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 18 September 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
18 Sep 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 448 292 197
Rank change year-on-year -156 -95 +41
Contract jobs citing Big Data 243 287 474
As % of all contract jobs in the UK 0.45% 0.87% 1.23%
As % of the Database & Business Intelligence category 2.97% 4.79% 6.85%
Number of daily rates quoted 173 206 315
10th Percentile £359 £400 £353
25th Percentile £425 £448 £456
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £525 £550 £575
Median % change year-on-year -4.55% -4.35% -4.17%
75th Percentile £625 £648 £719
90th Percentile £718 £738 £845
UK excluding London median daily rate £492 £500 £556
% change year-on-year -1.60% -10.11% +1.14%
Number of hourly rates quoted 7 2 5
10th Percentile £54.70 £45.06 £27.25
25th Percentile £61.75 £54.22 £36.25
Median hourly rate £70.00 £69.48 £47.50
Median % change year-on-year +0.75% +46.27% -39.10%
75th Percentile £75.00 £84.74 £53.75
90th Percentile £81.00 £93.90 -
UK excluding London median hourly rate £59.08 £38.96 -
% change year-on-year +51.64% - -

All Database & BI 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 8,181 5,987 6,922
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the UK 15.04% 18.17% 17.97%
Number of daily rates quoted 5,462 4,012 4,763
10th Percentile £356 £343 £350
25th Percentile £419 £413 £425
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £500 £533
Median % change year-on-year - -6.19% -2.20%
75th Percentile £613 £625 £650
90th Percentile £710 £738 £800
UK excluding London median daily rate £475 £475 £485
% change year-on-year - -2.06% -3.00%
Number of hourly rates quoted 266 89 91
10th Percentile £16.35 £21.24 £17.50
25th Percentile £23.35 £29.07 £21.00
Median hourly rate £39.84 £43.50 £35.00
Median % change year-on-year -8.41% +24.29% -36.36%
75th Percentile £59.88 £65.00 £60.78
90th Percentile £75.50 £81.50 £73.75
UK excluding London median hourly rate £39.00 £37.48 £30.00
% change year-on-year +4.06% +24.93% -45.45%

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 18 September 2026.

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
Hourly Rate Histogram

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing Big Data over the 6 months to 18 September 2026.

Hourly rate histogram for Big Data in the UK

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 18 September 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 -138 203 £530 -3.64% 475
London -99 126 £590 +3.85% 355
UK excluding London -122 89 £492 -1.60% 184
Work from Home -82 77 £500 -0.99% 166
North of England -49 32 £505 +1.00% 24
Yorkshire -19 21 £518 +3.50% 6
Scotland -19 16 £402 -19.60% 36
Midlands -53 13 £414 -2.59% 23
South East -76 13 £451 -21.52% 30
South West -30 12 £505 +12.22% 29
East Midlands -18 8 £500 +19.05% 6
North East -41 7 £425 - 1
West Midlands -48 5 £405 -9.40% 17
North West -57 4 £513 +5.13% 17
East of England -41 2 £540 +6.93% 20
Wales - 2 £475 - 2

