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 4 August 2026.

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

6 months to
4 Aug 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 10 19 13
Rank change year-on-year +9 -6 +3
Contract jobs requiring an Architect 5,892 3,075 3,977
As % of all contract jobs in the UK 11.15% 9.35% 10.15%
As % of the Job Titles category 12.04% 10.22% 10.92%
Number of daily rates quoted 3,894 1,986 2,582
10th Percentile £475 £468 £488
25th Percentile £525 £530 £550
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £620 £625 £650
Median % change year-on-year -0.80% -3.85% -
75th Percentile £713 £701 £738
90th Percentile £788 £779 £813
UK excluding London median daily rate £621 £600 £646
% change year-on-year +3.50% -7.12% -0.62%
Number of hourly rates quoted 178 19 77
10th Percentile £46.00 £37.19 £59.00
25th Percentile £60.00 £61.88 £60.00
Median hourly rate £65.00 £72.50 £70.00
Median % change year-on-year -10.34% +3.57% -
75th Percentile £73.25 £86.50 £85.00
90th Percentile £96.36 £100.00 £90.00
UK excluding London median hourly rate £65.00 £72.50 £70.00
% change year-on-year -10.34% +3.57% -

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 48,942 30,093 36,428
% of contract IT jobs with a recognized job title 92.61% 91.45% 92.94%
Number of daily rates quoted 29,465 19,115 23,531
10th Percentile £331 £282 £300
25th Percentile £425 £400 £413
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £525 £500 £525
Median % change year-on-year +5.00% -4.76% -2.33%
75th Percentile £625 £623 £638
90th Percentile £725 £725 £750
UK excluding London median daily rate £500 £475 £500
% change year-on-year +5.26% -5.00% -
Number of hourly rates quoted 3,396 1,494 2,063
10th Percentile £15.25 £13.60 £14.16
25th Percentile £21.25 £17.30 £20.12
Median hourly rate £42.50 £25.15 £43.00
Median % change year-on-year +68.99% -41.51% +1.18%
75th Percentile £68.00 £53.99 £65.00
90th Percentile £80.00 £73.10 £75.00
UK excluding London median hourly rate £45.00 £25.15 £43.90
% change year-on-year +78.93% -42.71% +17.07%

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 4 August 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 4 August 2026.

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 4 August 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 +7 4,970 £623 -0.40% 2,791
London +8 2,563 £625 -3.85% 1,619
UK excluding London +7 2,443 £621 +3.50% 1,320
Work from Home +4 1,595 £600 - 1,130
South East 0 716 £630 +5.00% 383
North of England +3 693 £600 - 320
Midlands -1 412 £625 +8.70% 163
North West +7 392 £600 - 155
West Midlands -3 306 £627 +4.42% 110
South West -2 291 £625 -2.34% 192
Yorkshire +6 235 £600 - 127
East of England +17 160 £600 +8.11% 96
Scotland +11 152 £648 +3.60% 104
East Midlands +8 99 £600 +18.23% 53
North East -1 68 £600 -14.29% 38
Wales +3 35 £620 +14.81% 27
Northern Ireland +8 6 £475 -32.14% 46
Channel Islands -1 3 £575 -22.56%

Architect Skill Set
Top 30 Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities

