User Research Contracts in the UK excluding London

User Research
UK > UK excluding London

The table below provides summary statistics for contract job vacancies advertised in the UK excluding London requiring User Research skills. It includes a benchmarking guide to the contractor rates offered in vacancies that cited User Research over the 6 months leading up to 18 May 2025, comparing them to the same period in the previous two years.

6 months to
18 May 2025
Same period 2024 Same period 2023
Rank 248 258 162
Rank change year-on-year +10 -96 -23
Contract jobs citing User Research 92 129 367
As % of all contract jobs advertised in the UK excluding London 0.71% 0.63% 1.60%
As % of the Processes & Methodologies category 0.78% 0.75% 1.79%
Number of daily rates quoted 74 78 288
10th Percentile £303 £325 £377
25th Percentile £366 £375 £418
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £450 £500 £488
Median % change year-on-year -10.00% +2.56% -2.50%
75th Percentile £569 £575 £588
90th Percentile £650 £600 £644
UK median daily rate £495 £539 £525
% change year-on-year -8.08% +2.57% -

All Process and Methodology Skills
UK excluding London

User Research falls under the Processes and Methodologies category. For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all contract job vacancies requiring process or methodology skills in the UK excluding London.

Contract vacancies with a requirement for process or methodology skills 11,760 17,139 20,553
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the UK excluding London 90.52% 84.34% 89.47%
Number of daily rates quoted 7,326 10,219 14,173
10th Percentile £235 £250 £256
25th Percentile £375 £381 £400
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £475 £500 £500
Median % change year-on-year -5.00% - +4.17%
75th Percentile £580 £600 £600
90th Percentile £653 £688 £688
UK median daily rate £515 £525 £550
% change year-on-year -1.90% -4.55% +3.77%
Number of hourly rates quoted 850 2,064 1,258
10th Percentile £14.12 £12.35 £10.63
25th Percentile £17.30 £15.25 £15.25
Median hourly rate £25.15 £37.50 £35.00
Median % change year-on-year -32.93% +7.14% +75.00%
75th Percentile £63.66 £61.30 £65.00
90th Percentile £75.00 £72.50 £73.72
UK median hourly rate £28.00 £36.05 £35.65
% change year-on-year -22.32% +1.11% +38.82%

User Research
Job Vacancy Trend in the UK excluding London

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

Job vacancy trend for User Research in the UK excluding London

User Research
Contractor Daily Rate Trend in the UK excluding London

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

Daily rate trend for User Research in the UK excluding London

User Research
Daily Rate Histogram in the UK excluding London

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing User Research in the UK excluding London over the 6 months to 18 May 2025.

Daily rate histogram for User Research in the UK excluding London

User Research
Contractor Hourly Rate Trend in the UK excluding London

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

Hourly rate trend for User Research in the UK excluding London

User Research
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 User Research within the UK excluding London region over the 6 months to 18 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
Scotland -15 36 £438 -12.50% 33
North of England -3 25 £400 +6.67% 105
South West +43 11 £575 -23.33% 20
North West -3 10 £408 +12.41% 62
South East +43 9 £550 +22.22% 78
Yorkshire +7 8 £400 -20.00% 28
Midlands +20 7 £463 +2.78% 41
North East -5 7 £288 -52.58% 15
West Midlands +6 5 £550 +22.22% 23
East of England - 3 £450 - 15
East Midlands - 2 £318 - 17
Wales - 2 £650 - 8
Northern Ireland -10 1 £450 -12.20% 4
User Research
UK

