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 17 March 2026.

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

6 months to
17 Mar 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 14 16 14
Rank change year-on-year +2 -2 +3
Contract jobs requiring an Architect 4,574 2,985 4,408
As % of all contract jobs in the UK 10.59% 10.17% 9.91%
As % of the Job Titles category 11.53% 10.94% 10.67%
Number of daily rates quoted 3,012 1,932 2,835
10th Percentile £463 £475 £500
25th Percentile £513 £541 £563
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £620 £625 £650
Median % change year-on-year -0.80% -3.85% -1.89%
75th Percentile £720 £725 £738
90th Percentile £800 £800 £800
UK excluding London median daily rate £600 £624 £650
% change year-on-year -3.89% -3.96% -
Number of hourly rates quoted 105 35 43
10th Percentile £49.40 £58.95 £50.92
25th Percentile £60.00 £63.75 £60.00
Median hourly rate £71.27 £72.50 £76.53
Median % change year-on-year -1.70% -5.27% +9.33%
75th Percentile £89.00 £83.63 £87.53
90th Percentile £95.00 £87.50 £95.00
UK excluding London median hourly rate £71.27 £73.31 £78.90
% change year-on-year -2.78% -7.08% +12.71%

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 39,673 27,289 41,313
% of contract IT jobs with a recognized job title 91.89% 92.94% 92.87%
Number of daily rates quoted 24,785 17,711 27,109
10th Percentile £313 £300 £272
25th Percentile £410 £406 £406
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £525 £525
Median % change year-on-year -4.76% - -4.11%
75th Percentile £613 £638 £638
90th Percentile £720 £738 £738
UK excluding London median daily rate £480 £475 £485
% change year-on-year +1.05% -2.06% -3.00%
Number of hourly rates quoted 2,471 884 2,499
10th Percentile £15.00 £15.25 £12.98
25th Percentile £19.00 £21.04 £16.25
Median hourly rate £35.71 £33.00 £32.90
Median % change year-on-year +8.21% +0.32% -22.60%
75th Percentile £65.00 £65.00 £59.95
90th Percentile £75.79 £77.41 £71.25
UK excluding London median hourly rate £35.00 £32.50 £32.70
% change year-on-year +7.69% -0.60% -19.44%

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 17 March 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 17 March 2026.

Hourly rate histogram for Architect in the UK

Architect
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 Architect within the UK over the 6 months to 17 March 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 +1 3,915 £625 - 1,071
UK excluding London +6 2,197 £600 -3.89% 844
London -2 1,752 £625 -3.85% 421
Work from Home +1 1,272 £610 -2.40% 567
South East +4 675 £625 - 273
North of England +1 569 £600 - 187
Midlands -1 387 £575 -4.17% 102
North West 0 322 £600 - 87
West Midlands -1 290 £600 -3.61% 59
South West +1 265 £700 +14.29% 118
Yorkshire +8 224 £563 -6.25% 70
East of England +13 165 £540 -13.60% 82
Scotland +22 146 £650 +4.00% 56
East Midlands -3 93 £513 -8.48% 42
North East -2 29 £625 - 33
Wales +3 27 £538 -0.46% 33
Northern Ireland +3 11 £500 -26.47% 7

Architect Skill Set
Top 30 Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities

For the 6 months to 17 March 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 1,446 (31.61%) Security Cleared
2 1,173 (25.64%) Azure
3 1,024 (22.39%) SC Cleared
4 972 (21.25%) AWS
5 665 (14.54%) Roadmaps
6 637 (13.93%) Microsoft
7 597 (13.05%) Migration
8 584 (12.77%) Agile
9 556 (12.16%) Stakeholder Management
10 518 (11.32%) DevOps
11 478 (10.45%) Enterprise Architecture
12 473 (10.34%) CI/CD
13 445 (9.73%) Stakeholder Engagement
14 437 (9.55%) Data Modelling
15 432 (9.44%) TOGAF
16 415 (9.07%) Technical Leadership
17 396 (8.66%) AI
18 388 (8.48%) Analytics
19 383 (8.37%) Problem-Solving
20 371 (8.11%) GCP
21 367 (8.02%) Data Architecture
22 351 (7.67%) Integration Patterns
23 339 (7.41%) Python
24 331 (7.24%) Architectural Patterns
25 330 (7.21%) Microservices
26 307 (6.71%) DV Cleared
27 282 (6.17%) Terraform
28 281 (6.14%) Architectural Design
29 263 (5.75%) Cybersecurity
30 257 (5.62%) Data Governance

