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 18 February 2026.

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

6 months to
18 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 4,111 3,145 4,367
As % of all contract jobs in the UK 10.14% 10.25% 9.84%
As % of the Job Titles category 11.06% 11.03% 10.57%
Number of daily rates quoted 2,739 1,921 2,805
10th Percentile £460 £477 £500
25th Percentile £513 £548 £563
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £625 £625 £650
Median % change year-on-year - -3.85% -
75th Percentile £725 £734 £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 76 32 48
10th Percentile £49.40 £58.43 £51.91
25th Percentile £60.00 £61.50 £61.25
Median hourly rate £71.25 £71.25 £76.53
Median % change year-on-year - -6.90% +9.33%
75th Percentile £89.27 £81.00 £87.53
90th Percentile £95.00 £87.33 £95.00
UK excluding London median hourly rate £72.50 £72.50 £78.74
% change year-on-year - -7.92% +12.49%

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 37,174 28,501 41,310
% of contract IT jobs with a recognized job title 91.66% 92.92% 93.10%
Number of daily rates quoted 23,390 17,648 27,150
10th Percentile £305 £288 £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 £613 £638 £638
90th Percentile £720 £738 £738
UK excluding London median daily rate £478 £475 £488
% change year-on-year +0.53% -2.56% -2.50%
Number of hourly rates quoted 2,257 809 2,323
10th Percentile £14.57 £16.25 £13.15
25th Percentile £18.82 £21.46 £16.50
Median hourly rate £30.00 £34.11 £35.00
Median % change year-on-year -12.05% -2.54% -9.09%
75th Percentile £61.84 £63.75 £61.25
90th Percentile £72.52 £75.00 £72.50
UK excluding London median hourly rate £29.60 £32.50 £35.58
% change year-on-year -8.92% -8.64% +1.64%

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 18 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 18 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 18 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 3,523 £625 - 957
UK excluding London +3 1,988 £600 -4.00% 704
London -3 1,579 £636 -2.12% 408
Work from Home -3 1,161 £625 - 471
South East +7 606 £625 - 296
North of England -2 493 £575 -4.17% 162
Midlands -3 354 £573 -4.58% 91
North West -3 280 £579 -3.50% 97
West Midlands 0 263 £600 - 60
South West +1 250 £708 +13.20% 68
Yorkshire +2 195 £563 -2.17% 46
East of England +13 151 £550 -13.73% 42
Scotland +14 138 £650 +4.00% 49
East Midlands -3 89 £496 -12.60% 31
Wales +4 31 £600 +5.26% 4
North East -11 23 £625 -1.96% 21
Northern Ireland +1 9 £500 -26.47% 3

Architect Skill Set
Top 30 Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities

For the 6 months to 18 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 1,264 (30.75%) Security Cleared
2 1,080 (26.27%) Azure
3 914 (22.23%) SC Cleared
4 871 (21.19%) AWS
5 591 (14.38%) Roadmaps
6 590 (14.35%) Microsoft
7 541 (13.16%) Agile
8 540 (13.14%) Stakeholder Management
9 518 (12.60%) Migration
10 470 (11.43%) DevOps
11 461 (11.21%) Enterprise Architecture
12 414 (10.07%) TOGAF
13 408 (9.92%) Data Modelling
14 404 (9.83%) Stakeholder Engagement
15 401 (9.75%) CI/CD
16 391 (9.51%) Technical Leadership
17 359 (8.73%) AI
18 358 (8.71%) Problem-Solving
19 354 (8.61%) Analytics
20 337 (8.20%) Data Architecture
21 335 (8.15%) GCP
22 324 (7.88%) Python
23 293 (7.13%) Microservices
24 289 (7.03%) Integration Patterns
25 266 (6.47%) Architectural Patterns
26 264 (6.42%) DV Cleared
27 255 (6.20%) Terraform
28 238 (5.79%) Architectural Design
29 236 (5.74%) Data Governance
30 232 (5.64%) Cybersecurity

