Aerospace Contract Job Trends

Aerospace
UK

The table below looks at the prevalence of the term Aerospace in contract job vacancies. Included is a benchmarking guide to the contractor rates offered in vacancies that cited Aerospace over the 6 months leading up to 22 September 2026, comparing them to the same period in the previous two years.

6 months to
22 Sep 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 185 285 306
Rank change year-on-year +100 +21 +49
Contract jobs citing Aerospace 842 278 274
As % of all contract jobs in the UK 1.54% 0.86% 0.72%
As % of the General category 2.77% 1.35% 1.24%
Number of daily rates quoted 140 94 54
10th Percentile £400 £268 £267
25th Percentile £513 £450 £353
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £578 £550 £544
Median % change year-on-year +5.09% +1.10% +1.12%
75th Percentile £682 £646 £671
90th Percentile £801 £739 £723
UK excluding London median daily rate £575 £525 £450
% change year-on-year +9.52% +16.67% -16.28%
Number of hourly rates quoted 523 92 127
10th Percentile £26.25 £22.63 £31.97
25th Percentile £35.54 £41.15 £45.00
Median hourly rate £52.50 £51.49 £50.00
Median % change year-on-year +1.96% +2.99% -9.09%
75th Percentile £75.00 £67.00 £70.00
90th Percentile £85.85 £73.75 £75.00
UK excluding London median hourly rate £52.50 £50.49 £50.00
% change year-on-year +3.99% +0.97% -9.09%

All General Skills
UK

Aerospace falls under the General Skills category. For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all contract job vacancies requiring general skills.

Contract vacancies with a requirement for general skills 30,427 20,617 22,081
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the UK 55.76% 63.48% 58.10%
Number of daily rates quoted 17,821 12,765 13,200
10th Percentile £313 £275 £283
25th Percentile £420 £400 £413
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £525 £500 £525
Median % change year-on-year +5.00% -4.76% -4.55%
75th Percentile £638 £625 £650
90th Percentile £738 £738 £775
UK excluding London median daily rate £500 £475 £495
% change year-on-year +5.26% -4.04% -1.00%
Number of hourly rates quoted 2,558 1,199 1,073
10th Percentile £13.50 £13.50 £14.73
25th Percentile £16.25 £16.17 £17.25
Median hourly rate £29.78 £25.15 £35.36
Median % change year-on-year +18.41% -28.87% +28.58%
75th Percentile £54.36 £47.31 £60.00
90th Percentile £77.50 £67.00 £71.08
UK excluding London median hourly rate £30.00 £21.00 £35.03
% change year-on-year +42.86% -40.05% +28.79%

Aerospace
Job Vacancy Trend

Historical trend showing the proportion of contract IT job postings citing Aerospace relative to all contract IT jobs advertised.

Aerospace job vacancy trend in the UK

Aerospace
Daily Rate Trend

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in the UK citing Aerospace.

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in the UK citing Aerospace

Aerospace
Daily Rate Histogram

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing Aerospace over the 6 months to 22 September 2026.

Daily rate histogram for Aerospace in the UK

Aerospace
Hourly Rate Trend

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in the UK citing Aerospace.

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in the UK citing Aerospace

Aerospace
Hourly Rate Histogram

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing Aerospace over the 6 months to 22 September 2026.

Hourly rate histogram for Aerospace in the UK

Aerospace
Top 17 Contract Job Locations

The table below looks at the demand and provides a guide to the median contractor rates quoted in IT jobs citing Aerospace within the UK over the 6 months to 22 September 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
England +105 779 £581 +5.64% 1,836
UK excluding London +94 767 £575 +9.52% 1,666
South East +80 356 £578 +6.64% 549
South West +24 168 £498 -9.55% 324
Work from Home +41 146 £565 +7.62% 755
East of England +9 105 £500 -28.57% 262
North of England -22 80 £600 +33.78% 175
North West -27 55 £600 +33.33% 118
London -74 39 £675 +12.50% 243
Midlands -46 27 £538 +17.23% 153
East Midlands -6 18 £500 -23.08% 65
Scotland -16 18 £438 +548.15% 185
Yorkshire -32 14 - - 28
North East - 11 - - 30
Wales - 11 - - 32
West Midlands -53 8 - - 88
Northern Ireland +6 2 £252 - 22

