Degree Contract Job Trends in the UK excluding London

Academic Degree
UK > UK excluding London

The table below provides summary statistics for contract job vacancies advertised in the UK excluding London with a requirement for Degree qualifications. It includes a benchmarking guide to the contractor rates offered over the 6 months leading up to 26 September 2025, comparing them to the same period in the previous two years.

6 months to
26 Sep 2025
Same period 2024 Same period 2023
Rank 22 20 19
Rank change year-on-year -2 -1 +9
Contract jobs citing Degree 1,134 1,365 1,725
As % of all contract jobs advertised in the UK excluding London 7.27% 7.69% 8.02%
As % of the Qualifications category 20.67% 22.54% 23.39%
Number of daily rates quoted 600 730 998
10th Percentile £203 £160 £207
25th Percentile £325 £351 £380
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £450 £475 £500
Median % change year-on-year -5.26% -5.00% +5.26%
75th Percentile £575 £588 £600
90th Percentile £650 £638 £688
UK median daily rate £500 £500 £525
% change year-on-year - -4.76% -2.78%
Number of hourly rates quoted 142 149 174
10th Percentile £15.50 £20.12 £15.90
25th Percentile £22.78 £33.93 £26.24
Median hourly rate £33.50 £57.35 £50.00
Median % change year-on-year -41.59% +14.70% +11.11%
75th Percentile £59.56 £72.50 £68.70
90th Percentile £81.00 £81.00 £80.00
UK median hourly rate £36.48 £52.50 £48.28
% change year-on-year -30.51% +8.74% +7.29%

All Academic and Professional Certifications
UK excluding London

Degree falls under the Academic Qualifications and Professional Certifications category. For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all contract job vacancies requiring academic qualifications or professional certifications in the UK excluding London.

Contract vacancies requiring academic qualifications or professional certifications 5,487 6,056 7,375
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the UK excluding London 35.18% 34.13% 34.28%
Number of daily rates quoted 3,323 3,536 4,561
10th Percentile £213 £275 £281
25th Percentile £387 £410 £415
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £525 £533
Median % change year-on-year -4.76% -1.41% +3.40%
75th Percentile £600 £625 £638
90th Percentile £688 £700 £700
UK median daily rate £525 £525 £550
% change year-on-year - -4.55% -
Number of hourly rates quoted 714 538 596
10th Percentile £17.74 £17.00 £15.72
25th Percentile £18.87 £25.41 £23.32
Median hourly rate £25.15 £51.72 £52.50
Median % change year-on-year -51.37% -1.49% +17.55%
75th Percentile £39.88 £69.73 £70.00
90th Percentile £71.00 £78.00 £78.36
UK median hourly rate £25.15 £49.00 £54.00
% change year-on-year -48.67% -9.26% +20.00%

Degree
Job Vacancy Trend in the UK excluding London

Job postings citing Degree as a proportion of all IT jobs advertised in the UK excluding London.

Job vacancy trend for Degree in the UK excluding London

Degree
Daily Rate Trend in the UK excluding London

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in the UK excluding London citing Degree.

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in the UK excluding London citing Degree

Degree
Daily Rate Histogram in the UK excluding London

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing Degree in the UK excluding London over the 6 months to 26 September 2025.

Daily rate histogram for Degree in the UK excluding London

Degree
Hourly Rate Trend in the UK excluding London

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in the UK excluding London citing Degree.

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in the UK excluding London citing Degree

Degree
Hourly Rate Histogram in the UK excluding London

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing Degree in the UK excluding London over the 6 months to 26 September 2025.