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
1 114 (2.77%) Confluence
2 100 (2.43%) SharePoint
3 61 (1.48%) Microsoft Exchange
4 33 (0.80%) SAS
5 23 (0.56%) Apache Spark
5 23 (0.56%) CMS
6 19 (0.46%) Apache Airflow
7 17 (0.41%) Apache
8 16 (0.39%) Anypoint
8 16 (0.39%) OpenStack
9 15 (0.36%) WebLogic
10 14 (0.34%) Appian
10 14 (0.34%) ArcGIS
11 13 (0.32%) nginx
12 9 (0.22%) Smallworld
13 7 (0.17%) Ethereum
13 7 (0.17%) Hyperledger
13 7 (0.17%) Oracle SOA Suite
13 7 (0.17%) Sitecore CMS
13 7 (0.17%) Skype for Business
Applications
1 51 (1.24%) Microsoft Office
2 32 (0.78%) Microsoft Project
3 29 (0.71%) Microsoft Excel
3 29 (0.71%) Microsoft PowerPoint
4 15 (0.36%) MS Visio
5 7 (0.17%) Chatbot
6 1 (0.024%) ArchiCAD
6 1 (0.024%) AutoCAD
6 1 (0.024%) FrameMaker
6 1 (0.024%) OrCAD
6 1 (0.024%) Revit
6 1 (0.024%) Siemens NX
6 1 (0.024%) Spreadsheet
6 1 (0.024%) Trello
Business Applications
1 107 (2.60%) SAP S/4HANA
2 41 (1.00%) Sparx Enterprise Architect
3 24 (0.58%) Dynamics CRM
4 22 (0.54%) Workday HCM
5 17 (0.41%) Payment Gateway
6 16 (0.39%) Salesforce CRM
7 12 (0.29%) NetSuite
8 11 (0.27%) SAP ERP
8 11 (0.27%) SAP EWM
9 10 (0.24%) Oracle EBS
9 10 (0.24%) SAP PM
10 9 (0.22%) Oracle Receivables
11 8 (0.19%) Dynamics AX
11 8 (0.19%) 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 1,080 (26.27%) Azure
2 871 (21.19%) AWS
3 335 (8.15%) GCP
4 151 (3.67%) Serverless
5 150 (3.65%) Power Platform
6 145 (3.53%) SaaS
7 138 (3.36%) Microsoft 365
8 132 (3.21%) Entra ID
9 91 (2.21%) IaaS
10 89 (2.16%) Azure DevOps
11 88 (2.14%) AWS Lambda
12 86 (2.09%) GitHub
13 80 (1.95%) Amazon S3
14 75 (1.82%) Microsoft Purview
14 75 (1.82%) PaaS
15 69 (1.68%) AWS CloudFormation
15 69 (1.68%) Dynamics 365
16 68 (1.65%) OpenShift
17 66 (1.61%) Azure Data Factory
18 65 (1.58%) Azure Synapse Analytics
Communications & Networking
1 213 (5.18%) Firewall
2 140 (3.41%) Network Security
3 126 (3.06%) WAN
4 108 (2.63%) DNS
5 104 (2.53%) VPN
6 77 (1.87%) LAN
7 67 (1.63%) SD-WAN
8 39 (0.95%) BGP
9 31 (0.75%) DHCP
10 30 (0.73%) Wi-Fi
11 27 (0.66%) MPLS
12 26 (0.63%) OSPF
12 26 (0.63%) TCP/IP
13 23 (0.56%) SAN
14 20 (0.49%) Kerberos
14 20 (0.49%) VLAN
15 18 (0.44%) Internet
15 18 (0.44%) IPsec
15 18 (0.44%) SSL
15 18 (0.44%) VSAN
Database & Business Intelligence
1 153 (3.72%) Data Warehouse
2 132 (3.21%) Metadata
3 106 (2.58%) Power BI
4 96 (2.34%) Data Lake
5 71 (1.73%) SQL Server
6 63 (1.53%) PostgreSQL
7 52 (1.26%) Tableau
8 42 (1.02%) NoSQL
9 38 (0.92%) Oracle Database
10 37 (0.90%) Amazon Redshift
10 37 (0.90%) Azure SQL Database
11 32 (0.78%) DynamoDB
12 26 (0.63%) Big Data
13 25 (0.61%) Amazon Athena
14 23 (0.56%) GIS
14 23 (0.56%) Relational Database
15 22 (0.54%) Amazon RDS
16 21 (0.51%) Amazon Aurora
16 21 (0.51%) Redis
17 20 (0.49%) Metadata Repository
Development Applications
1 132 (3.21%) JIRA
2 93 (2.26%) Jenkins
3 47 (1.14%) GitLab
4 34 (0.83%) Git
5 19 (0.46%) ERwin
6 10 (0.24%) Artifactory
6 10 (0.24%) Bitbucket
7 9 (0.22%) SonarQube