Aerospace
Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities 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 7 (0.83%) SharePoint
2 3 (0.36%) Apache Spark
2 3 (0.36%) ThingWorx
3 2 (0.24%) Apache
3 2 (0.24%) Apache Airflow
3 2 (0.24%) Apache Superset
3 2 (0.24%) Microsoft Exchange
4 1 (0.12%) Confluence
4 1 (0.12%) IIS
4 1 (0.12%) Jupyter
4 1 (0.12%) Kinematics
4 1 (0.12%) Palantir Foundry
4 1 (0.12%) Red Hat Fuse
4 1 (0.12%) Tomcat
Applications
1 18 (2.14%) Microsoft Excel
2 16 (1.90%) Microsoft Project
2 16 (1.90%) Simulink
3 11 (1.31%) CATIA
4 10 (1.19%) Windchill
5 9 (1.07%) Microsoft Office
6 4 (0.48%) OrCAD
6 4 (0.48%) Stateflow
7 3 (0.36%) Microsoft PowerPoint
8 2 (0.24%) Adobe Illustrator
8 2 (0.24%) Photoshop
8 2 (0.24%) Siemens NX
9 1 (0.12%) Adobe XD
9 1 (0.12%) FrameMaker
9 1 (0.12%) MS Visio
Business Applications
1 22 (2.61%) SAP S/4HANA
2 7 (0.83%) Teamcenter
3 6 (0.71%) Primavera
3 6 (0.71%) SAP HR
4 5 (0.59%) SAP GRC
4 5 (0.59%) SAP Payroll
4 5 (0.59%) SAP PP
5 4 (0.48%) SAP EHS
6 3 (0.36%) SAP FI
6 3 (0.36%) SAP QM
7 2 (0.24%) DELMIA
7 2 (0.24%) ENOVIA
7 2 (0.24%) Remedy ITSM
7 2 (0.24%) SAP CO
7 2 (0.24%) SAP FI/CO
8 1 (0.12%) SAP CCM
8 1 (0.12%) SAP ERP
8 1 (0.12%) SAP FI-GL
8 1 (0.12%) SAP HCM
8 1 (0.12%) SAP PM
Cloud Services
1 86 (10.21%) Azure
2 35 (4.16%) AWS
3 28 (3.33%) Azure DevOps
4 23 (2.73%) GCP
5 22 (2.61%) Power Platform
6 15 (1.78%) GitHub
7 13 (1.54%) Dynamics 365
7 13 (1.54%) OpenShift
8 8 (0.95%) Entra ID
8 8 (0.95%) Google Workspace
9 7 (0.83%) GitHub Actions
9 7 (0.83%) Power Automate
10 6 (0.71%) Azure Functions
10 6 (0.71%) Azure Logic Apps
10 6 (0.71%) Cloud Computing
10 6 (0.71%) PowerApps
10 6 (0.71%) Serverless
11 4 (0.48%) Google Sheets
11 4 (0.48%) SaaS
12 3 (0.36%) Figma
Communications & Networking
1 19 (2.26%) Wireless
2 15 (1.78%) Ethernet
3 14 (1.66%) DNS
4 12 (1.43%) DHCP
4 12 (1.43%) Firewall
4 12 (1.43%) Software-Defined Radio
5 9 (1.07%) TCP/IP
6 7 (0.83%) VPN
7 3 (0.36%) HTTP
7 3 (0.36%) HTTPS
7 3 (0.36%) Kerberos
7 3 (0.36%) Network Security
7 3 (0.36%) Software-Defined Networking
8 2 (0.24%) FTP
8 2 (0.24%) RS-232
8 2 (0.24%) SSL
9 1 (0.12%) HSRP
9 1 (0.12%) MQTT
9 1 (0.12%) RS-422
9 1 (0.12%) SpaceWire
Database & Business Intelligence
1 19 (2.26%) Power BI
2 15 (1.78%) Metadata
3 11 (1.31%) NoSQL
4 5 (0.59%) Tableau
5 4 (0.48%) Big Data
5 4 (0.48%) Data Warehouse
5 4 (0.48%) MS Access
5 4 (0.48%) Oracle Reports
5 4 (0.48%) Qlik Sense
5 4 (0.48%) SQL Server
6 3 (0.36%) Hadoop
7 2 (0.24%) PostgreSQL
7 2 (0.24%) SAP HANA
8 1 (0.12%) Amazon Redshift
8 1 (0.12%) Azure SQL Database
8 1 (0.12%) BigQuery
8 1 (0.12%) Data Lake
8 1 (0.12%) Looker
8 1 (0.12%) Relational Database
8 1 (0.12%) SQLite
Development Applications
1 39 (4.63%) Rational DOORS
2 24 (2.85%) Git
3 15 (1.78%) JIRA
4 11 (1.31%) GitLab
5 10 (1.19%) Jenkins
6 3 (0.36%) SonarQube
6 3 (0.36%) Visual Studio
7 2 (0.24%) Artifactory
7 2 (0.24%) eggPlant
