Computer Science Contract Job Trends

Computer Science
UK

The table below provides summary statistics and contractor rates for jobs requiring Computer Science skills. It covers contract job vacancies from the 6 months leading up to 30 September 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
30 Sep 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 148 67 59
Rank change year-on-year -81 -8 +24
Contract jobs citing Computer Science 1,055 1,178 1,306
As % of all contract jobs in the UK 1.92% 3.59% 3.47%
As % of the Processes & Methodologies category 2.28% 3.96% 4.05%
Number of daily rates quoted 604 669 797
10th Percentile £176 £178 £338
25th Percentile £200 £331 £425
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £473 £475 £550
Median % change year-on-year -0.42% -13.64% -
75th Percentile £600 £630 £688
90th Percentile £743 £750 £825
UK excluding London median daily rate £375 £420 £513
% change year-on-year -10.71% -18.05% +0.99%
Number of hourly rates quoted 88 53 42
10th Percentile £21.28 £26.35 £20.12
25th Percentile £28.25 £29.00 £29.88
Median hourly rate £47.10 £33.50 £51.50
Median % change year-on-year +40.60% -34.95% -14.52%
75th Percentile £77.69 £67.00 £68.56
90th Percentile £87.16 £82.40 £70.25
UK excluding London median hourly rate £52.50 £33.50 £60.00
% change year-on-year +56.72% -44.17% -

All Process & Methodology Skills
UK

Computer Science falls under the Processes and Methodologies category. For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all contract job vacancies requiring process or methodology skills.

Contract vacancies with a requirement for process or methodology skills 46,343 29,774 32,275
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the UK 84.43% 90.67% 85.82%
Number of daily rates quoted 28,026 18,502 19,486
10th Percentile £325 £296 £308
25th Percentile £425 £404 £413
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £525 £500 £525
Median % change year-on-year +5.00% -4.76% -2.78%
75th Percentile £630 £625 £638
90th Percentile £731 £725 £750
UK excluding London median daily rate £500 £475 £500
% change year-on-year +5.26% -5.00% -
Number of hourly rates quoted 3,222 1,849 1,345
10th Percentile £13.70 £14.29 £15.00
25th Percentile £17.19 £17.30 £20.12
Median hourly rate £38.86 £25.15 £42.50
Median % change year-on-year +54.51% -40.82% -
75th Percentile £65.60 £43.75 £65.00
90th Percentile £78.75 £65.00 £74.48
UK excluding London median hourly rate £39.27 £22.32 £43.00
% change year-on-year +75.98% -48.10% +1.18%

Computer Science
Job Vacancy Trend

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

Computer Science job vacancy trend in the UK

Computer Science
Daily Rate Trend

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

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in the UK citing Computer Science

Computer Science
Daily Rate Histogram

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing Computer Science over the 6 months to 30 September 2026.

Daily rate histogram for Computer Science in the UK

Computer Science
Hourly Rate Trend

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

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in the UK citing Computer Science

Computer Science
Hourly Rate Histogram

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing Computer Science over the 6 months to 30 September 2026.

Hourly rate histogram for Computer Science in the UK

Computer Science
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 Computer Science within the UK over the 6 months to 30 September 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 -67 957 £470 -1.05% 3,383
UK excluding London -56 552 £375 -10.71% 1,540
London -74 429 £535 +0.94% 2,084
Work from Home -89 247 £520 +13.06% 1,201
South East -18 205 £438 +20.69% 407
North of England -53 145 £447 +7.27% 282
Midlands -47 89 £213 -52.62% 187
Yorkshire -17 77 £425 +10.68% 80
West Midlands -48 59 £213 -54.79% 122
North West -60 57 £524 +23.29% 156
East of England -38 45 £425 -5.56% 197
South West -65 32 £195 -5.57% 180
East Midlands -25 29 £217 -51.34% 65
Scotland -54 29 £400 -11.11% 153
North East -32 12 £195 -57.84% 48
Northern Ireland +5 5 £175 - 110
Wales -18 4 £530 +14.59% 39

