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 5 November 2025.

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

6 months to
5 Nov 2025
Same period 2024 Same period 2023
Rank 20 15 17
Rank change year-on-year -5 +2 +1
Contract jobs requiring an Architect 3,050 3,599 4,378
As % of all contract jobs in the UK 8.82% 9.85% 9.43%
As % of the Job Titles category 9.70% 10.61% 10.06%
Number of daily rates quoted 2,042 2,134 2,991
10th Percentile £462 £476 £500
25th Percentile £525 £538 £567
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £625 £625 £650
Median % change year-on-year - -3.85% -
75th Percentile £720 £738 £729
90th Percentile £800 £800 £775
UK excluding London median daily rate £600 £625 £630
% change year-on-year -4.00% -0.79% -3.08%
Number of hourly rates quoted 19 30 45
10th Percentile £60.62 - £53.32
25th Percentile £66.25 £60.00 £65.00
Median hourly rate £83.82 £68.75 £75.00
Median % change year-on-year +21.92% -8.33% +7.14%
75th Percentile £94.26 £87.50 £80.00
90th Percentile £96.00 £97.50 £85.23
UK excluding London median hourly rate £83.00 £66.75 £76.53
% change year-on-year +24.34% -12.78% +9.33%

All Contract IT Job Vacancies
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 31,437 33,917 43,537
% of contract IT jobs with a recognized job title 90.93% 92.87% 93.82%
Number of daily rates quoted 19,929 20,451 29,620
10th Percentile £278 £300 £299
25th Percentile £402 £412 £413
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £525 £525
Median % change year-on-year -4.76% - -4.55%
75th Percentile £623 £638 £650
90th Percentile £725 £738 £743
UK excluding London median daily rate £475 £490 £500
% change year-on-year -3.06% -2.00% -
Number of hourly rates quoted 1,780 1,278 1,520
10th Percentile £14.05 £15.09 £14.92
25th Percentile £17.50 £20.21 £19.06
Median hourly rate £25.15 £37.39 £45.00
Median % change year-on-year -32.74% -16.91% +55.71%
75th Percentile £51.02 £65.00 £65.00
90th Percentile £69.65 £73.75 £77.50
UK excluding London median hourly rate £25.15 £36.00 £44.50
% change year-on-year -30.14% -19.10% +85.42%

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 5 November 2025.

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 5 November 2025.

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 5 November 2025. 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 -5 2,637 £625 - 2,490
UK excluding London -7 1,351 £600 -4.00% 1,963
London -1 1,272 £650 - 1,093
Work from Home -4 1,004 £625 - 1,535
South East +1 401 £600 -4.76% 1,057
North of England -11 362 £600 +2.13% 242
Midlands -9 224 £575 -2.28% 146
North West -8 220 £588 -1.96% 150
South West -3 195 £675 +3.85% 181
West Midlands -15 157 £582 -6.73% 92
Yorkshire -20 127 £613 +6.52% 70
East of England -7 82 £555 -7.50% 201
Scotland -10 80 £618 -1.98% 66
East Midlands -6 66 £500 +1.01% 46
Wales -4 18 £625 +0.40% 58
North East -11 16 £738 +28.26% 22
Channel Islands - 6 £743 - 28
Northern Ireland -13 4 £550 -8.33% 22

Architect Skill Set
Top 30 Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities

For the 6 months to 5 November 2025, 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.

1 875 (28.69%) Azure
2 857 (28.10%) Security Cleared
3 742 (24.33%) AWS
4 601 (19.70%) SC Cleared
5 464 (15.21%) Microsoft
6 455 (14.92%) Roadmaps
7 415 (13.61%) Stakeholder Management
8 399 (13.08%) Agile
9 369 (12.10%) Migration
10 357 (11.70%) DevOps
11 353 (11.57%) Data Modelling
12 347 (11.38%) Problem-Solving
13 339 (11.11%) CI/CD
14 330 (10.82%) Enterprise Architecture
15 321 (10.52%) TOGAF
16 310 (10.16%) Stakeholder Engagement
17 275 (9.02%) Technical Leadership
18 273 (8.95%) Microservices
19 269 (8.82%) GCP
20 248 (8.13%) Python
21 246 (8.07%) Terraform
22 241 (7.90%) AI
23 235 (7.70%) Data Architecture
24 223 (7.31%) Analytics
25 214 (7.02%) Cybersecurity
26 207 (6.79%) Data Governance
26 207 (6.79%) Firewall
27 206 (6.75%) Security Architecture
28 199 (6.52%) Kubernetes
28 199 (6.52%) SAP