For the 6 months to 4 August 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 1,817 (30.84%) Security Cleared
2 1,479 (25.10%) Azure
3 1,369 (23.23%) SC Cleared
4 1,287 (21.84%) AWS
5 859 (14.58%) Roadmaps
6 820 (13.92%) Stakeholder Management
7 804 (13.65%) Migration
8 737 (12.51%) Microsoft
9 714 (12.12%) AI
10 682 (11.58%) Enterprise Architecture
11 659 (11.18%) Agile
12 617 (10.47%) DevOps
13 605 (10.27%) Data Modelling
14 601 (10.20%) Technical Leadership
15 600 (10.18%) CI/CD
16 582 (9.88%) Stakeholder Engagement
17 574 (9.74%) Integration Patterns
18 559 (9.49%) Data Architecture
19 520 (8.83%) Analytics
20 489 (8.30%) TOGAF
21 473 (8.03%) Architectural Patterns
22 448 (7.60%) GCP
23 421 (7.15%) Security Architecture
24 411 (6.98%) Microservices
25 384 (6.52%) Event-Driven
26 362 (6.14%) Problem-Solving
27 356 (6.04%) Cybersecurity
28 352 (5.97%) Infrastructure as Code
29 351 (5.96%) Data Governance
30 341 (5.79%) 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 92 (1.56%) SharePoint
2 77 (1.31%) SAS
3 68 (1.15%) Confluence
4 45 (0.76%) Apache
5 43 (0.73%) Apache Spark
6 32 (0.54%) Microsoft Exchange
7 26 (0.44%) Apache Airflow
8 23 (0.39%) Palantir Foundry
9 17 (0.29%) CMS
10 15 (0.25%) OpenStack
11 11 (0.19%) Appian
11 11 (0.19%) ArcGIS
12 10 (0.17%) nginx
13 7 (0.12%) Documentum
14 6 (0.10%) Adobe Experience Manager
14 6 (0.10%) Camunda
15 5 (0.085%) NetWeaver
16 4 (0.068%) JBoss
16 4 (0.068%) Jupyter
16 4 (0.068%) Tomcat
Applications
1 19 (0.32%) MS Visio
2 13 (0.22%) Microsoft Excel
3 12 (0.20%) Microsoft PowerPoint
4 9 (0.15%) Chatbot
5 7 (0.12%) Navisworks
5 7 (0.12%) Revit
5 7 (0.12%) Spreadsheet
6 5 (0.085%) Microsoft Office
7 3 (0.051%) PlantUML
7 3 (0.051%) Windchill
8 1 (0.017%) Microsoft Project
8 1 (0.017%) Notion
Business Applications
1 153 (2.60%) SAP S/4HANA
2 34 (0.58%) Sparx Enterprise Architect
3 33 (0.56%) Dynamics CRM
4 24 (0.41%) Oracle EBS
5 17 (0.29%) Payment Gateway
6 16 (0.27%) Oracle ERP
6 16 (0.27%) Teamcenter
7 14 (0.24%) Oracle Payables
7 14 (0.24%) SAP ERP
8 12 (0.20%) Oracle Receivables
8 12 (0.20%) Remedy ITSM
9 11 (0.19%) NetSuite
10 10 (0.17%) SAP BRIM
11 9 (0.15%) Oracle Retail
12 8 (0.14%) SAP IBP
12 8 (0.14%) SAP MDG
13 7 (0.12%) Maximo
13 7 (0.12%) Workday HCM
14 6 (0.10%) Endur
14 6 (0.10%) SAP CO
Cloud Services
1 1,479 (25.10%) Azure
2 1,287 (21.84%) AWS
3 448 (7.60%) GCP
4 286 (4.85%) Power Platform
5 207 (3.51%) Entra ID
6 204 (3.46%) SaaS
7 192 (3.26%) Serverless
8 141 (2.39%) GitHub
9 125 (2.12%) Dynamics 365
10 120 (2.04%) PaaS
11 115 (1.95%) Microsoft 365
12 113 (1.92%) Azure DevOps
13 106 (1.80%) Snowflake
14 96 (1.63%) AWS Lambda
15 85 (1.44%) Amazon S3
15 85 (1.44%) IaaS
16 64 (1.09%) Azure Synapse Analytics
16 64 (1.09%) OCI
17 62 (1.05%) Virtual Private Cloud
18 61 (1.04%) Azure Data Factory
Communications & Networking
1 199 (3.38%) Firewall
2 182 (3.09%) Network Security
3 107 (1.82%) WAN
4 106 (1.80%) VPN
5 93 (1.58%) DNS
6 78 (1.32%) LAN
7 52 (0.88%) SD-WAN
8 44 (0.75%) BGP
9 41 (0.70%) TCP/IP
10 40 (0.68%) DHCP
11 37 (0.63%) MPLS
12 36 (0.61%) VLAN
13 32 (0.54%) SAN
14 31 (0.53%) Wireless
15 27 (0.46%) NAS
15 27 (0.46%) OSPF
16 25 (0.42%) Structured Cabling
17 24 (0.41%) VXLAN
18 22 (0.37%) Cisco IOS
18 22 (0.37%) IPsec
Database & Business Intelligence
1 199 (3.38%) Power BI
2 190 (3.22%) Data Lake
