Cloud Architect Contract Job Trends

Cloud Architect
UK

The median Cloud Architect daily rate in the UK is £620, according to job vacancies posted in the 6 months leading up to 8 August 2026.

The table below compares current contractor rates and summary statistics with the previous two years.

6 months to
8 Aug 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 350 362 348
Rank change year-on-year +12 -14 -21
Contract jobs requiring a Cloud Architect 350 198 227
As % of all contract jobs in the UK 0.65% 0.60% 0.58%
As % of the Job Titles category 0.71% 0.66% 0.63%
Number of daily rates quoted 223 142 161
10th Percentile £480 £500 £500
25th Percentile £550 £513 £525
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £620 £625 £650
Median % change year-on-year -0.80% -3.85% -3.70%
75th Percentile £714 £737 £763
90th Percentile £793 £789 £800
UK excluding London median daily rate £613 £640 £700
% change year-on-year -4.30% -8.57% +3.70%
Number of hourly rates quoted 8 0 0
10th Percentile - - -
25th Percentile £23.20 - -
Median hourly rate £25.47 - -
75th Percentile £27.73 - -
90th Percentile £40.41 - -
UK excluding London median hourly rate £25.47 - -

All Contract IT Job Roles
UK

For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all contract IT job vacancies. Most job vacancies include a discernible job title that can be normalized. As such, the figures in the second row provide an indication of the number of contract jobs in our overall sample.

Contract vacancies in the UK with a recognized job title 49,634 30,076 36,192
% of contract IT jobs with a recognized job title 92.60% 91.43% 92.92%
Number of daily rates quoted 29,863 19,075 23,380
10th Percentile £328 £281 £300
25th Percentile £425 £400 £413
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £525 £500 £525
Median % change year-on-year +5.00% -4.76% -1.87%
75th Percentile £625 £625 £638
90th Percentile £725 £725 £750
UK excluding London median daily rate £500 £475 £500
% change year-on-year +5.26% -5.00% -
Number of hourly rates quoted 3,458 1,498 2,043
10th Percentile £15.00 £13.64 £14.16
25th Percentile £20.69 £17.30 £20.24
Median hourly rate £42.00 £25.15 £43.00
Median % change year-on-year +67.00% -41.51% +0.58%
75th Percentile £67.84 £53.83 £65.00
90th Percentile £80.00 £73.25 £75.00
UK excluding London median hourly rate £42.50 £25.15 £45.00
% change year-on-year +68.99% -44.11% +20.00%

Cloud Architect
Job Vacancy Trend

Historical trend showing the proportion of contract IT job postings featuring 'Cloud Architect' in the job title relative to all contract IT jobs advertised.

Cloud Architect job vacancy trend in the UK

Cloud Architect
Daily Rate Trend

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for Cloud Architect job vacancies in the UK.

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for Cloud Architect job vacancies in the UK

Cloud Architect
Daily Rate Histogram

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing Cloud Architect over the 6 months to 8 August 2026.

Daily rate histogram for Cloud Architect in the UK

Cloud Architect
Hourly Rate Trend

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for Cloud Architect job vacancies in the UK.

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for Cloud Architect job vacancies in the UK

Cloud Architect
Hourly Rate Histogram

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing Cloud Architect over the 6 months to 8 August 2026.

Hourly rate histogram for Cloud Architect in the UK

Cloud Architect
Top 16 Contract Job Locations

The table below looks at the demand and provides a guide to the median contractor rates quoted in IT jobs citing Cloud Architect within the UK over the 6 months to 8 August 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 +10 285 £625 -2.34% 359
London -2 180 £650 +1.56% 240
Work from Home -45 109 £623 +2.43% 120
UK excluding London -35 108 £613 -4.30% 127
South East -44 27 £575 +6.48% 36
Midlands -29 24 £675 +12.50% 19
North of England -66 19 £625 -16.67% 29
South West -40 16 £600 -6.61% 24
East Midlands +1 12 £538 - 4
West Midlands -42 12 £725 +44.57% 15
East of England -8 11 £600 -11.11% 10
Scotland -4 10 £650 - 6
Yorkshire -34 9 £650 -12.31% 12
North West -38 9 £600 -20.00% 18
Wales -20 2 £663 +38.02% 3
North East - 1 - -

Cloud Architect Skill Set
Top 30 Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities

For the 6 months to 8 August 2026, Cloud Architect contract job roles required the following skills and capabilities in order of popularity. The figures indicate the absolute number of co-occurrences and as a proportion of all contract job ads featuring Cloud Architect in the job title.

