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 6 December 2025, comparing them to the same period in the previous two years.

6 months to
6 Dec 2025
Same period 2024 Same period 2023
Rank 153 271 243
Rank change year-on-year +118 -28 -45
Contract jobs citing BPSS Clearance 690 323 452
As % of all contract jobs in the UK 1.89% 0.90% 1.00%
As % of the Qualifications category 5.67% 3.04% 3.39%
Number of daily rates quoted 505 175 304
10th Percentile £308 £220 £360
25th Percentile £400 £372 £446
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £488 £500 £550
Median % change year-on-year -2.50% -9.09% -
75th Percentile £588 £600 £623
90th Percentile £695 £688 £702
UK excluding London median daily rate £465 £470 £550
% change year-on-year -1.06% -14.55% -
Number of hourly rates quoted 54 16 32
10th Percentile £15.93 £20.06 £24.25
25th Percentile £22.63 £20.12 £33.14
Median hourly rate £33.50 £37.93 £55.00
Median % change year-on-year -11.67% -31.05% -8.33%
75th Percentile £47.46 £64.06 £76.99
90th Percentile £70.11 £65.00 £84.36
UK excluding London median hourly rate £33.50 £38.85 £55.00
% change year-on-year -13.77% -29.36% -8.33%

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 12,174 10,608 13,341
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the UK 33.40% 29.48% 29.49%
Number of daily rates quoted 7,906 6,439 8,410
10th Percentile £306 £306 £300
25th Percentile £413 £420 £427
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £525 £525 £550
Median % change year-on-year - -4.55% -
75th Percentile £625 £638 £650
90th Percentile £725 £725 £725
UK excluding London median daily rate £500 £515 £538
% change year-on-year -2.91% -4.19% +2.38%
Number of hourly rates quoted 1,020 506 753
10th Percentile £17.04 £19.00 £17.72
25th Percentile £19.20 £24.18 £27.50
Median hourly rate £25.15 £41.71 £53.50
Median % change year-on-year -39.70% -22.05% +18.89%
75th Percentile £45.46 £66.00 £67.75
90th Percentile £74.26 £75.00 £80.00
UK excluding London median hourly rate £25.15 £45.00 £51.90
% change year-on-year -44.11% -13.29% +15.33%

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 6 December 2025.

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 6 December 2025.

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 6 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 +96 487 £492 -1.60% 740
UK excluding London +67 364 £465 -1.06% 761
Work from Home +99 245 £475 -13.64% 405
North of England +50 189 £469 +17.25% 183
North West +60 140 £450 -10.00% 126
London +47 137 £513 -10.87% 44
Midlands -18 55 £445 -8.25% 79
West Midlands -13 43 £475 +1.06% 40
South East +9 39 £475 +13.10% 208
South West +12 38 £550 -6.78% 138
Yorkshire -20 38 £490 +122.73% 44
Scotland +26 28 £420 -23.64% 34
East of England -20 18 £515 +134.09% 203
North East +8 14 £488 +17.82% 14
East Midlands -10 12 £350 -42.95% 35
Northern Ireland - 6 £375 - 5
Wales -3 5 £458 +108.00% 12

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 (6.23%) Confluence
2 10 (1.45%) Microsoft Exchange
