C Contract Job Trends

C
UK

The table below provides summary statistics and contractor rates for jobs requiring C skills. It covers contract job vacancies from the 6 months leading up to 19 May 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
19 May 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 413 345 172
Rank change year-on-year -68 -173 +69
Contract jobs citing C 221 166 565
As % of all contract jobs in the UK 0.46% 0.57% 1.33%
As % of the Programming Languages category 1.72% 1.67% 4.44%
Number of daily rates quoted 61 68 245
10th Percentile £350 £269 £391
25th Percentile £413 £322 £463
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £475 £475 £536
Median % change year-on-year - -11.38% -4.29%
75th Percentile £550 £581 £600
90th Percentile £625 £675 £699
UK excluding London median daily rate £488 £413 £544
% change year-on-year +18.18% -24.14% +8.75%
Number of hourly rates quoted 83 39 192
10th Percentile £60.00 £54.40 £46.25
25th Percentile £65.00 £61.00 £57.50
Median hourly rate £67.50 £68.00 £65.00
Median % change year-on-year -0.74% +4.62% +8.33%
75th Percentile £70.00 £85.00 £70.00
90th Percentile - £87.50 £85.00
UK excluding London median hourly rate £67.50 £68.00 £65.00
% change year-on-year -0.74% +4.62% -

All Programming Languages
UK

C falls under the Programming Languages category. For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all contract job vacancies requiring coding skills.

Contract vacancies with a requirement for coding skills 12,859 9,937 12,717
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the UK 26.77% 34.03% 29.87%
Number of daily rates quoted 8,451 6,748 9,044
10th Percentile £355 £358 £350
25th Percentile £413 £413 £425
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £520 £530
Median % change year-on-year -3.85% -1.89% -3.64%
75th Percentile £600 £638 £650
90th Percentile £710 £763 £763
UK excluding London median daily rate £481 £475 £489
% change year-on-year +1.32% -2.86% -2.20%
Number of hourly rates quoted 556 240 493
10th Percentile £40.63 £24.49 £32.25
25th Percentile £54.55 £34.54 £46.25
Median hourly rate £65.00 £62.25 £62.50
Median % change year-on-year +4.42% -0.40% +1.46%
75th Percentile £70.00 £68.75 £70.00
90th Percentile £77.50 £85.00 £78.75
UK excluding London median hourly rate £65.00 £63.87 £62.50
% change year-on-year +1.77% +2.20% -

C
Job Vacancy Trend

Historical trend showing the proportion of contract IT job postings citing C relative to all contract IT jobs advertised.

C job vacancy trend in the UK

C
Daily Rate Trend

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in the UK citing C.

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in the UK citing C

C
Daily Rate Histogram

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing C over the 6 months to 19 May 2026.

Daily rate histogram for C in the UK

C
Hourly Rate Trend

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in the UK citing C.

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in the UK citing C

C
Hourly Rate Histogram

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing C over the 6 months to 19 May 2026.

Hourly rate histogram for C in the UK

C
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 C within the UK over the 6 months to 19 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 -34 209 £488 -2.50% 333
UK excluding London -22 170 £488 +18.18% 306
Work from Home -26 72 £475 -5.00% 119
East of England 0 63 £525 +31.25% 67
South West +2 46 £463 -15.91% 57
London -72 45 £461 -13.43% 44
South East -29 43 £500 - 111
Midlands -61 6 £525 +213.43% 24
North of England -65 5 £625 - 36
West Midlands - 5 £488 - 11
Northern Ireland - 5 £425 - 1
Scotland -15 2 - - 13
North East -20 2 £625 - 10
North West - 2 - - 19
Wales -12 1 £460 -12.38% 6
East Midlands -34 1 £525 +213.43% 13
Yorkshire -53 1 - - 7