8 7 (0.17%) MLflow
8 7 (0.17%) Postman
9 6 (0.15%) REST Assured
10 5 (0.12%) Cucumber
10 5 (0.12%) Oracle Forms
10 5 (0.12%) Selenium
11 4 (0.097%) MSI
11 4 (0.097%) Rational DOORS
11 4 (0.097%) Terragrunt
12 3 (0.073%) ER Studio
12 3 (0.073%) Maven
12 3 (0.073%) Visual Studio Code
General
1 974 (23.69%) Social Skills
2 640 (15.57%) Finance
3 484 (11.77%) Public Sector
4 286 (6.96%) Analytical Skills
5 234 (5.69%) Banking
6 139 (3.38%) Documentation Skills
7 105 (2.55%) Legal
8 99 (2.41%) Influencing Skills
9 79 (1.92%) Presentation Skills
9 79 (1.92%) Retail
10 78 (1.90%) Military
10 78 (1.90%) Telecoms
11 69 (1.68%) Marketing
12 59 (1.44%) Manufacturing
13 39 (0.95%) Inclusion and Diversity
14 36 (0.88%) Billing
15 25 (0.61%) Financial Institution
15 25 (0.61%) Law
16 21 (0.51%) Aerospace
16 21 (0.51%) Investment Banking
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 211 (5.13%) REST
2 136 (3.31%) Middleware
3 117 (2.85%) SOAP
4 95 (2.31%) .NET
5 80 (1.95%) Kafka
6 78 (1.90%) OpenID
7 76 (1.85%) LDAP
8 67 (1.63%) OAuth
8 67 (1.63%) SAML
9 51 (1.24%) JSON
10 42 (1.02%) OAuth2
11 40 (0.97%) React
11 40 (0.97%) RESTful
12 38 (0.92%) AngularJS
13 36 (0.88%) SailPoint
14 33 (0.80%) PySpark
15 32 (0.78%) Oracle Fusion
16 27 (0.66%) Web Services
17 26 (0.63%) Node.js
18 23 (0.56%) Spring
Miscellaneous
1 292 (7.10%) Cloud Native
2 139 (3.38%) Product Ownership
3 130 (3.16%) Data Centre
4 116 (2.82%) Onboarding
5 109 (2.65%) Legacy Systems
6 99 (2.41%) Enterprise Software
7 90 (2.19%) PKI
8 80 (1.95%) Hybrid Cloud
9 73 (1.78%) Management Information System
10 66 (1.61%) Distributed Systems
11 65 (1.58%) Security Posture
12 63 (1.53%) Public Cloud
13 58 (1.41%) Operational Technology
14 49 (1.19%) CMDB
14 49 (1.19%) Data Protection Act
15 44 (1.07%) Self-Motivation
16 40 (0.97%) NHS
17 38 (0.92%) AI Agents
17 38 (0.92%) Data Structures
18 32 (0.78%) Private Cloud
Operating Systems
1 169 (4.11%) Windows
2 106 (2.58%) Linux
3 40 (0.97%) Windows Server
4 34 (0.83%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
5 18 (0.44%) Windows 7
6 15 (0.36%) Windows 10
7 12 (0.29%) Unix
7 12 (0.29%) Windows Server 2016
7 12 (0.29%) Windows Server 2019
8 10 (0.24%) Android
8 10 (0.24%) Apple iOS
8 10 (0.24%) VMS
9 9 (0.22%) Mac OS
10 7 (0.17%) zOS
11 6 (0.15%) Ubuntu
12 4 (0.097%) CentOS
13 2 (0.049%) Windows Server 2012
14 1 (0.024%) Kali Linux
14 1 (0.024%) Solaris
14 1 (0.024%) SUSE
Processes & Methodologies
1 591 (14.38%) Roadmaps
2 541 (13.16%) Agile
3 540 (13.14%) Stakeholder Management
4 518 (12.60%) Migration
5 470 (11.43%) DevOps
6 461 (11.21%) Enterprise Architecture
7 414 (10.07%) TOGAF
8 408 (9.92%) Data Modelling
9 404 (9.83%) Stakeholder Engagement
10 401 (9.75%) CI/CD
11 391 (9.51%) Technical Leadership
12 359 (8.73%) AI
13 358 (8.71%) Problem-Solving
14 354 (8.61%) Analytics
15 337 (8.20%) Data Architecture
16 293 (7.13%) Microservices
17 289 (7.03%) Integration Patterns
18 266 (6.47%) Architectural Patterns
