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

6 months to
21 Jul 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 104 190 245
Rank change year-on-year +86 +55 -24
Contract jobs citing BPSS Clearance 1,247 483 398
As % of all contract jobs in the UK 2.37% 1.48% 0.96%
As % of the Qualifications category 7.55% 4.82% 3.22%
Number of daily rates quoted 895 326 263
10th Percentile £331 £274 £200
25th Percentile £403 £400 £400
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £488 £500 £500
Median % change year-on-year -2.50% - -8.88%
75th Percentile £570 £586 £581
90th Percentile £654 £698 £650
UK excluding London median daily rate £473 £488 £470
% change year-on-year -2.97% +3.72% -13.04%
Number of hourly rates quoted 167 46 49
10th Percentile £19.50 £18.50 £14.00
25th Percentile £36.35 £22.63 -
Median hourly rate £43.96 £27.63 £16.06
Median % change year-on-year +59.10% +72.04% -63.77%
75th Percentile £62.50 £56.37 £35.00
90th Percentile £74.26 £75.00 £77.50
UK excluding London median hourly rate £43.96 £30.89 £16.06
% change year-on-year +42.33% +92.31% -60.42%

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 16,518 10,025 12,378
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the UK 31.33% 30.76% 29.95%
Number of daily rates quoted 11,028 6,216 7,798
10th Percentile £350 £275 £310
25th Percentile £430 £413 £425
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £525 £523 £525
Median % change year-on-year +0.38% -0.38% -4.55%
75th Percentile £625 £620 £638
90th Percentile £713 £703 £738
UK excluding London median daily rate £513 £500 £525
% change year-on-year +2.50% -4.76% -
Number of hourly rates quoted 1,196 738 985
10th Percentile £17.87 £17.87 £14.16
25th Percentile £25.75 £19.38 £20.75
Median hourly rate £52.25 £25.15 £43.00
Median % change year-on-year +107.75% -41.51% -25.00%
75th Percentile £73.00 £56.00 £65.00
90th Percentile £85.81 £75.00 £75.24
UK excluding London median hourly rate £50.00 £25.15 £43.00
% change year-on-year +98.81% -41.51% -21.82%

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 21 July 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 21 July 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 21 July 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 +82 922 £483 -3.40% 267
UK excluding London +67 705 £473 -2.97% 222
Work from Home +68 494 £451 -5.16% 160
London +72 291 £494 -2.76% 64
North of England +30 258 £470 -1.00% 53
Midlands +34 147 £478 -2.95% 36
North West +6 140 £475 -1.14% 32
West Midlands +29 132 £475 +5.20% 34
South East -13 112 £500 -2.91% 48
Scotland +36 75 £350 -1.13% 18
South West +9 74 £525 +50.00% 42
North East +5 71 £452 +10.80% 17
Yorkshire -8 59 £475 -4.04% 4
East of England -17 26 £604 +202.06% 22
East Midlands -13 14 £550 -21.43% 2
Northern Ireland +9 11 £450 +28.57%
Wales -7 11 £463 -19.57% 4

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 55 (4.41%) Confluence
2 44 (3.53%) SharePoint
3 15 (1.20%) SharePoint Server
4 10 (0.80%) Apache Spark
