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 15 February 2026.

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

6 months to
15 Feb 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 18 17 14
Rank change year-on-year -1 -3 +3
Contract jobs requiring an Architect 4,042 3,189 4,402
As % of all contract jobs in the UK 10.12% 10.32% 9.81%
As % of the Job Titles category 11.04% 11.10% 10.54%
Number of daily rates quoted 2,698 1,939 2,835
10th Percentile £458 £477 £500
25th Percentile £513 £550 £563
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £625 £625 £650
Median % change year-on-year - -3.85% -
75th Percentile £725 £725 £738
90th Percentile £788 £799 £788
UK excluding London median daily rate £600 £625 £650
% change year-on-year -4.00% -3.85% -
Number of hourly rates quoted 75 32 45
10th Percentile £49.40 £58.43 £53.22
25th Percentile £60.00 £61.50 £61.25
Median hourly rate £72.50 £71.25 £76.53
Median % change year-on-year +1.75% -6.90% +9.33%
75th Percentile £89.55 £81.00 £87.53
90th Percentile £95.00 £87.33 £95.00
UK excluding London median hourly rate £72.50 £72.50 £78.37
% change year-on-year - -7.49% +11.96%

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 36,606 28,720 41,783
% of contract IT jobs with a recognized job title 91.62% 92.93% 93.16%
Number of daily rates quoted 23,016 17,759 27,499
10th Percentile £303 £290 £275
25th Percentile £406 £406 £410
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £525 £525
Median % change year-on-year -4.76% - -4.55%
75th Percentile £614 £638 £638
90th Percentile £720 £738 £738
UK excluding London median daily rate £477 £475 £490
% change year-on-year +0.32% -3.06% -2.00%
Number of hourly rates quoted 2,236 814 2,315
10th Percentile £14.61 £16.07 £13.14
25th Percentile £18.87 £21.30 £16.30
Median hourly rate £30.00 £33.25 £35.00
Median % change year-on-year -9.77% -5.00% -2.78%
75th Percentile £61.84 £63.75 £60.75
90th Percentile £72.52 £75.00 £72.50
UK excluding London median hourly rate £29.60 £31.76 £35.00
% change year-on-year -6.80% -9.26% -

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 15 February 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 15 February 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 15 February 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 3,466 £625 - 881
UK excluding London +4 1,962 £600 -4.00% 642
London -2 1,551 £630 -3.08% 369
Work from Home -3 1,133 £624 -0.20% 446
South East +9 598 £625 - 258
North of England -3 484 £575 -4.17% 151
Midlands -1 347 £571 -4.90% 91
North West -6 275 £579 -3.50% 88
West Midlands -1 257 £600 - 65
South West +1 248 £708 +13.20% 58
Yorkshire -3 191 £563 -2.17% 42
East of England +15 151 £550 -13.73% 44
Scotland +8 138 £650 +4.00% 40
East Midlands -3 88 £492 -13.30% 26
Wales +6 31 £600 +5.26% 5
North East -11 23 £625 -1.96% 23
Northern Ireland 0 9 £500 -26.47% 5

Architect Skill Set
Top 30 Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities

For the 6 months to 15 February 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 1,246 (30.83%) Security Cleared
2 1,062 (26.27%) Azure
3 900 (22.27%) SC Cleared
4 855 (21.15%) AWS
5 582 (14.40%) Roadmaps
6 578 (14.30%) Microsoft
7 535 (13.24%) Agile
8 532 (13.16%) Stakeholder Management