Hourly rate histogram for Degree in the UK excluding London

Degree
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 Degree within the UK excluding London region over the 6 months to 26 September 2025. 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
North of England -13 235 £447 -14.86% 1,010
South East -1 219 £450 -1.91% 1,954
Midlands -1 216 £464 -1.85% 601
West Midlands -5 155 £475 -5.00% 357
North West -3 152 £458 -14.96% 559
Scotland +3 147 £450 - 295
South West -6 126 £500 -4.31% 410
East of England 0 119 £488 +21.88% 502
Yorkshire -24 73 £420 -16.00% 306
East Midlands +2 61 £447 +11.75% 238
Wales 0 41 £305 -23.63% 123
Northern Ireland -2 37 £588 +23.68% 69
North East -14 10 £450 +5.88% 154
Degree
UK

Degree
Co-occurring Skills and Capabilities in the UK excluding London by Category

The follow tables expand on the table above by listing co-occurrences grouped by category. The same employment type, locality and period is covered with up to 20 co-occurrences shown in each of the following categories:

Application Platforms
1 68 (6.00%) Confluence
2 58 (5.11%) SharePoint
3 55 (4.85%) Microsoft Exchange
4 15 (1.32%) nginx
5 12 (1.06%) Apache Airflow
5 12 (1.06%) Apache Spark
5 12 (1.06%) Skype for Business
6 7 (0.62%) Apache
6 7 (0.62%) CMS
6 7 (0.62%) Exchange Server 2013
7 6 (0.53%) OpenStack
8 5 (0.44%) SAS
9 3 (0.26%) IIS
9 3 (0.26%) JBoss
10 2 (0.18%) Anypoint
10 2 (0.18%) Camunda
10 2 (0.18%) HCL Notes
10 2 (0.18%) Mule
10 2 (0.18%) Mule ESB
10 2 (0.18%) Tomcat
Applications
1 148 (13.05%) Microsoft Office
2 96 (8.47%) Microsoft Excel
3 64 (5.64%) Microsoft Project
4 54 (4.76%) Microsoft PowerPoint
5 42 (3.70%) MS Visio
6 18 (1.59%) Simulink
7 11 (0.97%) FrameMaker
8 10 (0.88%) Mozilla Thunderbird
9 8 (0.71%) Chatbot
10 6 (0.53%) Adobe Captivate
10 6 (0.53%) Maya
10 6 (0.53%) Trello
11 5 (0.44%) Spreadsheet
12 3 (0.26%) Stateflow
12 3 (0.26%) UserZoom
12 3 (0.26%) Windchill
13 2 (0.18%) Adobe Creative Suite
13 2 (0.18%) InDesign
13 2 (0.18%) Photoshop
13 2 (0.18%) Sketch
Business Applications
1 15 (1.32%) SAP S/4HANA
2 12 (1.06%) Primavera
3 10 (0.88%) Dynamics CRM
4 8 (0.71%) Teamcenter
5 7 (0.62%) SAP WM
6 6 (0.53%) SAP EWM
7 5 (0.44%) Dynamics GP
7 5 (0.44%) SAP ERP
8 4 (0.35%) SAP HR
8 4 (0.35%) SAP PM
9 3 (0.26%) Maximo
9 3 (0.26%) SAP CO
9 3 (0.26%) SAP FI
9 3 (0.26%) SAP FI/CO
10 2 (0.18%) Dynamics NAV
10 2 (0.18%) Payment Gateway
10 2 (0.18%) SAP GRC
10 2 (0.18%) Sprinklr
10 2 (0.18%) Workday HCM
11 1 (0.088%) SAP MDG
Cloud Services
1 156 (13.76%) Azure
2 141 (12.43%) AWS
3 103 (9.08%) Microsoft 365
4 66 (5.82%) GCP
5 64 (5.64%) Power Platform
6 36 (3.17%) Serverless
7 34 (3.00%) SaaS
