Architect Contract Job Trends

Architect
UK

The median Architect daily rate in the UK is £620, according to job vacancies posted in the 6 months leading up to 18 June 2026.

The table below compares current contractor rates and summary statistics with the previous two years.

6 months to
18 Jun 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 9 17 11
Rank change year-on-year +8 -6 +5
Contract jobs requiring an Architect 5,556 2,897 4,580
As % of all contract jobs in the UK 11.02% 9.73% 10.44%
As % of the Job Titles category 11.94% 10.55% 11.24%
Number of daily rates quoted 3,658 1,858 2,933
10th Percentile £463 £463 £490
25th Percentile £515 £537 £550
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £620 £625 £650
Median % change year-on-year -0.80% -3.85% -
75th Percentile £725 £719 £738
90th Percentile £800 £799 £825
UK excluding London median daily rate £616 £600 £650
% change year-on-year +2.71% -7.69% -
Number of hourly rates quoted 146 29 98
10th Percentile £47.70 £49.79 £59.25
25th Percentile £60.00 £62.50 £60.00
Median hourly rate £65.00 £72.50 £70.00
Median % change year-on-year -10.34% +3.57% -
75th Percentile £78.75 £82.25 £86.66
90th Percentile £97.50 £89.71 £90.00
UK excluding London median hourly rate £65.00 £73.25 £70.00
% change year-on-year -11.26% +4.64% -

All Contract IT Job Roles
UK

For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all contract IT job vacancies. 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 with a recognized job title 46,545 27,461 40,758
% of contract IT jobs with a recognized job title 92.35% 92.26% 92.92%
Number of daily rates quoted 28,281 17,668 26,127
10th Percentile £325 £289 £280
25th Percentile £413 £402 £407
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £515 £500 £525
Median % change year-on-year +3.00% -4.76% -2.33%
75th Percentile £625 £625 £638
90th Percentile £725 £738 £750
UK excluding London median daily rate £500 £475 £488
% change year-on-year +5.26% -2.56% -2.50%
Number of hourly rates quoted 3,104 1,179 2,967
10th Percentile £15.24 £13.97 £12.86
25th Percentile £20.79 £17.79 £16.37
Median hourly rate £43.61 £27.50 £37.50
Median % change year-on-year +58.56% -26.67% -16.67%
75th Percentile £67.50 £57.50 £62.01
90th Percentile £80.00 £75.00 £73.75
UK excluding London median hourly rate £45.00 £25.15 £40.00
% change year-on-year +78.93% -37.13% -1.45%

Architect
Job Vacancy Trend

Historical trend showing the proportion of contract IT job postings featuring 'Architect' in the job title relative to all contract IT jobs advertised.

Architect job vacancy trend in the UK

Architect
Daily Rate Trend

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for Architect job vacancies in the UK.

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for Architect job vacancies in the UK

Architect
Daily Rate Histogram

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing Architect over the 6 months to 18 June 2026.

Daily rate histogram for Architect in the UK

Architect
Hourly Rate Trend

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for Architect job vacancies in the UK.

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for Architect job vacancies in the UK

Architect
Hourly Rate Histogram

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing Architect over the 6 months to 18 June 2026.

Hourly rate histogram for Architect in the UK

Architect
Top 18 Contract Job Locations

The table below looks at the demand and provides a guide to the median contractor rates quoted in IT jobs citing Architect within the UK over the 6 months to 18 June 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 +7 4,720 £620 -0.80% 1,856
UK excluding London +9 2,476 £616 +2.71% 1,056
London +5 2,291 £625 -3.85% 933
Work from Home +4 1,508 £600 -0.04% 789
South East +6 698 £625 +4.17% 265
North of England +7 695 £600 - 295
Midlands +3 442 £613 +3.07% 113
North West +4 368 £612 +2.64% 153
West Midlands -1 313 £625 +4.17% 85
South West +4 269 £640 +4.49% 168
Yorkshire +8 268 £558 -7.00% 84
East of England +21 211 £575 -4.17% 84
Scotland +11 160 £650 +4.00% 70
East Midlands +5 123 £575 +15.00% 28
North East +5 66 £575 -4.17% 59
Wales -1 32 £600 +26.32% 37
Northern Ireland +5 7 £475 -28.30% 32
Channel Islands 0 3 £575 -22.56%

Architect Skill Set
Top 30 Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities

For the 6 months to 18 June 2026, Architect contract job roles required the following skills and capabilities in order of popularity. The figures indicate the absolute number of co-occurrences and as a proportion of all contract job ads featuring Architect in the job title.