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 64 (2.10%) Confluence
2 40 (1.31%) SharePoint
3 30 (0.98%) Microsoft Exchange
4 24 (0.79%) Apache Spark
4 24 (0.79%) SAS
5 19 (0.62%) Apache Airflow
6 17 (0.56%) Apache
7 16 (0.52%) OpenStack
8 14 (0.46%) ArcGIS
9 13 (0.43%) CMS
9 13 (0.43%) WebLogic
10 10 (0.33%) Anypoint
10 10 (0.33%) Mule
11 6 (0.20%) Smallworld
11 6 (0.20%) WebSphere
12 5 (0.16%) GeoServer
12 5 (0.16%) Jupyter
13 4 (0.13%) nginx
13 4 (0.13%) Oracle Coherence
13 4 (0.13%) Tomcat
Applications
1 28 (0.92%) MS Visio
2 23 (0.75%) Microsoft PowerPoint
3 21 (0.69%) Microsoft Excel
4 13 (0.43%) Siemens NX
5 12 (0.39%) Microsoft Office
6 5 (0.16%) Chatbot
6 5 (0.16%) Microsoft Project
7 3 (0.098%) Fusion 360
7 3 (0.098%) Spreadsheet
8 1 (0.033%) FrameMaker
8 1 (0.033%) Revit
8 1 (0.033%) Trello
8 1 (0.033%) Windchill
Business Applications
1 97 (3.18%) SAP S/4HANA
2 32 (1.05%) Dynamics CRM
3 21 (0.69%) Payment Gateway
4 18 (0.59%) Salesforce CRM
5 16 (0.52%) Teamcenter
6 15 (0.49%) Maximo
6 15 (0.49%) Workday HCM
7 14 (0.46%) Sparx Enterprise Architect
8 13 (0.43%) Remedy ITSM
8 13 (0.43%) SAP PM
9 12 (0.39%) NetSuite
10 10 (0.33%) Endur
10 10 (0.33%) SAP CO
11 9 (0.30%) SAP FI
11 9 (0.30%) SAP MDG
12 8 (0.26%) SAP ERP
12 8 (0.26%) SAP FI/CO
13 7 (0.23%) Dynamics AX
14 6 (0.20%) Oracle ERP
14 6 (0.20%) SAP HR
Cloud Services
1 875 (28.69%) Azure
2 742 (24.33%) AWS
3 269 (8.82%) GCP
4 162 (5.31%) SaaS
5 147 (4.82%) Power Platform
6 133 (4.36%) Serverless
7 102 (3.34%) Entra ID
8 97 (3.18%) GitHub
9 89 (2.92%) Amazon S3
10 83 (2.72%) Dynamics 365
10 83 (2.72%) Microsoft 365
11 81 (2.66%) IaaS
12 80 (2.62%) Azure DevOps
13 74 (2.43%) AWS Lambda
14 71 (2.33%) PaaS
15 64 (2.10%) Snowflake
16 58 (1.90%) Azure Synapse Analytics
16 58 (1.90%) GitHub Actions
17 55 (1.80%) Azure Data Factory
18 49 (1.61%) Microsoft Purview
Communications & Networking
1 207 (6.79%) Firewall
2 104 (3.41%) WAN
3 100 (3.28%) Network Security
4 93 (3.05%) LAN
5 73 (2.39%) VPN
6 68 (2.23%) SD-WAN
7 62 (2.03%) DNS
8 38 (1.25%) Wi-Fi
9 36 (1.18%) BGP
10 27 (0.89%) DHCP
10 27 (0.89%) MPLS
10 27 (0.89%) SAN
11 25 (0.82%) Cisco Nexus
11 25 (0.82%) SSL
12 20 (0.66%) VSAN
13 18 (0.59%) Internet
14 16 (0.52%) Fibre Channel
14 16 (0.52%) iSCSI
14 16 (0.52%) OSPF
14 16 (0.52%) VLAN
Database & Business Intelligence
1 122 (4.00%) Data Warehouse
2 96 (3.15%) Power BI
3 80 (2.62%) Metadata
4 71 (2.33%) Data Lake
5 64 (2.10%) PostgreSQL
6 60 (1.97%) SQL Server
7 52 (1.70%) NoSQL
8 40 (1.31%) Amazon Redshift
9 35 (1.15%) Big Data
10 34 (1.11%) Oracle Database
11 33 (1.08%) BigQuery
12 32 (1.05%) DynamoDB
13 31 (1.02%) MongoDB
14 26 (0.85%) Azure SQL Database
14 26 (0.85%) Relational Database
15 24 (0.79%) Amazon RDS
16 23 (0.75%) Tableau
17 22 (0.72%) Delta Lake
18 21 (0.69%) Amazon Athena
18 21 (0.69%) GIS
Development Applications
1 95 (3.11%) JIRA
2 74 (2.43%) Jenkins
3 53 (1.74%) Git
4 35 (1.15%) GitLab
5 23 (0.75%) CircleCI
5 23 (0.75%) ERwin
6 11 (0.36%) Oracle Forms
7 9 (0.30%) Maven
7 9 (0.30%) SonarQube
