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

6 months to
31 May 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 119 207 224
Rank change year-on-year +88 +17 +7
Contract jobs citing BPSS Clearance 1,040 381 437
As % of all contract jobs in the UK 2.12% 1.31% 1.02%
As % of the Qualifications category 6.70% 4.21% 3.40%
Number of daily rates quoted 764 248 315
10th Percentile £320 £262 £216
25th Percentile £400 £407 £413
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £475 £500 £500
Median % change year-on-year -5.00% - -8.68%
75th Percentile £569 £581 £622
90th Percentile £661 £674 £675
UK excluding London median daily rate £450 £500 £525
% change year-on-year -10.00% -4.76% -2.78%
Number of hourly rates quoted 93 31 52
10th Percentile £16.01 £18.50 £13.99
25th Percentile £23.00 £22.66 -
Median hourly rate £47.00 £45.00 £16.06
Median % change year-on-year +4.44% +180.20% -30.17%
75th Percentile £73.00 £72.50 £26.25
90th Percentile £85.36 £76.25 £76.50
UK excluding London median hourly rate £42.00 £50.00 £16.06
% change year-on-year -16.00% +211.33% -23.52%

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 15,527 9,048 12,854
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the UK 31.61% 31.08% 29.96%
Number of daily rates quoted 10,303 5,682 8,007
10th Percentile £350 £275 £310
25th Percentile £425 £413 £425
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £525 £520 £530
Median % change year-on-year +0.96% -1.89% -3.64%
75th Percentile £620 £619 £645
90th Percentile £713 £700 £738
UK excluding London median daily rate £500 £500 £535
% change year-on-year - -6.54% +1.90%
Number of hourly rates quoted 1,132 527 1,097
10th Percentile £16.35 £17.84 £13.86
25th Percentile £21.33 £21.86 £18.13
Median hourly rate £48.05 £32.50 £40.00
Median % change year-on-year +47.85% -18.75% -27.27%
75th Percentile £71.50 £65.00 £62.00
90th Percentile £85.23 £78.38 £75.65
UK excluding London median hourly rate £47.50 £32.18 £40.94
% change year-on-year +47.61% -21.40% -22.02%

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 31 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 31 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 31 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 +86 769 £480 -4.71% 203
UK excluding London +47 558 £450 -10.00% 168
Work from Home +78 426 £438 -12.50% 120
London +75 251 £512 -2.51% 40
North of England +11 202 £450 -10.00% 31
Midlands +12 129 £438 -5.71% 14
North West +6 115 £393 -25.85% 19
West Midlands 0 97 £449 +9.39% 12
South East -9 91 £483 -9.04% 25
Scotland +36 53 £320 -10.49% 12
South West +3 53 £525 +82.61% 60
North East +7 49 £475 +16.56% 9
Yorkshire -25 44 £480 +37.14% 3
East Midlands -5 31 £395 -43.57% 2
East of England -22 27 £450 +125.00% 26
Wales -12 6 £550 -4.35% 3
Northern Ireland +4 1 £450 +42.63%

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 47 (4.52%) Confluence
2 38 (3.65%) SharePoint
3 15 (1.44%) SharePoint Server
4 13 (1.25%) Apache Spark
5 8 (0.77%) Apache Airflow