19 238 (5.79%) Architectural Design
20 236 (5.74%) Data Governance
Programming Languages
1 324 (7.88%) Python
2 215 (5.23%) SQL
3 176 (4.28%) PowerShell
4 138 (3.36%) Java
5 62 (1.51%) C#
5 62 (1.51%) JavaScript
6 37 (0.90%) Bicep
7 35 (0.85%) Bash
7 35 (0.85%) TypeScript
8 20 (0.49%) PL/SQL
9 19 (0.46%) Apex Code
10 14 (0.34%) Kusto Query Language
11 13 (0.32%) R
12 10 (0.24%) Ruby
12 10 (0.24%) T-SQL
13 9 (0.22%) Scala
14 8 (0.19%) PHP
14 8 (0.19%) VB
15 7 (0.17%) Korn
15 7 (0.17%) VBScript
Qualifications
1 1,264 (30.75%) Security Cleared
2 914 (22.23%) SC Cleared
3 264 (6.42%) DV Cleared
4 207 (5.04%) Degree
5 120 (2.92%) TOGAF Certification
6 116 (2.82%) CISSP
7 114 (2.77%) AWS Certification
8 103 (2.51%) Azure Certification
9 76 (1.85%) Computer Science Degree
10 74 (1.80%) BPSS Clearance
11 71 (1.73%) Cisco Certification
12 61 (1.48%) CISM
13 60 (1.46%) Master's Degree
14 59 (1.44%) Microsoft Certification
15 56 (1.36%) AWS Certified Solutions Architect
16 42 (1.02%) CCNP
17 32 (0.78%) CCIE
18 31 (0.75%) ITIL Certification
19 30 (0.73%) ISEB
20 22 (0.54%) (ISC)2 CCSP
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 186 (4.52%) GDPR
2 139 (3.38%) NIST
3 132 (3.21%) Data Quality
4 127 (3.09%) ISO/IEC 27001
5 79 (1.92%) NCSC
6 59 (1.44%) QA
7 51 (1.24%) PCI DSS
8 34 (0.83%) Accessibility
8 34 (0.83%) COBIT
9 31 (0.75%) GRC
10 26 (0.63%) ISO 20022
11 22 (0.54%) JSP 440
12 21 (0.51%) Cyber Essentials
13 19 (0.46%) HIPAA
14 18 (0.44%) HMG Security Policy Framework
15 16 (0.39%) MiFID
16 15 (0.36%) California Consumer Privacy Act
17 13 (0.32%) FINRA
17 13 (0.32%) Sarbanes-Oxley
18 12 (0.29%) SEPA
System Software
1 170 (4.14%) Active Directory
2 129 (3.14%) Docker
3 90 (2.19%) VMware Infrastructure
4 62 (1.51%) VMware NSX
5 36 (0.88%) vSphere
6 24 (0.58%) Virtual Desktop
7 14 (0.34%) 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 (0.097%) NFS
14 3 (0.073%) Active Directory Lightweight Directory Services
14 3 (0.073%) Ceph
14 3 (0.073%) Firmware
14 3 (0.073%) Lustre
Systems Management
1 255 (6.20%) Terraform
2 208 (5.06%) Kubernetes
3 107 (2.60%) Ansible
4 64 (1.56%) Single Sign-On
5 31 (0.75%) FortiGate
6 30 (0.73%) OPNET
7 29 (0.71%) Microsoft Intune
8 28 (0.68%) vCenter Server
9 23 (0.56%) Grafana
9 23 (0.56%) SCCM
10 20 (0.49%) Prometheus
11 18 (0.44%) WMI
12 16 (0.39%) Active Directory Federation Services
12 16 (0.39%) Argo
13 8 (0.19%) Istio
14 6 (0.15%) Consul
14 6 (0.15%) Kibana
15 5 (0.12%) Puppet
16 4 (0.097%) Data Guard
16 4 (0.097%) Progress Chef
Vendors
1 590 (14.35%) Microsoft
2 230 (5.59%) ServiceNow
3 224 (5.45%) SAP
4 194 (4.72%) Oracle
5 185 (4.50%) Salesforce
6 161 (3.92%) VMware
7 133 (3.24%) Databricks
8 116 (2.82%) Cisco
9 106 (2.58%) Google
10 94 (2.29%) CyberArk
11 68 (1.65%) Palo Alto
12 64 (1.56%) MuleSoft
13 63 (1.53%) Splunk
14 49 (1.19%) Centrify
14 49 (1.19%) Red Hat
15 48 (1.17%) Atlassian
16 47 (1.14%) Remedy
16 47 (1.14%) Workday
17 45 (1.09%) OpenAI
18 40 (0.97%) Sparx