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 25 March 2026.

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

6 months to
25 Mar 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 14 16 11
Rank change year-on-year +2 -5 +6
Contract jobs requiring an Architect 4,709 2,933 4,450
As % of all contract jobs in the UK 10.73% 10.09% 10.05%
As % of the Job Titles category 11.67% 10.85% 10.82%
Number of daily rates quoted 3,109 1,921 2,863
10th Percentile £463 £475 £500
25th Percentile £513 £538 £563
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £620 £625 £650
Median % change year-on-year -0.80% -3.85% -1.89%
75th Percentile £725 £725 £738
90th Percentile £800 £799 £800
UK excluding London median daily rate £600 £625 £650
% change year-on-year -4.00% -3.85% -
Number of hourly rates quoted 109 34 46
10th Percentile £49.40 £58.78 £51.51
25th Percentile £60.00 £61.75 £60.00
Median hourly rate £71.27 £71.25 £82.38
Median % change year-on-year +0.03% -13.51% +17.69%
75th Percentile £90.09 £81.83 £87.53
90th Percentile £97.50 £85.70 £95.00
UK excluding London median hourly rate £71.27 £72.50 £83.77
% change year-on-year -1.70% -13.45% +19.66%

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 40,363 27,024 41,118
% of contract IT jobs with a recognized job title 91.96% 92.92% 92.86%
Number of daily rates quoted 25,200 17,764 26,931
10th Percentile £313 £300 £275
25th Percentile £412 £406 £406
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £520 £525
Median % change year-on-year -3.85% -0.95% -4.37%
75th Percentile £613 £630 £638
90th Percentile £725 £738 £738
UK excluding London median daily rate £482 £475 £488
% change year-on-year +1.47% -2.56% -2.50%
Number of hourly rates quoted 2,503 906 2,513
10th Percentile £15.00 £15.20 £12.87
25th Percentile £19.34 £21.00 £16.25
Median hourly rate £36.71 £32.50 £32.50
Median % change year-on-year +12.95% - -24.42%
75th Percentile £65.00 £64.52 £60.00
90th Percentile £76.58 £76.25 £71.90
UK excluding London median hourly rate £36.86 £32.50 £32.50
% change year-on-year +13.40% - -20.36%

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 25 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 25 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 25 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 +2 4,044 £625 - 1,070
UK excluding London +8 2,246 £600 -4.00% 752
London 0 1,822 £625 -3.85% 478
Work from Home +1 1,309 £615 -1.60% 510
South East +5 696 £625 - 249
North of England +6 588 £600 - 190
Midlands -2 393 £575 -4.17% 95
North West +7 334 £605 +0.83% 98
West Midlands +1 294 £600 -2.04% 70
South West +2 275 £700 +14.29% 107
Yorkshire +9 230 £563 -6.25% 70
East of England +16 170 £540 -16.92% 67
Scotland +18 136 £650 +4.00% 32
East Midlands -3 95 £525 -6.25% 25
North East +5 32 £575 -7.95% 26
Wales +2 27 £538 -5.70% 24
Northern Ireland +4 11 £500 -26.47% 4

Architect Skill Set
Top 30 Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities

For the 6 months to 25 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 1,505 (31.96%) Security Cleared
2 1,183 (25.12%) Azure
3 1,063 (22.57%) SC Cleared
4 1,001 (21.26%) AWS
5 685 (14.55%) Roadmaps
6 660 (14.02%) Microsoft
7 615 (13.06%) Migration
8 599 (12.72%) Agile