7 2 (0.24%) LabVIEW
8 1 (0.12%) Atlassian Bamboo
8 1 (0.12%) Eclipse
8 1 (0.12%) PetaLinux
8 1 (0.12%) Postman
8 1 (0.12%) Visual Studio Code
General
1 230 (27.32%) Manufacturing
2 144 (17.10%) Social Skills
3 65 (7.72%) Finance
4 48 (5.70%) Analytical Skills
5 42 (4.99%) Aviation
5 42 (4.99%) Electronics
6 38 (4.51%) Avionics
7 33 (3.92%) Automotive
8 25 (2.97%) Influencing Skills
9 17 (2.02%) Public Sector
10 15 (1.78%) Military
10 15 (1.78%) Telecoms
11 13 (1.54%) Organisational Skills
12 9 (1.07%) Documentation Skills
13 7 (0.83%) Presentation Skills
14 5 (0.59%) Inclusion and Diversity
14 5 (0.59%) Legal
15 4 (0.48%) French Language
15 4 (0.48%) Law
15 4 (0.48%) Publishing
Job Titles
1 100 (11.88%) Lead
2 96 (11.40%) Systems Engineer
3 58 (6.89%) Architect
4 54 (6.41%) Senior
4 54 (6.41%) Software Engineer
5 45 (5.34%) Delivery Manager
6 41 (4.87%) Test Engineer
7 38 (4.51%) Developer
8 35 (4.16%) Quality Engineer
9 33 (3.92%) QA Engineer
10 31 (3.68%) Embedded Engineer
11 30 (3.56%) Administrator
12 29 (3.44%) Embedded Software Engineer
13 25 (2.97%) Product Manager
14 24 (2.85%) Analyst
14 24 (2.85%) Product Delivery Manager
15 23 (2.73%) Data Engineer
15 23 (2.73%) Test Technician
16 22 (2.61%) Programmer
17 21 (2.49%) Configuration Manager
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 24 (2.85%) Terraform
2 15 (1.78%) Middleware
3 14 (1.66%) LDAP
4 10 (1.19%) AngularJS
4 10 (1.19%) REST
5 8 (0.95%) OAuth
5 8 (0.95%) React
5 8 (0.95%) Redux
5 8 (0.95%) SAML
5 8 (0.95%) Vue
6 7 (0.83%) .NET
6 7 (0.83%) ARM Templates
6 7 (0.83%) Backbone.js
7 6 (0.71%) Web Services
7 6 (0.71%) XML
8 4 (0.48%) OpenID
8 4 (0.48%) RESTful
8 4 (0.48%) Yocto
9 3 (0.36%) Hibernate
9 3 (0.36%) Spring Boot
Miscellaneous
1 32 (3.80%) Product Ownership
2 28 (3.33%) Management Information System
3 25 (2.97%) Self-Motivation
4 22 (2.61%) Embedded Systems
5 21 (2.49%) FPGA
6 16 (1.90%) Hybrid Cloud
7 14 (1.66%) Data Structures
8 12 (1.43%) Enterprise Software
8 12 (1.43%) PCIe
9 11 (1.31%) Cyber Threat
10 10 (1.19%) Algorithms
10 10 (1.19%) Onboarding
10 10 (1.19%) Virtual Team
11 9 (1.07%) Cloud Native
12 8 (0.95%) VHDL
13 7 (0.83%) Operational Technology
13 7 (0.83%) Verilog
14 6 (0.71%) Analogue Electronics
15 5 (0.59%) Enterprise Cloud
16 4 (0.48%) Greenfield Project
Operating Systems
1 29 (3.44%) Linux
2 22 (2.61%) Windows
3 13 (1.54%) Windows Server
4 8 (0.95%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
5 6 (0.71%) Embedded Linux
6 5 (0.59%) CentOS
6 5 (0.59%) FreeRTOS
7 3 (0.36%) Mac OS
7 3 (0.36%) Ubuntu
8 2 (0.24%) Windows Server 2012
9 1 (0.12%) Unix
Processes & Methodologies
1 140 (16.63%) Stakeholder Management
2 122 (14.49%) Agile
3 106 (12.59%) Continuous Improvement
4 97 (11.52%) Software Engineering
5 88 (10.45%) Roadmaps
6 72 (8.55%) Cybersecurity
7 70 (8.31%) Problem-Solving
8 68 (8.08%) Digital Engineering
9 61 (7.24%) Stakeholder Engagement
