Big Data Contract Job Trends

Big Data
UK

The table below provides summary statistics and contractor rates for jobs requiring Big Data skills. It covers contract job vacancies from the 6 months leading up to 4 December 2025, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
4 Dec 2025
Same period 2024 Same period 2023
Rank 343 220 229
Rank change year-on-year -123 +9 -55
Contract jobs citing Big Data 261 404 480
As % of all contract jobs in the UK 0.72% 1.12% 1.07%
As % of the Database & Business Intelligence category 4.09% 6.25% 6.37%
Number of daily rates quoted 202 241 311
10th Percentile £358 £363 £400
25th Percentile £407 £436 £488
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £525 £550 £550
Median % change year-on-year -4.55% - -8.33%
75th Percentile £613 £688 £700
90th Percentile £731 £775 £800
UK excluding London median daily rate £449 £612 £500
% change year-on-year -26.72% +22.40% -13.04%
Number of hourly rates quoted 0 5 22
10th Percentile - £27.25 £42.50
25th Percentile - £36.25 £46.18
Median hourly rate - £52.50 £50.53
Median % change year-on-year - +3.90% +15.81%
75th Percentile - £53.75 £76.50
90th Percentile - - £78.68
UK excluding London median hourly rate - - £46.18

All Database and Business Intelligence Skills
UK

Big Data falls under the Databases and Business Intelligence category. For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all contract job vacancies requiring database or business intelligence skills.

Contract vacancies with a requirement for database or business intelligence skills 6,378 6,465 7,531
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the UK 17.48% 17.97% 16.84%
Number of daily rates quoted 4,375 4,269 5,274
10th Percentile £329 £345 £350
25th Percentile £409 £425 £436
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £530 £534
Median % change year-on-year -5.66% -0.75% -2.91%
75th Percentile £606 £650 £650
90th Percentile £713 £775 £738
UK excluding London median daily rate £475 £495 £500
% change year-on-year -3.94% -1.10% -
Number of hourly rates quoted 86 88 143
10th Percentile £23.17 £18.35 £16.61
25th Percentile £29.41 £22.66 £21.50
Median hourly rate £47.61 £31.55 £46.18
Median % change year-on-year +50.93% -31.69% -7.64%
75th Percentile £68.19 £54.25 £64.77
90th Percentile £84.13 £65.30 £77.50
UK excluding London median hourly rate £54.85 £27.50 £46.18
% change year-on-year +99.45% -40.45% +2.99%

Big Data
Job Vacancy Trend

Historical trend showing the proportion of contract IT job postings citing Big Data relative to all contract IT jobs advertised.

Big Data job vacancy trend in the UK

Big Data
Daily Rate Trend

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in the UK citing Big Data.

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in the UK citing Big Data

Big Data
Daily Rate Histogram

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing Big Data over the 6 months to 4 December 2025.

Daily rate histogram for Big Data in the UK

Big Data
Hourly Rate Trend

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in the UK citing Big Data.

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in the UK citing Big Data

Big Data
Top 16 Contract Job Locations

The table below looks at the demand and provides a guide to the median contractor rates quoted in IT jobs citing Big Data within the UK over the 6 months to 4 December 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 -115 229 £525 -7.73% 101
London -78 147 £550 - 52
UK excluding London -93 83 £449 -26.72% 77
Work from Home -29 82 £500 -4.58% 82
South East -21 17 £450 -27.27% 32
Midlands -31 17 £420 -31.37% 6
North of England -49 16 £473 -0.53% 18
Scotland +4 15 £500 +28.37% 5
East Midlands -7 13 £420 -1.18% 2
North West -9 13 £473 +15.53% 10
South West -29 13 £525 -21.35% 6
East of England -16 5 £505 -20.78% 9
West Midlands -37 4 £402 -34.31% 4
North East -15 2 - - 2
Northern Ireland -4 1 £513 -6.82% 3
Yorkshire -45 1 - - 6

