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 April 2026, comparing them to the same period in the previous two years.

6 months to
6 Apr 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 125 250 224
Rank change year-on-year +125 -26 -21
Contract jobs citing BPSS Clearance 941 310 469
As % of all contract jobs in the UK 2.08% 1.06% 1.07%
As % of the Qualifications category 6.26% 3.46% 3.48%
Number of daily rates quoted 701 190 351
10th Percentile £313 £220 £313
25th Percentile £394 £400 £425
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £469 £500 £508
Median % change year-on-year -6.20% -1.48% -7.73%
75th Percentile £550 £575 £628
90th Percentile £650 £669 £675
UK excluding London median daily rate £438 £475 £525
% change year-on-year -7.89% -9.52% -4.55%
Number of hourly rates quoted 71 22 53
10th Percentile £14.96 £18.50 £13.99
25th Percentile £22.84 £20.00 -
Median hourly rate £43.69 £45.00 £16.06
Median % change year-on-year -2.91% +180.20% -66.60%
75th Percentile £68.75 £67.50 £42.64
90th Percentile £82.25 £77.38 £75.50
UK excluding London median hourly rate £48.75 £50.00 £16.06
% change year-on-year -2.50% +211.33% -67.21%

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 15,031 8,959 13,459
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the UK 33.24% 30.64% 30.67%
Number of daily rates quoted 9,957 5,714 8,339
10th Percentile £343 £300 £300
25th Percentile £425 £413 £425
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £518 £525 £538
Median % change year-on-year -1.43% -2.33% -2.27%
75th Percentile £619 £625 £650
90th Percentile £725 £713 £738
UK excluding London median daily rate £500 £513 £525
% change year-on-year -2.44% -2.38% -
Number of hourly rates quoted 1,102 489 1,015
10th Percentile £16.35 £18.50 £13.69
25th Percentile £20.54 £23.50 £17.55
Median hourly rate £37.50 £45.00 £37.50
Median % change year-on-year -16.67% +20.00% -30.56%
75th Percentile £69.19 £67.50 £61.30
90th Percentile £85.00 £81.01 £75.00
UK excluding London median hourly rate £37.00 £47.81 £39.92
% change year-on-year -22.60% +19.75% -19.39%

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 April 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 6 April 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 6 April 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 +95 672 £475 -5.00% 287
UK excluding London +52 491 £438 -7.89% 264
Work from Home +106 385 £438 -12.50% 132
London +90 224 £500 -4.94% 79
North of England +7 186 £425 -15.00% 45
North West +26 140 £400 -25.65% 28
Midlands +8 110 £431 -1.20% 17
West Midlands -8 80 £445 +1.95% 15
South East -2 79 £469 -8.93% 87
South West +8 48 £525 +61.54% 58
Scotland +40 47 £320 -37.25% 18
East Midlands -5 29 £416 - 2
Yorkshire -40 26 £480 +106.90% 4
East of England -21 24 £468 +133.88% 42
North East -2 22 £475 +16.56% 13
Wales -10 7 £458 -20.42% 1
Northern Ireland -2 3 £375 +33.45% 1

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 50 (5.31%) Confluence
2 31 (3.29%) SharePoint
