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

6 months to
8 Oct 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 88 161 263
Rank change year-on-year +73 +102 -27
Contract jobs citing BPSS Clearance 1,671 597 339
As % of all contract jobs in the UK 3.06% 1.81% 0.90%
As % of the Qualifications category 9.62% 5.68% 3.06%
Number of daily rates quoted 1,220 419 193
10th Percentile £367 £313 £213
25th Percentile £433 £405 £360
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £505 £500 £500
Median % change year-on-year +1.00% - -8.68%
75th Percentile £600 £609 £588
90th Percentile £671 £713 £650
UK excluding London median daily rate £488 £500 £447
% change year-on-year -2.50% +11.86% -18.73%
Number of hourly rates quoted 235 53 20
10th Percentile £19.50 £20.00 £19.85
25th Percentile £40.47 £22.63 £20.12
Median hourly rate £43.96 £29.27 £28.30
Median % change year-on-year +50.19% +3.45% -50.65%
75th Percentile £44.25 £48.13 £59.06
90th Percentile £66.00 £71.03 £65.00
UK excluding London median hourly rate £43.96 £33.50 £28.30
% change year-on-year +31.22% +18.40% -49.62%

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 17,368 10,519 11,093
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the UK 31.84% 31.82% 29.30%
Number of daily rates quoted 11,521 6,557 6,724
10th Percentile £355 £282 £310
25th Percentile £447 £413 £420
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £533 £525 £525
Median % change year-on-year +1.43% - -4.55%
75th Percentile £631 £625 £634
90th Percentile £713 £703 £725
UK excluding London median daily rate £525 £500 £520
% change year-on-year +5.00% -3.85% -3.26%
Number of hourly rates quoted 1,440 884 592
10th Percentile £16.50 £17.87 £18.13
25th Percentile £25.00 £18.87 £25.47
Median hourly rate £43.96 £25.15 £47.84
Median % change year-on-year +74.79% -47.43% -10.88%
75th Percentile £71.43 £42.00 £68.75
90th Percentile £88.75 £70.00 £76.17
UK excluding London median hourly rate £43.96 £25.15 £50.00
% change year-on-year +74.79% -49.70% -3.66%

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 8 October 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 8 October 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 8 October 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 +88 1,273 £500 -1.48% 1,124
UK excluding London +63 958 £488 -2.50% 914
Work from Home +55 588 £515 +8.42% 708
London +99 381 £530 +6.00% 266
North of England +24 346 £490 - 148
Midlands +63 310 £488 -6.79% 126
West Midlands +67 299 £488 -7.14% 77
North West -1 182 £527 +12.42% 85
North East +19 101 £463 -5.13% 31
South East -15 91 £470 -8.76% 187
Yorkshire +6 80 £475 -5.00% 32
South West +3 75 £525 +2.44% 128
Scotland +28 68 £450 +2.86% 110
East of England +7 58 £566 -6.29% 184
Northern Ireland +22 20 - - 26
Wales +3 13 £419 - 11
East Midlands -23 11 £600 +21.95% 49

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 70 (4.19%) Confluence
2 40 (2.39%) SharePoint
3 13 (0.78%) SharePoint Server
4 12 (0.72%) CMS
5 11 (0.66%) Apache Spark
