Architect Contract Job Trends

Architect
UK

The median Architect daily rate in the UK is £625, according to job vacancies posted in the 6 months leading up to 1 March 2026.

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

6 months to
1 Mar 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 17 15 14
Rank change year-on-year -2 -1 +3
Contract jobs requiring an Architect 4,271 3,108 4,383
As % of all contract jobs in the UK 10.29% 10.21% 9.81%
As % of the Job Titles category 11.20% 11.00% 10.56%
Number of daily rates quoted 2,829 1,941 2,818
10th Percentile £460 £480 £500
25th Percentile £513 £547 £563
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £625 £625 £650
Median % change year-on-year - -3.85% -
75th Percentile £725 £738 £738
90th Percentile £800 £800 £788
UK excluding London median daily rate £600 £625 £650
% change year-on-year -4.00% -3.85% -
Number of hourly rates quoted 85 32 43
10th Percentile £49.40 £58.43 £53.45
25th Percentile £60.00 £61.50 £61.25
Median hourly rate £70.00 £71.25 £76.53
Median % change year-on-year -1.75% -6.90% +9.33%
75th Percentile £85.00 £81.00 £87.53
90th Percentile £95.00 £87.33 £95.00
UK excluding London median hourly rate £70.36 £72.50 £80.00
% change year-on-year -2.96% -9.38% +14.29%

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 38,119 28,262 41,512
% of contract IT jobs with a recognized job title 91.82% 92.85% 92.95%
Number of daily rates quoted 23,936 17,829 27,270
10th Percentile £310 £290 £275
25th Percentile £409 £406 £408
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £525 £525
Median % change year-on-year -4.76% - -4.55%
75th Percentile £613 £638 £638
90th Percentile £721 £738 £738
UK excluding London median daily rate £481 £475 £488
% change year-on-year +1.32% -2.56% -2.50%
Number of hourly rates quoted 2,335 854 2,415
10th Percentile £14.71 £16.25 £13.05
25th Percentile £18.87 £21.46 £16.30
Median hourly rate £33.50 £34.06 £34.53
Median % change year-on-year -1.63% -1.38% -13.68%
75th Percentile £63.88 £64.73 £60.00
90th Percentile £75.00 £75.18 £72.00
UK excluding London median hourly rate £32.50 £32.50 £35.00
% change year-on-year - -7.14% -6.67%

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 1 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 1 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 1 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 3,669 £625 - 1,019
UK excluding London +5 2,059 £600 -4.00% 774
London -1 1,641 £630 -3.08% 396
Work from Home -3 1,187 £621 -0.60% 494
South East +6 626 £625 - 299
North of England -1 512 £575 -4.17% 146
Midlands -2 367 £575 -4.17% 122
North West -3 281 £600 - 85
West Midlands -2 275 £600 -1.15% 70
South West +1 262 £706 +12.96% 78
Yorkshire +1 212 £558 -2.62% 40
East of England +15 161 £550 -13.73% 62
Scotland +17 136 £650 +4.00% 51
East Midlands -5 90 £506 -7.95% 49
Wales +6 31 £600 +11.11% 25
North East -9 24 £625 -1.96% 23
Northern Ireland +4 10 £500 -26.47% 6

Architect Skill Set
Top 30 Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities

For the 6 months to 1 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 1,336 (31.28%) Security Cleared
2 1,090 (25.52%) Azure
3 955 (22.36%) SC Cleared
4 900 (21.07%) AWS
5 613 (14.35%) Roadmaps
6 605 (14.17%) Microsoft
7 556 (13.02%) Stakeholder Management
8 548 (12.83%) Migration
9 544 (12.74%) Agile
10 479 (11.22%) DevOps
11 466 (10.91%) Enterprise Architecture
12 425 (9.95%) TOGAF
13 419 (9.81%) CI/CD
13 419 (9.81%) Data Modelling
14 407 (9.53%) Stakeholder Engagement
15 389 (9.11%) Technical Leadership
16 372 (8.71%) Analytics
17 368 (8.62%) Problem-Solving
18 362 (8.48%) AI
19 350 (8.19%) Data Architecture
20 349 (8.17%) GCP
21 322 (7.54%) Python
22 311 (7.28%) Integration Patterns
23 300 (7.02%) Microservices
24 281 (6.58%) DV Cleared
25 280 (6.56%) Architectural Patterns
26 261 (6.11%) Terraform
27 249 (5.83%) Architectural Design
27 249 (5.83%) ServiceNow
28 243 (5.69%) Cybersecurity