2 10 (1.45%) SharePoint
3 7 (1.01%) nginx
4 5 (0.72%) Apache
5 4 (0.58%) CMS
5 4 (0.58%) SugarCRM
6 3 (0.43%) ArcGIS
6 3 (0.43%) MTS
6 3 (0.43%) WebLogic
7 2 (0.29%) Apache Airflow
7 2 (0.29%) HCL Domino
7 2 (0.29%) HCL Notes
7 2 (0.29%) Oracle SOA Suite
8 1 (0.14%) Apache Spark
8 1 (0.14%) Drupal
8 1 (0.14%) GeoServer
8 1 (0.14%) OpenStack
8 1 (0.14%) Oracle Workflow
8 1 (0.14%) Orchard CMS
Applications
1 20 (2.90%) Microsoft Excel
2 12 (1.74%) Microsoft Office
3 6 (0.87%) Microsoft PowerPoint
3 6 (0.87%) MS Visio
4 5 (0.72%) AutoCAD
4 5 (0.72%) ProjectWise
5 4 (0.58%) Trello
6 3 (0.43%) Adobe XD
6 3 (0.43%) Microsoft Project
7 2 (0.29%) Adobe Illustrator
7 2 (0.29%) Photoshop
7 2 (0.29%) Sketch
7 2 (0.29%) Spreadsheet
8 1 (0.14%) Chatbot
8 1 (0.14%) Navisworks
8 1 (0.14%) Revit
8 1 (0.14%) Windchill
Business Applications
1 45 (6.52%) SAP S/4HANA
2 16 (2.32%) Oracle EBS
3 13 (1.88%) SAP EHS
4 10 (1.45%) Oracle EBS R12
5 9 (1.30%) Oracle Financials
6 7 (1.01%) Oracle Payables
6 7 (1.01%) SAP HCM
7 6 (0.87%) Oracle Cash Management
7 6 (0.87%) SAP VC
8 5 (0.72%) Oracle ASCP
8 5 (0.72%) SAP QM
9 4 (0.58%) Maximo
9 4 (0.58%) Oracle ERP
9 4 (0.58%) Oracle SCM
10 3 (0.43%) SAP BRIM
10 3 (0.43%) SAP Hybris
10 3 (0.43%) SAP IBP
10 3 (0.43%) SAP Payroll
10 3 (0.43%) SAP PM
10 3 (0.43%) Sparx Enterprise Architect
Cloud Services
1 110 (15.94%) AWS
2 85 (12.32%) Azure
3 32 (4.64%) Serverless
4 26 (3.77%) GitHub
5 25 (3.62%) Power Platform
6 24 (3.48%) AWS Lambda
7 19 (2.75%) AWS CloudFormation
8 18 (2.61%) Microsoft 365
9 17 (2.46%) Azure DevOps
9 17 (2.46%) GCP
9 17 (2.46%) GitHub Actions
9 17 (2.46%) SuccessFactors
10 16 (2.32%) Amazon EC2
11 15 (2.17%) Amazon CloudWatch
12 13 (1.88%) Amazon S3
13 12 (1.74%) Amazon ECS
14 11 (1.59%) Amazon EKS
14 11 (1.59%) Amazon SQS
14 11 (1.59%) Power Automate
15 10 (1.45%) Virtual Private Cloud
Communications & Networking
1 15 (2.17%) Firewall
2 13 (1.88%) SSH
3 10 (1.45%) DNS
4 9 (1.30%) LAN
5 8 (1.16%) WAN
6 7 (1.01%) MPLS
6 7 (1.01%) SAN
6 7 (1.01%) VPN
7 6 (0.87%) Network Security
8 4 (0.58%) Intrusion Detection
8 4 (0.58%) SDH
8 4 (0.58%) SD-WAN
8 4 (0.58%) Wi-Fi
9 3 (0.43%) 5G
9 3 (0.43%) BGP
9 3 (0.43%) DHCP
9 3 (0.43%) OSPF
9 3 (0.43%) VLAN
9 3 (0.43%) VoIP
9 3 (0.43%) VSAN
Database & Business Intelligence
1 18 (2.61%) Power BI
2 13 (1.88%) PostgreSQL
3 12 (1.74%) MongoDB
4 11 (1.59%) Metadata
4 11 (1.59%) NoSQL
5 10 (1.45%) SQL Server
6 8 (1.16%) Amazon RDS
6 8 (1.16%) Data Lake
6 8 (1.16%) Data Warehouse
6 8 (1.16%) Relational Database
7 7 (1.01%) MySQL
7 7 (1.01%) Oracle Database
7 7 (1.01%) Redis
8 6 (0.87%) BigQuery
9 5 (0.72%) DocumentDB
9 5 (0.72%) Geospatial Data
9 5 (0.72%) Tableau
10 4 (0.58%) Data Hub
10 4 (0.58%) Looker
10 4 (0.58%) SAP HANA
Development Applications
1 75 (10.87%) Git
2 64 (9.28%) JIRA
3 33 (4.78%) GitLab
4 29 (4.20%) Jenkins
5 11 (1.59%) SonarQube
6 9 (1.30%) Cucumber
6 9 (1.30%) Cypress.io
7 8 (1.16%) Mockito
8 7 (1.01%) JUnit
9 6 (0.87%) Selenium
10 5 (0.72%) Bitbucket
11 4 (0.58%) Gradle
11 4 (0.58%) Grunt
11 4 (0.58%) gulp