6 7 (0.67%) Apache
7 6 (0.58%) nginx
7 6 (0.58%) SAS
8 4 (0.38%) Microsoft Exchange
8 4 (0.38%) Oracle Workflow
9 3 (0.29%) ArcGIS
9 3 (0.29%) CICS
9 3 (0.29%) CMS
9 3 (0.29%) LiveCycle
10 2 (0.19%) Cloud Foundry
10 2 (0.19%) Ethereum
10 2 (0.19%) Hyperledger
10 2 (0.19%) WordPress
11 1 (0.096%) Apache Pulsar
11 1 (0.096%) Camunda
Applications
1 44 (4.23%) Microsoft Excel
2 18 (1.73%) Microsoft Office
3 16 (1.54%) Microsoft PowerPoint
4 14 (1.35%) Microsoft Project
5 13 (1.25%) MS Visio
6 5 (0.48%) Simulink
7 2 (0.19%) Chatbot
7 2 (0.19%) Spreadsheet
7 2 (0.19%) Trello
8 1 (0.096%) Autodesk Inventor
8 1 (0.096%) CATIA
8 1 (0.096%) InVision
8 1 (0.096%) MicroStation
8 1 (0.096%) PTC Creo
8 1 (0.096%) Sketch
Business Applications
1 47 (4.52%) SAP S/4HANA
2 15 (1.44%) SAP PSCD
3 14 (1.35%) SAP BRIM
4 13 (1.25%) SAP IBP
4 13 (1.25%) SAP Travel Management
5 8 (0.77%) SAP EWM
5 8 (0.77%) SAP FI
6 7 (0.67%) SAP FI-CA
7 5 (0.48%) Payment Gateway
7 5 (0.48%) SAP EHS
7 5 (0.48%) SAP HR
8 4 (0.38%) Loan IQ
8 4 (0.38%) SAP Convergent Charging
9 3 (0.29%) Exchequer
9 3 (0.29%) iTrent
9 3 (0.29%) Primavera
9 3 (0.29%) ProductWriter
9 3 (0.29%) SAP HCM
9 3 (0.29%) SAP MDG
9 3 (0.29%) SAP MM
Cloud Services
1 192 (18.46%) AWS
2 189 (18.17%) Azure
3 72 (6.92%) Power Platform
4 50 (4.81%) Azure DevOps
5 47 (4.52%) GitHub
6 43 (4.13%) GCP
7 41 (3.94%) Serverless
8 37 (3.56%) Microsoft 365
9 35 (3.37%) GitHub Actions
10 34 (3.27%) Entra ID
11 27 (2.60%) AWS Lambda
12 23 (2.21%) Power Automate
13 22 (2.12%) Amazon S3
14 21 (2.02%) PowerApps
15 18 (1.73%) AWS CloudFormation
16 17 (1.63%) Amazon EKS
17 16 (1.54%) Amazon EC2
17 16 (1.54%) Amazon ECS
17 16 (1.54%) Amazon SQS
18 13 (1.25%) Amazon CloudWatch
Communications & Networking
1 15 (1.44%) DNS
1 15 (1.44%) Firewall
2 14 (1.35%) Network Security
3 12 (1.15%) SSH
4 9 (0.87%) HTTPS
5 7 (0.67%) Ethernet
5 7 (0.67%) VPN
6 6 (0.58%) DHCP
6 6 (0.58%) Reverse Proxy
6 6 (0.58%) WAN
7 4 (0.38%) SSL
8 3 (0.29%) Internet
8 3 (0.29%) LAN
8 3 (0.29%) Modbus
8 3 (0.29%) TCP/IP
8 3 (0.29%) VSAN
8 3 (0.29%) WebEx
8 3 (0.29%) Wi-Fi
9 2 (0.19%) RS-485
9 2 (0.19%) SD-WAN
Database & Business Intelligence
1 59 (5.67%) Power BI
2 34 (3.27%) PostgreSQL
3 23 (2.21%) SQL Server
4 22 (2.12%) Metadata
5 20 (1.92%) Data Warehouse
6 19 (1.83%) MongoDB
7 17 (1.63%) NoSQL
8 16 (1.54%) DynamoDB
9 13 (1.25%) Amazon RDS
9 13 (1.25%) Relational Database
10 12 (1.15%) MySQL
11 9 (0.87%) Data Lake
11 9 (0.87%) Delta Lake
11 9 (0.87%) Geospatial Data
12 8 (0.77%) Big Data
13 7 (0.67%) Amazon Aurora
13 7 (0.67%) Spark SQL
13 7 (0.67%) Tableau
14 6 (0.58%) Power Query
14 6 (0.58%) SQL Server Integration Services
Development Applications
1 82 (7.88%) JIRA
2 56 (5.38%) Git
3 52 (5.00%) GitLab
4 41 (3.94%) Jenkins
5 18 (1.73%) Selenium
6 16 (1.54%) Cucumber
7 12 (1.15%) JUnit
8 9 (0.87%) Postman
8 9 (0.87%) Team Foundation Server
9 8 (0.77%) Cypress.io
10 7 (0.67%) Artifactory
11 5 (0.48%) Gatling
11 5 (0.48%) REST Assured
11 5 (0.48%) Visual Studio
11 5 (0.48%) WebDriver
