Designer Contracts in the UK excluding London

Designer
UK > UK excluding London

The median Designer daily rate in the UK excluding London is £430, according to job vacancies posted in the 6 months leading up to 31 May 2025.

The table below provides contractor rate benchmarking and summary statistics, comparing them to the same period in the previous two years.

6 months to
31 May 2025
Same period 2024 Same period 2023
Rank 191 154 170
Rank change year-on-year -37 +16 -47
Contract jobs requiring a Designer 158 284 329
As % of all contract jobs advertised in the UK excluding London 1.21% 1.37% 1.44%
As % of the Job Titles category 1.32% 1.48% 1.53%
Number of daily rates quoted 119 128 227
10th Percentile £305 £277 £323
25th Percentile £360 £383 £406
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £430 £450 £475
Median % change year-on-year -4.44% -5.26% -5.00%
75th Percentile £530 £575 £555
90th Percentile £595 £625 £686
UK median daily rate £463 £475 £525
% change year-on-year -2.63% -9.52% -
Number of hourly rates quoted 7 43 8
10th Percentile £30.24 £45.00 £40.53
25th Percentile £36.45 £53.40 £55.94
Median hourly rate £49.00 £57.35 £63.75
Median % change year-on-year -14.56% -10.04% +50.89%
75th Percentile £57.00 £61.30 £67.75
90th Percentile £63.86 - £83.94
UK median hourly rate £45.00 £57.35 £47.50
% change year-on-year -21.53% +20.74% +9.20%

All Contract IT Job Vacancies
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 11,956 19,149 21,481
% of contract IT jobs with a recognized job title 91.73% 92.41% 94.28%
Number of daily rates quoted 7,594 11,598 14,941
10th Percentile £213 £213 £225
25th Percentile £363 £363 £393
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £475 £488 £500
Median % change year-on-year -2.56% -2.50% +5.26%
75th Percentile £575 £594 £600
90th Percentile £650 £688 £688
UK median daily rate £505 £525 £540
% change year-on-year -3.81% -2.78% +2.86%
Number of hourly rates quoted 855 2,392 1,083
10th Percentile £13.78 £12.50 £13.41
25th Percentile £16.95 £15.75 £17.95
Median hourly rate £26.28 £40.00 £43.00
Median % change year-on-year -34.30% -6.98% +115.00%
75th Percentile £62.24 £62.50 £65.00
90th Percentile £75.00 £74.00 £75.40
UK median hourly rate £28.17 £37.50 £45.00
% change year-on-year -24.89% -16.67% +87.50%

Designer
Job Vacancy Trend in the UK excluding London

Job postings that featured Designer in the job title as a proportion of all IT jobs advertised in the UK excluding London.

Job vacancy trend for Designer in the UK excluding London

Designer
Contractor Daily Rate Trend in the UK excluding London

3-month moving average daily rate quoted in jobs citing Designer in the UK excluding London.

Daily rate trend for Designer in the UK excluding London

Designer
Daily Rate Histogram in the UK excluding London

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing Designer in the UK excluding London over the 6 months to 31 May 2025.

Daily rate histogram for Designer in the UK excluding London

Designer
Contractor Hourly Rate Trend in the UK excluding London

3-month moving average hourly rates quoted in jobs citing Designer in the UK excluding London.

Hourly rate trend for Designer in the UK excluding London

Designer
Hourly Rate Histogram in the UK excluding London

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing Designer in the UK excluding London over the 6 months to 31 May 2025.

Hourly rate histogram for Designer in the UK excluding London

Designer
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 Designer within the UK excluding London region over the 6 months to 31 May 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 -3 53 £404 -5.06% 76
Scotland -16 38 £475 +5.56% 11
North West +16 26 £447 +19.20% 44
South East -38 24 £453 -14.06% 66
Midlands +10 17 £410 +2.50% 41
Yorkshire -8 15 £400 -6.65% 23
South West +46 14 £442 +4.00% 27
West Midlands +17 14 £436 -3.06% 26
North East -4 12 £475 -11.63% 9
Wales - 10 £306 - 5
East of England +24 4 £475 -26.92% 25
East Midlands +2 3 £322 -19.50% 14
Designer
UK

Designer Skill Set
Top 30 Co-occurring Skills and Capabilities in the UK excluding London

For the 6 months to 31 May 2025, Designer contract job roles required the following skills and capabilities in order of popularity. The figures indicate the absolute number co-occurrences and as a proportion of all contract job ads across the UK excluding London region featuring Designer in the job title.

