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

6 months to
9 Jun 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 117 201 233
Rank change year-on-year +84 +32 -1
Contract jobs citing BPSS Clearance 1,078 398 446
As % of all contract jobs in the UK 2.17% 1.36% 1.03%
As % of the Qualifications category 6.90% 4.39% 3.44%
Number of daily rates quoted 779 258 316
10th Percentile £329 £304 £216
25th Percentile £400 £405 £412
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £480 £500 £500
Median % change year-on-year -4.00% - -9.09%
75th Percentile £570 £581 £625
90th Percentile £657 £688 £675
UK excluding London median daily rate £450 £500 £501
% change year-on-year -10.00% -0.25% -4.89%
Number of hourly rates quoted 118 34 52
10th Percentile £17.14 £18.50 £13.99
25th Percentile £31.37 £25.32 -
Median hourly rate £43.96 £45.00 £16.06
Median % change year-on-year -2.31% +180.20% -35.76%
75th Percentile £63.75 £70.31 £26.25
90th Percentile £80.68 £76.25 £76.50
UK excluding London median hourly rate £43.96 £50.00 £16.06
% change year-on-year -12.08% +211.33% -30.17%

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 15,625 9,067 12,961
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the UK 31.45% 30.97% 29.93%
Number of daily rates quoted 10,368 5,651 8,039
10th Percentile £350 £275 £310
25th Percentile £425 £413 £425
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £525 £520 £525
Median % change year-on-year +0.96% -0.95% -4.55%
75th Percentile £621 £619 £638
90th Percentile £713 £700 £738
UK excluding London median daily rate £505 £500 £530
% change year-on-year +1.00% -5.66% +0.95%
Number of hourly rates quoted 1,152 554 1,109
10th Percentile £17.00 £17.53 £13.87
25th Percentile £21.91 £22.23 £18.19
Median hourly rate £49.36 £32.00 £40.00
Median % change year-on-year +54.25% -20.00% -27.27%
75th Percentile £72.50 £65.00 £62.50
90th Percentile £85.00 £76.25 £76.25
UK excluding London median hourly rate £47.50 £30.91 £40.97
% change year-on-year +53.70% -24.57% -21.96%

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 9 June 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 9 June 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 9 June 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 +76 802 £480 -3.95% 256
UK excluding London +57 597 £450 -10.00% 249
Work from Home +72 446 £438 -12.50% 152
London +78 260 £510 -0.73% 33
North of England +24 216 £453 -9.40% 53
Midlands +5 133 £438 -5.71% 24
North West +17 125 £400 -24.53% 39
West Midlands -2 100 £459 +11.89% 18
South East -10 94 £483 -8.00% 50
Scotland +39 61 £330 -7.69% 14
South West +11 57 £525 +44.83% 64
North East +4 51 £453 +11.17% 4
Yorkshire -26 45 £481 -1.28% 10
East Midlands -9 32 £416 -40.54% 6
East of England -22 28 £450 +125.00% 34
Wales -9 7 £550 -4.35% 10
Northern Ireland +4 5 £450 +28.57% 7

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 (4.64%) Confluence
2 38 (3.53%) SharePoint
3 15 (1.39%) SharePoint Server
4 13 (1.21%) Apache Spark
