BPSS Clearance Contract Job Trends

Baseline Personnel Security Standard (BPSS) Clearance
UK

The table below provides summary statistics for contract job vacancies with a requirement for BPSS Clearance qualifications. It includes a benchmarking guide to the contractor rates offered over the 6 months leading up to 13 May 2026, comparing them to the same period in the previous two years.

6 months to
13 May 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 121 224 226
Rank change year-on-year +103 +2 -13
Contract jobs citing BPSS Clearance 986 348 448
As % of all contract jobs in the UK 2.09% 1.20% 1.05%
As % of the Qualifications category 6.56% 3.88% 3.45%
Number of daily rates quoted 723 226 330
10th Percentile £320 £241 £229
25th Percentile £394 £405 £425
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £475 £500 £507
Median % change year-on-year -5.00% -1.38% -6.97%
75th Percentile £569 £580 £625
90th Percentile £656 £662 £675
UK excluding London median daily rate £439 £500 £525
% change year-on-year -12.25% -4.76% -4.55%
Number of hourly rates quoted 89 27 52
10th Percentile £19.53 - £13.99
25th Percentile £27.88 £18.50 -
Median hourly rate £47.00 £45.00 £16.06
Median % change year-on-year +4.44% +180.20% -49.30%
75th Percentile £73.00 £74.38 £42.64
90th Percentile £85.36 £76.75 £76.50
UK excluding London median hourly rate £43.69 £53.75 £16.06
% change year-on-year -18.71% +234.65% -49.30%

All Academic and Professional Certifications
UK

BPSS Clearance falls under the Academic Qualifications and Professional Certifications category. For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all contract job vacancies requiring academic qualifications or professional certifications.

Contract vacancies requiring academic qualifications or professional certifications 15,023 8,977 12,977
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the UK 31.83% 30.98% 30.35%
Number of daily rates quoted 9,981 5,660 7,999
10th Percentile £350 £285 £305
25th Percentile £425 £413 £425
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £520 £525 £533
Median % change year-on-year -0.95% -1.50% -3.09%
75th Percentile £619 £623 £650
90th Percentile £719 £700 £738
UK excluding London median daily rate £500 £500 £530
% change year-on-year - -5.66% +0.95%
Number of hourly rates quoted 1,063 507 1,065
10th Percentile £16.35 £18.13 £13.75
25th Percentile £21.25 £21.27 £17.80
Median hourly rate £50.00 £37.50 £40.00
Median % change year-on-year +33.33% -6.25% -25.93%
75th Percentile £70.42 £65.00 £61.60
90th Percentile £85.36 £79.22 £75.85
UK excluding London median hourly rate £47.50 £37.50 £40.94
% change year-on-year +26.67% -8.40% -18.12%

BPSS Clearance
Job Vacancy Trend

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

BPSS Clearance job vacancy trend in the UK

BPSS Clearance
Daily Rate Trend

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in the UK citing BPSS Clearance.

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in the UK citing BPSS Clearance

BPSS Clearance
Daily Rate Histogram

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing BPSS Clearance over the 6 months to 13 May 2026.

Daily rate histogram for BPSS Clearance in the UK

BPSS Clearance
Hourly Rate Trend

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in the UK citing BPSS Clearance.

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in the UK citing BPSS Clearance

BPSS Clearance
Hourly Rate Histogram

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing BPSS Clearance over the 6 months to 13 May 2026.