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
1 113 (2.65%) Confluence
2 110 (2.58%) SharePoint
3 63 (1.48%) Microsoft Exchange
4 33 (0.77%) SAS
5 23 (0.54%) Apache Spark
5 23 (0.54%) CMS
6 20 (0.47%) Apache Airflow
7 17 (0.40%) Apache
7 17 (0.40%) WebLogic
8 16 (0.37%) Anypoint
9 15 (0.35%) Appian
9 15 (0.35%) ArcGIS
10 14 (0.33%) OpenStack
11 13 (0.30%) nginx
12 9 (0.21%) Smallworld
13 8 (0.19%) Adobe Experience Manager
14 7 (0.16%) GeoServer
14 7 (0.16%) Oracle SOA Suite
14 7 (0.16%) Sitecore CMS
14 7 (0.16%) Skype for Business
Applications
1 50 (1.17%) Microsoft Office
2 32 (0.75%) Microsoft Project
3 27 (0.63%) Microsoft PowerPoint
4 25 (0.59%) Microsoft Excel
5 15 (0.35%) MS Visio
6 7 (0.16%) Chatbot
7 2 (0.047%) PlantUML
8 1 (0.023%) ArchiCAD
8 1 (0.023%) AutoCAD
8 1 (0.023%) OrCAD
8 1 (0.023%) Siemens NX
8 1 (0.023%) Trello
8 1 (0.023%) Windchill
Business Applications
1 113 (2.65%) SAP S/4HANA
2 40 (0.94%) Sparx Enterprise Architect
3 24 (0.56%) Dynamics CRM
4 23 (0.54%) Workday HCM
5 17 (0.40%) Payment Gateway
6 16 (0.37%) Salesforce CRM
7 12 (0.28%) NetSuite
7 12 (0.28%) Oracle EBS
8 11 (0.26%) SAP ERP
8 11 (0.26%) SAP EWM
9 10 (0.23%) SAP PM
10 9 (0.21%) Oracle Receivables
11 8 (0.19%) Maximo
11 8 (0.19%) Remedy ITSM
12 7 (0.16%) Dynamics AX
12 7 (0.16%) Oracle ERP
12 7 (0.16%) R3 Corda
12 7 (0.16%) SAP PP
13 6 (0.14%) Distributed Ledger
13 6 (0.14%) Teamcenter
Cloud Services
1 1,090 (25.52%) Azure
2 900 (21.07%) AWS
3 349 (8.17%) GCP
4 160 (3.75%) Power Platform
5 152 (3.56%) Serverless
6 146 (3.42%) SaaS
7 144 (3.37%) Microsoft 365
8 141 (3.30%) Entra ID
9 96 (2.25%) IaaS
10 91 (2.13%) GitHub
11 90 (2.11%) Azure DevOps
12 86 (2.01%) AWS Lambda
13 79 (1.85%) PaaS
14 76 (1.78%) Microsoft Purview
15 74 (1.73%) Amazon S3
16 73 (1.71%) AWS CloudFormation
17 70 (1.64%) OpenShift
18 67 (1.57%) Snowflake
19 66 (1.55%) Azure Data Factory
19 66 (1.55%) Dynamics 365
Communications & Networking
1 228 (5.34%) Firewall
2 140 (3.28%) Network Security
3 126 (2.95%) WAN
4 118 (2.76%) DNS
5 109 (2.55%) VPN
6 74 (1.73%) LAN
7 70 (1.64%) SD-WAN
8 39 (0.91%) BGP
9 35 (0.82%) DHCP
10 30 (0.70%) MPLS
11 29 (0.68%) Wi-Fi
12 27 (0.63%) OSPF
13 26 (0.61%) TCP/IP
14 25 (0.59%) VLAN
15 22 (0.52%) SAN
15 22 (0.52%) Wireless
16 20 (0.47%) IPsec
16 20 (0.47%) Kerberos
16 20 (0.47%) VSAN
17 19 (0.44%) VXLAN
Database & Business Intelligence
1 161 (3.77%) Data Warehouse
2 133 (3.11%) Metadata
3 113 (2.65%) Power BI
4 99 (2.32%) Data Lake
5 78 (1.83%) SQL Server
6 66 (1.55%) PostgreSQL
7 50 (1.17%) Tableau
8 43 (1.01%) NoSQL
9 41 (0.96%) Azure SQL Database
10 39 (0.91%) Oracle Database
11 34 (0.80%) Amazon Redshift
12 28 (0.66%) Big Data
13 27 (0.63%) DynamoDB
14 24 (0.56%) GIS
14 24 (0.56%) Relational Database
15 22 (0.52%) Amazon Athena
16 21 (0.49%) Amazon Aurora
16 21 (0.49%) Metadata Repository
17 20 (0.47%) Amazon RDS
17 20 (0.47%) Redis
Development Applications
1 132 (3.09%) JIRA
2 91 (2.13%) Jenkins
3 48 (1.12%) GitLab
4 36 (0.84%) Git
5 21 (0.49%) ERwin
6 11 (0.26%) Bitbucket
7 10 (0.23%) SonarQube