8 28 (2.47%) Amazon S3
9 26 (2.29%) GitHub
10 25 (2.20%) Entra ID
11 24 (2.12%) Azure Sentinel
12 22 (1.94%) Cloud Computing
13 18 (1.59%) Amazon EC2
13 18 (1.59%) OneDrive
14 17 (1.50%) Amazon ECS
15 16 (1.41%) AWS Lambda
16 15 (1.32%) OpenShift
17 14 (1.23%) Dynamics 365
17 14 (1.23%) Virtual Private Cloud
18 13 (1.15%) Lucidchart
Communications & Networking
1 69 (6.08%) Firewall
2 68 (6.00%) DNS
3 55 (4.85%) VPN
4 32 (2.82%) DHCP
4 32 (2.82%) Network Security
5 27 (2.38%) Wireless
6 22 (1.94%) Unified Communications
7 20 (1.76%) LAN
8 19 (1.68%) WAN
9 18 (1.59%) SSH
9 18 (1.59%) TCP/IP
10 17 (1.50%) BGP
10 17 (1.50%) MPLS
10 17 (1.50%) VoIP
11 16 (1.41%) SMTP
12 15 (1.32%) Ethernet
12 15 (1.32%) Internet
12 15 (1.32%) Skype
12 15 (1.32%) Wi-Fi
13 13 (1.15%) HTTP
Database & Business Intelligence
1 53 (4.67%) Power BI
2 37 (3.26%) PostgreSQL
3 35 (3.09%) NoSQL
4 30 (2.65%) SQL Server
5 28 (2.47%) Amazon RDS
5 28 (2.47%) Tableau
6 27 (2.38%) Relational Database
7 26 (2.29%) Data Warehouse
8 24 (2.12%) Big Data
9 13 (1.15%) Oracle Database
10 12 (1.06%) Amazon Aurora
10 12 (1.06%) Elasticsearch
11 11 (0.97%) Hadoop
12 9 (0.79%) Metadata
13 7 (0.62%) Amazon Redshift
13 7 (0.62%) Data Lake
13 7 (0.62%) Oracle Reports
13 7 (0.62%) RDBMS
13 7 (0.62%) Redis
14 6 (0.53%) MySQL
Development Applications
1 123 (10.85%) JIRA
2 56 (4.94%) Jenkins
3 49 (4.32%) Git
4 44 (3.88%) GitLab
5 20 (1.76%) Liquibase
6 12 (1.06%) Postman
7 10 (0.88%) Vagrant
8 9 (0.79%) Artifactory
8 9 (0.79%) Selenium
9 8 (0.71%) Rational DOORS
10 7 (0.62%) Subversion
11 6 (0.53%) JUnit
12 5 (0.44%) TeamCity
12 5 (0.44%) webpack
13 4 (0.35%) Bitbucket
13 4 (0.35%) IntelliJ
13 4 (0.35%) SpecFlow
14 3 (0.26%) SonarQube
14 3 (0.26%) Visual Studio
15 2 (0.18%) Zephyr
General
1 630 (55.56%) Social Skills
2 288 (25.40%) Analytical Skills
3 217 (19.14%) Finance
4 108 (9.52%) Public Sector
5 79 (6.97%) Banking
6 72 (6.35%) Manufacturing
7 61 (5.38%) Organisational Skills
8 45 (3.97%) Presentation Skills
9 43 (3.79%) Aerospace
10 38 (3.35%) Automotive
11 35 (3.09%) Legal
12 32 (2.82%) Influencing Skills
13 30 (2.65%) Telecoms
14 25 (2.20%) Electronics
15 23 (2.03%) Marketing
15 23 (2.03%) Military
16 22 (1.94%) Financial Institution
17 21 (1.85%) Pharmaceutical
18 19 (1.68%) Documentation Skills
19 17 (1.50%) Publishing
Job Titles
1 182 (16.05%) Analyst
2 81 (7.14%) Senior
3 78 (6.88%) Lead
4 72 (6.35%) Architect
5 69 (6.08%) Developer
6 57 (5.03%) Support Engineer
7 49 (4.32%) Business Analyst
8 47 (4.14%) Project Manager
9 43 (3.79%) Support Analyst
10 42 (3.70%) IT Support
11 32 (2.82%) Consultant
12 30 (2.65%) Desktop Support
13 29 (2.56%) IT Analyst