C
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 3 (1.36%) Confluence
2 2 (0.90%) Oracle SOA Suite
2 2 (0.90%) Oracle Workflow
3 1 (0.45%) Apache
3 1 (0.45%) Apache Spark
3 1 (0.45%) Microsoft Exchange
3 1 (0.45%) SharePoint
Applications
1 12 (5.43%) Simulink
2 4 (1.81%) Microsoft Office
3 1 (0.45%) Microsoft Excel
Business Applications
1 5 (2.26%) BASE24
1 5 (2.26%) Payment Gateway
2 3 (1.36%) Teamcenter
3 1 (0.45%) Actimize
3 1 (0.45%) Dynamics CRM
3 1 (0.45%) Dynamics NAV
3 1 (0.45%) Loan IQ
3 1 (0.45%) Oracle Applications
3 1 (0.45%) Oracle EBS
Cloud Services
1 13 (5.88%) Azure
2 12 (5.43%) AWS
3 8 (3.62%) GitHub
4 6 (2.71%) Azure DevOps
5 5 (2.26%) Power Platform
6 4 (1.81%) GCP
7 3 (1.36%) GitHub Actions
8 2 (0.90%) Amazon S3
8 2 (0.90%) AWS CloudFormation
8 2 (0.90%) AWS IoT
8 2 (0.90%) Azure Monitor
8 2 (0.90%) Dynamics 365
8 2 (0.90%) GitHub Copilot
9 1 (0.45%) Amazon CloudWatch
9 1 (0.45%) Amazon Kinesis
9 1 (0.45%) Google Drive
9 1 (0.45%) IaaS
9 1 (0.45%) Microsoft 365
9 1 (0.45%) PaaS
9 1 (0.45%) SaaS
Communications & Networking
1 23 (10.41%) Ethernet
2 17 (7.69%) Wireless
3 16 (7.24%) Software-Defined Radio
4 6 (2.71%) TCP/IP
5 5 (2.26%) 3GPP
5 5 (2.26%) Modbus
5 5 (2.26%) RS-232
5 5 (2.26%) RS-485
6 4 (1.81%) Network Security
7 3 (1.36%) Bluetooth
7 3 (1.36%) DNS
7 3 (1.36%) MQTT
7 3 (1.36%) MVNO
7 3 (1.36%) RS-422
7 3 (1.36%) SMPP
7 3 (1.36%) SMS
7 3 (1.36%) SpaceWire
7 3 (1.36%) VXLAN
8 2 (0.90%) 5G
8 2 (0.90%) VSAN
Database & Business Intelligence
1 6 (2.71%) NonStop SQL
2 5 (2.26%) OLTP
2 5 (2.26%) Power BI
2 5 (2.26%) SQL Server
3 4 (1.81%) NoSQL
3 4 (1.81%) PostgreSQL
4 3 (1.36%) Data Warehouse
4 3 (1.36%) MongoDB
4 3 (1.36%) Tableau
5 2 (0.90%) Metadata
5 2 (0.90%) Oracle Database
6 1 (0.45%) Amazon Athena
6 1 (0.45%) Amazon Redshift
6 1 (0.45%) Apache Hudi
6 1 (0.45%) Apache Iceberg
6 1 (0.45%) Big Data
6 1 (0.45%) Data Lake
6 1 (0.45%) Kdb+
6 1 (0.45%) Redis
6 1 (0.45%) Relational Database
Development Applications
1 26 (11.76%) Rational DOORS
2 19 (8.60%) Git
3 15 (6.79%) Rational Rhapsody
4 14 (6.33%) JIRA
5 9 (4.07%) GitLab
6 6 (2.71%) PVCS
7 5 (2.26%) Visual Studio
8 3 (1.36%) Subversion
9 2 (0.90%) Jenkins
10 1 (0.45%) Appium
10 1 (0.45%) Crashlytics
10 1 (0.45%) ER Studio
10 1 (0.45%) fastlane
10 1 (0.45%) git-flow
10 1 (0.45%) PetaLinux
10 1 (0.45%) Postman
10 1 (0.45%) Robot Framework
10 1 (0.45%) SonarQube
10 1 (0.45%) XCTest
10 1 (0.45%) XCUITest
General
1 44 (19.91%) Social Skills
2 27 (12.22%) Aerospace
3 26 (11.76%) Electronics