9 555 (11.79%) Stakeholder Management
10 533 (11.32%) DevOps
11 503 (10.68%) Enterprise Architecture
12 494 (10.49%) CI/CD
13 465 (9.87%) Stakeholder Engagement
14 450 (9.56%) TOGAF
15 449 (9.53%) Data Modelling
16 431 (9.15%) Technical Leadership
17 415 (8.81%) AI
18 402 (8.54%) Analytics
19 388 (8.24%) GCP
20 387 (8.22%) Problem-Solving
21 376 (7.98%) Data Architecture
22 368 (7.81%) Integration Patterns
23 352 (7.48%) Architectural Patterns
24 351 (7.45%) Python
25 347 (7.37%) Microservices
26 323 (6.86%) DV Cleared
27 313 (6.65%) Architectural Design
28 284 (6.03%) Terraform
29 282 (5.99%) Security Architecture
30 279 (5.92%) 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
1 122 (2.59%) Confluence
2 118 (2.51%) SharePoint
3 64 (1.36%) Microsoft Exchange
4 35 (0.74%) SAS
5 25 (0.53%) CMS
6 24 (0.51%) Apache Spark
7 18 (0.38%) Apache Airflow
8 17 (0.36%) Anypoint
8 17 (0.36%) Apache
9 16 (0.34%) ArcGIS
10 15 (0.32%) Appian
10 15 (0.32%) WebLogic
11 14 (0.30%) nginx
12 11 (0.23%) OpenStack
13 10 (0.21%) Adobe Experience Manager
14 9 (0.19%) Smallworld
15 7 (0.15%) GeoServer
15 7 (0.15%) NetWeaver
15 7 (0.15%) Oracle SOA Suite
15 7 (0.15%) Skype for Business
Applications
1 50 (1.06%) Microsoft Office
2 31 (0.66%) Microsoft Project
3 30 (0.64%) Microsoft PowerPoint
4 25 (0.53%) Microsoft Excel
5 21 (0.45%) MS Visio
6 6 (0.13%) Chatbot
7 2 (0.042%) PlantUML
7 2 (0.042%) Windchill
8 1 (0.021%) ArchiCAD
8 1 (0.021%) AutoCAD
8 1 (0.021%) OrCAD
8 1 (0.021%) Siemens NX
8 1 (0.021%) Spreadsheet
Business Applications
1 119 (2.53%) SAP S/4HANA
2 47 (1.00%) Sparx Enterprise Architect
3 25 (0.53%) Dynamics CRM
4 23 (0.49%) Workday HCM
5 19 (0.40%) Payment Gateway
6 18 (0.38%) Oracle EBS
7 14 (0.30%) Salesforce CRM
8 13 (0.28%) SAP ERP
9 12 (0.25%) SAP EWM
10 11 (0.23%) NetSuite
11 10 (0.21%) Remedy ITSM
11 10 (0.21%) SAP PM
12 9 (0.19%) Maximo
12 9 (0.19%) Oracle Receivables
12 9 (0.19%) Teamcenter
13 8 (0.17%) SAP PP
14 7 (0.15%) R3 Corda
14 7 (0.15%) SAP CRM
14 7 (0.15%) SAP QM
15 6 (0.13%) Distributed Ledger
Cloud Services
1 1,183 (25.12%) Azure
2 1,001 (21.26%) AWS
3 388 (8.24%) GCP
4 192 (4.08%) Power Platform
5 172 (3.65%) Entra ID
6 166 (3.53%) Serverless
7 150 (3.19%) SaaS
8 145 (3.08%) Microsoft 365
9 110 (2.34%) GitHub
10 107 (2.27%) IaaS
11 101 (2.14%) Azure DevOps
12 95 (2.02%) PaaS
13 88 (1.87%) Dynamics 365
14 85 (1.81%) AWS Lambda
15 81 (1.72%) OpenShift
16 74 (1.57%) Microsoft Purview
17 73 (1.55%) AWS CloudFormation
18 71 (1.51%) Amazon S3
18 71 (1.51%) Virtual Private Cloud
19 70 (1.49%) Azure Synapse Analytics
Communications & Networking
1 235 (4.99%) Firewall
2 172 (3.65%) Network Security
3 137 (2.91%) WAN
4 126 (2.68%) VPN
5 122 (2.59%) DNS
6 85 (1.81%) LAN
7 78 (1.66%) SD-WAN
8 38 (0.81%) BGP
9 34 (0.72%) DHCP
10 32 (0.68%) Wi-Fi
11 29 (0.62%) OSPF
12 28 (0.59%) MPLS
12 28 (0.59%) TCP/IP
13 24 (0.51%) SAN
14 23 (0.49%) Kerberos
14 23 (0.49%) VXLAN
15 22 (0.47%) VLAN
15 22 (0.47%) Wireless
16 19 (0.40%) Internet
16 19 (0.40%) VSAN
Database & Business Intelligence
1 155 (3.29%) Data Warehouse
2 146 (3.10%) Power BI
3 141 (2.99%) Metadata
4 108 (2.29%) Data Lake
5 83 (1.76%) SQL Server
6 65 (1.38%) PostgreSQL
7 57 (1.21%) NoSQL
8 50 (1.06%) Azure SQL Database
8 50 (1.06%) Tableau