12 4 (0.38%) Atlassian Bamboo
12 4 (0.38%) Maven
12 4 (0.38%) Mockito
12 4 (0.38%) Rational DOORS
13 3 (0.29%) JMeter
General
1 315 (30.29%) Social Skills
2 186 (17.88%) Public Sector
3 146 (14.04%) Finance
4 114 (10.96%) Analytical Skills
5 46 (4.42%) Aerospace
5 46 (4.42%) Banking
6 35 (3.37%) Documentation Skills
7 24 (2.31%) Legal
8 21 (2.02%) Billing
8 21 (2.02%) Influencing Skills
8 21 (2.02%) Manufacturing
9 17 (1.63%) Aviation
9 17 (1.63%) Presentation Skills
10 13 (1.25%) Telecoms
11 12 (1.15%) Organisational Skills
12 11 (1.06%) Inclusion and Diversity
13 9 (0.87%) Local Government
13 9 (0.87%) Retail
14 8 (0.77%) Military
14 8 (0.77%) Publishing
Job Titles
1 150 (14.42%) Developer
2 120 (11.54%) Analyst
3 119 (11.44%) Senior
4 110 (10.58%) Architect
5 107 (10.29%) Lead
6 81 (7.79%) Consultant
7 60 (5.77%) SAP Consultant
8 55 (5.29%) Business Analyst
9 48 (4.62%) Designer
10 40 (3.85%) Data Engineer
10 40 (3.85%) Java Developer
11 30 (2.88%) Administrator
12 26 (2.50%) Delivery Manager
12 26 (2.50%) DevOps Engineer
12 26 (2.50%) Service Designer
13 23 (2.21%) Data Architect
13 23 (2.21%) Senior Developer
13 23 (2.21%) Solutions Architect
14 22 (2.12%) Senior Analyst
15 21 (2.02%) Product Manager
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 59 (5.67%) Node.js
2 54 (5.19%) REST
3 51 (4.90%) React
4 45 (4.33%) HTML
5 42 (4.04%) RESTful
6 40 (3.85%) CSS
7 33 (3.17%) Spring
8 32 (3.08%) Spring Boot
9 28 (2.69%) .NET
10 25 (2.40%) Kafka
11 20 (1.92%) JSON
12 18 (1.73%) OAuth
12 18 (1.73%) Playwright
13 15 (1.44%) AngularJS
13 15 (1.44%) Middleware
13 15 (1.44%) SPFx
14 14 (1.35%) OpenAPI
15 13 (1.25%) OAuth2
15 13 (1.25%) SAP TM
15 13 (1.25%) Swagger
Miscellaneous
1 79 (7.60%) Product Ownership
2 52 (5.00%) Onboarding
3 50 (4.81%) Cloud Native
4 22 (2.12%) Management Information System
5 20 (1.92%) Distributed Systems
6 17 (1.63%) Legacy Systems
6 17 (1.63%) NHS
7 16 (1.54%) Algorithms
8 14 (1.35%) Self-Motivation
9 9 (0.87%) Data Centre
9 9 (0.87%) Enterprise Software
10 8 (0.77%) Data Structures
10 8 (0.77%) Public Cloud
11 6 (0.58%) Mobile App
11 6 (0.58%) Operational Technology
12 5 (0.48%) AI Agents
12 5 (0.48%) BYOD
12 5 (0.48%) Linux Command Line
12 5 (0.48%) PMI
12 5 (0.48%) Replication
Operating Systems
1 72 (6.92%) Linux
2 45 (4.33%) Windows
3 26 (2.50%) Unix
4 15 (1.44%) Android
5 13 (1.25%) Windows Server
6 10 (0.96%) Apple iOS
7 9 (0.87%) Mac OS
8 6 (0.58%) Windows 10
9 3 (0.29%) AIX
9 3 (0.29%) Solaris
10 2 (0.19%) Debian
10 2 (0.19%) Ubuntu
10 2 (0.19%) VMS
11 1 (0.096%) Mac OS X
11 1 (0.096%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
Processes & Methodologies
1 328 (31.54%) Agile
2 212 (20.38%) CI/CD
3 168 (16.15%) DevOps
4 165 (15.87%) Problem-Solving
5 152 (14.62%) Stakeholder Management
6 113 (10.87%) Continuous Improvement
7 110 (10.58%) Stakeholder Engagement
8 98 (9.42%) Roadmaps
9 89 (8.56%) Test Automation
10 85 (8.17%) Scrum
11 83 (7.98%) Infrastructure as Code
12 80 (7.69%) Decision-Making
