) Scala
10 6 (0.65%) PowerShell
11 2 (0.22%) HiveQL
11 2 (0.22%) JavaScript
12 1 (0.11%) Bicep
12 1 (0.11%) C++
12 1 (0.11%) COBOL
12 1 (0.11%) Go
12 1 (0.11%) Perl
12 1 (0.11%) R
Qualifications
1 283 (30.56%) Security Cleared
2 237 (25.59%) SC Cleared
3 19 (2.05%) Degree
4 18 (1.94%) BPSS Clearance
5 16 (1.73%) DV Cleared
6 9 (0.97%) Computer Science Degree
7 8 (0.86%) City & Guilds
8 4 (0.43%) BICSI Certification
8 4 (0.43%) CISM
8 4 (0.43%) CISSP
8 4 (0.43%) SnowPro
9 3 (0.32%) Azure Certification
9 3 (0.32%) CEH
9 3 (0.32%) Master's Degree
10 2 (0.22%) AWS Certification
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 196 (21.17%) Data Quality
2 22 (2.38%) QA
3 14 (1.51%) GDPR
4 10 (1.08%) SLA
5 5 (0.54%) Accessibility
5 5 (0.54%) FATCA
6 4 (0.43%) HIPAA
6 4 (0.43%) ISO/IEC 27001
7 2 (0.22%) California Consumer Privacy Act
7 2 (0.22%) Disclosure Scotland
7 2 (0.22%) Sarbanes-Oxley
8 1 (0.11%) Government Security Classifications
8 1 (0.11%) NIST
8 1 (0.11%) SNOMED CT
8 1 (0.11%) WCAG
System Software
1 47 (5.08%) Docker
2 2 (0.22%) HDFS
3 1 (0.11%) Virtual Machines
Systems Management
1 49 (5.29%) Terraform
2 45 (4.86%) Kubernetes
3 34 (3.67%) Grafana
4 10 (1.08%) Ansible
5 3 (0.32%) Prometheus
6 2 (0.22%) Apache Ranger
6 2 (0.22%) Control-M
6 2 (0.22%) Rancher
7 1 (0.11%) Kibana
7 1 (0.11%) logstash
Vendors
1 144 (15.55%) Databricks
2 114 (12.31%) Oracle
3 104 (11.23%) Microsoft
4 103 (11.12%) Talend
5 72 (7.78%) Informatica
6 53 (5.72%) Denodo
7 32 (3.46%) Cisco
7 32 (3.46%) F5
8 20 (2.16%) SAP
9 17 (1.84%) Salesforce
10 14 (1.51%) Cloudera
10 14 (1.51%) Google
11 13 (1.40%) ServiceNow
12 9 (0.97%) Sage
13 7 (0.76%) Splunk
14 6 (0.65%) Dynatrace
14 6 (0.65%) Infor
14 6 (0.65%) InterSystems
14 6 (0.65%) SYSPRO
15 4 (0.43%) Palantir