9 509 (12.59%) Migration
10 461 (11.41%) DevOps
11 456 (11.28%) Enterprise Architecture
12 403 (9.97%) TOGAF
13 401 (9.92%) Data Modelling
14 397 (9.82%) CI/CD
15 396 (9.80%) Stakeholder Engagement
16 383 (9.48%) Technical Leadership
17 352 (8.71%) Problem-Solving
18 349 (8.63%) AI
18 349 (8.63%) Analytics
19 330 (8.16%) GCP
20 324 (8.02%) Data Architecture
21 321 (7.94%) Python
22 285 (7.05%) Microservices
23 281 (6.95%) Integration Patterns
24 260 (6.43%) Architectural Patterns
24 260 (6.43%) DV Cleared
25 255 (6.31%) Terraform
26 236 (5.84%) Architectural Design
27 232 (5.74%) Cybersecurity
28 229 (5.67%) 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
1 112 (2.77%) Confluence
2 96 (2.38%) SharePoint
3 57 (1.41%) Microsoft Exchange
4 33 (0.82%) SAS
5 24 (0.59%) Apache Spark
6 23 (0.57%) CMS
7 18 (0.45%) Apache
7 18 (0.45%) Apache Airflow
8 16 (0.40%) Anypoint
8 16 (0.40%) OpenStack
9 15 (0.37%) WebLogic
10 14 (0.35%) Appian
11 13 (0.32%) ArcGIS
12 12 (0.30%) nginx
13 9 (0.22%) Smallworld
14 7 (0.17%) Ethereum
14 7 (0.17%) Hyperledger
14 7 (0.17%) Oracle SOA Suite
14 7 (0.17%) Sitecore CMS
14 7 (0.17%) Skype for Business
Applications
1 51 (1.26%) Microsoft Office
2 32 (0.79%) Microsoft Project
3 30 (0.74%) Microsoft Excel
3 30 (0.74%) Microsoft PowerPoint
4 15 (0.37%) MS Visio
5 6 (0.15%) Chatbot
6 1 (0.025%) ArchiCAD
6 1 (0.025%) AutoCAD
6 1 (0.025%) FrameMaker
6 1 (0.025%) OrCAD
6 1 (0.025%) Revit
6 1 (0.025%) Siemens NX
6 1 (0.025%) Spreadsheet
6 1 (0.025%) Trello
Business Applications
1 106 (2.62%) SAP S/4HANA
2 41 (1.01%) Sparx Enterprise Architect
3 24 (0.59%) Dynamics CRM
4 22 (0.54%) Workday HCM
5 17 (0.42%) Payment Gateway
6 16 (0.40%) Salesforce CRM
7 12 (0.30%) NetSuite
8 11 (0.27%) SAP EWM
9 10 (0.25%) Oracle EBS
9 10 (0.25%) SAP ERP
9 10 (0.25%) SAP PM
10 9 (0.22%) Oracle Receivables
11 8 (0.20%) Dynamics AX
11 8 (0.20%) Maximo
12 7 (0.17%) R3 Corda
12 7 (0.17%) SAP CO
12 7 (0.17%) SAP PP
13 6 (0.15%) Distributed Ledger
13 6 (0.15%) Oracle SCM
13 6 (0.15%) SAP FI
Cloud Services
1 1,062 (26.27%) Azure
2 855 (21.15%) AWS
3 330 (8.16%) GCP
4 150 (3.71%) Serverless
5 147 (3.64%) Power Platform
6 142 (3.51%) SaaS
7 130 (3.22%) Microsoft 365
8 129 (3.19%) Entra ID
9 89 (2.20%) Azure DevOps
10 88 (2.18%) IaaS
11 87 (2.15%) AWS Lambda
12 85 (2.10%) GitHub
13 79 (1.95%) Amazon S3
14 74 (1.83%) Microsoft Purview
15 73 (1.81%) PaaS
16 70 (1.73%) AWS CloudFormation
17 69 (1.71%) Dynamics 365
18 67 (1.66%) OpenShift
19 66 (1.63%) Azure Data Factory
20 65 (1.61%) Azure Synapse Analytics
Communications & Networking
1 210 (5.20%) Firewall
2 134 (3.32%) Network Security
3 124 (3.07%) WAN
4 106 (2.62%) DNS
5 102 (2.52%) VPN
6 75 (1.86%) LAN
7 66 (1.63%) SD-WAN
8 37 (0.92%) BGP
9 30 (0.74%) DHCP
9 30 (0.74%) Wi-Fi
10 27 (0.67%) MPLS
11 26 (0.64%) TCP/IP
12 24 (0.59%) OSPF
13 23 (0.57%) SAN
14 20 (0.49%) Kerberos
15 19 (0.47%) Internet
15 19 (0.47%) IPsec
15 19 (0.47%) VLAN
16 18 (0.45%) SSL
16 18 (0.45%) VSAN
Database & Business Intelligence
1 151 (3.74%) Data Warehouse
2 129 (3.19%) Metadata
3 105 (2.60%) Power BI
4 95 (2.35%) Data Lake
5 71 (1.76%) SQL Server
6 63 (1.56%) PostgreSQL
7 52 (1.29%) Tableau
8 41 (1.01%) NoSQL
9 38 (0.94%) Oracle Database
10 37 (0.92%) Amazon Redshift
10 37 (0.92%) Azure SQL Database