9 45 (0.96%) Oracle Database
10 39 (0.83%) Big Data
11 27 (0.57%) Amazon Redshift
12 26 (0.55%) GIS
13 24 (0.51%) Delta Lake
14 22 (0.47%) DynamoDB
15 21 (0.45%) Electronic Patient Records
15 21 (0.45%) Metadata Repository
15 21 (0.45%) Relational Database
16 20 (0.42%) BigQuery
16 20 (0.42%) Elasticsearch
Development Applications
1 135 (2.87%) JIRA
2 95 (2.02%) Jenkins
3 51 (1.08%) GitLab
4 49 (1.04%) Git
5 25 (0.53%) ERwin
6 12 (0.25%) Bitbucket
7 11 (0.23%) SonarQube
8 10 (0.21%) Artifactory
9 8 (0.17%) MLflow
10 6 (0.13%) REST Assured
11 5 (0.11%) Cucumber
11 5 (0.11%) Postman
11 5 (0.11%) PowerDesigner
11 5 (0.11%) Selenium
11 5 (0.11%) Sonatype Nexus
12 4 (0.085%) Maven
12 4 (0.085%) Oracle Forms
12 4 (0.085%) Rational DOORS
12 4 (0.085%) Snyk
12 4 (0.085%) Terragrunt
General
1 1,019 (21.64%) Social Skills
2 727 (15.44%) Finance
3 554 (11.76%) Public Sector
4 322 (6.84%) Analytical Skills
5 271 (5.75%) Banking
6 155 (3.29%) Documentation Skills
7 114 (2.42%) Influencing Skills
8 109 (2.31%) Legal
9 92 (1.95%) Retail
10 87 (1.85%) Military
11 84 (1.78%) Telecoms
12 74 (1.57%) Presentation Skills
13 65 (1.38%) Marketing
14 61 (1.30%) Manufacturing
15 54 (1.15%) Law
16 45 (0.96%) Financial Institution
17 34 (0.72%) Inclusion and Diversity
18 33 (0.70%) Billing
19 30 (0.64%) Investment Banking
20 25 (0.53%) Local Government
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 226 (4.80%) REST
2 175 (3.72%) Middleware
3 116 (2.46%) SOAP
4 96 (2.04%) Kafka
5 95 (2.02%) .NET
6 84 (1.78%) OpenID
7 79 (1.68%) LDAP
8 77 (1.64%) OAuth
9 66 (1.40%) SAML
10 52 (1.10%) JSON
11 48 (1.02%) React
12 47 (1.00%) OAuth2
13 43 (0.91%) AngularJS
14 37 (0.79%) RESTful
15 35 (0.74%) SailPoint
16 31 (0.66%) Web Services
17 30 (0.64%) Spring
18 26 (0.55%) Oracle Fusion
18 26 (0.55%) PySpark
19 24 (0.51%) Vue
Miscellaneous
1 371 (7.88%) Cloud Native
2 162 (3.44%) Data Centre
3 149 (3.16%) Product Ownership
4 129 (2.74%) Onboarding
5 116 (2.46%) Legacy Systems
6 109 (2.31%) Enterprise Software
7 96 (2.04%) Management Information System
8 95 (2.02%) Hybrid Cloud
9 93 (1.97%) Distributed Systems
10 92 (1.95%) PKI
11 87 (1.85%) Public Cloud
12 79 (1.68%) Security Posture
13 69 (1.47%) Data Protection Act
14 67 (1.42%) Operational Technology
15 60 (1.27%) CMDB
16 50 (1.06%) Self-Motivation
17 49 (1.04%) AI Agents
18 45 (0.96%) Data Structures
19 41 (0.87%) NHS
19 41 (0.87%) Private Cloud
Operating Systems
1 190 (4.03%) Windows
2 129 (2.74%) Linux
3 45 (0.96%) Windows Server
4 35 (0.74%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
5 29 (0.62%) Android
5 29 (0.62%) Apple iOS
6 16 (0.34%) Windows 7
7 15 (0.32%) Windows 10
8 14 (0.30%) Unix
8 14 (0.30%) Windows Server 2016
9 13 (0.28%) VMS
10 11 (0.23%) Windows Server 2019
11 10 (0.21%) zOS
12 9 (0.19%) Mac OS
13 4 (0.085%) Ubuntu
14 3 (0.064%) Windows Server 2012
15 2 (0.042%) CentOS
16 1 (0.021%) Data ONTAP
16 1 (0.021%) Solaris
16 1 (0.021%) SUSE
Processes & Methodologies
1 685 (14.55%) Roadmaps
2 615 (13.06%) Migration
3 599 (12.72%) Agile
4 555 (11.79%) Stakeholder Management
5 533 (11.32%) DevOps
6 503 (10.68%) Enterprise Architecture
7 494 (10.49%) CI/CD
8 465 (9.87%) Stakeholder Engagement
9 450 (9.56%) TOGAF
10 449 (9.53%) Data Modelling
11 431 (9.15%) Technical Leadership