1 63 (39.87%) User Experience
2 49 (31.01%) Agile
3 43 (27.22%) UX Design
4 35 (22.15%) Service Design
5 34 (21.52%) Figma
5 34 (21.52%) Social Skills
5 34 (21.52%) User Research
6 31 (19.62%) Finance
6 31 (19.62%) Public Sector
7 27 (17.09%) Prototyping
8 25 (15.82%) User-Centered Design (UCD)
9 23 (14.56%) Wireframes
10 22 (13.92%) Problem-Solving
11 18 (11.39%) Adobe
12 17 (10.76%) Azure
12 17 (10.76%) Interaction Design
13 16 (10.13%) Accessibility
14 15 (9.49%) Degree
15 14 (8.86%) Stakeholder Management
15 14 (8.86%) Business Strategy
16 12 (7.59%) Decision-Making
16 12 (7.59%) ITSM
16 12 (7.59%) Usability Testing
17 11 (6.96%) SC Cleared
17 11 (6.96%) Security Cleared
17 11 (6.96%) Analytical Skills
17 11 (6.96%) Continuous Improvement
17 11 (6.96%) Enterprise Architecture
17 11 (6.96%) Design Thinking
18 10 (6.33%) Master's Degree

Designer Skill Set
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 2 (1.27%) CICS
1 2 (1.27%) Confluence
1 2 (1.27%) Microsoft Exchange
1 2 (1.27%) SharePoint
2 1 (0.63%) CMS
2 1 (0.63%) Drupal
2 1 (0.63%) Joomla!
2 1 (0.63%) Umbraco
2 1 (0.63%) WordPress
Applications
1 8 (5.06%) Sketch
2 7 (4.43%) Adobe XD
3 5 (3.16%) Adobe Creative Suite
3 5 (3.16%) Chatbot
4 4 (2.53%) Adobe Illustrator
5 3 (1.90%) AutoCAD
5 3 (1.90%) SketchUp
6 2 (1.27%) InDesign
6 2 (1.27%) MS Visio
6 2 (1.27%) Photoshop
7 1 (0.63%) Adobe After Effects
7 1 (0.63%) Adobe Premiere
7 1 (0.63%) CINEMA 4D
7 1 (0.63%) Final Cut Pro
7 1 (0.63%) OmniGraffle
7 1 (0.63%) Siemens NX
7 1 (0.63%) UXPin
7 1 (0.63%) Zeplin
Business Applications
1 1 (0.63%) Teamcenter
Cloud Services
1 34 (21.52%) Figma
2 17 (10.76%) Azure
3 9 (5.70%) AWS
4 7 (4.43%) GCP
4 7 (4.43%) SaaS
5 2 (1.27%) Cloud Computing
5 2 (1.27%) Dynamics 365
5 2 (1.27%) GitHub
5 2 (1.27%) Google Analytics
5 2 (1.27%) Lucidchart
6 1 (0.63%) Adobe Creative Cloud
6 1 (0.63%) Nutanix
6 1 (0.63%) PaaS
6 1 (0.63%) Power Platform
Communications & Networking
1 7 (4.43%) VLAN
2 5 (3.16%) DHCP
2 5 (3.16%) DNS
3 4 (2.53%) BGP
3 4 (2.53%) Firewall
3 4 (2.53%) MPLS
3 4 (2.53%) Network Security
3 4 (2.53%) OSPF
3 4 (2.53%) VPN
4 3 (1.90%) iSCSI
4 3 (1.90%) SAN
4 3 (1.90%) TCP/IP
5 2 (1.27%) Broadband
6 1 (0.63%) Wireless
Database & Business Intelligence
1 3 (1.90%) SQL Server
2 2 (1.27%) Easytrieve
2 2 (1.27%) MongoDB
3 1 (0.63%) Metadata
3 1 (0.63%) NoSQL
3 1 (0.63%) Power BI
Development Applications
1 4 (2.53%) JIRA
2 3 (1.90%) Axure RP
3 2 (1.27%) Balsamiq
3 2 (1.27%) Postman
4 1 (0.63%) Git
General
1 34 (21.52%) Social Skills
2 31 (19.62%) Finance
2 31 (19.62%) Public Sector
3 11 (6.96%) Analytical Skills
4 9 (5.70%) Telecoms
5 8 (5.06%) Banking
6 7 (4.43%) Billing
6 7 (4.43%) Publishing
7 6 (3.80%) Games
7 6 (3.80%) Legal
7 6 (3.80%) Marketing
8 5 (3.16%) Inclusion and Diversity
8 5 (3.16%) Pharmaceutical
8 5 (3.16%) Presentation Skills
9 4 (2.53%) Manufacturing
9 4 (2.53%) Organisational Skills
9 4 (2.53%) Polish Language
10 3 (1.90%) Retail
10 3 (1.90%) Welsh Language
11 2 (1.27%) Military
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 9 (5.70%) Web Services
2 8 (5.06%) CSS
2 8 (5.06%) HTML
2 8 (5.06%) REST