Computer Science
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 44 (4.17%) Confluence
2 32 (3.03%) SharePoint
3 22 (2.09%) Apache Spark
4 17 (1.61%) Apache Airflow
5 15 (1.42%) Apache
6 13 (1.23%) IIS
7 10 (0.95%) Camunda
8 8 (0.76%) Adobe Experience Manager
9 7 (0.66%) CMS
9 7 (0.66%) Microsoft Exchange
10 5 (0.47%) SAS
11 4 (0.38%) OpenStack
11 4 (0.38%) Oracle SOA Suite
12 3 (0.28%) CICS
13 2 (0.19%) ArcGIS
13 2 (0.19%) Cloud Foundry
13 2 (0.19%) Jupyter
13 2 (0.19%) nginx
13 2 (0.19%) Oracle Service Bus
14 1 (0.095%) Headless CMS
Applications
1 40 (3.79%) Microsoft Office
2 24 (2.27%) Microsoft Excel
3 14 (1.33%) MS Visio
4 11 (1.04%) Microsoft PowerPoint
5 7 (0.66%) Navisworks
5 7 (0.66%) Revit
6 4 (0.38%) Chatbot
6 4 (0.38%) Microsoft Project
6 4 (0.38%) Trello
6 4 (0.38%) Windchill
7 2 (0.19%) Adobe XD
7 2 (0.19%) CPLEX
7 2 (0.19%) Simulink
7 2 (0.19%) Sketch
Business Applications
1 9 (0.85%) SAP S/4HANA
2 5 (0.47%) Workday HCM
3 4 (0.38%) Dynamics CRM
3 4 (0.38%) Infor M3
3 4 (0.38%) Oracle ERP
3 4 (0.38%) Workfront
4 3 (0.28%) Oracle EBS
4 3 (0.28%) Primavera
4 3 (0.28%) Salesforce CRM
5 2 (0.19%) Actimize
5 2 (0.19%) Aladdin
5 2 (0.19%) Temenos T24
6 1 (0.095%) Finacle
6 1 (0.095%) Oracle Payables
6 1 (0.095%) Payment Gateway
6 1 (0.095%) SAP CAR
6 1 (0.095%) SAP Forecasting and Replenishment
6 1 (0.095%) SAP GRC
6 1 (0.095%) SAP HCM
6 1 (0.095%) Sparx Enterprise Architect
Cloud Services
1 297 (28.15%) Azure
2 192 (18.20%) AWS
3 114 (10.81%) GCP
4 64 (6.07%) Entra ID
4 64 (6.07%) Power Platform
5 57 (5.40%) Microsoft 365
6 56 (5.31%) Azure DevOps
7 55 (5.21%) GitHub
8 45 (4.27%) SaaS
9 37 (3.51%) Serverless
10 29 (2.75%) Snowflake
11 22 (2.09%) AWS Lambda
11 22 (2.09%) PowerApps
12 21 (1.99%) GitHub Actions
12 21 (1.99%) OpenShift
13 18 (1.71%) Amazon EKS
13 18 (1.71%) Microsoft Copilot
13 18 (1.71%) Power Automate
14 16 (1.52%) Anthropic Claude
14 16 (1.52%) Dynamics 365
Communications & Networking
1 45 (4.27%) Firewall
2 40 (3.79%) DNS
3 35 (3.32%) Network Security
4 31 (2.94%) VPN
5 25 (2.37%) TCP/IP
6 20 (1.90%) DHCP
7 16 (1.52%) SSH
8 13 (1.23%) Wireshark
9 12 (1.14%) WAN
10 11 (1.04%) 5G
10 11 (1.04%) HTTP
10 11 (1.04%) Wireless
11 10 (0.95%) 3GPP
11 10 (0.95%) LAN
12 9 (0.85%) VLAN
13 8 (0.76%) Intrusion Detection
14 7 (0.66%) BGP
14 7 (0.66%) MPLS
15 6 (0.57%) OSPF
15 6 (0.57%) Reverse Proxy
Database & Business Intelligence