1 1,660 (29.88%) Security Cleared
2 1,367 (24.60%) Azure
3 1,250 (22.50%) SC Cleared
4 1,177 (21.18%) AWS
5 788 (14.18%) Migration
6 776 (13.97%) Roadmaps
7 723 (13.01%) Microsoft
8 675 (12.15%) Stakeholder Management
9 642 (11.56%) Agile
10 628 (11.30%) DevOps
11 597 (10.75%) CI/CD
12 576 (10.37%) Enterprise Architecture
13 573 (10.31%) AI
14 529 (9.52%) Stakeholder Engagement
15 524 (9.43%) Data Modelling
16 521 (9.38%) Technical Leadership
17 510 (9.18%) Integration Patterns
18 468 (8.42%) Data Architecture
19 456 (8.21%) Architectural Patterns
20 448 (8.06%) Analytics
21 431 (7.76%) TOGAF
22 419 (7.54%) Microservices
23 406 (7.31%) GCP
24 365 (6.57%) Problem-Solving
25 357 (6.43%) Architectural Design
26 342 (6.16%) Security Architecture
27 340 (6.12%) Infrastructure as Code
28 331 (5.96%) Cybersecurity
29 330 (5.94%) Event-Driven
30 320 (5.76%) Python

Architect Skill Set
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
1 119 (2.14%) SharePoint
2 87 (1.57%) Confluence
3 54 (0.97%) Microsoft Exchange
4 45 (0.81%) SAS
5 33 (0.59%) Apache Spark
6 30 (0.54%) Apache
7 23 (0.41%) Apache Airflow
8 18 (0.32%) Palantir Foundry
9 16 (0.29%) Appian
10 15 (0.27%) CMS
10 15 (0.27%) WebLogic
11 14 (0.25%) nginx
12 13 (0.23%) Anypoint
13 11 (0.20%) OpenStack
14 10 (0.18%) Adobe Experience Manager
15 9 (0.16%) ArcGIS
15 9 (0.16%) Camunda
16 7 (0.13%) Tomcat
17 6 (0.11%) NetWeaver
17 6 (0.11%) Sitecore CMS
Applications
1 23 (0.41%) Microsoft PowerPoint
2 18 (0.32%) MS Visio
3 13 (0.23%) Microsoft Excel
4 10 (0.18%) Chatbot
4 10 (0.18%) Microsoft Office
5 7 (0.13%) Navisworks
5 7 (0.13%) Revit
5 7 (0.13%) Spreadsheet
6 3 (0.054%) PlantUML
6 3 (0.054%) Windchill
7 1 (0.018%) ArchiCAD
7 1 (0.018%) Microsoft Project
7 1 (0.018%) OrCAD
Business Applications
1 146 (2.63%) SAP S/4HANA
2 40 (0.72%) Sparx Enterprise Architect
3 25 (0.45%) Dynamics CRM
4 22 (0.40%) Payment Gateway
5 17 (0.31%) SAP ERP
6 15 (0.27%) Oracle EBS
6 15 (0.27%) Oracle ERP
7 13 (0.23%) Teamcenter
8 11 (0.20%) Remedy ITSM
9 9 (0.16%) SAP BRIM
10 8 (0.14%) Oracle Retail
10 8 (0.14%) SAP IBP
11 7 (0.13%) Oracle Payables
11 7 (0.13%) Salesforce CRM
11 7 (0.13%) SAP MDG
11 7 (0.13%) Workday HCM
12 6 (0.11%) Maximo
12 6 (0.11%) SAP GRC
13 5 (0.090%) SAP EWM
13 5 (0.090%) SAP Oil and Gas
Cloud Services
1 1,367 (24.60%) Azure
2 1,177 (21.18%) AWS
3 406 (7.31%) GCP
4 266 (4.79%) Power Platform
5 204 (3.67%) Serverless
6 185 (3.33%) Entra ID
7 183 (3.29%) SaaS
8 140 (2.52%) Microsoft 365
9 135 (2.43%) GitHub