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
1 132 (54.32%) Apache Spark
2 41 (16.87%) Apache
3 39 (16.05%) Apache Airflow
4 7 (2.88%) Confluence
5 6 (2.47%) JBoss
6 5 (2.06%) Jupyter
6 5 (2.06%) SAS
6 5 (2.06%) SharePoint
7 3 (1.23%) CMS
7 3 (1.23%) Microsoft Exchange
7 3 (1.23%) Palantir Foundry
8 2 (0.82%) Apache Pig
8 2 (0.82%) Apache Superset
9 1 (0.41%) Luigi
9 1 (0.41%) MQSeries
9 1 (0.41%) nginx
Applications
1 3 (1.23%) Microsoft Office
Business Applications
1 2 (0.82%) Endur
2 1 (0.41%) Oracle ERP
2 1 (0.41%) SAP ERP
Cloud Services
1 113 (46.50%) AWS
2 93 (38.27%) Azure
3 71 (29.22%) GCP
4 45 (18.52%) Snowflake
5 32 (13.17%) Amazon S3
6 30 (12.35%) Power Platform
7 23 (9.47%) Amazon EMR
7 23 (9.47%) Azure DevOps
8 20 (8.23%) AWS Lambda
8 20 (8.23%) GitHub
9 17 (7.00%) Serverless
10 14 (5.76%) Amazon ECS
11 13 (5.35%) Azure Data Factory
11 13 (5.35%) OpenShift
12 12 (4.94%) PaaS
13 11 (4.53%) Amazon EKS
14 10 (4.12%) Azure Databricks
14 10 (4.12%) GitHub Actions
15 9 (3.70%) dbt
16 8 (3.29%) Amazon EC2
Communications & Networking
1 6 (2.47%) Kerberos
2 5 (2.06%) DNS
3 3 (1.23%) Broadband
3 3 (1.23%) DHCP
3 3 (1.23%) Firewall
3 3 (1.23%) Internet
3 3 (1.23%) SMTP
3 3 (1.23%) VPN
Database & Business Intelligence
1 47 (19.34%) Hadoop
2 43 (17.70%) Data Warehouse
3 37 (15.23%) Data Lake
4 30 (12.35%) NoSQL
5 29 (11.93%) PostgreSQL
5 29 (11.93%) Power BI
6 23 (9.47%) Apache Hive
7 20 (8.23%) Amazon Redshift
8 19 (7.82%) BigQuery
9 16 (6.58%) MongoDB
10 14 (5.76%) Amazon Athena
11 13 (5.35%) Amazon RDS
12 12 (4.94%) Metadata
12 12 (4.94%) Relational Database
13 11 (4.53%) DynamoDB
13 11 (4.53%) Elasticsearch
14 10 (4.12%) Tableau
15 9 (3.70%) Amazon Aurora
16 8 (3.29%) SQL Server
17 7 (2.88%) MySQL
Development Applications
1 36 (14.81%) Git
2 33 (13.58%) GitLab
3 28 (11.52%) Jenkins
4 14 (5.76%) JIRA
5 8 (3.29%) Selenium
6 4 (1.65%) SonarQube
7 3 (1.23%) JUnit
7 3 (1.23%) PowerDesigner
7 3 (1.23%) Robot Framework
8 2 (0.82%) JMeter
8 2 (0.82%) LoadRunner
8 2 (0.82%) MLflow
8 2 (0.82%) TeamCity
9 1 (0.41%) Atlassian Bamboo
9 1 (0.41%) Claude Code
9 1 (0.41%) eggPlant
9 1 (0.41%) Gatling
General
1 74 (30.45%) Social Skills
2 54 (22.22%) Analytical Skills
3 49 (20.16%) Finance
4 28 (11.52%) Banking
5 20 (8.23%) Public Sector
6 10 (4.12%) Documentation Skills
6 10 (4.12%) Marketing
7 9 (3.70%) Investment Banking
8 8 (3.29%) Inclusion and Diversity
9 3 (1.23%) Aerospace
9 3 (1.23%) Legal
9 3 (1.23%) Retail
9 3 (1.23%) Telecoms
10 2 (0.82%) Financial Institution
10 2 (0.82%) Influencing Skills
10 2 (0.82%) Local Government
11 1 (0.41%) Dutch Language
11 1 (0.41%) French Language
11 1 (0.41%) Organisational Skills
11 1 (0.41%) Police
Job Titles
1 77 (31.69%) Data Engineer
2 42 (17.28%) Senior
3 34 (13.99%) Architect
4 21 (8.64%) Developer
5 16 (6.58%) Analyst
6 15 (6.17%) DevOps Engineer
7 14 (5.76%) Senior Data Engineer
7 14 (5.76%) Solutions Architect
8 13 (5.35%) Data Architect
9 12 (4.94%) Big Data Engineer
10 11 (4.53%) Data Analyst
11 10 (4.12%) Databricks Data Engineer
11 10 (4.12%) Databricks Engineer
11 10 (4.12%) Lead
11 10 (4.12%) Python Engineer
12 9 (3.70%) Azure Engineer
12 9 (3.70%) Test Engineer
13 8 (3.29%) Java Developer
13 8 (3.29%) Kafka Engineer
13 8 (3.29%) Scala Engineer
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 53 (21.81%) Kafka
2 45 (18.52%) Terraform
3 28 (11.52%) PySpark
4 17 (7.00%) REST
5 16 (6.58%) Spring
6 15 (6.17%) Spring Boot
7 12 (4.94%) Pandas
8 10 (4.12%) Apache NiFi
9 8 (3.29%) CSS
9 8 (3.29%) HTML
9 8 (3.29%) Play Framework
10 7 (2.88%) Elastic Stack
10 7 (2.88%) NumPy
11 6 (2.47%) .NET
12 5 (2.06%) Langfuse
12 5 (2.06%) Microsoft Graph
12 5 (2.06%) RESTful
13 4 (1.65%) Apache Beam
13 4 (1.65%) PyTorch
13 4 (1.65%) TensorFlow
Miscellaneous
1 34 (13.99%) Cloud Native
