Architect Contract Job Trends

Architect
UK

The median Architect daily rate in the UK is £618, according to job vacancies posted in the 6 months leading up to 26 May 2026.

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

6 months to
26 May 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 9 16 11
Rank change year-on-year +7 -5 +5
Contract jobs requiring an Architect 5,351 2,823 4,398
As % of all contract jobs in the UK 11.02% 9.87% 10.31%
As % of the Job Titles category 11.94% 10.70% 11.11%
Number of daily rates quoted 3,543 1,826 2,817
10th Percentile £463 £463 £500
25th Percentile £513 £538 £560
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £618 £625 £650
Median % change year-on-year -1.20% -3.85% -0.08%
75th Percentile £725 £713 £738
90th Percentile £788 £799 £825
UK excluding London median daily rate £613 £600 £650
% change year-on-year +2.08% -7.69% -
Number of hourly rates quoted 134 30 92
10th Percentile £46.00 £51.15 -
25th Percentile £60.00 £63.38 £60.00
Median hourly rate £65.00 £72.50 £70.00
Median % change year-on-year -10.34% +3.57% -
75th Percentile £78.75 £81.69 £85.65
90th Percentile £97.50 £85.70 £88.00
UK excluding London median hourly rate £65.00 £72.91 £70.00
% change year-on-year -10.84% +4.15% -

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 44,822 26,395 39,583
% of contract IT jobs with a recognized job title 92.33% 92.28% 92.81%
Number of daily rates quoted 27,378 17,183 25,758
10th Percentile £325 £289 £280
25th Percentile £413 £405 £410
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £513 £508 £525
Median % change year-on-year +0.99% -3.33% -2.78%
75th Percentile £619 £625 £638
90th Percentile £725 £738 £750
UK excluding London median daily rate £500 £475 £488
% change year-on-year +5.26% -2.56% -2.50%
Number of hourly rates quoted 2,956 1,008 2,746
10th Percentile £15.00 £14.00 £12.81
25th Percentile £20.49 £18.12 £16.30
Median hourly rate £42.50 £27.52 £36.50
Median % change year-on-year +54.46% -24.62% -18.89%
75th Percentile £67.06 £60.00 £61.30
90th Percentile £78.75 £75.00 £72.50
UK excluding London median hourly rate £43.69 £25.15 £40.00
% change year-on-year +73.72% -37.13% -5.88%

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 26 May 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 26 May 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 26 May 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 +8 4,578 £620 -0.80% 1,532
UK excluding London +9 2,398 £613 +2.08% 856
London +4 2,205 £625 -3.85% 779
Work from Home +2 1,416 £600 - 755
South East +6 700 £625 - 220
North of England +3 664 £600 - 227
Midlands +1 435 £600 +0.97% 102
North West +6 371 £608 +4.29% 125
West Midlands -2 313 £620 +3.33% 74
South West 0 257 £650 +8.33% 128
Yorkshire +6 250 £557 -7.25% 64
East of England +19 202 £575 -4.17% 54
Scotland +12 145 £650 +4.00% 68
East Midlands 0 116 £560 +6.46% 28
North East +7 51 £575 -4.17% 41
Wales -3 30 £600 +25.00% 41
Northern Ireland +6 7 £475 -28.30% 24

Architect Skill Set
Top 30 Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities

For the 6 months to 26 May 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 1,614 (30.16%) Security Cleared
2 1,299 (24.28%) Azure
3 1,185 (22.15%) SC Cleared
4 1,128 (21.08%) AWS
5 720 (13.46%) Roadmaps
6 715 (13.36%) Migration
7 693 (12.95%) Microsoft
8 600 (11.21%) Agile
9 595 (11.12%) Stakeholder Management
10 592 (11.06%) DevOps
11 562 (10.50%) CI/CD
12 529 (9.89%) Enterprise Architecture
13 499 (9.33%) AI
14 495 (9.25%) Data Modelling
15 482 (9.01%) Stakeholder Engagement
16 475 (8.88%) Technical Leadership
17 464 (8.67%) Integration Patterns
18 433 (8.09%) Data Architecture
19 425 (7.94%) Architectural Patterns
20 414 (7.74%) Analytics
21 406 (7.59%) TOGAF
22 402 (7.51%) GCP
23 401 (7.49%) Microservices
24 351 (6.56%) Problem-Solving
25 341 (6.37%) Architectural Design
26 324 (6.05%) Python
27 314 (5.87%) Security Architecture
28 311 (5.81%) Infrastructure as Code
28 311 (5.81%) SAP
29 308 (5.76%) DV Cleared