6 9 (0.54%) Microsoft Exchange
7 8 (0.48%) SAS
8 7 (0.42%) Apache Airflow
9 6 (0.36%) Headless CMS
9 6 (0.36%) WebLogic
10 5 (0.30%) WordPress
11 4 (0.24%) IIS
12 3 (0.18%) Oracle Workflow
13 2 (0.12%) Cloud Foundry
13 2 (0.12%) Ethereum
13 2 (0.12%) Hyperledger
13 2 (0.12%) nginx
13 2 (0.12%) OpenROAD
13 2 (0.12%) SAP Portal
14 1 (0.060%) Appian
Applications
1 42 (2.51%) Microsoft Excel
2 31 (1.86%) Microsoft Office
3 15 (0.90%) Microsoft Project
4 8 (0.48%) Microsoft PowerPoint
4 8 (0.48%) Windchill
5 4 (0.24%) AutoCAD
6 3 (0.18%) Chatbot
6 3 (0.18%) Navisworks
7 2 (0.12%) MS Visio
7 2 (0.12%) Revit
7 2 (0.12%) Spreadsheet
8 1 (0.060%) Civil 3D
8 1 (0.060%) ProjectWise
8 1 (0.060%) Siemens NX
8 1 (0.060%) Trello
Business Applications
1 64 (3.83%) SAP S/4HANA
2 22 (1.32%) SAP HR
2 22 (1.32%) SAP Payroll
3 16 (0.96%) SAP BRIM
3 16 (0.96%) SAP PSCD
4 15 (0.90%) SAP HCM
5 11 (0.66%) SAP FI
6 8 (0.48%) SAP PP
7 7 (0.42%) SAP FI-CA
7 7 (0.42%) SAP MDG
8 6 (0.36%) SAP GRC
8 6 (0.36%) Teamcenter
9 5 (0.30%) Exchequer
9 5 (0.30%) SAP ERP
9 5 (0.30%) SAP Hybris
9 5 (0.30%) SAP IBP
10 4 (0.24%) SAP Convergent Charging
10 4 (0.24%) SAP EHS
10 4 (0.24%) Shopify
11 3 (0.18%) SAP Travel Management
Cloud Services
1 308 (18.43%) AWS
2 277 (16.58%) Azure
3 91 (5.45%) GitHub
4 85 (5.09%) Power Platform
5 65 (3.89%) Azure DevOps
6 59 (3.53%) GCP
6 59 (3.53%) Serverless
7 57 (3.41%) GitHub Actions
8 51 (3.05%) Microsoft 365
9 47 (2.81%) Amazon S3
9 47 (2.81%) AWS Lambda
10 46 (2.75%) Entra ID
11 29 (1.74%) SuccessFactors
12 26 (1.56%) Amazon CloudWatch
12 26 (1.56%) AWS CloudFormation
13 25 (1.50%) Azure Monitor
13 25 (1.50%) Power Automate
13 25 (1.50%) PowerApps
14 22 (1.32%) Amazon ECS
15 19 (1.14%) Amazon EKS
Communications & Networking
1 18 (1.08%) DNS
2 13 (0.78%) SSL
2 13 (0.78%) WAN
3 12 (0.72%) Network Security
4 10 (0.60%) WebEx
5 9 (0.54%) Cisco IPT
5 9 (0.54%) Firewall
6 8 (0.48%) Intranet
7 7 (0.42%) 5G
7 7 (0.42%) Radio Access Network
7 7 (0.42%) VPN
7 7 (0.42%) Wireshark
8 6 (0.36%) Ethernet
8 6 (0.36%) LAN
8 6 (0.36%) MPLS
9 5 (0.30%) 3GPP
9 5 (0.30%) HTTP
9 5 (0.30%) NGN
9 5 (0.30%) tcpdump
10 4 (0.24%) SDH
Database & Business Intelligence
1 55 (3.29%) MongoDB
1 55 (3.29%) Power BI
2 52 (3.11%) PostgreSQL
3 44 (2.63%) Metadata
4 38 (2.27%) Data Warehouse
5 33 (1.97%) SQL Server
6 25 (1.50%) Amazon RDS
6 25 (1.50%) MySQL
7 24 (1.44%) NoSQL
8 22 (1.32%) Data Lake
9 20 (1.20%) SQL Server Integration Services
10 19 (1.14%) Oracle Database
10 19 (1.14%) Relational Database
11 16 (0.96%) DynamoDB
12 14 (0.84%) Amazon Aurora
12 14 (0.84%) Amazon Redshift
13 11 (0.66%) Amazon Athena
13 11 (0.66%) Redis
14 10 (0.60%) Big Data
15 8 (0.48%) SAP BW
Development Applications
1 123 (7.36%) Git
2 119 (7.12%) JIRA
3 111 (6.64%) GitLab
4 64 (3.83%) Jenkins
5 44 (2.63%) JUnit
6 36 (2.15%) Selenium
7 34 (2.03%) Cucumber
8 30 (1.80%) Maven
9 23 (1.38%) SonarQube
10 21 (1.26%) Gatling
11 20 (1.20%) Mockito
12 19 (1.14%) Postman
13 14 (0.84%) Team Foundation Server
13 14 (0.84%) Visual Studio
