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

6 months to
22 Mar 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 134 252 220
Rank change year-on-year +118 -32 -28
Contract jobs citing BPSS Clearance 897 300 477
As % of all contract jobs in the UK 2.04% 1.02% 1.08%
As % of the Qualifications category 6.06% 3.33% 3.52%
Number of daily rates quoted 678 180 355
10th Percentile £313 £212 £314
25th Percentile £400 £354 £425
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £475 £475 £500
Median % change year-on-year - -5.00% -9.09%
75th Percentile £556 £576 £628
90th Percentile £650 £676 £675
UK excluding London median daily rate £438 £470 £525
% change year-on-year -6.91% -10.48% -4.55%
Number of hourly rates quoted 66 17 55
10th Percentile £15.14 £15.74 £14.00
25th Percentile £22.68 £27.11 -
Median hourly rate £36.51 £45.00 £16.06
Median % change year-on-year -18.87% +180.20% -63.53%
75th Percentile £67.50 £67.50 £45.07
90th Percentile £77.43 £76.75 £73.50
UK excluding London median hourly rate £47.50 £45.00 £16.06
% change year-on-year +5.56% +180.20% -66.19%

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 14,793 9,004 13,569
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the UK 33.69% 30.49% 30.64%
Number of daily rates quoted 9,751 5,695 8,408
10th Percentile £335 £290 £298
25th Percentile £420 £413 £425
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £515 £525 £538
Median % change year-on-year -1.90% -2.33% -2.27%
75th Percentile £614 £625 £650
90th Percentile £720 £715 £738
UK excluding London median daily rate £500 £513 £525
% change year-on-year -2.44% -2.38% -2.33%
Number of hourly rates quoted 1,088 479 1,005
10th Percentile £16.17 £18.51 £13.92
25th Percentile £19.98 £24.35 £17.80
Median hourly rate £30.00 £42.50 £37.50
Median % change year-on-year -29.41% +13.33% -28.06%
75th Percentile £67.84 £67.50 £62.50
90th Percentile £84.00 £81.01 £76.25
UK excluding London median hourly rate £28.50 £48.31 £37.50
% change year-on-year -41.01% +28.83% -23.47%

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 22 March 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 22 March 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 22 March 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 +93 638 £475 - 299
UK excluding London +67 465 £438 -6.91% 272
Work from Home +104 360 £438 -12.50% 142
London +90 211 £512 -1.58% 83
North of England +2 185 £425 -15.00% 48
North West +32 141 £400 -25.65% 31
Midlands +11 105 £425 -2.63% 15
West Midlands -19 76 £425 -2.63% 13
South East -2 70 £469 -17.28% 85
South West -5 43 £525 +61.54% 64
Scotland +33 41 £325 -26.97% 21
East Midlands -6 29 £416 - 2
Yorkshire -48 26 £480 +118.18% 6
East of England -13 24 £468 +133.88% 45
North East -5 19 £475 +32.87% 11
Wales -3 7 £458 -20.42% 1
Northern Ireland 0 3 £375 +33.45% 2

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 52 (5.80%) Confluence
2 28 (3.12%) SharePoint
3 11 (1.23%) nginx