2 26 (10.70%) Distributed Systems
3 16 (6.58%) Product Ownership
4 15 (6.17%) Data Structures
5 13 (5.35%) Onboarding
6 12 (4.94%) Clustering
6 12 (4.94%) Virtual Team
7 6 (2.47%) Cyber Threat
8 5 (2.06%) Algorithms
8 5 (2.06%) Distributed Architecture
8 5 (2.06%) Distributed Computing
9 4 (1.65%) Data Protection Act
9 4 (1.65%) FMCG
10 3 (1.23%) AI Agents
10 3 (1.23%) Data Centre
10 3 (1.23%) Linux Command Line
10 3 (1.23%) PKI
10 3 (1.23%) Social Media
11 2 (0.82%) Analytical Mindset
11 2 (0.82%) Legacy Systems
Operating Systems
1 27 (11.11%) Linux
2 10 (4.12%) Unix
3 6 (2.47%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
4 3 (1.23%) Windows
4 3 (1.23%) Windows Server
5 1 (0.41%) Windows Server 2003
Processes & Methodologies
1 117 (48.15%) Data Pipeline
2 100 (41.15%) Analytics
3 91 (37.45%) ETL
4 90 (37.04%) Data Engineering
5 89 (36.63%) CI/CD
6 79 (32.51%) Agile
6 79 (32.51%) AI
7 65 (26.75%) DevOps
8 64 (26.34%) Machine Learning
9 53 (21.81%) Data Modelling
10 46 (18.93%) Problem-Solving
11 43 (17.70%) Containerisation
12 42 (17.28%) Data Science
13 39 (16.05%) Infrastructure as Code
13 39 (16.05%) Scrum
14 38 (15.64%) Data Governance
15 36 (14.81%) Validation
16 35 (14.40%) Test Automation
17 33 (13.58%) Business Intelligence
17 33 (13.58%) Data Integration
Programming Languages
1 138 (56.79%) Python
2 118 (48.56%) SQL
3 58 (23.87%) Java
4 30 (12.35%) Scala
5 21 (8.64%) PowerShell
6 14 (5.76%) JavaScript
7 12 (4.94%) R
8 10 (4.12%) Bash
9 9 (3.70%) C#
10 3 (1.23%) Kusto Query Language
10 3 (1.23%) Shell Script
11 2 (0.82%) Go
11 2 (0.82%) Korn
11 2 (0.82%) Rust
11 2 (0.82%) SAS Macro
12 1 (0.41%) C
12 1 (0.41%) C++
12 1 (0.41%) MATLAB
12 1 (0.41%) PL/SQL
12 1 (0.41%) TypeScript
Qualifications
1 56 (23.05%) Security Cleared
2 41 (16.87%) SC Cleared
3 26 (10.70%) Degree
4 13 (5.35%) Computer Science Degree
5 10 (4.12%) BPSS Clearance
6 9 (3.70%) DV Cleared
6 9 (3.70%) Master's Degree
7 5 (2.06%) AWS Certification
7 5 (2.06%) Azure Certification
8 3 (1.23%) PhD
8 3 (1.23%) SnowPro
9 2 (0.82%) AWS Certified Cloud Practitioner
10 1 (0.41%) AWS Certified Developer
10 1 (0.41%) Cisco Certification
10 1 (0.41%) CISSP
10 1 (0.41%) ISEB
10 1 (0.41%) Microsoft Certification
10 1 (0.41%) PMI Certification
10 1 (0.41%) PMP
10 1 (0.41%) TOGAF Certification
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 50 (20.58%) Data Quality
2 19 (7.82%) QA
3 9 (3.70%) GDPR
4 3 (1.23%) SLA
5 2 (0.82%) Actionable Recommendations
6 1 (0.41%) California Consumer Privacy Act
6 1 (0.41%) EMIR
6 1 (0.41%) EU AI Act
6 1 (0.41%) IFRS
6 1 (0.41%) IFRS 9
6 1 (0.41%) ISO/IEC 27001
6 1 (0.41%) MiFID
6 1 (0.41%) NCSC
6 1 (0.41%) NIST
6 1 (0.41%) PCI DSS
6 1 (0.41%) PSD2
6 1 (0.41%) SEPA
System Software
1 43 (17.70%) Docker
2 9 (3.70%) VMware Infrastructure
3 6 (2.47%) HDFS
4 5 (2.06%) Active Directory
5 3 (1.23%) BitLocker
5 3 (1.23%) Hyper-V
5 3 (1.23%) Microsoft App-V
5 3 (1.23%) Terminal Services
5 3 (1.23%) Virtual Machines
5 3 (1.23%) VMware ESXi
6 2 (0.82%) Apache Flume
Systems Management
1 47 (19.34%) Kubernetes
2 27 (11.11%) Grafana
3 11 (4.53%) Ansible
3 11 (4.53%) Puppet
4 8 (3.29%) Kibana
4 8 (3.29%) Prometheus
5 6 (2.47%) Red Hat Satellite
6 5 (2.06%) Failover Clustering
7 3 (1.23%) Nagios
7 3 (1.23%) vCenter Server
7 3 (1.23%) vMotion
8 2 (0.82%) Control-M
9 1 (0.41%) HAProxy
9 1 (0.41%) HP ALM
9 1 (0.41%) Kubeflow
Vendors
1 66 (27.16%) Databricks
2 22 (9.05%) Google
3 20 (8.23%) Microsoft
4 17 (7.00%) Splunk
5 14 (5.76%) Salesforce
6 13 (5.35%) Cloudera
7 10 (4.12%) Oracle
8 9 (3.70%) VMware
9 6 (2.47%) Red Hat
10 5 (2.06%) Amplitude
10 5 (2.06%) Cisco
10 5 (2.06%) IBM
10 5 (2.06%) Informatica
11 4 (1.65%) Foundry
11 4 (1.65%) HP
11 4 (1.65%) Talend
11 4 (1.65%) Tenable
12 3 (1.23%) Citrix
12 3 (1.23%) Palantir
12 3 (1.23%) Teradata