3 173 (2.94%) Data Warehouse
4 166 (2.82%) Metadata
5 74 (1.26%) NoSQL
6 51 (0.87%) PostgreSQL
6 51 (0.87%) SQL Server
7 48 (0.81%) Big Data
8 43 (0.73%) Azure SQL Database
9 42 (0.71%) BigQuery
10 41 (0.70%) Amazon RDS
11 40 (0.68%) Oracle Database
12 38 (0.64%) Delta Lake
13 32 (0.54%) Amazon Redshift
14 26 (0.44%) GIS
15 24 (0.41%) MongoDB
15 24 (0.41%) Semantic Layer
16 23 (0.39%) Amazon Athena
16 23 (0.39%) Electronic Patient Records
16 23 (0.39%) Relational Database
Development Applications
1 85 (1.44%) JIRA
2 79 (1.34%) Git
3 61 (1.04%) Jenkins
4 30 (0.51%) GitLab
5 23 (0.39%) ERwin
6 10 (0.17%) Claude Code
7 9 (0.15%) SonarQube
8 8 (0.14%) Artifactory
8 8 (0.14%) Cypress.io
8 8 (0.14%) MLflow
9 7 (0.12%) Oracle Forms
9 7 (0.12%) Postman
9 7 (0.12%) PowerDesigner
9 7 (0.12%) Sonatype Nexus
10 6 (0.10%) Hudson
10 6 (0.10%) Maven
11 5 (0.085%) Storybook
12 4 (0.068%) Bitbucket
12 4 (0.068%) ER Studio
12 4 (0.068%) Snyk
General
1 1,094 (18.57%) Social Skills
2 876 (14.87%) Finance
3 666 (11.30%) Public Sector
4 328 (5.57%) Banking
5 302 (5.13%) Analytical Skills
6 249 (4.23%) Retail
7 146 (2.48%) Influencing Skills
8 131 (2.22%) Telecoms
9 130 (2.21%) Documentation Skills
10 120 (2.04%) Manufacturing
11 112 (1.90%) Legal
12 63 (1.07%) Marketing
13 56 (0.95%) Billing
14 50 (0.85%) Financial Institution
15 47 (0.80%) Inclusion and Diversity
15 47 (0.80%) Military
16 46 (0.78%) Law
17 41 (0.70%) Presentation Skills
18 39 (0.66%) Aerospace
19 33 (0.56%) Police
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 274 (4.65%) REST
2 206 (3.50%) Middleware
3 136 (2.31%) Kafka
4 128 (2.17%) .NET
5 118 (2.00%) SOAP
6 117 (1.99%) OAuth
7 73 (1.24%) Oracle Fusion
8 68 (1.15%) OpenID
9 62 (1.05%) OAuth2
9 62 (1.05%) SAML
10 54 (0.92%) JSON
11 49 (0.83%) React
12 47 (0.80%) RESTful
13 43 (0.73%) SailPoint
14 41 (0.70%) PySpark
15 35 (0.59%) .NET Framework
16 33 (0.56%) GraphQL
17 32 (0.54%) Node.js
17 32 (0.54%) XML
18 31 (0.53%) Web Services
Miscellaneous
1 497 (8.44%) Cloud Native
2 194 (3.29%) Data Centre
3 179 (3.04%) Management Information System
4 147 (2.49%) Legacy Systems
4 147 (2.49%) Product Ownership
5 143 (2.43%) Onboarding
6 142 (2.41%) Distributed Systems
7 138 (2.34%) Hybrid Cloud
8 122 (2.07%) AI Agents
9 118 (2.00%) Enterprise Software
10 96 (1.63%) Data Protection Act
11 89 (1.51%) Operational Technology
12 87 (1.48%) Public Cloud
13 81 (1.37%) CMDB
14 65 (1.10%) Enterprise Cloud
15 64 (1.09%) Security Posture
16 59 (1.00%) Data Structures
17 50 (0.85%) Private Cloud
18 47 (0.80%) IoT
19 45 (0.76%) Taxonomies
Operating Systems
1 126 (2.14%) Windows
2 101 (1.71%) Linux
3 46 (0.78%) Windows Server
4 29 (0.49%) Android
5 28 (0.48%) Apple iOS
6 23 (0.39%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
7 22 (0.37%) Unix
8 10 (0.17%) zOS
9 9 (0.15%) AIX
10 8 (0.14%) VMS
11 7 (0.12%) Ubuntu
12 5 (0.085%) Data ONTAP
12 5 (0.085%) Solaris
12 5 (0.085%) Windows Server 2019
13 4 (0.068%) Alpine Linux
13 4 (0.068%) Windows Server 2016
14 2 (0.034%) CentOS
14 2 (0.034%) HPUX
14 2 (0.034%) Mac OS
15 1 (0.017%) Windows Server 2012
Processes & Methodologies
1 859 (14.58%) Roadmaps
2 820 (13.92%) Stakeholder Management
3 804 (13.65%) Migration
4 714 (12.12%) AI
5 682 (11.58%) Enterprise Architecture
6 659 (11.18%) Agile
7 617 (10.47%) DevOps
8 605 (10.27%) Data Modelling
9 601 (10.20%) Technical Leadership