5 8 (0.74%) Apache Airflow
5 8 (0.74%) SAS
6 7 (0.65%) Apache
7 4 (0.37%) Microsoft Exchange
7 4 (0.37%) Oracle Workflow
8 3 (0.28%) ArcGIS
8 3 (0.28%) CICS
8 3 (0.28%) CMS
8 3 (0.28%) LiveCycle
9 2 (0.19%) Cloud Foundry
9 2 (0.19%) Ethereum
9 2 (0.19%) Hyperledger
9 2 (0.19%) WordPress
10 1 (0.093%) Apache Pulsar
10 1 (0.093%) Camunda
10 1 (0.093%) Palantir Foundry
Applications
1 43 (3.99%) Microsoft Excel
2 18 (1.67%) Microsoft Office
3 15 (1.39%) Microsoft PowerPoint
4 14 (1.30%) Microsoft Project
5 11 (1.02%) MS Visio
6 5 (0.46%) Simulink
7 2 (0.19%) Chatbot
7 2 (0.19%) Spreadsheet
7 2 (0.19%) Trello
8 1 (0.093%) Autodesk Inventor
8 1 (0.093%) CATIA
8 1 (0.093%) InVision
8 1 (0.093%) MicroStation
8 1 (0.093%) PTC Creo
8 1 (0.093%) Sketch
Business Applications
1 45 (4.17%) SAP S/4HANA
2 15 (1.39%) SAP PSCD
3 14 (1.30%) SAP BRIM
4 13 (1.21%) SAP Travel Management
5 11 (1.02%) SAP IBP
6 8 (0.74%) SAP EWM
6 8 (0.74%) SAP FI
7 7 (0.65%) SAP FI-CA
8 5 (0.46%) Payment Gateway
8 5 (0.46%) SAP HR
9 4 (0.37%) Loan IQ
9 4 (0.37%) SAP Convergent Charging
9 4 (0.37%) SAP EHS
10 3 (0.28%) Exchequer
10 3 (0.28%) iTrent
10 3 (0.28%) Primavera
10 3 (0.28%) ProductWriter
10 3 (0.28%) SAP HCM
10 3 (0.28%) SAP MDG
10 3 (0.28%) SAP MM
Cloud Services
1 196 (18.18%) AWS
2 194 (18.00%) Azure
3 74 (6.86%) Power Platform
4 50 (4.64%) Azure DevOps
5 46 (4.27%) GitHub
6 45 (4.17%) GCP
7 43 (3.99%) Serverless
8 35 (3.25%) Entra ID
8 35 (3.25%) Microsoft 365
9 34 (3.15%) GitHub Actions
10 32 (2.97%) AWS Lambda
11 28 (2.60%) Amazon S3
12 21 (1.95%) Power Automate
13 19 (1.76%) PowerApps
14 17 (1.58%) Amazon CloudWatch
14 17 (1.58%) AWS CloudFormation
15 15 (1.39%) Amazon ECS
16 13 (1.21%) Amazon EC2
16 13 (1.21%) Amazon EKS
17 12 (1.11%) Azure Monitor
Communications & Networking
1 15 (1.39%) DNS
1 15 (1.39%) Firewall
2 14 (1.30%) Network Security
3 10 (0.93%) SSH
4 9 (0.83%) HTTPS
5 7 (0.65%) Ethernet
5 7 (0.65%) VPN
6 6 (0.56%) DHCP
6 6 (0.56%) WAN
7 4 (0.37%) SSL
8 3 (0.28%) Internet
8 3 (0.28%) LAN
8 3 (0.28%) Modbus
8 3 (0.28%) Reverse Proxy
8 3 (0.28%) TCP/IP
8 3 (0.28%) WebEx
8 3 (0.28%) Wi-Fi
9 2 (0.19%) MQTT
9 2 (0.19%) NAS
9 2 (0.19%) RS-485
Database & Business Intelligence
1 62 (5.75%) Power BI
2 36 (3.34%) PostgreSQL
3 23 (2.13%) SQL Server
4 22 (2.04%) Data Warehouse
4 22 (2.04%) Metadata
5 20 (1.86%) MongoDB
6 17 (1.58%) NoSQL
7 16 (1.48%) DynamoDB
7 16 (1.48%) Relational Database
8 13 (1.21%) Amazon RDS
9 11 (1.02%) Amazon Athena
9 11 (1.02%) MySQL
10 10 (0.93%) Data Lake
11 9 (0.83%) Delta Lake
11 9 (0.83%) Geospatial Data
12 8 (0.74%) Amazon Redshift
12 8 (0.74%) Big Data
13 7 (0.65%) Amazon Aurora
13 7 (0.65%) Spark SQL
14 6 (0.56%) Power Query
Development Applications
1 88 (8.16%) JIRA
2 58 (5.38%) Git
3 52 (4.82%) GitLab
4 41 (3.80%) Jenkins
5 19 (1.76%) Selenium
6 16 (1.48%) Cucumber
7 12 (1.11%) JUnit
8 10 (0.93%) Postman
9 9 (0.83%) Team Foundation Server
10 8 (0.74%) Cypress.io
11 7 (0.65%) Artifactory
12 6 (0.56%) REST Assured
13 5 (0.46%) Gatling
13 5 (0.46%) Visual Studio