10 117 (2.11%) PaaS
11 110 (1.98%) Azure DevOps
12 107 (1.93%) Dynamics 365
13 97 (1.75%) AWS Lambda
14 91 (1.64%) Snowflake
15 89 (1.60%) IaaS
16 82 (1.48%) Amazon S3
17 66 (1.19%) Amazon EKS
18 65 (1.17%) Azure Data Factory
18 65 (1.17%) OpenShift
19 64 (1.15%) GitHub Actions
Communications & Networking
1 206 (3.71%) Firewall
2 179 (3.22%) Network Security
3 118 (2.12%) VPN
3 118 (2.12%) WAN
4 112 (2.02%) DNS
5 78 (1.40%) LAN
6 65 (1.17%) SD-WAN
7 41 (0.74%) BGP
8 40 (0.72%) DHCP
9 33 (0.59%) Wireless
10 32 (0.58%) MPLS
10 32 (0.58%) TCP/IP
10 32 (0.58%) VLAN
11 31 (0.56%) OSPF
12 29 (0.52%) SAN
13 27 (0.49%) NAS
14 25 (0.45%) Structured Cabling
15 22 (0.40%) IPsec
16 21 (0.38%) BIG-IP
16 21 (0.38%) VXLAN
Database & Business Intelligence
1 190 (3.42%) Power BI
2 156 (2.81%) Data Lake
3 153 (2.75%) Metadata
4 146 (2.63%) Data Warehouse
5 75 (1.35%) NoSQL
6 70 (1.26%) PostgreSQL
7 67 (1.21%) SQL Server
8 48 (0.86%) Azure SQL Database
9 42 (0.76%) Big Data
10 37 (0.67%) Oracle Database
11 36 (0.65%) Amazon RDS
12 34 (0.61%) Tableau
13 31 (0.56%) Delta Lake
14 30 (0.54%) Amazon Redshift
14 30 (0.54%) BigQuery
15 24 (0.43%) MongoDB
15 24 (0.43%) Relational Database
16 21 (0.38%) Amazon Athena
16 21 (0.38%) Amazon Aurora
17 20 (0.36%) Electronic Patient Records
Development Applications
1 109 (1.96%) JIRA
2 89 (1.60%) Jenkins
3 65 (1.17%) Git
4 42 (0.76%) GitLab
5 24 (0.43%) ERwin
6 12 (0.22%) SonarQube
7 10 (0.18%) Artifactory
8 9 (0.16%) Bitbucket
9 8 (0.14%) MLflow
9 8 (0.14%) Postman
10 7 (0.13%) REST Assured
11 6 (0.11%) Hudson
11 6 (0.11%) Selenium
12 5 (0.090%) Cucumber
12 5 (0.090%) JMeter
12 5 (0.090%) JUnit
12 5 (0.090%) Maven
12 5 (0.090%) PowerDesigner
13 4 (0.072%) Claude Code
13 4 (0.072%) Sonatype Nexus
General
1 1,031 (18.56%) Social Skills
2 858 (15.44%) Finance
3 622 (11.20%) Public Sector
4 314 (5.65%) Banking
5 271 (4.88%) Analytical Skills
6 193 (3.47%) Retail
7 152 (2.74%) Documentation Skills
8 138 (2.48%) Legal
9 124 (2.23%) Influencing Skills
10 98 (1.76%) Manufacturing
11 95 (1.71%) Telecoms
12 58 (1.04%) Law
13 50 (0.90%) Marketing
14 49 (0.88%) Military
15 47 (0.85%) Billing
16 46 (0.83%) Financial Institution
17 45 (0.81%) Presentation Skills
18 42 (0.76%) Inclusion and Diversity
19 40 (0.72%) Aerospace
20 35 (0.63%) Investment Banking
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 268 (4.82%) REST
2 205 (3.69%) Middleware
3 134 (2.41%) .NET
4 129 (2.32%) SOAP
5 114 (2.05%) Kafka
6 99 (1.78%) OAuth
7 95 (1.71%) OpenID
8 78 (1.40%) LDAP