4 18 (8.14%) Analytical Skills
5 16 (7.24%) Finance
6 13 (5.88%) Documentation Skills
6 13 (5.88%) Law
7 11 (4.98%) Manufacturing
8 9 (4.07%) Banking
9 5 (2.26%) Automotive
9 5 (2.26%) Public Sector
10 4 (1.81%) Avionics
10 4 (1.81%) Games
11 3 (1.36%) Telecoms
12 2 (0.90%) Investment Banking
12 2 (0.90%) Japanese Language
12 2 (0.90%) Military
12 2 (0.90%) Publishing
13 1 (0.45%) Korean Language
13 1 (0.45%) Local Government
Job Titles
1 86 (38.91%) Software Engineer
2 73 (33.03%) Embedded Engineer
3 51 (23.08%) Embedded Software Engineer
4 35 (15.84%) Developer
5 24 (10.86%) C Software Engineer
6 23 (10.41%) C++ Software Engineer
7 22 (9.95%) C/C++ Software Engineer
8 13 (5.88%) Embedded C Engineer
8 13 (5.88%) Embedded C Software Engineer
9 12 (5.43%) FPGA Engineer
9 12 (5.43%) Senior
10 11 (4.98%) C/C++ Embedded Software Engineer
10 11 (4.98%) Embedded C/C++ Engineer
10 11 (4.98%) Embedded C/C++ Software Engineer
10 11 (4.98%) Embedded C++ Engineer
10 11 (4.98%) Embedded C++ Software Engineer
11 10 (4.52%) Lead
11 10 (4.52%) Software Developer
11 10 (4.52%) Validation Engineer
12 9 (4.07%) Test Leader
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 15 (6.79%) Yocto
2 7 (3.17%) .NET
3 6 (2.71%) Middleware
3 6 (2.71%) WinForms
4 5 (2.26%) Kafka
5 4 (1.81%) HTML
6 3 (1.36%) ARM Templates
6 3 (1.36%) Itk
6 3 (1.36%) JSON
6 3 (1.36%) Qt
6 3 (1.36%) REST
7 2 (0.90%) HTML5
7 2 (0.90%) NumPy
7 2 (0.90%) Pandas
7 2 (0.90%) RESTful
8 1 (0.45%) Boost C++ Libraries
8 1 (0.45%) GStreamer
8 1 (0.45%) OpenID
8 1 (0.45%) RabbitMQ
8 1 (0.45%) SciPy
Miscellaneous
1 41 (18.55%) FPGA
2 40 (18.10%) Embedded Systems
3 19 (8.60%) PCIe
4 16 (7.24%) VHDL
5 11 (4.98%) Verilog
6 9 (4.07%) Algorithms
6 9 (4.07%) Device Driver
7 7 (3.17%) MicroBlaze
7 7 (3.17%) RISC-V
8 6 (2.71%) IoT
8 6 (2.71%) Tandem
9 5 (2.26%) Data Centre
9 5 (2.26%) EMV
10 3 (1.36%) ARM Cortex
10 3 (1.36%) Cloud Native
10 3 (1.36%) Cyber Threat
10 3 (1.36%) Java Card
10 3 (1.36%) Legacy Systems
11 2 (0.90%) CAN bus
11 2 (0.90%) Video\Live Streaming
Operating Systems
1 56 (25.34%) Linux
2 21 (9.50%) Embedded Linux
3 13 (5.88%) FreeRTOS
4 11 (4.98%) Windows
5 3 (1.36%) Unix
6 1 (0.45%) Apple iOS
6 1 (0.45%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
Processes & Methodologies
1 117 (52.94%) Software Engineering
2 45 (20.36%) Validation
3 38 (17.19%) Problem-Solving
4 32 (14.48%) Test Automation
5 28 (12.67%) Workflow
6 27 (12.22%) CI/CD
6 27 (12.22%) Signal Processing
7 21 (9.50%) Digital Signal Processing