1 54 (5.12%) PostgreSQL
1 54 (5.12%) SQL Server
2 51 (4.83%) Power BI
3 47 (4.45%) Relational Database
4 39 (3.70%) Metadata
5 28 (2.65%) MongoDB
6 26 (2.46%) Data Warehouse
6 26 (2.46%) MySQL
7 25 (2.37%) NoSQL
8 23 (2.18%) Elasticsearch
9 18 (1.71%) Big Data
10 14 (1.33%) Redis
11 13 (1.23%) Azure SQL Database
11 13 (1.23%) Data Mining
12 12 (1.14%) Amazon RDS
12 12 (1.14%) Tableau
13 11 (1.04%) Data Lake
13 11 (1.04%) Oracle Database
14 6 (0.57%) Pinecone
14 6 (0.57%) Power Query
Development Applications
1 101 (9.57%) Git
2 51 (4.83%) JIRA
3 50 (4.74%) Jenkins
4 45 (4.27%) GitLab
5 23 (2.18%) JUnit
6 21 (1.99%) Gradle
6 21 (1.99%) Maven
7 19 (1.80%) Selenium
8 18 (1.71%) SonarQube
9 16 (1.52%) Mockito
10 14 (1.33%) Sonatype Nexus
11 12 (1.14%) Cucumber
11 12 (1.14%) REST Assured
12 10 (0.95%) Bitbucket
12 10 (0.95%) SpecFlow
13 9 (0.85%) Bitbucket Server
14 8 (0.76%) TeamCity
14 8 (0.76%) Visual Studio
15 7 (0.66%) Postman
16 6 (0.57%) Cypress.io
General
1 453 (42.94%) Social Skills
2 236 (22.37%) Analytical Skills
2 236 (22.37%) Finance
3 99 (9.38%) Banking
4 68 (6.45%) Public Sector
5 53 (5.02%) Documentation Skills
6 46 (4.36%) Inclusion and Diversity
7 43 (4.08%) Aerospace
8 39 (3.70%) Manufacturing
9 35 (3.32%) Organisational Skills
10 32 (3.03%) Telecoms
11 30 (2.84%) Influencing Skills
12 28 (2.65%) Marketing
13 22 (2.09%) Front Office
14 20 (1.90%) Military
15 18 (1.71%) Legal
16 17 (1.61%) Presentation Skills
17 14 (1.33%) Retail
18 13 (1.23%) Law
19 12 (1.14%) Investment Banking
Job Titles
1 164 (15.55%) Developer
2 110 (10.43%) Senior
3 86 (8.15%) Architect
4 71 (6.73%) Lead
5 70 (6.64%) Analyst
6 36 (3.41%) Data Engineer
7 33 (3.13%) Java Developer
8 27 (2.56%) Software Engineer
9 26 (2.46%) Artificial Intelligence Engineer
9 26 (2.46%) Security Engineer
10 25 (2.37%) IT Support
10 25 (2.37%) Senior Developer
11 23 (2.18%) Data Scientist
11 23 (2.18%) Full-Stack Developer
12 22 (2.09%) Infrastructure Engineer
12 22 (2.09%) Python Developer
13 21 (1.99%) C# Developer
14 20 (1.90%) Solutions Architect
15 19 (1.80%) Consultant
15 19 (1.80%) Python Engineer
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 96 (9.10%) REST
2 67 (6.35%) React
3 66 (6.26%) Terraform
4 62 (5.88%) HTML
5 60 (5.69%) CSS
6 54 (5.12%) .NET
6 54 (5.12%) Kafka
7 50 (4.74%) RESTful
8 37 (3.51%) OAuth
8 37 (3.51%) Spring Boot
9 35 (3.32%) Spring
10 31 (2.94%) OAuth2
10 31 (2.94%) SOAP