11 4 (0.58%) JMeter
12 3 (0.43%) Android Studio
12 3 (0.43%) Toad
12 3 (0.43%) webpack
13 2 (0.29%) Axure RP
13 2 (0.29%) WebDriver
General
1 207 (30.00%) Social Skills
2 129 (18.70%) Public Sector
3 106 (15.36%) Finance
4 60 (8.70%) Analytical Skills
5 28 (4.06%) Banking
6 25 (3.62%) Aerospace
7 17 (2.46%) Manufacturing
8 16 (2.32%) Organisational Skills
9 15 (2.17%) Aviation
10 14 (2.03%) Influencing Skills
10 14 (2.03%) Telecoms
11 13 (1.88%) Documentation Skills
12 8 (1.16%) Local Government
13 7 (1.01%) Billing
13 7 (1.01%) Legal
13 7 (1.01%) Marketing
13 7 (1.01%) Presentation Skills
14 6 (0.87%) Law
15 4 (0.58%) Financial Institution
16 3 (0.43%) Publishing
Job Titles
1 112 (16.23%) Developer
2 90 (13.04%) Consultant
3 71 (10.29%) Senior
4 60 (8.70%) Analyst
5 51 (7.39%) Lead
6 48 (6.96%) Architect
7 44 (6.38%) SAP Consultant
8 35 (5.07%) Java Developer
9 23 (3.33%) Business Analyst
10 22 (3.19%) Administrator
11 21 (3.04%) Designer
12 20 (2.90%) DevOps Engineer
12 20 (2.90%) Project Manager
13 18 (2.61%) Senior Developer
13 18 (2.61%) Solutions Architect
14 16 (2.32%) Delivery Manager
14 16 (2.32%) Senior Manager
15 15 (2.17%) Oracle Consultant
16 13 (1.88%) Management Consultant
17 12 (1.74%) Support Engineer
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 41 (5.94%) Node.js
2 32 (4.64%) React
3 30 (4.35%) REST
4 28 (4.06%) HTML
5 27 (3.91%) Kafka
6 24 (3.48%) RESTful
7 22 (3.19%) CSS
8 20 (2.90%) JSON
9 16 (2.32%) Spring
10 13 (1.88%) SAP Fiori
10 13 (1.88%) Spring Boot
11 12 (1.74%) AngularJS
11 12 (1.74%) XML
12 11 (1.59%) .NET
13 9 (1.30%) ActiveMQ
13 9 (1.30%) Jest
13 9 (1.30%) SOAP
14 8 (1.16%) Elastic Stack
14 8 (1.16%) HTML5
14 8 (1.16%) LangChain
Miscellaneous
1 45 (6.52%) Onboarding
2 34 (4.93%) Product Ownership
3 19 (2.75%) Management Information System
4 14 (2.03%) Security Posture
5 12 (1.74%) Cloud Native
5 12 (1.74%) Driving Licence
6 9 (1.30%) Mobile App
6 9 (1.30%) SCADA
7 8 (1.16%) Data Centre
7 8 (1.16%) Legacy Systems
7 8 (1.16%) NHS
8 7 (1.01%) Low-Code
9 6 (0.87%) AI Agents
9 6 (0.87%) Operational Technology
9 6 (0.87%) Public Cloud
10 5 (0.72%) Cyber Threat
10 5 (0.72%) Distributed Systems
10 5 (0.72%) Greenfield Project
10 5 (0.72%) Hybrid Cloud
10 5 (0.72%) Linux Command Line
Operating Systems
1 67 (9.71%) Linux
2 29 (4.20%) Windows
3 25 (3.62%) Unix
4 9 (1.30%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
5 7 (1.01%) Android
6 6 (0.87%) Mac OS X
7 5 (0.72%) Windows Server
8 4 (0.58%) Apple iOS
9 2 (0.29%) Windows 10
9 2 (0.29%) Windows Server 2019
10 1 (0.14%) CentOS
10 1 (0.14%) Oracle Linux
10 1 (0.14%) Robot Operating System
10 1 (0.14%) Ubuntu
10 1 (0.14%) VME
10 1 (0.14%) VMS
10 1 (0.14%) Windows 7
10 1 (0.14%) Windows 8
10 1 (0.14%) Windows Server 2016
Processes & Methodologies
1 200 (28.99%) Agile
2 110 (15.94%) Problem-Solving
3 105 (15.22%) CI/CD
4 96 (13.91%) Stakeholder Management
5 88 (12.75%) DevOps
6 58 (8.41%) Continuous Improvement
7 51 (7.39%) Migration
7 51 (7.39%) Scrum
7 51 (7.39%) Stakeholder Engagement