14 13 (0.78%) Cypress.io
15 11 (0.66%) Atlassian Bamboo
16 10 (0.60%) Rational DOORS
16 10 (0.60%) REST Assured
17 9 (0.54%) Bitbucket
18 7 (0.42%) Gradle
General
1 577 (34.53%) Social Skills
2 445 (26.63%) Public Sector
3 256 (15.32%) Finance
4 161 (9.63%) Analytical Skills
5 141 (8.44%) Organisational Skills
6 140 (8.38%) Legal
7 55 (3.29%) Aerospace
8 40 (2.39%) Documentation Skills
8 40 (2.39%) Influencing Skills
9 37 (2.21%) Manufacturing
10 31 (1.86%) Inclusion and Diversity
11 29 (1.74%) Telecoms
12 28 (1.68%) Presentation Skills
13 22 (1.32%) Banking
13 22 (1.32%) Billing
14 20 (1.20%) Aviation
15 16 (0.96%) Local Government
16 15 (0.90%) Military
16 15 (0.90%) Publishing
17 13 (0.78%) Avionics
Job Titles
1 227 (13.58%) Developer
2 197 (11.79%) Architect
3 192 (11.49%) Senior
4 171 (10.23%) Lead
5 117 (7.00%) Analyst
6 107 (6.40%) Consultant
7 75 (4.49%) Java Developer
8 63 (3.77%) SAP Consultant
9 59 (3.53%) Data Engineer
10 58 (3.47%) Technical Architect
11 56 (3.35%) Designer
11 56 (3.35%) DevOps Engineer
11 56 (3.35%) Solutions Architect
12 55 (3.29%) Business Analyst
13 43 (2.57%) Delivery Manager
14 39 (2.33%) Product Manager
15 36 (2.15%) Data Architect
16 33 (1.97%) Administrator
16 33 (1.97%) Lead Developer
17 32 (1.92%) User Researcher
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 124 (7.42%) Terraform
2 100 (5.98%) REST
3 96 (5.75%) Spring
4 77 (4.61%) Spring Boot
5 57 (3.41%) Node.js
5 57 (3.41%) React
5 57 (3.41%) RESTful
6 49 (2.93%) HTML
7 48 (2.87%) Playwright
8 44 (2.63%) Kafka
9 38 (2.27%) CSS
10 37 (2.21%) OpenAPI
11 29 (1.74%) OAuth
12 27 (1.62%) JSON
13 26 (1.56%) OAuth2
13 26 (1.56%) Swagger
13 26 (1.56%) XML
14 25 (1.50%) .NET
15 22 (1.32%) Web Services
16 20 (1.20%) Jest
Miscellaneous
1 119 (7.12%) Virtual Team
1 119 (7.12%) Web Conferencing
2 116 (6.94%) Onboarding
3 109 (6.52%) Podcast
4 87 (5.21%) Product Ownership
5 84 (5.03%) Cloud Native
6 37 (2.21%) Enterprise Software
7 26 (1.56%) Replication
8 25 (1.50%) Management Information System
9 23 (1.38%) Legacy Systems
9 23 (1.38%) Mobile App
9 23 (1.38%) Self-Motivation
10 21 (1.26%) Distributed Systems
11 18 (1.08%) NHS
12 17 (1.02%) Driving Licence
13 15 (0.90%) BYOD
14 14 (0.84%) Low-Code
15 12 (0.72%) AI Agents
15 12 (0.72%) Taxonomies
16 11 (0.66%) Video Conferencing
Operating Systems
1 77 (4.61%) Windows
2 55 (3.29%) Linux
3 30 (1.80%) Unix
4 21 (1.26%) Android
5 20 (1.20%) Windows Server
6 14 (0.84%) Apple iOS
7 11 (0.66%) Windows 10
8 10 (0.60%) VMS
9 8 (0.48%) Mac OS
10 2 (0.12%) AIX
11 1 (0.060%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
11 1 (0.060%) Robot Operating System
11 1 (0.060%) SUSE Linux Enterprise Server
11 1 (0.060%) Windows Server 2016
11 1 (0.060%) Windows Server 2019
Processes & Methodologies
1 528 (31.60%) Agile
2 350 (20.95%) Stakeholder Management
3 299 (17.89%) CI/CD
4 255 (15.26%) DevOps
5 218 (13.05%) Continuous Improvement
6 200 (11.97%) Problem-Solving
7 183 (10.95%) Stakeholder Engagement
8 182 (10.89%) Scrum