5 8 (0.64%) Apache Airflow
5 8 (0.64%) SAS
6 5 (0.40%) Oracle Workflow
7 4 (0.32%) Apache
7 4 (0.32%) IIS
7 4 (0.32%) WordPress
8 3 (0.24%) ArcGIS
8 3 (0.24%) CICS
8 3 (0.24%) CMS
8 3 (0.24%) LiveCycle
8 3 (0.24%) Microsoft Exchange
9 2 (0.16%) Cloud Foundry
9 2 (0.16%) Ethereum
9 2 (0.16%) Hyperledger
9 2 (0.16%) OpenROAD
9 2 (0.16%) WebLogic
Applications
1 47 (3.77%) Microsoft Excel
2 26 (2.09%) Microsoft Office
3 16 (1.28%) Microsoft PowerPoint
4 13 (1.04%) Microsoft Project
5 11 (0.88%) MS Visio
6 5 (0.40%) Simulink
7 4 (0.32%) Chatbot
8 2 (0.16%) Navisworks
8 2 (0.16%) Trello
9 1 (0.080%) AutoCAD
9 1 (0.080%) Autodesk Inventor
9 1 (0.080%) CATIA
9 1 (0.080%) InVision
9 1 (0.080%) MicroStation
9 1 (0.080%) ProjectWise
9 1 (0.080%) Revit
9 1 (0.080%) Sketch
9 1 (0.080%) Spreadsheet
Business Applications
1 41 (3.29%) SAP S/4HANA
2 16 (1.28%) SAP PSCD
3 13 (1.04%) SAP BRIM
4 12 (0.96%) SAP IBP
5 9 (0.72%) SAP FI
6 7 (0.56%) SAP EWM
6 7 (0.56%) SAP FI-CA
7 6 (0.48%) SAP HR
7 6 (0.48%) SAP Travel Management
8 5 (0.40%) Shopify
9 4 (0.32%) Primavera
9 4 (0.32%) SAP Convergent Charging
9 4 (0.32%) SAP EHS
9 4 (0.32%) SAP GRC
9 4 (0.32%) SAP MDG
9 4 (0.32%) SAP MM
10 3 (0.24%) Dynamics CRM
10 3 (0.24%) iTrent
10 3 (0.24%) Payment Gateway
10 3 (0.24%) SAP Payroll
Cloud Services
1 236 (18.93%) Azure
2 228 (18.28%) AWS
3 86 (6.90%) Power Platform
4 58 (4.65%) GitHub
5 50 (4.01%) GCP
6 49 (3.93%) Azure DevOps
7 48 (3.85%) Serverless
8 43 (3.45%) GitHub Actions
9 41 (3.29%) Entra ID
10 37 (2.97%) Amazon S3
10 37 (2.97%) AWS Lambda
10 37 (2.97%) Microsoft 365
11 22 (1.76%) Power Automate
12 21 (1.68%) Amazon CloudWatch
12 21 (1.68%) PowerApps
13 20 (1.60%) Amazon ECS
14 19 (1.52%) Amazon EKS
14 19 (1.52%) AWS CloudFormation
15 16 (1.28%) Amazon EC2
16 15 (1.20%) Azure Data Factory
Communications & Networking
1 18 (1.44%) DNS
2 12 (0.96%) Network Security
2 12 (0.96%) WAN
3 11 (0.88%) Firewall
3 11 (0.88%) WebEx
4 9 (0.72%) HTTPS
5 7 (0.56%) LAN
6 6 (0.48%) DHCP
6 6 (0.48%) Ethernet
6 6 (0.48%) MPLS
6 6 (0.48%) SDH
6 6 (0.48%) SSL
7 5 (0.40%) Intranet
8 4 (0.32%) Cisco IPT
8 4 (0.32%) SSH
8 4 (0.32%) TCP/IP
8 4 (0.32%) VPN
9 3 (0.24%) IP Telephony
9 3 (0.24%) SD-WAN
9 3 (0.24%) Wireless
Database & Business Intelligence
1 67 (5.37%) Power BI
2 40 (3.21%) PostgreSQL
3 30 (2.41%) Metadata
4 28 (2.25%) Data Warehouse
5 27 (2.17%) MongoDB
6 24 (1.92%) SQL Server
7 22 (1.76%) Relational Database
8 19 (1.52%) NoSQL
9 16 (1.28%) MySQL
10 15 (1.20%) SQL Server Integration Services
11 14 (1.12%) Amazon RDS
11 14 (1.12%) Data Lake
11 14 (1.12%) DynamoDB
12 12 (0.96%) Amazon Athena
12 12 (0.96%) Amazon Redshift
13 10 (0.80%) Geospatial Data
14 9 (0.72%) Big Data
15 7 (0.56%) Amazon Aurora
15 7 (0.56%) Azure SQL Database
15 7 (0.56%) Oracle Database
Development Applications
1 97 (7.78%) JIRA
2 76 (6.09%) Git
3 63 (5.05%) GitLab
4 56 (4.49%) Jenkins
5 20 (1.60%) Selenium
6 17 (1.36%) Cucumber
7 14 (1.12%) Team Foundation Server
8 13 (1.04%) JUnit
8 13 (1.04%) Maven
8 13 (1.04%) Postman