3 11 (1.17%) nginx
4 8 (0.85%) Apache
4 8 (0.85%) Microsoft Exchange
5 7 (0.74%) SharePoint Server
6 6 (0.64%) Apache Spark
7 5 (0.53%) CMS
8 4 (0.43%) ArcGIS
8 4 (0.43%) Oracle Workflow
9 3 (0.32%) Apache Airflow
9 3 (0.32%) CICS
9 3 (0.32%) MTS
9 3 (0.32%) SAS
9 3 (0.32%) WebLogic
10 1 (0.11%) Apache Pulsar
10 1 (0.11%) Camunda
10 1 (0.11%) Drupal
10 1 (0.11%) LiveCycle
10 1 (0.11%) Palantir Foundry
Applications
1 40 (4.25%) Microsoft Excel
2 18 (1.91%) Microsoft Office
3 16 (1.70%) Microsoft PowerPoint
4 13 (1.38%) MS Visio
5 12 (1.28%) Microsoft Project
6 5 (0.53%) Simulink
7 2 (0.21%) Chatbot
7 2 (0.21%) Spreadsheet
7 2 (0.21%) Trello
8 1 (0.11%) Autodesk Inventor
8 1 (0.11%) CATIA
8 1 (0.11%) MicroStation
8 1 (0.11%) PTC Creo
8 1 (0.11%) Windchill
Business Applications
1 49 (5.21%) SAP S/4HANA
2 13 (1.38%) SAP Travel Management
3 10 (1.06%) SAP PSCD
4 9 (0.96%) SAP IBP
5 7 (0.74%) SAP BRIM
6 6 (0.64%) SAP EWM
6 6 (0.64%) SAP FI
7 5 (0.53%) SAP EHS
8 4 (0.43%) iTrent
8 4 (0.43%) Loan IQ
8 4 (0.43%) Payment Gateway
8 4 (0.43%) SAP FI-CA
8 4 (0.43%) SAP HR
8 4 (0.43%) SAP MM
8 4 (0.43%) SAP VC
8 4 (0.43%) Sparx Enterprise Architect
9 3 (0.32%) Exchequer
9 3 (0.32%) Primavera
9 3 (0.32%) SAP PM
9 3 (0.32%) SAP QM
Cloud Services
1 159 (16.90%) AWS
2 151 (16.05%) Azure
3 65 (6.91%) Power Platform
4 46 (4.89%) GitHub
5 45 (4.78%) Serverless
6 44 (4.68%) Azure DevOps
7 35 (3.72%) GCP
8 32 (3.40%) GitHub Actions
9 30 (3.19%) Microsoft 365
10 26 (2.76%) AWS CloudFormation
11 25 (2.66%) AWS Lambda
12 20 (2.13%) Power Automate
13 19 (2.02%) Entra ID
14 18 (1.91%) PowerApps
15 17 (1.81%) Amazon SQS
16 16 (1.70%) Amazon EKS
17 15 (1.59%) Azure Data Factory
17 15 (1.59%) Azure Synapse Analytics
18 14 (1.49%) Amazon CloudWatch
18 14 (1.49%) Microsoft Copilot
Communications & Networking
1 20 (2.13%) SSH
2 13 (1.38%) Firewall
3 12 (1.28%) Network Security
4 11 (1.17%) DNS
5 8 (0.85%) Reverse Proxy
6 7 (0.74%) HTTPS
6 7 (0.74%) WAN
7 6 (0.64%) Ethernet
7 6 (0.64%) MPLS
7 6 (0.64%) VPN
8 5 (0.53%) LAN
8 5 (0.53%) SDH
8 5 (0.53%) WebEx
9 4 (0.43%) SAN
9 4 (0.43%) VSAN
10 3 (0.32%) TETRA
10 3 (0.32%) Unified Communications
10 3 (0.32%) VoIP
10 3 (0.32%) Wireless
11 2 (0.21%) SNMP
Database & Business Intelligence
1 50 (5.31%) Power BI
2 28 (2.98%) PostgreSQL
3 26 (2.76%) Metadata
4 21 (2.23%) SQL Server
5 16 (1.70%) Data Warehouse
6 15 (1.59%) NoSQL
7 14 (1.49%) Relational Database
8 12 (1.28%) DynamoDB
8 12 (1.28%) Geospatial Data
8 12 (1.28%) MySQL
9 10 (1.06%) Delta Lake
9 10 (1.06%) Redis
10 9 (0.96%) Data Lake
10 9 (0.96%) MongoDB
11 8 (0.85%) DocumentDB
11 8 (0.85%) Tableau
12 7 (0.74%) Spark SQL
13 6 (0.64%) BigQuery
13 6 (0.64%) DataStage
14 5 (0.53%) GIS
Development Applications
1 81 (8.61%) JIRA
2 68 (7.23%) Git
3 46 (4.89%) GitLab
4 32 (3.40%) Jenkins
5 11 (1.17%) Selenium
6 9 (0.96%) JUnit
7 7 (0.74%) Cucumber
7 7 (0.74%) Cypress.io
8 6 (0.64%) Mockito
9 5 (0.53%) JMeter
9 5 (0.53%) Postman
10 4 (0.43%) Bitbucket
10 4 (0.43%) Gatling