Big Data
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
1 112 (42.91%) Apache Spark
2 47 (18.01%) Apache
3 29 (11.11%) Apache Airflow
4 14 (5.36%) Confluence
5 3 (1.15%) Jupyter
6 2 (0.77%) Apache Pig
6 2 (0.77%) Luigi
6 2 (0.77%) SAS
7 1 (0.38%) Apache Superset
7 1 (0.38%) IIS
7 1 (0.38%) nginx
Applications
1 2 (0.77%) MS Visio
2 1 (0.38%) Microsoft Excel
2 1 (0.38%) Microsoft Office
2 1 (0.38%) Microsoft PowerPoint
Business Applications
1 3 (1.15%) Salesforce CRM
2 2 (0.77%) Distributed Ledger
3 1 (0.38%) Avolution ABACUS
Cloud Services
1 102 (39.08%) AWS
2 78 (29.89%) Azure
3 56 (21.46%) GCP
4 35 (13.41%) Power Platform
5 33 (12.64%) Serverless
6 25 (9.58%) Snowflake
7 21 (8.05%) Amazon S3
8 20 (7.66%) GitHub
9 14 (5.36%) Azure Data Factory
10 12 (4.60%) GitHub Actions
11 11 (4.21%) Amazon SageMaker
11 11 (4.21%) Azure DevOps
12 10 (3.83%) AWS Lambda
12 10 (3.83%) Azure Synapse Analytics
13 8 (3.07%) AWS Step Functions
14 7 (2.68%) Amazon ECS
14 7 (2.68%) OpenShift
15 5 (1.92%) Google Kubernetes Engine
15 5 (1.92%) Microsoft Copilot
16 4 (1.53%) Amazon Bedrock
Communications & Networking
1 4 (1.53%) DNS
1 4 (1.53%) TCP/IP
2 3 (1.15%) SSH
3 2 (0.77%) Kerberos
3 2 (0.77%) SSL
3 2 (0.77%) VPN
4 1 (0.38%) HTTP
Database & Business Intelligence
1 99 (37.93%) Hadoop
2 55 (21.07%) Data Warehouse
3 37 (14.18%) NoSQL
4 35 (13.41%) Data Lake
4 35 (13.41%) Power BI
5 26 (9.96%) Elasticsearch
6 24 (9.20%) Metadata
6 24 (9.20%) Relational Database
7 23 (8.81%) Apache Hive
7 23 (8.81%) SQL Server
7 23 (8.81%) Tableau
8 22 (8.43%) PostgreSQL
9 17 (6.51%) BigQuery
10 13 (4.98%) HBase
11 12 (4.60%) RDBMS
12 11 (4.21%) Impala
13 9 (3.45%) Amazon Athena
14 8 (3.07%) Delta Lake
14 8 (3.07%) MongoDB
15 7 (2.68%) Azure SQL Database
Development Applications
1 35 (13.41%) Git
2 25 (9.58%) JIRA
3 22 (8.43%) Jenkins
4 17 (6.51%) GitLab
5 9 (3.45%) MLflow
6 7 (2.68%) ERwin
7 5 (1.92%) Artifactory
7 5 (1.92%) ER Studio
8 4 (1.53%) Gradle
8 4 (1.53%) SonarQube
9 3 (1.15%) Maven
9 3 (1.15%) Poetry
9 3 (1.15%) Sonatype Nexus
10 2 (0.77%) Cypress.io
10 2 (0.77%) PyCharm
10 2 (0.77%) Subversion
10 2 (0.77%) Team Foundation Server
10 2 (0.77%) Visual Studio Code
11 1 (0.38%) Gatling
11 1 (0.38%) Visual Studio Coded UI
General
1 75 (28.74%) Social Skills
2 70 (26.82%) Finance
3 45 (17.24%) Analytical Skills
4 27 (10.34%) Banking
5 17 (6.51%) Public Sector
6 8 (3.07%) Telecoms
7 6 (2.30%) Financial Institution