9 76 (1.37%) SAML
10 63 (1.13%) Oracle Fusion
11 60 (1.08%) OAuth2
12 57 (1.03%) React
13 54 (0.97%) RESTful
14 46 (0.83%) SailPoint
15 43 (0.77%) JSON
16 38 (0.68%) AngularJS
16 38 (0.68%) Web Services
17 34 (0.61%) Node.js
18 29 (0.52%) .NET Framework
18 29 (0.52%) GraphQL
Miscellaneous
1 465 (8.37%) Cloud Native
2 186 (3.35%) Data Centre
3 161 (2.90%) Management Information System
4 145 (2.61%) Product Ownership
5 141 (2.54%) Onboarding
6 130 (2.34%) Legacy Systems
7 125 (2.25%) Distributed Systems
8 119 (2.14%) Enterprise Software
9 112 (2.02%) Hybrid Cloud
10 93 (1.67%) Public Cloud
11 90 (1.62%) Operational Technology
12 88 (1.58%) Data Protection Act
13 82 (1.48%) CMDB
13 82 (1.48%) Security Posture
14 81 (1.46%) AI Agents
15 49 (0.88%) Enterprise Cloud
16 46 (0.83%) Data Structures
17 44 (0.79%) Greenfield Project
18 43 (0.77%) NHS
19 42 (0.76%) Private Cloud
Operating Systems
1 151 (2.72%) Windows
2 96 (1.73%) Linux
3 43 (0.77%) Windows Server
4 37 (0.67%) Android
5 36 (0.65%) Apple iOS
6 24 (0.43%) Unix
7 18 (0.32%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
8 10 (0.18%) zOS
9 9 (0.16%) VMS
9 9 (0.16%) Windows Server 2016
10 7 (0.13%) Windows Server 2019
11 6 (0.11%) Windows 10
12 5 (0.090%) Data ONTAP
12 5 (0.090%) Mac OS
12 5 (0.090%) Ubuntu
12 5 (0.090%) Windows 7
13 4 (0.072%) Alpine Linux
13 4 (0.072%) Solaris
14 3 (0.054%) AIX
14 3 (0.054%) Windows Server 2012
Processes & Methodologies
1 788 (14.18%) Migration
2 776 (13.97%) Roadmaps
3 675 (12.15%) Stakeholder Management
4 642 (11.56%) Agile
5 628 (11.30%) DevOps
6 597 (10.75%) CI/CD
7 576 (10.37%) Enterprise Architecture
8 573 (10.31%) AI
9 529 (9.52%) Stakeholder Engagement
10 524 (9.43%) Data Modelling
11 521 (9.38%) Technical Leadership
12 510 (9.18%) Integration Patterns
13 468 (8.42%) Data Architecture
14 456 (8.21%) Architectural Patterns
15 448 (8.06%) Analytics
16 431 (7.76%) TOGAF
17 419 (7.54%) Microservices
18 365 (6.57%) Problem-Solving
19 357 (6.43%) Architectural Design
20 342 (6.16%) Security Architecture
Programming Languages
1 320 (5.76%) Python
2 279 (5.02%) SQL
3 238 (4.28%) Java
4 146 (2.63%) PowerShell
5 104 (1.87%) JavaScript
6 65 (1.17%) C#
7 58 (1.04%) Bicep
8 43 (0.77%) TypeScript
9 36 (0.65%) Bash
10 24 (0.43%) Apex Code
11 21 (0.38%) Ruby
12 15 (0.27%) Scala
13 13 (0.23%) Kotlin
13 13 (0.23%) PL/SQL
14 11 (0.20%) Kusto Query Language
15 9 (0.16%) T-SQL
16 8 (0.14%) Shell Script
16 8 (0.14%) VBA
17 7 (0.13%) ABAP
17 7 (0.13%) Data Analysis Expressions
Qualifications