User Research
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 10 (10.87%) Confluence
2 1 (1.09%) Apache
2 1 (1.09%) SharePoint
Applications
1 7 (7.61%) Adobe XD
2 5 (5.43%) Sketch
3 3 (3.26%) MS Visio
3 3 (3.26%) UserZoom
4 2 (2.17%) InVision
4 2 (2.17%) Microsoft Excel
5 1 (1.09%) Microsoft PowerPoint
5 1 (1.09%) Spreadsheet
5 1 (1.09%) UXPin
Cloud Services
1 13 (14.13%) Figma
2 6 (6.52%) AWS
3 4 (4.35%) Azure
3 4 (4.35%) SaaS
4 3 (3.26%) Azure DevOps
4 3 (3.26%) Google Analytics
5 2 (2.17%) Serverless
6 1 (1.09%) dbt
6 1 (1.09%) GCP
6 1 (1.09%) Google Data Studio
6 1 (1.09%) Google Tag Manager
6 1 (1.09%) Microsoft 365
6 1 (1.09%) Miro
6 1 (1.09%) Power Platform
Communications & Networking
1 1 (1.09%) Internet
Database & Business Intelligence
1 2 (2.17%) Data Warehouse
1 2 (2.17%) MongoDB
1 2 (2.17%) NoSQL
2 1 (1.09%) Elasticsearch
2 1 (1.09%) Flink
2 1 (1.09%) Power BI
2 1 (1.09%) Tableau
Development Applications
1 10 (10.87%) JIRA
2 2 (2.17%) Axure RP
2 2 (2.17%) Git
2 2 (2.17%) GitLab
3 1 (1.09%) Balsamiq
3 1 (1.09%) Selenium
General
1 37 (40.22%) Public Sector
2 21 (22.83%) Social Skills
3 10 (10.87%) Analytical Skills
3 10 (10.87%) Finance
4 6 (6.52%) Influencing Skills
5 5 (5.43%) Publishing
6 3 (3.26%) Presentation Skills
7 2 (2.17%) Banking
7 2 (2.17%) Marketing
8 1 (1.09%) Documentation Skills
8 1 (1.09%) Inclusion and Diversity
8 1 (1.09%) Legal
Job Titles
1 34 (36.96%) Designer
2 15 (16.30%) Analyst
2 15 (16.30%) Senior
2 15 (16.30%) UX Designer
3 14 (15.22%) User Researcher
4 13 (14.13%) Business Analyst
5 10 (10.87%) Content Designer
6 9 (9.78%) Lead
7 8 (8.70%) User Experience Researcher
8 7 (7.61%) Service Designer
9 6 (6.52%) Developer
9 6 (6.52%) UI Designer
9 6 (6.52%) UI/UX Designer
10 5 (5.43%) Senior Designer
11 4 (4.35%) Interaction Designer
11 4 (4.35%) Senior UX Designer
12 3 (3.26%) Data Business Analyst
12 3 (3.26%) Senior Analyst
12 3 (3.26%) Senior Business Analyst
12 3 (3.26%) User Experience Consultant
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 11 (11.96%) CSS
1 11 (11.96%) HTML
2 6 (6.52%) Node.js
3 2 (2.17%) React
3 2 (2.17%) Vue
4 1 (1.09%) AngularJS
4 1 (1.09%) Apache NiFi
4 1 (1.09%) Kafka
4 1 (1.09%) Play Framework
4 1 (1.09%) React Native
4 1 (1.09%) REST
4 1 (1.09%) RESTful
4 1 (1.09%) Spring
4 1 (1.09%) Spring Boot
Miscellaneous
1 11 (11.96%) Product Ownership
2 3 (3.26%) Management Information System
2 3 (3.26%) Mobile App
3 2 (2.17%) SCADA
4 1 (1.09%) Analytical Mindset
4 1 (1.09%) Data Protection Act
4 1 (1.09%) Greenfield Project
4 1 (1.09%) Legacy Systems
4 1 (1.09%) NHS
4 1 (1.09%) Operational Technology
4 1 (1.09%) Social Media
Operating Systems
1 2 (2.17%) Android
1 2 (2.17%) Apple iOS
2 1 (1.09%) Linux
Processes & Methodologies
1 47 (51.09%) User Experience
2 42 (45.65%) Agile
3 28 (30.43%) UX Design
4 26 (28.26%) Usability Testing
5 24 (26.09%) User-Centered Design (UCD)
6 23 (25.00%) Service Design
7 22 (23.91%) Wireframes
8 21 (22.83%) Analytics
9 19 (20.65%) Prototyping
10 18 (19.57%) User Stories
11 16 (17.39%) UX Research
12 15 (16.30%) Project Management
12 15 (16.30%) Stakeholder Management
13 11 (11.96%) Actionable Insight
13 11 (11.96%) Interaction Design
13 11 (11.96%) Problem-Solving
14 10 (10.87%) A/B Testing
14 10 (10.87%) Business Analysis
14 10 (10.87%) Design Thinking
15 9 (9.78%) Journey Map
Programming Languages
1 12 (13.04%) JavaScript
2 3 (3.26%) Java
2 3 (3.26%) Python
3 2 (2.17%) SQL
4 1 (1.09%) Go
4 1 (1.09%) Scala
4 1 (1.09%) TypeScript
Qualifications
1 14 (15.22%) Security Cleared
2 9 (9.78%) SC Cleared
3 6 (6.52%) Degree
4 3 (3.26%) DV Cleared
4 3 (3.26%) IIBA
5 2 (2.17%) BPSS Clearance
6 1 (1.09%) Master's Degree
6 1 (1.09%) SAFe Agilist
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 18 (19.57%) Accessibility
2 6 (6.52%) Disclosure Scotland
3 5 (5.43%) WCAG
4 4 (4.35%) Actionable Recommendations
5 3 (3.26%) QA
6 2 (2.17%) Data Quality
6 2 (2.17%) GDPR
7 1 (1.09%) PERC
System Software
1 2 (2.17%) Docker
Systems Management
1 1 (1.09%) Ansible
1 1 (1.09%) Grafana
1 1 (1.09%) Kubernetes
1 1 (1.09%) Prometheus
1 1 (1.09%) Terraform
Vendors
1 10 (10.87%) Adobe
2 3 (3.26%) Google
3 2 (2.17%) CA Agile Central
3 2 (2.17%) DataCore
3 2 (2.17%) Microsoft
3 2 (2.17%) Palantir
4 1 (1.09%) Hotjar
4 1 (1.09%) IBM
4 1 (1.09%) Qualtrics
4 1 (1.09%) Salesforce