8 19 (8.60%) Embedded Software Development
9 17 (7.69%) Workflow Management
10 16 (7.24%) Agile
10 16 (7.24%) Verification and Validation
11 15 (6.79%) DevOps
11 15 (6.79%) Unit Testing
12 14 (6.33%) FPGA Design
12 14 (6.33%) Requirements Analysis
13 13 (5.88%) Software Testing
13 13 (5.88%) UML
14 12 (5.43%) TDD
14 12 (5.43%) Technical Leadership
Programming Languages
1 115 (52.04%) C++
2 54 (24.43%) Python
3 39 (17.65%) Embedded C
4 29 (13.12%) Ada
5 26 (11.76%) SQL
6 21 (9.50%) MATLAB
7 19 (8.60%) Java
8 16 (7.24%) Embedded C++
9 11 (4.98%) Bash
10 10 (4.52%) SystemVerilog
11 8 (3.62%) C#
12 7 (3.17%) PL/SQL
12 7 (3.17%) Shell Script
13 5 (2.26%) COBOL
13 5 (2.26%) Rust
14 4 (1.81%) JavaScript
14 4 (1.81%) ProC
15 2 (0.90%) Perl
15 2 (0.90%) VB
16 1 (0.45%) Korn
Qualifications
1 57 (25.79%) Security Cleared
2 42 (19.00%) SC Cleared
3 18 (8.14%) Degree
4 9 (4.07%) BPSS Clearance
4 9 (4.07%) DV Cleared
5 2 (0.90%) CCNA
5 2 (0.90%) Cisco Certification
5 2 (0.90%) Computer Science Degree
5 2 (0.90%) ISTQB
6 1 (0.45%) Azure Certification
6 1 (0.45%) ISTQB Advanced Certification
6 1 (0.45%) ISTQB Foundation Certification
6 1 (0.45%) Master's Degree
6 1 (0.45%) PhD
6 1 (0.45%) Six Sigma Black Belt
6 1 (0.45%) Six Sigma Green Belt
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 19 (8.60%) Def Stans
2 11 (4.98%) QA
3 6 (2.71%) MISRA
4 5 (2.26%) DO-178B
4 5 (2.26%) IEC 61508
4 5 (2.26%) ISO 8583
5 4 (1.81%) PCI DSS
6 3 (1.36%) Data Quality
6 3 (1.36%) MIL-STD-1553
7 1 (0.45%) Accessibility
7 1 (0.45%) DICOM
7 1 (0.45%) DO-254
7 1 (0.45%) HL7
7 1 (0.45%) IFRS
7 1 (0.45%) IFRS 9
7 1 (0.45%) ISO 14001
7 1 (0.45%) ISO 26262
7 1 (0.45%) ISO 9001
7 1 (0.45%) MiFID
7 1 (0.45%) MISRA C
System Software
1 21 (9.50%) Firmware
2 12 (5.43%) Docker
3 8 (3.62%) Embedded Firmware
3 8 (3.62%) Virtual Machines
3 8 (3.62%) VMware Infrastructure
4 2 (0.90%) Oracle RAC
4 2 (0.90%) vCloud
4 2 (0.90%) VMware NSX
4 2 (0.90%) vSphere
5 1 (0.45%) FreeRADIUS
Systems Management
1 9 (4.07%) Kubernetes
2 6 (2.71%) Terraform
3 3 (1.36%) Ansible
4 2 (0.90%) Prometheus
5 1 (0.45%) Grafana
5 1 (0.45%) HP ALM
5 1 (0.45%) Nagios
Vendors
1 14 (6.33%) IBM
2 12 (5.43%) Xilinx
3 11 (4.98%) Intel
4 8 (3.62%) Cisco
4 8 (3.62%) Microsemi
4 8 (3.62%) Oracle
4 8 (3.62%) VMware
5 7 (3.17%) HP
5 7 (3.17%) MathWorks
5 7 (3.17%) Microsoft
6 6 (2.71%) ANSYS
7 4 (1.81%) Lauterbach
7 4 (1.81%) SAP
8 3 (1.36%) Google
8 3 (1.36%) Thales
9 2 (0.90%) Dell
9 2 (0.90%) Perforce
10 1 (0.45%) Citrix
10 1 (0.45%) QNX
10 1 (0.45%) Veritas