4 8 (0.89%) Microsoft Exchange
5 7 (0.78%) Apache
6 6 (0.67%) Apache Spark
7 5 (0.56%) CMS
7 5 (0.56%) SharePoint Server
8 4 (0.45%) ArcGIS
9 3 (0.33%) Apache Airflow
9 3 (0.33%) MTS
9 3 (0.33%) Oracle Workflow
10 2 (0.22%) SAS
10 2 (0.22%) WebLogic
11 1 (0.11%) Apache Pulsar
11 1 (0.11%) Camunda
11 1 (0.11%) CICS
11 1 (0.11%) Palantir Foundry
11 1 (0.11%) Smallworld
11 1 (0.11%) SugarCRM
Applications
1 37 (4.12%) Microsoft Excel
2 16 (1.78%) Microsoft Office
3 15 (1.67%) Microsoft PowerPoint
4 13 (1.45%) MS Visio
5 11 (1.23%) Microsoft Project
6 3 (0.33%) Simulink
6 3 (0.33%) Trello
7 2 (0.22%) Chatbot
7 2 (0.22%) Spreadsheet
8 1 (0.11%) Adobe XD
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 45 (5.02%) SAP S/4HANA
2 13 (1.45%) SAP Travel Management
3 7 (0.78%) SAP PSCD
4 5 (0.56%) SAP BRIM
4 5 (0.56%) SAP EHS
4 5 (0.56%) SAP EWM
5 4 (0.45%) Loan IQ
5 4 (0.45%) Payment Gateway
5 4 (0.45%) SAP FI
5 4 (0.45%) SAP MM
5 4 (0.45%) SAP VC
5 4 (0.45%) Sparx Enterprise Architect
6 3 (0.33%) Exchequer
6 3 (0.33%) Primavera
6 3 (0.33%) ProductWriter
6 3 (0.33%) SAP HCM
6 3 (0.33%) SAP Hybris
6 3 (0.33%) SAP Payroll
6 3 (0.33%) SAP PM
6 3 (0.33%) SAP QM
Cloud Services
1 156 (17.39%) AWS
2 144 (16.05%) Azure
3 59 (6.58%) Power Platform
4 47 (5.24%) GitHub
5 46 (5.13%) Serverless
6 44 (4.91%) Azure DevOps
7 35 (3.90%) GCP
8 33 (3.68%) GitHub Actions
9 28 (3.12%) Microsoft 365
10 26 (2.90%) AWS CloudFormation
10 26 (2.90%) AWS Lambda
11 19 (2.12%) Power Automate
12 18 (2.01%) Amazon SQS
13 17 (1.90%) Entra ID
13 17 (1.90%) PowerApps
14 16 (1.78%) Amazon EC2
14 16 (1.78%) Amazon EKS
15 15 (1.67%) Azure Data Factory
15 15 (1.67%) Azure Synapse Analytics
16 14 (1.56%) Amazon CloudWatch
Communications & Networking
1 22 (2.45%) SSH
2 12 (1.34%) Firewall
2 12 (1.34%) Network Security
3 10 (1.11%) DNS
4 8 (0.89%) WAN
5 7 (0.78%) MPLS
5 7 (0.78%) Reverse Proxy
6 6 (0.67%) LAN
6 6 (0.67%) SDH
6 6 (0.67%) VPN
7 5 (0.56%) Ethernet
7 5 (0.56%) HTTPS
7 5 (0.56%) WebEx
8 4 (0.45%) SAN
8 4 (0.45%) VSAN
9 3 (0.33%) TETRA
9 3 (0.33%) Unified Communications
9 3 (0.33%) VoIP
9 3 (0.33%) Wireless
10 2 (0.22%) Radio Access Network
Database & Business Intelligence
1 46 (5.13%) Power BI
2 28 (3.12%) PostgreSQL
3 25 (2.79%) Metadata
4 20 (2.23%) SQL Server
5 15 (1.67%) Data Warehouse
5 15 (1.67%) NoSQL
6 13 (1.45%) Relational Database
7 12 (1.34%) Geospatial Data
7 12 (1.34%) MySQL
8 11 (1.23%) DynamoDB
8 11 (1.23%) Redis
9 10 (1.11%) Data Lake
9 10 (1.11%) Delta Lake
10 9 (1.00%) DocumentDB
10 9 (1.00%) MongoDB
11 8 (0.89%) Tableau
12 7 (0.78%) Spark SQL
13 6 (0.67%) BigQuery
14 5 (0.56%) GIS
14 5 (0.56%) Spatial Data
Development Applications
1 79 (8.81%) JIRA
2 68 (7.58%) Git
3 48 (5.35%) GitLab
4 32 (3.57%) Jenkins
5 9 (1.00%) JUnit
5 9 (1.00%) Selenium
6 7 (0.78%) Cucumber
7 6 (0.67%) Cypress.io
7 6 (0.67%) Mockito
8 5 (0.56%) JMeter
8 5 (0.56%) SonarQube
9 4 (0.45%) Gatling
9 4 (0.45%) Postman
9 4 (0.45%) Rational DOORS
10 3 (0.33%) Bitbucket
10 3 (0.33%) Maven