1 1,660 (29.88%) Security Cleared
2 1,250 (22.50%) SC Cleared
3 294 (5.29%) DV Cleared
4 190 (3.42%) Degree
5 120 (2.16%) Azure Certification
6 118 (2.12%) CISSP
7 112 (2.02%) BPSS Clearance
8 108 (1.94%) AWS Certification
9 101 (1.82%) Cisco Certification
10 81 (1.46%) Computer Science Degree
11 79 (1.42%) TOGAF Certification
12 64 (1.15%) CISM
13 48 (0.86%) CCNP
14 47 (0.85%) Master's Degree
15 45 (0.81%) Microsoft Certification
16 43 (0.77%) (ISC)2 CCSP
17 37 (0.67%) AWS Certified Solutions Architect
18 27 (0.49%) CCSP
19 22 (0.40%) DBS Check
20 19 (0.34%) GIAC
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 198 (3.56%) NIST
2 183 (3.29%) GDPR
3 162 (2.92%) Data Quality
4 152 (2.74%) ISO/IEC 27001
5 118 (2.12%) NCSC
6 67 (1.21%) QA
7 43 (0.77%) PCI DSS
8 41 (0.74%) GRC
9 35 (0.63%) Accessibility
10 28 (0.50%) ISO 20022
11 24 (0.43%) NIST 800
11 24 (0.43%) Sarbanes-Oxley
12 23 (0.41%) SEPA
13 21 (0.38%) Cyber Essentials
14 18 (0.32%) COBIT
14 18 (0.32%) HL7
15 16 (0.29%) IFRS
16 14 (0.25%) HIPAA
17 13 (0.23%) FINRA
17 13 (0.23%) MiFID
System Software
1 181 (3.26%) Active Directory
2 105 (1.89%) Docker
3 95 (1.71%) VMware Infrastructure
4 64 (1.15%) VMware NSX
5 28 (0.50%) vSphere
6 24 (0.43%) Hyper-V
6 24 (0.43%) Virtual Desktop
7 17 (0.31%) Virtual Machines
8 12 (0.22%) Varnish
9 11 (0.20%) VMware ESXi
10 10 (0.18%) Oracle RAC
11 9 (0.16%) NFS
11 9 (0.16%) Squid
12 8 (0.14%) vCloud
13 7 (0.13%) Postfix
14 5 (0.090%) RACF
15 4 (0.072%) BitLocker
15 4 (0.072%) Sendmail
16 3 (0.054%) EMC RecoverPoint
16 3 (0.054%) SRDF
Systems Management
1 267 (4.81%) Terraform
2 251 (4.52%) Kubernetes
3 115 (2.07%) Ansible
4 50 (0.90%) Grafana
5 49 (0.88%) Single Sign-On
6 39 (0.70%) Microsoft Intune
6 39 (0.70%) Prometheus
7 32 (0.58%) FortiGate
8 26 (0.47%) vCenter Server
9 20 (0.36%) Argo
10 16 (0.29%) Active Directory Federation Services
11 14 (0.25%) SCCM
12 11 (0.20%) Istio
13 9 (0.16%) Jamf Pro
14 8 (0.14%) Progress Chef
15 7 (0.13%) Consul
15 7 (0.13%) HAProxy
15 7 (0.13%) Puppet
16 5 (0.090%) EMC VPLEX
17 4 (0.072%) SnapMirror
Vendors
1 723 (13.01%) Microsoft
2 320 (5.76%) SAP
3 300 (5.40%) ServiceNow
4 253 (4.55%) Oracle
5 234 (4.21%) Databricks
6 182 (3.28%) Salesforce
7 176 (3.17%) VMware
8 139 (2.50%) Cisco
9 120 (2.16%) Google
10 73 (1.31%) CyberArk
11 72 (1.30%) MuleSoft
12 63 (1.13%) Splunk
13 53 (0.95%) Palo Alto
14 52 (0.94%) Red Hat
15 46 (0.83%) OpenAI
16 44 (0.79%) Workday
17 43 (0.77%) IBM
18 42 (0.76%) Sparx
19 39 (0.70%) Ariba
19 39 (0.70%) Foundry