Hourly rate histogram for BPSS Clearance in the UK

BPSS Clearance
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 BPSS Clearance within the UK over the 6 months to 13 May 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 +91 725 £476 -4.80% 268
UK excluding London +55 530 £439 -12.25% 245
Work from Home +90 412 £438 -12.50% 162
London +84 234 £500 -8.68% 35
North of England +21 195 £450 -10.00% 52
North West +21 124 £394 -26.81% 33
Midlands +20 119 £438 +6.71% 44
West Midlands +2 88 £455 +10.85% 35
South East -2 88 £483 -10.06% 51
South West +1 52 £504 +75.22% 51
Scotland +39 49 £325 -26.55% 6
North East +7 40 £480 +33.33% 12
Yorkshire -27 36 £481 +37.50% 7
East Midlands -3 30 £395 -39.83% 9
East of England -19 27 £450 +111.76% 39
Wales -11 5 - - 8
Northern Ireland +3 3 £375 +18.86%

BPSS Clearance
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 43 (4.36%) Confluence
2 32 (3.25%) SharePoint
3 13 (1.32%) Apache Spark
4 12 (1.22%) SharePoint Server
5 9 (0.91%) Apache Airflow
6 8 (0.81%) Apache
7 6 (0.61%) nginx
8 4 (0.41%) Microsoft Exchange
8 4 (0.41%) Oracle Workflow
9 3 (0.30%) ArcGIS
9 3 (0.30%) CICS
9 3 (0.30%) CMS
9 3 (0.30%) LiveCycle
9 3 (0.30%) SAS
10 1 (0.10%) Apache Pulsar
10 1 (0.10%) Camunda
10 1 (0.10%) Palantir Foundry
10 1 (0.10%) SharePoint 2013
10 1 (0.10%) Smallworld
10 1 (0.10%) WebLogic
Applications
1 42 (4.26%) Microsoft Excel
2 16 (1.62%) Microsoft PowerPoint
3 15 (1.52%) Microsoft Office
4 13 (1.32%) MS Visio
5 12 (1.22%) Microsoft Project
6 5 (0.51%) Simulink
7 2 (0.20%) Chatbot
7 2 (0.20%) Spreadsheet
7 2 (0.20%) Trello
8 1 (0.10%) Autodesk Inventor
8 1 (0.10%) CATIA
8 1 (0.10%) InVision
8 1 (0.10%) MicroStation
8 1 (0.10%) PTC Creo
8 1 (0.10%) Sketch
8 1 (0.10%) Windchill
Business Applications
1 45 (4.56%) SAP S/4HANA
2 15 (1.52%) SAP PSCD
3 13 (1.32%) SAP IBP
3 13 (1.32%) SAP Travel Management
4 12 (1.22%) SAP BRIM
5 8 (0.81%) SAP FI
6 7 (0.71%) SAP EWM
6 7 (0.71%) SAP FI-CA
7 6 (0.61%) SAP EHS
8 5 (0.51%) SAP HR
9 4 (0.41%) iTrent
9 4 (0.41%) Loan IQ
9 4 (0.41%) Payment Gateway
10 3 (0.30%) Exchequer
10 3 (0.30%) Primavera
10 3 (0.30%) ProductWriter
10 3 (0.30%) SAP HCM
10 3 (0.30%) SAP MDG
10 3 (0.30%) SAP Payroll
10 3 (0.30%) Sparx Enterprise Architect
Cloud Services
1 174 (17.65%) AWS
2 166 (16.84%) Azure
3 70 (7.10%) Power Platform
4 47 (4.77%) GitHub
5 45 (4.56%) Azure DevOps
6 42 (4.26%) GCP
7 41 (4.16%) Serverless
8 35 (3.55%) GitHub Actions
9 31 (3.14%) Microsoft 365
10 27 (2.74%) Entra ID