10 600 (10.18%) CI/CD
11 582 (9.88%) Stakeholder Engagement
12 574 (9.74%) Integration Patterns
13 559 (9.49%) Data Architecture
14 520 (8.83%) Analytics
15 489 (8.30%) TOGAF
16 473 (8.03%) Architectural Patterns
17 421 (7.15%) Security Architecture
18 411 (6.98%) Microservices
19 384 (6.52%) Event-Driven
20 362 (6.14%) Problem-Solving
Programming Languages
1 280 (4.75%) Python
2 268 (4.55%) SQL
3 264 (4.48%) Java
4 132 (2.24%) JavaScript
5 99 (1.68%) PowerShell
6 58 (0.98%) C#
7 55 (0.93%) Bicep
8 50 (0.85%) Bash
9 44 (0.75%) TypeScript
10 31 (0.53%) Apex Code
11 21 (0.36%) Ruby
12 15 (0.25%) Data Analysis Expressions
12 15 (0.25%) Shell Script
13 12 (0.20%) C++
13 12 (0.20%) Kotlin
14 11 (0.19%) Scala
15 10 (0.17%) ABAP
16 9 (0.15%) Groovy
16 9 (0.15%) PL/SQL
16 9 (0.15%) Rust
Qualifications
1 1,817 (30.84%) Security Cleared
2 1,369 (23.23%) SC Cleared
3 341 (5.79%) DV Cleared
4 182 (3.09%) Degree
5 150 (2.55%) CISSP
6 128 (2.17%) AWS Certification
7 127 (2.16%) Azure Certification
8 113 (1.92%) BPSS Clearance
9 111 (1.88%) Cisco Certification
10 94 (1.60%) TOGAF Certification
11 79 (1.34%) Computer Science Degree
12 72 (1.22%) CISM
13 49 (0.83%) (ISC)2 CCSP
13 49 (0.83%) CCNP
14 45 (0.76%) AWS Certified Solutions Architect
15 42 (0.71%) Microsoft Certification
16 35 (0.59%) CCSP
16 35 (0.59%) Master's Degree
17 22 (0.37%) CCNA
18 21 (0.36%) CISA
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 206 (3.50%) Data Quality
2 205 (3.48%) NIST
3 183 (3.11%) GDPR
4 163 (2.77%) ISO/IEC 27001
5 119 (2.02%) NCSC
6 73 (1.24%) GRC
7 60 (1.02%) QA
8 44 (0.75%) PCI DSS
9 41 (0.70%) Accessibility
10 31 (0.53%) Sarbanes-Oxley
11 30 (0.51%) NIST 800
12 23 (0.39%) Cyber Essentials
12 23 (0.39%) ISO 20022
12 23 (0.39%) SEPA
13 21 (0.36%) IFRS
14 17 (0.29%) HL7
15 14 (0.24%) Government Security Classifications
15 14 (0.24%) ISO/IEC 20000
15 14 (0.24%) SLA
16 13 (0.22%) HIPAA
System Software
1 166 (2.82%) Active Directory
2 125 (2.12%) Docker
3 78 (1.32%) VMware Infrastructure
4 48 (0.81%) VMware NSX
5 27 (0.46%) Virtual Desktop
6 21 (0.36%) vSphere
7 20 (0.34%) Hyper-V
8 17 (0.29%) Virtual Machines
9 11 (0.19%) VMware ESXi
10 8 (0.14%) NFS
11 7 (0.12%) Varnish
12 6 (0.10%) Postfix
12 6 (0.10%) vCloud
13 5 (0.085%) IAG
14 4 (0.068%) EMC RecoverPoint
14 4 (0.068%) Sendmail
14 4 (0.068%) Squid
15 3 (0.051%) KVM
15 3 (0.051%) SRDF
16 2 (0.034%) Firmware
Systems Management
1 298 (5.06%) Kubernetes
2 268 (4.55%) Terraform
3 100 (1.70%) Ansible
4 53 (0.90%) Grafana
5 45 (0.76%) Prometheus
6 43 (0.73%) Single Sign-On
7 40 (0.68%) Microsoft Intune
8 21 (0.36%) Argo
9 17 (0.29%) vCenter Server
10 15 (0.25%) Jamf Pro
11 14 (0.24%) Active Directory Federation Services
12 13 (0.22%) FortiGate
13 10 (0.17%) Istio
14 7 (0.12%) SCCM
15 6 (0.10%) CASB
15 6 (0.10%) HAProxy
16 5 (0.085%) EMC VPLEX
16 5 (0.085%) MOM
16 5 (0.085%) NetBackup
17 4 (0.068%) WMI
Vendors
1 737 (12.51%) Microsoft
2 335 (5.69%) SAP
3 304 (5.16%) ServiceNow
4 298 (5.06%) Oracle
5 258 (4.38%) Databricks
6 189 (3.21%) Salesforce
7 144 (2.44%) Google
7 144 (2.44%) VMware
8 133 (2.26%) Cisco
9 65 (1.10%) MuleSoft
10 60 (1.02%) IBM
11 58 (0.98%) CyberArk
12 54 (0.92%) Palo Alto
13 53 (0.90%) Workday
14 45 (0.76%) Foundry
15 44 (0.75%) Ariba
16 43 (0.73%) Splunk
17 42 (0.71%) Red Hat
18 37 (0.63%) Fortinet
18 37 (0.63%) OpenAI