11 32 (0.79%) DynamoDB
12 26 (0.64%) Amazon Athena
13 25 (0.62%) Big Data
14 23 (0.57%) Relational Database
15 22 (0.54%) Amazon RDS
15 22 (0.54%) GIS
16 21 (0.52%) Amazon Aurora
16 21 (0.52%) Redis
17 19 (0.47%) Delta Lake
Development Applications
1 130 (3.22%) JIRA
2 91 (2.25%) Jenkins
3 46 (1.14%) GitLab
4 34 (0.84%) Git
5 19 (0.47%) ERwin
6 10 (0.25%) Bitbucket
7 9 (0.22%) Artifactory
7 9 (0.22%) SonarQube
8 7 (0.17%) MLflow
9 6 (0.15%) Postman
10 5 (0.12%) Oracle Forms
10 5 (0.12%) REST Assured
10 5 (0.12%) Selenium
11 4 (0.099%) Cucumber
11 4 (0.099%) MSI
11 4 (0.099%) Rational DOORS
11 4 (0.099%) Terragrunt
12 3 (0.074%) ER Studio
12 3 (0.074%) Sonatype Nexus
12 3 (0.074%) Visual Studio Code
General
1 959 (23.73%) Social Skills
2 632 (15.64%) Finance
3 478 (11.83%) Public Sector
4 281 (6.95%) Analytical Skills
5 228 (5.64%) Banking
6 135 (3.34%) Documentation Skills
7 105 (2.60%) Legal
8 96 (2.38%) Influencing Skills
9 79 (1.95%) Retail
10 77 (1.90%) Military
11 76 (1.88%) Telecoms
12 75 (1.86%) Presentation Skills
13 68 (1.68%) Marketing
14 58 (1.43%) Manufacturing
15 39 (0.96%) Inclusion and Diversity
16 37 (0.92%) Billing
17 25 (0.62%) Law
18 24 (0.59%) Financial Institution
19 21 (0.52%) Aerospace
19 21 (0.52%) Investment Banking
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 209 (5.17%) REST
2 133 (3.29%) Middleware
3 117 (2.89%) SOAP
4 91 (2.25%) .NET
5 80 (1.98%) Kafka
6 78 (1.93%) OpenID
7 76 (1.88%) LDAP
8 67 (1.66%) OAuth
8 67 (1.66%) SAML
9 51 (1.26%) JSON
10 42 (1.04%) OAuth2
11 39 (0.96%) React
12 38 (0.94%) RESTful
13 37 (0.92%) AngularJS
14 36 (0.89%) SailPoint
15 33 (0.82%) Oracle Fusion
15 33 (0.82%) PySpark
16 27 (0.67%) Web Services
17 26 (0.64%) Node.js
18 23 (0.57%) Spring
Miscellaneous
1 292 (7.22%) Cloud Native
2 138 (3.41%) Product Ownership
3 125 (3.09%) Data Centre
4 113 (2.80%) Onboarding
5 108 (2.67%) Legacy Systems
6 99 (2.45%) Enterprise Software
7 89 (2.20%) PKI
8 80 (1.98%) Hybrid Cloud
9 73 (1.81%) Management Information System
10 66 (1.63%) Security Posture
11 65 (1.61%) Distributed Systems
12 62 (1.53%) Public Cloud
13 58 (1.43%) Operational Technology
14 48 (1.19%) CMDB
15 47 (1.16%) Data Protection Act
16 42 (1.04%) Self-Motivation
17 39 (0.96%) NHS
18 37 (0.92%) Data Structures
19 34 (0.84%) AI Agents
20 32 (0.79%) Private Cloud
Operating Systems
1 165 (4.08%) Windows
2 105 (2.60%) Linux
3 40 (0.99%) Windows Server
4 33 (0.82%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
5 18 (0.45%) Windows 7
6 15 (0.37%) Windows 10
7 12 (0.30%) Unix
7 12 (0.30%) Windows Server 2016
7 12 (0.30%) Windows Server 2019
8 10 (0.25%) VMS
9 9 (0.22%) Android
9 9 (0.22%) Apple iOS
9 9 (0.22%) Mac OS
10 6 (0.15%) Ubuntu
10 6 (0.15%) zOS
11 4 (0.099%) CentOS
12 2 (0.049%) Windows Server 2012
13 1 (0.025%) Kali Linux
13 1 (0.025%) Solaris
13 1 (0.025%) SUSE
Processes & Methodologies
1 582 (14.40%) Roadmaps
2 535 (13.24%) Agile
3 532 (13.16%) Stakeholder Management
4 509 (12.59%) Migration
5 461 (11.41%) DevOps
6 456 (11.28%) Enterprise Architecture
7 403 (9.97%) TOGAF
8 401 (9.92%) Data Modelling
9 397 (9.82%) CI/CD
10 396 (9.80%) Stakeholder Engagement
11 383 (9.48%) Technical Leadership
12 352 (8.71%) Problem-Solving
13 349 (8.63%) AI
13 349 (8.63%) Analytics
