PhD Contract Job Trends in the UK excluding London

Doctor of Philosophy (PhD, DPhil, EngD, Doctorate)
UK > UK excluding London

The table below provides summary statistics for contract job vacancies advertised in the UK excluding London with a requirement for PhD qualifications. It includes a benchmarking guide to the contractor rates offered over the 6 months leading up to 30 December 2025, comparing them to the same period in the previous two years.

6 months to
30 Dec 2025
Same period 2024 Same period 2023
Rank 376 337 370
Rank change year-on-year -39 +33 +83
Contract jobs citing PhD 26 10 29
As % of all contract jobs in the UK excluding London 0.14% 0.069% 0.15%
As % of the Qualifications category 0.38% 0.20% 0.40%
Number of daily rates quoted 10 6 19
10th Percentile £340 £506 £463
25th Percentile £509 £597 £489
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £537 £650 £550
Median % change year-on-year -17.38% +18.18% +15.79%
75th Percentile £600 £675 £710
90th Percentile £629 - £825
UK median daily rate £650 £650 £700
% change year-on-year - -7.14% -1.41%
Number of hourly rates quoted 8 2 0
10th Percentile - £20.56 -
25th Percentile - £21.21 -
Median hourly rate £29.61 £22.62 -
Median % change year-on-year +30.92% - -
75th Percentile - £24.21 -
90th Percentile £33.85 £24.99 -
UK median hourly rate £29.61 £22.62 -
% change year-on-year +30.92% - -

All Academic and Professional Certifications
UK excluding London

PhD 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 6,754 5,049 7,174
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the UK excluding London 36.92% 34.63% 36.81%
Number of daily rates quoted 4,235 3,017 4,350
10th Percentile £255 £225 £250
25th Percentile £405 £400 £413
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £501 £540
Median % change year-on-year -0.24% -7.19% +2.86%
75th Percentile £600 £613 £645
90th Percentile £705 £700 £703
UK median daily rate £522 £525 £550
% change year-on-year -0.52% -4.55% -
Number of hourly rates quoted 856 393 615
10th Percentile £16.00 £18.51 £15.85
25th Percentile £18.87 £24.18 £26.24
Median hourly rate £25.15 £42.50 £51.89
Median % change year-on-year -40.82% -18.10% +16.09%
75th Percentile £51.53 £67.50 £67.50
90th Percentile £74.26 £75.00 £79.21
UK median hourly rate £25.15 £40.00 £52.50
% change year-on-year -37.13% -23.81% +16.67%

PhD
Job Vacancy Trend in the UK excluding London

Historical trend showing the proportion of contract IT job postings citing PhD relative to all contract IT jobs advertised in the UK excluding London.

PhD job vacancy trend in the UK excluding London

PhD
Daily Rate Trend in the UK excluding London

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

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

PhD
Daily Rate Histogram in the UK excluding London

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing PhD in the UK excluding London over the 6 months to 30 December 2025.

Daily rate histogram for PhD in the UK excluding London

PhD
Hourly Rate Trend in the UK excluding London

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

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

PhD
Hourly Rate Histogram in the UK excluding London

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing PhD in the UK excluding London over the 6 months to 30 December 2025.

Hourly rate histogram for PhD in the UK excluding London

PhD
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 PhD within the UK excluding London region over the 6 months to 30 December 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
South East -3 10 £500 - 285
North of England - 10 £537 - 312
Yorkshire - 10 £537 - 123
East of England -20 3 £625 -3.85% 220
Scotland - 2 £390 - 59
Midlands - 1 - - 237
West Midlands - 1 - - 120
PhD
UK

