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 23 April 2026.

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

6 months to
23 Apr 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 11 16 11
Rank change year-on-year +5 -5 +6
Contract jobs requiring an Architect 5,091 2,896 4,499
As % of all contract jobs in the UK 10.97% 9.81% 10.29%
As % of the Job Titles category 11.88% 10.59% 11.09%
Number of daily rates quoted 3,349 1,908 2,904
10th Percentile £463 £478 £500
25th Percentile £513 £538 £563
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £620 £625 £650
Median % change year-on-year -0.80% -3.85% -1.52%
75th Percentile £725 £725 £738
90th Percentile £800 £799 £825
UK excluding London median daily rate £610 £602 £650
% change year-on-year +1.41% -7.46% -
Number of hourly rates quoted 120 37 62
10th Percentile £49.40 £54.30 £57.75
25th Percentile £60.00 £61.50 £61.25
Median hourly rate £69.72 £70.00 £80.00
Median % change year-on-year -0.40% -12.50% +14.29%
75th Percentile £83.25 £80.59 £87.46
90th Percentile £97.50 £85.61 £90.00
UK excluding London median hourly rate £71.27 £72.50 £80.00
% change year-on-year -1.70% -9.38% +14.29%

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 42,836 27,359 40,556
% of contract IT jobs with a recognized job title 92.28% 92.64% 92.76%
Number of daily rates quoted 26,486 17,911 26,489
10th Percentile £313 £300 £275
25th Percentile £413 £406 £409
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £515 £525
Median % change year-on-year -2.91% -1.90% -2.78%
75th Percentile £613 £625 £638
90th Percentile £725 £738 £750
UK excluding London median daily rate £488 £475 £490
% change year-on-year +2.63% -3.06% -2.00%
Number of hourly rates quoted 2,746 1,013 2,627
10th Percentile £15.00 £14.44 £12.86
25th Percentile £20.35 £18.51 £16.25
Median hourly rate £42.50 £30.00 £35.00
Median % change year-on-year +41.67% -14.29% -22.22%
75th Percentile £65.60 £63.00 £60.00
90th Percentile £77.75 £75.00 £72.50
UK excluding London median hourly rate £44.00 £28.88 £37.18
% change year-on-year +52.38% -22.34% -12.52%

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 23 April 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 23 April 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 23 April 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 +5 4,347 £625 - 903
UK excluding London +8 2,345 £610 +1.41% 609
London +3 2,019 £625 -3.85% 386
Work from Home +3 1,393 £600 - 438
South East +4 704 £625 - 157
North of England +5 614 £600 - 149
Midlands +2 405 £581 -3.17% 110
North West +8 358 £607 +1.08% 95
West Midlands 0 300 £603 +0.42% 79
South West +1 298 £693 +15.42% 97
Yorkshire +8 229 £558 -7.00% 36
East of England +20 197 £563 -6.25% 59
Scotland +13 137 £650 +4.00% 8
East Midlands -3 99 £513 -6.82% 31
North East +1 36 £575 -7.95% 18
Wales -9 24 £600 +20.00% 23
Northern Ireland +10 10 £488 -26.42% 15

Architect Skill Set
Top 30 Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities

For the 6 months to 23 April 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 1,598 (31.39%) Security Cleared
2 1,213 (23.83%) Azure
3 1,144 (22.47%) SC Cleared
4 1,073 (21.08%) AWS
5 719 (14.12%) Roadmaps
6 692 (13.59%) Microsoft
7 679 (13.34%) Migration
8 633 (12.43%) Agile