9 12 (0.96%) Visual Studio
10 11 (0.88%) Cypress.io
11 8 (0.64%) REST Assured
12 7 (0.56%) Artifactory
12 7 (0.56%) Gatling
12 7 (0.56%) Gradle
12 7 (0.56%) Mockito
13 6 (0.48%) WebDriver
14 5 (0.40%) Rational DOORS
14 5 (0.40%) SonarQube
General
1 376 (30.15%) Social Skills
2 286 (22.94%) Public Sector
3 188 (15.08%) Finance
4 128 (10.26%) Analytical Skills
5 81 (6.50%) Legal
6 70 (5.61%) Organisational Skills
7 50 (4.01%) Aerospace
8 44 (3.53%) Documentation Skills
9 30 (2.41%) Banking
10 28 (2.25%) Influencing Skills
11 22 (1.76%) Manufacturing
12 21 (1.68%) Billing
12 21 (1.68%) Inclusion and Diversity
12 21 (1.68%) Presentation Skills
13 18 (1.44%) Aviation
14 16 (1.28%) Telecoms
15 12 (0.96%) Local Government
16 11 (0.88%) Retail
17 9 (0.72%) Law
18 8 (0.64%) Publishing
Job Titles
1 157 (12.59%) Developer
2 139 (11.15%) Senior
3 130 (10.43%) Lead
4 118 (9.46%) Analyst
5 106 (8.50%) Architect
6 88 (7.06%) Consultant
7 61 (4.89%) Designer
8 59 (4.73%) SAP Consultant
9 50 (4.01%) Data Engineer
10 49 (3.93%) Business Analyst
11 47 (3.77%) Java Developer
12 37 (2.97%) DevOps Engineer
13 31 (2.49%) Product Manager
14 28 (2.25%) Administrator
15 26 (2.09%) Lead Developer
16 25 (2.00%) Data Analyst
16 25 (2.00%) Delivery Manager
16 25 (2.00%) Solutions Architect
16 25 (2.00%) User Researcher
17 24 (1.92%) AWS Engineer
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 75 (6.01%) REST
2 57 (4.57%) React
3 53 (4.25%) HTML
3 53 (4.25%) RESTful
4 49 (3.93%) Spring Boot
5 48 (3.85%) Spring
6 46 (3.69%) Node.js
7 42 (3.37%) CSS
8 32 (2.57%) Kafka
9 29 (2.33%) .NET
10 22 (1.76%) JSON
11 21 (1.68%) Playwright
12 17 (1.36%) PySpark
12 17 (1.36%) XML
13 15 (1.20%) SOAP
13 15 (1.20%) SPFx
14 14 (1.12%) BAPI
14 14 (1.12%) HTML5
14 14 (1.12%) OAuth
14 14 (1.12%) OpenAPI
Miscellaneous
1 83 (6.66%) Product Ownership
2 73 (5.85%) Onboarding
3 63 (5.05%) Virtual Team
4 62 (4.97%) Web Conferencing
5 58 (4.65%) Cloud Native
6 54 (4.33%) Podcast
7 25 (2.00%) Management Information System
8 21 (1.68%) NHS
9 17 (1.36%) Distributed Systems
9 17 (1.36%) Legacy Systems
10 16 (1.28%) Algorithms
10 16 (1.28%) BYOD
10 16 (1.28%) Mobile App
10 16 (1.28%) Self-Motivation
11 15 (1.20%) Enterprise Software
12 9 (0.72%) Data Centre
13 8 (0.64%) Data Structures
13 8 (0.64%) PMI
13 8 (0.64%) Replication
13 8 (0.64%) Video Conferencing
Operating Systems
1 65 (5.21%) Linux
2 59 (4.73%) Windows
3 34 (2.73%) Unix
4 18 (1.44%) Android
5 14 (1.12%) Windows Server
6 12 (0.96%) Apple iOS
7 9 (0.72%) Mac OS
8 8 (0.64%) Windows 10
9 4 (0.32%) VMS
10 3 (0.24%) AIX
10 3 (0.24%) Solaris
11 2 (0.16%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
12 1 (0.080%) Mac OS X
Processes & Methodologies
1 377 (30.23%) Agile
2 231 (18.52%) CI/CD
3 203 (16.28%) DevOps
4 192 (15.40%) Stakeholder Management
5 160 (12.83%) Problem-Solving
6 138 (11.07%) Continuous Improvement
7 136 (10.91%) Stakeholder Engagement
8 109 (8.74%) Roadmaps
9 108 (8.66%) Decision-Making
9 108 (8.66%) Scrum
10 107 (8.58%) Test Automation