14 324 (8.02%) Data Architecture
15 285 (7.05%) Microservices
16 281 (6.95%) Integration Patterns
17 260 (6.43%) Architectural Patterns
18 236 (5.84%) Architectural Design
19 232 (5.74%) Cybersecurity
Programming Languages
1 321 (7.94%) Python
2 212 (5.24%) SQL
3 176 (4.35%) PowerShell
4 131 (3.24%) Java
5 59 (1.46%) JavaScript
6 58 (1.43%) C#
7 37 (0.92%) Bicep
8 35 (0.87%) Bash
9 34 (0.84%) TypeScript
10 20 (0.49%) PL/SQL
11 19 (0.47%) Apex Code
12 14 (0.35%) Kusto Query Language
13 13 (0.32%) R
14 10 (0.25%) Ruby
14 10 (0.25%) T-SQL
15 9 (0.22%) Scala
16 8 (0.20%) PHP
16 8 (0.20%) VB
17 7 (0.17%) Korn
17 7 (0.17%) VBScript
Qualifications
1 1,246 (30.83%) Security Cleared
2 900 (22.27%) SC Cleared
3 260 (6.43%) DV Cleared
4 199 (4.92%) Degree
5 114 (2.82%) TOGAF Certification
6 113 (2.80%) AWS Certification
7 112 (2.77%) CISSP
8 100 (2.47%) Azure Certification
9 73 (1.81%) BPSS Clearance
10 72 (1.78%) Computer Science Degree
11 69 (1.71%) Cisco Certification
12 59 (1.46%) CISM
12 59 (1.46%) Master's Degree
12 59 (1.46%) Microsoft Certification
13 56 (1.39%) AWS Certified Solutions Architect
14 42 (1.04%) CCNP
15 31 (0.77%) CCIE
15 31 (0.77%) ITIL Certification
16 30 (0.74%) ISEB
17 22 (0.54%) (ISC)2 CCSP
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 182 (4.50%) GDPR
2 139 (3.44%) NIST
3 128 (3.17%) Data Quality
4 127 (3.14%) ISO/IEC 27001
5 78 (1.93%) NCSC
6 57 (1.41%) QA
7 51 (1.26%) PCI DSS
8 34 (0.84%) Accessibility
8 34 (0.84%) COBIT
9 31 (0.77%) GRC
10 23 (0.57%) ISO 20022
11 21 (0.52%) Cyber Essentials
11 21 (0.52%) JSP 440
12 20 (0.49%) HIPAA
13 18 (0.45%) HMG Security Policy Framework
14 15 (0.37%) California Consumer Privacy Act
14 15 (0.37%) MiFID
15 12 (0.30%) FINRA
15 12 (0.30%) Sarbanes-Oxley
16 11 (0.27%) Cyber Essentials PLUS
System Software
1 169 (4.18%) Active Directory
2 127 (3.14%) Docker
3 89 (2.20%) VMware Infrastructure
4 61 (1.51%) VMware NSX
5 36 (0.89%) vSphere
6 24 (0.59%) Virtual Desktop
7 14 (0.35%) VMware ESXi
8 13 (0.32%) Hyper-V
8 13 (0.32%) Virtual Machines
9 11 (0.27%) Oracle RAC
10 7 (0.17%) BitLocker
10 7 (0.17%) Squid
11 6 (0.15%) Varnish
12 5 (0.12%) RACF
12 5 (0.12%) vCloud
13 4 (0.099%) NFS
14 3 (0.074%) Active Directory Lightweight Directory Services
14 3 (0.074%) Ceph
14 3 (0.074%) Firmware
14 3 (0.074%) Lustre
Systems Management
1 255 (6.31%) Terraform
2 205 (5.07%) Kubernetes
3 106 (2.62%) Ansible
4 64 (1.58%) Single Sign-On
5 30 (0.74%) FortiGate
5 30 (0.74%) OPNET
6 28 (0.69%) vCenter Server
7 26 (0.64%) Microsoft Intune
8 23 (0.57%) Grafana
8 23 (0.57%) SCCM
9 20 (0.49%) Prometheus
10 18 (0.45%) WMI
11 16 (0.40%) Active Directory Federation Services
11 16 (0.40%) Argo
12 8 (0.20%) Istio
13 6 (0.15%) Consul
13 6 (0.15%) Kibana
14 5 (0.12%) Puppet
15 4 (0.099%) Data Guard
15 4 (0.099%) Progress Chef
Vendors
1 578 (14.30%) Microsoft
2 225 (5.57%) ServiceNow
3 222 (5.49%) SAP
4 191 (4.73%) Oracle
5 185 (4.58%) Salesforce
6 159 (3.93%) VMware
7 132 (3.27%) Databricks
8 114 (2.82%) Cisco
9 105 (2.60%) Google
10 94 (2.33%) CyberArk
11 68 (1.68%) Palo Alto
12 64 (1.58%) MuleSoft
13 62 (1.53%) Splunk
14 49 (1.21%) Centrify
14 49 (1.21%) Red Hat
15 48 (1.19%) Atlassian
16 47 (1.16%) Workday
17 46 (1.14%) Remedy
18 45 (1.11%) OpenAI
19 40 (0.99%) Sparx