9 573 (11.26%) Stakeholder Management
10 557 (10.94%) DevOps
11 531 (10.43%) CI/CD
12 524 (10.29%) Enterprise Architecture
13 477 (9.37%) Stakeholder Engagement
14 462 (9.07%) Data Modelling
15 461 (9.06%) Technical Leadership
16 457 (8.98%) AI
17 435 (8.54%) TOGAF
18 427 (8.39%) Analytics
19 424 (8.33%) Integration Patterns
20 393 (7.72%) GCP
21 389 (7.64%) Data Architecture
22 380 (7.46%) Problem-Solving
23 376 (7.39%) Architectural Patterns
24 366 (7.19%) Microservices
25 353 (6.93%) Python
26 338 (6.64%) Architectural Design
27 327 (6.42%) DV Cleared
28 312 (6.13%) ServiceNow
29 303 (5.95%) Infrastructure as Code
30 295 (5.79%) 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
1 128 (2.51%) SharePoint
2 108 (2.12%) Confluence
3 64 (1.26%) Microsoft Exchange
4 29 (0.57%) SAS
5 27 (0.53%) Apache Spark
6 25 (0.49%) Apache
7 22 (0.43%) CMS
8 18 (0.35%) Apache Airflow
9 16 (0.31%) Anypoint
9 16 (0.31%) Appian
10 15 (0.29%) nginx
10 15 (0.29%) WebLogic
11 14 (0.27%) ArcGIS
12 11 (0.22%) OpenStack
13 10 (0.20%) Adobe Experience Manager
13 10 (0.20%) Palantir Foundry
14 7 (0.14%) Camunda
14 7 (0.14%) Oracle SOA Suite
14 7 (0.14%) Sitecore CMS
14 7 (0.14%) Skype for Business
Applications
1 48 (0.94%) Microsoft Office
2 31 (0.61%) Microsoft Project
3 24 (0.47%) Microsoft PowerPoint
4 19 (0.37%) Microsoft Excel
5 17 (0.33%) MS Visio
6 4 (0.079%) Chatbot
6 4 (0.079%) Navisworks
6 4 (0.079%) Revit
7 3 (0.059%) Spreadsheet
8 2 (0.039%) PlantUML
8 2 (0.039%) Windchill
9 1 (0.020%) ArchiCAD
9 1 (0.020%) AutoCAD
9 1 (0.020%) OrCAD
9 1 (0.020%) Siemens NX
Business Applications
1 126 (2.47%) SAP S/4HANA
2 49 (0.96%) Sparx Enterprise Architect
3 22 (0.43%) Dynamics CRM
3 22 (0.43%) Workday HCM
4 19 (0.37%) Payment Gateway
5 16 (0.31%) Oracle EBS
6 15 (0.29%) SAP ERP
7 13 (0.26%) Teamcenter
8 12 (0.24%) SAP EWM
9 11 (0.22%) Remedy ITSM
10 10 (0.20%) Oracle ERP
10 10 (0.20%) Oracle Receivables
11 9 (0.18%) Salesforce CRM
12 8 (0.16%) SAP PM
12 8 (0.16%) SAP PP
13 7 (0.14%) Maximo
13 7 (0.14%) NetSuite
13 7 (0.14%) R3 Corda
13 7 (0.14%) SAP CRM
13 7 (0.14%) SAP QM
Cloud Services
1 1,213 (23.83%) Azure
2 1,073 (21.08%) AWS
3 393 (7.72%) GCP
4 219 (4.30%) Power Platform
5 183 (3.59%) Serverless
6 182 (3.57%) Entra ID
7 171 (3.36%) SaaS
8 142 (2.79%) Microsoft 365
9 114 (2.24%) GitHub
10 107 (2.10%) Dynamics 365
10 107 (2.10%) IaaS
10 107 (2.10%) PaaS
11 98 (1.92%) Azure DevOps
12 92 (1.81%) AWS Lambda
13 80 (1.57%) Amazon S3
13 80 (1.57%) OpenShift
14 75 (1.47%) AWS CloudFormation
14 75 (1.47%) Snowflake
15 71 (1.39%) Microsoft Purview
16 68 (1.34%) Azure Synapse Analytics
Communications & Networking
1 221 (4.34%) Firewall
2 174 (3.42%) Network Security
3 135 (2.65%) WAN
4 121 (2.38%) VPN
5 118 (2.32%) DNS
6 86 (1.69%) LAN
7 76 (1.49%) SD-WAN
8 38 (0.75%) BGP
9 34 (0.67%) DHCP
10 30 (0.59%) OSPF
11 29 (0.57%) Wi-Fi
12 27 (0.53%) MPLS
12 27 (0.53%) TCP/IP
12 27 (0.53%) VLAN
13 24 (0.47%) SAN
14 22 (0.43%) Wireless
15 21 (0.41%) NAS
15 21 (0.41%) VXLAN
16 20 (0.39%) BIG-IP
17 19 (0.37%) Kerberos
Database & Business Intelligence
1 162 (3.18%) Power BI
2 142 (2.79%) Metadata
3 137 (2.69%) Data Warehouse
4 130 (2.55%) Data Lake
5 81 (1.59%) SQL Server
6 66 (1.30%) NoSQL
7 59 (1.16%) PostgreSQL
8 54 (1.06%) Azure SQL Database