12 80 (7.69%) Microservices
13 71 (6.83%) Data Modelling
14 69 (6.63%) Analytics
15 68 (6.54%) Migration
16 63 (6.06%) AI
16 63 (6.06%) Business Intelligence
16 63 (6.06%) Workshop Facilitation
17 61 (5.87%) Validation
Programming Languages
1 124 (11.92%) Python
2 121 (11.63%) Java
3 113 (10.87%) SQL
4 77 (7.40%) JavaScript
5 45 (4.33%) TypeScript
6 32 (3.08%) Scala
7 23 (2.21%) C#
8 19 (1.83%) PowerShell
9 17 (1.63%) Shell Script
10 13 (1.25%) PL/SQL
11 10 (0.96%) Bicep
12 9 (0.87%) Bash
12 9 (0.87%) C
12 9 (0.87%) VB
13 8 (0.77%) C++
14 7 (0.67%) VB6
15 6 (0.58%) COBOL
15 6 (0.58%) MATLAB
16 5 (0.48%) Apex Code
16 5 (0.48%) Data Analysis Expressions
Qualifications
1 299 (28.75%) Security Cleared
2 211 (20.29%) SC Cleared
3 66 (6.35%) Degree
4 14 (1.35%) DV Cleared
5 12 (1.15%) AWS Certification
6 11 (1.06%) Master's Degree
7 10 (0.96%) Azure Certification
7 10 (0.96%) Computer Science Degree
8 8 (0.77%) PMI Certification
9 7 (0.67%) DBS Check
9 7 (0.67%) Microsoft Certification
10 6 (0.58%) CompTIA CySA+
10 6 (0.58%) PMP
11 5 (0.48%) AWS Certified Solutions Architect
11 5 (0.48%) GIAC
11 5 (0.48%) NVQ Level 4
12 4 (0.38%) CompTIA Security+
12 4 (0.38%) CTC Cleared
12 4 (0.38%) MBA
13 3 (0.29%) TOGAF Certification
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 69 (6.63%) Accessibility
2 66 (6.35%) Data Quality
3 61 (5.87%) QA
4 22 (2.12%) WCAG
5 17 (1.63%) ISO/IEC 27001
6 15 (1.44%) NIST
6 15 (1.44%) PMO
7 14 (1.35%) SLA
8 12 (1.15%) GDPR
9 9 (0.87%) GRC
10 8 (0.77%) PCI DSS
11 6 (0.58%) NCSC
12 5 (0.48%) Actionable Recommendations
12 5 (0.48%) IFRS
12 5 (0.48%) IFRS 17
12 5 (0.48%) ISO 20022
13 4 (0.38%) HL7
13 4 (0.38%) PSD2
14 3 (0.29%) DICOM
14 3 (0.29%) ISO 8583
System Software
1 67 (6.44%) Docker
2 30 (2.88%) Active Directory
3 21 (2.02%) VMware Infrastructure
4 7 (0.67%) Hyper-V
5 6 (0.58%) vSphere
6 5 (0.48%) Virtual Desktop
7 4 (0.38%) GPFS
7 4 (0.38%) NFS
7 4 (0.38%) Virtual Machines
7 4 (0.38%) VMware ESXi
8 3 (0.29%) VMware NSX
9 2 (0.19%) Firmware
9 2 (0.19%) QEMU
10 1 (0.096%) ACF2
10 1 (0.096%) RACF
10 1 (0.096%) Time Sharing Option
Systems Management
1 88 (8.46%) Terraform
2 63 (6.06%) Kubernetes
3 25 (2.40%) Grafana
4 17 (1.63%) Prometheus
5 16 (1.54%) Ansible
6 10 (0.96%) Kibana
7 9 (0.87%) Single Sign-On
8 8 (0.77%) Istio
9 6 (0.58%) Argo
9 6 (0.58%) Microsoft Intune
10 5 (0.48%) vRealize
11 4 (0.38%) HAProxy
11 4 (0.38%) Podman
11 4 (0.38%) SCCM
12 3 (0.29%) VxRail
13 2 (0.19%) Active Directory Federation Services
13 2 (0.19%) Kubeflow
13 2 (0.19%) Packer
14 1 (0.096%) linkerd
14 1 (0.096%) Microsoft Clustering
Vendors
1 117 (11.25%) SAP
2 97 (9.33%) Microsoft
3 53 (5.10%) Oracle
4 31 (2.98%) ServiceNow
5 22 (2.12%) Databricks
6 21 (2.02%) VMware
7 20 (1.92%) Google
8 19 (1.83%) Splunk
9 14 (1.35%) Cisco
10 13 (1.25%) IBM
11 12 (1.15%) Pega
12 10 (0.96%) Salesforce
13 8 (0.77%) Apple
13 8 (0.77%) CyberArk
13 8 (0.77%) OpenAI
13 8 (0.77%) Talend
14 7 (0.67%) BeyondTrust
14 7 (0.67%) MuleSoft
14 7 (0.67%) Workday
15 6 (0.58%) Informatica