10 58 (6.89%) Technical Leadership
11 56 (6.65%) DevOps
12 53 (6.29%) Validation
13 51 (6.06%) Risk Management
14 49 (5.82%) Systems Engineering
15 44 (5.23%) CI/CD
15 44 (5.23%) Digital Transformation Programme
16 43 (5.11%) Computer Science
16 43 (5.11%) ITIL
17 42 (4.99%) Decision-Making
18 39 (4.63%) Scaled Agile Framework
Programming Languages
1 53 (6.29%) Python
2 32 (3.80%) SQL
3 22 (2.61%) C
3 22 (2.61%) PowerShell
4 20 (2.38%) MATLAB
5 18 (2.14%) Ada
6 17 (2.02%) C++
6 17 (2.02%) JavaScript
7 16 (1.90%) Java
8 11 (1.31%) Bash
9 9 (1.07%) C#
10 8 (0.95%) Bicep
11 7 (0.83%) SystemVerilog
12 4 (0.48%) Shell Script
12 4 (0.48%) X++
13 2 (0.24%) Rust
14 1 (0.12%) ABAP
14 1 (0.12%) Ada 95
14 1 (0.12%) Google Apps Script
14 1 (0.12%) Scala
Qualifications
1 332 (39.43%) Security Cleared
2 257 (30.52%) SC Cleared
3 120 (14.25%) Degree
4 43 (5.11%) BPSS Clearance
5 34 (4.04%) DV Cleared
6 33 (3.92%) CISSP
7 29 (3.44%) Azure Certification
8 15 (1.78%) Computer Science Degree
9 14 (1.66%) PMI Certification
10 13 (1.54%) HNC
10 13 (1.54%) PMP
11 12 (1.43%) Cisco Certification
11 12 (1.43%) Microsoft Certification
12 11 (1.31%) Chartered Engineer
12 11 (1.31%) CISM
13 10 (1.19%) (ISC)2 CCSP
13 10 (1.19%) TOGAF Certification
14 9 (1.07%) CEH
15 8 (0.95%) CompTIA Security+
15 8 (0.95%) NVQ Level 4
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 42 (4.99%) QA
2 33 (3.92%) ISO/IEC 27001
3 25 (2.97%) NIST
4 22 (2.61%) Def Stans
5 16 (1.90%) GRC
6 15 (1.78%) Data Quality
6 15 (1.78%) GDPR
7 13 (1.54%) NCSC
8 9 (1.07%) IEC 61508
8 9 (1.07%) SLA
9 8 (0.95%) DO-254
9 8 (0.95%) ISO 9001
9 8 (0.95%) NIST 800
10 6 (0.71%) PMO
11 4 (0.48%) Cyber Essentials
11 4 (0.48%) Cyber Essentials PLUS
11 4 (0.48%) JSP 440
12 3 (0.36%) DO-160
13 2 (0.24%) ARP4761
13 2 (0.24%) MIL-STD-1553
System Software
1 22 (2.61%) Active Directory
2 17 (2.02%) Firmware
3 16 (1.90%) Docker
4 10 (1.19%) VMware Infrastructure
5 7 (0.83%) Hyper-V
6 6 (0.71%) Embedded Firmware
7 3 (0.36%) vSphere
8 2 (0.24%) Virtual Machines
8 2 (0.24%) VMware ESXi
9 1 (0.12%) IAG
9 1 (0.12%) NFS
Systems Management
1 25 (2.97%) Kubernetes
2 21 (2.49%) Ansible
3 7 (0.83%) Functional Safety
4 4 (0.48%) Grafana
5 3 (0.36%) Active Directory Federation Services
5 3 (0.36%) Check_MK
5 3 (0.36%) Istio
5 3 (0.36%) Jamf Pro
5 3 (0.36%) MOM
5 3 (0.36%) Podman
5 3 (0.36%) Red Hat Satellite
6 2 (0.24%) Argo
6 2 (0.24%) Prometheus
6 2 (0.24%) Single Sign-On
7 1 (0.12%) Nagios
7 1 (0.12%) PTC Integrity
7 1 (0.12%) RSA Archer
7 1 (0.12%) SolarWinds Orion
Vendors
1 92 (10.93%) Microsoft
2 75 (8.91%) SAP
3 27 (3.21%) EMC
4 16 (1.90%) Google
5 14 (1.66%) VMware
6 11 (1.31%) Xilinx
7 8 (0.95%) Red Hat
8 7 (0.83%) Altera
8 7 (0.83%) Intel
8 7 (0.83%) PTC
8 7 (0.83%) ServiceNow
9 6 (0.71%) Microsemi
9 6 (0.71%) Oracle
9 6 (0.71%) Siemens
10 5 (0.59%) Adobe
10 5 (0.59%) IBM
10 5 (0.59%) Palantir
11 4 (0.48%) Okta
11 4 (0.48%) Ping Identity
11 4 (0.48%) Workday