14 27 (2.38%) Security Engineer
14 27 (2.38%) Software Engineer
14 27 (2.38%) Technical Support
15 26 (2.29%) Network Engineer
16 25 (2.20%) DevOps Engineer
17 24 (2.12%) Desktop Engineer
17 24 (2.12%) Solutions Architect
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 60 (5.29%) REST
2 39 (3.44%) HTML
3 36 (3.17%) RESTful
4 28 (2.47%) CSS
4 28 (2.47%) XML
5 24 (2.12%) Middleware
5 24 (2.12%) SOAP
6 23 (2.03%) Elastic Stack
7 22 (1.94%) Web Services
8 21 (1.85%) Kafka
9 19 (1.68%) JSON
10 18 (1.59%) Spring
11 15 (1.32%) .NET
11 15 (1.32%) TensorFlow
12 13 (1.15%) LDAP
12 13 (1.15%) PyTorch
13 12 (1.06%) React
14 11 (0.97%) AngularJS
14 11 (0.97%) Visualforce
15 10 (0.88%) OAuth
Miscellaneous
1 113 (9.96%) Management Information System
2 47 (4.14%) Cloud Native
2 47 (4.14%) Data Protection Act
3 30 (2.65%) Algorithms
3 30 (2.65%) Product Ownership
4 29 (2.56%) Distributed Systems
4 29 (2.56%) Driving Licence
5 28 (2.47%) Public Cloud
5 28 (2.47%) Virtual Team
6 27 (2.38%) Data Centre
7 26 (2.29%) Analytical Mindset
8 23 (2.03%) Onboarding
8 23 (2.03%) Self-Motivation
9 22 (1.94%) PKI
10 21 (1.85%) NHS
11 17 (1.50%) Security Posture
12 16 (1.41%) SCADA
13 14 (1.23%) Enterprise Software
13 14 (1.23%) FPGA
13 14 (1.23%) Legacy Systems
Operating Systems
1 160 (14.11%) Windows
2 92 (8.11%) Linux
3 39 (3.44%) Windows Server
4 30 (2.65%) Unix
5 15 (1.32%) VMS
6 14 (1.23%) Ubuntu
7 12 (1.06%) Mac OS
8 11 (0.97%) Windows 10
9 10 (0.88%) Amazon Linux
10 9 (0.79%) Android
10 9 (0.79%) Apple iOS
11 4 (0.35%) CentOS
11 4 (0.35%) Solaris
12 1 (0.088%) AIX
12 1 (0.088%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
12 1 (0.088%) Windows Server 2016
12 1 (0.088%) Windows Server 2019
Processes & Methodologies
1 417 (36.77%) Computer Science
2 365 (32.19%) Problem-Solving
3 268 (23.63%) Agile
4 173 (15.26%) Project Management
5 162 (14.29%) ITIL
6 148 (13.05%) Stakeholder Management
7 140 (12.35%) Change Management
8 132 (11.64%) DevOps
9 118 (10.41%) Cybersecurity
10 104 (9.17%) CI/CD
11 98 (8.64%) Migration
12 95 (8.38%) Continuous Improvement
13 89 (7.85%) Analytics
14 87 (7.67%) Decision-Making
15 85 (7.50%) Mentoring
16 76 (6.70%) Data Protection
16 76 (6.70%) Software Engineering
17 75 (6.61%) Service Management
18 72 (6.35%) ITSM
19 68 (6.00%) Customer Service
Programming Languages
1 169 (14.90%) Python
2 118 (10.41%) SQL
3 70 (6.17%) Java
4 56 (4.94%) PowerShell
5 35 (3.09%) JavaScript
6 30 (2.65%) Go
7 20 (1.76%) C#
8 18 (1.59%) MATLAB
9 17 (1.50%) Bash
10 16 (1.41%) Shell Script
11 13 (1.15%) C++
11 13 (1.15%) R
12 11 (0.97%) Apex Code
12 11 (0.97%) Kusto Query Language
12 11 (0.97%) SystemVerilog