11 26 (2.64%) AWS Lambda
12 21 (2.13%) Power Automate
13 19 (1.93%) AWS CloudFormation
13 19 (1.93%) PowerApps
14 16 (1.62%) Amazon ECS
14 16 (1.62%) Amazon S3
15 15 (1.52%) Amazon SQS
16 14 (1.42%) Amazon EKS
17 13 (1.32%) Azure Data Factory
17 13 (1.32%) Azure Synapse Analytics
Communications & Networking
1 15 (1.52%) DNS
2 14 (1.42%) Firewall
2 14 (1.42%) SSH
3 12 (1.22%) Network Security
4 8 (0.81%) Reverse Proxy
5 7 (0.71%) Ethernet
5 7 (0.71%) HTTPS
5 7 (0.71%) VPN
6 6 (0.61%) DHCP
7 4 (0.41%) SAN
7 4 (0.41%) WAN
8 3 (0.30%) Internet
8 3 (0.30%) LAN
8 3 (0.30%) Modbus
8 3 (0.30%) TCP/IP
8 3 (0.30%) VSAN
8 3 (0.30%) WebEx
8 3 (0.30%) Wi-Fi
9 2 (0.20%) NAS
9 2 (0.20%) RS-485
Database & Business Intelligence
1 57 (5.78%) Power BI
2 34 (3.45%) PostgreSQL
3 24 (2.43%) SQL Server
4 23 (2.33%) Metadata
5 20 (2.03%) Data Warehouse
6 17 (1.72%) MongoDB
7 15 (1.52%) NoSQL
8 14 (1.42%) Relational Database
9 13 (1.32%) DynamoDB
10 11 (1.12%) Geospatial Data
10 11 (1.12%) MySQL
11 10 (1.01%) Big Data
11 10 (1.01%) Delta Lake
12 9 (0.91%) Data Lake
13 8 (0.81%) Redis
14 7 (0.71%) Amazon Aurora
14 7 (0.71%) DocumentDB
14 7 (0.71%) Spark SQL
14 7 (0.71%) Tableau
15 6 (0.61%) Amazon RDS
Development Applications
1 77 (7.81%) JIRA
2 61 (6.19%) Git
3 45 (4.56%) GitLab
4 39 (3.96%) Jenkins
5 15 (1.52%) Selenium
6 12 (1.22%) JUnit
7 11 (1.12%) Cucumber
8 8 (0.81%) Cypress.io
9 7 (0.71%) Postman
10 6 (0.61%) Gatling
11 4 (0.41%) Artifactory
11 4 (0.41%) JMeter
11 4 (0.41%) Maven
11 4 (0.41%) Mockito
11 4 (0.41%) Rational DOORS
12 3 (0.30%) REST Assured
12 3 (0.30%) SonarQube
12 3 (0.30%) Terragrunt
12 3 (0.30%) WebDriver
13 2 (0.20%) MLflow
General
1 304 (30.83%) Social Skills
2 177 (17.95%) Public Sector
3 144 (14.60%) Finance
4 118 (11.97%) Analytical Skills
5 48 (4.87%) Aerospace
6 42 (4.26%) Banking
7 30 (3.04%) Documentation Skills
8 22 (2.23%) Manufacturing
9 21 (2.13%) Legal
10 20 (2.03%) Influencing Skills
11 19 (1.93%) Billing
12 18 (1.83%) Aviation
13 16 (1.62%) Presentation Skills
14 13 (1.32%) Telecoms
15 12 (1.22%) Organisational Skills
16 9 (0.91%) Retail
17 8 (0.81%) Inclusion and Diversity
17 8 (0.81%) Law
17 8 (0.81%) Military
17 8 (0.81%) Publishing
Job Titles
1 143 (14.50%) Developer
2 123 (12.47%) Analyst
3 110 (11.16%) Senior
4 103 (10.45%) Architect
5 99 (10.04%) Lead
6 78 (7.91%) Consultant
7 58 (5.88%) Business Analyst
8 57 (5.78%) SAP Consultant
9 43 (4.36%) Designer
10 36 (3.65%) Java Developer
11 35 (3.55%) Data Engineer
12 32 (3.25%) Administrator