7 6 (2.30%) Investment Banking
8 5 (1.92%) Manufacturing
9 4 (1.53%) Inclusion and Diversity
9 4 (1.53%) Influencing Skills
10 3 (1.15%) Retail
11 2 (0.77%) Marketing
12 1 (0.38%) Advertising
12 1 (0.38%) Agriculture
12 1 (0.38%) Corporate Banking
12 1 (0.38%) Front Office
12 1 (0.38%) General Ledger
12 1 (0.38%) Presentation Skills
12 1 (0.38%) Retail Banking
Job Titles
1 75 (28.74%) Data Engineer
2 43 (16.48%) Senior
3 30 (11.49%) Developer
4 25 (9.58%) Architect
4 25 (9.58%) Data Scientist
5 19 (7.28%) Lead
6 15 (5.75%) Data Architect
7 14 (5.36%) Software Engineer
8 13 (4.98%) Python Engineer
9 12 (4.60%) Analyst
10 9 (3.45%) Python Data Engineer
10 9 (3.45%) Senior Data Engineer
10 9 (3.45%) Senior Software Engineer
11 8 (3.07%) Azure Engineer
11 8 (3.07%) Big Data Engineer
11 8 (3.07%) Data Analyst
11 8 (3.07%) Scala Developer
12 7 (2.68%) AWS Engineer
12 7 (2.68%) Data Modeller
12 7 (2.68%) Platform Engineer
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 60 (22.99%) Kafka
2 31 (11.88%) PySpark
3 28 (10.73%) Apache NiFi
4 23 (8.81%) Pandas
5 20 (7.66%) scikit-learn
6 15 (5.75%) Flask
6 15 (5.75%) NumPy
6 15 (5.75%) PyTorch
6 15 (5.75%) RESTful
6 15 (5.75%) TensorFlow
7 14 (5.36%) .NET
8 12 (4.60%) Elastic Stack
8 12 (4.60%) REST
9 11 (4.21%) OpenTelemetry
9 11 (4.21%) RabbitMQ
9 11 (4.21%) React
10 10 (3.83%) JSON
11 9 (3.45%) HTML
11 9 (3.45%) Hugging Face
11 9 (3.45%) XML
Miscellaneous
1 18 (6.90%) Distributed Computing
2 17 (6.51%) Algorithms
3 16 (6.13%) Cloud Native
4 7 (2.68%) Data Structures
4 7 (2.68%) Distributed Systems
5 6 (2.30%) Data Protection Act
5 6 (2.30%) Hybrid Cloud
5 6 (2.30%) Management Information System
6 5 (1.92%) Analytical Mindset
7 4 (1.53%) AI Agents
7 4 (1.53%) Derivative
7 4 (1.53%) Private Cloud
8 3 (1.15%) Credit Risk
8 3 (1.15%) Data Centre
8 3 (1.15%) Legacy Systems
8 3 (1.15%) Onboarding
8 3 (1.15%) Product Ownership
8 3 (1.15%) Virtual Team
9 2 (0.77%) CMDB
9 2 (0.77%) Self-Motivation
Operating Systems
1 30 (11.49%) Linux
2 10 (3.83%) Unix
3 4 (1.53%) Windows
4 3 (1.15%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
Processes & Methodologies
1 89 (34.10%) Agile
2 79 (30.27%) Data Modelling
2 79 (30.27%) ETL
3 77 (29.50%) Data Pipeline
4 74 (28.35%) Analytics
5 67 (25.67%) Machine Learning
6 65 (24.90%) Data Engineering
7 64 (24.52%) CI/CD
8 62 (23.75%) Problem-Solving
9 59 (22.61%) Data Governance
9 59 (22.61%) Data Science
10 46 (17.62%) AI