12 415 (8.81%) AI
13 402 (8.54%) Analytics
14 387 (8.22%) Problem-Solving
15 376 (7.98%) Data Architecture
16 368 (7.81%) Integration Patterns
17 352 (7.48%) Architectural Patterns
18 347 (7.37%) Microservices
19 313 (6.65%) Architectural Design
20 282 (5.99%) Security Architecture
Programming Languages
1 351 (7.45%) Python
2 252 (5.35%) SQL
3 188 (3.99%) PowerShell
4 181 (3.84%) Java
5 63 (1.34%) C#
6 61 (1.30%) JavaScript
7 42 (0.89%) Bicep
8 41 (0.87%) Bash
9 27 (0.57%) TypeScript
10 21 (0.45%) Ruby
11 19 (0.40%) Apex Code
12 18 (0.38%) PL/SQL
13 13 (0.28%) Kusto Query Language
14 12 (0.25%) Kotlin
14 12 (0.25%) R
14 12 (0.25%) Scala
15 9 (0.19%) ABAP
15 9 (0.19%) T-SQL
16 8 (0.17%) PHP
16 8 (0.17%) VB
Qualifications
1 1,505 (31.96%) Security Cleared
2 1,063 (22.57%) SC Cleared
3 323 (6.86%) DV Cleared
4 211 (4.48%) Degree
5 129 (2.74%) CISSP
6 123 (2.61%) TOGAF Certification
7 122 (2.59%) Azure Certification
8 116 (2.46%) AWS Certification
9 88 (1.87%) Cisco Certification
10 81 (1.72%) BPSS Clearance
11 78 (1.66%) Computer Science Degree
12 74 (1.57%) CISM
13 56 (1.19%) Master's Degree
14 54 (1.15%) AWS Certified Solutions Architect
15 53 (1.13%) Microsoft Certification
16 50 (1.06%) CCNP
17 36 (0.76%) (ISC)2 CCSP
18 34 (0.72%) ITIL Certification
19 33 (0.70%) ISEB
20 31 (0.66%) CCIE
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 199 (4.23%) GDPR
2 178 (3.78%) NIST
3 152 (3.23%) Data Quality
4 151 (3.21%) ISO/IEC 27001
5 103 (2.19%) NCSC
6 67 (1.42%) QA
7 61 (1.30%) PCI DSS
8 40 (0.85%) COBIT
9 31 (0.66%) Accessibility
9 31 (0.66%) GRC
10 29 (0.62%) ISO 20022
11 28 (0.59%) Cyber Essentials
12 20 (0.42%) JSP 440
13 18 (0.38%) HIPAA
13 18 (0.38%) HMG Security Policy Framework
13 18 (0.38%) Sarbanes-Oxley
14 16 (0.34%) HL7
15 15 (0.32%) NIST 800
16 14 (0.30%) MiFID
16 14 (0.30%) SEPA
System Software
1 193 (4.10%) Active Directory
2 125 (2.65%) Docker
3 106 (2.25%) VMware Infrastructure
4 72 (1.53%) VMware NSX
5 37 (0.79%) vSphere
6 24 (0.51%) Virtual Desktop
7 16 (0.34%) Hyper-V
8 14 (0.30%) Virtual Machines
9 12 (0.25%) VMware ESXi
10 11 (0.23%) Oracle RAC
11 9 (0.19%) Squid
11 9 (0.19%) Varnish
11 9 (0.19%) vCloud
12 7 (0.15%) BitLocker
13 5 (0.11%) NFS
13 5 (0.11%) RACF
14 4 (0.085%) Firmware
15 3 (0.064%) Ceph
15 3 (0.064%) IAG
15 3 (0.064%) Postfix
Systems Management
1 284 (6.03%) Terraform
2 239 (5.08%) Kubernetes
3 124 (2.63%) Ansible
4 60 (1.27%) Single Sign-On
5 39 (0.83%) Grafana
5 39 (0.83%) Microsoft Intune
6 34 (0.72%) vCenter Server
7 33 (0.70%) FortiGate
8 30 (0.64%) OPNET
9 29 (0.62%) Prometheus
10 22 (0.47%) SCCM
11 19 (0.40%) Argo
12 18 (0.38%) Active Directory Federation Services
13 15 (0.32%) WMI
14 11 (0.23%) Istio
15 7 (0.15%) Consul
15 7 (0.15%) Puppet
16 6 (0.13%) Kibana
17 5 (0.11%) Endace
17 5 (0.11%) Progress Chef
Vendors
1 660 (14.02%) Microsoft
2 266 (5.65%) ServiceNow
3 259 (5.50%) SAP
4 210 (4.46%) Oracle
5 194 (4.12%) VMware
6 181 (3.84%) Salesforce
7 156 (3.31%) Databricks
8 139 (2.95%) Cisco
9 109 (2.31%) Google
10 96 (2.04%) CyberArk
11 71 (1.51%) MuleSoft
12 70 (1.49%) Palo Alto
13 68 (1.44%) Splunk
14 60 (1.27%) Red Hat
15 53 (1.13%) Workday
16 51 (1.08%) Remedy
17 49 (1.04%) Atlassian
17 49 (1.04%) Centrify
18 48 (1.02%) IBM
19 46 (0.98%) Sparx