8 7 (0.23%) ER Studio
8 7 (0.23%) Gradle
8 7 (0.23%) Rational DOORS
9 6 (0.20%) Sonatype Nexus
10 5 (0.16%) Artifactory
10 5 (0.16%) SonarLint
10 5 (0.16%) Visual Studio Code
11 4 (0.13%) Bitbucket
11 4 (0.13%) MLflow
11 4 (0.13%) Postman
12 3 (0.098%) Hudson
General
1 823 (26.98%) Social Skills
2 543 (17.80%) Finance
3 381 (12.49%) Public Sector
4 233 (7.64%) Analytical Skills
5 202 (6.62%) Banking
6 91 (2.98%) Retail
7 88 (2.89%) Telecoms
8 80 (2.62%) Documentation Skills
9 64 (2.10%) Influencing Skills
9 64 (2.10%) Marketing
10 61 (2.00%) Legal
10 61 (2.00%) Manufacturing
10 61 (2.00%) Presentation Skills
11 45 (1.48%) Inclusion and Diversity
12 41 (1.34%) Financial Institution
13 33 (1.08%) Military
14 26 (0.85%) Aerospace
15 25 (0.82%) Back Office
16 23 (0.75%) Billing
17 21 (0.69%) Local Government
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 145 (4.75%) REST
2 89 (2.92%) Middleware
3 84 (2.75%) .NET
4 82 (2.69%) Kafka
5 74 (2.43%) SOAP
6 58 (1.90%) Web Services
7 56 (1.84%) JSON
8 54 (1.77%) OAuth
9 53 (1.74%) RESTful
10 43 (1.41%) SAML
11 39 (1.28%) React
12 36 (1.18%) AngularJS
13 35 (1.15%) Lightning Web Components
14 32 (1.05%) OAuth2
15 30 (0.98%) Node.js
15 30 (0.98%) RabbitMQ
16 27 (0.89%) OpenID
16 27 (0.89%) Spring Boot
17 26 (0.85%) LDAP
18 24 (0.79%) Oracle Fusion
Miscellaneous
1 234 (7.67%) Cloud Native
2 128 (4.20%) Legacy Systems
3 117 (3.84%) Product Ownership
4 112 (3.67%) Data Centre
5 93 (3.05%) Onboarding
6 78 (2.56%) Hybrid Cloud
7 58 (1.90%) Management Information System
8 53 (1.74%) PKI
9 51 (1.67%) Enterprise Software
10 46 (1.51%) Public Cloud
11 44 (1.44%) Distributed Systems
12 42 (1.38%) Operational Technology
13 36 (1.18%) Security Operations Centre
13 36 (1.18%) Security Posture
14 35 (1.15%) CMDB
14 35 (1.15%) NHS
15 32 (1.05%) SCADA
15 32 (1.05%) Self-Motivation
16 31 (1.02%) Data Protection Act
17 28 (0.92%) CSOC
Operating Systems
1 136 (4.46%) Windows
2 98 (3.21%) Linux
3 51 (1.67%) Windows Server
4 25 (0.82%) Windows Server 2019
5 22 (0.72%) Unix
6 19 (0.62%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
7 14 (0.46%) Android
7 14 (0.46%) Apple iOS
8 11 (0.36%) Windows 10
9 9 (0.30%) Windows 7
10 7 (0.23%) Mac OS
11 6 (0.20%) Windows Server 2016
12 5 (0.16%) Ubuntu
12 5 (0.16%) VMS
13 3 (0.098%) Solaris
13 3 (0.098%) Windows Server 2008
13 3 (0.098%) zOS
14 2 (0.066%) CentOS
14 2 (0.066%) Debian
15 1 (0.033%) AIX
Processes & Methodologies
1 455 (14.92%) Roadmaps
2 415 (13.61%) Stakeholder Management
3 399 (13.08%) Agile
4 369 (12.10%) Migration
5 357 (11.70%) DevOps
6 353 (11.57%) Data Modelling
7 347 (11.38%) Problem-Solving
8 339 (11.11%) CI/CD
9 330 (10.82%) Enterprise Architecture
10 321 (10.52%) TOGAF
11 310 (10.16%) Stakeholder Engagement
12 275 (9.02%) Technical Leadership
13 273 (8.95%) Microservices
14 241 (7.90%) AI
15 235 (7.70%) Data Architecture
16 223 (7.31%) Analytics
17 214 (7.02%) Cybersecurity
18 207 (6.79%) Data Governance
19 206 (6.75%) Security Architecture
20 193 (6.33%) Mentoring
Programming Languages