8 49 (7.10%) Microservices
9 46 (6.67%) Roadmaps
10 45 (6.52%) Test Automation
11 41 (5.94%) AI
11 41 (5.94%) User Experience
12 40 (5.80%) Change Management
12 40 (5.80%) Validation
13 38 (5.51%) User Acceptance Testing
14 36 (5.22%) Mentoring
15 35 (5.07%) Containerisation
15 35 (5.07%) Project Management
Programming Languages
1 83 (12.03%) Python
2 71 (10.29%) Java
3 48 (6.96%) SQL
4 38 (5.51%) JavaScript
5 24 (3.48%) TypeScript
6 19 (2.75%) Bash
7 13 (1.88%) ABAP
7 13 (1.88%) PowerShell
7 13 (1.88%) Ruby
8 11 (1.59%) Shell Script
9 10 (1.45%) PHP
10 9 (1.30%) PL/SQL
11 8 (1.16%) C++
11 8 (1.16%) R
12 7 (1.01%) Scala
13 6 (0.87%) Go
14 5 (0.72%) C#
15 4 (0.58%) Apex Code
16 3 (0.43%) Kotlin
17 2 (0.29%) Data Analysis Expressions
Qualifications
1 334 (48.41%) Security Cleared
2 233 (33.77%) SC Cleared
3 48 (6.96%) Degree
4 22 (3.19%) Computer Science Degree
5 13 (1.88%) DBS Check
5 13 (1.88%) DV Cleared
5 13 (1.88%) Master's Degree
6 12 (1.74%) BC Cleared
7 10 (1.45%) ISO 27001 Lead Implementer
8 9 (1.30%) Cisco Certification
9 7 (1.01%) CCNP
10 5 (0.72%) Azure Certification
11 4 (0.58%) AWS Certification
11 4 (0.58%) CISM
11 4 (0.58%) ISEB
11 4 (0.58%) ISTQB
11 4 (0.58%) ISTQB Foundation Certification
11 4 (0.58%) Oracle Certification
12 3 (0.43%) PMI Certification
12 3 (0.43%) PMP
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 42 (6.09%) Accessibility
2 39 (5.65%) QA
3 18 (2.61%) ISO/IEC 27001
4 14 (2.03%) Data Quality
5 12 (1.74%) GRC
5 12 (1.74%) SLA
6 10 (1.45%) Def Stans
7 9 (1.30%) GDPR
7 9 (1.30%) WCAG
8 8 (1.16%) NIST
8 8 (1.16%) PMO
9 7 (1.01%) NCSC
10 4 (0.58%) ISO 20022
11 3 (0.43%) ISO/IEC 27002 (supersedes ISO/IEC 17799)
11 3 (0.43%) PSD2
12 2 (0.29%) SEPA
13 1 (0.14%) Actionable Recommendations
13 1 (0.14%) ECSS
13 1 (0.14%) ITGC
13 1 (0.14%) P3O
System Software
1 47 (6.81%) Docker
2 19 (2.75%) Active Directory
3 10 (1.45%) VMware Infrastructure
4 5 (0.72%) Virtual Machines
4 5 (0.72%) vSphere
5 3 (0.43%) Hyper-V
6 2 (0.29%) GPFS
6 2 (0.29%) NFS
6 2 (0.29%) VMware ESXi
7 1 (0.14%) ACF2
7 1 (0.14%) HDFS
7 1 (0.14%) KVM
7 1 (0.14%) Postfix
7 1 (0.14%) RACF
7 1 (0.14%) Time Sharing Option
7 1 (0.14%) Varnish
Systems Management
1 45 (6.52%) Kubernetes
2 42 (6.09%) Terraform
3 13 (1.88%) Grafana
4 10 (1.45%) Prometheus
5 6 (0.87%) Ansible
5 6 (0.87%) EMC NetWorker
5 6 (0.87%) EMC VPLEX
5 6 (0.87%) Microsoft Intune
6 5 (0.72%) vRealize
7 4 (0.58%) Packer
7 4 (0.58%) Puppet
7 4 (0.58%) Single Sign-On
7 4 (0.58%) VxRail
8 3 (0.43%) Consul
8 3 (0.43%) PingFederate
8 3 (0.43%) SCCM
9 2 (0.29%) Ambari
9 2 (0.29%) FortiGate
9 2 (0.29%) Kibana
9 2 (0.29%) ZABBIX
Vendors
1 106 (15.36%) SAP
2 84 (12.17%) Microsoft
3 56 (8.12%) Oracle
4 25 (3.62%) Cisco
5 20 (2.90%) VMware
6 15 (2.17%) ServiceNow
7 11 (1.59%) Adobe
7 11 (1.59%) IBM
8 10 (1.45%) Dell
8 10 (1.45%) Google
9 9 (1.30%) Atlassian
10 8 (1.16%) Red Hat
11 6 (0.87%) AppDynamics
11 6 (0.87%) Brocade
11 6 (0.87%) EMC
11 6 (0.87%) Fortinet
11 6 (0.87%) Isilon
11 6 (0.87%) Salesforce
11 6 (0.87%) webMethods
11 6 (0.87%) Workday