10 46 (17.62%) Visualisation
11 44 (16.86%) Business Intelligence
11 44 (16.86%) DevOps
12 43 (16.48%) Software Engineering
13 40 (15.33%) Microservices
14 39 (14.94%) Containerisation
15 38 (14.56%) Decision-Making
16 34 (13.03%) Data Integration
Programming Languages
1 177 (67.82%) Python
2 126 (48.28%) SQL
3 47 (18.01%) Java
4 29 (11.11%) Scala
5 21 (8.05%) R
6 17 (6.51%) C++
7 15 (5.75%) C#
7 15 (5.75%) JavaScript
8 14 (5.36%) Bash
9 6 (2.30%) Shell Script
10 4 (1.53%) PowerShell
11 3 (1.15%) C
11 3 (1.15%) Groovy
11 3 (1.15%) Perl
11 3 (1.15%) PL/SQL
12 2 (0.77%) Kusto Query Language
12 2 (0.77%) T-SQL
13 1 (0.38%) CodeQL
13 1 (0.38%) Go
13 1 (0.38%) Korn
Qualifications
1 52 (19.92%) Security Cleared
2 40 (15.33%) SC Cleared
3 34 (13.03%) Degree
4 27 (10.34%) DV Cleared
5 19 (7.28%) Computer Science Degree
5 19 (7.28%) Master's Degree
6 8 (3.07%) Azure Certification
7 6 (2.30%) AWS Certification
7 6 (2.30%) PhD
8 4 (1.53%) BPSS Clearance
9 3 (1.15%) ITIL Certification
10 2 (0.77%) CISSP
11 1 (0.38%) HP APS
11 1 (0.38%) Microsoft Certification
11 1 (0.38%) OCP
11 1 (0.38%) Oracle Certification
11 1 (0.38%) Postgraduate
11 1 (0.38%) Tableau Certification
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 53 (20.31%) Data Quality
2 16 (6.13%) GDPR
3 11 (4.21%) QA
4 4 (1.53%) California Consumer Privacy Act
5 3 (1.15%) Accessibility
6 1 (0.38%) HIPAA
6 1 (0.38%) IFRS
6 1 (0.38%) IFRS 17
6 1 (0.38%) PCI DSS
6 1 (0.38%) Solvency II
System Software
1 36 (13.79%) Docker
2 12 (4.60%) HDFS
3 2 (0.77%) Slurm Workload Manager
4 1 (0.38%) Virtual Machines
Systems Management
1 46 (17.62%) Kubernetes
2 19 (7.28%) Terraform
3 17 (6.51%) Grafana
4 11 (4.21%) Ansible
4 11 (4.21%) Argo
4 11 (4.21%) Prometheus
5 7 (2.68%) Kibana
6 6 (2.30%) logstash
7 4 (1.53%) Hadoop YARN
7 4 (1.53%) Kustomize
8 3 (1.15%) Istio
8 3 (1.15%) Nagios
8 3 (1.15%) Oozie
8 3 (1.15%) Rancher
9 2 (0.77%) Progress Chef
10 1 (0.38%) HP ALM
10 1 (0.38%) Puppet
10 1 (0.38%) Single Sign-On
10 1 (0.38%) Tivoli
Vendors
1 42 (16.09%) Databricks
2 26 (9.96%) Google
3 21 (8.05%) Cloudera
4 18 (6.90%) Microsoft
5 14 (5.36%) Foundry
5 14 (5.36%) Palantir
6 9 (3.45%) Oracle
7 7 (2.68%) ServiceNow
8 5 (1.92%) Informatica
9 4 (1.53%) Ab Initio
9 4 (1.53%) Sage
10 3 (1.15%) Salesforce
11 2 (0.77%) Bloomberg
11 2 (0.77%) IBM
11 2 (0.77%) OpenAI
11 2 (0.77%) Red Hat
11 2 (0.77%) Refinitiv
11 2 (0.77%) Splunk
11 2 (0.77%) Talend
11 2 (0.77%) Vertica