8 8 (0.19%) Artifactory
9 7 (0.16%) MLflow
10 6 (0.14%) REST Assured
11 5 (0.12%) Cucumber
11 5 (0.12%) Oracle Forms
11 5 (0.12%) Postman
11 5 (0.12%) Selenium
12 4 (0.094%) Terragrunt
13 3 (0.070%) ER Studio
13 3 (0.070%) JUnit
13 3 (0.070%) Rational DOORS
13 3 (0.070%) Snyk
13 3 (0.070%) Sonatype Nexus
General
1 981 (22.97%) Social Skills
2 656 (15.36%) Finance
3 502 (11.75%) Public Sector
4 299 (7.00%) Analytical Skills
5 240 (5.62%) Banking
6 141 (3.30%) Documentation Skills
7 100 (2.34%) Legal
8 98 (2.29%) Influencing Skills
9 85 (1.99%) Retail
10 80 (1.87%) Military
11 79 (1.85%) Telecoms
12 76 (1.78%) Presentation Skills
13 69 (1.62%) Marketing
14 60 (1.40%) Manufacturing
15 39 (0.91%) Inclusion and Diversity
16 36 (0.84%) Billing
17 33 (0.77%) Financial Institution
18 26 (0.61%) Law
19 24 (0.56%) Investment Banking
20 20 (0.47%) Aerospace
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 214 (5.01%) REST
2 155 (3.63%) Middleware
3 116 (2.72%) SOAP
4 93 (2.18%) .NET
5 84 (1.97%) Kafka
6 79 (1.85%) OpenID
7 76 (1.78%) LDAP
8 70 (1.64%) OAuth
9 64 (1.50%) SAML
10 51 (1.19%) JSON
11 44 (1.03%) OAuth2
12 42 (0.98%) React
13 41 (0.96%) RESTful
14 39 (0.91%) AngularJS
15 36 (0.84%) SailPoint
16 35 (0.82%) Oracle Fusion
17 30 (0.70%) PySpark
18 26 (0.61%) Web Services
19 25 (0.59%) Node.js
20 22 (0.52%) Spring
Miscellaneous
1 304 (7.12%) Cloud Native
2 143 (3.35%) Product Ownership
3 138 (3.23%) Data Centre
4 122 (2.86%) Onboarding
5 113 (2.65%) Legacy Systems
6 99 (2.32%) Enterprise Software
7 93 (2.18%) PKI
8 85 (1.99%) Hybrid Cloud
9 79 (1.85%) Management Information System
10 72 (1.69%) Public Cloud
11 67 (1.57%) Distributed Systems
12 66 (1.55%) Security Posture
13 65 (1.52%) Operational Technology
14 58 (1.36%) Data Protection Act
15 52 (1.22%) CMDB
16 45 (1.05%) Self-Motivation
17 42 (0.98%) Data Structures
18 38 (0.89%) AI Agents
19 36 (0.84%) NHS
20 33 (0.77%) Private Cloud
Operating Systems
1 181 (4.24%) Windows
2 113 (2.65%) Linux
3 40 (0.94%) Windows Server
4 34 (0.80%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
5 20 (0.47%) Android
5 20 (0.47%) Apple iOS
6 17 (0.40%) Windows 7
7 15 (0.35%) Windows 10
8 14 (0.33%) Unix
9 11 (0.26%) Windows Server 2016
10 10 (0.23%) VMS
10 10 (0.23%) Windows Server 2019
11 9 (0.21%) Mac OS
12 8 (0.19%) zOS
13 6 (0.14%) Ubuntu
14 4 (0.094%) CentOS
15 3 (0.070%) Windows Server 2012
16 1 (0.023%) Data ONTAP
16 1 (0.023%) Kali Linux
16 1 (0.023%) SUSE
Processes & Methodologies
1 613 (14.35%) Roadmaps
2 556 (13.02%) Stakeholder Management
3 548 (12.83%) Migration
4 544 (12.74%) Agile
5 479 (11.22%) DevOps
6 466 (10.91%) Enterprise Architecture
7 425 (9.95%) TOGAF
8 419 (9.81%) CI/CD
8 419 (9.81%) Data Modelling
9 407 (9.53%) Stakeholder Engagement
10 389 (9.11%) Technical Leadership
11 372 (8.71%) Analytics
12 368 (8.62%) Problem-Solving
13 362 (8.48%) AI
14 350 (8.19%) Data Architecture
15 311 (7.28%) Integration Patterns
16 300 (7.02%) Microservices
17 280 (6.56%) Architectural Patterns
18 249 (5.83%) Architectural Design
19 243 (5.69%) Cybersecurity