9 154 (9.22%) Test Automation
10 138 (8.26%) Customer Service
11 137 (8.20%) Decision-Making
12 135 (8.08%) Microservices
13 133 (7.96%) Roadmaps
14 127 (7.60%) Infrastructure as Code
15 123 (7.36%) Migration
16 121 (7.24%) Analytics
17 119 (7.12%) AI
18 117 (7.00%) Digital Transformation Programme
19 108 (6.46%) Mentoring
20 90 (5.39%) Software Engineering
Programming Languages
1 202 (12.09%) Java
2 177 (10.59%) SQL
3 133 (7.96%) Python
4 83 (4.97%) JavaScript
5 44 (2.63%) TypeScript
6 42 (2.51%) PowerShell
7 35 (2.09%) Scala
8 27 (1.62%) Bash
9 26 (1.56%) Shell Script
10 22 (1.32%) C#
11 21 (1.26%) PL/SQL
12 17 (1.02%) ABAP
13 14 (0.84%) T-SQL
14 11 (0.66%) VB
14 11 (0.66%) VB6
14 11 (0.66%) VBA
15 9 (0.54%) VBScript
16 8 (0.48%) C++
16 8 (0.48%) Kotlin
16 8 (0.48%) R
Qualifications
1 576 (34.47%) Security Cleared
2 449 (26.87%) SC Cleared
3 83 (4.97%) Degree
4 27 (1.62%) AWS Certification
5 21 (1.26%) Azure Certification
6 19 (1.14%) Microsoft Certification
7 15 (0.90%) DBS Check
8 13 (0.78%) DV Cleared
9 12 (0.72%) A+ Certification
10 11 (0.66%) PMI Certification
11 9 (0.54%) AWS Certified Solutions Architect
11 9 (0.54%) ITIL Foundation Certificate
12 8 (0.48%) HNC
12 8 (0.48%) HND
12 8 (0.48%) ISTQB
13 7 (0.42%) Master's Degree
14 6 (0.36%) CCNA
14 6 (0.36%) Cisco Certification
14 6 (0.36%) CTC Cleared
14 6 (0.36%) PhD
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 116 (6.94%) Accessibility
2 112 (6.70%) QA
3 70 (4.19%) Data Quality
4 45 (2.69%) WCAG
5 30 (1.80%) GDPR
6 25 (1.50%) ISO/IEC 27001
7 20 (1.20%) PMO
8 16 (0.96%) SLA
9 14 (0.84%) NCSC
9 14 (0.84%) NIST
10 11 (0.66%) GRC
11 8 (0.48%) Actionable Recommendations
11 8 (0.48%) IEC 61508
12 5 (0.30%) 21 CFR Part 11
12 5 (0.30%) GMP
12 5 (0.30%) GxP
12 5 (0.30%) ISO/IEC 17025
12 5 (0.30%) PERC
13 4 (0.24%) Cyber Essentials
13 4 (0.24%) Disclosure Scotland
System Software
1 112 (6.70%) Docker
2 38 (2.27%) Active Directory
3 13 (0.78%) Virtual Machines
4 10 (0.60%) Virtual Desktop
5 6 (0.36%) VMware Infrastructure
6 5 (0.30%) Hyper-V
7 4 (0.24%) Firmware
8 1 (0.060%) BitLocker
8 1 (0.060%) IAG
8 1 (0.060%) Oracle RAC
Systems Management
1 127 (7.60%) Kubernetes
2 41 (2.45%) Grafana
3 27 (1.62%) Kibana
4 24 (1.44%) Prometheus
5 20 (1.20%) Single Sign-On
6 14 (0.84%) Ansible
7 12 (0.72%) SCCM
8 10 (0.60%) Argo
8 10 (0.60%) Microsoft Intune
9 9 (0.54%) SCOM
10 8 (0.48%) Functional Safety
11 4 (0.24%) Istio
11 4 (0.24%) Packer
11 4 (0.24%) Podman
11 4 (0.24%) Puppet
12 3 (0.18%) HAProxy
12 3 (0.18%) Karpenter
13 2 (0.12%) Cilium
13 2 (0.12%) Data Guard
13 2 (0.12%) Progress Chef
Vendors
1 202 (12.09%) Microsoft
2 158 (9.46%) SAP
3 99 (5.92%) Oracle
4 65 (3.89%) ServiceNow
5 46 (2.75%) Google
6 27 (1.62%) BeyondTrust
7 19 (1.14%) Databricks
7 19 (1.14%) Splunk
8 17 (1.02%) Talend
9 16 (0.96%) Atlassian
10 13 (0.78%) CyberArk
10 13 (0.78%) IBM
11 12 (0.72%) Cisco
11 12 (0.72%) Dell
11 12 (0.72%) Informatica
12 11 (0.66%) Salesforce
13 10 (0.60%) Okta
14 9 (0.54%) MuleSoft
14 9 (0.54%) Workday
15 8 (0.48%) Blue Prism