13 10 (0.88%) Groovy
13 10 (0.88%) Perl
14 9 (0.79%) C
14 9 (0.79%) TypeScript
15 8 (0.71%) Tcl
Qualifications
1 302 (26.63%) Computer Science Degree
2 191 (16.84%) Security Cleared
3 153 (13.49%) SC Cleared
4 148 (13.05%) Master's Degree
5 49 (4.32%) PMI Certification
6 48 (4.23%) AWS Certification
6 48 (4.23%) Cisco Certification
6 48 (4.23%) PMP
7 45 (3.97%) Microsoft Certification
8 44 (3.88%) CISSP
9 39 (3.44%) Azure Certification
10 37 (3.26%) DV Cleared
11 35 (3.09%) HND
12 34 (3.00%) CCNP
13 32 (2.82%) HNC
14 29 (2.56%) AWS Certified Solutions Architect
15 26 (2.29%) BPSS Clearance
15 26 (2.29%) CCNA
16 21 (1.85%) CISM
16 21 (1.85%) ITIL Foundation Certificate
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 60 (5.29%) ISO/IEC 27001
2 50 (4.41%) QA
3 49 (4.32%) Data Quality
3 49 (4.32%) GDPR
4 39 (3.44%) NIST
5 28 (2.47%) PMO
6 17 (1.50%) GRC
6 17 (1.50%) Sarbanes-Oxley
7 15 (1.32%) NCSC
7 15 (1.32%) SLA
8 14 (1.23%) Accessibility
9 13 (1.15%) HIPAA
9 13 (1.15%) PCI DSS
10 12 (1.06%) JSP 440
10 12 (1.06%) NIST 800
11 11 (0.97%) Def Stans
12 10 (0.88%) Disclosure Scotland
12 10 (0.88%) DO-254
13 8 (0.71%) P3O
14 6 (0.53%) ISO/IEC 27002 (supersedes ISO/IEC 17799)
System Software
1 95 (8.38%) Active Directory
2 63 (5.56%) Docker
3 31 (2.73%) VMware Infrastructure
4 26 (2.29%) Firmware
5 17 (1.50%) Hyper-V
6 14 (1.23%) VMware ESXi
7 12 (1.06%) Virtual Machines
8 10 (0.88%) DFS Replication
8 10 (0.88%) Dovecot
8 10 (0.88%) Postfix
8 10 (0.88%) Squid
9 8 (0.71%) BitLocker
9 8 (0.71%) XenApp
10 6 (0.53%) Virtual Servers
10 6 (0.53%) vSphere
11 5 (0.44%) Microsoft App-V
11 5 (0.44%) Microsoft Virtual Server
11 5 (0.44%) Terminal Services
11 5 (0.44%) VMware NSX
12 1 (0.088%) Virtual Desktop
Systems Management
1 62 (5.47%) Ansible
2 58 (5.11%) Kubernetes
3 50 (4.41%) Terraform
4 37 (3.26%) Microsoft Intune
5 35 (3.09%) Grafana
6 34 (3.00%) Prometheus
7 28 (2.47%) SCCM
8 13 (1.15%) Puppet
9 11 (0.97%) Nessus
9 11 (0.97%) vCenter Server
10 10 (0.88%) Proxmox
11 7 (0.62%) AirWatch
11 7 (0.62%) WSUS
12 5 (0.44%) Active Directory Federation Services
12 5 (0.44%) Kibana
12 5 (0.44%) Nagios
12 5 (0.44%) Single Sign-On
12 5 (0.44%) vMotion
12 5 (0.44%) vRealize
13 4 (0.35%) Kustomize
Vendors
1 284 (25.04%) Microsoft
2 76 (6.70%) ServiceNow
3 60 (5.29%) Cisco
4 58 (5.11%) Oracle
5 56 (4.94%) SAP
6 43 (3.79%) Google
7 41 (3.62%) Splunk
8 40 (3.53%) VMware
9 34 (3.00%) Citrix
10 29 (2.56%) Salesforce
11 19 (1.68%) IBM
12 18 (1.59%) Atlassian
13 14 (1.23%) Palo Alto
14 13 (1.15%) Adobe
14 13 (1.15%) Apple
14 13 (1.15%) ArcSight
15 11 (0.97%) Avaya
15 11 (0.97%) F5
16 10 (0.88%) Altera
16 10 (0.88%) SolarWinds