1 183 (52.29%) AWS
2 134 (38.29%) Azure
3 102 (29.14%) Migration
4 98 (28.00%) Security Cleared
5 79 (22.57%) SC Cleared
6 69 (19.71%) GCP
7 65 (18.57%) DevOps
8 61 (17.43%) CI/CD
9 58 (16.57%) Infrastructure as Code
10 50 (14.29%) Microsoft
11 49 (14.00%) Technical Leadership
12 48 (13.71%) Cloud Security
13 45 (12.86%) Analytics
14 44 (12.57%) Stakeholder Management
15 43 (12.29%) Terraform
16 42 (12.00%) Roadmaps
17 41 (11.71%) Kubernetes
17 41 (11.71%) Stakeholder Engagement
18 40 (11.43%) TOGAF
19 36 (10.29%) Problem-Solving
19 36 (10.29%) SaaS
20 32 (9.14%) Oracle
20 32 (9.14%) Security Architecture
20 32 (9.14%) Technical Architecture
21 31 (8.86%) Firewall
22 30 (8.57%) AI
22 30 (8.57%) Containerisation
23 29 (8.29%) Data Lake
23 29 (8.29%) Google
24 28 (8.00%) Integration Patterns

Cloud Architect Skill Set
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 6 (1.71%) Palantir Foundry
2 3 (0.86%) Apache Spark
2 3 (0.86%) SAS
3 2 (0.57%) Apache
3 2 (0.57%) Apache Airflow
3 2 (0.57%) SharePoint
4 1 (0.29%) Appian
4 1 (0.29%) Camunda
4 1 (0.29%) Cloud Foundry
4 1 (0.29%) Confluence
4 1 (0.29%) Mendix
Business Applications
1 5 (1.43%) Payment Gateway
2 2 (0.57%) Oracle Retail
2 2 (0.57%) SAP S/4HANA
3 1 (0.29%) Oracle ERP
3 1 (0.29%) Oracle Payables
3 1 (0.29%) Oracle Receivables
3 1 (0.29%) Oracle SCM
3 1 (0.29%) Salesforce CRM
Cloud Services
1 183 (52.29%) AWS
2 134 (38.29%) Azure
3 69 (19.71%) GCP
4 36 (10.29%) SaaS
5 26 (7.43%) Serverless
6 25 (7.14%) PaaS
7 17 (4.86%) Entra ID
7 17 (4.86%) OCI
8 15 (4.29%) IaaS
9 13 (3.71%) AWS CloudFormation
10 9 (2.57%) Snowflake
11 8 (2.29%) GitHub
12 7 (2.00%) Amazon EKS
12 7 (2.00%) Azure Sentinel
12 7 (2.00%) Microsoft 365
12 7 (2.00%) Salesforce Service Cloud
13 6 (1.71%) Azure AKS
13 6 (1.71%) Azure Synapse Analytics
13 6 (1.71%) Salesforce Commerce Cloud
14 5 (1.43%) Azure Machine Learning
Communications & Networking
1 31 (8.86%) Firewall
2 27 (7.71%) VPN
3 14 (4.00%) Network Security
4 2 (0.57%) DNS
4 2 (0.57%) Intrusion Detection
5 1 (0.29%) 5G
5 1 (0.29%) Cisco ASA
5 1 (0.29%) CTI
5 1 (0.29%) DAB
5 1 (0.29%) Internet
5 1 (0.29%) NGFW
5 1 (0.29%) PSTN
5 1 (0.29%) Radio Access Network
5 1 (0.29%) RTP
5 1 (0.29%) VSAN
5 1 (0.29%) WAN
Database & Business Intelligence
1 29 (8.29%) Data Lake
2 14 (4.00%) Oracle Database
3 9 (2.57%) BigQuery
4 6 (1.71%) Amazon RDS
4 6 (1.71%) Data Warehouse
5 4 (1.14%) NoSQL
5 4 (1.14%) Oracle Exadata
6 2 (0.57%) Delta Lake
6 2 (0.57%) MySQL
6 2 (0.57%) SQL Server
6 2 (0.57%) Tableau
7 1 (0.29%) Apache Cassandra