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
1 119 (2.22%) SharePoint
2 88 (1.64%) Confluence
3 50 (0.93%) Microsoft Exchange
4 31 (0.58%) Apache Spark
5 29 (0.54%) Apache
6 28 (0.52%) SAS
7 20 (0.37%) Apache Airflow
8 16 (0.30%) Anypoint
8 16 (0.30%) Appian
8 16 (0.30%) CMS
9 15 (0.28%) nginx
9 15 (0.28%) Palantir Foundry
9 15 (0.28%) WebLogic
10 13 (0.24%) OpenStack
11 9 (0.17%) ArcGIS
11 9 (0.17%) Camunda
12 8 (0.15%) Adobe Experience Manager
13 7 (0.13%) Oracle SOA Suite
13 7 (0.13%) Tomcat
14 6 (0.11%) NetWeaver
Applications
1 25 (0.47%) Microsoft Office
2 20 (0.37%) Microsoft PowerPoint
3 19 (0.36%) MS Visio
4 14 (0.26%) Microsoft Excel
5 11 (0.21%) Microsoft Project
6 7 (0.13%) Navisworks
6 7 (0.13%) Revit
7 5 (0.093%) Spreadsheet
8 4 (0.075%) Chatbot
9 3 (0.056%) PlantUML
9 3 (0.056%) Windchill
10 1 (0.019%) ArchiCAD
10 1 (0.019%) AutoCAD
10 1 (0.019%) OrCAD
10 1 (0.019%) Siemens NX
Business Applications
1 138 (2.58%) SAP S/4HANA
2 42 (0.78%) Sparx Enterprise Architect
3 22 (0.41%) Payment Gateway
4 19 (0.36%) Dynamics CRM
4 19 (0.36%) Oracle EBS
5 17 (0.32%) SAP ERP
6 15 (0.28%) Teamcenter
6 15 (0.28%) Workday HCM
7 10 (0.19%) Remedy ITSM
8 9 (0.17%) Oracle ERP
8 9 (0.17%) SAP MDG
9 8 (0.15%) Oracle Receivables
9 8 (0.15%) SAP BRIM
10 7 (0.13%) Oracle Payables
10 7 (0.13%) Salesforce CRM
10 7 (0.13%) SAP EWM
10 7 (0.13%) SAP IBP
11 6 (0.11%) SAP GRC
11 6 (0.11%) SAP SD
12 5 (0.093%) Oracle Financials
Cloud Services
1 1,299 (24.28%) Azure
2 1,128 (21.08%) AWS
3 402 (7.51%) GCP
4 233 (4.35%) Power Platform
5 192 (3.59%) Serverless
6 186 (3.48%) Entra ID
7 175 (3.27%) SaaS
8 128 (2.39%) Microsoft 365
9 122 (2.28%) GitHub
10 115 (2.15%) PaaS
11 105 (1.96%) Azure DevOps
12 99 (1.85%) Dynamics 365
13 93 (1.74%) AWS Lambda
14 86 (1.61%) IaaS
15 82 (1.53%) Amazon S3
15 82 (1.53%) Snowflake
16 72 (1.35%) OpenShift
17 69 (1.29%) Amazon EKS
18 68 (1.27%) Virtual Private Cloud
19 67 (1.25%) Azure Data Factory
Communications & Networking
1 208 (3.89%) Firewall
2 175 (3.27%) Network Security
3 122 (2.28%) WAN
4 114 (2.13%) VPN
5 113 (2.11%) DNS
6 85 (1.59%) LAN
7 66 (1.23%) SD-WAN
8 42 (0.78%) BGP
9 38 (0.71%) DHCP
10 32 (0.60%) Wireless
11 31 (0.58%) OSPF
11 31 (0.58%) VLAN
12 30 (0.56%) SAN
13 29 (0.54%) MPLS
14 27 (0.50%) NAS
14 27 (0.50%) TCP/IP
15 24 (0.45%) Structured Cabling
16 23 (0.43%) NX-OS
17 21 (0.39%) BIG-IP
17 21 (0.39%) Wi-Fi
Database & Business Intelligence
1 170 (3.18%) Power BI
2 139 (2.60%) Metadata
3 137 (2.56%) Data Lake
4 130 (2.43%) Data Warehouse
5 74 (1.38%) SQL Server
6 69 (1.29%) PostgreSQL
7 68 (1.27%) NoSQL
8 48 (0.90%) Azure SQL Database
9 42 (0.78%) Tableau
10 40 (0.75%) Big Data
11 35 (0.65%) Oracle Database
12 32 (0.60%) Amazon Redshift
13 29 (0.54%) Delta Lake
14 28 (0.52%) Amazon RDS
15 27 (0.50%) BigQuery
16 23 (0.43%) Amazon Aurora
17 22 (0.41%) Relational Database
18 21 (0.39%) Electronic Patient Records
19 20 (0.37%) Amazon Athena
19 20 (0.37%) DynamoDB
Development Applications
1 102 (1.91%) JIRA
2 93 (1.74%) Jenkins
3 56 (1.05%) Git