9 48 (0.94%) Tableau
10 40 (0.79%) Big Data
11 37 (0.73%) Amazon Redshift
11 37 (0.73%) Oracle Database
12 27 (0.53%) Delta Lake
12 27 (0.53%) Relational Database
13 25 (0.49%) BigQuery
14 23 (0.45%) Amazon Athena
14 23 (0.45%) DynamoDB
15 22 (0.43%) Amazon RDS
15 22 (0.43%) Electronic Patient Records
15 22 (0.43%) MongoDB
Development Applications
1 123 (2.42%) JIRA
2 90 (1.77%) Jenkins
3 52 (1.02%) Git
4 48 (0.94%) GitLab
5 21 (0.41%) ERwin
6 13 (0.26%) SonarQube
7 11 (0.22%) Bitbucket
7 11 (0.22%) MLflow
8 10 (0.20%) Artifactory
9 6 (0.12%) Postman
9 6 (0.12%) REST Assured
10 5 (0.098%) Cucumber
10 5 (0.098%) JUnit
10 5 (0.098%) PowerDesigner
10 5 (0.098%) Selenium
10 5 (0.098%) Sonatype Nexus
11 4 (0.079%) Snyk
11 4 (0.079%) Terragrunt
12 3 (0.059%) Claude Code
12 3 (0.059%) ER Studio
General
1 1,014 (19.92%) Social Skills
2 767 (15.07%) Finance
3 572 (11.24%) Public Sector
4 318 (6.25%) Analytical Skills
5 290 (5.70%) Banking
6 154 (3.02%) Documentation Skills
7 128 (2.51%) Retail
8 116 (2.28%) Legal
9 113 (2.22%) Influencing Skills
10 91 (1.79%) Military
11 86 (1.69%) Telecoms
12 71 (1.39%) Manufacturing
12 71 (1.39%) Presentation Skills
13 63 (1.24%) Law
13 63 (1.24%) Marketing
14 44 (0.86%) Financial Institution
15 35 (0.69%) Investment Banking
16 34 (0.67%) Billing
17 30 (0.59%) Inclusion and Diversity
18 29 (0.57%) Aerospace
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 247 (4.85%) REST
2 185 (3.63%) Middleware
3 130 (2.55%) SOAP
4 115 (2.26%) .NET
5 108 (2.12%) Kafka
6 88 (1.73%) OpenID
7 85 (1.67%) LDAP
8 80 (1.57%) OAuth
9 61 (1.20%) SAML
10 58 (1.14%) JSON
11 52 (1.02%) React
12 47 (0.92%) OAuth2
13 43 (0.84%) RESTful
14 41 (0.81%) Oracle Fusion
15 39 (0.77%) AngularJS
16 38 (0.75%) Web Services
17 37 (0.73%) SailPoint
18 32 (0.63%) Spring
19 30 (0.59%) PySpark
20 28 (0.55%) Node.js
Miscellaneous
1 408 (8.01%) Cloud Native
2 167 (3.28%) Data Centre
3 144 (2.83%) Product Ownership
4 133 (2.61%) Onboarding
5 123 (2.42%) Legacy Systems
6 121 (2.38%) Management Information System
7 116 (2.28%) Enterprise Software
8 107 (2.10%) Distributed Systems
9 98 (1.92%) Hybrid Cloud
10 96 (1.89%) Public Cloud
11 80 (1.57%) PKI
12 79 (1.55%) Security Posture
13 74 (1.45%) Data Protection Act
14 72 (1.41%) CMDB
15 66 (1.30%) Operational Technology
16 51 (1.00%) AI Agents
17 48 (0.94%) Self-Motivation
18 45 (0.88%) Private Cloud
19 44 (0.86%) NHS
20 43 (0.84%) Data Structures
Operating Systems
1 180 (3.54%) Windows
2 119 (2.34%) Linux
3 41 (0.81%) Windows Server
4 32 (0.63%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
5 31 (0.61%) Android
5 31 (0.61%) Apple iOS
6 17 (0.33%) Unix
7 14 (0.27%) Windows 10
8 13 (0.26%) VMS
9 12 (0.24%) Windows 7
9 12 (0.24%) Windows Server 2016
10 11 (0.22%) zOS
11 9 (0.18%) Mac OS
11 9 (0.18%) Windows Server 2019
12 3 (0.059%) CentOS
12 3 (0.059%) Data ONTAP
12 3 (0.059%) Solaris
12 3 (0.059%) Windows Server 2012
13 2 (0.039%) AIX
13 2 (0.039%) Ubuntu
Processes & Methodologies
1 719 (14.12%) Roadmaps
2 679 (13.34%) Migration
3 633 (12.43%) Agile
4 573 (11.26%) Stakeholder Management
5 557 (10.94%) DevOps
6 531 (10.43%) CI/CD
7 524 (10.29%) Enterprise Architecture
8 477 (9.37%) Stakeholder Engagement
9 462 (9.07%) Data Modelling
10 461 (9.06%) Technical Leadership
11 457 (8.98%) AI