Programming Languages
1 322 (7.54%) Python
2 227 (5.31%) SQL
3 181 (4.24%) PowerShell
4 135 (3.16%) Java
5 66 (1.55%) JavaScript
6 63 (1.48%) C#
7 37 (0.87%) Bash
8 34 (0.80%) Bicep
8 34 (0.80%) TypeScript
9 20 (0.47%) PL/SQL
10 19 (0.44%) Apex Code
11 14 (0.33%) Kusto Query Language
12 13 (0.30%) R
13 11 (0.26%) Ruby
14 10 (0.23%) T-SQL
15 9 (0.21%) Scala
16 8 (0.19%) PHP
16 8 (0.19%) VB
17 7 (0.16%) Korn
17 7 (0.16%) VBScript
Qualifications
1 1,336 (31.28%) Security Cleared
2 955 (22.36%) SC Cleared
3 281 (6.58%) DV Cleared
4 201 (4.71%) Degree
5 122 (2.86%) TOGAF Certification
6 121 (2.83%) CISSP
7 113 (2.65%) AWS Certification
8 103 (2.41%) Azure Certification
9 81 (1.90%) Cisco Certification
10 75 (1.76%) Computer Science Degree
11 73 (1.71%) BPSS Clearance
12 63 (1.48%) CISM
13 57 (1.33%) AWS Certified Solutions Architect
13 57 (1.33%) Master's Degree
13 57 (1.33%) Microsoft Certification
14 49 (1.15%) CCNP
15 32 (0.75%) CCIE
16 31 (0.73%) ITIL Certification
17 30 (0.70%) ISEB
18 28 (0.66%) (ISC)2 CCSP
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 178 (4.17%) GDPR
2 142 (3.32%) NIST
3 136 (3.18%) Data Quality
4 121 (2.83%) ISO/IEC 27001
5 86 (2.01%) NCSC
6 61 (1.43%) QA
7 54 (1.26%) PCI DSS
8 35 (0.82%) COBIT
9 33 (0.77%) Accessibility
9 33 (0.77%) GRC
10 27 (0.63%) ISO 20022
11 25 (0.59%) Cyber Essentials
12 21 (0.49%) JSP 440
13 18 (0.42%) HMG Security Policy Framework
14 16 (0.37%) HIPAA
15 15 (0.35%) MiFID
16 14 (0.33%) California Consumer Privacy Act
16 14 (0.33%) Sarbanes-Oxley
17 13 (0.30%) FINRA
18 12 (0.28%) PSD2
System Software
1 178 (4.17%) Active Directory
2 126 (2.95%) Docker
3 90 (2.11%) VMware Infrastructure
4 69 (1.62%) VMware NSX
5 37 (0.87%) vSphere
6 22 (0.52%) Virtual Desktop
7 13 (0.30%) Hyper-V
7 13 (0.30%) Virtual Machines
7 13 (0.30%) VMware ESXi
8 11 (0.26%) Oracle RAC
9 8 (0.19%) Squid
10 7 (0.16%) BitLocker
10 7 (0.16%) Varnish
11 6 (0.14%) vCloud
12 5 (0.12%) NFS
12 5 (0.12%) RACF
13 3 (0.070%) Active Directory Lightweight Directory Services
13 3 (0.070%) Ceph
13 3 (0.070%) Firmware
13 3 (0.070%) Lustre
Systems Management
1 261 (6.11%) Terraform
2 213 (4.99%) Kubernetes
3 113 (2.65%) Ansible
4 58 (1.36%) Single Sign-On
5 40 (0.94%) Microsoft Intune
6 34 (0.80%) FortiGate
7 30 (0.70%) OPNET
8 29 (0.68%) vCenter Server
9 25 (0.59%) Grafana
10 24 (0.56%) SCCM
11 22 (0.52%) Prometheus
12 17 (0.40%) Argo
13 16 (0.37%) Active Directory Federation Services
13 16 (0.37%) WMI
14 9 (0.21%) Istio
15 7 (0.16%) Consul
16 6 (0.14%) Kibana
16 6 (0.14%) Puppet
17 5 (0.12%) Progress Chef
18 4 (0.094%) Data Guard
Vendors
1 605 (14.17%) Microsoft
2 249 (5.83%) ServiceNow
3 229 (5.36%) SAP
4 200 (4.68%) Oracle
5 184 (4.31%) Salesforce
6 174 (4.07%) VMware
7 136 (3.18%) Databricks
8 127 (2.97%) Cisco
9 106 (2.48%) Google
10 93 (2.18%) CyberArk
11 67 (1.57%) Palo Alto
11 67 (1.57%) Splunk
12 66 (1.55%) MuleSoft
13 50 (1.17%) Red Hat
14 49 (1.15%) Centrify
14 49 (1.15%) Remedy
14 49 (1.15%) Workday
15 47 (1.10%) Atlassian
16 40 (0.94%) IBM
17 39 (0.91%) Citrix