13 5 (0.46%) WebDriver
14 4 (0.37%) Atlassian Bamboo
14 4 (0.37%) Maven
14 4 (0.37%) Mockito
14 4 (0.37%) Rational DOORS
15 3 (0.28%) JMeter
General
1 337 (31.26%) Social Skills
2 206 (19.11%) Public Sector
3 164 (15.21%) Finance
4 113 (10.48%) Analytical Skills
5 47 (4.36%) Legal
6 46 (4.27%) Banking
7 45 (4.17%) Aerospace
8 37 (3.43%) Documentation Skills
9 33 (3.06%) Organisational Skills
10 21 (1.95%) Billing
10 21 (1.95%) Influencing Skills
10 21 (1.95%) Manufacturing
11 19 (1.76%) Presentation Skills
12 16 (1.48%) Aviation
13 13 (1.21%) Telecoms
14 11 (1.02%) Inclusion and Diversity
15 10 (0.93%) Local Government
16 9 (0.83%) Retail
17 8 (0.74%) Military
17 8 (0.74%) Publishing
Job Titles
1 144 (13.36%) Developer
2 123 (11.41%) Analyst
3 112 (10.39%) Senior
4 111 (10.30%) Architect
5 105 (9.74%) Lead
6 85 (7.88%) Consultant
7 61 (5.66%) SAP Consultant
8 56 (5.19%) Business Analyst
9 49 (4.55%) Designer
10 45 (4.17%) Data Engineer
11 42 (3.90%) Java Developer
12 31 (2.88%) Administrator
13 26 (2.41%) Delivery Manager
13 26 (2.41%) DevOps Engineer
13 26 (2.41%) Service Designer
14 24 (2.23%) Solutions Architect
15 22 (2.04%) Data Architect
15 22 (2.04%) Product Manager
15 22 (2.04%) Senior Analyst
16 21 (1.95%) Data Analyst
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 57 (5.29%) REST
2 52 (4.82%) React
3 48 (4.45%) Node.js
4 46 (4.27%) HTML
5 44 (4.08%) RESTful
6 41 (3.80%) CSS
7 35 (3.25%) Spring
7 35 (3.25%) Spring Boot
8 28 (2.60%) .NET
9 26 (2.41%) Kafka
10 20 (1.86%) JSON
11 17 (1.58%) OAuth
11 17 (1.58%) Playwright
12 16 (1.48%) PySpark
13 15 (1.39%) SPFx
14 14 (1.30%) Middleware
14 14 (1.30%) OpenAPI
15 13 (1.21%) AngularJS
15 13 (1.21%) SAP TM
15 13 (1.21%) XML
Miscellaneous
1 78 (7.24%) Product Ownership
2 53 (4.92%) Cloud Native
2 53 (4.92%) Onboarding
3 25 (2.32%) Virtual Team
4 22 (2.04%) Web Conferencing
5 21 (1.95%) Management Information System
5 21 (1.95%) Podcast
6 20 (1.86%) Distributed Systems
7 18 (1.67%) NHS
8 17 (1.58%) Legacy Systems
9 16 (1.48%) Algorithms
10 14 (1.30%) Self-Motivation
11 12 (1.11%) Enterprise Software
12 11 (1.02%) Data Centre
13 8 (0.74%) Data Structures
13 8 (0.74%) Public Cloud
14 6 (0.56%) Mobile App
14 6 (0.56%) Operational Technology
15 5 (0.46%) AI Agents
15 5 (0.46%) BYOD
Operating Systems
1 69 (6.40%) Linux
2 46 (4.27%) Windows
3 26 (2.41%) Unix
4 15 (1.39%) Android
5 13 (1.21%) Windows Server
6 10 (0.93%) Apple iOS
7 9 (0.83%) Mac OS
8 6 (0.56%) Windows 10
9 3 (0.28%) AIX
9 3 (0.28%) Solaris
10 2 (0.19%) Debian
10 2 (0.19%) Ubuntu
10 2 (0.19%) VMS
11 1 (0.093%) Mac OS X
11 1 (0.093%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
Processes & Methodologies
1 330 (30.61%) Agile
2 214 (19.85%) CI/CD
3 175 (16.23%) DevOps
4 163 (15.12%) Problem-Solving
5 154 (14.29%) Stakeholder Management
6 113 (10.48%) Continuous Improvement
7 111 (10.30%) Stakeholder Engagement
8 99 (9.18%) Roadmaps
8 99 (9.18%) Test Automation
9 89 (8.26%) Scrum
10 83 (7.70%) Decision-Making
11 82 (7.61%) Infrastructure as Code