10 4 (0.43%) Rational DOORS
10 4 (0.43%) SonarQube
11 3 (0.32%) Maven
11 3 (0.32%) Toad
12 2 (0.21%) Eclipse
12 2 (0.21%) MLflow
12 2 (0.21%) REST Assured
General
1 304 (32.31%) Social Skills
2 172 (18.28%) Public Sector
3 149 (15.83%) Finance
4 106 (11.26%) Analytical Skills
5 48 (5.10%) Aerospace
6 47 (4.99%) Banking
7 22 (2.34%) Documentation Skills
8 21 (2.23%) Influencing Skills
9 20 (2.13%) Legal
10 19 (2.02%) Manufacturing
10 19 (2.02%) Telecoms
11 17 (1.81%) Aviation
12 16 (1.70%) Presentation Skills
13 12 (1.28%) Organisational Skills
14 11 (1.17%) Local Government
15 9 (0.96%) Billing
15 9 (0.96%) Publishing
16 8 (0.85%) Military
16 8 (0.85%) Retail
17 6 (0.64%) Advertising
Job Titles
1 146 (15.52%) Developer
2 108 (11.48%) Analyst
3 103 (10.95%) Senior
4 89 (9.46%) Architect
5 87 (9.25%) Lead
6 72 (7.65%) Consultant
7 50 (5.31%) SAP Consultant
8 45 (4.78%) Business Analyst
9 37 (3.93%) Java Developer
10 32 (3.40%) Administrator
11 29 (3.08%) Data Engineer
11 29 (3.08%) Designer
12 25 (2.66%) DevOps Engineer
13 24 (2.55%) Senior Developer
14 20 (2.13%) Delivery Manager
15 19 (2.02%) Azure Engineer
15 19 (2.02%) Project Manager
15 19 (2.02%) Solutions Architect
16 18 (1.91%) Software Developer
16 18 (1.91%) User Researcher
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 64 (6.80%) Node.js
2 50 (5.31%) React
3 39 (4.14%) REST
4 37 (3.93%) RESTful
5 31 (3.29%) Kafka
6 27 (2.87%) .NET
6 27 (2.87%) HTML
7 26 (2.76%) Spring
8 24 (2.55%) CSS
9 23 (2.44%) Spring Boot
10 16 (1.70%) Middleware
11 15 (1.59%) JSON
12 13 (1.38%) SAP TM
12 13 (1.38%) XML
13 12 (1.28%) LangChain
13 12 (1.28%) OAuth
13 12 (1.28%) PySpark
14 11 (1.17%) AngularJS
14 11 (1.17%) Jest
15 10 (1.06%) Playwright
Miscellaneous
1 67 (7.12%) Product Ownership
2 50 (5.31%) Onboarding
3 46 (4.89%) Cloud Native
4 21 (2.23%) Management Information System
5 18 (1.91%) Distributed Systems
5 18 (1.91%) Legacy Systems
6 14 (1.49%) NHS
7 12 (1.28%) Algorithms
8 10 (1.06%) Public Cloud
8 10 (1.06%) Self-Motivation
9 8 (0.85%) Data Centre
9 8 (0.85%) Data Structures
10 7 (0.74%) Cyber Threat
10 7 (0.74%) Driving Licence
10 7 (0.74%) Enterprise Software
10 7 (0.74%) Linux Command Line
11 6 (0.64%) Hybrid Cloud
11 6 (0.64%) Mainframe
11 6 (0.64%) Replication
12 5 (0.53%) Tandem
Operating Systems
1 91 (9.67%) Linux
2 37 (3.93%) Windows
3 17 (1.81%) Unix
4 9 (0.96%) Android
5 7 (0.74%) Windows Server
6 6 (0.64%) Apple iOS
7 4 (0.43%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
8 3 (0.32%) AIX
8 3 (0.32%) Solaris
8 3 (0.32%) Ubuntu
9 2 (0.21%) Debian
9 2 (0.21%) Mac OS
10 1 (0.11%) CentOS
10 1 (0.11%) Mac OS X
10 1 (0.11%) VME
10 1 (0.11%) VMS
10 1 (0.11%) Windows 10
Processes & Methodologies
1 287 (30.50%) Agile
2 183 (19.45%) CI/CD
3 173 (18.38%) Problem-Solving
4 140 (14.88%) DevOps
5 133 (14.13%) Stakeholder Management
6 100 (10.63%) Stakeholder Engagement
7 93 (9.88%) Continuous Improvement
8 80 (8.50%) Test Automation
9 74 (7.86%) Microservices
9 74 (7.86%) Roadmaps
10 71 (7.55%) Scrum