10 3 (0.33%) Toad
11 2 (0.22%) Eclipse
11 2 (0.22%) Team Foundation Server
11 2 (0.22%) Visual Studio
General
1 291 (32.44%) Social Skills
2 170 (18.95%) Public Sector
3 138 (15.38%) Finance
4 97 (10.81%) Analytical Skills
5 48 (5.35%) Aerospace
6 45 (5.02%) Banking
7 20 (2.23%) Legal
7 20 (2.23%) Manufacturing
7 20 (2.23%) Telecoms
8 19 (2.12%) Documentation Skills
9 17 (1.90%) Aviation
9 17 (1.90%) Influencing Skills
10 16 (1.78%) Presentation Skills
11 11 (1.23%) Local Government
12 9 (1.00%) Billing
12 9 (1.00%) Organisational Skills
12 9 (1.00%) Publishing
13 8 (0.89%) Retail
14 6 (0.67%) Law
14 6 (0.67%) Military
Job Titles
1 143 (15.94%) Developer
2 108 (12.04%) Analyst
3 103 (11.48%) Senior
4 85 (9.48%) Lead
5 83 (9.25%) Architect
6 58 (6.47%) Consultant
7 47 (5.24%) Business Analyst
8 39 (4.35%) SAP Consultant
9 35 (3.90%) Java Developer
10 31 (3.46%) Administrator
11 27 (3.01%) Data Engineer
11 27 (3.01%) Designer
11 27 (3.01%) DevOps Engineer
12 23 (2.56%) Senior Developer
13 20 (2.23%) Solutions Architect
14 18 (2.01%) Azure Engineer
14 18 (2.01%) Delivery Manager
14 18 (2.01%) Software Developer
15 17 (1.90%) Project Manager
15 17 (1.90%) User Researcher
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 65 (7.25%) Node.js
2 48 (5.35%) React
3 36 (4.01%) REST
4 33 (3.68%) RESTful
5 32 (3.57%) Kafka
6 28 (3.12%) HTML
7 25 (2.79%) Spring
8 24 (2.68%) .NET
9 23 (2.56%) CSS
10 22 (2.45%) Spring Boot
11 18 (2.01%) JSON
12 13 (1.45%) Middleware
12 13 (1.45%) SAP TM
12 13 (1.45%) XML
13 12 (1.34%) LangChain
13 12 (1.34%) OAuth
14 11 (1.23%) Jest
14 11 (1.23%) PySpark
15 10 (1.11%) AngularJS
15 10 (1.11%) OpenAPI
Miscellaneous
1 63 (7.02%) Product Ownership
2 46 (5.13%) Onboarding
3 45 (5.02%) Cloud Native
4 20 (2.23%) Management Information System
5 18 (2.01%) Legacy Systems
6 17 (1.90%) Distributed Systems
7 14 (1.56%) NHS
8 11 (1.23%) Public Cloud
9 10 (1.11%) Self-Motivation
10 8 (0.89%) Data Structures
10 8 (0.89%) Linux Command Line
11 7 (0.78%) Cyber Threat
11 7 (0.78%) Data Centre
11 7 (0.78%) Driving Licence
11 7 (0.78%) Enterprise Software
11 7 (0.78%) Low-Code
11 7 (0.78%) Tandem
12 6 (0.67%) AI Agents
12 6 (0.67%) Algorithms
12 6 (0.67%) Hybrid Cloud
Operating Systems
1 88 (9.81%) Linux
2 38 (4.24%) Windows
3 16 (1.78%) Unix
4 9 (1.00%) Android
5 7 (0.78%) Windows Server
6 6 (0.67%) Apple iOS
7 4 (0.45%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
8 3 (0.33%) Ubuntu
9 2 (0.22%) Debian
9 2 (0.22%) Mac OS
10 1 (0.11%) AIX
10 1 (0.11%) CentOS
10 1 (0.11%) Mac OS X
10 1 (0.11%) Solaris
10 1 (0.11%) VME
10 1 (0.11%) VMS
10 1 (0.11%) Windows 10
Processes & Methodologies
1 279 (31.10%) Agile
2 178 (19.84%) CI/CD
3 164 (18.28%) Problem-Solving
4 136 (15.16%) DevOps
4 136 (15.16%) Stakeholder Management
5 93 (10.37%) Stakeholder Engagement
6 90 (10.03%) Continuous Improvement
7 76 (8.47%) Test Automation
8 73 (8.14%) Roadmaps
9 72 (8.03%) Scrum
10 70 (7.80%) Microservices
11 69 (7.69%) Infrastructure as Code