4 48 (0.90%) GitLab
5 23 (0.43%) ERwin
6 13 (0.24%) SonarQube
7 11 (0.21%) MLflow
8 10 (0.19%) Artifactory
9 9 (0.17%) Bitbucket
9 9 (0.17%) Postman
10 7 (0.13%) REST Assured
11 6 (0.11%) Hudson
11 6 (0.11%) Selenium
12 5 (0.093%) Cucumber
12 5 (0.093%) JMeter
12 5 (0.093%) JUnit
12 5 (0.093%) Maven
12 5 (0.093%) PowerDesigner
13 4 (0.075%) MSI
13 4 (0.075%) Terragrunt
General
1 983 (18.37%) Social Skills
2 799 (14.93%) Finance
3 575 (10.75%) Public Sector
4 299 (5.59%) Banking
5 262 (4.90%) Analytical Skills
6 165 (3.08%) Retail
7 145 (2.71%) Documentation Skills
8 130 (2.43%) Legal
9 117 (2.19%) Influencing Skills
10 97 (1.81%) Telecoms
11 89 (1.66%) Manufacturing
12 66 (1.23%) Military
13 60 (1.12%) Law
14 52 (0.97%) Presentation Skills
15 51 (0.95%) Billing
16 49 (0.92%) Marketing
17 45 (0.84%) Financial Institution
18 36 (0.67%) Aerospace
19 35 (0.65%) Inclusion and Diversity
19 35 (0.65%) Investment Banking
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 255 (4.77%) REST
2 203 (3.79%) Middleware
3 133 (2.49%) SOAP
4 130 (2.43%) .NET
5 109 (2.04%) Kafka
6 91 (1.70%) LDAP
7 90 (1.68%) OpenID
8 88 (1.64%) OAuth
9 68 (1.27%) SAML
10 54 (1.01%) React
11 51 (0.95%) OAuth2
11 51 (0.95%) Oracle Fusion
12 50 (0.93%) RESTful
13 43 (0.80%) SailPoint
14 39 (0.73%) JSON
15 37 (0.69%) AngularJS
15 37 (0.69%) Web Services
16 32 (0.60%) PySpark
17 30 (0.56%) Node.js
18 26 (0.49%) .NET Framework
Miscellaneous
1 436 (8.15%) Cloud Native
2 184 (3.44%) Data Centre
3 141 (2.64%) Onboarding
4 138 (2.58%) Product Ownership
5 136 (2.54%) Management Information System
6 121 (2.26%) Distributed Systems
7 116 (2.17%) Enterprise Software
8 114 (2.13%) Legacy Systems
9 103 (1.92%) Hybrid Cloud
10 93 (1.74%) Public Cloud
11 88 (1.64%) Security Posture
12 85 (1.59%) Data Protection Act
13 81 (1.51%) Operational Technology
14 72 (1.35%) CMDB
15 64 (1.20%) AI Agents
16 46 (0.86%) Data Structures
17 43 (0.80%) Private Cloud
18 42 (0.78%) Greenfield Project
19 41 (0.77%) Mainframe
19 41 (0.77%) NHS
Operating Systems
1 154 (2.88%) Windows
2 105 (1.96%) Linux
3 35 (0.65%) Windows Server
4 34 (0.64%) Android
4 34 (0.64%) Apple iOS
5 23 (0.43%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
6 22 (0.41%) Unix
7 11 (0.21%) Windows Server 2016
7 11 (0.21%) zOS
8 10 (0.19%) VMS
8 10 (0.19%) Windows 10
9 8 (0.15%) Windows Server 2019
10 7 (0.13%) Mac OS
11 6 (0.11%) Windows 7
12 3 (0.056%) CentOS
12 3 (0.056%) Data ONTAP
12 3 (0.056%) Solaris
12 3 (0.056%) Windows Server 2012
13 2 (0.037%) AIX
13 2 (0.037%) Ubuntu
Processes & Methodologies
1 720 (13.46%) Roadmaps
2 715 (13.36%) Migration
3 600 (11.21%) Agile
4 595 (11.12%) Stakeholder Management
5 592 (11.06%) DevOps
6 562 (10.50%) CI/CD
7 529 (9.89%) Enterprise Architecture
8 499 (9.33%) AI
9 495 (9.25%) Data Modelling
10 482 (9.01%) Stakeholder Engagement
11 475 (8.88%) Technical Leadership
12 464 (8.67%) Integration Patterns
13 433 (8.09%) Data Architecture
14 425 (7.94%) Architectural Patterns
15 414 (7.74%) Analytics
16 406 (7.59%) TOGAF
17 401 (7.49%) Microservices