7 1 (0.29%) Big Data
7 1 (0.29%) Cloudera CDH
7 1 (0.29%) Flink
7 1 (0.29%) HBase
7 1 (0.29%) Metadata
7 1 (0.29%) PostgreSQL
7 1 (0.29%) Power BI
7 1 (0.29%) SAP HANA
Development Applications
1 7 (2.00%) Git
2 4 (1.14%) JIRA
3 3 (0.86%) Jenkins
4 2 (0.57%) Claude Code
4 2 (0.57%) IntelliJ
4 2 (0.57%) JUnit
4 2 (0.57%) MLflow
4 2 (0.57%) Oracle Forms
4 2 (0.57%) SonarQube
5 1 (0.29%) Hudson
5 1 (0.29%) Oracle APEX
General
1 53 (15.14%) Social Skills
2 52 (14.86%) Finance
3 40 (11.43%) Public Sector
4 25 (7.14%) Banking
5 23 (6.57%) Documentation Skills
6 14 (4.00%) Retail
7 11 (3.14%) Analytical Skills
8 7 (2.00%) Influencing Skills
9 6 (1.71%) Marketing
10 5 (1.43%) Presentation Skills
11 4 (1.14%) Legal
12 3 (0.86%) Billing
12 3 (0.86%) Inclusion and Diversity
12 3 (0.86%) Telecoms
13 1 (0.29%) Aviation
13 1 (0.29%) Back Office
13 1 (0.29%) Investment Banking
13 1 (0.29%) Manufacturing
13 1 (0.29%) Military
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 23 (6.57%) Middleware
2 13 (3.71%) REST
3 9 (2.57%) Oracle Fusion
4 8 (2.29%) Kafka
5 7 (2.00%) Lightning Web Components
6 5 (1.43%) OAuth
7 4 (1.14%) Node.js
7 4 (1.14%) SailPoint
7 4 (1.14%) SOAP
8 3 (0.86%) .NET
8 3 (0.86%) ARM Templates
9 2 (0.57%) .NET Core
9 2 (0.57%) .NET Framework
9 2 (0.57%) AngularJS
9 2 (0.57%) JWT
9 2 (0.57%) OpenID
9 2 (0.57%) React
9 2 (0.57%) SAML
9 2 (0.57%) Spring
9 2 (0.57%) Spring Boot
Miscellaneous
1 66 (18.86%) Cloud Native
2 28 (8.00%) Management Information System
3 22 (6.29%) Data Centre
3 22 (6.29%) Enterprise Cloud
4 17 (4.86%) Hybrid Cloud
5 16 (4.57%) Onboarding
6 15 (4.29%) Public Cloud
7 9 (2.57%) Legacy Systems
8 8 (2.29%) Security Posture
9 6 (1.71%) Distributed Systems
9 6 (1.71%) Enterprise Software
10 5 (1.43%) Data Fabric
10 5 (1.43%) Private Cloud
10 5 (1.43%) Product Ownership
11 3 (0.86%) AI Agents
11 3 (0.86%) Greenfield Project
11 3 (0.86%) NHS
11 3 (0.86%) PKI
11 3 (0.86%) Wiki
12 2 (0.57%) Data Protection Act
Operating Systems
1 13 (3.71%) Windows
2 7 (2.00%) Windows Server
3 5 (1.43%) Linux
3 5 (1.43%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
4 3 (0.86%) Unix
5 1 (0.29%) AIX
5 1 (0.29%) Solaris
5 1 (0.29%) VMS
Processes & Methodologies
1 102 (29.14%) Migration
2 65 (18.57%) DevOps
3 61 (17.43%) CI/CD
4 58 (16.57%) Infrastructure as Code
5 49 (14.00%) Technical Leadership
6 48 (13.71%) Cloud Security
7 45 (12.86%) Analytics
8 44 (12.57%) Stakeholder Management
9 42 (12.00%) Roadmaps
10 41 (11.71%) Stakeholder Engagement
11 40 (11.43%) TOGAF
12 36 (10.29%) Problem-Solving