12 435 (8.54%) TOGAF
13 427 (8.39%) Analytics
14 424 (8.33%) Integration Patterns
15 389 (7.64%) Data Architecture
16 380 (7.46%) Problem-Solving
17 376 (7.39%) Architectural Patterns
18 366 (7.19%) Microservices
19 338 (6.64%) Architectural Design
20 303 (5.95%) Infrastructure as Code
Programming Languages
1 353 (6.93%) Python
2 272 (5.34%) SQL
3 207 (4.07%) Java
4 187 (3.67%) PowerShell
5 79 (1.55%) JavaScript
6 68 (1.34%) C#
7 45 (0.88%) Bicep
8 37 (0.73%) Bash
9 33 (0.65%) TypeScript
10 22 (0.43%) Ruby
11 18 (0.35%) PL/SQL
12 17 (0.33%) Apex Code
13 16 (0.31%) Scala
14 13 (0.26%) Kotlin
14 13 (0.26%) Kusto Query Language
15 10 (0.20%) R
15 10 (0.20%) Shell Script
15 10 (0.20%) T-SQL
16 9 (0.18%) ABAP
17 8 (0.16%) VB
Qualifications
1 1,598 (31.39%) Security Cleared
2 1,144 (22.47%) SC Cleared
3 327 (6.42%) DV Cleared
4 211 (4.14%) Degree
5 127 (2.49%) TOGAF Certification
6 126 (2.47%) Azure Certification
7 116 (2.28%) AWS Certification
8 114 (2.24%) CISSP
9 92 (1.81%) BPSS Clearance
10 89 (1.75%) Cisco Certification
11 83 (1.63%) Computer Science Degree
12 62 (1.22%) CISM
13 55 (1.08%) Master's Degree
14 53 (1.04%) AWS Certified Solutions Architect
15 50 (0.98%) Microsoft Certification
16 49 (0.96%) CCNP
17 34 (0.67%) (ISC)2 CCSP
18 33 (0.65%) ISEB
18 33 (0.65%) ITIL Certification
19 25 (0.49%) CCIE
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 189 (3.71%) GDPR
2 186 (3.65%) NIST
3 157 (3.08%) Data Quality
4 149 (2.93%) ISO/IEC 27001
5 103 (2.02%) NCSC
6 63 (1.24%) QA
7 49 (0.96%) PCI DSS
8 41 (0.81%) COBIT
9 33 (0.65%) GRC
10 32 (0.63%) ISO 20022
11 31 (0.61%) Accessibility
12 25 (0.49%) Cyber Essentials
13 20 (0.39%) SEPA
14 18 (0.35%) HL7
14 18 (0.35%) HMG Security Policy Framework
14 18 (0.35%) NIST 800
14 18 (0.35%) Sarbanes-Oxley
15 17 (0.33%) JSP 440
16 14 (0.27%) SLA
17 13 (0.26%) HIPAA
System Software
1 199 (3.91%) Active Directory
2 112 (2.20%) Docker
3 103 (2.02%) VMware Infrastructure
4 72 (1.41%) VMware NSX
5 33 (0.65%) vSphere
6 25 (0.49%) Virtual Desktop
7 17 (0.33%) Hyper-V
8 16 (0.31%) Virtual Machines
9 14 (0.27%) VMware ESXi
10 11 (0.22%) Varnish
11 10 (0.20%) Oracle RAC
11 10 (0.20%) vCloud
12 9 (0.18%) Squid
13 8 (0.16%) NFS
14 7 (0.14%) BitLocker
15 5 (0.098%) Postfix
15 5 (0.098%) RACF
16 4 (0.079%) Firmware
17 3 (0.059%) IAG
17 3 (0.059%) Sendmail
Systems Management
1 280 (5.50%) Terraform
2 237 (4.66%) Kubernetes
3 112 (2.20%) Ansible
4 52 (1.02%) Single Sign-On
5 42 (0.82%) Grafana
6 40 (0.79%) Microsoft Intune
7 33 (0.65%) FortiGate
8 30 (0.59%) OPNET
8 30 (0.59%) vCenter Server
9 29 (0.57%) Prometheus
10 22 (0.43%) SCCM
11 17 (0.33%) Argo
12 16 (0.31%) Active Directory Federation Services
13 12 (0.24%) Istio
14 11 (0.22%) WMI
15 8 (0.16%) Puppet
16 7 (0.14%) Consul
17 6 (0.12%) Kibana
18 5 (0.098%) HAProxy
18 5 (0.098%) Progress Chef
Vendors
1 692 (13.59%) Microsoft
2 312 (6.13%) ServiceNow
3 295 (5.79%) SAP
4 212 (4.16%) Oracle
5 196 (3.85%) VMware
6 189 (3.71%) Salesforce
7 186 (3.65%) Databricks
8 134 (2.63%) Cisco
9 112 (2.20%) Google
10 86 (1.69%) CyberArk
11 68 (1.34%) MuleSoft
12 64 (1.26%) Splunk
13 57 (1.12%) Red Hat
13 57 (1.12%) Workday
14 56 (1.10%) Palo Alto
15 48 (0.94%) IBM
15 48 (0.94%) Remedy
15 48 (0.94%) Sparx
16 46 (0.90%) Ariba
17 45 (0.88%) Atlassian