18 351 (6.56%) Problem-Solving
19 341 (6.37%) Architectural Design
20 314 (5.87%) Security Architecture
Programming Languages
1 324 (6.05%) Python
2 274 (5.12%) SQL
3 210 (3.92%) Java
4 160 (2.99%) PowerShell
5 85 (1.59%) JavaScript
6 62 (1.16%) C#
7 53 (0.99%) Bicep
8 41 (0.77%) TypeScript
9 33 (0.62%) Bash
10 22 (0.41%) PL/SQL
11 20 (0.37%) Apex Code
11 20 (0.37%) Ruby
12 16 (0.30%) Scala
13 13 (0.24%) Kotlin
13 13 (0.24%) Kusto Query Language
14 10 (0.19%) T-SQL
15 7 (0.13%) Shell Script
15 7 (0.13%) VBA
16 6 (0.11%) ABAP
16 6 (0.11%) R
Qualifications
1 1,614 (30.16%) Security Cleared
2 1,185 (22.15%) SC Cleared
3 308 (5.76%) DV Cleared
4 196 (3.66%) Degree
5 114 (2.13%) Azure Certification
5 114 (2.13%) CISSP
6 106 (1.98%) BPSS Clearance
7 104 (1.94%) AWS Certification
8 98 (1.83%) Cisco Certification
9 94 (1.76%) TOGAF Certification
10 79 (1.48%) Computer Science Degree
11 63 (1.18%) CISM
12 51 (0.95%) CCNP
12 51 (0.95%) Master's Degree
13 44 (0.82%) AWS Certified Solutions Architect
14 43 (0.80%) Microsoft Certification
15 39 (0.73%) (ISC)2 CCSP
16 25 (0.47%) CCSP
17 20 (0.37%) CCIE
18 19 (0.36%) GIAC
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 190 (3.55%) NIST
2 168 (3.14%) GDPR
3 144 (2.69%) Data Quality
3 144 (2.69%) ISO/IEC 27001
4 115 (2.15%) NCSC
5 69 (1.29%) QA
6 41 (0.77%) PCI DSS
7 39 (0.73%) GRC
8 34 (0.64%) Accessibility
9 29 (0.54%) ISO 20022
10 25 (0.47%) Cyber Essentials
11 21 (0.39%) NIST 800
11 21 (0.39%) SEPA
12 18 (0.34%) COBIT
12 18 (0.34%) HL7
12 18 (0.34%) Sarbanes-Oxley
13 13 (0.24%) FINRA
13 13 (0.24%) MiFID
13 13 (0.24%) SLA
14 12 (0.22%) PSD2
System Software
1 194 (3.63%) Active Directory
2 102 (1.91%) Docker
3 96 (1.79%) VMware Infrastructure
4 71 (1.33%) VMware NSX
5 31 (0.58%) Virtual Desktop
6 29 (0.54%) vSphere
7 22 (0.41%) Hyper-V
8 12 (0.22%) Varnish
8 12 (0.22%) Virtual Machines
8 12 (0.22%) VMware ESXi
9 10 (0.19%) Oracle RAC
9 10 (0.19%) vCloud
10 9 (0.17%) NFS
10 9 (0.17%) Squid
11 7 (0.13%) Postfix
12 5 (0.093%) RACF
13 4 (0.075%) BitLocker
13 4 (0.075%) Firmware
13 4 (0.075%) Sendmail
14 3 (0.056%) Ceph
Systems Management
1 259 (4.84%) Terraform
2 234 (4.37%) Kubernetes
3 107 (2.00%) Ansible
4 51 (0.95%) Single Sign-On
5 47 (0.88%) Grafana
6 38 (0.71%) Microsoft Intune
7 35 (0.65%) Prometheus
8 33 (0.62%) FortiGate
9 28 (0.52%) vCenter Server
10 17 (0.32%) Argo
10 17 (0.32%) SCCM
11 15 (0.28%) Active Directory Federation Services
12 11 (0.21%) Istio
12 11 (0.21%) OPNET
13 7 (0.13%) Consul
13 7 (0.13%) HAProxy
13 7 (0.13%) Progress Chef
13 7 (0.13%) WMI
14 6 (0.11%) Jamf Pro
14 6 (0.11%) Puppet
Vendors
1 693 (12.95%) Microsoft
2 311 (5.81%) SAP
3 301 (5.63%) ServiceNow
4 238 (4.45%) Oracle
5 215 (4.02%) Databricks
6 183 (3.42%) Salesforce
6 183 (3.42%) VMware
7 136 (2.54%) Cisco
8 114 (2.13%) Google
9 91 (1.70%) CyberArk
10 82 (1.53%) MuleSoft
11 64 (1.20%) Splunk
12 51 (0.95%) Workday
13 50 (0.93%) Palo Alto
14 49 (0.92%) Red Hat
15 44 (0.82%) Sparx
16 43 (0.80%) OpenAI
17 40 (0.75%) BeyondTrust
17 40 (0.75%) IBM
18 38 (0.71%) Ariba