PhD
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 10 (38.46%) Confluence
Applications
1 7 (26.92%) Chatbot
Cloud Services
1 3 (11.54%) Azure
2 2 (7.69%) AWS
3 1 (3.85%) Azure Machine Learning
3 1 (3.85%) Azure Synapse Analytics
3 1 (3.85%) GCP
3 1 (3.85%) Power Platform
Communications & Networking
1 3 (11.54%) Kerberos
2 1 (3.85%) Network Security
Database & Business Intelligence
1 1 (3.85%) GIS
1 1 (3.85%) Power BI
Development Applications
1 10 (38.46%) JIRA
2 1 (3.85%) MLflow
2 1 (3.85%) Subversion
General
1 9 (34.62%) Analytical Skills
2 5 (19.23%) Finance
3 2 (7.69%) Military
4 1 (3.85%) Aerospace
4 1 (3.85%) Agriculture
4 1 (3.85%) Agrochemical
4 1 (3.85%) Social Science
Job Titles
1 8 (30.77%) Lead
2 7 (26.92%) Architect
2 7 (26.92%) Lead Architect
2 7 (26.92%) Lead Solutions Architect
2 7 (26.92%) Solutions Architect
2 7 (26.92%) Trainer
3 5 (19.23%) Lead Security Architect
3 5 (19.23%) Security Architect
3 5 (19.23%) Security Solutions Architect
4 3 (11.54%) Design Engineer
5 2 (7.69%) Data Scientist
6 1 (3.85%) CyberArk Architect
6 1 (3.85%) Developer
6 1 (3.85%) Hardware Engineer
6 1 (3.85%) Head of Architecture
6 1 (3.85%) Lead Developer
6 1 (3.85%) Lead Software Developer
6 1 (3.85%) Senior
6 1 (3.85%) Senior Data Scientist
6 1 (3.85%) Software Developer
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 3 (11.54%) OAuth
1 3 (11.54%) SAML
2 1 (3.85%) HTML
2 1 (3.85%) PyTorch
Miscellaneous
1 8 (30.77%) Cloud Native
2 3 (11.54%) Management Information System
3 2 (7.69%) Algorithms
4 1 (3.85%) Acoustics
4 1 (3.85%) Analytical Mindset
4 1 (3.85%) IoT
4 1 (3.85%) Video\Live Streaming
Operating Systems
1 1 (3.85%) Linux
Processes & Methodologies
1 12 (46.15%) Computer Science
2 11 (42.31%) Software Engineering
2 11 (42.31%) Thought Leadership
2 11 (42.31%) TOGAF
2 11 (42.31%) Visualisation
3 10 (38.46%) AI
3 10 (38.46%) Cryptography
3 10 (38.46%) Cybersecurity
3 10 (38.46%) Identity Access Management
3 10 (38.46%) Incident Response
3 10 (38.46%) SABSA
3 10 (38.46%) Security Operations
3 10 (38.46%) Threat and Vulnerability Management
3 10 (38.46%) UML
3 10 (38.46%) Vulnerability Management
4 9 (34.62%) Privileged Access Management
4 9 (34.62%) Secrets Management
5 8 (30.77%) Decision-Making
5 8 (30.77%) Technical Debt
6 7 (26.92%) Conversational UI
Programming Languages
1 5 (19.23%) Python
2 2 (7.69%) C
2 2 (7.69%) C++
3 1 (3.85%) JavaScript
3 1 (3.85%) MATLAB
3 1 (3.85%) R
3 1 (3.85%) SQL
3 1 (3.85%) TypeScript
Qualifications
1 26 (100.00%) Degree
2 25 (96.15%) Master's Degree
3 11 (42.31%) CISSP
3 11 (42.31%) TOGAF Certification
4 10 (38.46%) CISM
5 2 (7.69%) Security Cleared
6 1 (3.85%) BPSS Clearance
6 1 (3.85%) Computer Science Degree
6 1 (3.85%) DV Cleared
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 2 (7.69%) Data Quality
2 1 (3.85%) Accessibility
2 1 (3.85%) GDPR
2 1 (3.85%) ISO/IEC 27001
2 1 (3.85%) JSP 440
2 1 (3.85%) NCSC
2 1 (3.85%) QA
System Software
1 1 (3.85%) Docker
Systems Management
1 3 (11.54%) Single Sign-On
2 1 (3.85%) Kubernetes
Vendors
1 10 (38.46%) BiZZdesign
2 7 (26.92%) Centrify
2 7 (26.92%) CyberArk
2 7 (26.92%) PayPal
3 2 (7.69%) Microsoft
4 1 (3.85%) Databricks