11 104 (8.34%) Analytics
12 94 (7.54%) Infrastructure as Code
12 94 (7.54%) Microservices
13 86 (6.90%) AI
14 77 (6.17%) Migration
15 75 (6.01%) Business Intelligence
16 74 (5.93%) Customer Service
16 74 (5.93%) Software Engineering
17 71 (5.69%) Data Modelling
Programming Languages
1 139 (11.15%) SQL
2 134 (10.75%) Python
3 129 (10.34%) Java
4 78 (6.26%) JavaScript
5 48 (3.85%) TypeScript
6 32 (2.57%) Scala
7 27 (2.17%) C#
8 25 (2.00%) PowerShell
9 16 (1.28%) PL/SQL
10 15 (1.20%) Bash
11 14 (1.12%) VB
12 13 (1.04%) Shell Script
13 12 (0.96%) VB6
14 11 (0.88%) C++
15 10 (0.80%) VBA
16 9 (0.72%) T-SQL
17 8 (0.64%) ABAP
18 7 (0.56%) C
18 7 (0.56%) Kotlin
19 6 (0.48%) Go
Qualifications
1 398 (31.92%) Security Cleared
2 288 (23.10%) SC Cleared
3 64 (5.13%) Degree
4 18 (1.44%) AWS Certification
5 14 (1.12%) Azure Certification
6 12 (0.96%) DV Cleared
7 10 (0.80%) Microsoft Certification
8 9 (0.72%) CTC Cleared
8 9 (0.72%) PMI Certification
9 8 (0.64%) A+ Certification
10 7 (0.56%) Master's Degree
11 6 (0.48%) AWS Certified Cloud Practitioner
11 6 (0.48%) AWS Certified Solutions Architect
11 6 (0.48%) CCNA
11 6 (0.48%) Cisco Certification
12 5 (0.40%) CompTIA CySA+
12 5 (0.40%) DBS Check
12 5 (0.40%) ISTQB
12 5 (0.40%) NVQ Level 4
13 4 (0.32%) GIAC
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 85 (6.82%) Data Quality
2 81 (6.50%) Accessibility
3 72 (5.77%) QA
4 22 (1.76%) GDPR
4 22 (1.76%) ISO/IEC 27001
5 20 (1.60%) PMO
6 19 (1.52%) WCAG
7 18 (1.44%) NIST
8 17 (1.36%) SLA
9 9 (0.72%) GRC
10 8 (0.64%) NCSC
11 4 (0.32%) Actionable Recommendations
11 4 (0.32%) HL7
11 4 (0.32%) PCI DSS
12 3 (0.24%) 21 CFR Part 11
12 3 (0.24%) DICOM
12 3 (0.24%) GMP
12 3 (0.24%) ISO 20022
12 3 (0.24%) ISO/IEC 17025
12 3 (0.24%) Solvency II
System Software
1 82 (6.58%) Docker
2 37 (2.97%) Active Directory
3 15 (1.20%) VMware Infrastructure
4 8 (0.64%) Virtual Desktop
4 8 (0.64%) Virtual Machines
5 5 (0.40%) Hyper-V
6 2 (0.16%) Firmware
6 2 (0.16%) vSphere
7 1 (0.080%) BitLocker
7 1 (0.080%) GPFS
7 1 (0.080%) IAG
7 1 (0.080%) NFS
7 1 (0.080%) Oracle RAC
7 1 (0.080%) VMware ESXi
7 1 (0.080%) VMware NSX
Systems Management
1 106 (8.50%) Terraform
2 81 (6.50%) Kubernetes
3 28 (2.25%) Grafana
4 19 (1.52%) Prometheus
5 14 (1.12%) Single Sign-On
6 11 (0.88%) Ansible
7 10 (0.80%) Kibana
8 9 (0.72%) Argo
9 7 (0.56%) Istio
9 7 (0.56%) SCCM
10 6 (0.48%) Microsoft Intune
11 4 (0.32%) HAProxy
11 4 (0.32%) Podman
11 4 (0.32%) Puppet
12 3 (0.24%) SCOM
13 2 (0.16%) Data Guard
13 2 (0.16%) Kubeflow
13 2 (0.16%) Oracle Enterprise Manager
13 2 (0.16%) Oracle RMAN
13 2 (0.16%) Packer
Vendors
1 138 (11.07%) Microsoft
2 114 (9.14%) SAP
3 63 (5.05%) Oracle
4 46 (3.69%) ServiceNow
5 34 (2.73%) Google
6 22 (1.76%) Splunk
7 21 (1.68%) Databricks
8 18 (1.44%) BeyondTrust
9 17 (1.36%) Cisco
10 15 (1.20%) VMware
11 14 (1.12%) Pega
12 11 (0.88%) CyberArk
12 11 (0.88%) IBM
13 9 (0.72%) Informatica
14 8 (0.64%) Salesforce
14 8 (0.64%) Talend
15 7 (0.56%) Apple
15 7 (0.56%) OpenAI
15 7 (0.56%) Workday
16 6 (0.48%) Okta