11 29 (2.75%) Middleware
11 29 (2.75%) OpenID
11 29 (2.75%) Web Services
12 27 (2.56%) SAML
13 24 (2.27%) .NET Core
13 24 (2.27%) JSON
14 22 (2.09%) LangChain
Miscellaneous
1 119 (11.28%) Management Information System
2 79 (7.49%) Cloud Native
3 68 (6.45%) Algorithms
4 63 (5.97%) Onboarding
5 53 (5.02%) Data Structures
6 52 (4.93%) Distributed Systems
6 52 (4.93%) Product Ownership
7 34 (3.22%) AI Agents
8 25 (2.37%) Enterprise Software
9 24 (2.27%) Virtual Team
10 23 (2.18%) Foreign Exchange (FX)
11 22 (2.09%) Hybrid Cloud
12 21 (1.99%) Data Centre
13 20 (1.90%) Self-Motivation
14 17 (1.61%) Derivative
15 15 (1.42%) Legacy Systems
15 15 (1.42%) Replication
16 13 (1.23%) Analytical Mindset
16 13 (1.23%) Operational Technology
16 13 (1.23%) Security Posture
Operating Systems
1 126 (11.94%) Windows
2 118 (11.18%) Linux
3 37 (3.51%) Unix
4 34 (3.22%) Windows Server
5 19 (1.80%) Windows 10
6 17 (1.61%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
7 12 (1.14%) Android
8 10 (0.95%) Apple iOS
9 8 (0.76%) Ubuntu
10 5 (0.47%) zOS
11 4 (0.38%) Mac OS
11 4 (0.38%) VMS
12 3 (0.28%) Solaris
12 3 (0.28%) Windows Server 2012
13 2 (0.19%) Debian
13 2 (0.19%) Mac OS X
13 2 (0.19%) MVS
13 2 (0.19%) Rocky
14 1 (0.095%) Embedded Linux
14 1 (0.095%) OpenVMS
Processes & Methodologies
1 324 (30.71%) Problem-Solving
2 268 (25.40%) Agile
3 225 (21.33%) CI/CD
4 216 (20.47%) AI
5 192 (18.20%) Software Engineering
6 191 (18.10%) DevOps
7 180 (17.06%) Stakeholder Management
8 177 (16.78%) Continuous Improvement
9 153 (14.50%) Analytics
10 120 (11.37%) ITIL
11 113 (10.71%) Mathematics
12 110 (10.43%) Cybersecurity
13 109 (10.33%) Scrum
14 108 (10.24%) Roadmaps
15 106 (10.05%) Test Automation
16 96 (9.10%) Machine Learning
17 95 (9.00%) Stakeholder Engagement
17 95 (9.00%) Validation
18 87 (8.25%) Change Management
19 83 (7.87%) Mentoring
Programming Languages
1 277 (26.26%) Python
2 203 (19.24%) SQL
3 138 (13.08%) Java
4 97 (9.19%) JavaScript
5 80 (7.58%) PowerShell
6 66 (6.26%) C#
7 47 (4.45%) Bash
8 40 (3.79%) TypeScript
9 26 (2.46%) C++
10 18 (1.71%) Bicep
11 14 (1.33%) Shell Script
12 11 (1.04%) R
12 11 (1.04%) Scala
13 10 (0.95%) Go
14 9 (0.85%) C
14 9 (0.85%) Kotlin
14 9 (0.85%) Perl
15 7 (0.66%) Apex Code
16 6 (0.57%) Data Analysis Expressions
16 6 (0.57%) PL/SQL
Qualifications
1 802 (76.02%) Degree
2 488 (46.26%) Computer Science Degree
3 185 (17.54%) Security Cleared