13 32 (9.14%) Security Architecture
13 32 (9.14%) Technical Architecture
14 30 (8.57%) AI
14 30 (8.57%) Containerisation
15 28 (8.00%) Integration Patterns
16 24 (6.86%) Architectural Patterns
16 24 (6.86%) Enterprise Architecture
16 24 (6.86%) Mentoring
Programming Languages
1 12 (3.43%) Java
2 11 (3.14%) Bicep
3 9 (2.57%) Python
4 7 (2.00%) Apex Code
4 7 (2.00%) JavaScript
4 7 (2.00%) SQL
5 5 (1.43%) Bash
6 4 (1.14%) C#
6 4 (1.14%) PowerShell
7 2 (0.57%) Shell Script
8 1 (0.29%) C
8 1 (0.29%) PL/SQL
8 1 (0.29%) ProC
8 1 (0.29%) Scala
8 1 (0.29%) TypeScript
Qualifications
1 98 (28.00%) Security Cleared
2 79 (22.57%) SC Cleared
3 26 (7.43%) AWS Certification
4 15 (4.29%) AWS Certified Solutions Architect
5 13 (3.71%) Azure Certification
6 11 (3.14%) Cisco Certification
6 11 (3.14%) DV Cleared
6 11 (3.14%) Microsoft Certification
7 10 (2.86%) CISSP
8 7 (2.00%) (ISC)2 CCSP
8 7 (2.00%) CCSP
9 6 (1.71%) Degree
10 5 (1.43%) CISM
11 4 (1.14%) CCNP
12 3 (0.86%) ISO 27001 Lead Auditor
12 3 (0.86%) TOGAF Certification
13 2 (0.57%) BPSS Clearance
13 2 (0.57%) Computer Science Degree
13 2 (0.57%) IBM Certification
13 2 (0.57%) Master's Degree
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 21 (6.00%) ISO/IEC 27001
2 18 (5.14%) NIST
3 13 (3.71%) PCI DSS
4 11 (3.14%) GDPR
5 5 (1.43%) Data Quality
6 4 (1.14%) GRC
6 4 (1.14%) NCSC
7 2 (0.57%) QA
8 1 (0.29%) COBIT
8 1 (0.29%) Disclosure Scotland
8 1 (0.29%) ISO 20022
8 1 (0.29%) NIST 800
8 1 (0.29%) PSD2
8 1 (0.29%) Sarbanes-Oxley
System Software
1 16 (4.57%) Active Directory
2 9 (2.57%) Docker
3 5 (1.43%) VMware NSX
4 3 (0.86%) VMware ESXi
5 2 (0.57%) Virtual Machines
5 2 (0.57%) VMware Infrastructure
5 2 (0.57%) zsh
6 1 (0.29%) Varnish
6 1 (0.29%) vCloud
6 1 (0.29%) vSphere
Systems Management
1 43 (12.29%) Terraform
2 41 (11.71%) Kubernetes
3 2 (0.57%) Ansible
3 2 (0.57%) CASB
3 2 (0.57%) Single Sign-On
4 1 (0.29%) CloudForms
4 1 (0.29%) Grafana
4 1 (0.29%) Microsoft Intune
4 1 (0.29%) Progress Chef
4 1 (0.29%) Prometheus
4 1 (0.29%) Puppet
4 1 (0.29%) QRadar
4 1 (0.29%) SCOM
4 1 (0.29%) vCenter Server
Vendors
1 50 (14.29%) Microsoft
2 32 (9.14%) Oracle
3 29 (8.29%) Google
4 20 (5.71%) Salesforce
5 18 (5.14%) Databricks
6 11 (3.14%) CyberArk
7 10 (2.86%) VMware
8 9 (2.57%) SAP
9 7 (2.00%) Foundry
9 7 (2.00%) IBM
10 6 (1.71%) Cisco
10 6 (1.71%) Palantir
11 5 (1.43%) Red Hat
11 5 (1.43%) Splunk
12 4 (1.14%) ServiceNow
13 3 (0.86%) Salesforce Marketing Cloud
14 2 (0.57%) Checkmarx
14 2 (0.57%) Denodo
14 2 (0.57%) MuleSoft
14 2 (0.57%) Zscaler