13 26 (2.64%) Delivery Manager
13 26 (2.64%) Senior Analyst
14 23 (2.33%) Data Architect
14 23 (2.33%) DevOps Engineer
14 23 (2.33%) Senior Developer
15 22 (2.23%) Senior Business Analyst
15 22 (2.23%) Service Designer
16 20 (2.03%) Solutions Architect
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 56 (5.68%) Node.js
2 48 (4.87%) React
3 43 (4.36%) REST
4 40 (4.06%) HTML
5 37 (3.75%) RESTful
6 35 (3.55%) CSS
7 29 (2.94%) .NET
8 28 (2.84%) Spring
9 27 (2.74%) Kafka
10 25 (2.54%) Spring Boot
11 17 (1.72%) OAuth
12 16 (1.62%) Middleware
13 15 (1.52%) JSON
13 15 (1.52%) Playwright
14 13 (1.32%) SAP TM
15 12 (1.22%) OAuth2
15 12 (1.22%) OpenAPI
15 12 (1.22%) PySpark
15 12 (1.22%) SPFx
16 11 (1.12%) Swagger
Miscellaneous
1 71 (7.20%) Product Ownership
2 49 (4.97%) Onboarding
3 44 (4.46%) Cloud Native
4 21 (2.13%) Management Information System
5 18 (1.83%) Distributed Systems
5 18 (1.83%) Legacy Systems
6 15 (1.52%) Algorithms
7 13 (1.32%) NHS
8 11 (1.12%) Self-Motivation
9 9 (0.91%) Data Centre
10 8 (0.81%) Data Structures
10 8 (0.81%) Enterprise Software
10 8 (0.81%) Public Cloud
11 6 (0.61%) Hybrid Cloud
11 6 (0.61%) Linux Command Line
11 6 (0.61%) Mobile App
11 6 (0.61%) Operational Technology
11 6 (0.61%) Replication
12 5 (0.51%) BYOD
12 5 (0.51%) Mainframe
Operating Systems
1 82 (8.32%) Linux
2 46 (4.67%) Windows
3 23 (2.33%) Unix
4 13 (1.32%) Android
5 12 (1.22%) Windows Server
6 9 (0.91%) Mac OS
7 8 (0.81%) Apple iOS
8 6 (0.61%) Windows 10
9 4 (0.41%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
10 3 (0.30%) AIX
10 3 (0.30%) Solaris
10 3 (0.30%) Ubuntu
11 2 (0.20%) Debian
11 2 (0.20%) VMS
12 1 (0.10%) CentOS
12 1 (0.10%) Mac OS X
Processes & Methodologies
1 308 (31.24%) Agile
2 195 (19.78%) CI/CD
3 165 (16.73%) Problem-Solving
4 154 (15.62%) DevOps
5 142 (14.40%) Stakeholder Management
6 107 (10.85%) Stakeholder Engagement
7 104 (10.55%) Continuous Improvement
8 87 (8.82%) Roadmaps
9 80 (8.11%) Infrastructure as Code
10 78 (7.91%) Test Automation
11 77 (7.81%) Decision-Making
11 77 (7.81%) Scrum
12 70 (7.10%) Analytics
12 70 (7.10%) Microservices
13 67 (6.80%) Data Modelling
14 66 (6.69%) Migration
15 60 (6.09%) AI
15 60 (6.09%) Business Intelligence
15 60 (6.09%) Workshop Facilitation
16 56 (5.68%) Validation
Programming Languages
1 130 (13.18%) Python
2 103 (10.45%) SQL
3 100 (10.14%) Java
4 68 (6.90%) JavaScript
5 42 (4.26%) TypeScript
6 30 (3.04%) Scala
7 24 (2.43%) C#
8 19 (1.93%) PowerShell
9 17 (1.72%) Shell Script
10 11 (1.12%) Bicep