3 5 (3.16%) JSON
4 4 (2.53%) Unity (Game Engine)
4 4 (2.53%) Unreal Engine
5 3 (1.90%) React
6 2 (1.27%) Middleware
6 2 (1.27%) Node.js
6 2 (1.27%) OpenAPI
7 1 (0.63%) Flutter
7 1 (0.63%) LDAP
7 1 (0.63%) React Native
7 1 (0.63%) RESTful
7 1 (0.63%) Swagger
7 1 (0.63%) Vue
7 1 (0.63%) XML
Miscellaneous
1 8 (5.06%) Product Ownership
2 7 (4.43%) Mobile App
2 7 (4.43%) Onboarding
3 6 (3.80%) Enterprise Software
3 6 (3.80%) Mobile Games
3 6 (3.80%) Virtual Reality
4 5 (3.16%) Frameworx
4 5 (3.16%) NHS
4 5 (3.16%) TM Forum
5 4 (2.53%) Hybrid Cloud
5 4 (2.53%) Motion Graphics
5 4 (2.53%) Social Media
6 3 (1.90%) Animation
6 3 (1.90%) Data Protection Act
6 3 (1.90%) IoT
7 2 (1.27%) CMDB
7 2 (1.27%) Graphic Design
7 2 (1.27%) Greenfield Project
7 2 (1.27%) Learning Management System
7 2 (1.27%) Photography
Operating Systems
1 6 (3.80%) Linux
2 3 (1.90%) Android
2 3 (1.90%) Apple iOS
2 3 (1.90%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
2 3 (1.90%) Windows
2 3 (1.90%) Windows Server
3 2 (1.27%) zOS
Processes & Methodologies
1 63 (39.87%) User Experience
2 49 (31.01%) Agile
3 43 (27.22%) UX Design
4 35 (22.15%) Service Design
5 34 (21.52%) User Research
6 27 (17.09%) Prototyping
7 25 (15.82%) User-Centered Design (UCD)
8 23 (14.56%) Wireframes
9 22 (13.92%) Problem-Solving
10 17 (10.76%) Interaction Design
11 14 (8.86%) Business Strategy
11 14 (8.86%) Stakeholder Management
12 12 (7.59%) Decision-Making
12 12 (7.59%) ITSM
12 12 (7.59%) Usability Testing
13 11 (6.96%) Continuous Improvement
13 11 (6.96%) Design Thinking
13 11 (6.96%) Enterprise Architecture
14 10 (6.33%) Microservices
14 10 (6.33%) Stakeholder Engagement
Programming Languages
1 8 (5.06%) JavaScript
2 7 (4.43%) Python
3 6 (3.80%) TypeScript
4 2 (1.27%) COBOL
4 2 (1.27%) JCL
4 2 (1.27%) SQL
5 1 (0.63%) Dart
5 1 (0.63%) PowerShell
Qualifications
1 15 (9.49%) Degree
2 11 (6.96%) SC Cleared
2 11 (6.96%) Security Cleared
3 10 (6.33%) Master's Degree
4 7 (4.43%) Computer Science Degree
5 4 (2.53%) CCIE
5 4 (2.53%) CCNP
5 4 (2.53%) Cisco Certification
5 4 (2.53%) JNCIE
6 3 (1.90%) BPSS Clearance
7 1 (0.63%) AWS Certification
7 1 (0.63%) Azure Certification
7 1 (0.63%) CISM
7 1 (0.63%) CISSP
7 1 (0.63%) DV Cleared
7 1 (0.63%) HND
7 1 (0.63%) Microsoft Certification
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 16 (10.13%) Accessibility
2 5 (3.16%) NIST
3 4 (2.53%) Disclosure Scotland
3 4 (2.53%) WCAG
4 3 (1.90%) QA
5 1 (0.63%) Data Quality
5 1 (0.63%) GDPR
5 1 (0.63%) ISO 9001
5 1 (0.63%) ISO/IEC 27001
5 1 (0.63%) PCI DSS
5 1 (0.63%) Sarbanes-Oxley
System Software
1 5 (3.16%) Active Directory
2 3 (1.90%) VMware Infrastructure
2 3 (1.90%) vSphere
3 2 (1.27%) VMware ESXi
Systems Management
1 1 (0.63%) Single Sign-On
Vendors
1 18 (11.39%) Adobe
2 10 (6.33%) Microsoft
3 6 (3.80%) Salesforce
3 6 (3.80%) ServiceNow
3 6 (3.80%) Virgin Media
4 5 (3.16%) Cisco
4 5 (3.16%) VMware
5 4 (2.53%) F5
5 4 (2.53%) Fortinet
5 4 (2.53%) Oracle
6 3 (1.90%) Google
6 3 (1.90%) Red Hat
7 2 (1.27%) BT
7 2 (1.27%) Genesys
7 2 (1.27%) Openreach
8 1 (0.63%) Avaya
8 1 (0.63%) Centrify
8 1 (0.63%) Databricks
8 1 (0.63%) Thycotic
8 1 (0.63%) YouTube