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
1 122 (2.67%) Confluence
2 119 (2.60%) SharePoint
3 63 (1.38%) Microsoft Exchange
4 34 (0.74%) SAS
5 25 (0.55%) CMS
6 24 (0.52%) Apache Spark
7 19 (0.42%) Apache Airflow
8 17 (0.37%) Apache
9 16 (0.35%) Anypoint
9 16 (0.35%) ArcGIS
10 15 (0.33%) Appian
10 15 (0.33%) WebLogic
11 13 (0.28%) nginx
12 11 (0.24%) OpenStack
13 10 (0.22%) Adobe Experience Manager
14 9 (0.20%) Smallworld
15 7 (0.15%) Ethereum
15 7 (0.15%) GeoServer
15 7 (0.15%) Oracle SOA Suite
15 7 (0.15%) Skype for Business
Applications
1 50 (1.09%) Microsoft Office
2 31 (0.68%) Microsoft Project
3 29 (0.63%) Microsoft PowerPoint
4 25 (0.55%) Microsoft Excel
5 21 (0.46%) MS Visio
6 7 (0.15%) Chatbot
7 2 (0.044%) PlantUML
8 1 (0.022%) ArchiCAD
8 1 (0.022%) AutoCAD
8 1 (0.022%) OrCAD
8 1 (0.022%) Siemens NX
8 1 (0.022%) Spreadsheet
8 1 (0.022%) Windchill
Business Applications
1 119 (2.60%) SAP S/4HANA
2 45 (0.98%) Sparx Enterprise Architect
3 24 (0.52%) Dynamics CRM
4 23 (0.50%) Workday HCM
5 19 (0.42%) Payment Gateway
6 17 (0.37%) Oracle EBS
7 16 (0.35%) Salesforce CRM
8 12 (0.26%) NetSuite
8 12 (0.26%) SAP EWM
9 10 (0.22%) SAP ERP
9 10 (0.22%) SAP PM
10 9 (0.20%) Maximo
10 9 (0.20%) Oracle Receivables
10 9 (0.20%) Remedy ITSM
11 8 (0.17%) Teamcenter
12 7 (0.15%) R3 Corda
12 7 (0.15%) SAP PP
13 6 (0.13%) Distributed Ledger
13 6 (0.13%) Oracle ERP
13 6 (0.13%) SAP QM
Cloud Services
1 1,173 (25.64%) Azure
2 972 (21.25%) AWS
3 371 (8.11%) GCP
4 182 (3.98%) Power Platform
5 167 (3.65%) Serverless
6 166 (3.63%) Entra ID
7 146 (3.19%) SaaS
8 142 (3.10%) Microsoft 365
9 105 (2.30%) GitHub
9 105 (2.30%) IaaS
10 97 (2.12%) Azure DevOps
11 91 (1.99%) PaaS
12 89 (1.95%) AWS Lambda
13 76 (1.66%) AWS CloudFormation
13 76 (1.66%) Microsoft Purview
13 76 (1.66%) OpenShift
14 75 (1.64%) Amazon S3
15 74 (1.62%) Dynamics 365
16 70 (1.53%) Azure Synapse Analytics
17 69 (1.51%) Virtual Private Cloud
Communications & Networking
1 232 (5.07%) Firewall
2 166 (3.63%) Network Security
3 137 (3.00%) WAN
4 118 (2.58%) VPN
5 116 (2.54%) DNS
6 82 (1.79%) LAN
7 79 (1.73%) SD-WAN
8 38 (0.83%) BGP
9 34 (0.74%) DHCP
10 31 (0.68%) Wi-Fi
11 28 (0.61%) OSPF
12 27 (0.59%) MPLS
13 26 (0.57%) TCP/IP
14 23 (0.50%) SAN
15 22 (0.48%) VLAN
15 22 (0.48%) VXLAN
16 21 (0.46%) Kerberos
16 21 (0.46%) Wireless
17 20 (0.44%) Internet
18 18 (0.39%) SSL
Database & Business Intelligence
1 157 (3.43%) Data Warehouse
2 142 (3.10%) Metadata
3 135 (2.95%) Power BI
4 101 (2.21%) Data Lake
5 82 (1.79%) SQL Server
6 70 (1.53%) PostgreSQL
7 58 (1.27%) NoSQL
8 52 (1.14%) Azure SQL Database
9 50 (1.09%) Tableau
10 43 (0.94%) Oracle Database
11 36 (0.79%) Big Data
12 31 (0.68%) Amazon Redshift
13 26 (0.57%) GIS
14 24 (0.52%) DynamoDB
15 23 (0.50%) Amazon Athena
15 23 (0.50%) Delta Lake
15 23 (0.50%) Relational Database
16 21 (0.46%) Amazon Aurora
16 21 (0.46%) Metadata Repository
17 19 (0.42%) Electronic Patient Records
Development Applications
1 132 (2.89%) JIRA
2 96 (2.10%) Jenkins
3 52 (1.14%) GitLab
4 47 (1.03%) Git
5 22 (0.48%) ERwin
6 11 (0.24%) Bitbucket