11 70 (7.44%) Infrastructure as Code
12 69 (7.33%) AI
13 67 (7.12%) Data Modelling
14 66 (7.01%) Analytics
15 65 (6.91%) Validation
16 63 (6.70%) Migration
17 60 (6.38%) Decision-Making
18 57 (6.06%) SDLC
19 54 (5.74%) Business Intelligence
Programming Languages
1 129 (13.71%) Python
2 102 (10.84%) SQL
3 98 (10.41%) Java
4 60 (6.38%) JavaScript
5 45 (4.78%) TypeScript
6 23 (2.44%) C#
6 23 (2.44%) Shell Script
7 18 (1.91%) PowerShell
8 17 (1.81%) Scala
9 15 (1.59%) Bash
10 14 (1.49%) Ruby
11 10 (1.06%) Bicep
12 8 (0.85%) ABAP
12 8 (0.85%) C
12 8 (0.85%) C++
12 8 (0.85%) COBOL
12 8 (0.85%) PL/SQL
13 6 (0.64%) MATLAB
14 4 (0.43%) Data Analysis Expressions
14 4 (0.43%) R
Qualifications
1 313 (33.26%) Security Cleared
2 233 (24.76%) SC Cleared
3 62 (6.59%) Degree
4 19 (2.02%) DV Cleared
5 17 (1.81%) Computer Science Degree
6 12 (1.28%) AWS Certification
6 12 (1.28%) Master's Degree
7 9 (0.96%) Azure Certification
8 8 (0.85%) DBS Check
8 8 (0.85%) PMI Certification
9 6 (0.64%) ISTQB
9 6 (0.64%) PMP
10 5 (0.53%) CompTIA CySA+
10 5 (0.53%) CompTIA Security+
11 4 (0.43%) AWS Certified Solutions Architect
11 4 (0.43%) CTC Cleared
11 4 (0.43%) GIAC
11 4 (0.43%) ISTQB Foundation Certification
11 4 (0.43%) MBA
11 4 (0.43%) Microsoft Certification
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 62 (6.59%) Accessibility
1 62 (6.59%) Data Quality
2 47 (4.99%) QA
3 21 (2.23%) WCAG
4 17 (1.81%) NIST
5 16 (1.70%) SLA
6 14 (1.49%) ISO/IEC 27001
7 13 (1.38%) PMO
8 11 (1.17%) GDPR
9 8 (0.85%) NCSC
9 8 (0.85%) PCI DSS
10 6 (0.64%) GRC
10 6 (0.64%) ISO 20022
11 5 (0.53%) IFRS
11 5 (0.53%) IFRS 17
12 4 (0.43%) HL7
12 4 (0.43%) PSD2
13 3 (0.32%) DICOM
13 3 (0.32%) P3O
13 3 (0.32%) SEPA
System Software
1 61 (6.48%) Docker
2 22 (2.34%) VMware Infrastructure
3 19 (2.02%) Active Directory
4 9 (0.96%) vSphere
5 5 (0.53%) GPFS
5 5 (0.53%) NFS
5 5 (0.53%) VMware ESXi
6 4 (0.43%) Hyper-V
6 4 (0.43%) Virtual Machines
7 3 (0.32%) VMware NSX
8 2 (0.21%) ACF2
8 2 (0.21%) Firmware
8 2 (0.21%) QEMU
8 2 (0.21%) RACF
8 2 (0.21%) Time Sharing Option
9 1 (0.11%) Postfix
9 1 (0.11%) Varnish
9 1 (0.11%) Virtual Desktop
Systems Management
1 79 (8.40%) Terraform
2 67 (7.12%) Kubernetes
3 20 (2.13%) Grafana
4 18 (1.91%) Prometheus
5 16 (1.70%) Ansible
6 8 (0.85%) vRealize
7 7 (0.74%) Istio
8 6 (0.64%) Argo
9 5 (0.53%) VxRail
10 4 (0.43%) Microsoft Intune
10 4 (0.43%) Packer
10 4 (0.43%) Podman
11 3 (0.32%) Kibana
12 2 (0.21%) CA Endevor
12 2 (0.21%) Consul
12 2 (0.21%) EMC NetWorker
12 2 (0.21%) EMC VPLEX
12 2 (0.21%) SCCM
12 2 (0.21%) Tivoli
12 2 (0.21%) Tivoli Storage Manager
Vendors
1 116 (12.33%) SAP
2 99 (10.52%) Microsoft
3 44 (4.68%) Oracle
4 26 (2.76%) VMware
5 23 (2.44%) Cisco
6 22 (2.34%) Databricks
7 21 (2.23%) ServiceNow
8 19 (2.02%) Google
9 17 (1.81%) IBM
10 12 (1.28%) Pega
11 11 (1.17%) Splunk
12 10 (1.06%) Atlassian
13 9 (0.96%) Workday
14 8 (0.85%) OpenAI
15 7 (0.74%) Adobe
15 7 (0.74%) Foundry
15 7 (0.74%) Salesforce
16 5 (0.53%) Citrix
16 5 (0.53%) Dell
16 5 (0.53%) Red Hat