12 66 (7.36%) Data Modelling
13 65 (7.25%) AI
14 63 (7.02%) Analytics
15 62 (6.91%) Migration
15 62 (6.91%) Validation
16 58 (6.47%) Decision-Making
17 56 (6.24%) SDLC
18 52 (5.80%) Containerisation
Programming Languages
1 126 (14.05%) Python
2 99 (11.04%) SQL
3 91 (10.14%) Java
4 58 (6.47%) JavaScript
5 42 (4.68%) TypeScript
6 23 (2.56%) Shell Script
7 20 (2.23%) C#
8 18 (2.01%) PowerShell
9 16 (1.78%) Bash
10 15 (1.67%) Scala
11 14 (1.56%) Ruby
12 10 (1.11%) Bicep
13 8 (0.89%) ABAP
13 8 (0.89%) PL/SQL
14 7 (0.78%) C
14 7 (0.78%) C++
15 6 (0.67%) COBOL
16 5 (0.56%) Go
17 4 (0.45%) Data Analysis Expressions
17 4 (0.45%) Kotlin
Qualifications
1 310 (34.56%) Security Cleared
2 225 (25.08%) SC Cleared
3 62 (6.91%) Degree
4 18 (2.01%) Computer Science Degree
4 18 (2.01%) DV Cleared
5 11 (1.23%) AWS Certification
5 11 (1.23%) Master's Degree
6 9 (1.00%) Azure Certification
6 9 (1.00%) DBS Check
7 8 (0.89%) PMI Certification
8 6 (0.67%) ISTQB
8 6 (0.67%) PMP
9 5 (0.56%) CompTIA CySA+
9 5 (0.56%) CompTIA Security+
10 4 (0.45%) CISSP
10 4 (0.45%) CTC Cleared
10 4 (0.45%) ISEB
10 4 (0.45%) ISTQB Foundation Certification
10 4 (0.45%) ITIL Foundation Certificate
10 4 (0.45%) Microsoft Certification
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 63 (7.02%) Accessibility
2 59 (6.58%) Data Quality
3 45 (5.02%) QA
4 19 (2.12%) WCAG
5 17 (1.90%) NIST
5 17 (1.90%) SLA
6 15 (1.67%) ISO/IEC 27001
7 11 (1.23%) GDPR
7 11 (1.23%) PMO
8 9 (1.00%) NCSC
9 8 (0.89%) PCI DSS
10 6 (0.67%) GRC
10 6 (0.67%) ISO 20022
11 5 (0.56%) IFRS
11 5 (0.56%) IFRS 17
12 4 (0.45%) PSD2
13 3 (0.33%) Actionable Recommendations
13 3 (0.33%) DICOM
13 3 (0.33%) HL7
13 3 (0.33%) SEPA
System Software
1 63 (7.02%) Docker
2 19 (2.12%) Active Directory
3 18 (2.01%) VMware Infrastructure
4 9 (1.00%) vSphere
5 5 (0.56%) GPFS
5 5 (0.56%) NFS
5 5 (0.56%) VMware ESXi
6 4 (0.45%) Hyper-V
7 3 (0.33%) Virtual Machines
7 3 (0.33%) VMware NSX
8 2 (0.22%) ACF2
8 2 (0.22%) QEMU
8 2 (0.22%) RACF
8 2 (0.22%) Time Sharing Option
9 1 (0.11%) Firmware
9 1 (0.11%) Postfix
9 1 (0.11%) Varnish
9 1 (0.11%) Virtual Desktop
Systems Management
1 78 (8.70%) Terraform
2 66 (7.36%) Kubernetes
3 20 (2.23%) Grafana
4 19 (2.12%) Prometheus
5 17 (1.90%) Ansible
6 8 (0.89%) vRealize
7 6 (0.67%) Istio
8 5 (0.56%) Argo
8 5 (0.56%) Packer
8 5 (0.56%) VxRail
9 4 (0.45%) Microsoft Intune
9 4 (0.45%) Podman
10 3 (0.33%) Kibana
11 2 (0.22%) CA Endevor
11 2 (0.22%) Consul
11 2 (0.22%) EMC NetWorker
11 2 (0.22%) EMC VPLEX
11 2 (0.22%) Kubeflow
11 2 (0.22%) SCCM
11 2 (0.22%) Single Sign-On
Vendors
1 105 (11.71%) SAP
2 98 (10.93%) Microsoft
3 40 (4.46%) Oracle
4 24 (2.68%) Cisco
5 22 (2.45%) VMware
6 20 (2.23%) Databricks
7 18 (2.01%) Google
7 18 (2.01%) ServiceNow
8 17 (1.90%) IBM
9 13 (1.45%) Pega
10 11 (1.23%) Splunk
11 9 (1.00%) Atlassian
12 8 (0.89%) Adobe
12 8 (0.89%) Workday
13 6 (0.67%) OpenAI
13 6 (0.67%) Red Hat
13 6 (0.67%) Salesforce
14 5 (0.56%) CyberArk
14 5 (0.56%) Dell
14 5 (0.56%) Foundry