7 10 (0.22%) SonarQube
8 8 (0.17%) Artifactory
8 8 (0.17%) MLflow
9 6 (0.13%) REST Assured
10 5 (0.11%) Cucumber
10 5 (0.11%) Oracle Forms
10 5 (0.11%) Postman
10 5 (0.11%) Selenium
11 4 (0.087%) PowerDesigner
11 4 (0.087%) Snyk
11 4 (0.087%) Sonatype Nexus
11 4 (0.087%) Terragrunt
12 3 (0.066%) ER Studio
12 3 (0.066%) Maven
General
1 1,010 (22.08%) Social Skills
2 703 (15.37%) Finance
3 549 (12.00%) Public Sector
4 318 (6.95%) Analytical Skills
5 260 (5.68%) Banking
6 151 (3.30%) Documentation Skills
7 102 (2.23%) Influencing Skills
7 102 (2.23%) Legal
8 88 (1.92%) Retail
9 86 (1.88%) Telecoms
10 85 (1.86%) Military
11 77 (1.68%) Presentation Skills
12 68 (1.49%) Marketing
13 61 (1.33%) Manufacturing
14 41 (0.90%) Law
15 39 (0.85%) Financial Institution
16 38 (0.83%) Billing
16 38 (0.83%) Inclusion and Diversity
17 31 (0.68%) Investment Banking
18 23 (0.50%) Local Government
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 230 (5.03%) REST
2 168 (3.67%) Middleware
3 122 (2.67%) SOAP
4 96 (2.10%) Kafka
5 95 (2.08%) .NET
6 81 (1.77%) OpenID
7 77 (1.68%) LDAP
8 75 (1.64%) OAuth
9 66 (1.44%) SAML
10 48 (1.05%) JSON
11 46 (1.01%) React
12 45 (0.98%) OAuth2
13 43 (0.94%) AngularJS
14 38 (0.83%) RESTful
15 33 (0.72%) SailPoint
16 31 (0.68%) Web Services
17 30 (0.66%) Oracle Fusion
18 28 (0.61%) Spring
19 27 (0.59%) Node.js
19 27 (0.59%) PySpark
Miscellaneous
1 357 (7.80%) Cloud Native
2 155 (3.39%) Data Centre
3 147 (3.21%) Product Ownership
4 130 (2.84%) Onboarding
5 115 (2.51%) Legacy Systems
6 101 (2.21%) Enterprise Software
7 92 (2.01%) PKI
8 89 (1.95%) Hybrid Cloud
9 88 (1.92%) Management Information System
10 85 (1.86%) Distributed Systems
11 82 (1.79%) Public Cloud
12 74 (1.62%) Security Posture
13 69 (1.51%) Data Protection Act
14 61 (1.33%) CMDB
15 60 (1.31%) Operational Technology
16 46 (1.01%) AI Agents
16 46 (1.01%) Self-Motivation
17 44 (0.96%) Data Structures
18 42 (0.92%) NHS
19 34 (0.74%) Private Cloud
Operating Systems
1 184 (4.02%) Windows
2 120 (2.62%) Linux
3 42 (0.92%) Windows Server
4 33 (0.72%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
5 28 (0.61%) Android
5 28 (0.61%) Apple iOS
6 16 (0.35%) Windows 7
7 15 (0.33%) Windows 10
8 13 (0.28%) VMS
9 12 (0.26%) Windows Server 2016
10 11 (0.24%) Unix
11 10 (0.22%) zOS
12 9 (0.20%) Mac OS
12 9 (0.20%) Windows Server 2019
13 4 (0.087%) Ubuntu
14 3 (0.066%) Windows Server 2012
15 2 (0.044%) CentOS
16 1 (0.022%) Data ONTAP
16 1 (0.022%) Solaris
16 1 (0.022%) SUSE
Processes & Methodologies
1 665 (14.54%) Roadmaps
2 597 (13.05%) Migration
3 584 (12.77%) Agile
4 556 (12.16%) Stakeholder Management
5 518 (11.32%) DevOps
6 478 (10.45%) Enterprise Architecture
7 473 (10.34%) CI/CD
8 445 (9.73%) Stakeholder Engagement
9 437 (9.55%) Data Modelling
10 432 (9.44%) TOGAF
11 415 (9.07%) Technical Leadership
12 396 (8.66%) AI
13 388 (8.48%) Analytics
14 383 (8.37%) Problem-Solving
15 367 (8.02%) Data Architecture
16 351 (7.67%) Integration Patterns
17 331 (7.24%) Architectural Patterns
18 330 (7.21%) Microservices
19 281 (6.14%) Architectural Design