12 81 (7.51%) Microservices
13 80 (7.42%) Analytics
14 73 (6.77%) AI
14 73 (6.77%) Data Modelling
15 70 (6.49%) Migration
16 68 (6.31%) Business Intelligence
17 65 (6.03%) Validation
18 63 (5.84%) Software Engineering
Programming Languages
1 128 (11.87%) Python
2 122 (11.32%) Java
3 118 (10.95%) SQL
4 74 (6.86%) JavaScript
5 45 (4.17%) TypeScript
6 32 (2.97%) Scala
7 23 (2.13%) C#
8 20 (1.86%) PowerShell
9 16 (1.48%) Shell Script
10 13 (1.21%) PL/SQL
11 10 (0.93%) Bicep
12 9 (0.83%) C
12 9 (0.83%) VB
13 8 (0.74%) C++
14 7 (0.65%) VB6
15 6 (0.56%) COBOL
15 6 (0.56%) MATLAB
16 5 (0.46%) Apex Code
16 5 (0.46%) Data Analysis Expressions
16 5 (0.46%) Go
Qualifications
1 314 (29.13%) Security Cleared
2 227 (21.06%) SC Cleared
3 69 (6.40%) Degree
4 16 (1.48%) AWS Certification
5 15 (1.39%) DV Cleared
6 11 (1.02%) Master's Degree
7 10 (0.93%) Azure Certification
7 10 (0.93%) Computer Science Degree
8 8 (0.74%) PMI Certification
9 7 (0.65%) DBS Check
9 7 (0.65%) Microsoft Certification
10 6 (0.56%) CompTIA CySA+
10 6 (0.56%) PMP
11 5 (0.46%) AWS Certified Cloud Practitioner
11 5 (0.46%) AWS Certified Solutions Architect
11 5 (0.46%) GIAC
11 5 (0.46%) NVQ Level 4
12 4 (0.37%) CompTIA Security+
12 4 (0.37%) CTC Cleared
12 4 (0.37%) MBA
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 74 (6.86%) Accessibility
2 72 (6.68%) Data Quality
3 62 (5.75%) QA
4 22 (2.04%) WCAG
5 20 (1.86%) ISO/IEC 27001
6 16 (1.48%) NIST
6 16 (1.48%) PMO
7 14 (1.30%) SLA
8 12 (1.11%) GDPR
9 10 (0.93%) GRC
10 8 (0.74%) PCI DSS
11 6 (0.56%) NCSC
12 5 (0.46%) Actionable Recommendations
12 5 (0.46%) IFRS
12 5 (0.46%) IFRS 17
12 5 (0.46%) ISO 20022
13 4 (0.37%) HL7
13 4 (0.37%) PSD2
14 3 (0.28%) Basel III
14 3 (0.28%) DICOM
System Software
1 70 (6.49%) Docker
2 30 (2.78%) Active Directory
3 19 (1.76%) VMware Infrastructure
4 6 (0.56%) Hyper-V
5 5 (0.46%) Virtual Desktop
6 4 (0.37%) Virtual Machines
6 4 (0.37%) vSphere
7 3 (0.28%) GPFS
7 3 (0.28%) NFS
7 3 (0.28%) VMware ESXi
7 3 (0.28%) VMware NSX
8 2 (0.19%) Firmware
8 2 (0.19%) QEMU
9 1 (0.093%) ACF2
9 1 (0.093%) RACF
9 1 (0.093%) Time Sharing Option
Systems Management
1 92 (8.53%) Terraform
2 65 (6.03%) Kubernetes
3 22 (2.04%) Grafana
4 14 (1.30%) Prometheus
5 11 (1.02%) Ansible
6 10 (0.93%) Kibana
7 9 (0.83%) Istio
7 9 (0.83%) Single Sign-On
8 7 (0.65%) Argo
9 6 (0.56%) Microsoft Intune
10 5 (0.46%) Podman
10 5 (0.46%) SCCM
11 4 (0.37%) HAProxy
12 3 (0.28%) vRealize
13 2 (0.19%) Active Directory Federation Services
13 2 (0.19%) Kubeflow
13 2 (0.19%) Packer
13 2 (0.19%) Puppet
14 1 (0.093%) linkerd
14 1 (0.093%) VxRail
Vendors
1 115 (10.67%) SAP
2 93 (8.63%) Microsoft
3 50 (4.64%) Oracle
4 31 (2.88%) ServiceNow
5 22 (2.04%) Databricks
6 21 (1.95%) Google
7 19 (1.76%) Splunk
7 19 (1.76%) VMware
8 12 (1.11%) Cisco
8 12 (1.11%) IBM
8 12 (1.11%) Pega
9 10 (0.93%) Informatica
10 9 (0.83%) CyberArk
10 9 (0.83%) Salesforce
11 8 (0.74%) Apple
11 8 (0.74%) BeyondTrust
11 8 (0.74%) OpenAI
11 8 (0.74%) Talend
12 7 (0.65%) MuleSoft
12 7 (0.65%) Workday