1 248 (8.13%) Python
2 175 (5.74%) SQL
3 174 (5.70%) Java
4 84 (2.75%) PowerShell
5 73 (2.39%) JavaScript
6 64 (2.10%) TypeScript
7 44 (1.44%) C#
8 36 (1.18%) Bicep
9 29 (0.95%) Apex Code
10 28 (0.92%) Bash
11 16 (0.52%) C++
11 16 (0.52%) Kotlin
12 15 (0.49%) R
13 12 (0.39%) C
13 12 (0.39%) Go
14 9 (0.30%) Scala
15 8 (0.26%) PL/SQL
16 7 (0.23%) Korn
17 6 (0.20%) ABAP
17 6 (0.20%) DataWeave
Qualifications
1 857 (28.10%) Security Cleared
2 601 (19.70%) SC Cleared
3 175 (5.74%) DV Cleared
4 144 (4.72%) Degree
5 113 (3.70%) CISSP
6 98 (3.21%) Azure Certification
7 89 (2.92%) AWS Certification
8 66 (2.16%) Cisco Certification
9 61 (2.00%) Microsoft Certification
10 56 (1.84%) Computer Science Degree
11 51 (1.67%) BPSS Clearance
12 46 (1.51%) CISM
13 43 (1.41%) TOGAF Certification
14 38 (1.25%) AWS Certified Solutions Architect
15 37 (1.21%) Master's Degree
16 31 (1.02%) CCNP
17 30 (0.98%) CCIE
18 22 (0.72%) (ISC)2 CCSP
19 19 (0.62%) VMware Certified Professional (VCP)
20 18 (0.59%) CCSP
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 162 (5.31%) GDPR
2 136 (4.46%) NIST
3 133 (4.36%) ISO/IEC 27001
4 97 (3.18%) Data Quality
5 57 (1.87%) NCSC
6 47 (1.54%) QA
7 45 (1.48%) PCI DSS
8 29 (0.95%) Accessibility
8 29 (0.95%) ISO/IEC 20000
9 27 (0.89%) HIPAA
10 25 (0.82%) GRC
11 23 (0.75%) JSP 440
12 22 (0.72%) California Consumer Privacy Act
13 21 (0.69%) COBIT
14 17 (0.56%) Sarbanes-Oxley
15 14 (0.46%) Cyber Essentials
15 14 (0.46%) SOC 2
16 13 (0.43%) HMG Security Policy Framework
17 12 (0.39%) NIST 800
18 11 (0.36%) ISO 20022
System Software
1 122 (4.00%) Docker
2 117 (3.84%) Active Directory
3 90 (2.95%) VMware Infrastructure
4 37 (1.21%) vSphere
5 25 (0.82%) VMware ESXi
6 24 (0.79%) VMware NSX
7 16 (0.52%) NFS
8 12 (0.39%) Hyper-V
9 10 (0.33%) Virtual Machines
10 9 (0.30%) Virtual Desktop
11 5 (0.16%) Slurm Workload Manager
12 4 (0.13%) Dovecot
12 4 (0.13%) Postfix
13 3 (0.098%) BitLocker
13 3 (0.098%) KVM
14 2 (0.066%) GPFS
14 2 (0.066%) Lustre
14 2 (0.066%) Oracle RAC
15 1 (0.033%) Active Directory Lightweight Directory Services
15 1 (0.033%) OpenDJ
Systems Management
1 246 (8.07%) Terraform
2 199 (6.52%) Kubernetes
3 90 (2.95%) Ansible
4 56 (1.84%) Single Sign-On
5 37 (1.21%) Prometheus
6 27 (0.89%) Grafana
6 27 (0.89%) Microsoft Intune
7 14 (0.46%) vCenter Server
8 13 (0.43%) SCCM
9 11 (0.36%) Active Directory Federation Services
10 7 (0.23%) Argo
10 7 (0.23%) WMI
11 5 (0.16%) FortiGate
12 4 (0.13%) SCOM
13 3 (0.098%) Jamf Pro
13 3 (0.098%) OPNET
13 3 (0.098%) Puppet
13 3 (0.098%) RSA Archer
14 2 (0.066%) Microsoft Clustering
14 2 (0.066%) vRealize
Vendors
1 464 (15.21%) Microsoft
2 199 (6.52%) SAP
3 177 (5.80%) Oracle
4 139 (4.56%) Salesforce
5 133 (4.36%) VMware
6 129 (4.23%) ServiceNow
7 115 (3.77%) Cisco
8 93 (3.05%) Google
9 89 (2.92%) Databricks
10 72 (2.36%) Splunk
11 53 (1.74%) Fortinet
12 45 (1.48%) Palo Alto
13 44 (1.44%) MuleSoft
14 38 (1.25%) IBM
15 37 (1.21%) F5
16 35 (1.15%) Workday
17 34 (1.11%) CyberArk
17 34 (1.11%) Juniper
18 32 (1.05%) OpenAI
19 29 (0.95%) Pega