11 10 (1.01%) Bash
12 9 (0.91%) C
12 9 (0.91%) PL/SQL
12 9 (0.91%) Ruby
13 8 (0.81%) C++
14 7 (0.71%) COBOL
15 6 (0.61%) MATLAB
15 6 (0.61%) VB
16 5 (0.51%) Go
16 5 (0.51%) R
Qualifications
1 302 (30.63%) Security Cleared
2 213 (21.60%) SC Cleared
3 60 (6.09%) Degree
4 16 (1.62%) DV Cleared
5 14 (1.42%) Computer Science Degree
6 11 (1.12%) AWS Certification
6 11 (1.12%) Master's Degree
7 10 (1.01%) Azure Certification
8 8 (0.81%) PMI Certification
9 7 (0.71%) Microsoft Certification
10 6 (0.61%) CompTIA CySA+
10 6 (0.61%) DBS Check
10 6 (0.61%) PMP
11 5 (0.51%) GIAC
12 4 (0.41%) AWS Certified Solutions Architect
12 4 (0.41%) CompTIA Security+
12 4 (0.41%) CTC Cleared
12 4 (0.41%) MBA
12 4 (0.41%) NVQ Level 4
12 4 (0.41%) TOGAF Certification
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 65 (6.59%) Data Quality
2 62 (6.29%) Accessibility
3 53 (5.38%) QA
4 18 (1.83%) ISO/IEC 27001
4 18 (1.83%) WCAG
5 16 (1.62%) NIST
6 15 (1.52%) PMO
7 13 (1.32%) SLA
8 9 (0.91%) GDPR
9 8 (0.81%) PCI DSS
10 7 (0.71%) GRC
11 6 (0.61%) ISO 20022
12 5 (0.51%) IFRS
12 5 (0.51%) IFRS 17
13 4 (0.41%) HL7
13 4 (0.41%) NCSC
13 4 (0.41%) PSD2
14 3 (0.30%) DICOM
14 3 (0.30%) ISO 8583
14 3 (0.30%) SEPA
System Software
1 59 (5.98%) Docker
2 29 (2.94%) Active Directory
3 24 (2.43%) VMware Infrastructure
4 7 (0.71%) vSphere
5 6 (0.61%) Hyper-V
5 6 (0.61%) Virtual Machines
6 5 (0.51%) GPFS
6 5 (0.51%) NFS
6 5 (0.51%) VMware ESXi
7 4 (0.41%) Virtual Desktop
8 3 (0.30%) VMware NSX
9 2 (0.20%) ACF2
9 2 (0.20%) Firmware
9 2 (0.20%) QEMU
9 2 (0.20%) RACF
9 2 (0.20%) Time Sharing Option
10 1 (0.10%) Postfix
Systems Management
1 87 (8.82%) Terraform
2 58 (5.88%) Kubernetes
3 25 (2.54%) Grafana
4 17 (1.72%) Prometheus
5 16 (1.62%) Ansible
6 10 (1.01%) Kibana
7 8 (0.81%) Istio
8 6 (0.61%) Argo
8 6 (0.61%) vRealize
9 5 (0.51%) Microsoft Intune
10 4 (0.41%) HAProxy
10 4 (0.41%) Podman
10 4 (0.41%) Single Sign-On
11 3 (0.30%) SCCM
11 3 (0.30%) VxRail
12 2 (0.20%) CA Endevor
12 2 (0.20%) EMC NetWorker
12 2 (0.20%) EMC VPLEX
12 2 (0.20%) Kubeflow
12 2 (0.20%) Packer
Vendors
1 117 (11.87%) SAP
2 91 (9.23%) Microsoft
3 49 (4.97%) Oracle
4 26 (2.64%) ServiceNow
4 26 (2.64%) VMware
5 22 (2.23%) Databricks
6 20 (2.03%) Google
7 19 (1.93%) Splunk
8 17 (1.72%) Cisco
9 16 (1.62%) IBM
10 13 (1.32%) Pega
11 9 (0.91%) Salesforce
12 8 (0.81%) Apple
12 8 (0.81%) OpenAI
13 7 (0.71%) BeyondTrust
13 7 (0.71%) CyberArk
13 7 (0.71%) Dell
13 7 (0.71%) Workday
14 6 (0.61%) Foundry
14 6 (0.61%) MuleSoft