4 141 (13.36%) SC Cleared
5 109 (10.33%) Master's Degree
6 51 (4.83%) Azure Certification
6 51 (4.83%) CISSP
7 50 (4.74%) DBS Check
8 42 (3.98%) Microsoft Certification
9 37 (3.51%) CISM
10 36 (3.41%) PhD
11 30 (2.84%) AWS Certification
12 29 (2.75%) Cisco Certification
12 29 (2.75%) DV Cleared
13 25 (2.37%) TOGAF Certification
14 23 (2.18%) PMI Certification
14 23 (2.18%) PMP
15 21 (1.99%) BPSS Clearance
16 18 (1.71%) CISA
17 15 (1.42%) (ISC)2 CCSP
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 67 (6.35%) Data Quality
2 64 (6.07%) ISO/IEC 27001
3 63 (5.97%) QA
4 49 (4.64%) NIST
5 27 (2.56%) GDPR
6 17 (1.61%) GRC
7 15 (1.42%) Accessibility
7 15 (1.42%) HIPAA
7 15 (1.42%) SLA
8 12 (1.14%) PCI DSS
9 8 (0.76%) ISO 9001
9 8 (0.76%) ISO/IEC 42001
9 8 (0.76%) NCSC
9 8 (0.76%) Sarbanes-Oxley
10 6 (0.57%) ISO 31000
10 6 (0.57%) ISO/IEC 27005
11 5 (0.47%) SOC 2
12 4 (0.38%) EU AI Act
12 4 (0.38%) ISO 19650
12 4 (0.38%) NIST 800
System Software
1 88 (8.34%) Docker
2 70 (6.64%) Active Directory
3 24 (2.27%) VMware Infrastructure
4 9 (0.85%) Virtual Machines
5 8 (0.76%) Firmware
5 8 (0.76%) Hyper-V
6 7 (0.66%) VMware NSX
7 6 (0.57%) RACF
8 5 (0.47%) ISA Server
8 5 (0.47%) Virtual Desktop
8 5 (0.47%) vSphere
9 3 (0.28%) ACF2
9 3 (0.28%) Embedded Firmware
9 3 (0.28%) Time Sharing Option
9 3 (0.28%) VMware Workstation
10 2 (0.19%) NFS
10 2 (0.19%) Oracle RAC
10 2 (0.19%) VMware ESXi
11 1 (0.095%) Active Directory Lightweight Directory Services
11 1 (0.095%) Squid
Systems Management
1 104 (9.86%) Kubernetes
2 34 (3.22%) Ansible
3 27 (2.56%) Microsoft Intune
4 22 (2.09%) Prometheus
5 18 (1.71%) Grafana
6 14 (1.33%) SCCM
7 10 (0.95%) Single Sign-On
8 7 (0.66%) CASB
9 5 (0.47%) Argo
10 4 (0.38%) Control-M
10 4 (0.38%) Progress Chef
10 4 (0.38%) Puppet
11 3 (0.28%) Cisco CUCM
11 3 (0.28%) Cisco Prime
11 3 (0.28%) Istio
11 3 (0.28%) SolarWinds Orion
12 2 (0.19%) Consul
12 2 (0.19%) Kubeflow
12 2 (0.19%) QRadar
12 2 (0.19%) vRealize Orchestrator
Vendors
1 206 (19.53%) Microsoft
2 76 (7.20%) Oracle
3 58 (5.50%) Google
4 40 (3.79%) ServiceNow
5 35 (3.32%) Databricks
5 35 (3.32%) IBM
6 34 (3.22%) VMware
7 31 (2.94%) SAP
8 29 (2.75%) Cisco
9 27 (2.56%) Splunk
10 24 (2.27%) Salesforce
11 20 (1.90%) CyberArk
12 18 (1.71%) Adobe
12 18 (1.71%) BeyondTrust
12 18 (1.71%) OpenAI
13 13 (1.23%) Red Hat
14 11 (1.04%) Dynatrace
15 10 (0.95%) CrowdStrike
15 10 (0.95%) F5
15 10 (0.95%) Veracode