20 263 (5.75%) Cybersecurity
Programming Languages
1 339 (7.41%) Python
2 250 (5.47%) SQL
3 184 (4.02%) PowerShell
4 159 (3.48%) Java
5 64 (1.40%) C#
5 64 (1.40%) JavaScript
6 44 (0.96%) Bicep
7 39 (0.85%) Bash
8 31 (0.68%) TypeScript
9 20 (0.44%) PL/SQL
10 19 (0.42%) Apex Code
11 14 (0.31%) Kusto Query Language
12 13 (0.28%) Ruby
13 12 (0.26%) Kotlin
13 12 (0.26%) R
13 12 (0.26%) Scala
14 10 (0.22%) T-SQL
15 8 (0.17%) PHP
15 8 (0.17%) VB
16 7 (0.15%) Shell Script
Qualifications
1 1,446 (31.61%) Security Cleared
2 1,024 (22.39%) SC Cleared
3 307 (6.71%) DV Cleared
4 208 (4.55%) Degree
5 123 (2.69%) AWS Certification
6 121 (2.65%) CISSP
7 120 (2.62%) TOGAF Certification
8 119 (2.60%) Azure Certification
9 83 (1.81%) BPSS Clearance
10 82 (1.79%) Cisco Certification
11 79 (1.73%) Computer Science Degree
12 73 (1.60%) CISM
13 61 (1.33%) AWS Certified Solutions Architect
14 56 (1.22%) Master's Degree
15 53 (1.16%) Microsoft Certification
16 49 (1.07%) CCNP
17 32 (0.70%) ITIL Certification
18 31 (0.68%) (ISC)2 CCSP
18 31 (0.68%) CCIE
19 30 (0.66%) ISEB
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 195 (4.26%) GDPR
2 165 (3.61%) NIST
3 154 (3.37%) Data Quality
4 138 (3.02%) ISO/IEC 27001
5 100 (2.19%) NCSC
6 61 (1.33%) QA
7 59 (1.29%) PCI DSS
8 38 (0.83%) COBIT
9 35 (0.77%) Accessibility
10 31 (0.68%) GRC
11 28 (0.61%) ISO 20022
12 25 (0.55%) Cyber Essentials
13 20 (0.44%) JSP 440
14 18 (0.39%) HMG Security Policy Framework
15 15 (0.33%) HIPAA
15 15 (0.33%) MiFID
16 14 (0.31%) HL7
17 13 (0.28%) FINRA
17 13 (0.28%) Sarbanes-Oxley
17 13 (0.28%) SEPA
System Software
1 188 (4.11%) Active Directory
2 124 (2.71%) Docker
3 101 (2.21%) VMware Infrastructure
4 68 (1.49%) VMware NSX
5 37 (0.81%) vSphere
6 24 (0.52%) Virtual Desktop
7 15 (0.33%) Hyper-V
8 14 (0.31%) Virtual Machines
9 11 (0.24%) Oracle RAC
9 11 (0.24%) VMware ESXi
10 9 (0.20%) Varnish
11 8 (0.17%) Squid
11 8 (0.17%) vCloud
12 7 (0.15%) BitLocker
13 5 (0.11%) RACF
14 4 (0.087%) Firmware
14 4 (0.087%) NFS
15 3 (0.066%) Active Directory Lightweight Directory Services
15 3 (0.066%) IAG
15 3 (0.066%) Postfix
Systems Management
1 282 (6.17%) Terraform
2 232 (5.07%) Kubernetes
3 117 (2.56%) Ansible
4 57 (1.25%) Single Sign-On
5 40 (0.87%) Microsoft Intune
6 35 (0.77%) Grafana
7 32 (0.70%) FortiGate
7 32 (0.70%) vCenter Server
8 30 (0.66%) OPNET
9 28 (0.61%) Prometheus
10 22 (0.48%) SCCM
11 18 (0.39%) Active Directory Federation Services
11 18 (0.39%) Argo
12 15 (0.33%) WMI
13 10 (0.22%) Istio
14 7 (0.15%) Consul
15 6 (0.13%) Kibana
15 6 (0.13%) Puppet
16 5 (0.11%) Progress Chef
17 4 (0.087%) Oracle RMAN
Vendors
1 637 (13.93%) Microsoft
2 256 (5.60%) ServiceNow
3 244 (5.33%) SAP
4 201 (4.39%) Oracle
5 183 (4.00%) VMware
6 182 (3.98%) Salesforce
7 147 (3.21%) Databricks
8 130 (2.84%) Cisco
9 107 (2.34%) Google
10 90 (1.97%) CyberArk
11 70 (1.53%) MuleSoft
12 66 (1.44%) Palo Alto
13 63 (1.38%) Splunk
14 55 (1.20%) Red Hat
15 50 (1.09%) Remedy
16 49 (1.07%) Atlassian
16 49 (1.07%) Centrify
16 49 (1.07%) Workday
17 44 (0.96%) IBM
17 44 (0.96%) Sparx